Doug Ford vigorously defended himself against the allegations by the Globe and Mail of him being a drug dealer. He trained his guns on the media. His point was simple. They (ie the media) is out to get him and his family because the Fords are standing up to the special interests groups. Is he right?
He appears to be.
It is interesting to see that both the centrist and left wing media has launched a full scale attack on the Fords' character. The attacks have been horrendous.They included a range of allegations, some as serious as sexual assault and drug trafficking. None of these allegations have been proven. In fact for drug use and trafficking, even the sources of these allegations have not been revealed. In other words, the Torontonians are expected to take the word of the journalists at face value. The rationale being, what do these journalists have to gain by lying. After all, these are professionals and wont jeopardize their careers by fabricating facts.
The argument of journalistic integrity makes sense. However the bigger issue is that what is the relevance of what Fords are doing in their private lives to their political activities. More importantly, why has the media decided to unleash their enormous resources and asked the journalists to go and fetch any dirt that they can dig up about the Fords. Yes they are running the city but so are many others who are leading many other important organizations (I am thinking of the Premiers of the various provinces, the Ministers, the Prime Minister etc). Why are the Fords so news worthy?
I think Doug Ford has a point when he says that the Fords are being unfairly treated by the media.
I have not been a supporter of the Fords (due to their political views). But they should be given the respect and people, specially the media, needs to focus on their political agenda. To be fair to the Fords, that is what they have been asking for.
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