Toronto's fat, vulgar, crack-smoking mayor

Discussion in 'World Events' started by Magical Realist, Nov 15, 2013.

  1. Randwolf Ignorance killed the cat Valued Senior Member

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    Magical is my friend. Doesn't mean we always see eye to eye. Just like you J, I respect you but we don't always agree...

    Magical's POV is destroyed if he is trying to hold elected officials to a higher standard than his neighbor. Which I believe MR is, in this case. I think we need to give our elected leaders a little slack, BOTOH, I believe we should pick the best of the best to represent. Perhaps Ford isn't that, eh?
     
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  3. wegs Matter and Pixie Dust Valued Senior Member

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    Off the beaten path a bit...

    I think the public has had a long time love affair with watching people in 'high places,' fall from grace. It's the public's drug of choice. Guess everyone has their vices. :m:
     
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  5. quinnsong Valued Senior Member

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    @ Balerion,
    I edited the last part of my prior response

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    .


    I get what your saying Balerion and I too have been frustrated with the over zealousness in the way both the media and society in general are sensationalizing the personal and private lives of our leaders, celebrities and sports figures but in this particular case Ford seemed to demand it. Part of it is that everything happens in real time w/ actual proof via texts and cellphones which makes us feel that we are part of the story and even have a say so in their lives (twitter) .
     
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  7. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    But not being a crack smoker is a minimum standard, not a higher standard. I may have crack-smoking neighbors, but if I knew they did this I wouldn't have much to do with them. If I'm electing a man to represent my city and to govern it, my standards ofcourse go up because he is doing a job for me. I'm invested in the kind of person he is, his character, and whether his personal habits will affect his ability to do the job. Crack-smoking is definitely a deal breaker in this situation. I don't hang out with crack smokers. And I certainly don't elect them to represent my interests. And I bet most people think this same way. Is it hypocritical? No..not if you don't do illegal drugs it isn't.
     
  8. Balerion Banned Banned

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    I just think the idea that a representative is supposed to be your personal avatar is ridiculous. It's not just politicians we do this to, either. Any time a celebrity falls off the wagon or dumps their boyfriend they become social pariahs, not to mention laughing stocks. It's just sad that we're so petty as a culture that our first reaction to a public figure's personal failure is to mock them. I mean, look at the title of this ill-thought out thread. What does being fat have to do with it? It's a useless dig made by an intellectual midget.
     
  9. Balerion Banned Banned

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    Man there's a lot of straw in here.

    Nobody has suggested you should elect a crack-smoker. (Though you have been asked several times if you'd vote for slave-owners back when it was legal, and because it destroys your argument you've chosen not to answer) What has been suggested is that maybe we should consider what the person has actually done as an elected official before we throw them out on their asses.
     
  10. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    Oh so THAT's what this is about! Did this strike a sensitive chord in you? Sniff sniff..

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  11. Balerion Banned Banned

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    And the 12 year old returns.

    You really are pathetic.
     
  12. Randwolf Ignorance killed the cat Valued Senior Member

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    It's not limited to celebrities, politicians or public figures. The social impact that's coming when facial recognition is perfected and all these girls (and guys) that have naked pics on the net which get tied back to their FaceB profiles are "outed"... Wow... I mean, there are like ten million nude photos on the net, at least. What will the fallout be?

    Can't everyone just get along? Let's agree we are all human, subject to human foibles, doing stupid human tricks... The question is, can you do your job? If so, I personally don't care if you get off with donkeys while eating mushrooms and sitting on a pole. I really don't. Unfortunately, redneck America (and by extension, redneck Earth) does seem to care.

    It will all shake out though...
     
  13. quinnsong Valued Senior Member

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    All I ask is don't shake my tree too hard.
     
  14. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    I was totally hoping someone would start a topic like this when Crackgate first broke several months ago, when the drug dealers attempted extortion and tried to sell their video clips to the highest bidder. It's been both exciting and hilarious from the start, and it hits so close to home for me. Sadly, I figured Toronto wasn't big enough on the map for most people to care, and at the time the allegations were still unproven. There's a simple reason why it's so difficult to unseat misbehaving Canadian politicians. I think technically even if they were convicted of a murder, they're still allowed to hold their position symbolically as long as their prison time doesn't interfere with their ability to serve the public. The reason we have such a stupid system for unseating politicians over misconduct, and the outdated simple plurality system we use to elect them, is because the foundations of our Canadian political system date back almost 150 years without any fundamental changes.

    We could open up our constitution to changes, but our outdated system for modifying it requires that 7 out of Canada's 10 provincial leaders agree to it among other requirements, and only at the end once all those hurdles are cleared, it gets put to a national referendum. It's impossible for us to legally modify our existing constitution because French separatists will use the opportunity to demand all sorts of constitutionally-enshrined concessions that basically amount to the rest of Canada paying through the nose to subsidize them while they enact fascists laws to suppress non-French cultures in Quebec (they started just such a fight several decades ago and almost split the country, right now they're busy picking on immigrants). There are also regions of Canada which are (by their own proclamations) loyal to the nation as a whole but have spent decades growing accustomed to subsidies and handouts from other parts of the country and would also like to make it a constitutional requirement.

    So basically because so many idiots in this country would use constitutional reform as an opportunity to impose their own stupidity on the rest of the nation, we haven't made any substantial reforms to our constitution in the last 150 years other than formalizing it as a Canadian rather than British document. As a consequence, we're stuck with crack smoking mayors, a dysfunctional senate filled with self-entitled absentee embezzlers who aren't required to step down until they turn 75, entire regions represented by people who only won 30% of the vote, and regions with dumb, lazy, dysfunctional people demanding constant subsidies from regions where people have their acts together instead of moving to regions that lend themselves to a good quality of life. I know every country has its problems, but things like a politically immune crack smoking mayor demonstrate that we've got some serious issues over here and it's time we started confronting them head on. At least Rob Ford managed to run a billion dollar surplus while smoking his crack, imagine how much it sucks when you're stuck with a delusional idiot who thinks Trotsky and Lenin just weren't born in the right time?

    I think Rob Ford needs to be forced out of office because he's far too unstable to be trusted, even if you ignore all the stories about him and his family looking like small-scale crime bosses and thugs. Furthermore, I think he needs to be hammered by the full weight of the law including prison time, because he's a conservative with strong conservative support and this is what they always say criminals deserve; he himself has advocated a tough on drugs and crime approach that includes draconian measures against fellow crack smokers such as himself.
     
  15. Bells Staff Member

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    It's ironic, isn't it?

    He advocated tough laws on drugs, but he hires a known drug trafficker as his sometimes driver, writes the guy recommendation letters using the Mayoral letterhead, tried to sway the law in his favour for his friends and there are numerous photos and video's taken by police surveillance (who were watching his "driver") of his meeting with the drug trafficker in very bizarre and unusual circumstances - such as in the woods at night, envelopes left in his car while he goes into petrol stations, slipping envelopes where they thought no one was looking, in dark parking lots in the middle of the night..

    And he is not going down quietly. Oh no, even as the extent of his illegal actions are coming to light, he actually became worse. Most would be begging for forgiveness and promising to never do it again after retreating to a small corner to remove oneself from the limelight, not Rob Ford. He and his brother got worse:

    I wonder if this is the same driver under police investigation for drug trafficking and extortion?

    I doubt he will be going anywhere soon. To the detriment of the public who have to continue to suffer this buffoon.
     
  16. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    What a lunatic. I saw that murderous rant he went thru on YouTube. This is a guy who has no self-control and the values of a street thug. It's amazing he has lasted this long. Guess we'll find out more as time goes on.
     
  17. (Q) Encephaloid Martini Valued Senior Member

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    One of the things that can't be ignored about Ford is his political agenda, which has a tremendous amount of support and could very well get him re-elected. And, while the guy is a circus act, the city of Toronto would elect a gerbil if they knew they were not going to get their taxes raised and garbage collection privatized.
     
  18. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Drinking beer hurts just you (if done to excess.) Having sex generally doesn't hurt anyone. Slavery hurts a lot of people.

    Your example is a very poor one.
     
  19. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    Canadian democracy at work

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    [video=youtube;0wldrgpyuQY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wldrgpyuQY[/video]​
     
  20. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    I'm sure the full rap sheet of rumours and accusations runs on for dozens of pages even in summary form. His brother Doug, who happens to also sit on Toronto city council, is alleged to have dealt substantial quantities of marijuana back in his young adult years, likely with Rob Ford's involvement. The crack house, where Ford was photographed with those drug dealers who were shot shortly afterward, has a very bad reputation in that neighbourhood and a long history with the police. Right after the scandal initially broke with the allegations of a crack tape, a goon showed up at that same house and bashed a man and woman with a pipe in an attempt to find the video, sounds like something right out of the Sopranos (actually on a slightly different topic, I think Montreal would make an amazing scene for a series like the Sopranos or a Grand Theft Auto game; the place has become infested with organized crime right up to the top and it's a city that's famous around the world for its corruption and excessive partying, but it has its charms and luxuries too).

    There were also allegations on the internet of Rob Ford's crack use half a year ago after he got tossed out of a military gala for public intoxication. Officials who were at the gala said he didn't seem to be drunk but he was definitely high on something and making quite a spectacle of himself. After that story broke, someone made a post on a local Toronto forum saying they knew he smoked crack because they had an Italian Canadian friend named "Jasmine" whose mother had been smoking it with him on a regular basis for years, but this girl was too afraid to tell the authorities for fear of shaming her family. Turns out the crack house where Ford was photographed and the crack tape was allegedly made, belongs to an Italian Canadian family with the surname "Basso", and one of the women living there has a daughter named Jasmine.
     
  21. Captain Kremmen All aboard, me Hearties! Valued Senior Member

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  22. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    Nyehehehe... I think Chris Farley is the best comparison, including his real party life. Tommy Boy doesn't seem anywhere near as far-fetched now. Now that I'm making comparisons to fiction, this whole scandal reminds me of the Simpsons episode "Trash of the Titans" where Homer gets placed in charge of the garbage service and blows the entire annual budget in his first month. Yeah Ford's been running a pretty hefty surplus at a time when most cities are taking on debt, but he's slashed services across the board in doing so, no telling how much damage that might cause down the road...

    [video=youtube;kpYVqZM4NnA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpYVqZM4NnA[/video]​
     
  23. Captain Kremmen All aboard, me Hearties! Valued Senior Member

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    Heavy drugs and obesity are a deadly combination.
    He's not going to make old bones.
    Once you are over 30 you need to consider carefully how much abuse your body is getting.
    Anyone got anything good to say about him?
     

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