[blackballed]

Ford likely couldn't find parking off the main festival strip. You have to be an idiot to drive down to the Taste of the Danforth.

I should say that the Greenwood/Danforth intersection is very sketchy with a lot of dealers and prostitutes hanging out. I'm surprised no one picked up on the fact that he parked his car a stone's throw away from the LCBO and Beer Store.

I'm inclined to agree that it was a parking issue, but "I'm Rob Fucking Ford" doesn't seem like the kind of guy who takes no for an answer - especially when he's under the influence and driving an Escalade. Certainly the proximity to the LCBO is in keeping with his well-established patterns.

A follow-up question that is more broadly applicable is: What are the police thinking in these situations where he's a danger to himself and others, but they let him slide? There are many credible accounts of him being pulled over or running down cyclists and yet he's free to keep doing it over and over. I get that TPS is trying to keep him alive long enough to make bigger charges, but they'd better hope he doesn't kill anyone before then.

 

[ShonTron]

Clever but in poor taste. You're sticking your head in the place of a murder victim. Regardless of how involved Anthony Smith was in gangs, the cutout was disrespectful of a dead guy who has family and friends still around to see people playing with replacing his head.

Agreed. I admit I chuckled when I first saw it, but yes, it's in very poor taste.

 

[evvabeing]

I'm inclined to agree that it was a parking issue, but "I'm Rob Fucking Ford" doesn't seem like the kind of guy who takes no for an answer - especially when he's under the influence and driving an Escalade. Certainly the proximity to the LCBO is in keeping with his well-established patterns.

A follow-up question that is more broadly applicable is: What are the police thinking in these situations where he's a danger to himself and others, but they let him slide? There are many credible accounts of him being pulled over or running down cyclists and yet he's free to keep doing it over and over. I get that TPS is trying to keep him alive long enough to make bigger charges, but they'd better hope he doesn't kill anyone before then.

there were those rumours of ford being at a jays game earlier that night. but regardless... if the fords have been under surveillance...

Although he didn’t specify it was from above, the mayor said on Aug. 15 — the same day the plane buzzed the Fords’ home — that he was routinely being followed.

then one can assume the cops know where he was, and if he drove drunk, since the night in question was less than a week before that quote.

 

[JWBF]

To sidestep for a moment... The latest and greatest from the TTC to cause more confusion:

TTC says the days of subway names are numbered
The Yonge-University-Spadina line will be simply No. 1 under a new system proposed as part of a massive overhaul of signs and maps.

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/10/05/ttc_says_the_days_of_subway_names_are_numbered.html

 

[TheTigerMaster]

I like it. Most cities already do this. And it will help people not familiar with Toronto's geography navigate.

And it's not li ke our names were exactly accurate either. The Yonge-University-Spadina only goes under Spadina for about 700m.Yonge-University-Allen is a more appropiate name. Or how about the Yonge-Front-University-Bloor-Spadina-St. Clair-Allen-York-Jane-Vauhan line

 

[dowlingm]

Re: Doolittle's book. I get the impression (note impression only - I'm friends with a Torstar writer and I have not asked that person whether this is the case) that books by TorStar writers, mostly of the e-book variety, are basically another income stream for that newspaper consisting of lightly reheated agglomerations of past articles rather than books in the traditional sense which might be related to past work but have notable structure and content not previously circulated. It could be that RD's book is a little more meaty and thus might provide fodder for a talking point about RD basically trying to fit up Ford in order to get a book deal, but it's a VERY long shot in my view (though not so long that it won't show up on the deeply discredited CFRB at some point in the next year)

 

[guitarchitect]

Re: Doolittle's book. I get the impression (note impression only - I'm friends with a Torstar writer and I have not asked that person whether this is the case) that books by TorStar writers, mostly of the e-book variety, are basically another income stream for that newspaper consisting of lightly reheated agglomerations of past articles rather than books in the traditional sense which might be related to past work but have notable structure and content not previously circulated. It could be that RD's book is a little more meaty and thus might provide fodder for a talking point about RD basically trying to fit up Ford in order to get a book deal, but it's a VERY long shot in my view (though not so long that it won't show up on the deeply discredited CFRB at some point in the next year)

Isn't that almost every journalists' books though? Like look at Malcolm Gladwell - he's a writer for the New Yorker and every few years he puts out a book... more often than not, elements in the book have been put into print as standalone articles, and they get fleshed out as chapters in the book - then they get combined with new chapters to form a cohesive theme/structure. I can't imagine Doolittle's will be any different... and it's not like there has never been a biography of Ford (see, Toronto Life, Maclean's) - so I don't think there's any expectation that there will be groundbreaking epiphanies. It's just a way of "telling the story" about a subject that she has been consumed with for a few years. I'm sure at some point she thinks - OK, I've covered this for a while now... I'll write a book about it to summarize everything that has happened and really tell the story, and then move on with my life/career. I know that's what I'd do - especially if I believed this would be Ford's last term, as many of us do.

 

[animatronic]

Isn't that almost every journalists' books though?

I think dowlingm was trying to differentiate between a long-form essay (The Star Dispatches format) and a conventional tome. My assumption is that the Dispatches are ghost-written offshore using existing published material + some net new contributions by the putative author (anyone know for sure?). In Doolittle's case I would guess that she's prepping a full dead tree book to come out in time for the 2014 election.

 

[dforthandbview]

So it's obvious that this whole story goes way beyond just a video of Ford smoking whatever. As alluded to before, there's a huge criminal underbelly to Toronto's society that most people don't know about. My question is, do you think the police and the crown and others are feeling rather reluctant to let the monster out of the cage? Obviously if there are illegal activities going on it is the duty of the police to put a stop to them. But, is it possible that they are hesitant to fully expose this thing in fear of tarnishing Toronto's reputation and bringing it to it's knees, to a place that we, as a city, have never been to before?

 

[blackballed]

I'm sure at some point she thinks - OK, I've covered this for a while now... I'll write a book about it to summarize everything that has happened and really tell the story, and then move on with my life/career. I know that's what I'd do - especially if I believed this would be Ford's last term, as many of us do.

Worth noting that Doolittle said back in July that she thought Ford would "probably get re-elected". Obviously we have learned a lot since July, but I'm not sure if she has (which is not to knock her, but rather to say that she's always known more than everyone else).

In terms of her book, I agree that her previously published work will be the foundation, but I'm slightly more optimistic about the amount of new information that will be revealed (and, on this topic, I'm actually reasonably well-informed). Keep in mind that, for good reasons, Donovan and Doolittle have never really given a detailed account of their activities in pursuing the story. Clearly, there is a lot more that could be revealed and I expect that there's an audience for that information. Also, there's the whole aspect of how they have been made part of this story because of how the Fords and others have questioned their credibility. So, I think the book will contain a lot more than warmed up leftovers from her articles.

Having noted all that, events are still unfolding and one expects that they are limited in what they can reveal before trials have started and even (in certain cases) arrests have been made.

So, dowlingm, I'd be interested to hear what your friend at TorStar has to say.

 

[animatronic]

SBut, is it possible that they are hesitant to fully expose this thing in fear of tarnishing Toronto's reputation and bringing it to it's knees...?

The average cop cares a lot more about making their mortgage payments than they do about the city's reputation - many (most?) of them don't even live here. The three priorities for cops are 1. protect your own ass, 2. protect your buddy's ass and 3. protect your boss' ass. Why chase after white-collar "victimless" crimes when your job is toast if/when anything in the investigation goes wrong?

 

[eastcoastanddown]

Given the attention span of the average news reader nowadays, this is a story that probably makes more sense in book form.

I don't anticipate Ford Nation giving it the benefit of a full read-through, but for the majority of people out there that are aware of Ford's antics by way of the occasional glance-over the Star/GM articles (because let's face it, there are SOME more important stories out there), it would be a good way to illustrate the gravity of it all.

 

[dforthandbview]

Worth noting that Doolittle said back in July that she thought Ford would "probably get re-elected". Obviously we have learned a lot since July, but I'm not sure if she has (which is not to knock her, but rather to say that she's always known more than everyone else).

At the Word On The Street festival a couple of weeks ago Doolittle had said that she thinks it's very likely that Ford will get re-elected. I think she said that not because she and others don't have anything new on Ford but rather because his support is strong and he's a good campaigner.

 

[blackballed]

One point on the surveillance plane: We should not assume that Ford (or anyone associated with him) knew about this. There are a couple reasons to doubt what Doug has said:

1) Doug Ford is a pathological liar.
2) Does it seem very likely that police would pay for a special surveillance plane and then use it to "buzz" one of the locations they were monitoring?
3) I'm not convinced that those "two superintendents" actually did reveal anything to Doug because (see #1 above).

To me, this sounds a lot like Doug trying to bluster the impression than they know more than they actually do. It would certainly not be the first time he'd done so.

 

[aghost]

Any word on whether Robbo's flight from the conveniently-extended-by-football vacation has made it back in town