I am here in Toronto and it is raining both on the G8 and on the protest. Your Tele maybe showing mayhem but it is far from that. There are sporadic incidents but nothing spectacular as the pictures repeatedly shown on television may seem to convey.
This is Toronto after all, the home of the Maple Leafs and the Blue Jays and the Argos, and you should expect nothing more than boring. This is a city that is non-dramatic/non-exiciting...I am watching Cannon the foreign minister laboring to explain how they can spend over $1.2 billion for security and can only come up with $5 billion over 5 years for maternal/ child care...it is criminal. This great show of police/security, according to Cannon is based on what happened in Quebec city....he did not explain the artificial lake.
CBC is trying to make things worse than it is by repeatedly showing the same pictures of one car burning and one Second Cup with windows broken. The most recent report by one of their many reporters is that "people are just hanging out"...that there continues to be a lull.
I tried to get downtown. I got into the subway at Davisvill at 2 o'clock, on my way to Eaton Centre to do some shopping and after four stops, we were told that all services are cancelled and that we can go no further. Shops, banks, liquor stores etc are closed. It is a joke, and reminds me of a few years ago when the mayor called the military after a few inches of snow fell. The prim and easily exicitable Torontonians, led by Peter Mansbridge and the CBC. Wire fences, thousands of armed police and other Security forces, oh here is another of your ministers, van Loon, citing Seattle, for all this security, and deploring the fact that the city in which he studied will get a bad reputation...for what, a burning car and a few people dressed in black making noise . It is now six o,clock and according to another CBC reporter it is quiet and Peter asked him whether he is going back to his hotel....Stay on the job and bring us some shocking report, even if you have to make it up. WELL, THERE IS TOMORROW AND MAYBE THEIR WILL BE SOME BLOODY HEADS SOME SPECTACULAR FIRES AND TEAR GASSED PEOPLE GAGGING FOR TELEVISION.
Tomorrow is here and guess what? The police are adding to the farce, by picking up people at random and detaining them. It is raining and miserable and the play-acting goes on. Young, old, male , female, in a little black or on a bicycle, you are liable to be picked up and held, so that the excessive spending can be justified. An old film set is the holding pen...how appropriate. All are let go after a few hours.
The reporting and the reporters are pathetic. These recent journalism school grads. have learnt their 5W's and little else. They lack knowledge and analytical skills and just mouth off the usual "bromides" of "riots", " widespread violence", "arson"...two police car on fire , one Starbuck's and a few ransacked stores on Saturday, but the police arrested or stopped no one then...I guess it was good for television to repeat time and again and help justify this wasted expenditure. They made up for the numbers on Sunday when hundreds were detained.
The "Leaders" came, they ate, they drank, they talked at each other and produced little and then hurriedly left like thieves in the night and Harper was left to explain what was achieved...NOTHING.......
This is Toronto after all, the home of the Maple Leafs and the Blue Jays and the Argos, and you should expect nothing more than boring. This is a city that is non-dramatic/non-exiciting...I am watching Cannon the foreign minister laboring to explain how they can spend over $1.2 billion for security and can only come up with $5 billion over 5 years for maternal/ child care...it is criminal. This great show of police/security, according to Cannon is based on what happened in Quebec city....he did not explain the artificial lake.
CBC is trying to make things worse than it is by repeatedly showing the same pictures of one car burning and one Second Cup with windows broken. The most recent report by one of their many reporters is that "people are just hanging out"...that there continues to be a lull.
I tried to get downtown. I got into the subway at Davisvill at 2 o'clock, on my way to Eaton Centre to do some shopping and after four stops, we were told that all services are cancelled and that we can go no further. Shops, banks, liquor stores etc are closed. It is a joke, and reminds me of a few years ago when the mayor called the military after a few inches of snow fell. The prim and easily exicitable Torontonians, led by Peter Mansbridge and the CBC. Wire fences, thousands of armed police and other Security forces, oh here is another of your ministers, van Loon, citing Seattle, for all this security, and deploring the fact that the city in which he studied will get a bad reputation...for what, a burning car and a few people dressed in black making noise . It is now six o,clock and according to another CBC reporter it is quiet and Peter asked him whether he is going back to his hotel....Stay on the job and bring us some shocking report, even if you have to make it up. WELL, THERE IS TOMORROW AND MAYBE THEIR WILL BE SOME BLOODY HEADS SOME SPECTACULAR FIRES AND TEAR GASSED PEOPLE GAGGING FOR TELEVISION.
Tomorrow is here and guess what? The police are adding to the farce, by picking up people at random and detaining them. It is raining and miserable and the play-acting goes on. Young, old, male , female, in a little black or on a bicycle, you are liable to be picked up and held, so that the excessive spending can be justified. An old film set is the holding pen...how appropriate. All are let go after a few hours.
The reporting and the reporters are pathetic. These recent journalism school grads. have learnt their 5W's and little else. They lack knowledge and analytical skills and just mouth off the usual "bromides" of "riots", " widespread violence", "arson"...two police car on fire , one Starbuck's and a few ransacked stores on Saturday, but the police arrested or stopped no one then...I guess it was good for television to repeat time and again and help justify this wasted expenditure. They made up for the numbers on Sunday when hundreds were detained.
The "Leaders" came, they ate, they drank, they talked at each other and produced little and then hurriedly left like thieves in the night and Harper was left to explain what was achieved...NOTHING.......
