610 CKTB host Gene Valaitis and Jon Liedtke discuss Premier Doug Ford’s governance, labeling him a “Soviet-style central planner”. They critique his use of taxpayer money for “voter bribes” like rebate checks, his inconsistent free-market stance regarding monopolies and subsidies, and the controversy surrounding his purchase of an impractical private jet.
Transcript (Gemini Generated):
Gene Valaitis: Well, we’re talking about Premier Doug Ford a lot today. You know, he loves to pitch himself as the ultimate free-market small-c conservative. But is the premier actually running the province like a Soviet-style central planner? Only one person could come up with that sort of a hook, and it is our friend, Jon Liedtke. He’s a broadcaster, a business owner, and he also writes for the blog, Kvech and Release. And Jon actually had one of those famous personal phone calls with the premier himself. And we welcome him to the show; he’s filling in for Adam Cyvot today. Good morning, Jon.
Jon Liedtke: Good morning, Gene.
Gene Valaitis: Well, Jon, you’ve just published a piece, let’s — this is going to make a lot of people in the Progressive Conservative party maybe spit their coffee. You’re calling the open-for-business premier — this is going to be a good one — a Soviet-style central planner. Now, how do you square his conservative branding and how he actually governs?
Jon Liedtke: Well, you’ve just gotta look at the receipts, Gene. Once you get past the shiny blue “open-for-business” stickers and signs, the reality of how the province is being run is not quite small-c. True small-c conservatives believe in getting the government out of the way, but Doug Ford is operating like he’s the regional manager of Ontario, but running the day-to-day operations of specific stores. He uses taxpayer dollars to pick winners and losers, whether with EV subsidies or overriding local municipal autonomy with minister zoning orders, or taking control of school boards. He isn’t shrinking the state, he weaponizes it to benefit his circle. The conservatism, it’s just a label that’s printed over a different reality. But that makes sense, considering the family business.
Gene Valaitis: Mm-hmm. Okay. Well, you’ve actually experienced what you call a faux free-market routine firsthand when you were fighting for your cannabis business when it went from legal and — they changed a lot of the rules around. You actually had a personal call with Doug Ford, and he gave you a — what you call — a wink and a nod and told you to hold on. But what actually happened when the dust settled with your cannabis lounge?
Jon Liedtke: Well, this is when he was giving out his phone number and not trying to shield the records of his phone calls from the public. But yeah, I learned exactly firsthand when the Smoke-Free Ontario Act was suffocating my cannabis lounge. I got the phone call treatment from him. It was a private call, I called him, and he gave me the populist pitch. He said he was on my side, he said that he told inspectors to be lenient, he told me “hold on” while he would fix the mess that the Liberals caused. He made it clear that he was in my corner. But when the dust settled, there was no relief that came. The industry ended up facing a regulatory bloodbath; we’ve talked about that. I realized that his pro-business phone calls aren’t economic policy, it’s just customer service. It’s a script designed to give you that nod and a wink to keep a centralized grip on the market directly in his hand.
Gene Valaitis: Now, you were running a legal cannabis lounge here, too, and essentially it — you had to close it down, right?
Jon Liedtke: Yeah, it was really frustrating. I mean, we weren’t instructed to shut it down, we were just told that the inspectors would issue tickets of $100,000 to my staff and to my customers, which made it impossible to operate a business. We weren’t going to do that, so — yeah, we shut down. It sucks.
Gene Valaitis: Well, in addition to the controversy that we’ve been talking about for four days — the private jet thing — he recently defended major grocers by saying, “God bless the Westons,” and attacked surveillance pricing, claiming that he’s a capitalist who doesn’t intervene in the economy. Is this capitalism just a convenient sales pitch?
Jon Liedtke: What a forced error. I mean, come on, why — why would he hand that to the left wing in this province? But it’s the ultimate hypocrisy. When there was the conversation — it’s still ongoing — about grocery surveillance pricing, Ford did say “God bless the Westons,” that he wouldn’t intervene because he’s capitalist. But all you have to do is look at his track record. This is the same premier who imposes strict provincial minimum pricing on alcohol, cannabis, tobacco, lottery — there’s no free market there. Why not blow up the LCBO and the OCS wholesale monopolies? During COVID, he used the heavy hand of the state to impose economic martial law; he shuttered independent mom-and-pop shops while letting massive big-box retailers stay open and get record profits. He only lets the market dictate when it benefits massive corporate players.
Gene Valaitis: Yeah. You know, we were just speaking to Chris Sims from the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, as we do every single Wednesday morning here. We were talking about the jet. And Chris reminded us that the province is $485 billion in debt. I mean, that’s a lot. And you know, we service that debt by paying millions and millions and millions of dollars every single week, and it’s our tax dollars, and it’s just going — as I always say — up in smoke or down the drain. Now, the deficit’s exploding, but the premier not too long ago mailed out those $200 rebate checks to just about everybody in Ontario. And I like your phrase, you wrote: “He’s risking the house to pay for a second pool.”
Jon Liedtke: Yeah, we’re staring down that deficit and a debt right now, and the premier’s solution is to borrow to spend directly into your pocket. I mean, some people might make an allegation that that’s trying to bribe voters. I’m not going to go and make that on the air, Gene, because I have been told by my lawyer not to go and make such allegations publicly.
Gene Valaitis: Fair enough.
Jon Liedtke: But listen, we’re talking about left-wing Keynesian stimulus policies and spending that’s being disguised as anything other. Between this and the farce of buying the $30 million jet only to try and flip it because the optics got bad — I mean, these are rash, desperate moves. He’s risking the house to pay for that second pool. But here’s the worst part: he’s using our credit card to do so.
Gene Valaitis: Yeah. So true. Uh, you end off your piece by pointing out that the opposition is too afraid to call him out on this, and the voters seem happy being bought off. Now, you know, when we heard about the private jet and — he was not in question period on Monday, but said he was going to sell it on Sunday — I mean, I don’t blame him for not being in question period, I wouldn’t show up either. But then yesterday, Tuesday, he said he has also been receiving a lot of phone calls from people saying, “You know what? You should keep the jet.” But then this morning, there’s another report pointing out that the kind of jet he purchased and is now selling, but is being told to keep — uh, can only land in 10% of Ontario airports. So even if he did keep it, I mean, it can’t go everywhere. And you know, and what I said was, you know, to Stiles, the NDP leader, and to the Liberal leader, was, you know, the guy is a man of the people, and people do like him. And if you’re going to go after Doug Ford, go after the fact that hospitals are underfunded, go after the fact that schools are underfunded. I mean, the guy really is the Teflon Doug.
Jon Liedtke: He really is. I mean, a leopard doesn’t change its spots, a cheetah won’t change its stripes, and the 800-pound gorilla won’t take away the ability to consume all the attention in the room. But hey, listen — I mean, it’s hilarious that it doesn’t have the ability to land in 90% of the province. I actually bought their argument that because it was a private plane and because Ontario has bad weather throughout a lot of it — we’re a big place — that it made sense to not have to rely on commercial flights. But I mean, well, that just falls apart under this argument entirely. That is — that’s incredible. But there’s no reason for him to change; the strategy is working perfect for him. But the opposition parties can’t call him out on it because they’d be called hypocrites. They’re left-wing central planners inherently by the definition and the nature of their policies and what it is that they are trying to go for. But they have shame. Ford has no shame, and that’s the big difference. Shame is a weakness when it is in politics. And Ford knows the academic definition of free-market capitalism, and it is basically, when it comes to him, Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: feed the people what they want. And he does that like he’s working the grill at a backyard barbecue. He keeps the voters happy; they’re being bought off with their own money, but they don’t seem to know it, they seem to be happy. He’s the 800-pound white elephant, if anything else. He takes all the attention.
Gene Valaitis: And speaking of barbecues, he still has his barbecues, too, by the way.
Jon Liedtke: He sure does. I mean, I haven’t gone to one yet, but if they come back to Windsor, maybe I’ll go this year.
Gene Valaitis: All right. As usual, always a great take on what’s happening in our country. Thank you so much, Jon. Have a great day.
Jon Liedtke: You too, Gene. Cheers.
Gene Valaitis: There he goes, Jon Liedtke. He writes for the Kvech and Release podcast. I tell you, his takes are something else. I love having him on the show.
This aired on 610 CKTB
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