I could be wrong, but I believe this is the first time Rob Ford has publicly apologized:

I’m sure you understand this has been a very stressful week for myself and my family, but that doesn’t justify using the terminology I did to describe the media, so I sincerely apologize to each and every one of you. I understand you have a job to do. It’s been bothering me a lot: I know we agree and disagree on some issues, most of the time, some of the time, but you have to move on.

So, to be fair, we have to give him this little ray of sunshine. Plus, he knew that “maggots” comment would be a stinky turd the moment he opened his mouth.

But the rest of his statement, delivered this afternoon with the intent of addressing the recent “personnel” changes in his office (plus those additional, pesky, ongoing stories), don’t fill me with much additional confidence:

And that’s it, it’s business as usual.

…

Everything’s fine. I have no idea what the police are investigating. It would be best to talk to the police about that.

Rob, in proper Ford fashion, continued to stay mum and ignore the swelling crack scandal, and has instead decided to fire his chief of staff of just 10 months, Mark Towhey.

The firing was likely pretty sudden and not terribly congenial as Towhey was escorted out of City Hall by security. Rumours are that it had something to do with football, but it’s hard to imagine what exactly that could be.

This is Rob’s second chief of staff in as many years, and is in line with the Fords’ disdain for pretty much everyone and everything that doesn’t lick their shoes.

It should be noted that the choice of the mayor’s chief of staff is well within Ford’s purview, so I’m not suggesting that he did anything wrong or illegal, but there’s obviously a tempest brewing behind the scenes, and we all know who’s providing the hot air for that storm.

Shit’s about to get real!

Well, today’s his birthday, so that’s a good place to start. He turns 59 today, something to genuinely celebrate given the history of one of Toronto’s perennially peripheral figures.

Originally from England, in the early 80s Clarke suddenly found himself unemployed and decided to found the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty, a group both vilified and praised for standing up for, or claiming to stand up for, the city’s poor.

Clarke doesn’t mince words or shy away from controversy, often staging demonstrations, sit-ins, and occupations to drive his message. He’s had run-ins with cops, politicians, and even the media aren’t particularly fond of him. Basically, he’s not in it for the popularity.

Although he’s not homeless, Clarke somehow manages to raise a family of two kids and a wife on a budget that verges on poverty. Prior to 1986, Clarke’s biggest investment was a vehicle — a 1980 Lada.

Clarke doesn’t like the word Marxist and instead prefers to call himself a socialist. Personally, I think the title of bellicose advocate for the poor is probably more appropriate– it’s certainly been his raison d’être.

And at the end of the day, even if you disagree with Clarke or his methods, you have to admire the man’s tenacity and willingness to stand up for justice. If the world only had more men like that in it, we’d all be leading much better lives.

Happy birthday, John.

It’s been about 6 months now and Rob Ford has not yet responded to allegations that he’s taken control of City of Toronto correspondence by updating the wording at the bottom of City Hall press releases to make Toronto seem like a vigorous young suburb rather than the place you’d want to come to.

Under Miller

• Toronto is Canada’s largest city and sixth largest government, and home to a diverse population of about 2.6 million people. It is the economic engine of Canada and one of the greenest and most creative cities in North America. Toronto has won numerous awards for quality, innovation and efficiency in delivering public services. Toronto’s government is dedicated to prosperity, opportunity and liveability for all its residents. For information about non-emergency City services and programs, Toronto residents, businesses and visitors can dial 311, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

He did manage to kill the bike lockers, so that probably left old Robbie emboldened to try yet another City Hall renovation change. This time around he wanted to make the pool in front of City Hall a wading pool. But that didn’t entirely go over.

On the bright side, Rob called yesterday’s TTC transit debate defeat (or almost) “one of the greatest days in Toronto history”. A city stuck in gridlock, a fool for a mayor, and no way to fund transit — that’s a grand day indeed!

Someone (presumably Ford’s election team), recently created a video called “Respect Democracy“. Toronto City Life has responded by including a few inconvenient facts in the same video — and unlike them, we won’t hide behind anonymity:

(Yeah, I realized I’d made a spelling mistake after I uploaded it. Oh well.)

I know that the headlines prior to “Respect?” in the video are hard to make out, so here they are (all easily found using Google):

Don’t think so?

Let’s look at the facts.

First he starts making plans for the 2014 election, presumably because he’s given up.

Then he invites others to run against his opponents in the same election, presumably because he’s given up.

Then he scales back on his election promise to privatize garbage collection until the same 2014 election, presumably because he’s given up.

Then a leaked letter reveals he’s stopped planning for the next two years and instead wants to start again after the 2014 election, presumably because he’s given up.

Then he shows Canada what “champion” he is by waffling out of his weight loss program week after week, presumably because he’s given up.

Not necessarily in this order, but you get the idea.

Now the Toronto Star reveals that RoFo has cut his Mayorly activities by over 60%, presumably because he’s given up.

Here’s a smattering of his absentee agenda:

In January 2012, Ford averaged 11 meetings a week compared with 33 in January 2011, his first full month as mayor. In February 2012, he had 15 meetings scheduled each week, compared with an average of 34 a year earlier.

…

According to sources that include former and current staff, Ford often does not leave his home until noon. His itineraries indicate that daily staff briefings are held at about 9:30 a.m., but on those late days, the sources say, Ford participates by phone or not at all. Some days he never appears in his office. Ford has always spent much of his time outside the walls of city hall, doing his famous one-on-one constituency work, but even that has dropped off drastically.

…

The mayor routinely doesn’t show up for long-scheduled events and meetings with officials. On Wednesday, Councillor Peter Milczyn had to step in for him at a VIA Rail speaking engagement. He has cancelled five of the last nine weekly weigh-ins — often the only time Ford takes media questions for the week — including one on Tuesday.

On numerous occasions, Deputy Mayor Doug Holyday, the mayor’s brother, Doug Ford, or other close allies have been called upon at the last minute to meet foreign dignitaries or visiting officials. Holyday said there have been only “a couple of times” where he’s had less than an hour’s notice and that, as deputy mayor, it’s his job to fill this role.

The mayor was supposed to meet his Calgary counterpart, Naheed Nenshi, at an event held at the Corus building on Sept. 20, but Ford never showed up.

Ford also hasn’t held a formal meeting with many prominent Toronto leaders in more than a year, including United Way Toronto CEO Susan McIsaac, Board of Trade president Carol Wilding, Ryerson University president Sheldon Levy or CivicAction’s CEO, Mitzie Hunter. He has never attended a Federation of Canadian Municipalities event.

…

Ford’s own committee chairs don’t regularly meet directly with the mayor to discuss policy. For example, Norm Kelly, who chairs the parks and environment committee, says the mayor is very accessible, although he concedes that the last specific formal meeting he can remember was during Occupy Toronto, which was last November.

Ford’s cadre of yes-men continue to defend him, claiming that he helps out people on a one-to-one basis:

Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti, one of his staunchest supporters, said looking at the mayor’s itinerary alone doesn’t speak for the work he does.

“The reality is he does a lot of spontaneous work. If constituents call, he’s on it. So you won’t see that on his schedule. He calls people back on a regular basis, and I know he does that.”

There’s only one problem with that kind of thing (assuming it’s true); in a city of 2.5 million people, he would necessarily have to pick and choose who to help. To help each one equally, he would have to be responding to about 1,700 calls a day, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

To believe that he can adequately do this is clearly insane, yet this is the excuse that Rob Ford uses for not performing his duties as Mayor. Not to mention that, even if the excuse is actually true, Ford has to pick and choose which of his buddies and allies get his attention, and based on his “I hate all charity” agenda, those would would probably be the same petty dictators and millionaire corporate hobnobs who hang out in his back yard.

Clearly Rob Ford doesn’t understand what a Mayor’s job is, and it’s exactly why he shouldn’t have one.

—

By the way, Sarah and I are forming a little group to get the wheels moving on Rob Ford’s ouster. We’re meeting at a central downtown location tonight to get some initial ideas together — if you’d like to drop by at the next one (most likely over drinks), please drop me a line and I’ll send you the details.

It’s easy to blame politics, but let’s be honest about exactly who started and actively perpetuated it all. Remember Ford’s inaugural “pinkos” speech (via Don Cherry, but you know the sentiment is the same)?

“What depresses me the most about right-wing politicians is their belief that they are right and that there doesn’t seem to be any opportunity for dialogue. It’s my way or the highway. I have found that deeply disappointing.

http://www.thestar.com/iphone/news/article/1161454–how-rob-ford-s-mayoralty-has-divided-the-people-of-toronto

Half journalist, half activist, they spend hours monitoring meetings of city council and its committees. Their main vehicle is Twitter, the social-media tool that is changing journalism and politics with its 140-character-or-less bursts of commentary, argument and wit. They even live-tweet the Ford brothers’ weekly radio show, or #FoBroShow, with minute-by-minute, play-by-play commentary. No mayoral gaffe or mis-statement goes unchecked.

http://m.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/toronto/globe-to/city-hall-critics-of-a-feather-tweet-together/article2402106/

According to Ford, the theme in Toronto for 2012 is “CUT CUT CUT!”, even though it looks like there’s going to be a healthy budget surplus from 2011.

According to Ford, we can’t depend on one-time surpluses to balance the books, even though that’s exactly what he did with the money left over after Miller left office.

According to Ford, there’s way too much “gravy” at City Hall, even though after a full year of wandering around with a ladle and a forlorn expression, none has been found.

According to Ford Ford, unlike every other mayor we’ve had he just just can’t seem to find any additional funding sources (fuck events like Pride).

If you’re a Ford supporter and you can look at these four statements and claim that any of this isn’t absolute and complete bullshit, that this scumbag isn’t ripping up our city solely because he can, that he has a brain cell to share between him and his brother, that he didn’t produce one broken election promise after another, that Ford is a nice and courteous guy who’s focus is to build and support the city of Toronto, that Ford is being accountable and open like he vehemently swore he would, that most of Ford’s promises don’t sound like they were slapped together by a mildly retarded 6-year-old child (promise to cut Council in half by having Councillors vote to fire themselves, for example), well, you need serious psychiatric help, my friend.

If you live with your eyes open and even half a brain in your head then it’s time to throw some major opposition under the fat man’s train. I admit, I’ve been patient and sometimes even defensive of Ford, sometimes to the chagrin of my girl who rails against Ford on a daily basis, but with the austerity-loving politicians (criminals) forking over all taxpayers’ money to mega-banks because “we’re in debt!”, it’s clear that unless people start taking some major action globally (including here in this city), we will be raped blind by the crony capitalists and left with a shambles.

At this point, “respect for taxpayers” means tossing Ford’s sorry ass on the street and maybe re-invigorating some of those charges that the cops outright refuse to follow up on –dangerous driving, beating his wife, repeated abuse of 911 dispatch, etc. It’d be a start, at least.