Rob Ford's Toronto

[smalltown]

Delurking to provide comment: This has been an interesting twitter day!

I originally posted this photo back in March as a response to another comment. The guy who responded (who I am currently in battle with over who gets the most retweets, and the loser get to buy the first round of beer! ) for some reason retweeted the photo early this morning! This followed with enough retweets to rouse me out of a dead sleep and an email from Kevin Donovan asking for comment. While I've been trying to keep up, it's hard to write properly in 140 character or less!

So some background: I originally remembered of the photo existence when the Globe article came out about Doug and his, ahem, youth indiscretions posted along with yearbook photos of the terrible twosome. I spent a good four hours digging through boxes in the middle of the night trying to find it. While it's not the best photo (he was very camera shy) his name was Rob and from Etobicoke. I was 10(ish?) and regularly attended YMCA summer camp on the Islands each summer. Since I normally attended each session, I tended to get the know the councillors more than other kids because they were the more constant (and more interesting) and built a special rapport with them.

The man in this photo, did not last long. Not only was he rude and uncomfortable, it was widely rumoured that he was the provider of drugs to the other councillors. Not to decry the YMCA or their staff, because all-in-all, it was amazing and memorable experience to attend the camp -- but drug usage was rampant. After all, do you want to spend your summer between courses taking care of snot-nosed hyper kids? But perhaps the dealing was a little too much for other councillors to stomach and he was reported.

While I'm not 100% convinced that this is our "illustrious" Worship, the coincidences are a little hard to ignore. He had the same high-pitched annoying voice -- specifically when you hit him with a pool noodle -- and often attempted to organise football games, failing mostly at times. And while a poor photo taken from an angle of my youthful stature, it does look a heck of a lot like him!

Donovan has said the he personally doesn't know of him ever working there but will be making some calls and will keep me informed. After all, if he did, would he advertise it after being unceremoniously relieved of his duties? Given Rob's track-record, I'd assume: No.

Well, that was a fun first post. Back to lurking! (...and keep up the great comments and photos, I love UT! )

Same eyes as Rob. My money is it's him. Facebook look back Rog Ford: http://tune.pk/video/2255594/rob-ford-facebook-look-back

 

[Soop]

Jonathan Goldsbie ‏@goldsbie 1m
Here's your totally-unsubstantiated-but-nevertheless-fun Rob Ford rumour of the day:http://bit.ly/1nNtiwv (h/t @r4v4g3dsku11s)

Jonathan Goldsbie ‏@goldsbie 5m
(That is: consider it non-canon until/unless you eventually read otherwise.)

Cameron MacLeod ‏@c_9 3m
.@goldsbie UT is like Star Wars: everything is canon until Disney buys it. TOpoli is like Star Trek: only famous people comments are canon.

 

[pud99]

Fiound on a web site called All Fired Up In The Big Smoke

A Letter From Our Mayor (With Some Early Edits)


Dear Friends (Folks, really. But I’m trying to be all mayor formal here.),
Over the last few days, we have heard a lot of talk about Toronto Community Housing. (Disregard everything you’ve heard. All of it was lies, political smear jobs and witch hunting.)
I am here today to ask people to put politics aside (Politics in its original meaning, meaning views of those who oppose or disagree with me. Look it up.) and look at what is best for both the staff, and the residents of Toronto Community Housing. (FORD MORE YEARS! FORD MORE YEARS!)
Four years ago, Toronto Community Housing was in a state of disarray – overspending, ineffective operations, and a culture of entitlement (David Miller. BOOGILY-BOOGILY!!) meant that the TCH didn’t work for the people it was supposed to serve.

Over $90,000 spent on 2 Christmas parties, chocolates, manicures, and boat cruises, just to name a few items. (Please avert your eyes from the nearly $1.4 million increase in severance payouts since I became mayor over the previous 3 years. Nothing to see there.)
When I became Mayor I vowed to clean up this mess. (And build subways. And make no service cuts, guaranteed.)
We made some tough decisions that were necessary to get things working again. (Which totally explains why both the state of good repair backlog and waiting list for housing at the TCHC has increased during my time in office… No, wait. It doesn’t. Never mind. Delete! DELETE!)
Working with the Board a new CEO was hired and new senior management – with strong and clear mandates (Remember, folks. Having a mandate means doing whatever you want to do regardless of rules and regulations. Sometimes that even means kicking out old freeloaders who don’t pay their rent. There’s no ‘t’ or ‘c’ or ‘h’ in free lunch.) – to make Toronto Community Housing work for the people of Toronto.

Eugene Jones has done what was necessary to root out the people at TCH who were working in an environment of entitlement. (Burn, burn, BURN, BURN IT TO THE GROUND!!!!) He is bringing people on board who see the work that needs to be done, they are getting it done, and they are the right people for the job. (Team players. Team Ford players. God bless Ford Nation.)
Eugene Jones was brought to TCH to clean up a mess. (It’s messy, cleaning up messes. You can’t clean up a mess without creating a mess. Without a mess to clean up, you can’t clean up any messes.) It’s a simple as that folks. (Never ever think anything is complicated. It only leads to having to clean up messes.) Corruption (Completely different from cronyism. Corruption leads to messes. Cronyism cleans up messes.), waste, and poor service to tenants were major problems and Eugene was told to clean it up. He has done an excellent job in doing so. (Didn’t I tell you to ignore those increases in state of good repair backlogs and housing waiting list?)

Tomorrow morning, the Board of Toronto Community Housing will meet to decide the future of Eugene Jones. The meeting starts at 8:00 AM at their head office, 931 Yonge St, just north of Yonge & Davenport. (8a.m. is a bit early for the hardest working mayor Toronto has ever had. I’ll be there in spirit, and even then, probably late.)
Come out and show support for a man whose key message has always been to Put The Tenants First. (Bet you didn’t know that, did you? Because I just made it up for this letter.) Show your support for Eugene Jones. (Never mind. Show your support for Eugene Jones by re-electing me this October so I can re-hire Eugene Jones. FORD MORE YEARS! FORD MORE YEARS! ME AND MR. JONES! ME AND MR. JONES! But I’m totally not playing politics with this.)
As always, please contact me at 416-397-FORD (3673) or email me at mayor_ford@toronto.ca if I can ever be of assistance to you. (And I’m desperately trying to replace that voters’ list I lost in one of my drunken stupors, probably.)

Yours truly,
Mayor Rob Ford

OFFICE OF THE MAYOR
Mayor Ford’s Four Priorities:
1 Customer Service Excellence (Through Creating A Culture Of Fear)
2 Transparent & Accountable Government (The Ombudsman Has To Go)
3 Reduced Cost and Size of Government (See Point 1. It’s Just Basic Math)
4 Transportation City (Subways, Subways, Subways)

 

[dforthandbview]

TL;DR: Rob Ford: "With around six months until the election, I am concerned that we do not have an obvious candidate to replace TCHC Gene Jones, who was all that stood between this city and a repeat of the Danzig Street shootings. People get shot in summer."

Just... wow. How much of what he's saying does he believe? Does he believe his own BS now?

Ford is using the fearmonger tactic. How do politicians influence people? Instill fear into them. Who is most likely to be influenced? The poor and uneducated. Now that the Lord Almighty Jones is gone, scary times are ahead for residents. Shootings, bombings, nuclear warfare.

 

[pud99]

 

[pud99]

 

[L23]

New pic that's surfaced of that camp counsellor: It does look like RoFoMoFo enjoying himself on the swings:

 

[pud99]

 

[pud99]

 

[Kat_YYZ]

I wonder why he doesn't park the Escalade in the garage?

I guess his chauffeur ( or whatever his Job Title is ) parks his own car at RoFo's when on Escalade duty?

it was one of my dad's biggest pet peeves: people who have their own garage, own an expensive car (heck, any car, but especially an expensive one) yet they keep the car outdoors while keeping rusty old shovels and junk in the garage.

I know I'm not perfect, but this time it surely cannot be His Worship Robert Bruce Ford. The condos in this ad are in a '55 years and older' building (not to mention that they are not in Hallendale). Also, IIRC (but I may not, of course), it has been said that none of the Ford condos (which are in Hallendale) is owned by Robert Bruce Ford. (His Worship has referred to going to 'my mother's condo in Florida'.) (When telling the sports radio jocks that the Fords have 6 condos in Florida, His Worship said "we". In Fordspeak that means someone or other, or some company or other, connected in some manner to the Fords - a la who actually owns the Escalade.)

The only reasonable way to settle this is to send a UT forum member down to Florida to investigate. As I have already shown my prowess at finding Rob Ford (even when not trying), I nominate myself. Should I set up the kickstarter page so you can all donate to fund my trip??

 

[pud99]

The only reasonable way to settle this is to send a UT forum member down to Florida to investigate. As I have already shown my prowess at finding Rob Ford (even when not trying), I nominate myself. Should I set up the kickstarter page so you can all donate to fund my trip??

Taking a lead from LA Ford, you should fly executive/first, with an entourage.

 

[tiffer24]

Ford is using the fearmonger tactic. How do politicians influence people? Instill fear into them. Who is most likely to be influenced? The poor and uneducated. Now that the Lord Almighty Jones is gone, scary times are ahead for residents. Shootings, bombings, nuclear warfare.

Maybe even a few unsupervised riots in the streets...

 

[newearthling]

I had to repair to my fainting couch. The mastery and elegance of his verbiage was truly inspiring.

Where can I get a fainting couch?
Sitting, watching a movie and then BAM! A fall to the ground! Could make for an enjoyable viewing experience.

 

[Expatriot]

Well, I guess that I'm not perfect. (Maybe you are.)

This kind of joke still makes me laugh every time!

 

[pud99]