At the end of last week, after a long silence, the video’s owner reached out to the intermediary we have been dealing with. He told him the video is “gone.”
Gawker blames Toronto Star for shoddy journalism and angering the video’s owner. gawker.com/the-rob-ford-c… #TOpoli #crackmayor
— Tom Kott (@TomK0tt) June 4, 2013
Beauty.
The Toronto media, where a cop says the leader of a federal party visited a whorehouse, and you get crickets. But a drug dealer says Rob Ford used crack, and the media whips to a frenzy.
If this doesn’t show how shallow they are, I don’t know what will.
I can’t stop laughing…when does Rob Ford sue the rubes up the ying yang; somewhere several leveraged light years into the hereafter. A bunch of ne’re do wells hawking illicit drugs say they have a video of the mayor doing crack cocaine and now the ‘source’ mysteriously can’t find it; after promoting it’s sale for $200 large.
The STAR clowns should be breaking crack cocaine ‘rocks’ in debtors prison for a few lifetimes.
So when does the defamation of character suit begin?
Grab your beer and popcorn, this should be entertainment for several years!
Cheers
Hans Rupprecht, Commander in Chief
1st Saint Nicolaas Army
Army Group “True North”
LOL and I mean that literally.
BTW, is there any chance the ridiculous locution “reached out to” will disappear any time soon?
I love how Gawker is blaming the TorStar for queering the deal…
That’s not nice, you should at least have a warning label before sending me to Gawker on a link.
Nice folks there, just full of the juice of human kindness.
“…though he is a conservative and a racist buffoon”
wow. Ford shpuld sue them for libel.
Good point.
Sorry, I’m late to the party, but is there any evidence that the tape exists? Or that Mayor Ford does in fact smoke crack? The article says they watched the tape in a parking lot, which would sort of imply a single viewing on a cellphone, not very conducive to a thorough analysis. The article at Gawker seems to be very light on actual facts.
Little Mogadishu.
Ya, like that term doesn’t hold some irony.
http://articles.latimes.com/2009/nov/25/nation/la-na-little-mogadishu25-2009nov25
Too bad certain reporters at The Star aren’t “gone”.
Rob Ford knows if he is innocent in this.
If Ford does NOT sue everyone involved in this matter and press for criminal charges then you know that he is guilty.
Awkward? I suppose for Torstar / Gawker it’s awkward …. or exactly what many of us thought from the get go.
I do hope that Rob Ford sues Torstar for the entirety of their pension fund.
Rob Ford’s name has been dragged through the mud for weeks now, with nary a shred of evidence aside from, “I saw a video”.
At some point, the media needs to know it can not libel people in apparent desire to change a past mayoralty outcome.
Libel:
http://www.cba.org/bc/public_media/rights/240.aspx
It is obvious that the guy in the middle of the picture is not Rob Ford. Just look at his belly. Ford has a much bigger belly. They just superimposed Ford’s face over some other guy’s head. Gawker was used because Ford cannot sue a US website with any hope of winning (1st amendament). From the beginning, the plan was for the Canadian media to start quoting the Gawker story. Ford could not sue them either, because they would say that they are just quoting a US website.
These guys are bent on destroying people on the right and they will use any means to do it. Are there any peacefull ways for us to fight back? I don’t think that reading or writing blogs is very effective. Any suggestions?
Wow. What a bunch of losers. 200k is nice money if you can get it suckering a bunch of socialist libtards I guess.
Too bad the Star isn’t “gone”.
Sue, Rob, Sue
Not shallow, just incredibly biased and partisan.
Good point about how to do it if you are the Red Star and maintain unsueability plausible deniability.
John…what picture are you referring to?
Someone here please correct me if I am wrong:
There is a picture around that shows Mayor Ford standing between two young black guys.
That picture was around months ago, but has frequently been used as a ‘stock photo’ accompanying the video story.
There has never been a ‘photo/capture’ from the actual ‘so called’ crack vid.
Is that correct?
Seriously can’t wait for Ford to launch libel suits. Little would please me more.
Evan Solomon’s so-called Power Panel was trying to explain this debacle this evening. Went round the table. The blonde Liberal skank piped up with this gem,
“It doesn’t matter if the video is gone. We’ll just get him on something else.”
Words cannot express how much I loathe these people.
You called it right.
I had said previously here that it was piously stated the money would be “given to charity”. This if the deal fell through. 200,000 beautiful bucks and what greedy, itchy and clutching hands will there be to do just this?
P.T. Barnum could not have worked it better. I salute the Gawker (dubiously) of course!
I believe that the to sue the media in the US, you must show malice. That may be why Ford has been silent. The evidence for malice is growing. He may have a case in the US. In Canada, loser pays, so here he needs to be careful.
You know what would make me laugh?
If Rob Ford set them up with a fake video.
Are you kidding? Do you have *any* idea how much lawsuits can cost, even before your case gets to court?
The behaviour is most assuredly contemptible. If it just weren’t so funny!
The spectacle of blind-drunk “in-crowd” Toronto/CBC leftoid hypocrites, all jacked up on their very own self-righteousness Kool-Aid home brew and blathering guilty-without-trial non sequitors, is truly worthy of its own Mastercard commercial, IMO.
Losers, the entire lot of them. Gawker, Globe and Mail, the Star, the entire bloody lot!
CBC’s Web-page, entitled ‘The Agony of Rob Ford,’ is unprofessional and despicable. The intent of this video ‘story’ is to railroad an elected politician out of office. Period. Muckrakers REALLY need a comeuppance. Judging by the opinions of people with whom I’ve discussed this issue, it’s backfiring on the press who joined the feeding frenzy.
I’m shocked!!
That’s it!
I’m never going to read the Red Star again.
Evah!!!
Wait a minute.
I haven’t read the Star for 20 years because of its pro Commie stance on everything.
Commie Star, commie Globe, commie Liberals, commie NDPs, commies, commies everywhere.
Hep me, someone please hep me…….
No, you’re absolutely right, bluetech: not only is that photo *not* a photo-capture from the putative video, it was never presented as such, or alleged to be, not even by The Star.
Don’t tell John, though – let’s see what else he comes up with.
There was never a tape, as such, but a digital video file. And the only evidence that such a video file exists is that three people claim that they watched it. One of these “witnesses” to its existence is on an internet gossip site that says a lot of things that it can’t prove to be true and gets sued over, so there is nothing to suggest that’s not happening here. The other two are working for a tabloid that has a long-running vendetta against Mayor Ford.
All three have couched their report of what they seen carefully, saying that “it looks like him” but with the caveat that it was poor quality video displayed on a small handheld device in less than ideal conditions and they weren’t able to examine it in any way that would allow it to be authenticated.
This is why journalists claim of professionalism is incorrect. It assumes a level of occupational accountability and accuracy that is not present in journalism. I doubt any of those involved – the actual reporters or those who piled on to humiliate Ford – are honourable enough take any responsibility for their actions.
A video still may turn up of course but that doesn’t forgive the lack of professionalism that led to this circus. What they did was let their base nature override their brains. As my unsophisticated but sensible foreman would say ” you better not just be sure…you better be damned sure you’re right”.
See end of the article.
We can still imagine any number of scenarios in which this video comes to light.
If this doesn’t happen soon, we will … select a Canadian nonprofit that addresses substance abuse issues to receive the money.
In other words, the Toronto Star will be receiving the $200k
Huge victory Rob Ford – even if he doesn’t sue.
Aside from the cost and having your life mired in the legal system for years – who needs it? He wins big. Even the most blinkered obtuse person can see how badly the media credibilty has been destroyed.
No one will believe ANYTHING they say now; dead body buried in the back yard? – sorcery? yeah sure there sonny, run along now.
What can they possibly throw at him now?!
Just me ‘umble ‘pinion.
Vis a vis the $200,000 Gawker collected to buy the “Ford video,” I wonder if John Cook needed a little money?
He says he’s going to fork it over to “a Canadian nonprofit that addresses substance abuse issues.”
I’d like him to prove it.
(‘Sounds like the Star really screwed up John Cook’s game plan.)
As for the Leftards’ dashed plot for Mayor Rob Ford’s demise, and their being left with egg all over their faces, it looks good on them. Despicable is as despicable does. Their credibility is in utter shreds.
Thanks EBD.
I have had a similar discussion on other sites. The picture is used frequently in discussions about the vid.
Ford does not need to sue…He just needs to keep reminding the public about what a crappy bunch of so-called journalists the Star and the Globe and Mail employ.
I think the word was “maggots”…yup, that was the word.
If I were Rob and Doug I’d start every presser from here on out with the statement – “Before we begin, does anybody have a video they’d like to share with the group? No? OK, let’s begin…”
ONMAG…..ever try to sue somebody with pockets that are far deeper than yours? If so, you would know your comment is idiotic.
Oh, and I agree very much so.
I might be wrong,but I think some of you have john confused with John. Somehow I do not think John will come on this thread and try to defend the machinations of his radical leftist friends.
Somehow, someway, I really hope these scum get what is coming to them.
Not a huge addition to the scandal but it does show the Star’s selective reporting, here about the CTV poll that didn’t look good for the Star.
http://bcblue.wordpress.com/2013/06/02/stars-ford-crack-video-reporter-admits-details-in-story-were-added-by-editor/
I don’t know Ken, I’m sure lower case john was the idiot troll, while John was legit. This john sounds different.
So john, if you’re not that john, you might be well advised to change your moniker!
Exactly! Frankly I’m disappointed that some unabashedly left wing advocacy group masquerading as a non-profit will get that 200K – it would have been better off going to crack dealers.
Thanks for pointing out that “john” isn’t “John”, Ken. I made an unfriendly reference to the wrong John/john because I didn’t notice.
I agree with those commenters who say Ford should sue the pants off The Star for this whole thing. Go for $50m, or something. Wrt Joey’s concern about The Star’s deep pockets, I’m sure Ford could find a lawyer who would do it on spec (or whatever the term is for taking his fee off the back end if he wins the case).
What do you think would happen if, say, I don’t know, some Liberal MP, or a pop star, or Peter Mansbridge was slurred based on this kind of hearsay evidence (“yeah, I saw a video — I’m not totally sure it was him, it was on a cellphone in bad viewing conditions — showing him performing a sex act with a donkey in Mexico”), and then the newspaper constantly ran “stories” about it for a month? Don’t you think they’d be sued into the ground?
“contingency fee”
Tony Merchant, for example, who never, NeVeR, NEVER, settles out of court.
Offer it to Tony, for 75% of whatever he can win, and giving the remains of the sum won, to the football league of Rob’s choice.
The job to smear Ford failed. Plan B- burn the “evidence”.
I had one member of the family who found the Red- sorry- Toronto Star thoroughly absorbent. It was the pet budgie. At least that rag was good for something.
Your welcome. I think I distinctly recall the well spoken lefty troll John spelling his name with a capital J, while the other john uses small case. The lefty John posted on the Oprah thread earlier in the day.
Btw,:-), how could you tell which one is the donkey? My bad!
Surprise, surprise! (Gomer Pyle voice)
Rob Ford is making all the big lefties in Toronto crazy. He deserves a medal just for that along. Otherwise, if they left the poor man alone he would do a lot of good for that city. Not that they deserve it.
Sorry Ken, you were right, I was wrong.
Had to go back to May 23rd- Looking For Rob Ford Lookalike…. where I remembered ‘John’ made a series of comments. He was indeed the Capital J.
My apologies.