I'm not dismissive, just realistic.

Looking on the bright side, he's got more votes than Mosley would have, maybe he'll try to spin this as an upward trend?

i could shit in a hat and it would get more votes than mosley.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/79085

FIA presidential candidate Ari Vatanen has welcomed declarations of support for his bid from the Ukranian Automobile Federation (FAU) and Middle Eastern bodies.

----------------------
http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=20372

More illustrious nations from the world of motor racing supporting Vatanen



NOT

Actually Prince Feisal al Hussein of Jordan is not a total nobody in FIA circles, he's on Ari's candidacy list and he extended an invitation to attend the WRC rally in Jordan to Max last year when Spankgate was raging.

But I get your point, not really illustrious nations and they even forgot to mention that now also Palestinian Motor Sport & Motorcycle Federation is backing Ari, but what the hell a vote is a vote.

BTW Ari and Todt campaigning at Rally Catalunya tomorrow.

if i remember correctly, wasn't it one of max's middle eastern friends who bought a stack of those 'illustrious nations' votes to save his arse during his prostitute-beating scandal?

Mosley publically says that Vatanen will "lose badly"

http://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2009/10/mosl...ill-lose-badly/

Has Mosley no shame?

Actually, we all know the answer to that.

Power-crazy pond scum.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/79116


No sh** ...

Mosley has sunk to new lows and is now openly threatening members who vote for Ari. He has no shame and no self control, an utter tyrant, desperate to keep the current corrupt status quo and getting his man elected. This is the type of behavior you see in zimbabwe and russia with their mock democracies.

Its somewhat amazing how blatant its become, even for Mosley. He just cant resist.

He can't handle anyone challenging his intellectual superiority.

When they do he reacts like a child and comes out spitting and swinging.

Mosley's legacy is cemented though, a corrupt pervert who has been a stain on the sport.

He's a figure of fun who'll be quickly forgotten.

I'm sure he'll have a phrase attributed to him ;)

"Oh, Blah Blah just did a Mosely.." whatever that may be, I'd hate to think.

Based on the leaked Mosley letter, I sincerely hope that Vatanen wins....

Me too!

Never has a question been more rhetorical. I'd say he should just FOAD, but he'd probably enjoy trying to do that too much.

We all know deep down that what he's said is true and Vatanen has absolutely no chance at all, don't we?

The man is an absolute idiot. I hope that his good pal Todt understands it too...

Yep, because it isn't a fair race.

It's pretty clear Mosley has been using all the resources at his disposal for a long time to back Todt.

It's the racing equivilent of ballot stuffing.

Totally undemocratic and corrupt to the core.

Great response from Prince Feisal:-

"Jordan has always maintained a strong relationship with the FIA president, so I am deeply disappointed by the content and the insinuations of his letter which have raised serious questions as to the credibility of the upcoming and future elections."

Mosley's tactics of intimidation have been exposed. What a toe-rag.

Vatanen has a chance, thats why Mosley is getting worried. Maybe workload between Todt and Mosley is "good cop" "bad cop", one talks nice while other threatens.

----------
Quite strong comment from Feisal, he basicly says that he fears election fraud.

This is a disgrace. Why the hell to even hold any elections, just put your man to the job already.

That old wierdo act just like a elementary school insecure bully, nothing more.

If Max continues supporting Todt like this he makes sure Vatanen gets the job

From Prince Feisal, in a letter calling for an independent monitor for the FIA Presidential elections.

“Voting should be done with your hearts and your conscience, and not out of fear and intimidation. Now is the time to become one harmonious governing body, not to face a future of division and uncertainty due to decisions made during a democratic process.

“In the interests of democracy, transparency and integrity, we must be sure that this election is held in a fair and open environment through a secret ballot and under close third party supervision.”

He's pure evil.

People have said before that Mosley might could have made a great British Prime Minister if his Dad hadn't been in bed with the Nazis and best pals with some chap named A. Hitler.

To that I say bullshit.

Mosley couldn't have possibly survived in politics because all his methods are so corrupt and underhand, based on intimidation and lining the pockets of third world motor clubs.

Mosley would have been exposed and thrown from any other elected office on the planet.

All sporting bodies get the same type of leadership - IOC, FIFA, etc - full of those the voting public wouldn't give the time of day to. They can be as corrupt as they like, play power politics to their little hearts content and nobody in the real world has to suffer the consequences - let 'em have their sand pit.

No other big sporting organisation in the world would be able to get away with the kind of corruption we see at the FIA>

Certainly not FIFA, FINA or the IOC.

No way, their top officials are under too much public scrutiny and are accountable as a consequence.

Can you really image Sepp Blatter surviving Mosley's sorrid sex scandal?

Gareth must be poorly today and not on the forum

This just shows how much Mosley has got used to telling the members what to do over the years now he thinks it is normal practice. As President he should be making sure there is a level playing field, not tipping it in the direction he prefers.

I doubt Ari will win, maybe Mosley being so Todt will push a huge backlash though. I hope there is totally independent overseeing of the votes, I wouldn't put it past him to start altering them ...

Regards
Andy

Exactly, it reminds me of Putin's strong-arm tactics. He really is a despicable human being. Well done to Prince Feisal (presumably he leaked the letter too?) for spelling it out:

"Jordan has always maintained a strong relationship with the FIA president, so I am deeply disappointed by the content and the insinuations of his letter which have raised serious questions as to the credibility of the upcoming and future elections."

If the organisation had an ounce of decency it would censure its president.

Why hasn't autosport quoted any of that?

LOL they have, some even with worse than the relatively harmless powerplay in FIA, read a book by Andrew Jennings or have a look at www.playthegame.org, you'll be surprised.

As to Mosley's letter to Prince Feisal he's just doing his job, Vatanen has been going around badmouthing FIA and it's leaders, now surely Mosley has the right to defend FIA and warn the good Prince that this will not go unnoticed by other FIA members and that by endorsing Vatanen one assumes that he agrees with Vatanen's filthy remarks about FIA.

Nothing really, just a bit of posturing and powerplay but the hysterics in this thread calling bloody murder at every move Todt or Mosley makes are entertaining though

More coverage here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/motorspor...ses-uproar.html





If Mosley continues to p*** off the Arabs I can see Bernie getting a few phone calls...

Now wonder Max writes letters, Todt and him seem to be pretty nervous ..

Pretty much my take on it too, Vatanen has run a very negative campaign full of personal slurs whereas Todt has acted with professionalism and in a statesmanlike way, Todt will win and win heavily

They have no reason to be nervous as Todt will win, if Vatanen wins it will be an injustice as the only serious support for Vatanen seems to be from mobility and from third world nations so if Vatanen wins it is going to mean sport has had a candidate imposed on it that 90% of sport doesn't want to I don't see how they will work comfortably with Vatanen which will cause further division between FIA and F1

Fortunately Todt will prevail but Vatanen would be a disaster if he won as he does not command the respect of sport

Feeling dreadful, tbh, bloody sambucca ...

Mixed thoughts on this one really.

Definitely agree with jokuvaan. I didn't think Ari had much of a chance, now I'm not so sure at all.

Given Ari's attacks on the current FIA leadership, it's not that great a surprise they've fired back. And given his (if Mosley is to be believed) attempts to gain the support of the current leadership, his attacks on them don't reflect all that well on him.

But still, not the best way to go about responding IMO in sending that letter to one of Ari's team. And it certainly adds to the impression that the candidate list concept is a very undemocratic device.

We have gone from the chaps who drive the AA vans should decide who's the president of the FIA to what the prince of Arabia syas it what matters most.

BTW, if some of you fear that Todt is going to be a Ferrari guy, don't be afraid, it's probably going to be the opposite, given how he and LdM don't get along well with each other.

i'm no ferrari fan ( warming up a little now that todt and schumacher have gone though) but i no more want to see a president against ferrari than i want to see one in favour of it.

Thing is MegaManson that if Jean Todt has 90% of the sporting votes he should not worry at all.
Countries only have one nominated sporting club who controls the vote, where mobility clubs often have to "share" their vote with mobility clubs from the same country.

Example UK:

Sport
MOTOR SPORTS ASSOCIATION (MSA)
They have 1 vote (which will be for Todt as Graham Stoker is on his candidacy list).

Mobility
AUTOMOBILE ASSOCIATION LTD (AA)
EURORAP
RAC MOTORING SERVICES (RAC)
THE CAMPING AND CARAVANNING CLUB (CCC)
THE CARAVAN CLUB (CC)
THE INSTITUTE OF ADVANCED MOTORISTS LIMITED (IAM)
THE ROYAL AUTOMOBILE CLUB (RAC)

These 7 clubs have together also 1 vote and which way it goes is decided by a majority decision between those clubs.

Now the really interesting clubs are those that represent both Mobility and Sport in their countries, such as for example the Automobile and Touring Club for the United Arab Emirates (ATCUAE), because these clubs get 2 votes (which will go to Jean Todt as mr. Mohamed Ben Sulayem is on his candidacy list).

So like Mosley I expect Vatanen to lose badly and for those who endorsed his badmouthing of FIA to face some repercussions.

Todt doesn't have to get dirty because he has his hatchet man Max Freaking Mosley (President of the FIA!!!) doing his dirty work for him!

And Todt is benefiting from an entire FIA structure which has been geared to pave the way for the current president's annointed successor to win.

And that is beyond wrong.

Nowhere in this campaign has Jean Todt or anyone associated with his campaign, badmouthed FIA unlike Ari Vatanen.
That is why Mosley acted and that is what he's supposed to do as FIA President.

Vatanen promised us a clean campaign and he lied, I'm afraid that this will not go down very well with the FIA members in general.

Dear Jurer,
Don't you-a listen to-a da public prosecutor guy. He know nuthin'. He been dissin' me all-a through da trial. He's gonna get-a what's coming to him.
You better vote-a 'innocent' or the same will-a happen to you.
Now I ain't out ta nobble no jury, but that guy, he-a say bad things about me and-a I gota da right to tell you not-a to believe them if you know what's good for you.
Sincerely, your freind
Bugsy Malone

What is being presented as "dirty" is just Vatanen going about the business of campaining.

He offering an alternative to the leadershp style of Mosley, so of course he's going to be critical of it.

Todt, on the other hand, offers a business-as-usual presidency, with only a couple of minor changes to Mosley's reign.

So it is much easier for Todt to claim to be clean, he represents the status quo.

In any case, Mosley needs to stay firmly out of the fight.

When the U.S. elections took place last year, George Bush didn't react to the hours of criticism aimed at his administration from Obama.

That wouldn't have been right.

So why is Mosley weighing in, other than because zeppelin-sized ego feeling a prick of discomfort.

Which is how Mosley hung onto power when they had the vote after the sex scandal. It was ok then, but is bad bad bad now.

Problem with defending Mosley is that you have to end up always shifting your position and become inconsistent.

Regards
Andy

PS Get well soon Gareth, you need to be well for more drinking tonight ...

I am not a Mosley apologist, I think he has done some very good things with regards safety but he has done a lot of things I don't like too, in terms of safety he will go down as an outstanding president but in terms of his style, his meddling, his personal insults at opponents (Stewart for example), his corruption (selling the rights to F1 dirt cheap to Bernie and Bernie later giving him a £250m backhander) etc he has been a disaster

why would Todt critisise a corrupt organisation when it's pulling every dirty stroke in the book to make him the president?


Under Mosleys abusive regime anyone that critisised him was beaten into submission, now that his hold is weakening people are finding the courage to speak out against him and thank god.

I'm tremendously impressed that Ari had the balls to even get into this fight knowing the river of shit he would have to wade through and i'm very glad he has chosen to.

His campaign, even if unsuccessful, has at least forced Mosley/Todt to show how dirty the FIA machine has become.


Vatinen has behaved pretty well so far, you need to learn the difference between baseless mud-slinging (see Mosley) and justified critisisim. Ari has critisised a corrupt, murky little regime and rightly so as his whole campaign is based on ending that era which is hard to do without discussing it..

Ari made deeply libellous claims about Todt and the private jet that were afterwards totally discredited and Ari found to be a complete lying toad, that for me turned me completely against Ari whereas before I had a bit of support for him, it made me question his competence and judgement as he did not check his facts or do research so it left a bad taste as a competent president should check his facts, if Ari is going to shoot first and ask questions later his rule would be as divisive if not more than Max's

So accusing the FIA of sending Todt to Africa with a private jet to campaign is just campaigning cleanly?
Saying that the FIA is a 'stagnant pool which stinks' is just campaigning cleanly?

The first was proven to be a lie and he was reprimanded for that and if he believes the latter to be true he shouldn't be surprised that the president of the organisation he calls a "stagnant pool which stinks" steps in.

There was mileage in Todt travelling with his missus on FIA junkets, but yeah, Vatanen mishandled that one.

But when has Todt or Mosley ever observered the truth.

They're seriously underhand.



I don't know that the FIA is a stagnant pool.

It is filled with agitating creatures pushing their own agendas.

But Ari is right, it does stink.

It stinks to high heaven!

to call him a liar is to imply that he created the story falsley, he did nothing of the sort. A story was leaked to the press that Todt was being flown to venues at the FIA's expense for him to sell his candidacy, everyone reacted with scorn Ari included, when it was known Todt was involved in a safety campaign it made Ari look silly.


However there are two points here, firstly Ari did not lie, re reacted to a lie without checking his facts, not smart, but definitley not dishonest. Secondly he was spot on in his response, Todt may not be openly flying around in FIA jets to promote himeslef but he was placed in that safety campaign as a front to allow himself access to FIA venues for self promotion, venues whos doors have been closed to Ari.

You don't honestly beleive that it's just a coincidence that Todt has ended up flying to exclusive FIA venues, filled with voting club members, at the FIA's expense and with an FIA stamp of approval and an attractive FIA saftey campaign who's glow he can bask in, just as a Presidential election is on the horizon?

It's got the outward appearance of innocent coincidence but the reality is (as we've come to see all too clearly) it's pure FIA favouritism and Ari called it spot on.

Max's letter to Prince Feisal sounds a bit desperate.