Rob Ford going off the rails! Part II

Sineed, I received the exact same reply in response to my email pushing to keek Transit City.

Rob Ford is not interested in us. He is all about his "base" and we can just go screw ourselves. Bike riding commie pinkos.

I got the same response, twice.

N.R.Kissed wrote:

 meaningless formulaic crap

After the Cherry fiasco earlier this week, I welcome meaningless formulaic crap with open arms. Look how low my expections are now. Damn it all to hell.

I emailed my councilor Ana Baileo weeks ago and have still heard nothing from her. I see that she was recently given a pretty nice appointment by the Mayor considering she only has a few days experience as a councilor.

We're not surprised. We're fucking angry.

Well, I am.

Correction - Ford ran on a platform (released on Youtube at midnight and given as little publicity as possible) to REPLACE Transit City with his etch-a-sketch drawing of subway lines criss-crossing the city and he promised that it would be NO PROBLEM AT ALL to get the billions of dollars extra to build subway lines to all the places that LRTs were supposed to go to in Transit City. People did not vote for Ford to scrap Transit City and replace it with NOTHING (which is what will happen). Ford avoided talking about transit during the campiagn as much as possible and when pressed he said that by "stopping the gravy train" (ie: stopping city councillors from getting to go to the Zoo for free) - he would be able to pay for his etch-a-sketch of subway lines.

jrootham wrote:

The cost of the bridge was due to fraud on the part of the Toronto Port Authority.

 

Now that is funny.  Miller runs up millions of dollars in costs cancelling a bridge and that is someone else's fault . 

Gold that's lame!

Stockholm wrote:

Ford avoided talking about transit during the campiagn as much as possible and when pressed he said that by "stopping the gravy train" (ie: stopping city councillors from getting to go to the Zoo for free) - he would be able to pay for his etch-a-sketch of subway lines.

He talked about the 'gravy train'. Real trains, not so much. Even less about how he's going to pay for them, and have them built by 2015.

I've been engaging the pondlife on the Sun's comment boards (hey, I like blood sport), and the best they've come up with is that the Liberals will be so scared of losing Toronto in 2011, that they'll give Ford anything he wants.

Anyone notice that Ford is unable to say "citizen" or "resident". He reports to the "taxpayers" only. No one else matters. 

The Don Cherry thing was so revealing.

1) Conservatives have a hate on for anyone who doesn't vote for them or who takes transit (even if they vote for them).

2) The "war on cars" is over. It's more important for Mississaugans to have a fast drive in and out of Toronto than it is for Torontonians to get around on transit. They're taxpayers too.

3) Millionaires now speak on behalf of working people. Transit riders are elitists. 

Now that Ford is mayor, the focus is quickly shifting to electing Tim Hudak as premier next year. Expect to see more of Don Cherry campaigning in T.O. for "the little guy". 

This is worth reading. 

John Moore: Don Cherry’s ‘swaggering performance by a classic bully’

Quote:

Cherry’s behavior should come as no surprise. He’ll likely say it was all for show. But what has better than fifty percent of the population of Toronto done to be verbally abused at the induction of their new mayor

Here’s my challenge to those who were thrilled by Cherry’s braggadocio: provide me with a single example of a formal swearing-in ceremony where a left-wing office holder or one of his proxies turned to the audience and essentially said “suck on this”. In fact, I’ll widen the challenge: when has an incumbent liberal ever said “hey fascists, I’m in charge now. Screw you.”?

Somebody doesn't remember their history.  It was a scam from the get go.

Oh, and even inflated, it was $35 million, not hundreds of millions.

Also, check out the Porter Air books.  They are going bankrupt.

A political wrote:

jrootham wrote:

The cost of the bridge was due to fraud on the part of the Toronto Port Authority.

 

Now that is funny.  Miller runs up millions of dollars in costs cancelling a bridge and that is someone else's fault . 

Gold that's lame!

It's not like the TTC rushed to secure a bunch of Transit City contracts with heavy termination fees when they found out Rob Ford would probably win.

Free Transit and Movement Building

Quote:

Among the strengths of the free transit campaign is its potential to foreground and develop an analysis of our collective stake in the protection of public goods. It is not difficult to talk about public goods in the context of mass transportation infrastructure. The shared benefits of public transportation are difficult to deny, particularly in a city as large and as sprawling as Toronto. Even setting aside the obvious ecological imperatives that should be driving public investment in greener infrastructure, there are powerful economic reasons to support a massive re-investment in Ontario's transportation sector. A serious effort to expand the reach and accessibility of the public transit system would serve not only to ease the burden of Toronto's most vulnerable residents and reduce the economic and health costs associated with air pollution and traffic congestion: such an investment could re-direct the wasted skills and resources embodied in Ontario's laid-off auto-workers and silent auto-plants, which could be converted to the production of high efficiency mass transit vehicles. As Sam Gindin and Leo Panitch (2010) argued recently in the Toronto Star, public borrowing to finance such investments represents not a wasteful burden on future generations, but a commitment to securing them a future. The real squandering of our collective resources lies not in public borrowing or in benefits packages for public employees, but in our failure to direct existing skills, knowledge, and material capacities into a coherent strategy for building sustainable communities.

The idea of a free transit movement immediately foregrounds a number of thorny strategic questions for the left in Toronto: how to build trust, dialogue, and support for a free transit movement within the transit union; how to address and re-focus the widespread anger, mistrust, and resentment directed at the public sector in the current climate; how to sustain and advance anti-capitalist principles while building productive relationships within broader progressive milieux. Navigating these questions will be challenging, and the Assembly is still a long way from a coherent and systematic approach to answering them. But the fact that these questions surface so quickly and urgently is a positive sign of the ambition and seriousness with which the Assembly is approaching the organization of a free transit movement. The free transit campaign will push the Assembly to develop further its internal organizational and decision-making capacities, but it will also demand an outward-looking, inclusive process, in which the Assembly's role is to open space for debate, dialogue, and collective strategizing.

In fact, the transit system itself can provide the venue for us to stage public discussions about our collective resources and to share alternative visions for our city: the transit system is a readymade classroom, theatre, and art gallery, attended every day by people who could come to recognize their stake in the de-commodification of public goods of many kinds. My hope is that Toronto's buses, streetcars, and subway platforms could be places for experimentation, places to develop the new tactics, organizing skills, and relationships that might permit us to really depart from the prevailing script.

Olly wrote:

Ford ran on a platform of scrapping Transit City. Why is anyone surprised he's doing it? Same with Miller and the bridge, which cost hundreds of millions of dollars to scrap. I'm just so glad that right wing Smitherman didn't win! Then we'd be in real trouble!!

The details of the settlement for the bridge cancellation remain a secret to this day, although the Port Authority immediately committed 4 million for a new ferry. But the difference between four and "hundreds of millions" is pretty wide. Do you have an insider source for your information, Olly?

Or is your claim as ridiculous as I suspect?

edited to add

I see the issue was already dealt with earlier and better. Thanks to JR for this link.

A political wrote:

Certainly I have heard much larger numbers the 35 million, but let's concede that is is 35 million that Miller wasted because he promised in his campaign to dump the brigde.  Ford promised dump transit city.  So what is the difference.  Oh yeah you don't agree with Ford but you did with Miller!

Miller didn't waste anything because it wasn't city money. It was money paid by the Federal government to some corporate friends who were offered deals by the Port Authority just before Miller was elected. The difference was the port authority a federal body and run by a conservative shill was responsible. So once again conservative equals waste

A political wrote:

N.R.KISSED wrote:

Miller didn't waste anything because it wasn't city money. It was money paid by the Federal government to some corporate friends who were offered deals by the Port Authority just before Miller was elected. The difference was the port authority a federal body and run by a conservative shill was responsible. So once again conservative equals waste

Oh I am so out of touch-so if city officals waste my federal tax money that's okay, it only counts when it is city tax money.  NEWSFLASH   We are all the same taxpayers.  Gosh you don't make sense.  I hate the cancelling of Tranist City but frankly I see no difference between the two. 

[/quote]

Try paying attention, the Port Authority made deals when they knew David Miller was coming in. Forget your tax payer rhetoric the Port Authority is an unelected undemocratic body, they made these deals against the democratic interests of citizens and the waste was created by them, intentionally. The federal government then paid out more money than the project was actually worth. IF you don't see the difference with that and cancelling a plan that had approval from three levels of government then your not looking.

I created him? I'm not the one that is falling for the cheap slight of hand tricks. Transity City does not equal the bridge to the island in any way. i also didn't create amalgamation or shill for slitherman. The 53% that didn't vote for Ford can still fight him.

A political wrote:

Oh I am paying attention alright....Seems 47% of the voters were too and now we have Rob Ford. Enjoy him you created him!

A truly idiotic statement.  Even if Pantalone dropped out, Smitherman still would have lost, unless you make the ridiculously unrealistic assumption that about 97% of Pantalone's voters would gone to Smitherman.

Lord Palmerston wrote:

 

A political wrote:

Oh I am paying attention alright....Seems 47% of the voters were too and now we have Rob Ford. Enjoy him you created him!

A truly idiotic statement.  Even if Pantalone dropped out, Smitherman still would have lost, unless you make the ridiculously unrealistic assumption that about 97% of Pantalone's voters would gone to Smitherman.

At no time did I suggest anything to do with Smitherman>  I meant that people with the same attitude as our craxys over the top councillor Davis, Fletcher McConnelland vaughan allowed Ford to win>

That is a bunch of crap. It was the Liberal shills at the Toronto Star that made Ford by crapping all over the Miller administration for an entire year after the garbage strike after a successful tenure in office of fairly substantive achievements. The Liberals figured they could come in on the anti-Miller bandwagon that they created with pretty much constant negative press about not much of anything. They thought they could do a whole lot better if they made Smitherman Minister of Toronto for the McGuinty government, so that he could P3 Transit City.

It is no accident that Ford registered to run for mayor the day after the Miller/McGuinty split on Transit City implementation became official.

The result was that Ford came in on an anti-Smitherman ticket aided and abetted by the Stars anti-Miller campaign that they hoped would get their man elected. Instead, if they had actually promoted the real benefits of real Miller initiatives like Transit City, instead of using every opportunity to trash Miller, Ford might have lost on the issues. Instead they tried to panic the voters, making Ford the key election issue, and in the cacophony of fear-mongering all logic and issue based politics was lost.

Fact is that no one really knows who Vaughan or McConnell is, except in their respective wards, and trying to cast blame in that direction is just sour grapes laden with misinformation.

I do too.

Partially.

I think the Star definitely made the miscalculation that they could take out Miller and replace him with Smitherman. (As an aside, this speaks to the major miscalculation the Mayor when he decided to abandon the NDP and put his chips down with the Liberals)

But as the election results showed the Toronto Star's ability to deliver elections is pretty limited.

I also think the profoundly anti-populist instincts of Miller, Perks, Vaughan, Fletcher, Bussin etc. made it pretty easy to paint the "establishment" at City Hall as arrogant, out-of-touch and downtown elitist. I'd disagree that "no one knows" se hgwho these Councillors are. Every Rob Ford voter knows that Kyle Rae was the guy who threw himself a $12,000 party. Sandra Bussin was the Councillor who called John Tory's show and lied about it. Paula Fletcher was the woman who yelled at a citizen because he asked for a tax cut. And that Miller's team charged you $60 on your birthday if you own a car (which is a virtual necessity in the poorly planned inner suburbs).

If people want to win back City Hall they have to win back voters that Miller easily won in 2003 and subsequently alienated. And you can't rely on the Toronto Star for any help. They're wrong on almost everything and hopelessly partisan.

Sunday Hat wrote:

I do too.

I think the Star definitely made the miscalculation that they could take out Miller and replace him with Smitherman. (As an aside, this speaks to the major miscalculation the Mayor when he decided to abandon the NDP and put his chips down with the Liberals)

But as the election results showed the Toronto Star's ability to deliver elections is pretty limited.

I also think the profoundly anti-populist instincts of Miller, Perks, Vaughan, Fletcher, Bussin etc. made it pretty easy to paint the "establishment" at City Hall as arrogant, out-of-touch and downtown elitist. I'd disagree that "no one knows" se hgwho these Councillors are. Every Rob Ford voter knows that Kyle Rae was the guy who threw himself a $12,000 party. Sandra Bussin was the Councillor who called John Tory's show and lied about it. Paula Fletcher was the woman who yelled at a citizen because he asked for a tax cut. And that Miller's team charged you $60 on your birthday if you own a car (which is a virtual necessity in the poorly planned inner suburbs).

I'm not sure if I agree with all this. First of all, how was it a "miscalculation" for Miller not to renew his NDP membership? I'm not saying I'm happy he did that - but so what?? (I don't recall him ever "putting his chips with the Liberals" - if he had actually done that the Toronto Star would have fallen in love with him!) Its not exactly unprecedented for mayoral candidates and mayors who are trying to appeal to voters in more than one party - to get rid of some of their "partisan baggage". I wouldn't be surprised if Shelley Carrol let's it be known in the near future that she has let her Liberal Party membership lapse - that way she can start amassing support from NDPers and non-partisan progressives.

The litany of incidents you mention about some of these councillors have nothing to do with being "populist" or not. Paula Fletcher has been a firebrand defender of the poor and underprivileged since the days when she was leader of the Manitoba Communist Party (lol) - so she got angry and told someone to shut up at a meeting - compare that to the countless incidents where Ford as councillor ran amok - including getting drunk at a hockey game and hurling racist epithets at people. Kyle Rae was retiring anyways - so he wasn't on the ballot - but let's not forget that Ford's newly named TTC chair Karen Stintz was on the front page of the Star for spending $5,000 of her office budget on public speaking lessons for herself - remind me why she's a populist and Kyle Rae isn't?? The city councillor who would always spend the most on questionable stuff was that great "populist" Giorgio Mammoliti (aka as "gino boy" according to Ford) - and he's now a major ally of Ford's. Gord Perks is out there every day fighting to protect city-delivered social programs people depend on - to me THAT is what being a "populist" is all about - fighting for things that benefit the average person. I'm not exactly sure what is "anti-populist" about Adam Vaughan - he seems to champion the issues that "the people (ie: the root of where the word "populist" comes from)" in his ward care about.

I usually think of "populism" as something I associate with the left - since the whole point of leftwing politics is to help the common people against the rich and power. Now, people seem to think that the only way to earn "populist credentials" is to be some crude anti-intellectual who talks in code about racism and gets endorsed by Don Cherry (you know, the guy who gets paid $800,000 by the publicly funded CBC to talk nonsence on Hockey Night in Canada).

Stockholm, you're right and I wish/hope you're providing advice to the folks on Council.

Rightly or wrongly (and I agree it was mostly wrongly) the "Left" on Council got branded as "not caring about the little guy" and Ford took a series of incidents and weaved them into a potent narrative - and the "Left" never got off the defensive.

But you're right, the petty crimes Ford used to indict Miller were also committed by members of his team and by Ford himself. Moreover, he's about to launch a series of measures that will brutally screw over the "little guy" he claims he's fighting for. The people waiting an hour for the bus at Jane and Finch won't be getting a train line. The mom who needs that City run daycare or she'll lose her job stands a good chance of losing that daycare. etc.

Paging Andrea Horwath: Make sure saving Transit City features prominently in your party's election platform next year.

Stargazer wrote:

Transit City is dead.

Good Evening (blank),

I would like to reassure you that your concerns are being taken seriously. By being an active part of the democratic process, you are allowing me to gain perspective on public opinion and suggestions.

It is my hope that the Transit City brand will be replaced with a brand that takes a broader transportation perspective. The plan isn't being killed, but much of the work will be refocused underground.

The first transit priority is to build a subway on Sheppard Avenue and replace the Scarborough RT. These routes were first priority in the Transit City plan, I would like them open before the Pan-Am Games in 2015. The second transit priority is the Eglinton line. This route was second priority in Transit City plan. I would like this line open, as currently scheduled, by 2020.

I have asked the TTC to investigate and present options for a new plan to achieve these goals. Once this plan is established, I will be able to answer more specific questions with regards to cost and changes.

The previous Transit City plan was not approved as one plan by Council, individual lines were voted on. As your Mayor, I look forward to bringing the new plans forward to my council colleagues.

Sincerely,

Rob Ford
Mayor of Toronto

My reply from Ford.

I got this one too