Le Ford: Le Pen

Nina Penteado 2010

France's ''National Front' President, Jean- Marie Le Pen, made his political career by making controversial, mob-rousing statements in the name of freedom of political speech. The seeds of his truculent success sprouted in 1983 when his right-wing National Front party earned him a much contested councillor's seat in Paris' 20th 'arrondisement' (district). Meanwhile in Canada, Rob Ford is making calculated, and dangerously misleading statements in his bid to win the 2010 mayoral seat - as he continues exploiting public xenophobia. Rob Ford is not a disorganized, clueless politician. Instead, he is a calculated politician who, like Le Pen, has made his political career by belching out polarizing statements with impunity and success. Rob Ford's serial 'offenses' have been matched with serial electoral victories. Just like Rob Ford, Le Pen's numerous 'public service' bids have focused on: anti-immigration policies, nationalism, the common man's fight against corruption, tough law and order, and slashing budget deficits at any social cost. Combining legitimate policy initiatives, (like cutting wasteful government spending), with illegitimate policy slogans, (like an immigration-free zone), delivered Le Pen protgs victories in municipal governments over the years. Rob Ford is applying the same tactics. Many will agree with Rob Ford on the following: cutting politician expense accounts, reducing politician salaries, abolishing various taxes - and maybe even cutting democratically elected councillors from 44 to 22 (starting with ward 2, of course) may sound like a good idea. On reducing councillors, Rob Ford counts on the fact that many prospective voters may not appreciate mayors have one vote on any key matter in City Council - along with councillors. This means Rob Ford would have to convince other councillors to vote themselves out of a job. He knows that will not happen, but he wants voters to think he will really push this initiative forward if he is elected. Cutting politician expense accounts to address a city budget deficit is also great political rhetoric on route to the mayoral seat, but it's cynical political decoyism. City Hall's budget crisis started when Mike Harris loaded provincial responsibilities onto the City of Toronto, and Rob Ford knows this. In addition, Torontonians pay high taxes to provincial and federal governments, but get very little back to fund vital city services. So, either a) you make massive cuts to essential public

subsidies and services, (services, for example, seniors, homeless, and TTC riders rely on); b) increase taxes, or; c) you increase federal and provincial transfers back to Toronto. Miller was on the right proverbial track with the Transit City initiative, but the City of Toronto lost out to Premier McGuinty when his government recently cut funding to this vital public transportation expansion project. This predictable McGuinty about face certainly deflated the NDPs mayoral bid (as it was intended to), but it certainly has not helped Smitherman either (as it was not intended to). Rob Ford wants the unsuspecting and ignorant voter, to think cutting various taxes and expense accounts will fund, for example, public transit initiatives. He also wants voters to believe Miller and his 'cronies' are behind the budget deficit. Well-positioned misinformation. Strategically, what Ford has done quite effectively is exaggerate and link 'out-of-control' government spending with an elitist 'political' class called the NDP. Le Pen has applied the same political tactic repeatedly. This elitist political class in Toronto has conspired to keep Rob Ford (an 'outsider,' and the underdog 'champion of the people') out of the mainstream. The effective marriage between fake populism and nuveau right-wing fascism has worked very well for Rob Ford. Incredibly, his game has been uncontested by the other mayoral candidates, who do not want to risk losing the suburban vote. The 'common man' and Rob Ford, (angry, openly racist head honcho of a multi-million operation), interestingly have a common interest: fighting the establishment. This is absolutely remarkable given that Rob Ford IS the establishment. It is also astonishing and cruelly ironic to see poor people or seniors campaigning on behalf of Rob Ford, (because, for example, he felt compelled to speak to the issue of bedbugs once or twice), and directly against their own interests. Speaking of voters, do the homeless vote? Rob Ford obviously does not think so. He has been vocally peeved with this dispensable lot for a while. In 2002, he adamantly contested a proposal to build homeless shelters in his ward, so much so he felt holding a public debate on the issue amounted to an insult aimed at his constituents a public lynching, he said. In 2005, he was angry about the construction of affordable housing project, suggesting government housing depreciates property values. Le Pen's National Front, and Rob Ford have a curiously erotic fascination with tough law enforcement. Rob Ford has called for an increase in police presence (of course after he reduces council from 44 to 22). The National Front's political platform calls for the death penalty. On the one hand, Rob Ford also apparently dreams of the reinstatement of the death penalty this he says every time a handgun ban debate surfaces. Rob Ford likes the powerful symbolism of a gun-wielding police officer; and dislikes preventative, community-based initiatives. Yet, crime rates have been going down.

On the other hand, he is a pro-gun kind of guy. Like Palin, he likes the idea of hunting, and the votes that come along with it. Yet, the National Public Services Research Institute estimates the yearly cost associated with gunshot wounds in Canada is $6.6 billion. Anti-handgun ban attitudes like Rob Ford's are costing Canadians a lot of money, money which could be funneled back into taxpayers pockets. The National Front's central anti-immigration platform additionally mirrors Rob Ford's stated sentiments about immigrants. In 2008, he said this about Orientals: Those Oriental people work like dogs. Theyre slowly taking over. But Rob Ford has been at it, the business of openly hating immigrants, for a while. He advocated Toronto become a refugee-free zone back in 2003, and continues to do so now in 2010. While, thankfully, immigration is not a municipal matter, one cannot help but wonder if Rob Ford's proposed ban on immigrants (especially after the Tamil boat incident) includes his loyal Polish constituents? We know he is not seriously courting votes in Little India, Chinatown, Little Portugal, or St. James Town; instead he is focusing on the suburbs. In 2003, Le Pen made violently derogatory statements against Muslims in a famous Le Monde interview. He has since been fined 10,000 Euros for 'inciting hatred, discrimination, and violence.' But that did not deter him from later calling Sarkozy, Frances current President, a 'foreigner' in 2007. Sarkozy is of Hungarian and Jewish decent. The list goes on: a National Front campaign poster read: "Immigrants are going to vote...and you are abstaining?" The upside: immigrants in Toronto, to Fords utter shock, will not abstain from voting this coming October, and at least Le Pen was fined for the Le Monde statements. The downside: Le Pen and Rob Ford keep getting cheap publicity at great social cost. Le Pen and Rob Ford do not like homosexuals. In 1987, Le Pen suggested people with AIDS be shipped off and isolated in a 'sidatorium.' According to Rob Ford's 2006 statement, you would not likely get AIDS - unless you fit into two degenerate categories: gays and needle-users. In fact, in 2006 he voted against an AIDS prevention program. The message was and is clear: if you got AIDS, it's because you deserved it. In 2010, Rob Ford aligned himself with a fundamentalist Christian pastor, who believes samesex marriage has the real potential to devastate a healthy democratic civilization. The irony: manipulative people like Rob Ford and Le Pen, who incite hate, have proven themselves to be dangerous to a healthy and democratic civilization over and over again. Le Pen and Rob Ford have physically vented their guttural distaste for women. In 1997, the unrelenting 68-year-old Le Pen physically attacked fellow politician-mayor, socialist Annette Peulvast-Bergeal. He pushed her violently up against a wall, adding that people are fed-up with socialists.

Rob Ford also has an issue with female politicians. In 2005, he said conservative councillor Gloria Lindsay Luby was a "waste of skin.. In 2008, Rob Ford was charged with assaulting his wife and uttering threats. She called 911. The charges were subsequently dropped. In 2006, he was ejected from a Maple Leafs game after a drunken verbal altercation in which he said: "Do you want your little wife to go over to Iran and get raped and shot?" Rob Ford's now notorious explosions (verbal and physical) have been cynically orchestrated, and spinned when he has gone too far. The outbursts have been conveniently 'branded' as a common man's affliction (an insult to the common man). Rob Ford, he wants people to additionally believe, is an honest guy - despite having been caught lying on numerous occasions about his criminal charges and other inconvenient facts. He loses it like any other guy around the block. He professes to be one of us. Rob Ford is not a populist champion of the people. He is cynically exploiting high unemployment rates, ignorance about immigrants, and general public frustrations and fears to champion the interests of Rob Ford - a member of the political and socio-economic establishment. But above all he is cleverly exploiting the colossal ineffectiveness of the other mayoral contenders. His political tactics have effectively immobilized the remaining mayoral candidates into flatulent campaign inertia. Worse yet, they may have started kissing Rob Ford's grande derrier in anticipation of his victory. Epilogue: The dangerous clown was voted in, and you know the rest.