The affable, chatty half of Toronto’s Twin Mayor system can always be counted on to kibitz with reporters and engage in the daily fencing between city hall journalists and politicians.
If reporters want to know what the elected Mayor Rob is thinking, the appointed Mayor Doug is always willing to oblige by filling in the details, often to excess.
So, when word filtered out that Doug would emerge from six days of self-imposed exile to unmute himself and address a Toronto Star story that two of its reporters saw a video of the Mayor Rob allegedly smoking crack with Etobicoke drug dealers, expectations rose.
Alas, the Ford administration’s attempt at damage control blew up in their faces, live and in colour, just outside the mayor’s office, even as the video mayor continued to duck the media.
“I’m not speaking for the mayor. The mayor’s my brother. I love him and he’ll speak for himself.”
When? A reporter shouts, already impatient.
“My brother is an honest and hardworking man with integrity, a man who has dedicated his . . . .
“Shame, shame,” a citizen shouts, startling Doug for a little while.
“He’s the people’s mayor . . .”
But has he smoked crack? A reporter asked.
“Now our mayor faces yet another accusation, an accusation driven by questionable reporting from a news outlet . . .”
“That’s us,” I’m thinking. “Questionable? Is that the best you can do, Doug? Questionable? Not libelous. Not unconscionable. Not irresponsible to the point of legal action . . .?”
“Rob is telling me these stories are untrue, that these accusations are ridiculous and I believe him. I will always support my brother . . . I believe in his track record.”
OK. We are done here. The Fords intend to rag the puck, run out the clock, hang in there until the media lose interest.
Six days of hiding and dissembling and ducking the media and running away from a video that purports to show the mayor smoking crack with drug dealers has left us with this conclusion:
The mayor has no strategy to deal with the fallout — except to sit and wait and hope that some unspeakable tragedy preoccupies the city’s considerable array of media — and his troubles will just fade away.
But even that is a miscalculation. For, barring an Oklahoma City-style natural disaster or a Boston-type bombing, the story of the Rob Ford video and what it seems to show just won’t disappear.
The only thing worth reporting from Brother Doug’s oblique defence of the mayor is essentially over a minute into his prepared statement. He could have constructed that in two minutes. Soon, reporters would realize why he delayed giving his statement by 30 minutes, then arrived at the podium 12 minutes late. The mayor’s staff had been busy writing up the mayor’s achievements for Brother Doug to deliver in lieu of the real issue.
As the Doug Ford statement morphed into a Mayor Ford State of the City address, reporters were insulted, took offence, gently at first, then grew openly confrontational.
“Moody’s and DBRS have kept our credit rating strong . . .”
You are praising the mayor for keeping the city’s credit rating where he found it?
“We’ve had three consecutive years of job growth, folks . . .”
Can you deal with the mayor? A reporter asks. Why isn’t the mayor saying more at this point? Another asks.
Why are you here addressing us today? Where is the mayor?
Is the mayor done hiding?
“Please leave my family out of this!”
“When is the mayor going to talk?
“To the folks at Gawker (the celebrity website that first published the story), what you are doing is disgusting and morally wrong. Giving away prizes to try to raise money for drug dealers and extortionists is disgraceful . . .”
Extortion? I thought your claim was the video is false, a fake, nonexistent, a fabrication, a fiction?
“By no means will we be pressured by the Toronto Star to answer their questions on their time frame . . .”
It’s not just the Star. Look at everybody here, a reporter shoots back.
And on and on it went, until, nervous, visibly shaken, Doug Ford tried to collect the five or six pages of the statement written for him and high-tail it away from the media pack.
“Now, you are just going to run away without answering questions,” I shout at him.
In such a hurry, he left behind the second-last page — the one claiming, “We spoke to our family and our lawyers before deciding how to proceed.”
They may have. But no adviser would have counseled the Brothers Ford to engage or disengage in the manner they have chosen.
Robin Sears, one of the country’s top trouble-shooters for politicians stuck in a mess, was on CP24 watching the debacle. His conclusion:
“This is among the worst damage-control limitation statement” he’s seen in over 40 years — a performance that slid downhill from a “sad, embarrassing event to tragedy.”
Deputy Mayor Doug Holyday was visibly shaken at how far short the episode fell from what’s required and from what he has advised.
“He listens well, but I don’t see much in the way of action,” Holyday told reporters. “Certainly we want to hear something from Rob, not Doug.”
Original Article
Source: thestar.com
Author: Royson James
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