There was a time when unions in Canada fought for jobs, pensions and wages like they meant it. And it wasn’t so very long ago. Well, it was a while – back in the 1970s, to be exact. Back then Canada had the highest rate of unofficial strikes in the adv…
Continue readingTag: Rob Ford
Driving The Porcelain Bus: Rob Ford’s Gravy Train – another $43.4 million please
City takes over debt-ridden Leafs practice facility – thestar.comThe City of Toronto will take over interim management of the debt-plagued Lakeshore Lions Arena while it seeks to find a new operator for the four-pad rink that opened two years ago.The f…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your review.- Iglika Ivanova calculates the cost of poverty in British Columbia:My findings confirm what we’ve already suspected: poverty comes with a very high price tag. The cost of poverty to government alone is estimated to b…
Continue readingDriving The Porcelain Bus: Rob Ford Must Go – Campaign to Impeach Mayor Ford
Rob Ford Must Go – Campaign to Impeach Mayor Ford – Petition Online CanadaRob Ford definitely won’t be impeached due to this petition (I don’t think the mayor can be impeached. I think he can be removed from office if he breaks certain laws – see Oh, s…
Continue readingthe reeves report: Compromising on Bike Lanes at Toronto City Hall: Pt. II
Yesterday afternoon, when onlookers in the crowd spotted Ford staffers handing out voting sheets to ‘Fordnation,’ as the right wing of Council is known, we who were there to support bike lanes should have guessed the issue was dead in the water. The slim chance that cyclists and their advocates on Council had in retaining … Continue reading »
Driving The Porcelain Bus: Jarvis Bike Lane dead. Ford’s war on cyclists continues
Jarvis Bike Lanes Saved for One Year, Birchmount and Pharmacy Bike Lanes to be Removed – TorontoistToday, Toronto City Council voted 28-19 in favour of removing the Jarvis, Birchmount and Pharmacy bike lanes.Excerpt from the link:As per the language in…
Continue readingDriving The Porcelain Bus: Rob Ford: Bad math and police layoffs
Layoffs loom for police and city staff – thestar.comBack in May 2011, Rob Ford gave the Toronto Police a big raise. Now, he wants to lay them off. The need for police layoffs could have been greatly reduced if he hadn’t given them such a big raise. For…
Continue readingDriving The Porcelain Bus: Could the vote on the Jarvis Bike Lane be a turning point for Ford’s support on council?
Fighting for Bike Lanes at Toronto City Hall: Pt. I « the reeves reportEarlier today, Mayor Rob Ford voted against all the community grants, while council voted unanimously to continue the grants (with one vote exception where Doug Ford voted along wi…
Continue readingthe reeves report: Fighting for Bike Lanes at Toronto City Hall: Pt. I
“Dammit. My phone died.” “You can use mine.” “That’s okay. I kinda knew it would happen. I didn’t have time to charge my phone today on my morning off. ‘Cause I spent it here.” Andrea Garcia, Advocacy Director with the Toronto Cyclists Union, had already had a long day when I left Council at 7:00 … Continue reading »
Rob Ford unmasked
This is pretty funny.“The Robber” as he liked to be called, was an ass man. He always over-tipped the pretty waitresses and usually ordered the Suicide Wings. He certainly considered himself the life of the party, and if there were any lampshades i…
Continue readingDriving The Porcelain Bus: Hey Rob! Cutting these will result in higher costs down the road and result in insignificant savings
All Aboard the Gravy Train: Business, Culture, Employment, Medical Supplies – TorontoistCutting these services (listed at the link) will result in higher costs for Toronto in the future. And, they won’t amount to much savings for Toronto. It would make…
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Critical Thinking: Do We Get The Kind Of Political Leadership We Deserve?
In many ways, I suspect that we get exactly the kind of political representation that we deserve. A population that is either largely disengaged from the political process or lacking in fundamental critical thinking skills invites our elected represen…
Continue readingDriving The Porcelain Bus: Ford continues to nickel-and-dime while Toronto burns
City bosses face buyout offer in Ford’s quest for cuts – thestar.comRob Ford continues to make little cuts here and there while ignoring the elephant in the room of his own creation. While he nickles and dimes cuts to employees, he has also cut large i…
Continue readingDriving The Porcelain Bus: Rob Ford does not compute
Ford’s expenses report questioned in complaint – thestar.comOne way for politicians to cover up bribes would be to funnel those bribes into paying for expenses and not keep track of those expenses or where the money came from. This is one of the reas…
Continue readingDriving The Porcelain Bus: The Rob Ford supporters never paid attention
Mapping Toronto’s Wellbeing – TorontoistOkay, first, no one is surprised that they didn’t and don’t pay attention.Here is a smoking gun of inattentiveness:Scroll down to “Overcrowded TTC Routes”. Notice that the most overcrowded public transit routes a…
Continue readingthe reeves report: Licensing cyclists is not the answer
Listen up, my broke and miserly city: licensing cyclists is not the answer. Licensing cyclists will not prevent the highly unfortunate accident that took place yesterday, in which a pedestrian was hit in Kensington Market and is now in critical condition. Why? Because the problem with that cyclist, among thousands and thousands of others, is … Continue reading »
Giorgio Mammoliti: small man syndrome or snitch?
Heather Mallick has a rather funny piece in The Star on Giorgio Mammoliti’s creepy video taping of lesbians during this past Saturday’s Dyke March. Mallick thinks Mr. M is just another ‘snitch’. One of the commenters called it ‘small man’s syndrome’. I…
Continue readingPushed to the Left and Loving It: The Neoconservative Passion for Alexis de Tocqueville
A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada Neoconservative doctrine was written by academics and based on the writings of scholars, from Plato to Aristotle, Locke to Rousseau, and everything in between. But one of the sch…
Continue readingCalgaryGrit: A Tale of Two Cities
I had some fun last fall comparing the elections of Naheed Nenshi in Calgary and Rob Ford in Toronto. Fairly or unfairly, it appears the two will be forever linked. We got yet another example of that this week with the news that Nenshi will become the …
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: The Right – Rarely Gracious, Even When In Power
One thing that I have noticed about the far right, and I think this applies both to those in the United States and in Canada, is that they have a winner-take-all attitude that rarely permits them a moment of serenity or grace. For example, even though…
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