Do we need to beef up security for Doug Ford in 2026?
I ask after the surreal capture of Venezuela president Nicolás Maduro this weekend. It was like a Michael Bay blockbuster with a similar running time. One second, Maduro is planning another defiant dance video. The next, American wizards knock out the lights in Caracas as the skies rumble with F-22 Raptors and heavily armed extraction teams.
They stole Maduro with less effort than it takes to swipe a lamp from Ikea.
In addition to Big Macs, Diet Coke, vanilla ice cream and Oreos, it seems Donald Trump has acquired a taste for imperial conquest. Happy New Year!
Maduro wasn’t even inside his New York jail before the ghouls and conquistadors inside Trump 2.0 were threatening Venezuela sequels all over the map.
Axios published a roundup of doofus-in-chief quotes from this weekend: “We need Greenland.” “Something’s going to have to be done with Mexico.” “Cuba looks like it’s ready to fall.” Colombian President Gustavo Petro needs to “watch his ass.”
We are in dark times when a U.S. president sounds like El Chapo.
This is why I’m worried about our premier. Whether he’s threatening to choke off energy exports in response to tariffs or running anti-Trump ads featuring a speech by Ronald Reagan, no Canadian politician gets under Agent Orange’s skin quite like Mr. Ford.
The situation in Venezuela should be a wake-up call for all of us.
At his press conference on Saturday, following the Maduro arrest, notice how Trump never used the word “democracy.” The man is as transactional as an ATM. This mission wasn’t about fentanyl or regime change. It was about crude — Trump is now saying “oil” more than you’ll hear during an ExxonMobil conference call.
What happened after he heard Greenland is a frozen hotbed of critical minerals? He decided he “needs” the Danish territory. It’s as if I decided to invade Drake’s Bridle Path mansion because I “need” the indoor basketball court and 4,000-pound marble bathtub.
Stephen Miller, Trump’s lieutenant of horrors and a fellow more unpleasant than gonorrhea, went on CNN this week to basically say America is the most powerful country in the world and if it covets Greenland nobody can stop it. The old postwar order, in which America championed rules and democratic freedoms, has been replaced by what Trump now calls the “Donroe Doctrine,” a portmanteau of “Donald” and “Monroe.”
Coles Notes: the world is hereby sliced into spheres of influence and America can do whatever it wants in the Western hemisphere. That includes Canada. The United States is the suzerain and all other countries in proximity are vassal states. Trump wants Venezuela’s oil, Cuba’s cigars, Brazil’s coffee, Mexico’s bananas … it’s bananas.
And we need to stand on guard for thee.
On Monday, in the aftermath of Operation Absolute Resolve in Venezuela, Ford told reporters he wasn’t concerned about Trump’s previous threats to turn our great country into America’s 51st state: “It’s not going to frighten me.”
But should it? Should we all be frightened after this weekend? Maduro was captured in a military assault that took less time than it takes to make lasagna from scratch. Trump has abandoned his dream of getting the Nobel Peace Prize.
He is now on a war footing and there are many spoils in Ontario.
I’m certain lunatics such as Pam Bondi or Kash Patel are searching for a pretext to arrest Ford. Was it illegal under the WTO for Ford to remove all American liquor bottles from the LCBO? Does the muddled privatization of Ontario’s recycling program pose an existential risk to Michigan landfills? Does Ford’s ongoing war of words with the president qualify as an actual act of war?
Should Toronto be renamed Trumponto?
Trump is preoccupied in the Caribbean right now. But we know he has the attention span of a fruit fly. Eventually, someone in his inner circle will casually say, “Why don’t we capture that Doug Ford guy and take over Ontario’s automotive, machinery, minerals and food sectors?”
Compared to Venezuela, this mission will be called Operation Absolute Breeze. The Pentagon won’t need to send bombers or Delta Force soldiers. The Salvation Army could probably nab Ford outside a Home Depot and take him to Rikers Island where Kristi Noem in a stolen OPP uniform will ask through glitter lips, “Why did you run that ad? Big mistake.”
After this weekend, Canada needs to recalibrate our threat matrix to the south. America has gone from a neighbour we could ask for a cup of sugar to someone peering into our windows at 3 a.m. while casing the joint for valuables that can be pawned in crypto.
Doug Ford needs to be careful when he enters and exits Queen’s Park this year.
America is in a hostile takeover mood and we are in plain sight.
