Blogging The News For You

Wow, more media problems in this region. We are suffering economically:

• "The Journal Register Co., publisher of The Oakland Press, The Macomb Daily, The Royal Oak Tribune and other newspapers, filed for Chapter 11 protection Feb. 21, the AP reported."

With all of the new BLOGs starting up in Windsor to provide alternative information outlets, I thought it might be interesting for you, dear reader, to understand how I as a Blogger operate.

Obviously, as only one individual, I don’t have the time and resources to cover news stories the way the traditional media do. In any event, my BLOG is meant to try and analyze what is going on rather than to report the news. Granted though, I have broken a number of interesting news stories as exclusives over the years.

There is no doubt that I rely on the traditional media to provide the facts while I try to go behind the stories to let you in on the secrets and the machinations, something that is not done very much these days.

I am sure that you must understand by now that members of the Sheriff's posse in the media signal us so we can follow-up on certain stories!

Let me give you one for instance just so that you will understand what I am saying a bit better. Of course, everything that I am saying is not true in this BLOG. It is just meant to be an example, although very realistic since I hope to keep you involved. All of the names have been changed of key contacts to protect the innocent as they used to say on Dragnet.

Since it was the weekend, I did not have to hurry to get out a BLOG. After a leisurely breakfast, I started reading the Star. Within five minutes, I knew that I had my story and I immediately started working on it.

You know how the Star operates by now, dear reader. Saturday was a prime example. Here was the headline, the opening paragraph, a key paragraph and then the last line of the story:

• “'Green' rec centre gets $15.7M
  
  McGuinty praises Amherstburg sports complex
  
  Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty was in Amherstburg Friday to announce $15.7 million from the federal and provincial governments for a recreation complex that "showed imagination and heart…"
  
  Federal Minister of Transportation, Infrastructure and Communities John Baird said the project was moving ahead because the community put together a great 700-page proposal…
  
  Baird also said he planned to meet Friday with Mayor Eddie Francis to discuss Windsor's needs.”

In important Star stories, the vital piece of news is generally buried towards the end. The Star knows that its readers cannot absorb that much so it can say that it revealed the information even though most people will never read that far.

Immediately, I got on the telephone and also started writing e-mails to my inside moles to find out what exactly went on. Naturally, because it was generally politicians and trusted aides only at the meeting, the information is secondhand but the sources are usually reliable.

Here though is how a pretend conversation might have taken place:

BLOGMEISTER: Good morning, what juicy bit of gossip are you prepared to share with me so that I can tell my readers on Monday? I am sure that know something that the reporters have not found out yet.

INSIDE MOLE: I cannot tell you a thing. Everything is hush-hush.

BLOGMEISTER: Oh, not that old routine again. Come on, even the Mayor said

• “I sometimes question why we have in-camera because stuff (confidential information) gets out there anyway," the mayor said in frustration.”

Be a pal. Spill the beans.

INSIDE MOLE: You win but you have to promise that you won’t post in your BLOG that I once asked you to remove my name from your BLOGlist for emailings. No one in a position of political responsibility can stand the embarrassment of being accused that we were not interested in hearing what members of the public have to say. It is almost political suicide.

Look at what happened to Junior after Don McArthur got through cutting him to pieces publicly. That is the McArthur that we learned to read and love in his BLOGs:

• “You don't need to pay a consultant $1,200 per day to find out what John Q. Windsor thinks about a hike in rates that were jacked up 86 per cent with only token public debate less than two years ago. All you need is a computer.
  
  Scores of dumbfounded and outraged Windsorites began sounding off -- for free -- minutes after a story about this crackpot proposal, which is being championed by Lewenza, was posted on The Star's website…
  
  "Off with Junior's head!"
  
  “Someone should tell Lewenza, chairman of the Windsor Utilities Commission, that you don't actually need to hire a consultant to consult the public.
  
  All you have to do is listen to your constituents instead of dismissing them as naysayers or irrelevant bloggers. All you have to do is open your ears and the doors of meeting rooms that are all too often closed for suspect reasons.
  
  The reality is that Lewenza and the rest of the well-compensated council puppets on the commission don't really care what you think. They just want you to think that they do.”

I could not believe that one of the Councillors who asked you not to send out an e-mail forgot that you are a Ward constituent of that Councillor! I will bet that this will be something that the Councillor does not want to hear at the all-candidates meeting before the next election.

BLOGMEISTER: I told you already, I don’t hold a grudge for too long. So where did they meet? I know that the Federal Minister had to fly out so did they meet in the Minister’s car on the way to the airport à la Dwight Duncan?

INSIDE MOLE: Give me a break. You are dealing with the Federal Government, not some Finance Minister of a have-not Province. Of course, they met in a meeting room but I am not going to tell you where.

BLOGMEISTER: Coward. I will find out anyway. Caterers like to brag about their important customers! How long was the meeting?

INSIDE MOLE: You tell me smart guy

BLOGMEISTER: Hmmmm. The Prime Minister only spent 10 minutes in a personal phone call with the Mayor to solve the important issues so I cannot see Minister Baird spending much more time than that. Given the pleasantries and the handshaking of a mano-a-mano meeting in person, maybe double that or say 20 minutes.

INSIDE MOLE: Wow, No wonder they call you the BLOGMeister. You are good!

BLOGMEISTER: I assume that the Premier was not there and that it was just a two-party conversation.

INSIDE MOLE: Do you really believe that the Premier wants to be anywhere close to the Mayor after the Red Bull embarrassment. The Mayor was lucky that an MPP convinced the Premier’s office not to pull the plug on the $3.2M sponsorship. And then look at how the 4 Liberal MPPs were treated with the lack of attention for their big press conference.

BLOGMEISTER: Well, the story is that the City and the Feds get along well so it must have been a pleasant meeting. Did they set the price for the Brighton Beach purchase?

INSIDE MOLE: You forget, that is the Mayor’s perspective and what HE is saying.

There was all that conversation before about Brighton Beach and then Eddie was talking about putting the jail there. He knew as well as the Senior Levels did that the Province’s Environmental Guidelines would have probably restricted the jail from being built because of the possible contamination danger to the people who worked at the jail and the inmates. They could not believe what he was saying because there was a nice location for it right off Highway 401.

If he was just trying to increase the price for the plaza lands, the tactic was not appreciated. He may have harmed the DRIC Bridge and plaza construction now too. I am so surprised that the CBSA officers' Union has not said anything...yet! I'll bet that they are gearing up if the EA is approved. Think of how Eddie's actions will hurt the Senior Levels.

BLOGMEISTER: Now I understand the jail matter. It had nothing to do with it being located near shopping or residences. No wonder everything is so quiet now about the jail.

The latest big news involving Transport Canada and the City has to be the airport. After all, Transport has a responsibility for air matters. If I recall correctly, Schwartz talked about a transportation hub at the airport so Eddie would need something from that Report to justify all the money paid to Schwartz and Estrin. Who better to talk to now that Senator Fortier is gone but Minister Baird?

INSIDE MOLE: Are you being that foolish? The Minister is not going to take a hit in Question Period for the Mayor of Windsor.

BLOGMEISTER: What do you mean by that crack?

INSIDE MOLE: The Transport Minister has no intention I am sure of having every consultant in Canada complain about the “BUY FOREIGN AND SOLE-SOURCE” proposal entered into by the City. If the Minister offered one penny to help pay the cost of that consulting agreement, then he would be ripped to shreds by IGGY!

BLOGMEISTER: But surely, this airport transportation hub project fits in with the Federal Government P3 philosophy of giving taxpayer money to private interests to the detriment of Canadian taxpayers. It would cost millions of dollars that the City does not have so that it would be easy to justify as a P3. I am sure some Infrastructure funds could be found as well if the Federal Government wanted to be a partner in this.

INSIDE MOLE: Now you are starting to sound like Brian Masse about private enterprise! Heck, the City cannot even provide their 1/3 share or $10 million for the Tunnel Plaza improvements. How can they pay anything for the airport!

The Mayor will try anything to get his pie-in-the-sky ideas built at someone else’s expense. This is about as Blue Sky as the canal is Blue Water. Trying to suck up to Finance Minister Flaherty won’t work. Even with Lufthansa as a co-partner to legitimize all that, the Minister almost decided to fly into DTW. That was going to be his message to the Mayor about YQG if the Mayor decided to press him on the point. Believe it or not, in this instance the Minister actually listened to Jeff Watson and flew into Windsor.

BLOGMEISTER: You are not giving me very much information. I will not have a BLOG to write if you keep this up. They must have talked about something after all.

Okay, I got it. The Senior Levels give all that money, $15.7 million, to the new Amherstburg sports complex. Eddie must have asked for some Federal money for the completed East End Arena. After all, the Province put in some money.

INSIDE MOLE: Listen to yourself speaking. You just answered your own question. The County complex has not yet been built. The City one is all finished. Money is not put in these days retroactively.

In any event, did you not read that the Complex was a Green one that "showed imagination and heart." Your Mayor bought an old Port Huron arena concept transplanted to Windsor design that the Feds would have no interest in funding.

Your Mayor should have known better. After all, he overpaid on green hybrid buses rather than buying diesel but he was able to get back some money from the Senior Levels because everybody is Green these days.

Green gets you Green don’t you know That’s why, in hockey terms, Windsor was shutout.

BLOGMEISTER: At the least then, he must have asked for a bigger share of the Federal/Provincial Infrastructure money for the City.

INSIDE MOLE: The Mayor was not going to ask for it at the meeting for heavens sake. If he got turned down, he could be blamed for failure. That is why Councillor “Why doesn’t anyone listen to Windsor” Valentinis was quoted in the Star saying:

• “Windsor Coun. Fulvio Valentinis said since Amherstburg got $16 million and LaSalle received $12 million for Laurier Parkway, Windsor should expect eight times those amounts — or $96 million.
  
  “I welcome the money for the region, but if Windsor is eight or nine times the size of those communities, I expect our grants to be eight or nine times the size.”

BLOGMEISTER: Oh, that is why he said what he did.

INSIDE MOLE: Of course, but the Senior Levels are getting tired of the Windsor entitlement mentality.

Haven’t the politicians in Windsor understood yet they have to keep their mouths closed and not bite the hand that feeds them? Can you imagine, Councillor Gignac expected the Premier to attend in front of Council and be cross-examined by the TV lawyers and Black Letter Law experts.

I wonder if the Councillor was told by the Mayor about the Transport Minister and the Premier coming to Windsor. Do you think that the Mayor told her and her colleagues about it? Perhaps the Mayor knew better because he might have expected Councillor Brister to bristle again and to suggest that he and Council Gignac get members of the Greenlink community together to lie down in front of the Premier and Minister’s cars. It would be a peaceful “lie-in” so that they could not leave town until the Windsor got what they think we deserve.

Now that would have been funny and would have made the news at 6 p.m. if only Windsor still had a TV station.

BLOGMEISTER: Speaking of keeping one’s mouth closed, do you think that the Mayor has been so silent because he knew several weeks ago about the visit of the Premier and the Minister?

INSIDE MOLE: Probably. You know that he was being tested.

BLOGMEISTER: Tested, what do you mean by that?

INSIDE MOLE: Haven’t you noticed that the Mayor has been virtually silent over the border file for the last couple of weeks as well as his colleagues too? Sure the City is spending $60,000 on full page ads and radio spots but there has been no real publicity given about the advantages of Greenlink over the DRIC road.

Consider this. Infrastructure Ontario effectively told us that nothing is going to happen until late 2010, as the Mayor predicted. No outcry. No “I told you so.”

Money was given to the County for the Laurier Parkway. Councillor Valentinis mentioned it again after the Complex money was given but there was no attack on County politicians selling out to DRIC as was alleged before. No real outcry. No “I told you so.”

BLOGMEISTER: Oh, I get it now. The Senior Levels deliberately placed matters in front of the Mayor that one would have expected him to shout out about. Why, they even held the meeting in camera where they discussed the Report to be presented with respect to the DRIC Environmental Assessment. Eddie did not want to work up the public.

INSIDE MOLE: Exactamundo BLOGMeister. It would not surprise me to see the Transport Minister congratulate Eddie for smartening up. I am sure that Eddie was pleased because can you imagine if the Transport Minister told him that the infrastructure funds were being cut off to the City because of his outbursts. How would he explain that to the public?

BLOGMEISTER: What about the DRIC road and Greenlink? Or the Manning Road construction? What about those homes on Indian Road? I would have thought Eddie wanted to be congratulated about the Sandwich Heritage plan or the two year Interim Control by law that froze everything and the Demolition Bylaw that still does.

INSIDE MOLE: Please. I have said more than I should have. However, because you are such a nice guy. I wanted to give you one tip.

Do you remember when the Transport Canada spokesperson said about the Ambassador Bridge Enhancement project and the need to get permits

• “My understanding is from the city they will also need to have a building permit."

BLOGMEISTER: Yes, I read that. I could not believe that a Transport Canada official would think that the City has any role to play whatsoever in the new bridge whether built by the Bridge Company or the Governments. It sure sounded to me like the City was threatening a federal undertaking.

INSIDE MOLE: Of course, he did not believe it. It was a setup line similar to what Councillor Loppy de Loop did at Council for Eddie. As the Transport Minister was leaving the meeting room, I bet he was breaking out in laughter saying that he had read the Mayor’s testimony at the Senate where he conceded the paramount position of the Federal Government. He must have said as well that Senator Eyton gave Eddie his best wishes. The Senator had pretty much put down anything that the Mayor had said about the role of a municipality respecting an international bridge.

Now BLOGMEISTER I am hanging up. Of course, I will deny that we have ever spoken and that I even know you.

So that is how a Lonely Blogger gets you the information that I can share with you, dear reader, to keep you ahead of the pack and in the know.