Rob Ford's say-nothing strategy is better than the experts think

Communications experts are saying that Mayor Rob Ford's failure to respond to stories about a video that apparently shows him smoking crack is a total disaster, but I'm not so sure about that.

It's been a week since the Star and the Gawker website in the U.S. reported on the infamous phone video, shown to Star reporters Robyn Doolittle and Kevin Donovan and on another occasion to a Gawker editor by people trying to sell it for a six-figure sum.

The Star has yet to buy it (and I agree with my colleague Rosie DiManno, who says we should), while Gawker has raised more than $100,000 from the public for its purchase, which means there's a chance it'll come out soon.

But there's been nary a word of denial or challenge of the story from Ford, other than to describe it last Friday as "ridiculous," and a smear by the Star.

Brother Doug told reporters Wednesday that he believes the mayor when he says it is untrue, and spent nearly 10 minutes reciting the successes of the Ford administration, talking over reporters peppering him with questions about the mayor and the video.

Even many of his most faithful supporters want to hear him at least say something, while the rest of the public think it is unconscionable for the mayor to not address such serious allegations.

Robin Sears, a well-known political communications strategist, said it's "mindboggling" that Ford hasn't responded by now. "This will go into the textbooks of how not to do something like this."

So let's try to figue out the thinking - if there is any - behind this strategy.

Pretend you're Ford for a minute. Word gets out of a video that compromises you in the worst possible way, and there is no explaining it.

You can jump up and down and deny it, claim it's a fake, send libel notices to the Star and Gawker and stick to the line that the Star is out to get you, which is gospel to Ford Nation.

But if the video comes out and is verified as undoctored, you'll still be expected by most of the world (after all, it is a worldwide story), to explain it, and you will also wear the additional shame of having lied about it.

Ford has some experience with that.

If you keep mum and run away from the media for long enough, and simply refuse to talk about it when there's no getting away, the questions will eventually ease up. The reporters will get distracted by something else. Guaranteed.

On the bright side, it may never end up in the hands of any media. And you can bet Toronto police are trying hard to find the video and grab it from the guys peddling it. We will quite likley never know if the cops get their hands on it, and that'll be the end of it.

Also, there's always the option that the Ford camp could buy it. Anyone who believes the Ford Bros. wouldn't love to get their hands on it, and have the money to pay for it, is kidding themselves. If the video is genuine, the mayor absolutely has the, uh, connections needed to talk to the right guys.

So for now, the best strategy may be to play for time. Rope-a-dope, Muhammad Ali style.

If the video comes out, then decide what to do, or say. And if doesn't, you can take your chances that Ford Nation will believe it's just another smear job.

Listen to talk radio and it's obvious that a lot of his supporters are sticking with him. Some even say they don't care if he smokes crack. And Brother Doug's address was clearly directed at the faithful, to shore up support.

As for the rest of the public, Ford knows he has lost most of them anyway, so why cave in to their demands that he speak?

For a guy who clearly has no intention of confessing to anything, it's the percentage play.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Betting against a downtown casino was easy money

I cashed a $100 bet when Toronto city council drove the final stake through the heart of the proposed downtown casino, and if I wasn't such a nice guy, it would have been $1,000.

But Paul Godfrey has rolled nothing but snake eyes over the past few days. He was dumped by the Liberal goverment as chair of the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp. last Thursday, and then his high-flying plans for a waterfront resort casino were kneecapped Tuesday by council.

He was supposed to be the rainmaker for the U.S. casino operators so anxious to set up shop here. They were banking on his persuasiveness in local political matters, believing he could wave a magic wand over city hall and stack a vote to approve a casino.

There was a time, not so long ago, when he could. But every dog has his day, and Big Paulie's seems to have passed.

A lot of people around here also bought into the Godfrey mystique, thinking he need only pull a few strings from the background to make a casino happen, including a friend of mine who likes to back his opinion with a wager.

My read of the situation was that council wouldn't vote for a casino unless it was literally a license to print money for the city. I was certain that wouldn't be the case (and said so in previous blogs), since there is only so much to go around, and the province doesn't want to share any more than is absolutely necessary.

My buddy told me I was wrong, and that the forces behind the downtown casino push - Godfrey chief among them - were so powerful that they could not be resisted.

He's a poker dealer at the sporting gentlemen's club where I play cards, and is constantly in action with a bet on something or other. He proposed a $1,000 wager, which I immediately accepted.

I thought it over and didn't like the idea of taking that much dough from a pal who can't afford to lose it. So I said why don't we keep it friendly and make it $100, just enough for the loser to wince a little when he hands over the money.

I'll be collecting on my bet when I see my friend, but there'll be no payday for Paulie.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The fight against dandelions is lost, but so what?

I'm raising a white flag at my house and declaring a surrender to the struggle against dandelions.

It's been five years since Toronto outlawed  herbicides, which the province extended to other municipalities in 2009, banning the most effective weapons - including the marvellously deadly  Roundup -  used to kill common weeds.

At the time, the wailing of lawn care companies was deafening, and a sincere demonstration of their concern for the future of, uh, their business.

They hired well-paid lobbyists to plead their case, but were unable to persuade the bike-riding, tree-hugging pinkos in charge of the loony asylum (I'm practicing my Sue-Ann Levy imitation here) at city hall that weed-killing chemicals are good for us.

Our kids are quite likely healthier for it and that the day will come when we realize we were poisoning ourselves, and wonder how we could have been so stupid, similar to the change in attitude towards smoking.

Oh, but what a price we are paying for cleaner ground water.

Now that we're well into the prohibition, dandelions have completely taken over many lawns, including mine. Large open areas, such as parks and schoolyards, are a sea of yellow and white this week, as the flowers go to seed.

The lawn care outfits switched gears and came out with safe and environmentally friendly products they say are just as good as the banned stuff, no less a nose-stretcher than their earlier claims that herbicides are safe.

I tried the safe stuff twice, and found it was nearly as good as dousing weeds with boiling water.

There's a tool available at garden centres that you can jam into into the middle of a dandelion or thistle and dislodge the root by pushing down on it with your foot, advertised as the solution to dandelions.

I spent many hours inching over my lawn with the tool, diligently rooting them out, and I can testify that they are useful only if you have absolutely nothing else to do.

Dandelions always come back.

So that's it for me. I used to be aggrieved by it, but gave up this spring and just run the lawn mower across them more often, which spreads the puffy white seeds even further.

They'll be gone in another week or so, and without flowers, they'll blend into the grass, until round two in July.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There’s no need to make up anything about Rob Ford

It is tiring and dreary to observe Ford Nation twisting itself into pretzels to rationalize the video of Mayor Rob Ford apparently puffing on a crack pipe.

The video must be doctored, they say. Ford was inserted into it, using editing software easily available to anyone intent on trickery.

If it’s not a forgery, how do you know that’s a crack pipe, unless you have “expertise,” as Ford’s lawyer suggested, in smoking crack? Aha!

Even if it is legit, how do you know he is really smoking crack? Could be anything in that pipe. Or nothing.

Are you sure he inhaled?

Why should a video produced by Somali drug dealers be believed? They are liars, pirates and thieves.

And the inevitable claim – floated for the 40th time by Ford and clung to by the believers, like a life raft on a sea of lies – that it is a further proof the Star is out to get him.

This has to be a tough day around the Toronto Sun. Not only was it not offered a chance to buy or even watch the video, it is reduced to reporting Ford’s non denial -“ridiculous!” - to get a sniff of the story into the paper.

More than 1,700 reader comments posted to the Sun’s online story reveal the extent of the delusions of Ford Nation. Nothing could persuade them that their beloved mayor is not a pillar of virtue.

“If the video turns out to be bogus, it shows just how low his detractors will sink,” said Hardworkinalbertan. “I bet it’s fake. If he was all cracked out he would be all paranoid and not interested in being filmed.”

Sounds like Ford to me.

Another reader asked, “What if the video is authentic, but it is weed he is smoking?”

I've never smoked crack, or even seen it, but I know a little something about pot. You don't light it by waving a flame under the bowl.

PortCreditAl said, “Until YOU see it, you’re just taking someone else’s word. And why should we believe the word of a drug dealer? We already know the Star has it out for Ford.”

Here’s the thing: Ford lurches from disaster to disaster on an almost daily basis. Seldom does a week go by when he is not involved in a controversy, or worse, of his own making.

If he has a fondness for speedy drugs, it explains a lot.

Reporters don’t have to make up anything. Just follow him around. Simply cover the guy, and enough apples to feed everyone will fall out of the tree.

As for the belief that the video is somehow a fabrication to further a Star vendetta that Ford fans are so convinced of, what a joke.

Have any of them noticed that Ford has not once sued the Star for libel, despite the many unflattering stories relied on by the tribe to sustain their unshakeable belief in a campaign to take him down? He dismisses every story as ridiculous.

One of the best newsmen to ever work in the business was Ray Timson, who ran the Star for decades. Whenever someone on the pointy end of the Star’s stick questioned a story, Timson would say: “Don’t threaten me, sue me.”

Go ahead, Mr. Mayor.

 

 

 

 

 

Fridge magnet non-scandal shouldn’t stick to Rob Ford

 Mayor Rob Ford has a knack for getting into trouble, but suggesting he broke the law by putting fridge magnets on cars is quite a stretch.

Ford raised eyebrows at an Etobicoke community council meeting Tuesday when he bolted from the meeting, in which a controversial redevelopment proposal was being discussed, a few minutes after he got there.

Reporters followed him into the parking lot and watched as the mayor went from car to car, attaching fridge magnets with his name and phone number on them to the vehicles.

Now, it is reasonable to wonder why the mayor of Canada’s largest city – an important job – left the meeting to distribute fridge magnets, a task better suited to an underling.

While shooting video of the incident, Star reporter Daniel Dale asked the mayor about it, saying “I think some people will find it strange that you’re doing this,” while there’s an important meeting going on inside.

Ford quipped that some people might find Dale strange. Dale, who’s a good sport, agreed.

That should have been the end of it, other than arriving at the unsettling conclusion that the mayor would rather stick little magnets on cars than be in the meeting.

While driving on Wednesday, I heard a radio report that a complaint was filed with Municipal Licensing and Standards over Ford’s fridge magnet giveaway; apparently, a license is needed to put advertising flyers on cars, which the mayor didn’t have.

Without considering whether the flyer bylaw applies to what Ford was doing – after all, fridge magnets are not flyers, even if they amount to advertising for the mayor – it raises questions about the person who emailed in the complaint to MLS.

Ford has been dogged by complaints since he became chief magistrate on even the slightest misstep. He is a polarizing figure who a lot of people would like to take down.

But is this one worth the bother of investigating, as MLS is apparently doing? Shouldn’t we cut the mayor a little slack, and not turn a harmless bit of campaigning into grounds for yet another investigation?

Even in a worst (or best, depending on what side you’re on)-case scenario – conviction on all counts! – it doesn’t amount to a hill of beans.

Ford is doing a fine job of revealing himself to voters. The haters don’t need to pile on with nuisance complaints that are petty, vengeful and play into the hands of Ford Nation, where a siege mentality is alive and well.

Leave the mayor alone, so he can do the things he is good at.

 

 

 

 

There’s no fix for the loss of a much-loved bicycle to a thief

 I'd like to fix the guy who made off with Liz Hunt’s “Road Star,” a bicycle she loves so much that she says it’s her soul mate.

I get a lot of email from readers, but sometimes a note stands out, like Hunt’s plea for help in recovering her bike, which a thief managed to pry loose from its lock.

“First off, I'm no millionaire,” she said, describingherself as “barely getting by as a self-employed small biz person.

“So, I was a tad ticked when I visited my friend yesterday afternoon, locked my bike up in front of her place and returned to find it gone, with the calling card of a broken off hockey stick festooned with my cable and lock as a keepsake.”

Her steel grey, Walmart-issue “Frenzy” was taken between 6 and 10 p.m., on May 9, from the Queen-Jarvis area, which she acknowledges is an “unsavory neighbourhood, but that’s where my bike was pinched.

“Call me a crybaby if you want, but this is WRONG!

“I don't want a souvenir of some junkie's idiocy. I want my bike back. I'm not a rich girl. “I depend on my bike for transportation. This is my warrior, my horse. It fits me like a glove and is built (like me), to hang tough, come what may.

“I rode my bike through the winter this year, like I always do, and it was Heck cold and I had to wear double gloves and a face scarf.

“In other words, I was flat-out broke. So, what is the deal with some jerk ripping off my bike?”

She’s had other bikes stolen from her, “but this time it’s different. It’s my soul mate.”

Hunt has posted notices in the area that say her bike can be returned with no questions asked to her friends at Savemore Sports, on the northwest corner of Queen and Jarvis.

It would be nice if the guilty party would see the notice, have a twinge of regret and give it back, but not likely.

And that’s a shame. Anyone who’s as passionate about their ride as Hunt deserves better.

 

Leafs' playoff performance could soften even a hard-core hater

 

If the Maple Leafs keep playing like they have against the
Boston Bruins and manage to get by them tonight, I could yet become a
fair-weather fan.

Toronto
is the easiest place in the world to sell hockey, which is why the Leafs have
been able to get away with icing a perennial loser and still fill the rink with
chumps willing to pay outrageous prices for tickets.

I didn’t grow up in Toronto
and have never been infected with fondness for the Leafs, but I have lived here
for more than 30 years and have witnessed the suffering of those who are.

I still remember an Export “A” cigarette calendar of the
1967 Leafs, the last time they won a Stanley Cup, on the wall of my Uncle Wayne
Blankenship’s barber shop in Burford Ont., when I was 10 years old.

Even as a boy I didn’t like them. I was a Boston fan, while my father and brother were
loyal to the Canadiens, whom I hated at least as much as the Leafs, since they
often knocked the Bruins out of the playoffs.

The only Leaf fan in our house was my mother, who was endlessly
needled by my Dad because they were such bums. On one occasion, she ended up
telling him to f… off (and this from a woman who never uttered a cuss word) and
stormed out of the house.

It is pitiful and disgusting to listen to Leaf fans engage
in an annual debate at the outset of each season about the chances of making
the playoffs. It happens so seldom that the benchmark of success is simply
squeaking into the post-season.

In lesser hockey cities – Boston,
Detroit, even Vancouver
or Montreal –
fans talk about how far into the playoffs their teams will advance, or even
winning it all. Getting there is a given. They’d be embarrassed by a bar set as
low as Toronto’s.

The mediocrity has seeped into the walls of the Air Canada
Centre, or so I thought until the Leafs managed to make the playoffs this year,
no doubt aided by a strike-shortened season too short to accommodate the
inevitable swoon.

I figured the Bruins would clean them up like last night’s
supper, especially when they were up three games to one last week and snatched
away what looked to be a Leafs win on Wednesday night.

But the Leafs have surprised me with tenacity, great
goaltending and key goals that has given them the momentum going into a
do-or-die seventh game. For the first time since I can remember, it’s possible
that they could advance to a second playoff round.

If they do, I just might switch allegiance to the Leafs. I’m
not going to run out and buy a $175 blue-and-white jersey, or start flying one
of those Leaf flags on my car, but it’s hard not to like this bunch, they way
they’ve been playing.

I can’t believe it, but I am keeping my fingers crossed for
them.

 

 

 

Soft spring ground is easily torn up by spinning wheels

 

 

Some people are incredibly dumb about obvious things, like driving a big truck over soft, muddy ground.

It’s been a cold, wet spring so far, with lots of rain to keep the soil spongy, especially in the last week or so, adding to the moisture from the melting of a substantial snow cover.

Anyone whose feet have strayed from the sidewalk has probably stepped in mud, which is the best reminder the ground is still soggy and easily damaged.

I live next to a public school along the Scarborough bluffs, where the front lawn is soft and muddy from rain and kids trampling over it.

On Monday morning I saw a big stake truck back up over the curb and onto the sidewalk leading to the front doors of the school, to drop off or pick up something or other.

I didn’t think much of it until Tuesday, when I walked past the school and saw fresh ruts caused by dual truck wheels in the area next to the sidewalk, obviously made by the truck I saw a day earlier.

The ruts were incredibly deep, as if the truck had spun its wheels before grabbing hold and climbing onto the sidewalk, where muddy tire tracks were still visible. The same area had ruts that weren’t so fresh, as if another truck came along before and did the same thing.

It had me wondering what world the drivers live in. Shouldn’t they know that the grass is too soft to support the weight  of a big truck that would clearly cause damage, or maybe even get stuck?

If the driver on Monday had simply stopped at the edge of the sidewalk, instead of backing onto the lawn, there’d be no problem. The back of the truck would have been no more than another metre away from the school doors.

Even if the ruts are filled and the ground seeded, the grass has zero chance of catching on, with so many kids constantly walking on it. And if you’ve noticed how sod never seems to take root next to a sidewalk, it’s not the solution, either.

So we’ll have a fine mud hole at the entrance to the school for at least the next couple months, all because a driver had to get a little bit closer to the doors.

 

 

 

 

Bad timing on a tweet that was supposed to be clever

Timing is everything, and yesterday was the wrong time to send out a tweet about exploding transit shelters.

The Fixer column in today’s paper is about the curious case of a transit shelter on Eastdale
  Ave, where three of the four glass panels shattered during high winds last Thursday night.

The panels on the latest design of shelter are made of safety glass that is capable of sustaining tremendous force before shattering into small square chunks, which made it even more puzzling.

An email from a reader had “Another TTC shelter explodes in wind,” in the subject line, and noted that glass panels in the same shelter were also broken during high winds on Jan. 20.

It turns out that powerful wind gusts are capable of lifting the angled glass roof, which slams down on the top edges of the panels when the gust subsides and eventually breaks them.

With so many people using the 1,600 new transit shelters already on city streets, it raises questions about others that may also be vulnerable to high wind; a maintenance worker cleaning up the broken glass said panels on other shelters have also shattered in windstorms.

I often tweet out a teaser about a column or blog, along with a link to it, and tweeted “What’s the city coming to, when transit shelters ‘explode’ on windy days? Better wait for the bus somewhere else,” shortly before 4 p.m., after the column was posted on the star.com.

I looked at my twitter feed right after and saw a tweet from Star editor Garnet Fraser about a photo of a casualty with missing limbs, which sent me scurrying to the star.com, where I first learned about the Boston marathon bombings.

A couple minutes later, a guy named Chris Bateman tweeted me, saying, “Badly time tweet.”

Was it ever. When I realized that someone might think I deliberately tweeted about an exploding bus shelter while twitter was lighting up with tweets on the bombings, I shuddered.

It was a feeble attempt at cleverness at the worst possible moment, borne of ignorance about what had just happened. I’m truly sorry and hope I didn’t offend anyone.

 

 

The TTC is sweating the small stuff, and it shows

 If compliments are an indication, the TTC has turned a critical corner on customer service.

The Star reported on Friday that the TTC logged 45,408 complaints in 2012, a significant increase from the year before, which it partly attributes to doubling the hours its customer service centre is open.

But it also recorded 4,440 compliments, the most ever and a huge increase over the 3,604 fielded in 2011.

A surprising number were about bus and streetcar operators who defied the stereotype of the surly, distracted driver with good cheer and a willingness to go the extra mile to help riders.

Until the hiring of CEO Andy Byford and customer service chief Chris Upfold, the TTC never seemed to understand that washrooms, clean stations and vehicles and courteous staff are key to customer satisfaction.

It was always good at running subways, but the corporate culture was steeped in an indifference to riders and their comfort.

Byford and Upfold have succeeded at changing the culture and improving how the TTC is regarded.

New washrooms in subways stations and cleanup crews that hop on subway trains during rush hours to give them a quick sweep send a message to riders that the TTC is serious about customer satisfaction.

It’s easier to overlook a bucket under a leaky ceiling or a closed escalator if the station is free of litter and the washroom doesn’t smell, which is often the case, and a big change from a few years ago.

The ongoing renovation of stations will further improve the customer experience, but it’s a long term initiative that will pay off down the road.

I don’t get nearly as many complaints about the TTC as I did a few years ago, which is further evidence it’s on the right track.

There was a time when it was regarded as one of the best systems in North America. If the goal is to
recapture that reputation, the TTC is off to a good start.