Should Doug Ford be told by an adult to shut up?

Last week we wrote this, about Doug Ford and his histrionics.

The more bullies like him and Rob bellow their loathsome discourse, the quicker it become evident how mendacious they truly are.

Today Doug Ford described Karen Stintz in disparaging terms, at a Toronto council meeting about how the city might handle future natural disasters like the ice storm. The Fordzilla brothers reacted to her criticism about Rob Ford's activities with their well-honed two-fer tactics: temper tantrums and name-calling.

From here: “You saw for the first time Karen Stintz going unglued. I’ve seen it numerous times,..." Doug Ford said.

Norm Wilner is a seasoned observer of the Toronto political and cultural environment.  He also tweeted this:

Before the council meeting, Mayor Ford was asked by reporters about his campaigning activities on the weekend.  A female journalist had the temerity to ask him if he had been drinking. His response was to suggest she was jealous - yes jealous - of the prurient attention that he draws when he appears in public.

Wilmer's observation about Rob Ford's attitudes towards women was not pulled out of thin air.  

In December, Ford said: "Women love money," [...] Ford added that while he planned to get his wife "some treats on the side," his big gift to her would be "a nice cheque." "I get a basket and flowers and a little bit of this and that, but at the end of the day, she wants her cash," he said. "So I give her a nice cheque and we're all happy." 

From here.  

The Sun reported recently that Ford bragged about what he did give his spouse Renata at Christmas. 

Since Ford doesn't let his wife talk to reporters, we'll have to take his word that "she's really really happy".

At this point, Diane, the Ford matriarch, may be the only one who might be able to get Doug and Rob to shut up.  Though it's unlikely she would do so; she gets gratification from her boys attacking women who are councillors and journalists and professionals; they are paid to speak their mind.  That's not why women get "a nice cheque" in the Ford family.  

My co-blogger fernhill has written quite a bit about the dysfunctional Fords. 

So, where's the CONspiracy? Has #TGDN gone global or delusional?

#TGDN = Twitter Gulag Defense Network.

In case you don't gaze towards the Excited States of America much these days, or don't tweet, this little right-wing nutjob conspiracy hoohaw might have not caught your attention.

From here:

Twitter makes it easy to report accounts for spam. When enough users report an account, it automatically gets suspended. Some users abuse this feature by organizing a group to report or “spam-block” a single account in order to get it suspended.

Conservatives created the “Twitter Gulag Defense Network” or #TGDN to stop spam-blocking attacks. Aware that accounts with more followers are less likely to get suspended, they mutually followed anyone else using #TGDN. Now that their group is organized and members are protected, they have begun targeted spam-blocking of progressive accounts, exactly what their group was created to oppose. Ironic.

Bloggers at LGF have been diligently following this phenomena and its permutations. Many have posted about the various Hatriots and other right-wing, firearm-fetishizing nutjobs who are involved.

One of my twitter friends, @fem_progress, drew my attention to this item:

A little known policy slips quietly under the radar in January 2012 as our friends at Twitter announce they will censor tweets, if a country’s government requests them to do so. A year later, Australia becomes the first modern democracy to identify, filter and ban free speech whilst not in a state of War.

In recent weeks, the censoring of tweets by Australian conservatives, or, indeed anyone who dares to either engage in political debate or offer opinion on the ruling Labor-Green alliance, has become so pervasive many have thought it was a bug with Twitter. You can read Twitter’s well hidden censorship policy here.

But now I can reveal that Twitter is actively censoring Australian tweets at the direct request of the government.

It sounds like the rantings of disgruntled Australian RWNJs and neo-cons, but if that Twitter policy does indeed exist, it could be deployed in accordance with the whims of a tinpot dictator like PMSHithead, at the request of his PMO/Politburo, to censor progressive or anti-Harper conservative tweets.

So, if this Aussie idiot has stumbled upon a MASSIVE ploy by his government, why hasn't that happened in Canada yet?  Critics of the Harper regime have certainly been quite vociferous in their excoriation of CPC electoral fraud, its corruption, its censorship of scientists and other public servants, its quasi-legal and illicit manipulations, its incessant prevarications and Rovian tactics.

My intuition tells me that it serves a greater purpose to have us scurrying around in plain view, expressing our anger, our fears, our hopes.

Harper's CPC is focused on perfecting the military precision of a volunteer and staff infrastructure that will facilitate the rigging of the next federal election in their favour, while their opponents are distraught, scattered and distracted.

Their May 2011 machinations were a taste of things to come.  Alison at Creekside has done an extraordinary job of investigative work on this matter.

So we have to get cracking on the coalition and cooperation-building NOW.  Talk is cheap, and the Cons have millions in their election war-chest, likely from the Koch Brothers foundations and possibly more that will be siphoned off from public funds now that Kevin Page is gone.

#CreepingSharia

From here:

Tommy Robinson took a few seconds on Sunday evening to make an observation about Twitter's homepage. "Welcome to twitter homepage has a picture of a mosque," he wrote. "What a joke #creepingsharia." Of course, Tommy isn't just any old tweeter, but the co-founder of the English Defence League, a far-right protest group. [...]

In less than 24 hours, #creepingsharia was trending, but what could have become a feed for EDL members and sympathisers to display their hard-hitting "evidence" of the rampant Islamisation of Britain, instead attracted the nimble fingers of sensible and funny tweeters, wittily but firmly telling Robinson and others of his ilk where to shove their ill-informed views. (It's worth pointing out that the "mosque" that started this hashtag, this emblem of creeping sharia law into Britain was in fact the Taj Mahal, the marble mausoleum in India. It's almost as if the very existence of the EDL is based on false information, suspicion and idiocy. Hang on…)

Hilarious. And fundamentalist religious political rightwing racist zealots wonder why rational folks think they're stupid.

I'm going to use that hashtag when tweeting about MP Wankworth's antichoice M312, adding beforehand #catholic.

Grand merci to this tweet.

Just speak for yourself.

What is it with Wente and her use of the royal "We" in this column?

The Globe & Mail columnist, whom I rarely read when I subscribed to her paper and even less now, is the mistress of facile observations and dim-witted generalizations. Maggie has determined that the HarperCons moved *left* in support of Stevie Spiteful's dream of turning Canada sharply to the right. She obsesses about "fat girls" as she watches the CBC program Village on a Diet.

Today she moans and groans about the fact she doesn't and won't cook healthy meals to save her life, and she includes us all in her we-eeeeeaning diatribe.

Just speak for yourself, Mags. Don't include everyone in your confessional glurge. Although your little trip down memory lane was fascinating and revealing - Pizza had not yet been invented when you were young? Lucky, that your G&M stipend supports your Botox™ addiction - it's a fatuous pile of regurgitated drivel.

My parents, who both worked, dished up two squares a day (three on weekends), plus school lunches for the kids. Those were the days before McDonald's, so they didn't really have a choice. Once a month, they got us takeout - an enormous treat. We ate our share of frozen fish sticks and Tater Tots, but the microwave had not yet been invented. Nor had pizza.

Thousands of people enjoy cooking meals from scratch and do it every day of the week, for themselves and for their friends and family members. I do, as well as the majority of my acquaintances. Now there's a reality to acknowledge and celebrate, even though it doesn't jibe with yours.

Eyebrow raised in salute.

Roughly twice a year I get my hair cut and coiffed by a lovely woman, a business person who owns her own salon.

She listens to what I want, makes suggestions and prunes my hair so I can style it with my fingers. Since it can be gnarly, as well as curling and flipping in odd directions. it's a demonstration of her skills that the cut grows out nicely and requires no daily fussing.

This time she convinced me that my (also gnarly) eyebrows would benefit from a judicious weeding. This involved the application of warm wax around the imaginary perimeter of a normal eyebrow line, the firm pressing of a small cloth, and many merciless yanks.

After the swelling subsided - about 24 hours later - I observed the results. Who knew that brows, much like the berms along rivers, need something to anchor them? The removal of those sparse, wandering wisps precipitated un glissement de terrain.

The upside is that one of my eyebrows is quite mobile and often emphasizes what I'm thinking and saying. So now when I raise that brow, it is a perfectly defined, expressive arch instead of a fuzzy caterpillar wriggling between my forehead and my eye.

This calls for such salute. Is it my imagination or is Ezrant's apology a wee bit ... grudgy?

Self-professed 'right-wing Judy Garland' ?!? (updated)

Gay. Back in the day, when the air was clean and sex was dirty, the word 'gay' only meant cheery, perky, happy. Now some of the unstraight guys in the US Republican party are trying to redefine 'fun'.

"The gay left has done their best to take all the fun out of politics, with their endless list of boycotts and protests. Homocon is going to be our annual effort to counter the 'no fun police' on the left," said Christopher Barron, Chairman of the Board of GOProud, in a statement. "I can't think of any conservative more fun to headline our inaugural party then (sic) the self-professed 'right-wing Judy Garland' - Ann Coulter."

From here. Leaving aside the fact that those unfun boycotts and protests produced some significant advancements for lesbians and gay men - WTF?

Self-professed, eh? C'mon, you didn't really expect Coulter to refer to herself as the Republican Renée Richards?

So, what's next? Which other loathsome fundie, zealot or political figure will be recast in the name of 'fun'? How about Karl Rove: the 'right-wing Truman Capote'? Condaleezza Rice as the 'rightwing Whoopie Goldberg'?

Update: More here on Christoper Barron's perspectives regarding hate crimes. He appears to be a registered lobbyist - which explains why he thinks he's above using unfun boycotts and protests as political tactics.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

Un grand merci to LuLu, now at TGB, who flagged this special WTF? moment.