Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - The Toronto Star's Edward Keenan: Toronto Mike'd #1663

Episode Date: April 3, 2025

In this 1663rd episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Toronto Star city columnist Ed Keenan about what's happening in the city of Toronto. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, Silverwax, Yes We Are Open, Nick Ainisand RecycleMyElectronics.ca. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

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Building Toronto Skyline, a podcast and book from Nick Ienis, sponsored by Fusion Corp Construction Management Inc. and Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Joining me today making his quarterly visit to Toronto Mike. It's Ed Keenan from the Toronto Star Oh yeah! Oh the Macho Man! Oh yeah! I was hoping I'd get some Macho Man here Last time I was here I think one of the questions was like a request

Andrew Ward I think it was I even remember He's like give us some Macho Man It's not that I do a particularly good Macho man or any savage so much as they do it Enthusiastically, I think it's pretty good So I'm watching this show the floor it's like Rob Lowe hosted is a a game show okay but it people people are supposed to do these trivia things where one of them is an expert on the subject but if you beat somebody in some situation do you

inherit their subject so this woman had wrestlers as her subject and and I think like her original subject was some in English literature thing or something so But a picture of macho man Randy Savage came up and he was totally in the middle of that flexing like And she was like Randy somebody Randy something Randy Randy that's Randy and then she couldn't come up with it. So ah Randy, Randy, that's Randy and then he couldn't come up with it. So, oh man, yeah, leaping Lanny Poffo was his brother, but you know this. I can't tell you anything. People forget that leaping Lanny because he was Randy Poffo and he was a minor

league baseball, like he was a prospect. Right. I want to say for the Cardinals or something. And then when the baseball career didn't work out, he's a hell of a ball player, obviously to get that deep. But then, the baseball career didn't work out, he's a hell of a ball player, obviously, to get that deep, but then turned to wrestling. But then heck of a professional wrestling legend. And he's in Spider-Man. And Miss Elizabeth. Remember him in Spider-Man? I do not remember him in Spider-Man. Peter Parker fights that guy, like just a wrestler. That guy's played by Macho Man. He's not playing himself himself but he's acting you know you know Randy Poffo so Ed Keenan I was thinking when

you were coming over it like we have these as recurring quarterly calendar events yeah and we it's always the first Thursday every three months every quarter it's every three every three every quarter yeah the first Thursday of the month at 2 p.m. Like this is just recurring. And every time you're coming over, I think your timing is impeccable. I think, man, Ed Keenan's timing is impeccable,

but it's a recurring quarterly visit. But kudos to you for always having impeccable timing. Well, also though, kudos to you because you're the one who created the original calendar event that would recur every three months and somehow found the rhythm. Give me the kudos. Found the rhythm. Give me the kudos.

And we should also maybe thank Mark Weisblot, who when he stopped visiting quarterly, I think he was doing monthly, he said, you know, Keenan would be a good replacement. And I said, yeah, he would be a good replacement. And you've kind of taken on that role here in the TMU. Well, there you go. It's heavy. But wait, so Great Lakes was just here because we recorded a new episode of their podcast between two fermenters and they left for you just so you know, this is a hot pop pop.

So no alcohol, but delicious. You like it. And that is here for you. And they also brought me a sunny side because tomorrow, April 4th, 2025 is sunny day in this fine province. And they're launching their delicious summer brew, which is called sunny side session IPA. So I'm going to crack. So we should crack. So I'm going to do a countdown.

Are you ready? Okay. Three, two, one. Cheers to you. Here we survivors, okay, I'm Gotta say No bullshit my summer beer of choice is this sunny side because it's just so do they do that every year every year? Okay, so this is like that's a launch it for the season on the same date every year or whatever. Well, that I don't know about. I don't know how organized they are, but for sure tomorrow, April 4th, is sunny day.

And I've worked into my calendar a visit to the GLB HQ at 30 Queen Elizabeth Boulevard to drop by and hang out and celebrate sunny day. Well there you go. I mean today is a sunny day. Thank goodness. Yesterday almost broke me I think. That thunder snow. It snows every year in April but this year, I'll just be honest, I have been having a hard time with the

going outside the last few weeks. It's just like I'm ready for for something warmer and sunnier. I'm sick of the grind so today is nice it's a much better day. Quite a swing right like like literally at this time yesterday it was snowing and slushy and garbage outside blowing wind and then 24 hours later even here by the lake even by the lake it's shorts weather. It's like yeah sure sure shortve shirt weather for sure.

Yeah. And, uh, I'm glad you wore your, uh, cut-off jeans for me here, Ed. Thank you. That's right. Right, got the Daisy Dukes. Always the day before sunny day every year. That's my cue. You said Daisy Duke, and, uh, I remember even buying it with my mom at, we had, there was

a byway at Jane and Annette. And at this byway, they had sheet sets, like we're matching like pillowcases and sheets. And then, I don't know if there was a comforter or not. Like fitted sheet and then just a sheet. And then they're all matched up. And I was a huge Dukes of Hazard fan. And I wanted these Dukeskes of hazard sheets in this pillow

set or whatever pillowcase and then I got it so I get this and you had two sides to the to the pillow one side had bow and Luke Duke and the other side had Daisy Duke I would only sleep on Daisy Duke so most of us had to make do with a poster over our bed but you you know I literally could like, I was drooling on Daisy. Honestly I just, I'll never forget my, You can smooch your faces. The other sheet set, just to shout this out real quick,

I had two that, cause man cannot live on one sheet set alone. And the other one from Byway that I would enjoy and I was lucky enough to have was Pac-Man sheets. Oh, now there you go. And it was a Ms. Pac-Man on the pillow. You know what? Oh my goodness. You know what?

I think you've cracked the code here. Yeah. So, Ed, how are you? I mean, it sounds like you're having trouble getting out. I actually surprised myself by setting a personal best for kilometers biked in the city and Mississauga in the month of March in In that I've never cleared a thousand kilometers in any month of March in my life, and I cleared, I had a thousand and five kilometers

cycled in March. So I've never been out of the house more, Ed Keeley, and I'm here to shame you. Well, that's good for you. Yeah, I... Like, how are you doing? I don't think I like, you know, people talk about seasonal depression and whatnot,

and I probably do get a little bit of the blues through the winter, and it probably is just related to sunshine or whatever. But the past month, I actually have just been feeling like down and unmotivated. Not sad, right? Not not when I think of the word depressed. I think of a certain. Well, you want to. But it's more like I feel like I've just been like in a bit of a fog. And it was like a week or two ago that I realized maybe this is related to the weather because it was like I was like summoning up the ambition to like walk to

the store and and you know, that's a 10 minute walk away and just thinking. Would I would I feel differently about this walk if I didn't have to put on a toque and mitts and then if it was sunnier? If you could wear your Daisy Dukes. And then I was like, yeah, yeah, that's it. But also, I don't want to...

I just want that kind of weather to make me feel good being outside. I don't want to be your armchair psychiatrist here, okay? That's not my role here. But new agenda for this week. I think it would only make you human if you were grappling with what's happening in the zeitgeist world. I was thinking, I need you. I'm gonna look in your baby blues there.

I need you because I know, and again, I'm biking up a storm, but I think that's how I deal with anxiety is I just bike more. Like, I think that's my coping deal with anxiety is I just bike more. Like I think that's my coping mechanism to be quite frank, but I don't feel, I feel like this mild anxiety with these threats from the country you were living in for a few years in the United States of America. And I was really glad to see you. And I said your timing was impeccable because I really do. You covered Trump.

Yeah. In fact, we should set the table by telling just remind us who are you Ed Keenan I do I always forget people might not know who Ed Keenan is. I'm a writer for the Toronto Star I'm currently a city columnist there I also am one of the hosts of a podcast called This Matters. I was for a time, well the end of Donald Trump's last term and the beginning of Joe Biden's term as president, I was the Washington bureau chief for the Toronto Star. So I lived in Washington DC, I covered the, like all the highlights, the insurrection, I was going to build up to that, but yes certainly. I'll fix it in post.

Yeah, like two impeachment trials, the largest mass protest movement in American history, and the insurrection at the Capitol. I was at the Capitol building, you know, standing outside with the rioters during those events. And so it does it, but I'm not sure what I'm gonna say is gonna reassure you. Like you're saying, oh I need to walk down off a ledge because I have a lot of anxiety. But I think it's justified anxiety. The good news I think is that people across Canada have really woken up to that. Like all of a sudden like a giant slap in the face. And the reaction of Canadians inspires a bit of hope. I wrote

a parody when the first time the news came out that Donald Trump had said, had made a joke or people thought a joke about Canada as the 51st state. Which I'll just say last time you were over, which was the first week of 2025, we talked about that. So it was pre that. So I wrote a like parody column like a set in the not too distant future where Canada was the 51st state. And you know, mostly for laughs, I kind of looked back from that imagined future and

talked about how the world's Longest undefended border lived up to its name because when the Americans rolled over they barely faced a fight at all and all of that um and and you know I I was I Was making jokes and making a bit of a point and part of the point then was that Everybody always thinks he's joking at first and they never turns out to be joking always thinks he's joking at first and then he never turns out to be joking. But I'm not I might tackle that a little bit differently today because the way Canadians are reacting at least in the short term shows that like we have some fight in us. We have some sense of national pride. We're willing to go to the

mat for this and and not sort of sleepwalk into it. And I think that that's a reason for some optimism. But I think Donald Trump is showing that he's a full-on fascist with, wants to like wreak economic havoc on the entire world, not just us. And he has expansionist ambitions, and he continues to cast his eyes our way and there's not a lot of good news from that on that front.

All right I'm looking in the eyes again because you have beautiful eyes you know this right? They they they see well they they do what they're supposed to do for me. Well that's important okay. Mr.. Kenan, you've covered this man, you've, you know, you're a journalist with the Toronto Star. If it should come to this, and this is the only way I think it could ever happen, would the commander in chief of the world's largest military have his military invade our sovereign nation? like I don't want to be too alarmist and I think it's still a remote possibility that that would happen I don't think it's an impossibility right he's not saying right now that he plans any kind of military invasion in fact he said when when he was asked

about that specifically he said no they would use economic force to take over Canada and so I think he believes that um But Donald Trump goes from From point a to point Z or Z as Americans would say said very Very quickly and in ways that that all the reasonable rational people constantly tell us not to worry about I'm like it's in its I mean even just in the case of the insurrection I was there on January 6th I'm and what what happened is like when he had lost the election he spent the

months leading up to the election saying they're gonna try and steal it from me and I'm not gonna let them steal it right and lots of experts were saying he's laying the groundwork to try and dispute this election and stay in office even if he loses. But the American system has all these, you know, it would never work. He's just trying to like, it's a rhetorical ploy. And then after the election he kept trying to postpone acknowledging the victory and all of that and everybody you know two days before January 6th, so January 4th that year I was at a

Giant Trump rally in Rome, Georgia like some like rural, Georgia Where he was trying to whip up followers and saying you know Mike Pence I think he's gonna do the right thing he has to do the right thing or else and I need all of you to stand with me, we're not going to let them steal this election." And he was basically saying out loud then, I'm not going to give up, we have to overturn this. And still there was a sense like, yeah, but what can he do, right? And then I think when he whipped his supporters into a frenzy to go attack the Capitol building, two days later everybody realize don't like

this was never just rhetoric for him and he's willing to do things that nobody would have guessed an american president would do or he would do so he's opening openly talking about the possibility of invading greenland and using military force to seize the Panama Canal and so in that context when he talks about making Canada 51st state again and again and again talks about it and says he's planning to use economic force but I

don't think it's a big leap for him to then say oh we have strategic interests we need to go and protect right like especially when we look at the north which is vast and essentially undefended by Canada at this stage and the Chinese and the Russians have their eyes on it there are all kinds of pretexts you could imagine where an American president who wanted to kind of take over you know demands a military presence there, works backwards, right? Like, there's a lot of scenarios I can see that I think we just need to be more alert to than we have been, but I don't think

the tanks are gonna roll over the border any time in the next few months or anything. I remember that quote, it was pretty early, no, we're gonna use economic force, and, no, we're going to use economic force. And at some point, he's going to clue into the fact that there is no economic force that would cause this country, this very unified nation, you alluded to it earlier, but I feel it like this unification. I'm not so sure, but Alberta, we'll get back there, but very unified country.

And at some point, he's's gonna clue into the fact that oh It's almost like the Grinch couldn't stole Christmas like they were still singing at the end of that. Yeah That's a perfect So Christmas wait a minute the tariffs are at two hundred fifty five hundred percent one thousand percent and they still want to stay Canadian Yeah, and I was um, I wrote a column, I think white guys of our age maybe see hockey as like too much Canadian metaphor in hockey, right? Maybe too often we go to it.

Possibly. But I think after the Four Nations Cup. Elbows up, for example. Yeah, yeah. But I think after the Four Nations Cup, when Canada won, and you know, was a a slight underdog like it wasn't like some David and Goliath story, but but given Trump and all of that it had taken on this bigger dimension. This is not just a hockey game. Not just a hockey series. It's a

it's a proxy war for the for the trade war that's launching in the potential real war of the future and right and I think like every hockey fan, Canadian hockey fan, has this sense that like, I mean, it's the fallacy of fandom altogether that like your yearning, your faith, your undivided attention and concentration, your wanting it so bad, is going to

help the team win, right? And almost for sure, the American players want it just as much as the Canadian players, but the American public, by and large, it's only of passing interest to them, right? Like they can hop on the bandwagon or whatever, but it's like not really like it means anything to them and so to us it means so much so it's so important and I I was thinking and this is what I wrote in my column is that when it comes to a hockey game likely me and you sitting and screaming at our televisions and praying and and you know wearing our lucky jersey and all of that had no effect on the outcome right of course right but that stuff can have a

dramatic effect when we get into the kind of conflict we're actually getting into the fact that the Canadian people like as Stephen Harper right a conservative said like would be willing to like suffer impoverishment to fend this off. I think Canadians are braced for that. They're hoping that it doesn't take that, but they're braced for that and they're ready for that and they're willing to go through it. Whereas I think the average American, to the extent that they're vaguely aware that among the

battles Trump is picking because they're big fish to fry right at home for them but they're aware that the battles Trump is picking include an economic fight with Canada I don't think they are braced to withstand any amount of suffering in the name of that fight like most Americans don't want to take over Canada, first of all. And second of all, I think, how much impoverishment are you willing to go through in support of Trump's war against Canada? I think the answer for most average Americans is none. None impoverishment, right? Not one little bit bit and a trade war hurts everybody right so that there's gonna be pain for them, too So I mean I think if we're talking about an economic force we're gonna get often the worst of it, but we are

Prepared to take the worst of it in a way that they're not prepared to take any badness at all and listen I will live in the shed before I will live in the shed before I will agree to be in the other part of all of this that irks me is this fifty first state rhetoric, because of course we would never

be the fifty first state, right? We would be what's the designation Puerto Rico has? Possession, the territory, right? That's what Canada would be, where they don't vote. They don't vote for president, right? In Puerto Rico, they don't. And there is periodic talk about making Puerto Rico a state

But of course the Republicans don't want that because they think it would be Democrat state that would give him two more seats in the Senate Right. Um, right when that's precisely what would be this this landmass of almost 40 million people is not getting the same voting rights As California or Texas. Well, I mean people is not getting the same voting rights as California or Texas? Well, I mean, who knows? It's hard to foresee. I mean, he talks about it as a 51st state. Now Canadians would, if we were even to contemplate any scenario where we were peacefully joining, we would think of it as the 10 new states, not one new state, right?

But there is, I don't actually- I mean, we'd be a state, even if we were put in as one state, we'd be the size of California. And Trump has talked about it as a state from the beginning. I think they'd have a hard time. You know, it's possible. But you just said the sentence, peaceably join the United States. Right. And like I said- My brain can't come up with a scenario.

Like there is no, like it doesn't compute. Like I think, and I'm, again, I'm a guy living in Toronto and I understand that carries its own, you know, I was born and raised here. I've only lived in one city. Later we should talk about this moment when you came to the door and the MP for this riding is at my door when you arrive. Like and he's there and there's a little little chat there is just it's We didn't even get to the point fact that we're in an election cycle here

But there is no I can't even compute a scenario where Canada peacefully joins in any way the United States of America peacefully yeah, well not not Not from the position. We're in right now, right? Not from the starting point we came in right now. I don't know, like if you got kids, we both combined, we have many, many, many children, we have families. Where is this impoverishment? Impoverishment?

Where am I going for there? But how desperate, like economically, have we been devastated where we realize, okay, it's time to capitulate here and give up our sovereignty? Yeah, well, that's the thing is I don't think, I don't see that scenario unfolding, right? So you're saying my mild anxiety is well-warranted is what you're telling me.

Yeah, I think so. And it shouldn't be mild. It sounds like I need to elevate it. Yeah, or maybe you're already at just the right level of anxiety. Okay, that's what I want to hear. So did you hear the cold open off the top? Yeah. Because you mentioned the four nations.

That's a FOTM Chantel Kravyažek. I've been airing only from FOTMs though, these PSAs that I get from this group, they're called the pro bono group and they share these pro Canada PSA's. In fact, I aired one off the top of an episode that had Colin Mochrie and his wife, Deborah McGrath, who are FOTM as well. I mean, he's friends of Toronto Mike, if you're just kind of wandering by here. But that apparently got the attention of CNN. Are you aware that I was on CNN? I was not aware of that. Okay, so this is big news for you, Ed Keenan. Since you were last here, yeah, so since you were last here, I spoke with Audie Cornish on the

CNN This Morning show, live from right here. Like that happened to talk about this. Like I'm, yeah, I mean, I, you're the voice of Canada, you and Doug Ford. Well, that's it. I've been looking who else is getting the call from Canada and it's Doug Ford, it's Olivia Chow and Toronto Mike. Yeah, well, as it should be, right? As it should be. Yes, absolutely. Everything's right in the world, but your homework is to go to YouTube at some point

and just put in the keywords, CNN, Toronto Mike. And let me know how I did here. Because like my five, this is a few weeks ago, but since your last visit. But I'm telling you, the level I'm at is such that I could see it happening. And really, I don't know, since we both have children and families,

all I'm thinking is how do I get them somewhere safe so I can join the insurgency? Yeah, it's weird that I had a conversation with my kids at dinner one day about whether there's, you know, would be a draft in Canada, which of my kids would likely be draft eligible, given the timing of it, whether or not I would enlist, which I almost certainly would if they would take my middle-aged ass. Well, I actually am trying to get myself in tip-top condition for this insurgency. That's why the the number of kilometers on your bike in March.

Ah, I see. You do belong as a journalist at the country's highest circulated newspaper. Where this... But isn't it amazing? Because we've been doing this quarterly for years and it's amazing we're now having these talks because I have two sets of kids and there's an where we're now having these talks because I have, you know, two sets of kids and there's an older set where I have these kinds of conversations and then the younger set where it's literally my role to keep them completely oblivious. Like I feel it's like,

oh, what don't worry about anything. Yeah. Yeah. Singing lessons and soccer and everything's amazing. So I have that chat with the almost 11 year old and the recently turned, what is she now? Nine year old, I have to keep track of this. And then the 23 year old and 21 year old were having these kinds of conversations. And it's like I play, I put on both father hats. Right, yeah. I got three teenagers now.

So the youngest is still just graduating from grade eight. So she's still got a foot in childhood, but it's not shelter them from the news, because you can't at that age. Like she's aware of things going on in the world, and so we're having family conversations that are kind of interesting. But yeah, I'm sure there's lots of these conversations

happening across this country. Well, I'll tell you, like, I went to, and I wrote about this too. So there's a bunch of groups now who've embraced the slogan Elbows Up and they're not all affiliated with each other so there was like a big Elbows Up Canada rally at Nathan Phillips Square but then there's another group like like a week later had the Elbows Up Toronto meeting yes at the Metropolitan United Church.

Charlie Angus was there, yeah, and made a really fiery speech. John Sewell helped to organize it and people who've been in Toronto for a long time, who've been politically aware for a long time will remember back in the 1990s, John Sewell kind of led the anti-mega city fight and he did it from a group that met weekly in the 1990s, John Sewell kind of led the anti-mega city fight and he did it from a group that met weekly in the Metropolitan United Church, so right in that same location, right? And I spoke to, for my

Toronto Star podcast, I spoke to David Cromby. No, David Cromby was also there. Ken Greenberg, who's a former urban design director for the city of Toronto, and like genuinely on all kinds of Toronto projects, like Concerned Citizen. But he moved to Canada as a young man, as a draft resistor, right? So he was in college, he got drafted to fight in the Vietnam War and moved to Toronto to make his new home instead of that.

So actually came as like essentially a refugee from the American government. Sure, like Bill King and many a great Canadian. But so he was one of the ones who initially founded it. He sent an email to a bunch of people and said, what can we do, right? How can we get involved? How can we get organized? So before they even knew there was this Elbows Up Canada rally and group starting,

they they start named their group Elbows Up Toronto, planned this meeting. And I have to say going to the meeting itself, like, is is, it was part rally, right? Like, and there's some value to just going to be among a group of people who will shout at the top of their lungs like, no way, right? Over my dead body? No. Yeah. But it's also like, and I'm interested to watch how this evolves because their idea in John Sewell's sort of community organizing model is kind of that you get these people together and get inspired together

but then you also use that as a planning purpose for your further action and then it will be like decentralized so people will come to these meetings and speakers will talk about this is what our government should be doing like these are the policies we should be pursuing and people in the crowd will say and they'll say you know we need to organize letter writing campaigns. We need to everybody here to call or organize a meeting with their member of provincial parliament and insist that the provincial government do X or Y or Z or consider it, right? But then they also like have suggestions for like these are the kinds of things that you and I can do. You know and whether that's buying local or watching local and supporting the cultural industries or whether it's something else right

like and and I don't I don't have a lot of equally obvious things but like we can't take muskets and go to the border right now because there's no shooting war but like what can we do to play a role in this? And so people are supposed to be sharing ideas there but they also share information so then you get like little subgroups like it's like a bunch of residents here will become like elbows up New Toronto and you and your neighbors will be organizing the bottle drives to fundraise for the like whatever. And it's just like I feel like in my circle of acquaintance, yeah, there's an almost

really unified desire to be part of the resistance, right? To be, to man the barricades. Yes. And not a lot beyond like, canceling your Amazon subscription, and looking at the Made in Canada labels on your groceries, not a lot of other ideas of what exactly to do, right? And so to the extent that these guys plan to meet every two weeks I think in that church and try to build up a movement out of it that's action-oriented, I'm interested to see what they come up with. I was gonna ask you about this because I representing Toronto Mike there was Banjo Duncan Fremlin the you

know elbows up correspondent for yeah Mike in fact out of this so you know Charlie Angus dropped by here since your last visit and just to talk about this very subject yeah so it's something he is he's like in his semi-retirement back to music this has become his full-retirement back to music. This has become his full-time passion is this very subject, right? It's all interesting because he came over to talk about the music stuff and then he announced he was not going to run in the next federal election and we had a rapport because we hit it off obviously because he's a punk rock politician talking about Queen Street in the 80s like he's made for Toronto

Mike and then I wrote him him an email on a Sunday, and this was all swirling around in my tiny, tiny little brain. And I'm like, Charlie, I need to talk about this. Sort of like how I need to talk about this with you right now. It's a good thing I have a forum to talk about all this shit.

Who needs a therapist? So I said, Charlie, and I know Charlie lives in James Bay, like he lives in Timmins or somewhere far away. And I'm like, hey, I need to talk. This is a Sunday or something. I wrote an email. Charlie, I need to talk about this. When could you visit the basement?

He writes back two minutes later, how's tomorrow morning? Okay. I clear the track. Here comes Shaq. Okay. Here comes Charlie Angus. It turns out he was coming to town to be on the agenda with Steve Paikin.

And I think like many people are starting to do, they sort of drop by here first to work out their rap or whatever before they sit down with Pagan. It's like the pre-interview. Yeah. Work it out. And, you know, I had the cameras going and I got, there was some tremendous sound bites. Like this hour has 22 minutes took something I put on YouTube of Charlie and I talking during that visit and just aired it as part of this they did a bit about Wayne Gretzky and And they aired this so there I am on this hour's this is before CNN. I'm on this hour is 22 minutes with Charlie Angus zero attribution I

Know this hour is 22 minutes is a comedy program. It's not a program Don't you think would it be so tough to put from Toronto Mike? Well, they're stealing your intellectual property zero at their own commercial purpose You know what the kicker is here. Mr. Toronto star. I I took this video I recorded the video of me being on this hours 22 minutes and I uploaded it to my youtube channel and I got a copyright strike Okay, think about it because it belongs to CBC they steal from me my YouTube channel they air it nationally which is nice zero attribution and then when I upload that same clip to my YouTube I'm stealing from the CBC right what do you think about that is the right about that it's yours the Toronto Mike team of lawyers. You know what?

Lauren Honigman and I had a long chat just yesterday, so don't worry. I got Laura Lawrence. I know I let that one go. And then I said, well, CNN will attribute me fairly. And they did. So it's all it's all fine and dandy there. But Charso, yes, I'm very interested in these. What's happening? Because I did then write an email to John Sewell. And he said he was too busy to come on Toronto Mic'd. So I struck out, he's too busy to come on.

He's in his 80s, I understand. Yeah. So Banjo Dunk is working on David Cromby actually and we're gonna see what we can do. But I'm very interested in all this. Ken Greenberg is also, he's probably possibly be keen to talk to you. When John Sewell first emailed me about that Elbows Up Toronto group to just say, we're

having this meeting, this is what we're working on, he offered that Ken Greenberg and then a younger member of their steering committee who's like, they consciously, like a lot of these people are veterans of the wars in Toronto over the years, right? So David Crombie and John Sewell and Barbara Hall is part of this too. Barbara Hall, Kathleen Wynne, like they're of a certain generation and so I think they realized we need to... so they have some like youth members of their steering committee who are university student age who are trying to, you know, bring young people

who've never been part of this kind of organizing because they're, you know, the pandemic, but beyond the pandemic, their whole sense of like being political and being active is an online world, right? So trying to bring them into it. So, but those were the people who John Sewell at the time was saying were available to talk about it. So we'll see where all this goes, but I'm feeling you mentioned it's a it's in a lot of us to be a part of the resistance and I'm feeling it like I never thought I'd have these moments and these thoughts like I and then I mentioned that Mike Richards was on.

What day is it? Last week, I guess it was. I've lost track. No, it was earlier this week. I've lost track of everything, Ed Keenan. So earlier this week, Mike Richards comes by. He has a big announcement to make that sounds familiar I know but we do it and I'm telling him some of the thoughts he goes oh so you're a bomb shelter guy and then I have this moment where he's saying is I don't think I'm a bomb shelter guy like right but in this like I I think it would be and you kind of made me feel like I'm not as crazy as Mike Richards thinks I am but you'd be bit, I think it would be crazy to not take these threats seriously. No, yeah. From somebody you don't trust. And I was going to ask you, because you cover American politics so closely. We've always been told, I've been told this since grade school when you learn about the American political system, they kept telling me

about these checks and balances, okay? You remember sitting in primary school and then you get that lesson about how the American legislature and you got, remember sitting in primary school and then you get that lesson about how the American legislature and you got your Supreme Court and you got your Senate, your House, and then there's a president and these checks and balances in place. Are these checks and balances gonna hold up

with a fascist wannabe dictator? Well, and what you realize very quickly, watching Trump even in his first term and then even more so now as stay but basically are dismantling large sections of the american government civil service and pushing his heart as fast as they can

against the judiciary right like to defy judicial orders and openly say you know like the vice president will or you on musk will or the press secretary of the president and states will you know who does that judge work for we're the bosses no un-elected judge is going to tell us what we can and can't do it is like well

that's actually the american system is that that un-elected judge does get to tell you right um but but you realize very quickly and it's true in Canada too how much of what we consider to be like we I mean broadly all of us who grew up in the liberal west or whatever you want to call it. How much of it is enforced by the good faith of the people involved? So there is a constitutional convention that you know the prime minister goes and asks the you know governor-general you know I do not have the confidence of the House, will you grant me an election? And the Governor General has the option to either grant it or

ask the opposition if they think they can form a government and all of that, right? Right. And yet if you have an entirely shameless actor in the Prime Minister's office, this is what the law says they should do. Constitutional convention, that's the law, right? But if they just don't do it, we don't have like a constitutional police force who goes out and puts handcuffs on them. We don't have like a, like, and then you come to these, you know, constitutional crises which are, should at that point the head general of the military step in to enforce a Supreme Court order against the elected head of state, you know, in the case of the United

States, right? And it's unclear, right? Like, and depending on how we're viewing this crisis having emerged, we might say yes, but in other senses we'd say that's like an illegal coup to have the military take over, right? The president, the commander of chief of the military, so should the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff say, sir, I'm relieving you of command because like, so these are legitimate crises, and yet they're the only like real world enforcement mechanism. The other enforcement mechanisms are the like decency and sense of shame and care for the democratic integrity of the institutions of the people involved.

And if the we had a like tiny mini version of this in Toronto under Rob Ford. You sound like it's an echo. I feel like we've had this talk because you covered Rob Ford's Merrill period. And there was a point where everybody was saying, can't this guy be fired? Well, there's no mechanism for Toronto City Council to fire their own mayor. It's just our longstanding expectation is that in these circumstances somebody would do it. They would step down, right? They would. Of course.

And so it's like the framers of the American Constitution did set up all these checks and balances, but they were assuming a certain minimal level of like basic human decency among everybody who would ever be elected. Right, because if you didn't have that, you would never win the electoral college and be democratically elected because the American people, you wouldn't have got even on the ballot or at least not as one of the major two parties, if you lacked that decency. And what we did see in Trump's first term, he got away with a lot more than he should have. He pushed aside the general rule of law more than you would have expected in advance.

But he did encounter significant pushback, including from officials he had appointed. People who at the time did not appear to be like democratic sympathizers or even reasonable people, like people like Bill Barr, the attorney general, right? People like Mitt Romney, who had been the Republican candidate for president, like there were Republicans and people Trump himself appointed who essentially at certain points were saying no sir this is like you're going too far right? They got to the point of members of his own party voting against him in impeachment proceedings and whatnot and yet not not enough to actually formally of members of his own party voting against him in impeachin proceedings

and whatnot and yet not not enough to actually formally do it but enough that he was held back by people he himself appointed in the first term and it was exactly their commitment to the rule of law their commitment to the idea of what the United States is supposed to be about on to the integrity of the entire system and to doing ultimately, as partisan as they may have been and as many compromises as they were willing to make along the way for partisan purposes, to draw a line in the sand and say, this is too far, right? Right.

He's carefully made sure there's none of those people left this time, right? And that's the really scary thing, because I thought the first time around was pretty scary, but some of the institutions of American government in the end held as protection against it and just barely, with like lots of holes in the dam and water shooting through, but it held up and he had to leave. I mean for one example that always strikes me is Vice President Mike Pence actually certifying the results of the 2020 like now we have JD Vance more of a single fan I always mispronounce that word but it's not it's almost like Trump learned to surround himself with like-minded yes

people and not have to worry about somebody doing the right thing. Exactly. Yeah, and I mean I think he was pretty open. You really don't want me to lose this anxiety. Loyalty is the only... loyalty to him personally, right, is the only quality that he thinks is valuable and people who have gone out of their way and this is why the talk about the election being stolen last time was useful as a litmus test because people who were willing to people were willing to stay stand up and say Donald Trump says the sky is green therefore the sky is green are demonstrating like they are humiliating themselves in public in a way that demonstrates that their loyalty to him is more important to them than anything else

Including their own dignity right right and so that's a that's a qualifying characteristic for service in the Trump administration And and that's that's where we're at so when I asked you a few minutes ago about checks and balances it sounds like these checks and balances aren't gonna hold up what this time we'll see they still exist um midterm elections that are coming up there are like popular opinion coming up like I mean he's done a lot of hundred days you know we're a hundred days into this like I said to yeah I said to my wife Rebecca the other day because there was I mean, 18 months or something. He's done a lot in 100 days. You know, we're 100 days into this. I said to, yeah, I said to my wife, Rebecca, the other day, because there was like something had come up and we were watching something. I just like looked it up on my phone just to be doubled.

Sure. I was like, you know, the inauguration was just like, less than two and a half months ago, like just over two months ago. Right. Like this is like, like, uh, it feels like we've been living through it for years. So as you know, my resident expert on the constitution of the United States of America, may I ask you about the, these executive orders? So, uh, in particularly, and again, I'm nothing too deep because I know you're now covering Toronto, which we will get to in a moment, but I think, but these executive orders, you know, he's always signing executive orders and yesterday happens. I said your timing is impeccable because yesterday was that liberation day with all the tariffs and

he had that chart and everything. And he's there's even tariffs on countries that only have penguins or something like this. And that what's the French island off of Newfoundland? Oh, that place. Yeah, you'll come to me the name again. It's a French island off of Newfoundland? Oh. That place, you'll come to me the name again, it's a French name and Pique, whatever it is, apparently has like a 99% tariff on it because whatever formula, because apparently they don't import anything from the States,

but they export like lobster and this formula, which is just like, I feel like they went into Google. They're like, oh, this trade imbalance. Yeah, like this spit out a 99% tariff on this Pierre and me. Milan, it'll come to me. Everyone knows what I'm talking about. But OK, so yesterday was this all the tariffs. He can do I'm seriously curious.

He can do all that by signing in an executive order like. There are certain things he can do by signing in an executive order and there are certain things that he needs a legal pretext to do. So for instance the tariffs against Canada and Mexico that were initially announced were being justified that he can act in in times of a crisis an emergency right especially a border emergency he can act to secure the borders in an emergency by executive order without authorization from Congress right so the fentanyl stuff

right was all a legal pretext to to the fact that he can do this by executive order. That he doesn't need to go to Congress and get permission. Because it's security of America. And so that's why every time anybody looked at this fentanyl thing and said, including many Americans, some of them even saying the quiet part out loud in his administration, like Canada is not a significant source of fentanyl into the united states if anything the flow goes the other way right um that there's no danger like that the fentanyl crisis

as a like poisoning the people overdose crisis exists in both countries right as as a part of a larger opioid epidemic in both countries. It's tragic. And yet nobody's really smuggling it into the US from here. But they knew that. And so you say, well why go through this whole charade? This is about economic force against Canada to, to first of all, sub subject us and make us their minions and then maybe make us the 51st state along the way. If that's what it's about, why not just say that? And Trump does kind of hint at it sometimes, but they need this legal fiction.

Now the other question, given what we were just talking about, it's like legal for who? Because like, well, if it comes to the courts, like, he could justify them. He could justify any order that came from, whether it's from an international court or whether it's from an American court saying, you're not actually allowed to do this. You have to go get Congress to authorize it. But it's like one more obstacle and argument on the way there, right? Like they say you can't do that by executive order. He says, oh, yes, we can because of this emergency. If you want to litigate that, I'll see in court in a couple of years when the date comes

up, right? And in the meantime, we're doing it. And that they're doing the same thing. It's not it's not like Canada's special in this regard. They're doing the same thing in immigration. They're doing the same thing in all's not like Canada's special in this regard. They're doing the same thing in immigration. They're doing the same thing in all kinds of American laws, including just like firing tens of thousands of civil servants and setting that like disassembling entire government departments. They shut down the USAID, which is like massive foreign aid office, but also international develop office. This is huge. People in Africa are going to die because of this, because it was shut down.

They already are dying. It's like disease prevention, it's nation building, it's democratic supports, it's like there's all kinds of things. So just kind of shutting it down overnight, kinds of things, right? So just kind of shutting it down overnight, raised a question in the United States is like, can he even do that? Like he's the head of the government, so he's the executive who like is in charge of hiring and firing and organizing and doing those departments, but there's also a law that says that like he has to spend money that's set aside by Congress. If Congress says this is the budget for foreign aid, the president doesn't have the authorization to say,

yeah, well, we're not going to do that. Congress set aside that money. They allocated those funds. His job is to administer them, not to decide not to do it. And yet, so that is a legitimate argument in the United States about whether what he's doing is legal, but he's going to do it in the meantime, and maybe one day the Supreme Court's going to tell him he wasn't actually allowed to do that, and maybe he'll pay attention or maybe he won't, but it's a lot harder to like undo this stuff later. Like how you, you know, hire back thousands of people, reopen offices

that were closed. Like, like it's a lot easier to work fast and break things and then when people say you weren't supposed to break it, you say, oh well, I guess, what are you going to do? Rebuild it from scratch? Like yeah and in the meantime, those meals ain't on wheels. You know what I'm talking about, bro? Yeah, no, exactly. Jeez, okay, by the way, a fact check. It's Daniel Dale. No, it's not Daniel Dale, it's Hayref, sorry.

Saint Pierre in Miquelon. I hope I'm saying Miquelon correctly. I have grade nine French. This is the French island off the coast of Newfoundland. This is the French island off the coast of Newfoundland. Massive lobster trade imbalance with the United States. It's like three million dollars of lobster goes to the States and they don't actually

import anything from the States. So this algorithm, this very simple math, which is like trade imbalance divided by whatever that little formula was. I saw on Reddit, they figured out the formula and it's quite laughable actually. But that's whatever it spit out is the tariff and it spit out this 99%, I guess,

because I guess they had no 100, it's gotta be got you know and yeah 99 percent tariffs on those lobsters coming from Saint Pierre in Mycologne but at least there's human beings at in that island here okay so Ed Keenan do you wish you were back covering the United States of America presidential politics or are you glad you're here now where I think you're covering Toronto? I may have given an answer like this to you at an earlier time like during the election or something but but it's the truth is that I see saw back and forth between being sort of jealous of whoever is covering it. Um, and at the start, like we don't have a full-time Washington bureau chief anymore, but

still like sort of sort of feeling like like I have stuff to say and there's things I'd like to witness. There's um, this is exciting, right? And And in the journalism world, in the writing world in general, like conflict makes good stories. Exciting stuff gets your heart pumping. It makes you feel like this is important, right? I am contributing to history here. And I miss that. The truth was, truth is though too, there are as many days or maybe more where something happens And I'm so glad I don't have to like

Get on a plane and go and cover it or I'm so glad that I don't have to try to Unfurl the lies of it or stand in the midst of a crowd of Trump supporters who are You know doing doing horrible things and being horrible people right in front of me. Um, like I It gets exhausting and so Yeah, I I do miss the rush and the sense of monument like Like of being an eyewitness to history or a recorder of part of that history. I miss that some days. And I still have the latitude to write about this stuff sometimes for the star in my column. But there are a lot of days, and I think, where I'm so relieved

that it's not my job to work late to do that, to have to cover that stuff, that there are other people whose job is to spend day and night paying attention to it and worrying about it. And contributing to that, I think quite aside from that professional feeling, my family and I have had a lot of conversations over the last couple of months about how glad we are we came back to Canada when we did because just to be living here with my children feels like I'm in the right place at this moment. We did enjoy living in the United States and there was a lot to like about it and like for all that we've been talking about and and i am a proud canadian a fierce defender the thing

about like going down to cover the united states was that there were crazy political things happening but i genuinely kind of love the united states but i love it as a neighbor right like like i like american culture and i think it's it's huge and problematic and the United States as a country has been the evil empire but also the hero of the story at different times it's like the history is complicated but like the culture and large parts of the United States are things that I genuinely love and I genuinely feel like like have contributed great things to my life. Like whether we're talking about movies or literature or food or music or just their

wrestling with those complicated parts of their history and sometimes finding the right thing and sometimes not but like as a neighbor as a as a relative like somebody somebody sitting here experiencing it from afar like I think there's a lot to like about the United States but there's that does not the same as wanting to be subsumed in it and I also think at a certain point living there witnessing its problems and feeling like as much as i was there as a

recorder of those things an interpreter of them for canadians that there's a helplessness in that my family and i these are our problems to solve these are our battles to even join we are outsiders here, we'll always be outsiders here. And our home is back in Toronto, right? And so now we're back home and so there are days I miss the job, days I'm relieved I don't have to do the job, but an overriding sense that I'm in the right place in the world right now with my

family. So I'm looking at the clock. So I think this episode is going to be an hour on what's on our minds in our hearts. And that is a lot to do with what's happening south of the border. And I thought that was a very thoughtful answer by the way. And then we're going to do an hour on more, you know, hyper local, local things after I give you some cool swag for making the trip here. But my last moment, so I'll say this then you go and then I'll do some things and then but I was gonna say not to be your you

know amateur psychiatrist again but hearing you speak of the states and I mean I majored in history and it's the American history that's fascinating like so I totally get what you're saying and these are you, you live there and you spoke very warmly and you almost said the word ally, you called them like a relative. But yeah, until very recently, we all looked at that big, powerful country to the South as our closest ally, our protector. Like we didn't have to worry about being a strong military because our buds are big buds would have our back, right?

We've learned some valuable lessons. Like that's literally the defense strategy of Canada is gonna be the Americans are gonna stand beside it really really is like if anyone if Russia messes up there we knew that you know America's not gonna let that happen don't worry so I think the part of the reason this is striking such a nerve and angering and riling up us you know I consider myself like a peaceful peace and love beatnik kind of guy. Like the fact that I'm ready to join some kind of insurgency and help protect the sovereignty of this nation. Like, I think it's because of how much it hurts for your

closest ally to pick a fight for no reason and inventing reasons and beans and trying to devastate, like literally trying to devastate you economically and for you to say I don't trust that this country won't resort to military might in order to get what this president clearly wants like the fact that this is actually happening from just like a human it's it's a sense of betrayal right of course it's absolute betrayal it's like you know when you when Michael Corleone kisses Fredo, right? You were my brother. That's it.

And that's exactly it. Like they were our brother and they were our big brother. Right? So, so that speaks to why it hurts to close. And then you get your time out. Is that I think, and we're starting to hear this from some of the candidates in the election, but I do think that like, there is a hope, and it's not a completely unfounded hope, that in the short to medium term, we can write and repair this economic relationship somewhere, somewhat right, that Trump might back down from this terror fever dream against Canada

and the whole world. But we won't trust him ever again. We'll never be fooled again. Right. We can never go back to that complacent sense of believing that no matter what happens, the United States will be on our side because we have seen clear evidence that even when nothing happens, right, they can betray us overnight. Yes.

And you get a time out here and I would just echo that sentiment 100% and just say that it'll never be repaired to the way it was. And no matter what, we'll never think of the United States again the way we have our entire, you know, we're 250 something year old guys here, the way we have our entire life. So let me something your old guys here, the way we have our entire life. So let me share with the listenership that Mr. Ed Keenan, quarterly guest on Toronto mic, love talking to him as you can hear in the headphones there. I have for Ed a large lasagna from Palma

pasta and I want to give my love. He's cheering from the other room. I want to give my love to Palma pasta. the other room. I want to give my love to Palma Pasta. They're going to feed us at TMLX 18, which is going to be June 26 at Great Lakes Brewery, which is 30 Queen Elizabeth Boulevard. So this event's from 6 to 9 p.m. I hope Ed can make it out. I'm going to definitely ping him before and see if he can make it out. People with the FOTMs would love to see Ed Keenan.

But they're going to feed us. So thank you, Palma. Thank you, Great Lakes. And this is exciting news. Al Gregor, who will be there at this event, he's hosting a great show for Mineris called Yes, We Are Open, and they are now dropping episodes from season eight. And in these episodes, Al Gregor went to Saskatchewan. He went to Regina specifically, and he's bringing back these inspiring stories with small business owners. So we get to, you know, here in Toronto, I've been, I realize, I think every, like I live in this Toronto bubble Ed, and it's like, I've had to, you know, Bruce Dobigan came over recently, Bruce Dobigan has been living in Calgary for years,

and he thinks so differently about everything. It's like, I guess we're the same species in the same country, but it's like, that's why, you know, you mentioned Alberta earlier. It's like I guess we're the same species in the same country, but it's like that's why you know you mentioned Alberta earlier. It's really, I speak Toronto and I have to remind myself sometimes that the whole country is not Toronto. Like this is a problem I have and I've been working on it. So Bruce will tell me what he's thinking and then he's not alone in that province. So it's I'm just glad that Al Grego gets out of the GTA and you went to actually Saskatchewan and talked to people in Regina and he sent over, Ed, I saw you using this at your 50th birthday party.

You got kids, right? I don't know if they all have one yet, but this is a wireless speaker from Monaris. Box and wireless speaker. So you are going to listen to season eight of Yes, We Are Open. And of course you already know this. Turn on the Bluetooth. Oh no, you do though, actually. You do. You do have to turn on the Bluetooth. Oh no, you do though actually.

You do have to turn on the Bluetooth. But I don't know if you've got those and they're great. But if they ever break, don't throw them in the garbage. Because you go to RecycleMyElectronics.ca and you put in your postal code and you can drop off these electronics, these cables, these devices to be properly recycled. So RecycleMyElectronics.ca

And this is exciting Ed, I'm glad you drove here today instead of taking the bike. I can't believe I said those words, but. Well, the weather was, it is good cycling weather, but yeah. It's beautiful out there. Do you enjoy driving a nice clean car? Do you like a nice clean car? I, I do.

I enjoy it more than I'm good at keeping it that way. Well, I'm gonna help you here, man. This is a huge help you're going to get here. Cleaning is only a hassle if you make it one, Ed. And that's how they feel at Silver Wax. Silver Wax, a proud Canadian company since 1999, by the way. They make it all in Quebec. They're proud to be Canadian. And that's key to me. And Ridley Funeral Home is proud to be Canadian. And they only sell Canadian caskets. And Brad Jones from there knows I love that. But Silver Wax, they make pro-grade auto care and cleaning technology easy for everyone.

Even you, Ed Keenan, they have kits for beginners, experts, or professionals, everything you need. So the order for the listenership and you, Ed, is to go to silver wax dot C a and use the promo code Toronto Mike 10 and you get 10% off your next order. But I have for you. It's exciting. I, cause I looked it up. This is a really serious kit. I'm sending you home with the most robust cleaning kit for your car, courtesy of silver wax. Holy cow. It's happening. Like that's

not just a, that's just started April 1st. Brand new Ed, you're getting Silver Wax and everybody can save 10% right now at silverwax.ca with the promo code Toronto Mike 10. After the long winter, the salt. My car needs some cleaning up. I think this is why they said hey, could we be on the show in April?

Spring cleaning happens because you know you've accumulated all your stuff and all of that. But it's also like when we're in the summer and we're going on road trips and stuff, we're often just like in the car as a family. But it's like a trip is an occasion where like you clean it up, you come back, you wash it up again. It's like the long tail of Toronto winters are kind of for me like in my home, in my car, in everything kind of a like let's just camp out and wait. Right? Like I got a bunch of stuff in my garage I got to take or in my porch I got to take out to the garage to store but like the snow was too high and then it was too cold and then I was

What a way to so it's like, you know, we're getting to that time. So well, I think this is why they said Hey, can we we join you and partner with you for April because they know Kenny us Torontonians us Canadians We're coming out of this winter. Our car needs some help in this. Yeah time right here. Hey, so let's go hyper local for a minute I got some quick hits here. But one is do we know who burned down that red canoe? as As I do not know as of this time we're speaking and news may have broken about it well while we were talking about sure and That was one that I just like you're just like who would do that why would you do this is my question

we do that? Why would you do that? This is my question. Who would do that? So in some ways what you hope was the case, like what you would hope is the case first of all and this should go without saying but it doesn't. So I'll just say it should not have happened. Given that it happened I think the better case scenario is that it's like a bunch of drunk teenagers who started a little fire, you know, for the reason. Maybe they didn't know. They're either gonna warm their hands on it or whatever or they're gonna like they just like to see stuff burn but they they didn't realize was gonna burn the whole thing right down. Stupid teenagers is best case scenario. Okay. You know and the the worst case scenarios are that somebody

intentionally did it because like, they don't want us to have nice things. They don't want any beautiful symbol of like, a neighborhood there to continue existing. It's just like, like so, yeah. But as of, so the last I read I think I this morning I was looking in the story I had been reading was not updated or anything like that and so it was like the police are looking into it

They have not yet announced that they knew who did it or why or have any you know speculation on that But it is like there there's gotta be security cameras and stuff out there. I mean, I hope we figure out who did it. Yeah, this is fresh, this is only from this week and I think it was Sean McAleff who, I follow him on Blue Sky. You don't post much on Blue Sky, do you?

No, and I might get into it, I might get into it. It's more like, you know what like I think you and I have talked about this before I used to be kind of like a Twitter power user like there was a certain point where like I live tweeted the the birth of one of my children right like um I I was like a always on sure and For various reasons over a period of years, I was using it less and less often for personal reasons.

And partly it's just like I was more engaged with my kids right in front of me. But partly the amount of toxic stuff that you see starts to wear on you. And I just thought I didn't need that to be as big a part of my life anymore. And then X and Elon Musk changed Twitter to be a whole different scale of toxic. A rage farm.

And, and so I just kind of like stopped. Right. But, but in doing that, in that process, like I got out of the habit. And so the, when I first signed back up for Blue Sky, I was kind of like, oh, this is like the good old days. It really does feel like the cocktail party days of Twitter right like where there's a big audience of people out there some of whom I know and some of whom I don't but who are engaged in an interesting conversation and sharing interesting

observations or news or updates and and and I thought I could get back into this and it and I still think I could get back into it but I haven't because I've just been busy with other stuff. And so I haven't gotten into the habit of like it being my homepage for the internet the way that Twitter once was. Well, that's where I learned. Sean McAuliffe. Yeah, Sean, he posted about the Red Canoe and it was a few mornings ago.

I can't remember which was it was two days ago or what not. It was very couple days ago maybe. And I got to say it was like at first I'm like, oh, is this a joke? Like and then someone else of course course, has real-time footage. I mean, I bike-buy that thing all the time on the Martin Goodman trail, but it just seems so senseless, and I just wondered if we're gonna find out

who the heck did it and why. But we'll stay tuned for updates in the Toronto Star. Yeah, that's what we'll do, okay. Yeah, I mean, the Star has reporters that'll be updating that for sure. Of course, of course. Stay on that story. Now, another story is that was interesting from this week for especially for guys are vintage

because you and I are similar vintage and we don't know a Toronto without this giant tower. No, I just, as I was on my way here, filed a column on this very subject. And if I didn't screw it up phenomenally it'll be published like tomorrow morning okay or the turn 50 yeah okay 50 years of the CN tower so I just I produce a show for a great sponsor of this show his name is Nick Ienis and Nick Ienis has a show

called building Toronto Skyline. Nick has Fusion Corp Construction Management Inc. and they develop condominium towers, etc. And he's always tracking skyscrapers and towers and different infrastructure like that. But we're going to talk to a gentleman from Ontario Erectors. I promise them I won't make any jokes when I talk about Ontario Erectors. But this guy Jack is going to be our special guest Friday morning. So the next episode of Building Toronto Skyline with Nick Aynes is going

to be all about the CN Tower which turned 50. Always been there. Yeah, I mean for as long as I can remember it's always been there and it's interesting because this is like I mentioned it in the column that I just wrote that is gonna be published, but it's like I remember in in the column that I just wrote that is going to be published but it's like I remember in the nineteen eighties and early nineteen nineties when I was becoming old enough that I was aware of these things that there were like sophisticated adults

who thought it was like a tacky embarrassment right who would make jokes about like the world's tallest freestanding phallic symbol, or it's the symbol of our world-class neediness, or... Those hot takes. You know, that the best view of Toronto was from the CN Tower,

because it was the only place in Toronto you couldn't see the CN Tower, right? Which is a good line. And it's like, these are the people who would also explain to me why, like, jazz was real music, and the pop music I was listening to was garbage and stuff like that so it's like whatever a starberry but it is like that just kind of faded out

because I think like at a certain point it's like if you were living in Vancouver and complaining about the mountains it's like this is just a feature of the landscape it's like the defining feature of the landscape. It's just part of who we are. It's like ask anyone in Canada to draw a picture of Toronto and they start by drawing the TN Tower, right? It's like... 100%. And not to spoil everything, but assuming most readers are not gonna rush out to read this as soon as it's hot off the press but like I think part of the and bit part of the snobbery back then that I was aware of these adults having these sophisticated adults right like um was that like there's nothing snobs nothing that seems more gauche to a certain type of person

than striving right like? Like naked ambition and striving. And I think part of what I get nostalgic about looking at the CN Tower now, if I reflect on it, like it's most days is just a feature of the landscape. But when I sat to think about like, what it represents and what it means and like, we, you know know CN as a company saw a need for a communication tower and you know they ran a company that did that stuff but then they're like right here in this abandoned part of Toronto these old rail lands we could build like oh the tallest building in the world it'll be not just a communications tower but like a statement and and a tourist attraction

and like and and then that becomes iconic and it's like I don't feel like we're doing that kind of striving anymore in Toronto and I feel like maybe maybe I miss it a bit maybe we could like when we're having like these the fourth hour of debates at City Hall about whether we can open a public bathroom in the park because it's like is it worth hiring the employee to do it and it's like well maybe there was a certain neediness and like embarrassing neediness in our old world-class stuff but maybe there was also like a sense of building dressing for the job we wanted, right?

Like the city we want to become is a kind of city that can do this stuff and will do this stuff and will have fun and weird and like world beating attractions. And I don't necessarily, it's not like I want us to go out and host the Olympics or do like soft shoe things for like to break world records for the point of them but I would I do feel like some of that spirit of we have been in in a lot of ways like fulfilling our potential by becoming bigger and more diverse and and a you know a beacon for the world and yet I feel like there's a lot of ways where we've lost that sense of ambition that the CN tower embodies and I I'm nostalgic for that. Oh, yeah, sorry.

No, this every question you ask, I just turn into a like a rant. No, actually, that's why you're here. And again, we're going to hit the two hour mark. It's going to be beautiful, honestly. But I will. I'll just say that what I love it again, I don't know any better. I literally have only lived in one city my entire life, which I don't know if that's sad, maybe that's pathetic, but at least it's this city, which is a pretty cool fucking city, right?

But I, I love the fact that I can be in different corners of Toronto and I can still see that damn tower. Like it literally dominates the skyline to a point where there's so few spots where you can't see the damn thing. No, I mean, it's weird because where were we? We were skiing at Mount St. Louis. It was like my kids' school's ski trip, and every year I go as a parent supervisor.

It's the best parent supervisor gig you could ever have. That's a good gig. Because you don't actually have to supervise the kids. There are like professional ski instructors there. So you just go skiing all day. So I was skiing with my daughter and two of her friends were on the lift and they were debating because they were sure they could see the CN Tower over the horizon and and I was saying like that is almost certainly

not the CN Tower. I think that's just like a radio antenna on the next hill over. Right. But they're so used to like being able to see it from everywhere. Yeah. That they're sure even a two hour drive away, that must be it. Like what? No, it's I, I, I'm not surprised there were, you know, pundits and I don't know. That's the way I see it. Like these Dick Smythe type characters or whatever that might have been crapping on it back in the seventies.

But as a guy who's like addicted to the waterfront trail and biking it from here in South Etobicoke to often to just like Cherry Beach there or whatever and then back Sugar Beach at least and back. It's just that sort of like you always know where you are because of the damn tower and it's like you can't get lost in this city because of the damn tower. It's just like this beacon. Yeah, it's like for people who live their whole lives, you say, how do you figure out where South is? And they will say, like the lake, the lake is South. The lake is South. But that's not useful to people

who don't know the city, right? Yeah, you're standing in the corner of Young and Bluer, it's like, well, where's the lake? I don't know, right? So, but if you say, the CN tower is almost always south, unless you can see the lake from where you are, right? Like if you, Right.

Like for most of the city, first you have to figure out where south is, find the CN tower. Right, if you're on the harbor front, maybe not, but a hundred percent. But if you're on the harbor front, you know, cause you can see the lake. Cause you can see the lake, right.

I had a tourist, I was biking around downtown and a tourist came up to me and asked me, where's the aquarium? And I, I just said, you see that tall thing? It's like, go there. It's like at the base of it. The basis. Yeah. So happy birthday, CN tower.

Just glad you're, One more CN tower thing. One last little thing. I didn't go for decades, right? Cause I went on school trips and with the boy scouts and stuff when I was a kid and then I I was like at the Sky Dome and stuff but I never went up for years and years and when we moved back from the US my daughter wanted to go there because she had never been there that she could remember so we went up and we ate in the

restaurant there but the the revolving years last later so two things all these years later the view from the CN Tower could still take your breath away. It is magnificent. It is worth the trip up there. It is, and just to see the city like that, especially at night, it's like, this is amazing. And secondly, the restaurant that's up there is like kind of fancy. Yeah, I think so.

But it's like I've eaten in some really nice restaurants and it's not like remarkably great food. But what it is, is like if you're going to spend the amount of money to ride up the elevator anyway, the taste of the multi-course tasting menu that they have or like price fix menu that they have is like only a little bit more and includes the elevator ride up. And so it's like actually a super deal. Pro tip.

Compared to just going up the elevator. This ties in brilliantly. Like we talked a little earlier about Blue Sky which I'm enjoying and I no longer post on the app formerly known as Twitter. And if anyone listens to the Mike Willner visit, speaking of Toronto Star, Mike Willner came back a couple of weeks ago.

And after that episode, I posted my very last tweet. I guess I don't know what we call it now. It's funny, because then later that night, I got the email from the CNN producer and said would you come on tomorrow morning? So anyways, just it all it all I was quite a day. Okay, but on blue sky I said hey Ed Kenan's coming by you have a question. So the two things is one is Mish says Great guy gave me good advice for writing. I'll have to tune in later. So Misha you gave me some good advice That's just like right and not knowing which Mish this might be

among the Michelles and Michaels and- Yeah, it's not Mishie me. It's not Mishie me. But yeah, that's heartening to hear. And Walk of Life says, "'He knows so much about the city, and I'd love to know where he visits when he has a rare day off.'

I feel like he knows a lot of hidden gems. So the CN Tower, not quite a hidden gem. Not a hidden gem. And it's a good segue. This is an interesting question because then you feel like you're on the spot, right? Like where are the hidden gems? Give up a hidden gem because then the world,

the million people who listen to this show in 2024, they're gonna know about this hidden gem and it won't be a hidden gem anymore. That's true. You have to be strategic. I also feel like I need like, um, like some direction possibly from, from you of like, what are we looking for restaurants? Like bars?

Are we looking for like, how about this? So if Ben Rayner were here, a former colleague of yours, he would talk about, although it's closed now, we'll get to Ontario Place in a month. But he would talk about the beach at Ontario Place. Yeah, yeah. What he would have told me about. Yeah. And him and his daughter going to that beach.

See, a lot of the things that occur to me right off the bat are not so much hidden gems. Like, they're not obscure, necessarily. Right. So much as that they're not as broadly appreciated as they think they should be. Like Bluffers Park, Bluffers Park Beach and Bluffers Park itself at the foot of the Scarborough Bluffs is just like, I used to say in high school,

because I was like trying to learn to be sophisticated. And I used to say it's like, because I lived in Scarborough and I was in that teenage disenchantment with suburban monotony, like a character in a John Humes movie or something, right? Like, and I sort of bought this ideology off the shelf. Although I do think there's some alienating things about and life, especially if you're a teenager without a car, but I also think like the zeitgeist of the time was to believe that that should be alienating, right? But so what I used to say though about Bluffers Park is it's like maybe the only part of Scarborough you would photograph for a postcard. Like you're standing there and it looks like

like you can't believe this exists in Toronto because it is the cliffs are gorgeous um absolutely I love jogging along the Humber River which to me was a hidden gem because before I moved close to it I was like an East End kid and I just was like kind of unaware of the Humber I mean are you talking about like the ATN Brulay Park Yeah for like a little along there, and it's just gorgeous. Um I like skating at the bent way. Yeah, I skating at the bent way Which is like relatively new and again like not on completely undersung. Um, a lot of my favorite hidden gem like

Like I used to be a barfly completely undersung. A lot of my favorite hidden gem like, like I used to be a bar fly, so I had a lot of hidden gem bars, and a lot of those have even closed in the meantime, since I stopped drinking and stopped hanging out in bars. And a lot of my favorite hidden gem restaurants have closed. Like I was like always like just a, I love diners, right? Like I love greasy spoon diners,

and more and more of them have just like disappeared including the Dundas Street Grill, which was like relatively big but like great breakfast joint, especially with a family like because they had a parking lot. I'll give you a pro tip. I hope I don't blow it but because I also frequented the Dundas Street Grill and then was disappointed it was it was closing and where we now go is the Olive, which is like North Queen and East Mall. Right.

And it's similar geographically, but the family can eat there and I don't have to take out like a loan. I was already a big fan of Real McCoy Burgers, which would have been one, but then when they closed and then there was a big outcry and they became sort of social media darlings when they reopened at Bellamy and Lawrence there. But it is like a great burger shop. Of course Apache Burger, if you're a West End person you know Apache Burger. But similar kind of feel

of like an independent place. There's Jumbo Burgers in the junction. I do love Jumbo Burger. It's under new management in the last couple years and they're still good but they're no longer open as late at night as they used to. I know, shout out to my buddy James. If you go to Jumbo Burger, you get the onion rings. If you go to Tom's Dairy Freeze, you get soft serve ice cream. Right. If you go to the the Dairy Freeze at Caledonia and St. Clair. Oh, there's another one? Yeah, except it's not the same kind of place. It's not an ice cream place. They do have soft serve ice cream,

but it's not like, it's like at some point there was this branding of like a kind of burger and ice cream restaurant. But I think they're independently owned enough that they're like radically different places from each other now. So at Caledonia and St. Clair, you get the steak

sandwich, steak on a Kaiser. It's so good. The onion rings there are not worthy. Just get the fries. Get the fries. But writing this down. Yeah. This is good stuff. And shout out to Mama Martino's right across the street from Tom's Dairy Freeze, which I like. Again, I'm a palma pasta man. You know this. Yeah. But I have a lot of kids. Super comfortable too. Yeah. And you don't have to get a loan. Like the fact that six of us can go to eat at a restaurant. And, uh, it, you know, when you tap with your phone, there's a $250 limit. Do you know this? Right. And now I've become a, used to not bringing a real credit card. And then, and then you go to these restaurants where all of

a sudden dinner is cost. It's like, Oh, I'm gonna, Ben Marighi is gonna have to pick up this tab, but at Mama Martino's, it's still kind of economical, which is kind of rare, but I only eat it, poma pasta usually. But okay, that was you over-delivered on that answer. And because I'm gonna hit the two hour mark, I'm gonna move this on here. Are we already, okay, we're not quite there yet,

but you got more you gotta get to. But because I gotta, because you know what we haven't talked about until I brought up the legendary FOTM, Ben Ben Rayner and we're always thinking of the great Ben Rayner on this program but he loves swimming at that Ontario place which he can't do right now. They closed it down. Yeah. Did you know? No, I'm just kidding. We cover this so aggressively on Toronto Miked because I, well I just had Ali Weinstein on this program and she made a documentary about Ontario Place so it aired on TVO. You can still watch it. It's called in another tomorrow I always script the name of this place but I'll read this the Ford government is looking

at moving its Ontario Place parking lot north according to emails and documents obtained by Global News and it appears to be canvassing sites at exhibition place to build the garage and I'm'm 100% certain you and I have talked about this very thing. Is there an Ontario Place update for us? I don't have an update for you. But I mean, this is like, the thing is that I think, to me, the real scandal of this, like, hold on, like, the day I, I'm trying to remember if I was jogging or cycling or if I was driving and I got out of my car

because I was going to a Scepter's game, but like the day they were clear cutting that forest, I went by and stopped and like saw it. And I was like, I didn't cry, but I could have cried. Like I was feeling so profoundly disappointed. Yeah. And like this is just so unnecessary. Um and so whether I'll be happy if they don't spend 500 million dollars or something on a parking garage, underground parking garage there, I guess, like spending less, wasting less money than that

on a new parking garage there would be better than wasting that money. Right. I know Olivia Chow had offered like to help investigate sites at Ontario, at that exhibition place. You know, although I don't know that I love the idea of knocking down the Better Living Center and putting a giant parking garage there in,

but I mean, you know, there's a limit to how nostalgic I'm gonna get about the Better Living Center. It's not one of my more treasured buildings. It was like name of a good wise blog back in the yes it sure was it sure was real heads know what I'm talking about but I don't have the latest scoop on that because for me like that that thermos spa is gonna be built right and it's not a good place for it it may well turn out to be a fun place to go with your family when it opens it will never be what we should

have done with that land. It's going to be under construction there for some time and the entire time I'm going to like shake my head and grumble and be angry every time I go by. It looks like a weight because it's all flat in dirt right now and you got your Sinisphere and then it just looks like it's been like bombed out. It's so I will see what it but again I put this on blue sky because I blue sky and I don't know if I mentioned that but I posted that if thermae I'm saying that right thermae I think so yeah if thermae were an American company and not an Austrian company I

feel like the time now to yeah Ford would possibly rip up this bad deal for this province but it's an Austrian company maybe we can encourage some Americans to buy the company. Elon can buy it. Okay, there you go. Okay, now there's a great question on the live stream. Not that I wasn't gonna get to it because of course you know I subscribe. I love the Toronto Star and I also love what Matt Elliott is up to. Yeah. I got this news from him but I'm gonna give credit on the live stream. Firstly, Jeremy Hopkins on the live stream says the real McCoy has Bare-naked ladies lovers in a dangerous time fame as well. So in the video yes, absolutely. Yeah, so I mean that's that's

That that lovers in a dangerous time video has captured a lot of my Scarborough youth in it including the real McCoy That's everything I know about the old A&As on Eglinton. Like Stephen Page and Ed Robertson and I were high school students in Scarborough at the same time. They are I believe a couple years older. Did you know them in high school? No, but I did meet Ed Robertson. So like I said, I think they were like a year or two, like I could look it up Yeah, they get a couple years a couple years older than me, but I was at like some kind of like youth Family retreat weekend camp that my mom took us to and

he was there as like the facilitator of some kind of like youth arts group. And he said at that, like at the campfire that night, there was like a bunch of teenagers hanging out and he said, I'm in this band called bare naked ladies, uh, at Woburn, you know, with, it's just me and another guy were like a duo. I guess this is the origins of it or this is how I remember it. Tyler Stewart came over and explained. Yeah. I guess this is the origins of it or this is how I remember it. Yeah, yeah, because Tyler Stewart came over and explained. He played like a couple songs, including Yoko Ono.

And then another song that had like some kind of like Jeepers shag, like there was like a Scooby Doo reference in it, but that one never became as far as I know they recorded it. But they were like funny, but also kind of a... so immediately me and my cousin Adam who was there with me and a couple of our other friends who were there were always like talking about this Bare Naked Ladies, these Scarborough guys and then they had this yellow cassette came out like probably a year later or something like that. Page productions.

So we went and bought it and so we're like early boosters of theirs but the point I didn't know them but I did meet Ed Robertson while he was still a high school student before he was before the Bear Naked Ladies were famous and he identified himself as a Bear Naked Lady then and that's where I first heard of the group and so I felt like this custodial ownership of them from the very beginning while I was still in high school. But lovers in a dangerous time, like such a tribute to being a teenager in Scarborough at that time, right?

The late 80s, early 90s, early to mid 90s. I, as you know, I grew up in, maybe you don't know, but I grew up the West end of this city. So everything I learned about Scarborough is from that video. No end of this. Yeah. Yeah, so Everything I learned about Skirbler's from that video But what I I can't believe it happened and we have to and shout out to bare naked ladies pinch me We got a pinch ourselves when we consider that bare naked ladies wrote and performed a billboard hot 100 number one hit number one hit that closes with the line Birch Mount Stadium, home of the

Robbie. Do you know this? Yes. Just take a moment, I'm gonna sip my beer, take a moment and just think about that. It is, it is a, like that's great to have that immortalized for everybody. As somebody who used to go tobogganing at Birchmount High School next to the stadium, home of the Robbie. Yeah, no, it's great. So, and again, I caught up later, in fact, only when I started this podcast,

that I started to capture Scarborough lore and history and a lot of shout outs to Maestro Fresh West and some people who kind of caught me up to speed right and you know Elbows Up I think took on another level and Mike Myers went on Saturday Night Live and made the gesture right there right so there's some Scarborough talk here but it's like Birchmount Stadium home of the Robbie in a number one Billboard Hot One song and then it's like wow okay so on the live stream they're talking about this I'm gonna quote Matt Elliott, okay?

Cause I, yeah, I like the man. What's not to like, right? With the, and you said this word a moment ago, Eglinton. With the Eglinton Crosstown LRT finally opening this September, I'm feeling some existential dread. Is that true that the Eglinton Crosstown LRT is opening this September? Man, do not count. Let's not count our

LRTs before they're in service is the thing so Unless Like I like it's partly my job to keep on top of this stuff, but I'm always worried that there's been like some development in the last 24 hours that I haven't hip to yet right but as far as you're forgiven as much as recently as I know and and certainly when Matt Elliott wrote those words and when I wrote a column about it about the same topic like around the same time this is sort of like confirmed to the star by sources but not formally announced or acknowledged by anybody at Metrolinx, right? Well there was like a trail of breadcrumbs where the TTC was like, first

of all, starting to put up signs. Like you know there's the shuttle bus route. Like they have signs that say this is the shuttle bus for when the LRT is out of service right and they've already got they're putting those signs up all around and there's like somebody sent me a picture inside one of the central LRT stations where like where like you go in and it's underground and you can see that the the the video screens in there are live playing ads right now. They're like video interactive advertising is on there.

And the CDC had written into their budget staff to operate that line starting in June. So originally people were like, oh, it must be June. And then the TTC themselves and the people approving that budget were saying, guys we don't have any information, but we need to budget for it at some point. Like we we need to include this in our budget, so we're saying June because it seems like as good a guess as any, right? And then since then the Starz Transit reporter Andy Tagaki has reported that that He has heard from sources that September is now the planned opening date

But that hasn't been confirmed and I think the reason they don't want to officially confirm it because you know Ford and Metrolinx have been refusing to provide a date saying only that they don't want to get anybody's hopes up They don't want to, they've fooled us so many times that they don't want us to be fooled again. They're gonna under promise and over deliver. So they, when they are absolutely certain that they're three months out, that's when they'll announce it, right? Right. And those sources of Andes have said essentially that that if all goes according to plan now, it will be in September, but they're terrified to announce it in case they uncover some other problem, right? Like, they are regularly running full service in there, like training runs and all of that.

Like, it's on, but there always remains the chance when we're talking about, like, what's the largest infrastructure project in recent Canadian history, like in decades, certainly in Toronto in decades and decades, is now gone so far over schedule and encounter so many problems that you always think, well, something could happen. But September is the unofficial date. Well, you know, you'll be back here in three months, so we'll get an update then. You come every quarter. People don't know that yet. What will that put us into the window where they will have announced it officially or done one of those like, oopsie, no, not going to be September. This is definitely what we'll believe it when we see it kind of deal because we've gone

this far. It's interesting that the city and CN never built like this mad tower that was the tallest freestanding structure in the world for so long. I think until I know Dubai has got a big one out. But on that note, because I forgot to mention it before as well now CN Tower. Wow. That was opened in nineteen seventy five because it's fifty years old. I can't that math and I was I was opened in 1975 because it's 50 years old. See, I can do that math.

And I was opened in 1974. There you go. So I know exactly how this works. But, and I learned this from building Toronto Skyline with Nick Ainiis, I learned that your old stomping grounds, One Young Street, the tower that's being built at One Young Street is going to end up 345 meters tall, which, you know, there are much bigger towers in the Middle East and in China, et cetera.

But it's worth noting that the penthouse, which I think is like 30 million bucks, if you want to pick it up, I think it's, it'll be the 105th floor. If you want to live on the 105th floor, it's going to be the same level as the observation as the lower observation deck at the CN tower. Yeah. So that is interesting, that's happened. So I feel like you as a tour star guy, you might want to pick up that penthouse. Yeah. 30 mil.

Yeah, well maybe we could go in on together. Okay, 15 each? Because the journalism business isn't what it used to be. So it's a bit of a financial lift for me. But you know, if you want to get in on it with that juicy podcast, filthy, what I'll do is because I'm having the big event on June 26. By the way, I pass a hat there for our penthouse fund.

Last year, we had an event in late June at Great Lakes Brewery, TML X 15. The listenership bought me a kayak. Wow, I told you this. Yeah, I've been I literally not right now. But when the water warms up a bit, I spent a lot, every week I got out and explored, it's been amazing for me to be out there in my foldable kayak that goes in a backpack that I bike to the lake.

It was amazing. Do you know, have I talked on this show before, like kayak is like Olivia Chow's happy place, right? No, I didn't know that. Yeah, and in fact, I talked about this with her recently, is that like, so I read these, among the things that I like, I've read all of Michael Connolly's novels. He wrote the Lincoln Lawyer novels. They're like, and then he has these detective procedurals about Harry

Bosch, and like they're just really good crime fiction, right? It's not great literature, but he's written these great characters and followed them over years and years and years of their lives and it's all said in Los Angeles. But he has this most recent character named Renee Ballard and she's a woman of like half Hawaiian descent who is an LAPD police officer. But as we first meet her in the first novel she's

homeless nobody knows that she works the night shift and every night at the end of her shift she drives to the beach and goes surfing she has sets up a little tent on the beach goes surfing to clear her head and de-stress and then you know pitches up her surfboard she's got her dog tied up in front of the tent she goes inside and sleeps and that's where she lives when we meet it and it's like you can picture as a novelist but like almost the film adaptation or the TV gimmick of like it's like the Lincoln lawyer whose office is his Lincoln car right and it's like the detective who's like a surf bum by day, detective by

night. And Olivia Chow, from what I can tell actually, like at the end of a lot of shifts, year-round, because she has a dry suit that she wears and she goes in in the winter, but like year-round she has like her police detective escort, like who's her 24-7 body protection like drive her out to locations like along the Toronto waterfront and she kayaks out to the islands kayaks around like it's like where after a hard day of mayoring she's de-stressing and it seemed to me equally like the kind of gimmick that a TV character would have yeah yeah the kind of scene you would see on a of a

thing so but if you've got a kayak and you're you're getting into it too maybe that a TV character would have. Like the kind of scene you would see of a thing. So, but if you've got a kayak and you're getting into it too, maybe you could do a like, enticer with a kayak episode where you guys like get the portable studio out on floaties and get out there in the water. I'm always three steps ahead of you. You kidding me? I'm gonna pitch this for sure.

Cause Olivia Chow needs to become an FOTM. But yeah, I always loved it, but I never even thought about kayaking the city. But I mean, I was just a wild diversion to Renee Ballard. But it is like a weird thing about the mayor that you think. So she works hard, she plays hard and kayaking's her like, you know, and her recoping mechanism there.

Amazing. I will kayak with the mayor, absolutely make this happen here. So I was, yeah. So I, the last, last June, yes, I was surprised with the kayak. Maybe this June, TMLX 18 at Great Lakes brewery crowd fund you up a penthouse at one, right? One young penthouse. Uh, not that I actually want to live on the 105th floor, uh, because I like to take stairs. My mom lives on the third floor of a condo

and I've never been in that elevator. Like I like the stairs and that's the third floor. Now it's easy. 105th floor is a bit harder of a. Right, who's got that kind of time, right Ed? 105th floor, Mike won't take the elevators, 105th floor. Well, I was reading up on the CN Tower recently and apparently, you know, when they do those charity

stair climbs every year. Yeah, my buddy Marky does it. The average time to get up to that lower deck which is so at that same elevation is about half an hour but the fastest times are are like seven to ten minutes. Wow! The fastest guy or the fastest person ever do it with like seven minutes and change but like lots of me every year the fastest person, usually under 10 minutes. So if you build up your fitness, potentially you could be scrambling up to your,

up to your penthouse in a matter of 10 minutes. Oh man, my quads would be so hard. Okay, so a couple of points here, because we got like 20 minutes here, we're rocking and rolling here. Did you know since your last visit, we had a provincial election? I was vaguely aware that one had happened, yeah. The results are eerily similar to what would, as if it never happened. Except this riding, because you're in the riding leaf layer fair clow

I always butcher that name because fair clow Lee Won and we used to have a progressive conservative and that's right now we have a liberal but you're right It was awfully similar and it was a third majority for Doug Ford. Yeah, so Do you think why he's like the first? Yeah. So do you think... Well, he's like the first, the first premier of Ontario to win a third consecutive majority since like Leslie Frost in the 50s, I think, or something like that. Wow. Now, we were just kids, right Ed? So... There have been like people who've won three consecutive terms but not three consecutive majorities. No, it's impressive and it's clear because this ties in with the

federal election cycle we're in right now, because April 28, and then there's so this is how we're gonna close of all this stuff, which it's clear that Doug Ford is not going to help Pierre Poliam in his conservative party. Yeah, from what I can tell. Now, I mean it looks pretty clear. You and I have talked pretty regularly over the years, and so it will be no surprise to anyone that I am NOT a guy with deep sources in Doug Ford like sources close to Doug Ford are not talking to me right almost never so so this is like from my colleagues and the other political people that I talk to regularly impression I get is that Doug Ford and Pierre Poliev do not like each

other at all like is is an understatement and had a frosty to to non-existent relationship part of why Doug Ford wanted to go to the polls early was to beat the federal people there right because he he thought if Pierre Poliev won that would be bad news for him in a number of ways and all of that. But yeah, those behind the scenes tensions have certainly exploded into the forefront in the last couple weeks, haven't they? And I mean, it doesn't take Ed Keenan to connect dots dots that possibly again, this is all just speculation

and possibly stuff here. Pure speculate. Lauren Honigman wants me to say this is pure speculation on my part. So peer poly of let's say on April 28 that the he loses this election. Okay. Which, which, which could he might not write. There's a lot still to happen. Oh yeah.

What? Yeah, we're all speculating here. So let's say he loses a which I think is recently is four months, three months ago, we'll say, we I don't think that was any. I think we all thought three, I'm gonna speak for myself. I can't speak for anyone else. But three months ago, I thought it was a surety that the conservative party would form a majority government. Yeah. Smart political people were like, not even qualifying their statements that when Pierre Poliev is prime minister. I had many a CBC person over and I would talk to them,

when Pierre Poliev is prime minister, what are your concerns he's defunding the CBC on day one? I have like a almost, I think maybe I used to, like years ago, like a long time ago, I think maybe I used to what like years ago like a long time ago I think maybe I used to be too cocky about my ability to make political predictions. Yeah when you said Hillary was gonna win you said? I was I had already learned my lesson by then. Good. But even earlier than that when we yeah yeah when people thought Donald Trump like well we want him to be the nominee because he'll never win and I would just be like be careful what you

wish for right it's like things don't go according to things right like so like at some point I became almost too protective where like I I couch everything in a like well maybe maybe you know like don't and and so but yeah people around me were certainly talking as if people who follow Ottawa politics for a living were certainly considering it a sure thing three months ago, and now nothing is sure, and if anything, it looks a lot more likely that he will lose than it did,

and it looks like possibly if you were betting today that that would be, the safer bet would be that the conservatives were not gonna win. Yeah, so this is, and I say this on CNN, so when you get to my CNN appearance, in this four minutes I do talk about this greatest flip. I don't remember the terms I use. I was smarter on CNN than I am on Toronto Mike. You know this, right?

But this, the greatest turnaround I've ever witnessed in my life following politics. In polling history, I think. Yeah. So this surety and again, I spoke, I actually had, you know, it's one of those things where, you know, levels, the first you accept it and then you go on. So it's like I was braced for the fact that it will be Prime Minister Palyava. I will declare people listening, sure, no, I'm not a, I'm not a big fan of the man, but I'm not a journalist like Ed Keenan. I can have these, these opinions. Okay. So although you're columnist. I'm a columnist, so I'm allowed to have opinions. You're allowed to have opinions.

You're paid to have opinions. Okay. So what about to get back to the Doug Ford thing. So Doug Ford just won three majorities provincially. I don't know how good his French is. I don't know how much it matters in 2025, but you know where I'm going with this. Pierre Pauli, he loses. He would be ousted as, I think this, how'd you, how'd you blow a 4-1 lead against the Bruins, right? So, they did that to their last two leaders, it's like, both of whom were kind of expected to win the elections they were running. Yeah, Scheer and Erno Tull, right.

And both of them got turfed after one. Conservatives are not, have much of a history of letting people run. So, isn't it an inevitability that Doug Ford becomes leader of the conservative party and runs to become prime I don't think it's an inevitability, but I certainly think it's a possibility and it's looking more like a possibility than it did You know even a few months ago never mind a few years ago, right? But I think like his long-term ambition was was always used to be like that Maybe he'll be prime minister someday and Rob Ford would talk about that like I remember his quote and Doug Ford's gonna be the Prime Minister right? Right. And like I think he grew up wanting that

and I think in that interim like after he was after he lost his run for mayor and everybody's waiting to see what he was gonna do there was a lot more speculation that he was gonna run for the federal leadership. And then he got us all out to his book launch, where he said, no, he's not going to. And then he ran for the provincial leadership. Well, Tim Hudak was ousted because of a CTV story. Patrick Brown, yeah. Patrick Brown, right. Yes, you're right.

Tim Hudak had been ousted because of his failing campaign promise to fire everybody. Right, right. Um. Oh. Can't keep track of these. Where he took a sure thing and shot himself in the foot. Right. Which John Tory also did famously with the,

Yeah. Yeah, religious school. But yeah, like then he swept in and took over. But he was, so my understanding again, from talking to other people not from me having sources with direct firsthand knowledge is that he was taking French lessons after he became premier you know earnestly trying to learn enough French both of all first of all to like speak to the Francophones

of Ontario but also as a part of a potential. Sure. And I also, my understanding is like maybe he's abandoned that or semi abandoned it. You don't hear much about it anymore. He doesn't seem to be trying really to speak French anymore. But you know, that question of how much it matters in 2025 is like, I think it does matter in Quebec, but it's not the only thing in the way that it used to, right? And I think like we're seeing so far,

and maybe this will change during this election campaign, but like Mark Carney's French was advertised as like, he's fluent. And then he started speaking French in places where, his French is far better than mine, but that he speaks kind of Ottawa French, which means- Okay, well I have French, my daughter and my oldest my oldest all my kids but the older two are fluent in French so they went to French immersion and I'm yeah the accent is rough but I I have

it on good authority from my sources that his French is actually pretty damn good right but but according to Quebecois people I know and and people who are is that his his French he when they when people talk about him speaking Ottawa French they mean this is a level of bilingualism that certifiable he can he can communicate both languages and it is enough to do a job there but that when you're in the cut and thrust when you're thinking out loud in your second language you become like very much more limited in what you can say.

His ability on the fly to fully understand questions that he's being asked and sophisticated questions and follow all of that. It's like so that's different than where I understand Doug Ford to be at but at the same time so far the people of Quebec seem to be yeah it's not it's not that. If Polyev has much better French than him and

others have much better French than him, that's not really their primary concern. Now, the last federal leader, and now Stephen Harper, whose French got progressively better as he was Prime Minister and who made an effort to start every press conference by speaking French but whose French was considered poor at the beginning like when he was running you know he didn't dominate Quebec but he did have seats in Quebec he had whatever and it did seem like he was given a pass for the effort by a lot of francophones, right? And so like maybe there would be a bit of that. I don't know.

But no wonder. But it does seem like the question I have for love for is like if he would really want the job. And it's like one thing that you always kind of dreamed of it and maybe he would find that irresistible if there's a moment. But on the other hand, of it and maybe he would find that irresistible if there's a moment. But on the other hand,

he just got elected to a four-year term. He has a chance to be what he seems to have wanted to be here, which is like this generation's Bill Davis, right? Like a long-serving and popular serving and popular Ontario premier who does leave significant legacy projects. And you and I have talked about in various ways and I've written lots about where I would have chosen different legacy projects in a lot of cases. Not all cases, like his transit subway plans are I think remarkable right like but but it's like then he could go to Ottawa and have to be Mark Carney's enemy or like whatever like maybe he'll be a success maybe he'll be a failure maybe it will finally be time like maybe a fall on his face like I don't know like it does seem like a strong possibility and certainly the

people in Doug Ford world, like his most senior campaign advisors publicly bad mouthing Pierre Poliev, seem to be making a move to position themselves as like, we tried to tell him they wouldn't listen, so now it's our turn, right? Oh, here's our internal polling. Look what we see in Ontario for support for Pierre Poliev. It's quite obvious. It

seems obvious to me that not only is Doug Ford not going to help Pierre Poliev, but they're working against him and working for Mark Carney. Does seem that way. And that's where the shift to then running to be the leader of the opposition would be jarring is because he has made such a point in the last little while of being friends with Christia Freeland being right friendly with Mark Carney staying out of this keeping her power to dry

but yeah yeah do you have a predict no a lot of time to go we're talking on April 3rd and no one's gonna hold you to this in your crystal ball but do you have a prediction as to what's going to happen on April 28th? Well, I think that a lot can still happen and I think the last couple months has shown us that a lot probably will happen, right? And I think so much of what's currently happening in the polls is tied to Canadian reaction to Donald Trump. Yes that Donald Trump can be maybe a significant player in the outcome and and

He could do a lot in one month, right? in a sense So I so I think the most likely outcome To me at this stage appears to be like the liberals are going to win again largely on the strength of this Canadian sentiment that the pride and and resistance to the United States that's risen up and the sense that they think Mark Carney might be best to deal with that. That his resume and temperament qualify

him for the job in a way that Pierre Poliev sort of like attack dog leader of the opposition resume doesn't. But I think Trump could like when he announced those big worldwide tariffs yesterday crashed the economy implemented the auto tariffs on on Canada and Mexico too we were exempted somewhat from the retaliatory we expected worse yeah yeah um if he sort of could pulls back on us if the if the sense among Canadians that this is less of an emergency like takes hold that like we're still resistant but we're not like worried that that Armageddon is upon us like maybe that will fade as the primary consideration also I think Carney's

resistance to turfing a candidate who called for people to like kidnap and turn over to Chinese authorities like a freedom fighter who he's facing like like I think there's political instincts here have not been shown to be flawless and there's a chance especially with two big debates but also lots of big news items that he fouls it up that he ruins the impression of him as the content competent leader There's a chance that Pierre Poliev Convinces people That he's the Trump fighter that he has a different gear to go through rather than just being the sort of like Tear the government down attack dog that he could he he's shifted so like lots can happen

But if I was forced to place a bet right now, I would probably bet on a liberal majority to win more money. But I could also bet on just a liberal win. Yeah, I think the odds of a conservative majority look look very slim. Bruce Arthur, you friendly with Bruce? I know. Yeah. He's also an FOTM. Okay. Bruce Arthur, you friendly with Bruce? I know, yeah. He's also an FOTM. Okay. Bruce Arthur, just on Blue Sky, he wrote, truly incredible that today was the day Poliev proposed a stern and good faith renegotiation of the USMCA agreement and an accompanying

pause in tariffs. So Bruce has been relentless basically and that Pierre Poliev is struggling to I would say read the room but read the country and his response here and again I have to check myself that this is a I'm a Toronto guy so where I'm sitting is we're gonna it's gonna go red here and most of the city will go red with a few spotters of orange. Orange yeah. So Toronto's I don't think a single writing. We're not in a swing state. The 905 is Canada's version of Wisconsin and Michigan and Pennsylvania, but Toronto

is Massachusetts, baby. No blue. I can make this stern prediction right now. No blue in the 416 on April 28th. But I just wondered if pure poly ev has a comeback game in him in the next three and a half weeks Considering and this is a line that I've heard from many a PR expert over the years and I believe it to be true Which is you never let a good crisis go to waste and there's a quote I wrote down because Mark Carney apparently said this today if the United States or maybe it was yesterday But in the last, you know 24 hours if the United States no longer wants to lead Canada will and I think that sentence from somebody we see at the helm that we Trust as we go against Trump in the United States here that

It's exactly what Canada wants to hear like I feel like this is and I feel Carney and the Liberal Party of Canada should send flowers to Donald J Trump that this gift that he's given that party, when they were down and out and they make a leadership change, and now I think they're going to win a majority government on April 28, that they can basically be at the helm, say things like that, if the United States no longer wants to lead, Canada will. And I think Canada, Canadians mostly, unless you're a die-hard conservative voter and it doesn't really matter who's in charge you're voting conservative because you hate the liberals, whatever, you want to hear that

and I think that the the Liberal Party is in a very good spot thanks to Donald Trump. Another thing about that though and I think this is where Polyev has a hard time. It's one thing for like they say oh he should pivot to realize Trump is the enemy and all of that right but I also think that like with the with the Canadians having the sense that the country is under attack they do want stuff like that that sense of like if the United States is and who Charlie Angus said at the at the speech at the Elbows Up Toronto thing and he said something like like if we have to be the defenders of democracy because the United States isn't going to, we'll be that because we've done that before. We've

been doing that all the way along, right? And so I think this sense that Canada could take a place of like leadership in the free world not necessarily assumed to be leaders of the free world like the United States used to or like but to be a leadership role in the free world I think that's something that's Canadians are hungry for but I also think it's one of these times where our integration at the you and I talked about how the Relationships ruptured in a way that makes you question whether it could ever be restored the same way. But I think that's where this sense of like our national institutions suddenly come to

the forefront in a way they didn't. So for example, like a big part of your campaign being we're going to shut down the CBC reads different all of a sudden. And he's been quiet on that front ever since. That's well, but as recently as this week, he's promising to preserve Radio Canada, but he's also talking about like, you know, turning the CBC headquarters in Toronto into housing, right? And it's like, again, there's a read the room moment here, right? Where like Carney's coming out and saying, we're going to get back into the housing building business.

Like our government is going to unite us and we are going to do big things together because the moment calls for us having to do big things. And Pierre Poliev's whole politics, so this isn't like just a failure to read The Room, it's like his political mission has been to shrink government down, to slash away all the things that are not national security policing roads right again might be out of touch with that moment and maybe that's partly that I'm like a bleeding heart like big government guy to begin with and my criticisms of big government is often that they're not delivering what they promised they're going to deliver that they they don't get it done fast

enough that they don't do it effectively, right? But there's no question in my mind that a health care program, a dental care program, like government interventions in the housing market, like that those are good things. So that's my political bias coming in. But it does seem like at a time where like, can our federal government be the backstop that keeps Canada's economy going, props up the people, reunites us, gives us a new sense of mission, that it's hard to step up to that challenge if your entire political project has been, can we dismantle Canada's government?

Right? But that's the job he has. So we'll see. Right? Well, we will see. And this will be long in the rear view mirror by the next time you visit Ed. But that two hours blew by. Blew by! Time flies when you're talking Trump. We didn't even talk about the Science Centre. That's how this... Well, unfortunately, I have no new updates on this. No new updates on this.

Okay. But I did, there is to bring it back to Toronto and you can read more about Toronto. Go read the Toronto Star and read everything Ed Keenan has to write. He's a gem in this city. But that Gong guy is running for MP. The Gong. So like there's going to be thousands. The biggest spending mayoral candidate. Yeah. So there's going to be, and I, whatever riding he's running is gonna have thousands of gong signs again.

Yeah. So what's his deal? Are you looking into it? We have looked into it. You know what? I have to go talk to the people we had looking into it and figure out exactly what that deal turned out to be. I'm just glad the gong guy isn't running in,

what are we called here? Lakeshore, Tobaco, whatever the heck this is called. But yeah, geez, Ed, you're great, man. Great chat. Thanks, it's always so much fun to be here. Don't leave without your lasagna, okay? I know your kids are hungry. I will not.

My kids always are excited about podcast lasagna. And that brings us to the end of our 1,663rd show. Go to torontomike.com for all your Toronto Mike needs. My wife didn't like the Google ads and she asked me to remove them. And I said, you know, they bring in a massive $250 a month. Okay. And then she said, please kill them. And I did because she said she didn't like the, she's a UX design person for a bank. And then I said, well, she knows, you know, I had to make the experience better. So I got rid of the ads. So not only do I need a penthouse on June 26th at Great Lakes Brewery, but I need to replenish that money I'm losing from Google Ads. But no more ads. No more Google Ads.

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