Last week, at his nomination meeting on Jan. 22, Parish acknowledged that the Nazi regime “was the most evil regime in the history of humankind.” He continued, “Indeed, the terms genocide and crimes against humanity come that terrible part of our history. This caused pain to some people in the Jewish community in Ajax and beyond in Ontario, and for that, I am profoundly and completely sorry.” The apology failed to quell the controversy, with Jewish advocacy groups pointing out that Parish’s statement failed to say whether he had changed his views, and insisting he should not have been approved by the NDP as a candidate. Liberal and Conservative candidates in the riding also criticized the NDP’s decision to greenlight Parish’s nomination in the first place, given his record. Even NDP members were appalled by Parish’s nomination. Emma Cunningham, the former president of the Ontario NDP riding association in nearby Pickering-Uxbridge, said Parish’s nomination was the “final straw” and resigned her position, citing other cases where the NDP had failed to properly vet antisemitic candidates. After Horwath’s announcement, Cunningham tweeted, “WE DID IT!!!!!! (Next step: make sure the @ndp and @OntarioNDP put measures in place in order to not have this happen again.)” In her statement, Howarth thanked grassroots New Democrats and Jewish leaders who had met with her to discuss the issue. “Their counsel has been invaluable in arriving at this decision,” she said in her statement. “Our candidate team must be one that Ontario trusts to be leaders in the fight against antisemitism, and hate in all its forms—whether that’s in a synagogue in Texas or on the streets of Ottawa. Today, that means acknowledging and apologizing for our own mistakes, committing to do better, and moving forward.” n Lila Sarick is news editor of The CJN.
Doorstep Postings: Looking into Doug Ford’s future election prospects (from a Jewish angle) / Josh Lieblein
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n four months—Thursday, June 2, to be precise—Ontarians will head back to the polls to render judgment on Doug Ford’s government. Rest assured that Doorstep Postings will cover it all, with even more of the insider stories and campaign anecdotes that readers of The CJN came to expect during last year’s federal go-round. But before I launch into my story of my close encounter of the
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Ford kind—and every politico worth their salt has at least one— let’s ease into things with a quick quote from our Jewish sages: “Every moment that a person shuts his mouth, he merits the hidden light that no angel or creature can conceive of.” The sages were speaking about lashon hara, the practice of speaking ill of a person publicly. As we will soon see, they might have also been speaking about the sound and fury that follows the Ford clan like a tail. You see, I was an early adopter of the “Bash the Fords as often as possible, as publicly as possible” model. I had a good reason, or so I told myself. After all, if Rob Ford (z”l) had demanded that you be thrown off a campaign because he was mildly inconvenienced, would you take it lying down? The source of this mishap was a hastily installed phone system at the local campaign office. Transferring calls was more complicated than it had a right to be. When then city councillor Rob Ford placed one of his famous phone calls and asked me to connect him directly to the campaign manager posthaste, it went to the general mailbox instead of the CM’s personal voicemail. That voicemail, in which he unleashed a terrifying storm of invective against me, was later played aloud to the boisterous laughter of the entire campaign team. Rob Ford, who would later have bigger problems to deal with, likely soon forgot about this incident. But I didn’t. So when RoFo ran for mayor a year later, and it was made known through the usual channels that all loyal conservatives were to report for duty, I said, “Nothing doing.” Instead, I found a campaign composed of anti-Ford conservatives, liberals, and other non-partisans. The problem was, that campaign wasn’t that interested in actually out-campaigning him. Rather, they fundraised and spent a bunch of money, chased traditional media for a few measly column inches, and talked amongst themselves about how stupid, fat, racist and homophobic he was. Just you wait, they said. Councillor Ford would melt down and he’d never become Mayor of Toronto. Well, it’s coming up on a dozen years since all that happened. Rob Ford’s brother is premier, and those who would replace him are still engaging in the same rageful, ineffective lashon hara. If they repeat enough times that Doug Ford is stupid, fat, racist, corrupt, incompetent and a bit of a dick, Ontarians will have no choice but to get rid of him. Meanwhile, after two years of a pandemic that killed thousands in the province—and the countless lockdowns and reopenings—Premier DoFo is still flirting with majority territory. In the intervening decade, I’ve learned a lot about why the Fords endure. If I had to boil it down to one difference, it’s this: these people are willing to do what is necessary to win. Their opponents are mostly just willing to talk about it. Indeed, the wisdom of our Jewish sages has proven itself as relevant today as it ever was. If everyone who hates Doug Ford would get to work instead of posting creative insults on social media, it’d amount to a lot of hidden light being merited, which sounds nice. n Josh Lieblein is a political campaigner turned pharmacist who lives in Kitchener, Ont.
