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Remember when Rob & Doug said they got a "bomb threat" at city hall and the police came with bomb-sniffing dogs... yet the building was never evacuated and, of course, nothing was found. This MacLeod "threat" story seems very similar. When you don't want to deal with some shitshow of your own making, just create a diversion make yourself out to be the victim.
 
Kat_YYZ said:
Remember when Rob & Doug said they got a "bomb threat" at city hall and the police came with bomb-sniffing dogs... yet the building was never evacuated and, of course, nothing was found. This MacLeod "threat" story seems very similar. When you don't want to deal with some shitshow of your own making, just create a diversion make yourself out to be the victim.
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Better yet, remember the security film, big Mike (the security guard the Fords used as their own security detail) Big Mike helping Rob into Doug's car at CH after a night of drinking and drugs? Next day Doug proclaiming "My brother has been working out so much to lose weight, he had problems walking due to severe leg cramps!"
 
The way I see it there are two distinct threads of conversation here:

The one is Ford the man, an undisputably flawed man who deserves the criticism and antagonism being leveled at him.

The second is the public sentiment supporting his and other new right populist parties. I find this second phenomenon much more interesting than the daily gossip because I have been trying to understand it’s evolution for years. I actually believe that this movement is at the core actually of hostility to Ford because those who don’t get the paradigm can’t pin it down and slay the demons. It’s a bizarro world where in some ways right wing populism has become the new left and racist white men are roundly supported by visible minorities while white liberals pat themselves on the back for acknowledging diversity while practicing exclusion
 
Ford’s attendance in the legislature fell following the Taverner controversy

From link.

Premier Doug Ford’s attendance in the legislature has taken a dive since controversy began swirling over the hiring of his friend Ron Taverner as head of the Ontario Provincial Police.

Ford, who returned to question period Thursday after the veteran Toronto police superintendent bowed out of the OPP appointment, has missed 11 of 18 question periods since Dec. 1, New Democrat MPP Catherine Fife (Waterloo) said Friday.
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“Since the OPP meddling scandal began, Doug Ford has been absent for 61 per cent of question periods,” she told a news conference closing out a week where the premier was not in the legislature to answer queries from opposition MPPs from Monday through Wednesday.

“He’s ducking questions about his interference in the process to appoint the next OPP commissioner. That’s also why he’s been hiding out so much since the start of the new session” that began Feb. 19 following the Family Day long weekend, added Fife.

On Wednesday, New Democrat Leader Andrea Horwath also was not in question period.


The premier has repeatedly denied having a hand in the appointment of Taverner, announced Nov. 29, saying the process was handled by bureaucrats. Ontario’s integrity commissioner is wrapping up an investigation into any political involvement by Ford with a report expected soon.

Ford’s office issued a statement Friday saying an important part of his job is getting out of Queen’s Park to avoid becoming isolated, and noted the premier attended 38 of 60 or 63 per cent of question periods from July through December.

That tally includes six “legitimate” absences for the annual premiers’ conference, meetings with other premiers and Toronto Mayor John Tory. When those absences are factored in, his attendance rose to 73 per cent, on par with the level for former premier Kathleen Wynne in the last parliament, spokesman Simon Jefferies said.

“Every single day Premier Doug Ford travels across this province meeting with real people and job creators,” Jefferies added, pointing out a premier’s office count had Horwath missing 62 per cent of question periods in the last parliament.

This week’s Ford stops included a visit to the only Canadian manufacturing plant for Soda Stream, a Sobey’s grocery distribution centre, the annual general meeting of the Chicken Farmers of Ontario and opening the Ontario pavilion at the convention of the Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada
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“He heard from industry leaders who employ thousands of hard-working families in the mining sector,” Jefferies added, noting Ford also travelled to Washington, D.C. last month to meet with “key political and business leaders” including governors of states that are among Ontario’s largest trading partners.

“While the NDP believe that everything begins and ends in downtown Toronto, Premier Doug Ford knows you have to go out and hear from real Ontario families,” Jefferies said.


It is not unusual for handlers to keep premiers or ministers of any political stripe out of question period on occasion when hot-button issues flare. In 2012, then-Liberal premier Dalton McGuinty took the rare step of proroguing the minority legislature and announcing his resignation during a furor over the gas-plants scandal and threats of wage freezes for public-sector workers.

Fife said Ford has been a “no-show” too often at a time when concerns were being raised about the independence of the OPP with a friend of the premier in charge and about the government’s new autism program, which has come under fierce criticism from parents of autistic children.

“The premier of the provinces should be able to visit business and show up to question period and do his job.”

Ford also skipped question period in the week before Christmas after the government called MPPs back to pass legislation to prevent a possible strike by workers at Ontario Power Generation. Jefferies said that was because the premier had meetings and events planned because the legislature had been scheduled to be on Christmas break.

That was the week following a decision by Taverner to put his OPP appointment on hold pending the outcome of the integrity commissioner’s investigation.
Fife’s complaint echoes the attention Ford garnered as a mayoral candidate in 2014 for having the third-worst attendance as a Toronto city councillor that year, in which he missed 53 per cent of the votes on municipal issues.

As well, in his four years as councillor for Ward 2 (Etobicoke North), Ford was absent for 30 per cent of the 7,813 total votes during the term his late brother, Rob Ford, was mayor.

During that time, Ford was serving as councillor, president of the family company Deco Labels and Tags, and campaign manager for his brother, who exited the race because of cancer. Following that, Ford picked up his brother’s mantle and ran unsuccessfully for mayor.
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Still waiting for Doug's note from his doctor, that he forced us "folks" to get for our absences from work.
 
Kat_YYZ said:
Remember when Rob & Doug said they got a "bomb threat" at city hall and the police came with bomb-sniffing dogs... yet the building was never evacuated and, of course, nothing was found. This MacLeod "threat" story seems very similar. When you don't want to deal with some shitshow of your own making, just create a diversion make yourself out to be the victim.
Click to expand...

Funny, that is exactly what I thought of when I heard about the threat. There were so many crazy things that happened in those few years that I've forgotten half of them.
 
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