Steelers 23, Bills 10

Tabatha Southey is a good writer. Her weekly Globe and Mail column is a must-read for me and I follow her on Twitter too. Her column this past Saturday, entitled "Finally, the mayor he dreamed he'd be" drew an amusing connection between Sandro Lisi leaving plastic bags in the back seat of the mayor's Escalade and his "highly impassioned, successful crusade to end the five cent fee for plastic bags...". At this point in the exhausting Ford story, we're left with trying to find humour wherever it might lurk. It was easy enough at first but the story seems to have run out of funny chapters. But it's a new week and we can only hope.

The Fifth Estate piece on Friday night did a nice job of pulling all of the sordid elements of the story together. Ford's admission of crack use, his angry rant against someone in the latest video and Toronto City Council's continuing ostracization of him may be the least of his problems if more evidence comes to light about his connections to organized crime. The "broker" of the original video, a Dixon community organizer, claimed that unsavoury characters showed up in the days immediately following the original Toronto Star story offering (and showing people) large sums of cash in exchange for the video. Around this time, Ford was calling Lisi multiple times every day. Many of their clandestine meetings at gas stations and elsewhere were recorded as part of the ongoing police surveillance. He has not offered an explanation of any of this but, if he insists on remaining as mayor, the pressure to do so will be immense. Otherwise, we will draw our own conclusions. I wonder when we will get around to discussing the downtown relief line again.

If there is a silver lining to this very dark cloud stuck over the City of Toronto, it could be that the Ford saga has generated renewed interest in municipal politics which could translate into increased voter turnout next fall. High voter turnouts are the great fear of the right wing. Apathy and cynicism helped elect Stephen Harper but as voter turnout increases (if it does), his prospects diminish - and he knows it. Same goes for Ford Nation (which Adam Vaughan referred to as a failed state). Members of Ford Nation vote in large percentages and if others don't, Ford wins. If many citizens who have never voted in municipal elections do vote next October, very few of them are likely to vote for Ford. As long as the non-Ford vote isn't split too many ways, just think, we may be less than a year away from booting him out.

The most interesting thing I saw during yesterday's Bills game in Pittsburgh was some footage CBS dug up from the Bills one and only win in Pittsburgh which took place in 1975. The teams do not play each other all that often but their histories each go back more than 50 years. Many Bills fans were probably happy to see EJ Manuel under centre after missing 4 weeks with a knee injury from the Cleveland game in week 5. I was one of them. But even acknowledging that he had missed the previous 4 weeks and was making only his 6th NFL career start - in Pittsburgh - he had a bad day yesterday. Very bad. So bad that on the past-game call-in on WGR, The Bulldog wondered if the team should consider drafting another quarterback in next year's draft. The remaining 6 games in this season, while unimportant for Bills fans who have probably thrown in the towel on another lost season, are going to determine if the Bills will do that or stick with Manuel and fill another need in the draft. Let's hope he shows some of whatever they saw in him when they picked him. I predict that he will bounce back, play better and be the quarterback to lead the team back to the playoffs.