Beaten 79-year-old lucky to be alive
A 79-year-old man is “fortunate to be alive” after taking a vicious beating during a robbery at a midtown laundry shop, police said Thursday.
Threatening rap video takes aim at G20 and T.O.
Last Updated: June 3, 2010 9:23pm
The lyrics in the song F--- the Law by Dead Prez pulsate as the soundtrack to a video posted on YouTube Thursday highlights some of Toronto’s most precious landmarks and treasures.
It’s already alarming, but when you see the skull and bones image on top of subway stations, the cloaked threat makes the hair on the back of one’s neck stand up.
“You wonder why we feel like f--- the law, you wonder why we write up on the wall, you wonder why we burn the cities down, cuz we don’t give a f---, the time is now.”
A harmless rap video or a wicked warning of what could be coming to the G20 summit?
“It’s an open question for interpretation,” said terrorism expert David Harris of Insignis Strategic Research.
But Toronto Police are not alarmed.
“They don’t like capitalism and they are entitled not to like capitalism,” said spokesman Mark Pugash. Maybe we can hit the video-makers with a parking ticket instead?
On www.clac2010.net, which is credited at the end of the video, you will find the Convergence Des Luttes Anticapitalistes site with the heading “ATTACK THE G20 — TORONTO, JUNE 25-26-27, 2010” and describing itself as “a new anti-capitalist alliance” calling “for mobilization against the Group of 20.”
They have not called me back but I always find these types of slugs braver in packs of more than 100 and hidden behind bandanas.
None of the government organizers of this ridiculous downtown takeover extended the courtesy of a return call, either, and for their sanguine approach toward this video I will insist they are held accountable should someone use it for nefarious purposes.
Some of the organizers seem more interested in shutting out every normal Torontonian than making life uncomfortable for the garbage responsible for all of this expense.
Apparently no laws were broken with this video. Remember that when you get your next parking ticket.
I wonder if this beyond-the-pale video is not its own form of terrorism that could garner the same kind of prompt response the rest of us would get for driving while talking on the cellphone? Or does political correctness extend to the protection of the lazy anti-establishment bully ahead of those who pay the freight?
Being alarmist? Hey, somebody is obviously concerned something could happen. The taxpayer is on the hook for at least $1 billion in security for this shindig.
The police Thursday showed off what it will be able to do with new security toys that cost hundreds of millions. With a $300 video camera the anti-capitalists showed what they can do.
The video is clever and gutless. Clever in that it uses our freedoms to disguise itself as either an intimidator or a tourist travel log and gutless in that whoever made is not courageous enough to put his name to it.
This thing is as slick as it is sick. It plays like a target list — showing a map of inside and outside the G20 wall. On the video are closeups of streets, banks, hotels, condo buildings, parks and landmarks.
Next to the skull and bones on the map it often says “Vous etes Ici” which translates to “You are Here.”
Writing he did not make the video but simply posted it anti-globalization activist Jaggi Singh tweeted “targeting the Hockey Hall of Fame? Montrealers want to visit the Hall to see all the Stanley Cups they’ve won.”
Smug, smart, effective. But also mean.
In a world where we have witnessed the 9/11 attack and in a city where we’ve had the Toronto 18 terrorist scare, it’s vicious to show where innocent are prey.
“It doesn’t rise to the level of incitement under the criminal code but it is a most disturbing signal,” said Harris, formerly of CSIS.
Councillor Adam Vaughan said “your heart sinks” when you see such innuendo, and this video shows “that one $1 billion earmarked for security has to go for more than just protecting the visiting leaders but to protect all of Toronto.”
And to protect us from the doom insinuated in the lyrics: “Break the handcuffs, invade the campus, smash the cameras, f--- the police, pimp the system, slip the banks up, bang for freedom, burn the prisons.”
joe.warmington@sunmedia.ca
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