Also, where's MM at? I need to assuage this rage regarding the video.
I've been keeping quiet for two reasons:
1) I don't have any new info.
2) I've been contacted persistently by reporters who have tried through varied questioning gymnastics to get me to give up my sources and I've been followed on here, Twitter, and possibly Facebook by The Star's lead lawyer.
If any of the info I received was acquired and divulged to me illegally, I'm not aware of the process, only the final information but I do know it's not worth the aggravation. So I'll continue to comment, and if I'm told anything, I'll keep it to myself until it's clear that it'll be made public. You'll just have to read between the lines if I do know something new.
That said, I can talk about a few things.
One is that the Conservatives are buckling on their -- until recently -- strategy to run another candidate and may yet come out in support of Ford. Amazing how things have changed so dramatically from the imminent collapse of Rob Ford's office and the then apparently inevitable ostracizing of Ford, his brother and any of his inner group who remained.
Ford is going to run on the campaign mantra "Promise Made. Promise Kept" while Olivia Chow's campaign is being built on "One Toronto", a strategy that will mostly ignore Ford (leaving the negative campaigning to external groups) and sell pride in Toronto as one city, together. It'll pitch Olivia's positive vision for the city offering a refuge from the tired scandal after scandal. Adam Vaughan and even Shelly Carroll have both given guarantees that they will not run for Mayor.
As for Karen Stintz, she was (is?) trying hard to become the standard barer for the Conservatives and while they were looking outside of municipal politics for a candidate, she was increasingly becoming a viable choice for the Conservative machine to run. But Ford's luck has undeniably changed and he's once again looking like an attractive option. I mean, if he weathered a crack cocaine scandal and came out alive, then nothing can hurt this guy.
If he does have the right's support and campaign financing then I think he'll put up a good fight but that Olivia with the Laschinger team will very likely win the next election.
Now to comment on the video, I'm very confident from what I've heard and from who I've heard it from that it is in several hands, some of which could become slippery. Will the video come out soon? It's anybody's guess. Will it come out eventually? Absolutely. Is the video important? It would no doubt help to bring this whole situation to some sort of resolution, but at this point it doesn't really matter. Ford will never step down, he must be defeated at the polls and video or no video, most of Toronto is tired of hearing about it and putting up with Ford's scandals. He'll never get the support of the 20% or so that he lost after becoming Mayor. His only chance at re-election is a vote split, but I don't think that enough high profile candidates are going to run to pull support away from Olivia Chow.