Maybe not...Toronto is so far gone it cannot be helped.

Ipsos Reid, August 24: 40% of Toronto voters would probably vote for Miller again if he ran.

http://news.nationalpost.com/2010/08/24/mayor-miller-would-likely-win-if-he-ran-again-poll-shows/

It will take some time but it will happen. Once it's clear the false recovery is over and the harsh reality will set in that we are already bankrupt as a country. We simply can't keep spending our way into prosperity with more and more entitlements and resulting debt.

Keeping my fingers crossed for both Ford and the Torys in Ontario. It would be highly amusing to me if Toronto voters put in Ford and Ontario voters swung to the provincial Torys on the basis of an anti-extablishment sentiment while Harper's boys were busy wringing every breath of conservatism, populism, and libertarianism out of the federal Tory party in order to win votes in Toronto.

Meanwhile, in Alaska

Ford would be wonderful in Toronto just to watch the all the leftoid, social justice pandering, ohhhh soooo progressive grievance mongering pinhead brains explode.

BOOM!!

The instant replay would be just as good.

What we are seeing, North America wide, is an anti incumbent movement.

Here in BC, with the BC liberal party sinking due to anti HST sentiment and the nascent conservative party successfully flying up its own butt hole. the door is open to a return of the NDP.

If there was a "none-of-the-above party," it would win handsomely

Saw a "Rob Ford For Mayor" bumper sticker on a cab this morning.

I don't think the commies are done with all their dirty tricks yet though.
I'll believe it when he's elected, this city and the province is busting at the seams with flat out communists, special interest identity politics pimps, and big gubmint grifters.

BTW I just heard John Tory admitting he attended Warren (Catsmeat) Can't-Sell-It 's 50th birthday party a couple of weeks ago.

It's incredible how panic stricken the cocooned left are in Toronto. The Toronto Star is in an all-out campaign agenda for Smitherman, a far left sophist. The rest of the candidates are similar, all part of the left.

Toronto is the home of this left, for so many of them are in govt funded public service jobs in the massive Ontario and Toronto bureaucracy and in academia, health care, education. They all live in a cocoon of an imaginary reality where their work is not related to any results - for their jobs are tenured, unaccountable, with regular wage increases double that of the private sector and with benefits and pensions unavailable to the private sector.

Then, Toronto has another virtual community, the massive blocs of immigrants brought in by the open door policy of the Liberals. They are equally dependent on govt largesse, for funding of their community centres, immigrant services, welfare etc. Oh, and since at election time, there is no requirement for proof of citizenship, these people vote. Liberal.

The ratio of these taxpayer funded peoples to the private sector is completely unbalanced and the city of Toronto, in the grip of greedy unions, is in massive deficit.

Rob Ford is a necessary agent of change, with his focus on stopping the largesse and focusing on fiscal restraint and on the infrastructural devt of Toronto. The left's focus on the employees within the public sector has meant that 80% of the taxpayer dollars has gone to their extreme salaries and benefits, while the infrastructure of roads, transportation, public buildings etc of the city are crumbling.

Rete that NP article is like something out of Pravda , it’s a push poll and makes no sense.

There’s a better article in the Toronto Sun (you know the one applying for a CRTC licence to give us counter-surge images to the CBC) better describes the mood here. A Toronto restaurateur Louis “The King of Wings” Nemes told the Sun that he’s not left or right WING, just a guy who likes chicken WINGS.
The 72-year-old veteran businessman says he likes Ford.
“We’re just business people trying to make a living,” he said. “(Ford) may not be the intellectual of the bunch ... but that’s refreshing to see.”

We are seeing the rise of an anti-establishment Tea Party attitude in Toronto and it is terrifying the progressives. It’s too late to prevent spooking them, they are mighty spooked.

Heather Malice, Mallick , whatever, is going nuts in the Star about the buffoon Ford and us buffoons supporting him. We are seeing the Marks Workware crowd rebelling against elitists like Heather who shops at Holt Renfrew.

If smearing Rob Ford gave him eleven points, then mud-slinging isn't working.

Rete, that pole, I believe, is only for the riding of Toronto not the suburb ridings like Etobicoke or Scarborough. Toronto riding is primarily leftist public employees that support that POS Miller. They are panicked that Ford would outsource the union jobs and derail the gravy train.

This riding was the primary one with the ability of the socialists to get out their voters that defeated John Tory as the usual turnout of voters in the whole city is abysmal to say the least.

It alsod holds the elitists that want Porter Airlines, one of the most viable businesses in downtown Toronto, shut down.

Every day as I read more "news" I despise the left more and more.

From Christie Blatchford's column today in the Globe and Mail:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/ch...

[begin quote]

If you add in the excellent benefits (the city pays 100 per cent of dental and extended health care benefits), the mileage (52 cents a klick) and the extras or perqs some receive for extra work (TTC Chair Adam Giambrone, for instance, isn’t paid as chair, but racked up more than $100,000 in expenses), it costs taxpayers close to $400,000 a year per councillor (except for Mr. Ford and his always thrifty colleague Doug Holyday, who cost $254,000 and $291,000 a year respectively).

[44 x $400,000 = $17,600,000]

So in a city where, according to the 2006 census, individuals earned a median income of $26,754 a year, and annual family median income was $75,829 and declining, councillors’ wages are nothing to sneer at.

[end quote]

And, there's lots more about the profligate spending at City Hall which "the smart people" don't seem to mind but which the rest of us are heartily sick and tired of, seeing as they're raiding our pockets, piggy banks, and bank accounts.

Over at Stephen Taylor's blog, I've been called a cretin, an ass, a bigot, a racist, and "Tea Party material" for pointing out Toronto's runaway immigrant problem: welfare cheques for multiple wives; imported gang-related crime; Canada's becoming a hotel, a "country of convenience" only; immigrants who bring political problems from their country of origin to Canada and expect Canadians and our government to interfere with the affairs of state of foreign countries and disrupt our public life, unlawfully in many cases with no consequences, to make their point, etc.

Rob Ford is making many of the same arguments and is getting it in the jugular which, I guess, is the price you pay for riling "the smart people" aka the leftist, elitist, Libtards. I'm getting the feeling that the name-calling isn't working anymore; anger and financial reality are superseding political correctness and fear.

It's way past time for this conversation to be taking place and if all the leftards have in their quiver is poisoned verbal arrows, it could be that the status quo is about to change.

They're terrified out of their pants. I've never seen anything like it -- even Federal and Provincial politicians are coming out in support of their Toronto Mayoral candidates in hopes of getting their entire Parties to oppose Ford. NDP Layton has come out in favour of Pantaloni (Sp.?) and I think Lib McGuinty has come out in support of Smitherman. There is even talk of Miller changing his mind about retirement to enter the race at the last minute if it looks like Ford might get in.

It is truly resistance to anything that remotely reeks of conservativism -- the Lib/Left simply does not believe that Canadian citizens who happen to be conservative or libertarian have a legitimate democratic voice anymore. I have never heard of a municipal election being politicized along party lines and Fed and Provincial leaders campaigning. Can you imagine the outcry if the situation were reversed and PM Harper came out in support of Ford?

Does Canada need a "tea party"? Absolutely -- now we do, because the Left has created the suffocating conditions where a "counter-revolution" is necessary -- the Left demands absolute control of every sphere of Canadian political life. They're more privileged and corrupt than the old stuffed shirt right-wingers they used to protest in the '60's.

The Left needs a reality check -- they have evolved into the fat-cat fascist "man".

Take a look at the hatchet job the Winnipeg Free Press (The Toronto Star of the West) is doing on Conservative leaning Mayor Sam Katz of Winnipeg.

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/ghost-of-stanfields-drop-from-katzs-boot-to-face-101452314.html

His only competition for the election this fall is Judy Wasylycia-Leis, who resigned as an NDP MP for her run at the mayoralty. Since she was previously a Provincial MLA before coming an MP, she's trying for the rare triple dipper title. She wants to be seen as a tough on crime advocate, odd coming from a party that didn't want to support CPC attempts to tighten up crime laws. And one wonky plank in her anti-crime platform would be the establishment of a crime snitch line, seems she spent too much time in Ottawa, as Winnipeg has had a Crime Stoppers tip line for years.

Manitoba, still stuck in 1919.

Ford is by no means the perfect conservative candidate. But if he takes a common sense low-tax small government approach simlar to that of the current NJ governor, he could rocket up in popularity in toronto as there are a lot of small medium and large business people who have largely sat on their hands for decades as the socialists took over after crombie left. An anti-elite fiscal conservative would be hugely popular with them.

32% is hardly a huge vote of confidence.

Where I come from, 32% is an F.

richfisher, you know the old saw "birds of a feather flock together." John Tory is from the ruling class so why wouldn't he be at catmeat's party?

32 % with all the MSM and political elite of Ontario in wild panic to try and sideline Ford is nothing short of a miracle. Besides some polls show 37% with 11 % leads, which is all Ford needs. Now what he also needs is 22 out of 43 Councilors to be onside with the Glasnost.

What the smug progressive elitists don’t get is that the voter is becoming more and more engaged perhaps for the first time in decades. Maybe that’s the consolation prize we get from the obvious threats of the Obamarx gang.

So when the MSM now writes that Rob Ford is the most divisive blah blah … we think divisive is a good thing.

Because we saw what the Messiah rendered unto us with His post-divisive promises. That did not change anything; it made things worse by elitists taking even more control of our lives.

So we want a rupture. We want Ford to give us Wal-Mart government, not Tiffany’s carriage trade exclusively for the professional progressive elite.

testing

Toronto Mayoral races are all about election day and get out the vote.

Miller beat Tory because his supporters voted but Tory's suburban base did not. If Ford can get the vote out in Etobicoke and Don Mills etc then he has a good chance. Smitherman's vote wont be any bigger than Millers, likely smaller since he is splitting it with Pantalone.

Ford needs a ground game, I just hope he has it.

His other issue is going to be that regardless of who is mayor, council is full of left wing kleptocrats. He still has to deal with the inmates in the asylum. But if he only brings some sanity to the budget process then I would be thrilled.

As for Miller running again. Wont happen, and will only swing all those opposed, left and right to Ford (trust me Miller is not loved at all)

John Tory is a "bend with the wind", Granite Club, fair weather conservative with the spine of an earth worm. His reign as mayor would have been less bad than Miller's, but only by degree. He'd have done nothing to address the leftist/union ruling class power arrangement in Toronto.

What needs to happen in Toronto is a -massive- defunding in education, public works and especially the TTC. They need budget cuts of up to two thirds, with the lion's share coming out of middle and upper management. Jobs presently held by public sector unions need to be outsourced to private firms or eliminated altogether.

City workers with salaries of $40K+ (or way more, for all I know) and gold plated retirement funds are cutting the grass. That's insupportable insanity.

If Rob Ford can make a dent in that, he is a vast genius and will deserve the Victoria Cross. Frankly, I think the unionists will eat him, but if he's game its worth a go.

Robert Ford?

Not the same guy who shot Jesse James in the back of the head, I'm assuming...

When Canada develops an anti-establishment movement that returns some sanity to our government I will be extremely pleased. Why have past grass roots movements failed in Canada? What can we do better? How can we get involved?

ET;

The City of Toronto has an annual budget of about 7.5 billion and employs 30,000 management and unionized staff. If it were true that 80% of the budget went to staff remuneration, that would work out to about $200,000 per employee.

While there would certainly be some senior management hauling down that kind of pay package, the average unionized worker would collect not much more than 25% of that number.

Ford should keep doing what he's doing and don't back down. People are fed up with Liberals and taxes, not only in Toronto but all over the province.

All Ford needs to continue to spell it out in plain English and put forward a common sense approach, something the Liberal Left are incapable of doing.
The Unionistas are hopeless jackasses. Sidney Ryan should be told to go to Hell. He's not exactly the most popular person among the people, he's never been able to win any municipal election he's run in.

@lorenzo - Anti-establishment grassroots movements in Canada have a long history of success. CCF, SoCred, and Reform, just to name 3, all started out as grassroots movements and have had major impacts on Canadian society (good and bad). Or, if history only started last year, then what about the Wildrose Party in Alberta or the anti-HST campaign in BC?

My only comment would be that any successful grassroots movement needs a fundmental, immediate cause to rally around and I don't know if there is that kind of big issue right now in Canada.

bob c- the budget goes not just for salaries, but also benefits, pensions and expenses - the latter are enormous.

Never mind that Toronto City Hall Councillors each have 52,000 to spend on office expenses - with mayor candidate Pantalone charging a bottle of Advil to his office expenses, Giambrone charging for French lessons...etc.

But salaries are very high. And as I said, wage increases are twice that of the private sector and benefits and pensions are unreachable for the private sector.
No, the average municipal employee makes far more than in the private sector.

For example, there were, to my knowledge, in 2009, 14 TTC ticket takers receiving more than 100,000 salary - that's just the salary not the extras - per year. A ticket collector.
And 89 bus drivers. One ticket collector got 114,000.
Again - that doesn't include extras.
The TTC itself is in an open state of disrepair and poor service, with a mounting complaint against the decaying infrastructure, the indifferent service etc.

Over 4,000 city of Toronto municipal employees earned in the 6 figures.

This is just the City of Toronto. Remember, none of these can be fired; their union won't allow such an 'inhuman' action.

I think this poll saying that Miller would win must be either a joke or some bait to get Miller to try and run in order to further split the left. Pantalone is viewed as a Miller clone and is way way behind in the polls. If Miller could get elected then Pantalone should be the front runner.

Kyle Rae put a fork in the left when he had his $12,000 taxpayer-funded goodbye dinner. Oh, by the way, Rae is on another junket to Vienna at taxpayer expense.

Ford is the only one who has walked his talk.

When Ford takes over, the left will dust off the plan that took only three years to bring Harris to a standstill. Union bullies like Buzz Hargrove, Ryan, and their hangers on plus the weasel MSM media, Lieberals, NDP,and wackademics will scream blue murder every time a leftist patronage tap is turned off and padlocked. It will not be pretty. Let us give them a defeat they will never recover from no matter how rough and tough it gets.

Ford is just the kind of guy TO needs: twice convicted of assault, once for DUI, accused wife-beater, busted for dope in Florida.
A very interesting take on law and order, dont'chya think?

twice convicted of assault

Lying won't help your Marxist pals one bit.

“It will not be pretty”

Right on Sgt Lejaune! And that’s why we don’t need any nuanced pretty boys doing this. Ford ain’t pretty, he’s perfect for this.

It’s a 2-step process. Ford is needed now to clean out the conflicts of interests between Miller’s Dipper Executive Committee and the unions/developers. Then elect a more well-rounded, conciliator to pick up the pieces and rebuild the City on sustainable financing.

I have talked to Councillors who tell me they could never get to see Miller because he’s always busy with developers. And we know the developers are way under paying per unit of condo they are building along the subway lines here. Odd isn’t it…the anti-capitalist Dippers are in bed with developers. I’m not saying there is corruption but there is definitely a conflict of interest with the Miller gang giving the unions and developers top priority and the unengaged taxpayer has been given the shaft.

Lloyd,

Whatever Ford did or didnt do regarding drugs comes nowhere near Smithermans admitted taking and SELLING of things much harder than pot. Smithermans other record includes wasting a billion dollars on the unfinished ehealth project.

Yup Furious George is well qualified. Ford is definitiely an imperfect candidate, but less imperfect than the other.

lloyd fister - right, and Ford, unlike every other city councillor, has refused to charge a penny of expenses to the taxpayer - that 52,000 that each city councillor uses to pay for their new computers, French lessons, aspirins etc. And as another commenter has pointed out, how about Rae's trips and parties?

This differs from Smitherman, who headed the disastrous fiscal bomb of ehealth. And Pantalone, the sidekick of Miller - who handed the City over to the unions and their wage increases that are double that of the private sector. He charged the taxpayer for hot dogs, 4 AA batteries, taxis, charitable donations, even when he took the TTC.

Oh, and there's Rossi, who firmly supports the Gun Registry, informing everyone that it's accessed over 5,000 times a day - when if he had the capacity to think, he'd realize that there aren't 5,000 daily gun crimes in Canada and that the access is automatic even when someone is stopped for a car light that doesn't work or for speeding.

By the way, being 'accused' of something is, heh, rather different from being convicted of something. Ford was never convicted of assualt. Same with the 'dope' in Florida. After all, I could accuse you of being ignorant but - are you really? I could accuse you of carrying around dope - but do you?

Do you think facts or bias matter? Which is it?

But unfortunately Toronto is now a mini-Greece. They don't CARE that they're bankrupt. They just want to keep the gravy train rolling.....

ET;

The overwhelming majority of city staff who make 6 figure remuneration would be management staff. Sorry, but you can't lay that at the feet of the unions.

As far as "14 TTC ticket takers receiving more than 100,000 salary" there are a few things to consider. How many hundreds of them does the city employ. You're trying to make a point by focusing on a small exception rather than the general rule.

As far as I know, ticket collectors make in the range of $25 per hour. That works out to about $50-$55 thousand per year. In order to make $114,000, one would have to work close to 1400 hours of overtime in addition to the roughly 1800 regular hours they all work.

I said it to you once before and I'll do so again. The biggest problem with the city is the ratio between number of management to workers. It is somewhere in the range of 1-3 to 1-4. The standard for private industry is somewhere between 1-8 and 1-12.

Do you see where a big part of the problem lies.

bob c- of course I see that the public sector is overloaded with managers - but I don't agree that the high costs are due just to this ratio.

http://www.atu113.org/200000club.html

The number of management making these high salaries is only about six.

http://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/publications/salarydisclosure/2009/munic09.html

The above shows TTC high salary people such as 'staff sergeant', many operators, collectors, 'slip clerk', They aren't all upper level management.

Again, the FACT that 14 ticket takers and 89 bus drivers make in the 6 figure salaries, is not a small part of the budget. It's a reality that it's possible - easily possible - to obtain these salary ranges. That's ten million for just these 100 people - and that doesn't include benefits and pensions.

Plus, the union demands for time sharing, limits on hours, etc - mean that the number of employees has exponentially increased.

Rob Ford, the Chris Christie of Toronto?

The feds used to cost a body at about 125%. We paid into medical and dental and indexing on our pensions (1%). I can see with the benefits TO has it would be at least 130%. That is before lights, air, 'puter and a chair to park the arse in.

We should have a site like this in Canada.

http://reason.tv/video/show/porker-of-the-month-august-201

A little thought experiment:

Suppose it came out that Rob Ford, in years past, regularly took "party drugs" (a euphemism for cocaine, Ecstasy, and crystal meth), and then participated in orgies with many young women, where he had multiple partners in an evening. No suggestion of coercion or underage people - all consenting adults. Does anyone here (and I'm talking to you, Lloyd Fisting) seriously think he would get a pass from the MSM for this?

But, of course, change that from young women to young men, and that's exactly what George Smitherperson did. And it certainly hasn't been an issue at any time in his career, has it?

So it's OK to do coke and other illegal drugs, and have gay sex with many partners, but by God, have one beer too many, and you're a social pariah not worthy of public office. No double standard there at all.

Sarge said "When Ford takes over, the left will dust off the plan that took only three years to bring Harris to a standstill."

It's going to be another round of "Days of Action" protests. Especially if Toronto gets a Conservative mayor, Ontario gets a Conservative government and we already have a Federal Conservative government. Every union will be marching although this time with the Pali's and the Gay Pride people along for the ride. Hopefully the new Sun TV channel will be here by then to offset the CBC propaganda. This time around we also have the Internet Blog sites at our disposal. Could be a completely different outcome.

KevinB, the fact that Ford is anti-public sector union is enough to make him public enemy number one with Lloyd and his friends.

Lloyd is trying to get -us- not to like Ford. Lloyd doesn't care a damn about recreational drug use or stealing or loose morals (to put it mildly in the Smithereens case). But he knows -we- care.

Nice try Lloyd.

But if there's a 40-60 year old male out there who -never- smoked up as a kid, he's some kind of prissy accountant and not the guy who's going to kick the TTC and Public Works into order. Certainly not going to lock horns with the Teacher's Union.

"twice convicted of assault"
Lloyd Fister

I wonder if Rob Ford's lawyer is aware of this?

ET;

Sorry, but the chart at the second link you provided in your 5:28pm post completely disproves your assertion that "The number of management making these high salaries" (100k plus, my insertion) "is only about six."

Read the bloody chart. Of the 23 jobs listed on the first screen , 20 are management of some variety, be it a manager, a supervisor, a director, a director in chief etc. One was listed as a consultant and only two likely union members, a plant technician and a pumping control officer.

Of the first 60 positions listed, about 55 of them are management. And that is only to the end of the A's. You or I can go through the B's if you like, but trust me, it's a waste of time. It will show the exact same pattern. Management didn't make themselves lower paid than the hired help. It boggles my mind that you could think they did.

It's okay to be anti-union, but don't take it to the point of shutting down your critical faculties. There are 7500 management staff working for the city. To believe as you did that only 6 of them made 100k plus is to believe that only one tenth of one percent of them were making that kind of money, or that 99.9 percent were not. It's perhaps telling that you were prepared to believe that.

Is it possible the sheep in Ontario will walk upright with the self respect and posture of free men?

Will they cast off the thieves and oppressors who have turned them into grazing domesticated prey animals on ol' McGuinty's animal farm?

Nawwwww sheep have a brain with no capacity to reason. They do have a capacity for self preservation but that instinct only kicks in as they are entering the slaughterhouse.

Sheep are sheep, Ontario is doomed.

Again, bob c - your remarks refer only to salaries and not to benefits and pensions.

And I now understand what you seem to think I am referring to. I was not, in my original post, only referring to the 'greedy unions' but to the whole public sector culture of extreme remuneration.

The unions have, as I've noted, increased wages and benefits beyond the reach of any private sector employer - but the public sector culture itself, operates within that same mindset of entitlement. And, that means that 80% of the city's tax income goes to wages, benefits etc for the employees - and they have to go to the province and federal funding for infrastructure. [See federal and provincial funding of roads, buses, water treatments etc).

As an example of costs, the Waste Mgt cost is about 1 million a day. During the 39 day strike, when workers were not paid, the city saved 33 million. That sounds, to me, like saved wages and that's a high percentage of the budget.

With reference to the 'six' - I was referring only to the TTC and with reference to the second chart, I was referring only to the TTC list (letter T). I acknowledge that the whole list consists of, in large part, management, but my point is not merely anti-union but about a culture of entitlement within a public service.

Despite my contrarian views, I am compelled to agree on most points. Things in Toronto need to change. So do things in Ontario. And in Canada.

I must, however, raise my contrarian flag and challenge some questionable assertions.

"Then, Toronto has another virtual community, the massive blocs of immigrants brought in by the open door policy of the Liberals."

Are the Conservatives fundamentally opposed to immigration? I am a bit tired of hearing that one party supports immigration while the other knows better. The number of immigrants coming in has not decreased under the Harper government. The reason: Immigrant numbers are decided on the basis of population growth rates. Why? Population growth rates provide a significant boost to GDP growth. Positive population growth rate = more consumers = more consumption = economy grows. Then theres the overt economic reason - the so-called investor category. Love them or hate them, they pump money into the economy. Not thousands. Not ten thousands. Literally hundreds of thousand. I can continue on and on, but long story short, immigration isn't a liberal ploy, which is why you haven't seen numbers decrease and the countries of origin change. Nor is there any liberal conspiracy against immigrants from the western world; its rather obvious that more people want to leave poor countries, as oppposed to rich ones.

The only thing the Liberals did do was open up immigration to colored people in the 1960s. Even that wasn't a Liberal conspiracy. It was brought about by two obvious things - the decline of Europe as an immigrant base, and Canada's desire to improve relations with newly-indepenedent Commonwealth countries. Nor was Canada the only country to do this. Australia, which had the famous "White Australia" policy, the US and New Zealand - the only immigrant seeking countries, all changed tack at around the same time as Canada.

That, in a nutshell, is the history and rationale behind Canada's immigration policy. It would be utter hogwash to say that the Conservatives would have done anything dissimilar. The most compelling proof in this regard is the similarity between immigration policies regardless of which party forms the government. There has been no revision of targets and there has been no revision of the countries from which immigrants are targetted. If you are going after the refugee policy, just remember that of the 800,000 refugees this country has accepted since 1945, approximately 150,000 have come in the last 5 conservative-ruled years.

That the liberals have managed to promote themselves as immigration champions has less to do with facts and more to do with their ability to politically outmaneuver the conservatives.

"They are equally dependent on govt largesse, for funding of their community centres, immigrant services, welfare etc."

Sweeping statement there. Lets look at the obvious questions:

Which community centers are NOT dependent on government largesse? Your statement seems to suggest that only immigrant community centers want government funding.

What immigrant services? As Far as I know, immigrant services are typically limited to language translation services, with a few counselling services thrown in for good measure. Are immigrants desperate for these services? I doubt it. I am sure they can all find someone fluent in English to help them, when necessary. Would it be wrong to suggest that these services are funded by the fees that immigrants pay to come to this country? Immigration applications often range from five to six figure amounts, so I think its only that we translate some pages for them and provide them with some counselling on how to get started. I may well be wrong. I am sure you will enlighten me.

On the welfare issue, I am reluctant to take your word for it. Immigrants are chosen in a manner that is aimed at ensuring they do not go on welfare. They have to provide proof of funds, transfer money to Canada etc etc. This is all aimed at ensuring that they DO NOT go on to the welfare system. Getting on to the welfare system once here is also difficult. If it was easy, we wouldn't have so many articulate taxi drivers and pizza delivery-men roaming the streets at all hours of the night.

Nonetheless, reluctant though I am, I will admit that I am wrong if you provide any proof that immigrants are more likely to go on welfare than,say, fourth or fifth-generation Canadians. I feel compelled to add that immigrants are at an automatic disadvantage becuase employers do not recognize their academic credentials (even though the government does) or dismiss them on the basis of their lack of 'Canadian' work experience (apparently globalization hasn't reached the Canadian private sector). Most of them end up being underemployed, but not unemployed. Big differnece.

Like you, I have no time for welfare recipients. That said, I find it oddly ironic that the biggest welfare recipients in this country are, in many cases, descendents of the first settlers. I speak, of course, of the farming communities of Canada. They recieve welfare funded by taxpayers in the form of farming subsidies. And then theres the small matter of guaranteed prices. Take milk for example. Prices in Canada have actually increased despite a decline in the price of milk worldwide. All very strange. But I digress. If you are going to wield a stick against welfare, go after it wholeheartedly instead of taking potshots at immigrants. I would bet all my assets that, agricultural communities apart, there are less first-generation immigrants (even proportionallY) on welfare than there are fifth/sixth/seventh generation Canadians on welfare.

"Oh, and since at election time, there is no requirement for proof of citizenship, these people vote. Liberal."

You cannot register as a voter without proof of citizenship. How would you get onto the electoral roll and be able to vote?

"The ratio of these taxpayer funded peoples to the private sector is completely unbalanced"

Many farmers in Toronto, eh? Seriously speaking though, where are your stats? I would agree that there are many underemployed people in the city of Toronto, but not that the ratio is completely unbalanced. Toronto is, after all, the main private sector hub in this country.

FWIW, I feel that there is a general apathy in all of Canada, not just in Toronto. Think about it. Our "private sector" companies in our "competitive" oligopolies engage in rampant price-gouging. Think of all the nickel-and-diming your bank engages in, before it declares its massive profits. We are just used to being fleeced, no questions ask. Anytime a new tax shows up, we see it in a short-term "matter of cents" way, instead of as a long-term "matter of dollars" way. Truth be told, the left has won and we are none the better for it. Mention competition to our new champions of capitalism (former crown companies) and they get extremely upset. Don't get me wrong. I agree completely that the entire notion of free market has disappeared in Canada. Look at the way one former crown company is blocking competition in telecom.

On the other hand, we as consumers deserve it. WE don't question. They say the price is going up. We say okay - its just a dollar or two. Mind you, I'm talking about the private sector here, not the TTC. Don't believe me? Go out and see the consumer products offered by banks or telecom companies. When one raises the price, the others follow. Same product, same price. Minimal differnece. Again, this is Canadian apathy. And we are paying an arm and leg for it.

But all the same, despite my preferrence for being a contrarian, I feel compelled to agree with everyone here - things in Toronto in particular, and Canada in general, have to change.

ET;

Thanks for the clarification. The biggest problem I see with city government are politicians who seemingly don't see anything not worth spending money on, and a structure weighted toward management and paper pushers. No large company would ever have the boss to worker ratio that government has. It's indefensible.

Maybe the CBC headquarters will move to Halifax if Ford wins although Nunavut would be preferable...

Then SUN TV could buy the Front Street building...One can dream, can he?

Ford: a drunk driving, drug using, wife beating bully. What a great mayor he'll make. Hahaha.

Lloyd Fister at 2:28 PM:

"32% is hardly a huge vote of confidence.

Where I come from, 32% is an F."

Well, I guess Torontonians would disagree.

Considering the number of candidates in the field, I would say he has a
commanding lead, unless each and every one of those undecided voters throw their ballot behind Smitherman, Ford will most likely be mayor.

And may I remind you that the Harper Conservatives came to power with only 36% of the popular vote. Better luck next time.

Oh, and may I suggest a few classes in Political Science.

Right Honourable Terry Tory at 10:11 AM: "Then SUN TV could buy the Front Street building...One can dream, can he?"
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Wouldn't that be delicious!