So yeah, I’m back in Toronto.

And I want sushi. Like, NOW. Any takers? I’m free for dinner.

Vlad Tepes Blog contributor Grace has an essay on the Aqsa Parvez/Toronto Life honor killing story. Bottom line:

If it looks like an honour killing, walks like an honour killing and talks like an honour killing, it is an honour killing. Honour in Islam depends upon the dishonouring of women and to claim otherwise is a lie.

The socialist powers-that-be chased the Guardian Angels out of town when they sought to set up a chapter in Toronto. We, the residents of the ailing city, were told that we don’t need such tyrants and goose steppers patrolling our streets. And so the predictable panacea of social funding for basketball courts and crack kits was provided, and the city continued to die.

Till now. Chinatown has had enough of addicts, whores and panhandlers dirtying up its streets, stealing from its businesses, and scaring away its customers. And for the last two weeks, Chinatown has been employing a private security company to do what the police won’t do: Deal with petty crimes.

So far more than two dozen “banning orders” have been issued against disruptive undesirables, reported Ross McLeod, president and CEO of Intelligarde, the company patrolling the neighbourhood. Several intoxicated individuals have been carted off by police or ambulance, and he said numerous aggressive panhandlers have been “dealt with” by his employees.

“The last guy we arrested in Chinatown had lost control of his bowels, let me say, and was covered in his own feces but he would not stop aggressively panhandling,” reported Mr. McLeod, adding that responding police officers weren’t all that happy to have to take the person off his employees’ hands.

“For the low-level disorder, the public police just don’t have time for that unless it escalates into something much more serious.”

It isn’t just Chinatown, either. Liberty Village, Emery Village, Downtown Yonge Street and Kennedy Road in Scarborough all use either security firms or off duty cops. Why? Because petty crimes, vandalism, drug and alcohol abuse and panhandling are all problems if you’re trying to run a business. They may seem like small fry to the cops and commissioners, as well as the mayor, but to the residents and business owners, these “broken windows” only serve to make their areas a little worse every day.

Naturally, the mayor has a better idea:

Mayor David Miller said this week that he would prefer to see city staff such as social workers called in to deal with panhandlers and homeless people so that they can be referred to the proper support services.

Social workers. Yup, that’ll do it. When the next vagrant shits himself on the sidewalk, some social worker can come along to help him rebuild his self-esteem. One can only hope she’ll offer him a clean tissue in the process.

And the unions are pissed off, too:

Dave Wilson, the president of the union representing uniformed officers, has complained that private, lesser-trained employees taking over duties historically delegated to police is “lowering the standards in the policing world,” and “a dangerous slippery slope.”

No Dave. The standards have already been lowered so much, that private citizens are having to raise them up themselves. They’re not waiting for your union boys to do it for them. And that just rips your knitting, doesn’t it?

Kateland - mother to three teenage children - received a “safer crack kit” in her mailbox from the City of Toronto. Why? Because of her neighborhood. The city isn’t even bothering to find out who uses what anymore - they’re just handing these out, expecting every resident on Kateland’s street must be a crackhead.

C’mon kids! You’re not doing crack now, but you might as well be! Let us help you get started!

Thankfully, Kateland has done an awesome job with her children, so they won’t be taking the City up on their invite to try crack. I wonder though about the other families in the area.

Mayor Miller is clutching a petition in his greedy, sweaty little palm, to have handguns banned in Canada. Ninety percent of the people who signed it are from Toronto, where gun ownership among law abiding residents is low. However, gun crime is high, especially in social housing and areas with a high proliferation of black, fatherless boys. Why not ban Jamaicans instead? After all, a gun sitting on a table is highly unlikely to kill anyone, even by accident. But a gang-banger who perceives “disrespect” will shoot first and not bother asking questions later.

Ontario went ahead with a pitbul ban - a specific breed of dog was singled out for genocide. C’mon Ontario - show us you really mean it with the gun ban. Go ahead, you soft-bellied, bike-riding, electric-car-buying, soy-munching city folk: Stand up and ban that what threatens you: The Jamaican. It makes a helluva lot more sense than banning an inanimate object.

Ah, but to do so would expose the mild city folk of Toronto for what they really are: A bunch of NIMBYs who know what the problems are but are too politically correct and inert to address them. More social housing! they cry. More basketball courts! (which is by far one of the most racist things I have ever heard). Yet, never in their lovely manicured neighborhoods. Hey, I hear ya - I don’t wanna live next door to some hair-trigger black boy with daddy issues and a chip on his shoulder, either. But I try to be honest about it.

C’mon, Toronto - step it up! You’ve already convinced the black community to go back to segregation, something we thought had gone the way of the Dodo a looong time ago. You’ve got them setting up separate black schools inside already existing white schools, so they can have separate entrances and their very own water fountains. And you even convinced them that it was their idea in the first place! Surely you can convince them to commit genocide on themselves. I mean, we’re already halfway there anyway, with the amount of shootings and stabbing that take place on any given weekend. Surely your solution is more guns, not less?

Good luck, Toronto, with this sticky little problem. But really, can’t you find a way to keep us law-abiding folk out of your little social engineering project? We have more important things to do.

Didn’t we ban guns in Toronto? Surely these people heard about David Miller’s ban on guns!

At least six gunshots were fired into a ground-floor apartment in the city’s west end early this morning.

An 11-year-old boy, a 24-year-old man and a 35-year-old woman were inside the unit at 3735 Dundas St. W., near Scarlett Rd., around 1 a.m. when the shots were fired, Toronto police Staff Sgt. Mark Tilley said.

Someone from the unit frantically called police and once they arrived, no suspects were found, but bullet holes were found inside the apartment.

No one was injured.

“This is still fresh and it’s being actively investigated by our detective office,” he said.

Police are still investigating a similar case that occurred May 25.

An unknown number of suspects stood outside a townhouse complex and fired into three homes on Orpington Cr., near Finch Ave. and Albion Rd.

No one was hurt in that case either.

Wow, these guys couldn’t hit water if they fell out of a boat! If only they had some place to practice…

Toronto will never have crime again! I’m so excited! At long last, the murders will end, the sirens will be silenced, and candy gumdrops will grow on money trees.

After a long, at times bitter and widely diverging debate, Toronto city council passed a series of measures to stamp out gun violence this afternoon by a two-thirds margin.

The 31-9 vote was a victory for Mayor David Miller, who had championed the steps in order to give the city the moral authority to push other levels of government to get tough on gun crime after council voted strongly in April to ask Ottawa to enact a national handgun ban.

We’ll all sleep soundly from now on. Those pesky target shooters and gun collectors are going DOWN!

But you weren’t listening then.

Now it’s suddenly “news” that we have sleeper cells of Hezbollah in Canada that are waking up. Bravo. Where were you two years ago, when I was reminding Toronto police that Hezbollah is a recognized terror group in Canada, and that the men waving their flag should be taken in - at least for questioning? Those Toronto police said things like “We’re not wading into that mess…” Oh what manly men - how brave. Better that they let the cells continue to exist and finally come awake to wreak destruction on us. Pussies.

Intelligence officials tell ABC News the group has activated suspected “sleeper cells” in Canada and key operatives have been tracked moving outside the group’s Lebanon base to Canada, Europe and Africa.

Officials say Hezbollah is seeking revenge for the February assassination of Hezbollah’s military commander, Imad Mugniyah, killed by a car bomb in Damascus, Syria.

The group’s leaders blamed Israel, an allegation denied by Israeli officials.

There is no credible information on a specific target, according to the officials.

Suspected Hezbollah operatives have conducted recent surveillance on the Israeli embassy in Ottawa, Canada and on several synagogues in Toronto, according to the officials.

If anything at all should happen on Canadian soil, I will be sure to have those pictures linked above splattered on every billboard in every major city. I will make sure that every news station receives a copy of them. And I will scream “I told you so!” from the rooftops.

Shameful that this is the first most Canadians will have heard of this.

Hat tip Darcy

Yeah right.

2 men fatally shot in random attack in Toronto: police

This is Toronto. Our shootings are rarely “random” here. I was downtown at a friend’s last night, and heard the sirens. Another bloody night in the city. I am still rather under the weather today, so I will let one of my betters do the opining.

As for stuff in the news…. Those damn Americans have killed two more Torontonians.

Two fine fellas were sitting in an SUV last night, minding their own business, I’m sure on their way home from their university course on space administration and aeronautics when they were gunned down for absolutely no reason.

They had really turned their lives around, but then it all comes to an end because those damn Americans keep shipping guns up here. If Americans would stop doing that, we would probably have no murders at all in Toronto because everybody is nice and wonderful and squeaky clean with the best of intentions.

If only more people would listen to Mayor Miller, things would be a lot better.

My theory is that someone set up a deer blind on the corner of Richmond and Niagara, and just weren’t very good at aiming. Those pesky hunters…

Well, here’s a hint. Americans are always belittled, insulted and generally despised - openly - when they come to our “fair” city. Now even the city councilors are getting in on the act.

It is interesting to note that letters criticizing Toronto City Council for closing down city-run shooting ranges were sent from Mississauga, Halifax, Wellesley, Ont., Pickering and Peterborough.

I supported shutting down the shooting ranges because I believe it is hypocritical for city council to call for a total ban on handguns, while supporting and in fact subsidizing gun culture at city-run facilities – especially when recreation programs to keep kids away from the draw of a street culture that too often includes weapons are underfunded in Toronto.

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.

If all it took was closing a couple of shooting ranges to stop gun-toting Yanks from coming to our city, maybe we should have shut the doors on these clubs years ago.

As for people outside Toronto, you are free to shoot off your mouths in this city or any other town. Just don’t shoot off a gun in Toronto.

Adam Vaughan, City Councillor, Toronto

The SARS epidemic has nothing on the general rudeness that our American neighbors are faced with when they decide to come North.

Just another evening in Toronto.

A man was shot to death last night in an apparent gun battle on a northeast Toronto street corner.

Residents heard as many as five gunshots and the sounds of screeching tires on Bonis Ave. near Birchmount Rd. and Sheppard Ave. E. at about 11:20 p.m.

Police arrived to find the victim sprawled at the rear of the Agincourt Mall.

No word on whether the perp was a duck hunter or a target shooter.

The National Post is doing a bang-up impression of Toronto Star. For a moment, I forgot which website I was reading. In today’s Posted Toronto Blog, Barry Hertz rants about the latest Toronto shooting “tragedy” - the gangland execution-style bullet hail that took place in Lawrence Park last late last week - and blames everyone and everything except the little putz who pulled the trigger.

While I too have held some disdain for Toronto’s architectural failings (I come from Montreal and I lived in Britian and travelled Europe - Toronto is butt ugly), I never would have thought to blame the urban planners for gun crime.

Somebody is doing a good job shovelling the snow in Lawrence Heights. In a video police released yesterday, two men in dark jackets walk down a carefully cleared pathway, lined with thick white snow. They could be heading to the corner store for a litre of milk.

The guy in front turns down a side path toward a building. He pulls something from his coat pocket. It is a gun. He fires a shot. The next image closes in to a tight frame, seen from above, almost the way a movie editor might splice the scene. Only this is no movie, people. As the snow reminds us, this is Toronto the Good, 2008.

Oh the scene setting, oh the poetry. Right, so the tender-hearted urban cowboy goes on to describe the scenes from the murder footage, firing the gun (Get that part, people? Someone actually deliberately pulled the trigger to kill someone… but that’s not the point, is it?) etc.

And he then closes out his piece with the same Intro to Short Story Writing shmaltz that he opened with:

Where I live, we all shovel the snow and we all have pride. In Lawrence Heights some municipal worker shovelled the snow and then got the hell out of there, to leave the locals to die.

Relax, buddy. It’s criminals shooting criminals. I really don’t think the heavily unionized snow remover had much to do with it. He’d lose his pension, you know? And then he’d have to live in like, an ugly building? And ugly buildings, like, make people angry? It perpetuates a deadly cycle, you know, man?

With the arrest of 96 people ranging in age from 17 to 63, Toronto police say a five-month undercover project has put a serious dent in drug dealing on west-end streets.

“This is a clear message to those who are plaguing the people in these communities – this type of criminal behaviour will not be tolerated,” police spokesperson Mark Pugash said.

Yes it will. Because…

The alleged drug dealers were “known to police,” having accumulated 1,600 convictions prior to their recent arrests, said Pugash.

Nearly half of those people picked up in the sweep – 45 – were out on bail or on probation.

Seven others were free on two or more bails at the time of arrest.

Toronto justice, folks. No word if they had all been set free once more at the time the Star went to print.

Update: I see where we’re getting our “justice” cues from.

The judge was unmoved by the OM’s argument that the victim had given a very detailed statement and the fact that the Somali had been convicted of mugging earlier, Additionally the suspect lied in more than one court case in the past, the OM argued in vain.

“One must certainly have guts to immediately mug someone again after just having served a prison sentence of some months. One must also assume that the defendant has learned something from the sentence and that it has made him wiser,” according to the judge, who ordered the man’s release.

The Somali showed that this was not enough for him. He was kept in custody for two months despite, he claims, being innocent and will demand damages from the man who accused him.

More proof that Canadians have “polited” themselves into docility.

A gang of 10 teenagers violently robbed scores of subway commuters yesterday afternoon during the peak of commuter rush hour.

The youths, all aged about 15, robbed numerous people — sometimes punching victims in the face — between 4 and 6 p.m. in the stairwells and platforms at stations along the Bloor St. and Yonge St. lines.

In Toronto rush hour, there are thousands of people teeming through the subway system. You mean to tell me that no one could put down a gang of pimply-faced thugs? They just handed over their belongings to a bunch of brats without any kind of protest?

Unacceptable. Were they waiting for the government to step in and pass a resolution or something? If we can’t defend ourselves on the personal level, how can we be expected to defend the rights and interests of our entire country?

Some lefty sites were encouraging their readership to head on down to the U of T for Kathy’s Lunch n’ Learn today, to cause disruption or throw pies or somesuch. (Oh wait, only the super-cool Richard Warman encourages whackadoos to throw pies… nevermind)

They didn’t show. It was instead a lively room of conservatives, Conservatives, and general members of the population who are concerned about the stripping of our most basic right: The right to free speech.

So where were the provocateurs? Well, as Kathy told us:

They’re lefties…. they couldn’t afford the $20 to get in.

I was pleased to note that there was a reporter there from Eye Weekly. At first I was annoyed - they tend to be over-the-top liberal and rather unfriendly. But then I realized that with the kind of content they promote - homosexuality, virulent anti-establishment and anti-Americanism, anarchy, atheism and more - that they have a vested interest in not allowing publications and individuals to be silenced for their views and beliefs. And while they no more want to throw their lot in with conservatives than we want to throw our lot in with Stormfront, this is an issue that transcends political beliefs. Or at least it should.

The black-focused school is a go.

After a heated but civil debate, Canada’s largest school board voted 11-9 last night to open an alternative Africentric school to help fight a 40 per cent dropout rate among Toronto’s black teens.

It will be interesting to see how many school buses are needed to ensure that no one sits at the front of them…

Somewhere out there, Frederick Douglass and Martin Luther King are shaking their heads.

If all black teachers, teaching all black culture were the magic pill to create all black geniuses, then wouldn’t the degenerate black hole at Jane and Finch be a rocket science research complex by now?

WonderWoman, commenting on the idea of all black schools in Toronto

Or their raises. While Toronto crumbles under the corruption of Mayor Miller and his union-pandering henchmen, private industry is ensuring that Torontonians can get home safely after partying hard on New Years Eve.

The Toronto Transit Commission will be offering people a free ride New Year’s Eve thanks to a generous donation from a credit card company.

Capital One has donated $85,000 to the TTC to help it provide the service to party revelers from midnight until 4 a.m.

Though other transit systems in other municipalities regularly offer free rides on New Year’s Eve, the TTC hasn’t offered the service for 30 years.

The donation is roughly equal to the revenue the TTC will lose by offering the service. About 100,000 people are expected to take advantage of the offer.

Toronto police can preach the “don’t drink and drive” message all they want, while other major cities across Canada and around the world offer free transportation to back it up. But Toronto’s corrupt mismanagement means that it would be impossible were it not for Citi’s publicity stunt.

I hope Miller at least gave his kids something nice for Christmas with my money.

I caught a few minutes of the tree-lighting ceremony lat night from Nathan Phillips Square while surfing channels. I happened to see the part where our erstwhile Mayor Miller came out to say a few words (and thank the sponsors). Did anyone else notice that he never once said the word Christmas, even with a gospel choir standing behind him?

I know that the squeaky wheel gets the Crisco, and that the shrieking loudness of the gay lobby has brought about a new kind of “equality” in Canada whereby some are actually more equal than others. But I had to shake my head when I saw this article in the Star:

Two concerts have been cancelled after mega-club Kool Haus pulled the plug at the last-minute on two controversial reggae and dancehall artists.

Entertainers Elephant Man and Sizzla were scheduled to perform last Friday night and Oct. 5 respectively, but both Jamaicans have been under fire from human rights organizations who say their lyrics are homophobic and incite violence against gays.

Akim Larcher, founder of Stop Murder Music Canada – a coalition made up of 20 organizations that promote human rights – says the federal government has remained silent in this issue.

Suddenly a lobby group is worried about the violence of the Jamaican music scene? Why the hell did it take the gays to bring this about?? What about women’s rights groups, or the anti-gun freaks around Toronto, who are happy to ban an inanimate weapon, but not the inspiration, culture or criminals that perpetrate the killings?

Stop Murder Music talks about human rights, but when will they act against other groups that target not just gays, but women, other blacks, rival gangs etc?

This 2004 article out of Montreal about Sizzla got lots of pro- and anti-Sizzla comments, but no one seemed to mention the other types of dangers associated with the rasta/hip-hop/reggae/bling bling yo homie culture that we actually have to live with every day in Canada and the US.

Here’s an example of Elephant Man’s anti-gay lyrics:

Ok, don’t dat tune a fit fi radio play (Yeah)
Don’t dat tune a mek di gal dem wine up when dem hear it waan stay (True)
It tell mi seh dem waan dat tune a day (Boom)
Don’t dat tune a mek yuh feel like likkle pickney ready fi play (Yeah)
Don’t dat tune a mek yuh feel a way (True)
Don’t dat tune a mek yuh feel like seh fi tek a gun and shot a gay (Bo!!!)
Dem waan pollute go dung and not obey
Doolas nah support it not away

Bad? Yes. Terrible to the point of outcry? Well, that depends. How do you feel about this:

Homey you a bitch you got feminine ways
Heard you got four lips and bleed for seven days
I got fo’ fifths and bananas on the K’s
And got more whips than a runaway slave

That’s from 50 Cent, who isn’t banned in Canada, and is in fact considered mainstream popular.

What about sexual objectification of women? Isn’t that a more widespread issue affecting 50% of the country, whereas gays only make up about 2%?

This is why I’m hot, catch me on the block,
Every other day, another bitch, another drop,

From Mims.

I see you windin’ n grindin’ up on that pole,
I know you see me lookin’ at you and you already know
I wanna f**k you,(f**k you) you already know
I wanna f**k you,(f**k you) you already know, girl

Money in the air as mo feel grab you by your coat tail take you to the motel, hoe sale,
don’t tell, wont tell, baby said I don’t talk Dogg but she told on me, oh well,
take a picture wit me, what the flick gon’ do, baby stick to me & ima stick on u,
if you pick me then ima pick on you, d-o-double g and I’m here to put this dick on you,
I’m stuck on pussy n urs is right, wrip riding them poles and them doors is tight and tighter
and ima get me a shot for the end of the night cause pussy is pussy and baby you’re pussy for life.

Akon featuring Snoop Dogg. Two very popular “artists”.

Frankly, I haven’t the time or the inclination to research the lyrics that glorify gang violence - it’s been done before anyway.

Fact is, there’s more than just the gay bashing aspect of this culture we should be looking at. Why has it taken a gay advocacy group to speak up about it.

Shame on the other lobbyists. Where have you all been hiding?

But activist and Canadian author Orville Lloyd Douglas says “there are a lot of double standards here.”

These organization’s “don’t go after Eminem or Marilyn Manson.”

And there it is. The race card. Double shame.