The number of people here who's excuse for everything is 'raving liberals' is stupefying. Come up with better logic.
Gawker Claims Video Exists of Rob Ford Smoking Crack
- Thread starter Phil C. McNasty
- Start date
There was plenty of legal standard evidence against President Nixon, it was the fact that he was about to have been impeached and almost certainly convicted that lead to his resignation.
There is nothing like that standard of evidence in this instance.
Now Fuji makes the valid point that at the next election should the Mayor run for reelection the voters are entitled to take this episode or frankly any thing they like including the colour of the mayor's hair into account as they decide for whom to vote.
But is is a poor excuse for democracy when the press behaves as it has in this situation.
http://gawker.com/a-pipe-wielding-thug-stormed-the-rob-ford-crackhouse-s-511642073
I dunno.. I smell criminality of the organized crime variety, actually.
I dunno.. I smell criminality of the organized crime variety, actually.
President Nixon. Cunning. Manipulative. Paranoid. Bitter.
Does Rob Ford has a double?
https://i.chzbgr.com/maxW500/1960157440/h35326DD5/
Touche... well I didn't say that they were extraordinarily competent at it....
If I'm a betting man...Gawker is a front for the Toronto Star, operating at arms length over the border to ease the release of news with little risk.
Which is exactly why he should get a 2nd term :biggrin1:
They are definitely in cohorts with each other.
You have to be a total moron not to see that
Then you probably lost a lot of money. Heck, you probably bet on the Leafs.
More information is coming out about the crack house that Ford frequented:
http://www.thestar.com/news/city_ha...dent_of_home_in_photo_trafficked_cocaine.html
Yet another nail in Ford's coffin. But still not enough for a convicton if this were a court case
As I have said. Trouble is the other two parties also promised they would cancel the plants as soon as they were elected. So all three choices were bad ones. All three were happy to waste hundreds of millions cancelling two bad project that should never have been begun.
Where were the 'better than the Liberals' when the tenders were being called, where were they when the bad plans were announced? How is a bunch of name-calling and finger-pointing afterwards doing any good when there's no better choices out there? As I said above, sticking Tweedledum or Tweedledumber in the corner office won't fix things. What we voters have to do is make the pols play on our side instead of letting them sucker us into being their cheerleaders.
We need pols who get it right to begin with. None in that crop, and we won't get any better playing King of the Castle. Although you might be credulous enough to think so.
While I'd like to believe there was something as solid as a "… burden of proof …to prove that they deserve the vote" in elections, I'm afraid the history shows all they have to do is attract enough voters to turn out. The thought process that put the X next to any name are unknown. In the case of our current Mayor they've been most commonly summarized as, 'Miller was awful, so was Smitherman, so I voted Ford', which is a legitimate choice, though entirely subjective and opinionated, and certainly one that falls a long way short of your idealistic standard.
In fact I'd say no candidate offered anything that even rose to the standard of comforting personal assurances they deserved the vote, Rob least of all, and certainly there were no proofs (although there was much proof of Ford misconduct). But then that's my personal opinion, reflecting my idiosyncratic belief that good City governance takes actual intelligence and hard work, not childish sloganeering.
I assume you're referring to Rob raising property taxes to cover part of the shortfall that opened when he cancelled the Vehicle Registration tax (the MetroLinx proposals, would cover the rest). Also a matter of public record is his unkept promise to cancel the Land Transfer Tax. Good thing, because it gave him the surplus he's so proud of. And speaking of surpluses, the record shows it was the surplus from the Miller years that balanced Rob's first budget.
Smoking crack, like having a cocktail really has nothing much to do with being a Mayor, although lying about either certainly would, so proving such stuff is a sideshow. But when we're trying to come up with a 'why' that could account for a string of irrational, dangerous, illegal and ill-considered actions for which there has been neither explanation, admission or apology the possibility of drug use, legal or otherwise is certainly relevant..
And on the level of betting odds, I'd say yours would be dead even with the likelihood that Ford worked his relationship with his buddies from the smoking lounge to suppress the video.
Isn't it a sad commentary that we're still obsessing over stuff we can't see, evaluate or judge instead of really looking at what we can see: That everyone but the Mayor is reaching in to fill the Rob sized vacuum at City Hall, because stuff—transit, planning, ordinary stuff, infrastructure maintenance and building—has to get done, and all Rob cares about is shrinking the pot that pays for it.
Somewhat relevant is that the incoming President [Ford, no connection] speedily pardoned his predecessor so that the possibility of charging and trying him for anything, criminal or otherwise, moved back into politics. In Toronto we're still at the first stage, where the politics and the criminal stuff are completely inextricable.
As for the press, they go after and print what attracts the eyeballs they sell, and that's as true for the most respected journals as it is of the sleaziest tabloids and gossip sites. Like the unprincipled wrongdoing politicians who stubbornly cling to office, the prying salacious scandal-mongering media are the creations of the public. We buy their stories, we vote for them. And frankly, in an era when we're repeatedly voting for crooks and clowns and conspirators only because they chant the right slogans and wear the right colors it's a damned good thing we've got wikileakers, sneaky reporters and shrieking headlines to counter them with.
When we're all—or any of us—reading footnoted position papers and scholarly op-eds before and after voting, let me know. Until that glorious day, I only hope the press is free enough to be as self-interested and sleazy as the pols they go after. We get the pols and press we deserve.
yes I agree there are many, not all, that are completely obsessed with an invisible video to everyone but three. Based on your numerous posts on this topic you're at the top of this list: Obsession of the invisible.
You could have just said the burden is to prove they deserve the vote more than the next candidate. At any rate, it is for this reason that candidates are asked to reveal more about themselves than the law requires.
"I have a right to remain silent" has not proven itself an effective campaign strategy.
But similar to Watergate, and many other "scandals", it is the cover up that causes the downfall. It may not be the crack pipe but rather the length of pipe that causes the man to fall.
