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Rob Ford's Toronto

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Peepers said:
Blair said "I’d rather not have played any role in this at all but I’m not sure we were given any choice.†Of course he had a choice - he could have turned the investigation over to the OPP the second he learned Ford was involved. Not only was this a choice but an obligation and Blair should be fired for putting himself in this position of conflict of interest. Why did Blair want to control a police investigation of his boss? Did he want to use the dirt collected on Ford to extort another five year extension of his contract worth upwards of $2 Million to Blair?
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This comment by Blair struck me as odd well. I've always though it was odd that they OPP was not brought in to do the investigation.

Is this like an American Sherrif vs the Feds rivalry, or do I watch too many movies?
 
juniorfox said:
Yeah no need to defend. I really wasn't attacking. Just stating my feelings about the tenor some of the discussion had taken. What do I know though. I apparently used the phrase "fuck him in the ear" about someone and now people are blocking me haha.
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Not to bring up the dreaded scarlet letter ("A") yet again, but it should also be noted that the discussion there seemed to actually start out as legit before it went off the rails---seemed to me like people were more interested to know if she was part of the same criminal network that Ford is part of (e.g., any connections to any of the other players). It wasn't a sex thing so much as a crime thing. And, frankly, I am still curious about that.
 
Task for the left

King of Kensington said:
As a general rule, education has the impact of moving people leftward but people become more conservative with higher incomes. So there are 2 relationships at work. Thus a successful small business owner that didn't attend university is much more likely to be a political conservative than a lawyer or doctor.


The task then is for the left to somehow persuade the less well-off that their interests lie in more progressive redistributive-oriented public policy. This may not be as hard as it seems. It has been commented that there is significant overlap between Ford and Jack Layton supporters. Sadly, the last election saw Pantalone runnng on a platform that ALL WAS WELL in Toronto. This is clearly not the case as evidenced by growing inequality and deepening poverty in Toronto. What needs to be done is to provide a candidate that people can feel will watch out for them. And this may be Olivia!
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Apparently price has been given the boot from City Hall. No longer working there.

I hope he never finds another job.
 
Thank you TinyTiny - good that someone finally laid out of the math for all to see (and yes, I disapprove of someone spending city money on spousal travel unrelated to city business)

AoD
 
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rightwingSUVdriver said:
Here are a few promotional spots for the re-election campaign:

[video=youtube;MzpUUwfDI-s]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MzpUUwfDI-s[/video]

And:
Spot #2
Spot #3
Spot #4

Hopefully someone from the Ford camp does the smart thing and buys some airtime for these…
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They probably would, thinking that it would appeal to the regular person.
Did you do these? Good job.
 
James_D said:
Apparently price has been given the boot from City Hall. No longer working there.

I hope he never finds another job.
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Are there no hiring criteria at City Hall? I am paid with tax dollars and we are required to have all kinds of accountable and transparent hiring procedures in place. How can Councillors and mayors simply hire people with no experience,not be required to post jobs, hold interviews, etc?
 
NYCBoy2305 said:
King of Kensington said:
The task then is for the left to somehow persuade the less well-off that their interests lie in more progressive redistributive-oriented public policy. This may not be as hard as it seems. It has been commented that there is significant overlap between Ford and Jack Layton supporters. Sadly, the last election saw Pantalone runnng on a platform that ALL WAS WELL in Toronto. This is clearly not the case as evidenced by growing inequality and deepening poverty in Toronto. What needs to be done is to provide a candidate that people can feel will watch out for them. And this may be Olivia!
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There was some overlap between Ford and Layton supporters, but I don't know if there was a significant overlap - I'm pretty sure most of the 30-35% in Scarborough that voted NDP voted for candidates other than Ford. Nonetheless you're quite right about the failure of the left though. Pantalone came across as a technocrat defending the status quo and Smitherman was a dreadful candidate and not a progressive. Ford was lucky to have such weak opposition.
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The next time a Ford Nationite goes on about how he's saved money, cite this: Toronto Borrowing Costs Rise as Ford Drug Scandal Consumes City:
Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s crack scandal is beginning to weigh on the city’s finances, driving up borrowing costs and threatening to delay fixes to North America’s second-worst traffic congestion.
The extra interest Toronto must pay to borrow from the bond market compared with federal government benchmarks rose four basis points, or 0.04 percentage point, to 94 basis points since city council urged Ford to step aside after he admitted to smoking crack cocaine. During the same period, borrowing costs in the broader Bank of America Merrill Lynch Canadian Provincial & Municipal Index fell one basis point.
“Anybody who is outside the city or outside the country may just want to clean up their portfolios before this thing gets even uglier,” said Hosen Marjaee, senior managing director of fixed income at Manulife Asset Management Ltd., which manages C$16 billion ($15.3 billion) in debt, including Toronto bonds. “I’m not worried about the city or city finances or the ability to pay its debt, I’m worried about the negative press it’s getting, and inability to move on.”
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So right now, by conservative measures, you're looking at roughly $300,000+ of waste generated by mayor McCrackinstein.
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You have to remember that Ford is a metaphor for something people like peepers can't give up. So rationalization needs to be employed...and one can rationalize away even the most outrageous things. That's how if expensing some ice cream is perceived as misappropriation of public money, then he is a "disgusting scumbag".

But as long as Ford remains the metaphor for fiscal conservatism in people's minds, they will continue to rationalize away the obvious. Conservatives don't like to admit they are wrong, which is how obviously criminal televangelists stay in business...even after they have been found guilty. If you are STILL defending Rob Ford, and calling someone other than Rob Ford a "disgusting scumbag", then you are so far down the rabbit hole there's little point in trying to find a way out.

And Ford's "waste" has gone far beyond ice cream or $300,000. How about pissing away $200 million on inappropriately cancelling transit projects, or raiding the city's surplus funds to the tune of $346 million to pay for his campaign promises that were supposed to be "free" (cancelling VRT & freezing taxes).

There's over 1/2 $billion right there without even trying.
 
PinkLucy said:
Are there no hiring criteria at City Hall? I am paid with tax dollars and we are required to have all kinds of accountable and transparent hiring procedures in place. How can Councillors and mayors simply hire people with no experience,not be required to post jobs, hold interviews, etc?
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There are no criteria for political appointments. They're direct hires.
 
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