Doug Ford is lying about why he called the election.
Lisa MacLeod told all of us the truth. It has nothing to do with Trump.
The writ has been dropped! Or drawn up, depending on whether you still watch The Agenda on TVO. I’m not particularly a fan anymore.
As of January 28th, 2025, the 43rd Parliament of Ontario has been dissolved by Lieutenant Governor Edith Dumont, after receiving the advice and consent of Premier Doug Ford.
While the Legislative Assembly of Ontario can sit for at least five years according to Section 4 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Doug Ford has decided to cut it short at only 905 days, less than halfway to the maximum duration!
Mind you, there were zero problems holding confidence of the legislature, because Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservative Party held an ironclad majority at the time of dissolution, controlling 79 of the 124 seats.
Even if the New Democratic Party and the Liberal Party could agree to work together, and the Greens joined in for fun, it would have been pointless. The opposition is dwarfed by the government, to the point where Doug Ford can crush dissent and banish several MPPs from caucus without his whip needing to worry about math.
Despite all this, Doug Ford is bringing down the election hammer remarkably early. Ostensibly, he is doing so to respond to Donald Trump’s threats to annex Canada through economic force.
But there’s just one problem with that; Lisa MacLeod broke kayfabe, and revealed to all of us that Doug Ford is lying.
For those unaware, “kayfabe” is a wresting term for the fake, scripted nature of professional wrestling like WWE, WCW, and AEW. When something is going as scripted, it’s called a “work”, but when something is truly happening in reality, it’s called a “shoot”.
Political commentators have borrowed the term “kayfabe” in recent years, because it’s really useful for pointing out when a politician is “putting on a show”, so to speak. And in this case, Doug Ford is “working” the crowd like the two-bit carneys that wrestling promoters descend from.
Many months ago, Lisa MacLeod confirmed she would be retiring from the Legislative Assembly, and not run for re-election as MPP in Nepean.
Then, in early November, weeks before Trump first threatened to use tariffs, MacLeod participated in an absurdly villainous rally against the homeless, and gave a speech hinting that her time in office would conclude in the last week of February 2025.
She then proceeded to quickly deny to Policorner that this would have anything to do with a snap election call, saying it was entirely on “[her] terms”. Clearly, the Premier didn’t appreciate these rumours!
But then, wouldn’t you know it, Doug Ford has now called a snap election, with voting to be held in the last week of February 2025, exactly as Lisa MacLeod described!
I think it’s pretty obvious what’s going on here. Lisa MacLeod broke kayfabe.
The election has nothing to do with Donald Trump, it has nothing to do with getting a “mandate”, it was always planned to be snap called for February, because Doug Ford believes that this is a good tactic to fulfill some arcane purpose.
We can do a lot of theorycrafting as to why he believes it to be strategically advantageous, and he may even be proven correct in taking this gamble…whatever it is he’s even trying to accomplish!
But none of that matters to me as much as the fact that we all know he’s lying about what he’s really planning, and nobody who writes about this for a living is willing to just fucking point it out!
They told us the truth already! They broke kayfabe and revealed everything is scripted! They showed us that Rey Mysterio and Chris Jericho are actually friends in real life, and that their on-screen feud is a work!
Why are we pretending we didn’t see what we saw?! Stop telling us that a work is a shoot when Lisa MacLeod literally gave us the script for the match!
Whatever madness possesses Doug Ford, Ontarians should be focusing on one thing, and one thing only. Doug Ford called a snap election extremely early, and he lied about why he’s doing it.
So when you go to the polling booth on February 27th, and you vote for an MPP in your riding to join the 44th Parliament of Ontario, remember to ask yourself:
“Why is Doug Ford lying to me?”