Rob Ford, Toronto's laughable bumblefuck of a mayor, attended a community council meeting in the district of Etobicoke on Tuesday night, but didn't stay. After a few minutes, he "sprinted" down the aisle and ran into the parking lot, where he compulsively began slapping "Rob Ford Mayor" fridge-magnets on the cars of the people attending the meeting. When a reporter asked him if this was strange behavior, he responded that "some people find the reporter strange." When his aide and director of operations and logistics David Price was asked about why the mayor's wasn't inside the meeting, he snorted derisively at the idea that the mayor might want to "[sit] and [listen] to those deputations."
Price, Ford's former high school football coach and his recently named director of operations and logistics, put magnets on cars before Ford arrived. He stood between Ford and the reporters after the mayor said he would take no more questions.
Price scoffed at the suggestion that Ford should be attending the meeting-in-progress rather than circling the parking lot.
"He can do whatever he wants. Putting magnets on a community event — what do you expect him to be, up on stage?" Price said. When a reporter said the mayor might be expected to at least sit in the audience and listen, Price said, disparagingly, "Sitting and listening to those deputations?"
Ford, who speaks often of his love of campaigning, spent more than 15 minutes in the church lot. He eventually spotted an acquaintance who uses a wheelchair, calmly wheeled the man in, and returned to his seat deep in the crowd.
He later gave an impassioned speech in opposition to the Humbertown proposal, then stayed to cast a vote against it. It is rare for the mayor to attend a cmmunity council meeting, and several members of the council thanked him for his presence.
Toronto Mayor Rob Ford bolts from meeting to put fridge magnets on cars [Daniel Dale/Toronto Star]
(Thanks, Fipi Lele!)
(Image: downsized thumbnail cropped from a larger image by Daniel Dale)
