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Editor's Desk

Mr. Bush League

by Judi McLeodMay 9 - 30, 2000

Toronto Free Press cityscape columnist Gary Reid tells me I could write a book about the adventures of running an independent newspaper in a competitive city like Toronto. The trouble is who would believe it?

At our Elm Street digs, the telephones ring constantly. People who show up without an appointment ring the doorbell. For reasons unknown to us, members of the public at large think that investigative newspapers can solve problems of any nature.

Like any other newspaper, we get our share of kooks. Once during an impromptu office party, a strange lady came to the door, walked past two staff members pointing to me and saying, ‘I came to see her.’ Ignoring my mild protestations, she eventually cornered me in the back office. It turns out she had been in the audience when a well-meaning local minister made a speech saying that I was a hero as I had managed to save his school in a series of TFP stories. Alone with her while my colleagues partied, she announced: ‘God sent me.’ While I was trying to ease her out the door, she told me she had one more document to leave me. As I was slightly taller, I could see into her briefcase where she was carrying a hammer and a knife. The situation was a little disturbing given that my calls for assistance were drowned out by the pumped up for the party radio.

I was able to see the lady to the door without mishap.

On other occasions, we have had absolute strangers walk into the office behind someone who works here. Once, a strange man sat working on one of our computers for half an hour before we realized he was unknown to the person he followed in.

Reid thinks the story of how a reporter became a newspaper publisher would make for compelling reading.

Misadventures with ad reps alone would fill more than one book.

The year 2000 is a municipal election year and in election years our adventures seem to triple.

Certain politicians, who would give anything to destabilize us and not have us around come Election Day, have sent in a stable of hand- groomed ‘agent provocateurs’. The last one, who they dispatched in the guise of an ad rep, left us with new hope for the rest of election year. He was so incredibly stupid he could easily star in his own television sitcom.

It is always easy to take advantage of someone who is busy. When your mind is on a thousand things and you lost an eight-year staff member who left being the only one with knowledge of certain things, including the combination of the office safe, it is easy to create havoc. The latest agent provocateur kept asking us for the office telephone code, etc., etc. Super Spy bragged about his coveted leg muscles to 16-year-old co-op student Laura McGill. The much brighter, Laura, who rolled her eyes in mock horror during his rare visits to the office, thought him to be ‘quite bush league’.

When it became more than obvious to the rest of us that ‘Mr. Bush League’ had some sort of hidden agenda, he holed up at home where he would only communicate with us in a spate of faxes.

Whoever was paying his freight should first recycle him and then send him back to spy school.

When he wanted to relieve us of a huge number of papers in the latest edition, he sent one of his own family members. Unknown to her, the family member happened to be recognized by a client who happened to be making an unscheduled pit stop to the office at the very moment she was boosting our papers.

Because Mr. Bush League quit by fax, I never had the opportunity to give him a proper send-off. I had a special sign made up on stick-to paper, reading, ‘Mission Never Accomplished’, which I was hoping to stick to his back along with my good-bye hug.

Mr. Bush League returns to a job, site of which is common knowledge to the rest of us.

In spite of all our many adventures, Toronto Free Press celebrates its 10th anniversary of publishing on May 15.

Ten years old in 2000. At this year’s anniversary celebrations, we will be sure to roast the politician who sent Mr. Bush League.

Canada Free Press founding editor Most recent by Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years experience in the print media. Her work has appeared on Newsmax.com, Drudge Report, Foxnews.com, Glenn Beck. Judi can be reached at: judi@canadafreepress.com


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