Rob Ford's Toronto

[ParkdalePetunia]

Thanks for sharing

You're welcome! There has been a lot of detective work going on. John Furr has some interesting questions about the variance that was suddenly approved last month though the staff had recommended it not be and he had filed for it in 2007.

Also, lol, I seriously have nothing better to do then watch twitter tonight. Oh the joys of having children.

 

[updownaround]

This is indeed one of the key questions in this investigation. Toronto Police spent five months surveilling Ford from the air with a high-tech spy plane and on the ground with "spin-teams" of up to 20 officers. His phone lines were tapped as were phones of his associates and yet not one warrant to search his car and home? As Clayton Ruby explained all it would take is a three minute phone call to a justice of the peace and officers would have the search warrant needed to search Ford's car.

It is inexplicable that Police did not seize any of the many opportunities that they had to conduct a search of Ford's property. Without a search you cannot obtain physical evidence of a crime making it difficult or impossible to lay charges in relation to drug offenses OR influence peddling (were the brown envelopes stuffed with cash? We may never know).

Unfortunately the media has not been aggressively pursing the question why no searches of Ford property. I think part of the reason is they were dumbfounded when Blair dropped his video bombshell. I suspect Blair deliberately dropped his bombshell to divert attention from the actions - or rather in-action of his police force.

So we agree the inaction was likely due to them going for a bigger catch, right? Do reporters figure the investigations are still underway and more arrests are likely to come?

 

[Sweet Mister]

But the difference is, CBC isn't reporting it as a fact... it's pretty clear that it's Farah's opinion and his alone. Just like when any media organization lets anyone sit in an interview and say whatever they like, regardless of its veracity. I'm pretty sure that "verifiable truth" isn't what dictates what is edited into and out of interviews.

I'm sorry -- you don't know what you're talking about. I was a current affairs TV journalist for 10 years and did many of these kinds of shows. It doesn't matter who says it -- if the network broadcasts it without a disclaimer, they own it. If they weren't sure about it they would have edited it out. The standard is 'balance of probabilities' not verifiable truth. The network lawyers watch the show in rough cut and if they are worried they ask for backup. The producer has to show them what they would back it up with in a court of law. If the lawyer doesn't like it, out it comes.

If they weren't sure they would either have cut it out or said 'we can't verify this'. They didn't. That means they checked it out.

Feel free to disagree but I've done this for a living.

 

[inyyz]

Neither here nor there, but am I the only one who noticed Robyn's pupils were ginormous?

 

[toros]

Neither here nor there, but am I the only one who noticed Robyn's pupils were ginormous?

probably on crack

 

[dforthandbview]

So we agree the inaction was likely due to them going for a bigger catch, right? Do reporters figure the investigations are still underway and more arrests are likely to come?

CBC's Jamie Strashin said tonight that if this whole thing were a trilogy of books we would be right now at the beginning of volume 2. Whether that means more arrests are coming, who knows.

 

[tjm]

Neither here nor there, but am I the only one who noticed Robyn's pupils were ginormous?

It's called television lighting.

Well well well...I moved out of the Big Smoke a year ago to the east coast, and never expected this story to really get play. Heard some rumours about the Fords (namely the fact Robbie was the school dealer of Scarlett Heights) but after the CBC show tonight? Wondering if Mohammed Farah is looking at a multi-million dollar lawsuit against TPS for planting evidence.

Shit just got real, yo.

 

[newearthling]

Has this been posted already today? Detailed break down.

http://www.thestar.com/yourtoronto/...nstructing_mayor_rob_fords_fiscal_record.html


Deconstructing Mayor Rob Ford's fiscal record
The Star examines the claims behind Mayor Rob Ford’s $1 billion-in-savings boasts.

OUTSOURCING OF WASTE COLLECTION

FORD SAYS: The city saved $78 million from his successful push to outsource household waste collection west of Yonge St. and east of Etobicoke.

REALITY: The union that collects the rest of the city’s garbage says the city’s estimate of $11-plus million in annual savings is millions per year too high. Even if the city’s numbers are correct, the $78 million figure is for seven years. It is fair for Ford to take credit for all of the savings, even if some extend beyond this term in office, but he has not always made it clear that he is talking about a longer time period..

plus so much more
ending with:

In sum: Spending shrank for a brief moment in time, but then grew again. Regardless, the initial 2013 budget was $9.43 billion, higher than the end-of-year 2012 budget. A spending decline may have been realized, but it is not “happening†now.

Finally, these numbers are for the “gross†budget, which includes all city spending, even money from other levels of government —spending that isn’t coming directly out of Toronto pockets. (Ford has argued that there is “only one taxpayer.â€) The “net†budget has grown every year under Ford, from $3.58 billion in 2011 to $3.69 billion in 2012 to $3.71 billion in 2013.

 

[Peepers]

So we agree the inaction was likely due to them going for a bigger catch, right? Do reporters figure the investigations are still underway and more arrests are likely to come?

I am not convinced of that. If the theory is police didn't move in with search warrants because they were working on "something bigger" and therefore did not want to blow their cover why then did they bust Lisi and the dry cleaner for relatively minor drug charges? Why did police leak information to the media that Ford was under aerial surveillance if they were afraid of blowing their cover?

If police were working on a "bigger catch" what would that be? Connections to the mafia and influence peddling? If so the only way police could ever make such a case would have been to seize one of the brown envelopes to see if they were stuffed with cash. That opportunity is lost forever to the police.

I suspect that the reason police did not act is because they could not take down Rob Ford without taking down some of the most powerful mafia figures in the city who are associated with the most powerful organized crime organization - an organization that has infiltrated law enforcement and the judiciary as well as every level of government. The "liquid mafia".

 

[tjm]

I don't feel sorry for anyone including his family. They are going for sympathy here to try to make us feel bad, and it's going to work for many. And wtf CP24? Clearly this is biased.

Why are you making fun of Stephen LeDrew? Stephen helps out in the CP24 newsroom. Do you make fun of Joey Moss too?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FpZDtEbAWM

 

[Kat_YYZ]

It's called television lighting.

Well well well...I moved out of the Big Smoke a year ago to the east coast, and never expected this story to really get play. Heard some rumours about the Fords (namely the fact Robbie was the school dealer of Scarlett Heights) but after the CBC show tonight? Wondering if Mohammed Farah is looking at a multi-million dollar lawsuit against TPS for planting evidence.

Shit just got real, yo.

haha, based on what? His word? In that case every home search that uncovers a gun would be met with the same story. TPS would've been bankrupt long ago.

maybe he got a gun... with what he was mixed up in, it wouldn't be surprising. or maybe it was his brother's gun. If the police tested it and there are no bodies linked to it, it's probably not too big a deal.

At the end the host asked Farah 'why are you now talking about all this?' and I thought they would ask him if he was receiving payment for the interview (if he's not, it's a good thing to say in the show; if he is, CBC might as well be upfront with it, rather than having someone else report it later like some dirty secret).

 

[tjm]

I grew up in Etobicoke, I own a car and I take transit but I think cyclists are assholes, I pay taxes, I'm in a union but union overreach bothers me, I vote NDP (because they actually don't run deficits in practice) but I support the Monarchy. We can't just be rammed into a simple urban/suburban framework. It's total bullshit.

I grew up in Don Mills. After university,I lived in Thorncliffe Park, and after ten years away, moved to Forest Hill for three years. Never owned a car, but learned cyclists are assholes. Used to vote NDP until I found they're just as bad as the Conservatives for dissent. Meh on the monarchy. Would prefer if we didn't have to pay for it.

I voted for Joey Pants.

 

[tjm]

Hey man, for what it's worth - we cyclists think you're an asshole too

If it wasn't for bike couriers, I would have never met Igor Kenk. This was long before the bust. My buddy had to re-up his pot supply, so I got to hang out with this weird guy in a building with lots of bike parts, while he played a baby grand piano. Surreal. (This was about 2001.)

 

[tjm]

Americans don't even give a shit about their own politics. They're so ignorant.

My ex-girlfriend, who ran the Atlanta Journal-Constitution Olympic website (think about that for a minute, she was cutting edge) launched on me because she was two hours overdue on a roadtrip back from Mississippi and I called her sister inquiring.

This was before affordable cellphones. Oh, did she give me crap. But then I pointed out that people in Canada kind of, um, freeze to death at the side of the road because their car breaks down.

So of course that means I'm Canadocentric and not to be listened to...bleah bleah...

 

[hper]

This will show up so much later in the thread, so apologies for interjecting into whatever madness is currently operative.

@typezd,

Perks is correct. Yes, Ford is the worst thing thrust upon the old city, Mega!-City! too, since amalgamation. And he is thoroughly the twisted offspring of such. But he was elected. Improvising electoral law is not the way to solve this. Kicking the guy out by Provincial fiat would not please me. Nor should it you. It would definitely not please the "Nation'. And that is the Perks Point, no?

Sadly, we're stuck. Stuck in Doug's latest extemporaneous narrative about Rob's fresh gambol into magical realism: "Yeah Rob's gonna go away and get some rest. Then he'll come back more honest than ever. Honest!" He'll spit it at some sorry radio mic with absolute conviction as often as they let him.

As much as the current clown-show angers anyone personally, as Rob would say, "It is what it is". Fickle press sympathies aside, that's what it will be. It's Warming(ton) your heart right now! Feel it? No? Just wait 'til Rob goes away...A little time to reflect in FLA. He returns in January with a new sunny disposition. There will be a clear "That's all behind me now". He Signs his intention to run, aaaand....good to go. Ford More Years. That's the new Doug script, right?

Perks, I'm surmising, opposes that script. As should we all.

Fordmentia must be out-voted. The chap('s) are not fit to govern. But they have an inherited and successfully modified electoral machine. Fueled By Kouvalis® (He's still in, ya bet?)

It's the machine to beat. Maybe Laschinger's building one. Maybe Kinsella? Both of those guys will give us nothing redemptive of the crap through which we've been dragged. Why not build a machine of one's own?

I Got Spare Parts.