— Musings —06.06.2014 07:37 AM
Has the OPP become a criminal organization?
If nothing else, they’ve become a law unto themselves. I have never seen anything like this. Ever.
One thing is certain: the OPP had better hope the NDP win. Hudak and Wynne now both have plenty of justification for shutting those bastards down.
.
What did they leak about the Liberals?
And yes, they’ve been out of control for a loooooooooong time.
Nevermind, got it.
McGuinty interviewed by OPP about gas plants and they served court orders to Queens Park staff looking for key records about the cancellations.
Damn straight they are!
The OPP is made up of thousands of individuals who each have their own political opinion. You shouldn’t assume to same person did both things.
they do what they are told. See G20. that’s the day we saw them all for what they are and those who pull their strings and we’ve ceased to dissent ever since. Oh, and Sammy Yatim too.
Welcome to Toronto
where the cops shoot on sight
for the crime of having a meltdown
on a streetcar at night.
not that anything will ever change in Fat City.
they’ve got fat on their asses
fat on their souls
the only thing they care about
is not getting old.
So the OPP decided it had to level the playing field after the OPPA screwed up. Maybe a better way would be to charge the OPPA officials that used the OPP footage to express a political opinion during an election.
Coordinated or not the OPP have been a gift from heaven to the PCs this week.
First the OPPA’s actions. I understand it was the union but most voters don’t know the difference. It allowed Hudak to play the “what did the liberals promise the OPP in return for their support?” angle. If Tim needed any more incentive to motivate his base the OPPA have give it to him.
Now the OPP leak the information reagarding the gas plant investigation.
The PCs must think its Christmas and the OPP are Santa Claus.
The ads were minor compared to details contained in transcripts of an OPPA executive meeting leaked to QMI and the National Post.
Blew OPPA head Jim Christie’s claim the weren’t endorsing either the Liberals or NDP out of the water.
But the more troubling part was them saying they “would get more involved at the individual riding level closer to election day if the polls are leaning in Tim’s favour”.
What the OPP says and does, is “public business”. What the Union says and does, is private. Its the business of the Union. The Union has every right to say what it wants, just like any other Union. Some may argue is a Union of cops, but we have Unions of teachers, prison guards, nurses, etc. Try to remember, we do still have freedom of speech and Unions are still legal in Canada. Now both may go the way of the dodo bird at some future date, but until that happens, the Union is within its rights to do what it did.
You better hope those cops don’t like Hudak all that much because if Hudak is elected you can expect to see scenes like you saw in some American states when their teabagging govenors starting eliminating bargained for rights and salaries.
There is a massive difference in a teachers union or nurses union getting involved and a police union getting involved.
If you can’t see that, I don’t know what to say.
If Hudak wins his first act should be to ban 3rd party advertising.
“If Hudak wins his first act should be to ban 3rd party advertising.”
Such a ban would be unconstitutional.
That case was in relation to the referendum on the Charlottetown Accord. Is a referendum considered equal to an election?
If so, then as the ruling linked to states, he could severely limit what 3rd parties could spend. The ruling suggested $300.
Goodbye multimillion dollar union ad buys.
So tell me , Firefighters who have always been active Liberal supporters, are u suggesting that if God Forbid Tim’s house was on fire they would shirk their responsibilities? What about nurses also Liberal supporters would they refuse to care for known Tories? Just askin
Hey Warren! This dude didn’t get your post….do you have something remedial for him to chew on?
The “Hudak Counter-Attack”! Will it work at isolating the public service unions and rallying the rest of Ontario to the PCs?
Hudak suggests Liberals and OPPA made deal
By The Canadian Press — CP — Jun 5 2014
OTTAWA – Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak is suggesting the Liberals may have made a deal with the Ontario Provincial Police Association in exchange for its support during the election.
Union president Jim Christie has said that ads his association took out against the PC party were not an endorsement of the Liberals or the NDP, they just don’t want Hudak as premier.
But speaking today in Ottawa, Hudak pointed to a National Post report suggesting Christie is pushing for a Liberal victory in the June 12 election.
Hudak says he is concerned that the Liberals made promises to the union in return for the anti-Tory advertising.
In Toronto, Premier Kathleen Wynne said she had “no idea” what the OPPA was going to do in terms of its judgment of the Liberal policies or Conservative policies, and as far as she knows there has been no endorsement.
The Ontario Provincial Police force has said it does not, in any way, support the union campaign.
http://www.nationalnewswatch.com/2014/06/05/hudak-suggests-liberals-and-oppa-made-deal/#.U5CM0_mwJdw
And now the Firefighters union, OPFFA, is piling on:
http://www.torontosun.com/2014/06/04/firefighters-union-issues-anti-hudak-letter
The battle lines are drawn and the election will boil down to Tim Hudak versus the greedy public service unions… Wynne & Horwath will become irrelevant incidentals.
And the OPFFA needed to got to Washington DC to get the head of the IPFFA to write a letter to give to their membership.
Well they had good teachers – the RCMP and the leaked report that did the Fed Libs in a few years back, just makes us bloody cynical, but not Al because his side is winning as a result
And don’t forget the unbelievable smear they pulled off on Glen Clark in BC back in 1999.
WK: you’ve been rather gentle with the NDP for a while now.
With the OPP announcement, Horwath today ramped up her incessant use of ‘corrupt’ about the Liberals and added the word “criminal” to her spew about the Liberals.
She’s tarring a lot of good people and getting a pass, it seems.
she’s throwing hail mary passes on the road to Damascus
claims she’s seen the light
but that’s the price you pay
for having your say
and then turning right
Agreed. Words have meaning.
As a long time, safe seat, ndp voter I’m voting lib this time to punish the sheer opportunism of this group in charge of the ondp.
This risk vs reward is unconscionable.
http://www.thebeaverton.com/national/item/1385-staunch-new-democrat-to-vote-liberal-again
Watching the D-Day ceremony from Juno Beach, helps keep things in perspective.
Only the OPP? How about the RCMP offices forcing families to evacuate their homes even those not affected by the flood and then they themselves went about breaking into homes.
How far away are we from a time when you are pulling into the parking lot of the nearby school where the polling station is and hey, look, an OPP cruiser sitting there…
Laugh if you want. That’s how the police subtly intimidate voters in a lot of countries around the world, including parts of the US.
I can hear the OPP officer at a traffic stop now:
Licence, insurance, registration, party affiliation.
Horwath rolled the dice when she forced the election. If she looses, she still most likely have a job an a member of the Ontario leg. The rest of the province might not be so lucky. Lets how the Ontario Liberals win this one.
Interesting that the OPP union isn’t too keen on Tea-Party Tim, while the OPP brass thinks he’s the cat’s ass.
Ontario politics is Byzantine in the extreme. If you believe the Hudak narrative (*), OLP/Wynne and OPP are one of the same? All the while the OLP party claim it’s an NDP-OPP thing? What’s going on? Maybe it’s actually reverse psychology (it’s a police state!) to drive people away from the NDP/OLP and towards Hudak?
*
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnxYkXwSv7U
My understanding of the union intervention is it was the leadership of that union that decided to become overtly involved in this election campaign. Unions are political organizations and their leaders are politicians, not front line cops, like the ones that were working a Ride Program site I encountered this evening. (I had not been drinking so no worries). As well, unions represent the individual cops they do not represent the authority that is invested in them.
So, any aspersions cast on front line cops as a result of the actions of the union is flat wrong and the union has the right to express itself if it so pleases. If you do not like what it said then it sucks to be you but this is supposed to be a democratic society where individuals and organizations are free to express their opinions. I will leave it up to others to decide if their intervention was politically wise or not.
The police management that released the information about on-going gas plant investigation do represent authority so their actions could be a little more problematic. However, this investigation has been going on for some time and it makes sense that if they have something to report they would report it regardless of whether an election campaign is going on or not.
Really, what choice do they have. They are damned if they do or damned if they don’t. If they would have waited until after the election then they would still be accused of political favoritism by the Conservatives and NDP. The investigation is running its course and they are going to provide Ontarians with whatever information they believe they can release, to keep us informed, and Liberals are just going to have to suck it up.
I commend your ability to twist yourself into a pretzel.
this should scare anyone in any party who believes in free and open elections;
Labour’s $4B election fund: Unions free to spend compulsory dues on political activities
http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/06/06/labours-4b-election-fund-unions-free-to-spend-compulsory-dues-on-political-activities
And business doesn’t do advertising get real. Just how much has Catherine Swift spent of other peoples’ money just to get an antiunion message across, not to mention the CFIB and Chamber of Commerce’s messages. Third party advertising should be banned but ALL of it not just the unpopular ones!
Ipsos…
http://www.ipsos-na.com/news-polls/pressrelease.aspx?id=6528
“Examining the regional vote among likely voters, the data show that:
In the 416, Toronto proper, the Liberals (44%) remain ahead of the PCs (27%) and NDP (26%).
In the 905 area surrounding Toronto, the Tories (43%) edge ahead of the Grits (36%) and NDP (18%).
In Southwestern Ontario, the Tories (39%) increase their lead over the NDP (31%) and Liberals (24%).
In Central Ontario, the Tories (54%) dominate over the NDP (22%) and Liberals (21%), but the sample size is small.
In Eastern Ontario, the PCs (52%) are also flying high compared to the Liberals (31%) and NDP (15%).
In Northern Ontario, the PCs (38%) are ahead of the Liberals (33%) and NDP (29%), but the sample size is small. “
WTF happened to the NDP in the North? They led that region this whole election with one week showing them at 49%, now they’re last among likely voters??
Even the overall number, including all voters has them in third.
If these numbers hold up, the NDP are going to get trashed, and the Liberals won’t do much better.
Sweeping majority in the making…maybe epic.
No way the PC gets anything in Sudbury or Nickle Belt. I have seen NO PC signs in Nickle Belt. France Gelinas NDP has a lock on this riding. Cimino in Sudbury will lock that up, too.
Those poll numbers change with an excellent Liberal GOTV effort, which is all but guaranteed. The unions will be very, very active this time around because they know they are up against the wall and anything less than 100% will mean a complete disaster that they may never recover from.
For the Tories to win they need all of the following: Bad weather, strong NDP turnout that actually votes NDP and not Liberal, lots of family emergencies among Liberal volunteers and voters, a surge in ordinary PC voters offering to bring at least one other likely-PC voter to the polling station, a sudden change of heart among social conservatives who hate Hudak and a concerted and very expensive last minute ad blitz on radio, TV and online. Then maybe they win a minority which will last less than a year and it starts all over again.
It will be strategic voting, away from the NDP towards the Liberals and the public service unions will GOTV, all 1.2 million of them… believe it!
They’ve been overpaid forever, it’s time they come crashing down to planet earth. The anger I feel at the Liberals for allowing their salaries to get this out-of-control while the rest of Ontarians struggle cannot be expressed into words.
The anger I feel over Walmart managers becoming leaders of any party in any democracy on the planet cannot be expressed into words. The gutterers of living wages in the name of 1% profits should all be… better not say it, but guiolltines are involved Mr. Hudak, for you and your enablers.
It’s called “buying the vote” amongst the public service union workers. It’s a shrewd political strategy that worked for McGuinty for several elections, except the last one. Fear not, the PS unions will GOTV, all 1.2 million of them. Wynne majority government assured (and corruption be damned)!
Ralph Goodale and the trumped up RCMP charges all over again.
I would be more worried about the influences of Tim Hudak, teaparty wanna be. The guy gets in, the unions are in trouble and they know it. Why wouldnt they fight back. However why arent more of the canadian right and left worried about Hudaks ties with the Koch brothers.
http://www.sunnewsnetwork.ca/sunnews/politics/archives/2014/05/20140513-210044.html
If Ontario doesn’t enact right-to-work laws it will not be competitive with many union-busting American states and the Ontario economy will go down the crapper.
Ontario = Rustario …. and everybody either works for the government or is on welfare!
Back to the original question, Has the OPP become a criminal organization?
In my eyes, that happened back in 1995 when an OPP sniper murdered (yes, murdered) Dudley George at Ipperwash.
The Public Service union members who are running attack ads against Hudak don’t care about the gas plant snafu, ORNGE, eHealth, because that’s Billion$$$ that can’t be recovered.. it’s all money lost under the bridge. It’s all about self-interest now.
What the PS unions are concerned about is their jobs and wage demands that Hudak is threatening to cut cut cut… and they know it too.
There are about 1.2 million PS workers and they are obviously rallying to Stop Hudak and re-elect the “corrupt” Liberals because voting NDP will just split the vote and allow Hudak to win up the middle.
I predict a Wynne majority government because all the PS union workers will come out in force to strategically vote Liberal… particularly in the GTA and Golden Horseshoe where most of the PS workers reside and work.
With a majority government, Wynne can declare that Ontarians have not only forgiven the Liberals for their corruption, but they have also given her a strong vote of confidence to continue governing Ontario with a new and clean mandate. I wonder if she will again table her Left-of-the-NDP Budget, or will she backtrack and have an Austerity Budget to save the lagging Ontario economy.
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/2014/06/08/kathleen_wynne_a_vote_for_horwath_is_a_vote_for_hudak.html
Yup, she’s making the move on the Horwath NDP in an attempt to spook the Dipper lefties into voting Liberal to Stop Hudak.
The public service unions are also calling on their 1.2 million membership to vote Liberal to Stop Hudak.
It’s a strategic squeeze play that will ensure that Wynne Liberals get a majority government… and it will be a majority!
The unions have now made this election all about them.
Get ready for the backlash.
Far too many people, everywhere, are sick to death of this endless BS.
Globe and Mail, National Post, Burlington Post endorsing PCs…
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-debate/editorials/ontario-election-part-4-for-a-conservative-minority/article19047636/
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2014/06/07/national-post-editorial-board-a-conservative-government-for-ontario/
http://www.insidehalton.com/opinion-story/4556113-time-for-change/
This comment in the inside halton site says a lot about your “change”
“It would have been nice if the editorial had said anything about, or even mentioned the local candidates. This reads like a cut and paste job that could just as well be in the North Bay paper as the Burlington one. Politicians are not sports teams. They largely share the same goals, even if they disagree about how to go about achieving them. The editorial sadly says nothing about what Jane McKenna or Ted Chudleigh have done or will do to earn the right to represent Burlington or Halton. The Green candidates had the right idea, opting out of this farce altogether. If you want people to think long and hard about the importance of voting, you’ll have to come up with a better editorial effort than this.”
Sun media as well. I know what some are thinking: “Well duh! No shit Sherlock”
But remember in 2011 they endorsed – nobody.
Also from the, “Well, duh!” dept…
Toronto Star is endorsing the Liberals…
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/2014/06/06/kathleen_wynne_has_earned_a_fresh_mandate_in_ontario_editorial.html#
Incredibly, they never mentioned Rob Ford even once.
“But remember in 2011 they endorsed -nobody”
So remember well duh? Okay.
My grandfather voted pc his entire life and didn’t vote once when he disliked the pc candidate. Please don’t try to feed that as some sort of pillar of democracy and open minded ness.
@scot that’s rich coming from a Liberal. Horwath is telling the truth.
Police (OPP and RCMP) should be apolitical.
They are not.
Case in point.
#1. Leaking damaging information @ Lib addscam to sink Paul Martin just before an election.
#2. Haunting Rob Ford who tried to constraint balloning police budget.
(an average police officer is making now 100 k!)
And now the current scandal.
Those cases are just tip of the iceberg…
Heard a new Liberal ad on the radio this morning.
Sounded very desperate, basically begging people to “Please…….consider voting Liberal on June 12th”