...
Ford Sr. became a Member of the Ontario Legislature during the term of the Progressive Conservative government of Mike Harris.[7] After Ford Sr.'s death, Rob has maintained political connections with the provincial PC and the federal Conservative Parties. Former Ontario Premier Mike Harris regularly gives advice to Ford. A picture of Harris with Ford's father adorns his mayor's office. Ford describes his father as his "political hero, my business hero, he's my hero overall."[8]
...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Ford

Though at the municipal level, people aren't running under party banners, he is a very right-wing sort of guy. After a proposal by Mike Harris, Toronto was amalgamated, which means that all the suburban communities (Etobicoke, Oakville, Scarborough, North York) were made part of the "Greater Toronto Area" or GTA. If you look at the voting maps for the most recent mayoral election, all of the amalgamated cities voted for Ford, and he was overwhelmingly voted against by the city of Toronto proper. Unfortunately, those communities outnumber the Toronto core. His last election message was simple and spoke to the pocket books of suburban commuters. He was going to stop "the gravy train" at city hall, and bring back respect for the taxpayer. Unfortunately we discovered that he was indeed going to stop the gravy train... right at his desk so that he can tuck in.

He's not a politician so much as an avatar of sophomoric entitlement and wilful ignorance. To give you an idea, an earlier step of this whole process involved him deciding he was going to get rid of all the mayoral watchdogs in the city and replace them with his personal lawyer, for "efficiency's sake."

Sure, he whines about the left with the best of them, and claims this takedown's a small-l-liberal plot, but his general fuckheadedness supercedes his politics.

He's would feel comfy cozy in a Tea Party meeting. He was Toronto's consequence of voting in anger, and not out of intelligence. Toronto will be better off without this buffoon.

But I thought that the right-wing mayor of the 5th largest city in North America being removed from office due to conflict of interest/corruption charges would fit the bill.

"National interest" in this context means the USA. Most people in USA don't know this guy or don't care about him.

Statement of Purpose
Post the latest news from reputable mainstream news websites and blogs. Important news of national interest only. No analysis or opinion pieces. No duplicates. News stories must have been published within the last 12 hours. Use the published title of the story as the title of the discussion thread.

so why can't we laugh at the other country's crooked politicians?

And they replied that 'national' was not restricted to US national news.

My conversations in the hosts forum have taken a different POV. "National" means "national." That said, something that happens in another country (Israel/Palestine, for example, or Afghanistan, or Iraq) can indeed have "national" import to us, but the fact that a mayor in Canada--big city or not--is in hot water is just NOT "national interest" to my mind. The benchmark for "national import" is probably that our national (Big 3) nightly news might have a hope in hell of covering the story--not that a few folks over the border find it interesting.

My attitude is that the post is not doing any harm, so leave it, but this is a relative new poster, with sixty or so posts, and I figured the poster might not have known better.

But it's obvious from what's posted in Latest Breaking News.

Look at page 1 right now. Stories about:
Libya
Israel
Toronto
India
Israel
Israel
Britain
Israel
Sweden
Europe
Qatar
Egypt
Britain
Syria
Israel
India
Israel
Egypt
China

Why are you singling out Canada?

This is a story about a mayor--not about the government of Canada's relations with the USA.

Context matters.

People have noted Toronto's size and importance, but what's more significant is that the issue is of general applicability. There's a conflict-of-interest law, a powerful elected official who violates it, and a judge who can and does remove the offender from office.

A post about, say, the role of the Governor General would be on a different footing. That would directly raise the issue of whether "national interest" means just the U.S. The actual post is of interest even under the narrower interpretation, because we also face the issue of conflicts of interest.

If Toronto changes their mayor, or doesn't, it will not affect the average American. The vast majority of Americans don't know who this guy is, what his issues are, and damn few could even find Toronto on a map. If they can even distinguish Canada from USA on a map without any writing on it, they're doing well.

Further, Canadian law is not controlling in the USA, any more than British, French or Islamic law is. It's an object of curiosity for the reasons you state, but not a national matter. Most Americans couldn't tell you who the PM of Canada was. This topic was not covered on my nightly network news, the cable newsers didn't have it, and the BBC didn't have it, either.

It's just not a "national" issue. It's an "international" issue, at best (and that is a HUGE stretch), but truth is, it's a local or regional issue in Canada, and barely a "national" issue for them, either.

My mayor was just released from hospital after a long stay of over a month for a variety of not-insignificant medical issues. Now, Boston is big town, it's known to most Americans, it's the home of the Bean and the Cod...but I wouldn't consider the fact that Menino is finally home a matter of "national interest" either. My local news covered it, but damn--not a word from NBC, ABC, CBS, MSNBC, CNN, etc. about that, either.

It's a real stretch to put this kind of stuff in LBN, and it dilutes and cheapens the utility of the forum. There are other places where this kind of thing is more appropriate--like the woefully underutilized Canadian group, where yesterday, only four threads were posted--one of which was a duplicate of this one, garnering only a handful of replies.

The day-to-day affairs of Canadian mayors are NOT front page headlines in our papers, and the demise of one mayor won't make a blip on the American nightly news.

It's just not a "national" story of "national" interest. It's a CANADIAN "national" story. Doesn't fit the SOP.

Any more than the big news re: the mayor of Boston, a major American city, is "national" news.

Words have meanings. Local/regional is NOT national, and international is not national.

The government of Canada will not fall because the mayor of Toronto has issues.

some of you may remember her as "AspieGrrl" or "lightningandsnow".

Been a big couple of days. The Toronto Argonauts (our football team) won the Grey Cup (that's the CFL's championship) last night (not something I care a whole lot about), and today we lost our oaf of a mayor (which is making me do a happy dance, too).

He was quite happy. He lived in Toronto all his life until he moved to live in England in 2011.

I was born in the USA and am a dual. I lived in Toronto for 36 years until I moved north. Many people I know do not like Ford. so it is an interesting piece of news. Toronto is a very, very large worldly city.

and According to Wikipedia.

His mother, Doris, lives next door to my parents in FL. When Jack came to visit he an I would golf together. Afterward we'd stop somewhere and have a beer. It was always neet to see the Canadians recognize him and he would always give folks his complete attention.

I loved Jack. He was the man for all the people. I also revere Pierre Trudeau, another great Canadian.

that Calgary elected a Muslim mayor, and Toronto a redneck one?

I didn't think anyone could top Ralph Klein for dumbassery. Congrats, Rob.

Here in the United States, the worst offenders typically ensure many links in multiple layers of government are on their side before they begin the grand theft. Buy off enough officials, and you can create your own set of laws for yourself and a different set for the common people.