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Month: November 2013

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

November 20, 2013 by Graeme MacKay

Wednesday, November 20, 2013By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday, November 20, 2013

Ford brothers lurch from low to low

By Christie Blatchford – To the old saw about horseshoes and hand grenades, you may now add Meeting 44, the Nov. 18 special meeting of Toronto city council.
If that wasn’t a political castration a filled-to-the-brim council chamber witnessed, it’s close enough to count.

Now anyone who was there will have her favourite moment, by which I mean complete and utter nadir.

For some it will be when the Brothers Ford – Rob, the now-gelded mayor, and Doug, the councillor – turned on Coun. Paul Ainslie, who had invited the attack because he was provocatively, oh, breathing or something at the time.

“Councillor Ainslie,” Doug Ford sneered pointedly. “You got your own issues.”

At this point, the mayor went into a frantic cartoon pantomime of a man at the wheel, driving off the road.

Grinning like a man unhinged, the mayor hooted at Ainslie, “Or was it one wheel?” (Earlier this year, Ainslie received a warning from police after he was pulled over in a RIDE check. He wasn’t charged.)

For some, it may be the two occasions when Mayor Ford, sitting in the speaker’s chair, tried to get Coun. Ford’s attention by saying, “Jones!” and motioning for him to come up to the chair. (The Brothers Ford frequently call one another Jones.) Others may have embedded in their memories Mayor Ford’s closing address, when in his speech against the motion he invoked the memory of his dead father, self-identified with “the poor people (more) than the rich people,” plugged his new show airing that very evening on Sun News (he promised “my side of things, unfiltered,” to which in my head I cried, “But I want you filtered!”) and then compared the meeting to the Saddam Hussein-led invasion of Kuwait in 1990.

Imbuing U.S. president George Bush with his own weird tic of repeating that which he means most sincerely, Mayor Ford quoted him telling the Iraqi leader, “I warn you, I warn you, I warn you” and thundered, “You guys have just attacked Kuwait! This is going to be outright war!”

But for me, the lowest point came much earlier, when Mayor Ford finished off his questioning of Coun. John Filion, who proposed the motion to strip the mayor’s office of cash and power, by noting that Filion had wracked up more office expenses for his one ward than the mayor had and saying, and this was meant ironically, “Don’t you think you have a spending problem?”

By this point, many in the packed public gallery were openly chortling derisively or heckling the mayor.

Then, with Doug Ford taking over the questioning, speaker Frances Nunziata trying to direct him and maintain order, Ford demanded that the “special interests and the CUPEs behind me (in the public gallery) … do me a favour” and be quiet.

The mayor from his chair immediately began chanting “NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP!,” and muttering about “socialism.”

Very red in the face now, the mayor got up and walked away a bit; he was rocking back and forth on his heels, clearly spoiling for a rumble in the jungle.

 

[slideshow_deploy id=’1866’]

 

He approached a strapping fellow who, it was said later, either worked in his office or was a security officer.

“Let’s go out in the crowd and talk to them,” he told the man. Mayor Ford was again grinning, but also unmistakably bellicose.

The staffer obediently lifted the rope which separates the floor of council from the public section, and out came the mayor, glaring, bouncing on his feet, all but kicking up dust in the bull ring.

At the mayor’s explicit instruction, the staffer began filming citizens in the crowd with his cellphone, the mayor occasionally saying, “Did ya get these guys in the back?” and “Get this guy, right here!”

All the while, he was smiling ferociously, but there was a profound air of menace emanating from him.

I was in the second row of the public gallery and he walked inches from me, shaking the occasional hand, including that of the man beside me, who said he was an old friend, and giving the odd thumbs-up.

But mostly, with that big, thin, dangerous smile plastered on his face, he prowled the alley in front of the public gallery, daring the hecklers to heckle him in the face, in person.

Finally, a couple of them did. From the speaker’s chair, Nunziata called a recess, but it was too late to quell either the mayor or the enraged citizens.

From the gallery, the crowd began to chant, “Shame! Shame! Shame! Shame!” – and quite correctly too.

Here was the chief magistrate of the city, prowling up and down the public gallery, trying to intimidate the very people for whom he works and who pay his salary, frightening at least one woman, probably in her 50s, into pulling her blue scarf over her face.

“How do you know Anthony Smith, you lying scumbag?” someone shouted, referring to the young man who is a homicide victim and who is one of the three who posed in that now notorious picture with the mayor, outside an alleged crack house. “How do you know Anthony Smith, you lying scumbag?” the man shouted again.

By this point, Doug Ford had joined his brother in the alley, the two of them, bristling with hostility, shouting up at citizens.

“Special interests!” Doug yelled. “Get the real taxpayers down here!” I think it was the woman with the scarf over her face, who sat as if stunned, but someone murmured wonderingly to someone else, or no one, “But I’m a real taxpayer.”

To my eyes, it was only the intervention of Coun. Mark Grimes, a big (but gentle) man himself who steered Doug Ford back through the velvet rope, that prevented actual fisticuffs.

Minutes later, back in his seat, the mayor apparently perceived that his brother was under attack and sprinted to his aid, running behind the councillors’ row to get there, and in the process, bowling over Coun. Pam McConnell, who went arse over teakettle. It was the mayor and his chief of staff who appear to have caught McConnell just in time, sparing her from cracking her head open.

Afterwards, nursing a swollen cheek and lip, she said with real dignity, “This is the seat of democracy, not a football field.”

Amen.

(Source: The Vancouver Sun)

Posted in: Ontario Tagged: Cocaine, Crack, Doug Ford, Dr. Evil, Editorial Cartoon, Mini Me, Rob Ford, Toronto

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

November 19, 2013 by Graeme MacKay

Tuesday, November 19, 2013By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Hamilton Tiger-Cats finally earn trip to Grey Cup after years in CFL wilderness

For SaleThe big men sat like happy boulders in their stalls, cutting off tape and laughing as the sweat dried, giants who couldn’t feel the pain. Left guard Peter Dyakowski said, “I hate those guys who have three Grey Cup rings,” and right guard Tim O’Neill said, “there’s always somebody on every team you’re rooting for,” and Dyakowski said with a grin, “aside from the East final year in Winnipeg [in 2011], we were always out of it early enough that the bitterness would have faded away.” They talked about how there are guys in this league who have three rings, five rings, even more, and Hamilton Tiger-Cats centre Marwan Hage, the fulcrum of this franchise for a decade, grinned sweetly.

“And I hate on every one of them,” he said.

The Hamilton Tiger-Cats are headed to the Grey Cup for the first time since 1999, back when Ronnie Lancaster was still alive, a lifetime in an eight-team league, an ocean. They did it by crushing the defending Grey Cup champion Toronto Argonauts and their near-perfect quarterback in a half for the ages, a half they had been waiting for forever. Hage arrived in 2004, the same year Bob Young rescued the team from a fiscal sinkhole, and lived through the bad years. 4-14, 5-13, 3-15, 3-15 again. A joke, year after year. When they got talent, they found ways to screw it up. Hage was an all-star. He could have left.

“I used to drive to Montreal after each season, within two or three days, and you reflect,” said Hage, after Hamilton’s 36-24 victory over Toronto at the Rogers Centre. “Five hours on the road, and I’d think, ‘Man, am I doing the right thing here?’ Because I’d see my friends leave and go to other teams and win. And win. I can name so many guys who went to six different teams and four championships and …

“But to me, I wouldn’t trade it. I love the city of Hamilton. Hamilton’s been great to me, from Day 1, even in the bad times.”

There will be people who will half-jokingly blame this victory on Toronto mayor and global punchline Rob Ford, who arrived at halftime in his No. 12 MAYOR FORD Argos jersey. He sat in the lower bowl and posed for pictures, signed autographs, and brandished a tinfoil Grey Cup over his head, which probably interfered with police radio frequencies. One woman wearing black and gold held up a sign that said “Our mayor is better than your mayor;” one pro-Argos sign in the upper deck read “We have more than enough Tiger-Cats to eat at home.” The mayor caused a scene, as he tends to do these days. (Source: National Post)

Posted in: Hamilton Tagged: Editorial Cartoon, fans, football, Grey Cup, Hamilton, print sale, stadium, Ticats, tiger-cats

Saturday, November 16, 2013

November 16, 2013 by Graeme MacKay

Saturday, November 16, 2013By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, November 16, 2013

Kathleen Wynne urges Rob Ford to heed councillors urging him to step down

Premier Kathleen Wynne is urging embattled Mayor Rob Ford to “pay very close attention” to those city councillors urging him to step down.

In her most pointed comments yet on Ford, who has admitted to using crack cocaine and is under police investigation for his connections to an alleged drug dealer, Wynne hailed city council for taken action Friday morning.

“The concern for me is that city council can function and it seems today that that’s exactly what’s happening,” she said, referring to two overwhelming council votes to politically emasculate the mayor by stripping him of some powers.

“I see that city council is making decisions and they are determined . . . to find a way to make that work,” the premier said at a Council of the Federation meeting in Toronto.

On Thursday, she had warned she was open to giving the city “new tools” to deal with the rogue mayor — provided Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak and NDP Leader Andrea Horwath agreed.

Horwath was noncommittal while Hudak, a close political ally of Ford, has refused to comment.

But a provincial intervention may not come to pass because councillors are flexing their muscles against Ford, who has also acknowledged drinking and driving and buying illegal drugs while in office.

“The actions this morning demonstrate that city council is determined to function,” said Wynne.

“What’s happening at city hall right now is very fluid and I think that the mayor needs to pay very close attention to the messages that he’s getting from his councillors and my hope is that he would take his lead from their advice.”

When reporters noted the advice includes some councillors urging Ford to resign, Wynne was pointed.

“He needs to pay close attention to what he’s being advised by the councillors and the people around him,” the premier said. (Source: Toronto Star)

Posted in: Ontario Tagged: Crack, Editorial Cartoon, Kathleen Wynne, mayor, Ontario, recall, Rob Ford, scandal, Toronto

Friday, November 15, 2013

November 14, 2013 by Graeme MacKay

Friday, November 15, 2013By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday, November 15, 2013

Rob Ford’s comments ‘disappointing’ to Toronto Argonauts

The ongoing saga involving Toronto Mayor Rob Ford spilled over its political banks into the sports world on Thursday.

After his contentious showdown with council on Wednesday, Ford chose to switch up his workday wardrobe Thursday and wore his Toronto Argonauts sweater, complete with “Mayor Ford” on the nameplate and the No. 12, the year the Argos hosted and won the Grey Cup.

But while wearing the sweater to promote this weekend’s CFL East final against the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, Ford made comments on media reports coming from the second round of revelations coming from Toronto Police’s Information To Obtain document. More portions of the document, which were filed as part of the case against Ford’s friend and driver Alexander Lisi, were released by the courts on Wednesday night. Ford’s comments included a profane response to allegations he made sexually explicit comments to a former female staffer, for which he later apologized.

With the Argos preparing on the field Thursday afternoon, preparing for the East Division final — a game against their historic rivals, the Hamilton Tiger-Cats — the team’s media relations officials were pacing the sidelines, tied to their mobile telephones. Questions flooded in from all manners of outlets, but not many relating to football.

The team released a statement expressing their displeasure at being dragged into the the Mayor’s theatre of the absurd.

At the end of Ford’s comments, in which he said he would take legal action against former staffers for their statements made to police, Ford dropped in an Argos game promotion before returning to his dismissal of the information in the ITO.

“And the next thing, I wanna call Mayor [Bob] Bratina in Hamilton and tell him we’re going to spank their little Tiger-Cats.” (Source: National Post)

Friday, November 15, 2013This is the local version of the same cartoon.

 SOCIAL MEDIA

Both versions of this cartoon attracted quite a few likes, shares and comments on Facebook here, and here. It was also mentioned in a piece written in The Toronto Star, Friday, November 15, 2013 by Tech Reporter Raju Mudhar

Posted in: Ontario Tagged: Argos, Bob Bratina, Don Cherry, Editorial Cartoon, Gerald Ford, Hamilton, Jim Flaherty, mascots, mayor, Ontario, profanity, Rob Ford, Santa Claus, Toronto, vulgarity

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

November 13, 2013 by Graeme MacKay

Wednesday, November 13, 2013By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday, November 13, 2013

Integrity commissioner cleared Bratina

The integrity commissioner has cleared Mayor Bob Bratina of threatening city manager Chris Murray during a heated council meeting.

Earl Basse’s report says Bratina’s tone and comments to Murray during the April 24 discussion on light rail transit were “angry” and “not appropriate” but did not contravene council’s code of conduct.

Basse’s finding was based on the fact that Murray told him he did not feel intimidated or threatened by the mayor’s actions, nor felt his professional reputation had been injured.

According to Basse’s report, other senior managers near Murray did not feel “intimidated or harassed” and Bratina’s tone in his exchange with Murray reflected the “fervent” emotion of the meeting.

Basse notes that the mayor also apologized to Murray after the incident.
Bratina says the investigation was “thorough” and “fair” and his apology to Murray stands.

“I think the important part of the report is directed to council,” he said, adding all 16 members of council need to behave appropriately in their relationships with staff.

Bratina believes overall the relationship between councillors and staff is much better than the previous council term.

“Everyone acknowledges that. The decorum is light years better than it was.”

Council unanimously voted to ask Basse to investigate whether Bratina bullied Murray after the mayor left his chair and spoke aggressively to Murray.

Bratina was apparently responding to Murray’s comments that a proposed motion reaffirming council’s preference for LRT didn’t contradict council’s approved rapid transit plan.

Basse notes that during his investigation he learned that senior managers have a positive relationship with council but often “feel intimidated” when making presentations.

This is the second time Bratina has faced an integrity investigation. (Source: Hamilton Spectator)

Posted in: Hamilton Tagged: Bob Bratina, crab, earl Basse, Editorial Cartoon, Hamilton, Integrity Commissioner, soft-shell crab
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This website contains satirical commentaries of current events going back several decades. Some readers may not share this sense of humour nor the opinions expressed by the artist. To understand editorial cartoons it is important to understand their effectiveness as a counterweight to power. It is presumed readers approach satire with a broad minded foundation and healthy knowledge of objective facts of the subjects depicted.

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