Except on Twitter, where the usual transit suspects are busy debating the finer points of Doug Ford’s Ontario Line, the premier’s proposed subway has already blurred into middle space.

Out in the real world, the scheme was never taken seriously. The assumption, largely unspoken, is that of course it will never be built. Why would it? Even if the discredited Ford weren’t its proponent, promises like this are now understood to be little more than a form of phatic communication, words spoken to convey empathy and feeling, not meaning. They speak of what we’d like, not what we expect. They come from a magical land where there are no budget restraints, no bean counters, no politics ... And because of social media, such outlandish claims have become a major part of the modern leaders’ playbook.

Such pledges and claims are nothing new — usually they disappear along with the politicians who make them. And if they do materialize, typically they are compromised beyond recognition. Either that or they had little to do with reality to begin with.

In Toronto, for instance, the most recent subways — the Sheppard Line and the Yonge-Spadina extension to Vaughan — were intended to serve political ambitions rather than practical needs. Then there’s the Crosstown, now under construction several decades after then-premier Mike Harris killed the original Eglinton subway after work had begun. But the new line will be an LRT not a subway, a cheap-out we’ll always regret.

The subway Toronto needs most, the one that would actually move the greatest number of people, is the downtown relief line. First proposed in 1910, it would add capacity to the system not simply increase ridership. The difference, though crucial, is lost on decision-makers who’d rather extend the metro indefinitely. And so Bloor, Eglinton and Union stations are routinely, sometimes dangerously, overcrowded.

To be fair, Ford’s plan has much potential. It could relieve pressure on the existing network and give riders another way into the downtown core from east and west Toronto. Jogging the route east to service the planned employment hub at the Unilever site also makes sense.

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Unfortunately, lack of detail calls the whole scheme into question. As always, however, the giveaway is money. Ford’s promises come without the revenues required to pay for them. He has offered funding, but far from enough. Also significant is Ford’s failure to consult with federal and civic officials.

So when Ottawa and Toronto responded with skepticism, no one was surprised. But perhaps that was part of Ford’s plan: having gone out of his way to alienate Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Toronto Mayor John Tory, the premier’s toxic politics had already rendered their co-operation highly unlikely. On the other hand, their reluctance allowed him to blame them for the apparent collapse of his excellent venture and let him off the hook.

As Ford has grasped, transit planning has become part of a ritual in which provincial and municipal leaders participate when they assume office. It includes a promise of lower taxes and better public services, less congestion and more safety, happiness and prosperity for every man, woman and child, empty verbiage ignored by all but true believers and the most naïve.

Though it reveals the extent to which political practice has shifted from the uses of power to its acquisition, obviously this does not bode well for our lurching democracy.

The getting of power has never been far from any politician’s mind. But today’s practitioners — Doug Ford, U.S. President Donald Trump and new U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson — don’t distinguish between campaigning and governing. Either their agendas comprise a single issue (Brexit) or are so abstract as to be non-existent. For them, words, ideally tweets, speak louder than deeds. For many voters, that’s enough. As a result, the tendency to exaggerate, misstate, omit, make stuff up and outright lie has reached the point where whole journalistic careers are based on counting falsehoods.

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Welcome to the world of division, shortened attention spans and negative expectations. Tone has prevailed over substance. The primary political priority is to tell voters what they want to hear, as bluntly as possible. Ford insists government is the problem, which suits his purposes perfectly. For him, Trump and Johnson, power is for winners, governing is for losers.

As Neil Young told us years ago, “Sooner or later, it all gets real. Walk on.”

Christopher Hume is a former Star reporter who is a current freelance contributing columnist based in Toronto. Follow him on Twitter: @HumeChristopher

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