Via Girl on the Right , we have this provocative Toronto Star letter from Toronto City Councillor, Adam Vaughan :
…Letters from outside the city and indeed from across North America have been trickling in since council made its decision. My favourite letters are the ones being sent from the U.S. Gun owners there are now urging a boycott of Toronto. Considering that most of the problems with guns on our streets emanate from south of the border, I couldn’t be happier …
What do you say, U.S. Tourists? Could you possibly make his dreams come true and boycott Toronto altogether? Get your friends and families to join in. Toronto clearly doesn’t want you.
On the other hand, there are some other fine Canadian cities that would welcome you. I’m thinking Calgary, Niagara Falls, Montreal…
I’m sure they’d be willing to help out Adam Vaughn and take some of these gun-totin’ U.S. tourist dollars off Toronto’s hands.
* * * *
Saturday Update : Alright, alright! We have a heavy lobbying group for the city of Edmonton in comments – another great Canadian city for U.S. tourists to discover. And it sounds so much more appealing than Toronto the Bad !
CBL – David Miller Lies Again .
Well, Edmonton would be a great tourist stop. You do know we have the world’s largest mall, with a huge water park, ice rink, submarines, pirate ships, roller coaster, the list is endless!
We also welcome all redneck gun owner’s to the Canadian Rodeo Championships, more concerts than Toronto, more festivals than any other city, and just plain down home redneck BBQ’s with real meat, beer, and music. We even have unpolluted water and air, and the mountains are close by western standards. As a matter of fact, we have a ribbon of green right through our city, the river valley. If you are really lucky you will see the greatest dance on earth, the northern lights!
So, have I convinced anyone to come visit us?
Vaughn’s position is pretty much the same as the federal Liberal position: “As for people outside Toronto, you are free to shoot off your mouths. Just don’t shoot off a gun in Toronto. Unless, obviously, you’re a member of one of our electorally-targeted minority groups, in which case we’ll blame the gun for your crime, throw up a couple of hoops with wire nets, and push for a multi-billion dollar national program requiring Saskatchewan farmers to register their 80-year old gopher rifles under penalty of fines and imprisonment.”
All the truly brilliant solutions seem to come from GTA-area Liberals; I wish I knew why that should be.
So, have I convinced anyone to come visit us?
You just convinced me, Hunter! That sounds awesome.
Porgies at Hi Noon … Admonton Style … the New Hot Gun of the West … REALLY … In Our Cities … In Canada … Well … Western Canada EH!!!!!
If you ever head my way, give me a heads up, I will give you the grand tour!
I saw the web site regarding this..it’s torontothebad.com.Take a peek..oh yeah,I’m from Manitoba,and the only place east I would think of visiting is the Maritimes.TO is the absolute LAST place I would visit.
Hunter,
I’m old enough (61) to remember the Fifties when the Montreal Alouettes met the Edmonton Eskimo’s five or six times in the Grey Cup. I was just a kid growing up in Montreal and I used to have cut-out photos of the various CFL heros of the day but all of my heros played for either the Als or the Esks.
Go figure!
Sam Etchevary and Jackie Parker on the same wall. Normie Kwong and Hal Patterson. They used to appear in the Weekend Magazine that came with the Saturday edition of The Montreal Star and, more than likely, every other Saturday newspaper across Canada.
Edmonton dominated each and every one of those Grey Cups but I was still a big Edmonton fan.
I was a Montreal fan first and foremost but Edmonton was always my second favourite.
I love Montreal but I’m glad that I don’t live there anymore. Being a unilingual Quebecer I started to feel the heat of a rising Quebec nationalism and decided that my future looked brighter in Alberta so in 1977 I moved to Fort McMurray and got a job with Syncrude, the Oil Sands plant.
I used to work there as a process operator and know full well the power that is necessary to produce oil from the tarsands and it all comes to focus on any one of the twin Coker Units in Plant Eight. That’s where the separated hot tar from the sands is splashed onto a huge bed of super hot coke and is vapourized immediately. The turbulence is constant. I remember riding up the elevator to the mid-way point on the Coker (three or four big city double-decker buses would fit inside the burner alone) and having a contract worker ask if the elevator was always this shaky. My reply was that the elevator wasn’t the problem. It was going straight up. It was the building around it that was shaking.
Edmonton became our ‘big city’ and I was more than happy to take it all in.
I bought my furniture at the original Brick Warehouse. It used to be a big excursion for anyone who was new to McMurray. You’d get the job first and then the housing that went with it. Then you’d trek off to Edmonton to vist The Brick. I’ve made that trek.
I’ve been to Churchill Square during the Street Performers Festival (one of many festivals through the summer) and actually got involved in one of the acts when the male performer quickly came up and told me to get ready to catch him before he rushed off to have a final say with his irate wife who then drove him from their home and he ended up running and then jumping into my arms.
Maybe you had to be there.
It was good fun and something to do on the weekend.
That’s the thing about Edmonton. There’s always something going on and if there’s not then there is still plenty to see and do or, if you prefer, you can drive to the Rocky Mountains for the day.
Or even Fort McMurray for that matter. You’re far more likely to see the Northern Lights in Fort McMurray than you are in Edmonton and you have to see this heavy equipment to believe it.
Syncrude is an awesome sight at night.
I moved to Edmonton in 1988 and lived there for four years.
The Fringe Festival was always popular with us but more for the events surrounding all of the live theatre stuff.
I used to look forward to a visit to any one of the comic book shops on Whyte Avenue and my kids and I were at every one of their Canada Day Parades. Whyte Avenue was always a little eccentric and that made their Canada Day Parades all the more enjoyable.
We held a year-long pass to everything at West Edmonton Mall and shopped and played there often.
I loved the English restaurant on the European street. I forget the name but my wife and I used to stop in there on Friday nights before catching a movie at the same mall. How many theaters are there?? I once counted forty.
Where else in Canada could you go to a full-blown amusement park and aquatic show during the winter?
I’ve got photograghs of the Oilers practising at the WEM rink. Gretzy too.
I loved the WEM.
Fort Edmonton is fun too and so is the zoo.
Enough about my second favourite city in Canada.
NeilD
WEM hasn’t been the “world’s largest mall” for years now. In fact, there are two in China that are considerably bigger (South China Mall and Jin Yuan). Also one in the Philippines.
Thanks for the offer, Hunter! I may take you up on that someday.
Sammy, I read about that the other day. Thanks for the memory jog. I added it in an update.
as a citizen of toronto, i couldn’t be happier to learn that the gun-toting rednecks will be staying away.
edmonton and calgary are welcome to them.
i sincerely doubt this bogus outrage will have ANY effect on toronto tourism. the artificially high OIL loonie, on the other hand, does plenty to keep US tourists from visiting any canadian city.
the euro and pound are strong though. we are better off with european tourists anyway. they appreciate our latte drinking ways down in tdot, the best city in canada.
Was in Fort Mac for the long weekend and was really impressed by the city. It’s nestled in a beautiful valley with three rivers. The town is clean, friendly and full of families. We did a tour of Suncor… fascinating operation!
Apparently the fishing is awesome, so we will head back again some time over the summer.
Actually, having now lived in Calgary for 18 months hubby and I can’t imagine every wanting to be anywhere but Alberta. The landscape everywhere we go is stunning, Edmonton and Calgary are clean friendly and full of fun things to do, there are so many parks – provincial and national – to explore, dinosaur exhibits to see, skiing in the mountains etc, etc, I doubt we will ever need (or WANT) to go east again!
“as a citizen of toronto, i couldn’t be happier to learn that the gun-toting rednecks will be staying away.”
Right Jeff, because most of the murders in Toronto are being perpetrated by Americans. And I guess that’s more of that Lefty tolerance of others as well. Go ahead Jeffy, lets see you make a simialr comment against Muslims, Jews, Blacks, Italians, or whoever. So you are implying it’s those bad old American firearms to blame for gang shootings in Toronto, right? And all those bad old American firearms are illegal right Jeffy? So please explain how the gun ban will change that. The gangbangers won’t carry guns any more because its illegal?
Here are a few tips Jeffy:
1. Carrying a concealed weapon is illegal.
2. Possesion of an unlicensed weapon is illegal.
3. Firearms are, and have been for as long as I can remember registered upon purchase.
4. Those buying firearms legally must pass a strict screeing process. Those with previous convictions need not apply.
5. And this is the big one. Are you ready Jeffy? Murder, including killing someone with a gun, is ILLEGAL in Canada. Please take a drive downtown and inform all the gangbangers. I’m sure this will have the same desired effect as Miller’s gun ban on stoppoing this violence. After all, once they know it’s illegal it’s problem solved.
As for Vaughan’s comment, I had no idea Jamaica was south of the border. Perhaps Vaughan can talk them into coming by offering a cappuciano from his $300 taxpayer paid for machine.
We must kick the commies out of Toronto.
Most of the Americans who would be elligible to bring a firearm into Canada(i.e., not many, and nearly 100% hunters/sports shooters) would not be coming into Toronto, as there are no places there that cater to their recreational activities.
You CANNOT bring a licensed handgun into Canada, unless you jump through hoops as a recognized club shooter, and even then , it is a drawn out process and there is no guarantee.
Even American law enforcement officers are not allowed to bring their hanguns with them when they enter Canada.
It’s all in black and white people, on the gov’t firearms page.
It must make Jeff Dvidson sleep better at night knowing that when he gets his latte shot out of his hand in his local bistro, the bullet(s) will have come from an illegal firearm, used by an untrained and unlicensed criminal.You know..the kind his ilk coddles.
Toronto City Council Councilor Joe Mihevc & his executive assistant Sean Hill have added insult to injury. Check out the e-mail thread I have published on my blog dated today June 10th 2008 with the title “New Reasons to Boycott Toronto Canada”