Review: Crazy Town, The Rob Ford Story

I hadn’t planned to read Robyn Doolittle’s book about the Mayor of Toronto unless I borrowed it or got it for free. However, I encountered an unread hardcover at a garage sale a couple of weeks ago and figured .50 wasn’t too far off the mark. 

Doolittle was one of the Toronto Star reporters who viewed the infamous Rob Ford crack video and co-wrote the explosive story about it that ran in The Star just hours after the website Gawker went live with it online. (The other journalist, Kevin Donovan, happens to be a good friend of one of my brothers-in-law.)  Doolittle’s account of the negotiations and behind-the-scenes meetings about whether it was ethical to pay for the video are quite fascinating, even for someone like me who’s been in media a long while and has a pretty good idea about how it all works. While the rest of us heard bits and pieces as they emerged, the accusations (and confirmations) of wrongdoing against the mayor are stitched together by Doolittle like pieces of a big, crazy quilt. Doolittle never denies that Ford has done what he set out to do when he was elected, that is, get the city’s fiscal house in order. But when you see his behavior all in one volume, incident after incident and lie after lie, it’s an astonishing amount of bad judgment for a man with so much responsibility – even more than I remember.

The history of the Fords is also worth knowing. They think they’re a dynasty like the Kennedys. Their aspirations are lofty and, frankly, ridiculous. They’re a delusional mess.

Crazy Town is very well-written and meatier than I expected. I don’t know what I expected except that I knew Doolittle had only three months to put it all together and soon after, jumped ship from The Star to The Globe and Mail. It’s still unbelievable to me that so many Torontonians suspected The Star of fabricating the crack video story in an attempt to discredit the Mayor.  It took the Chief of Police to finally put the suspicion to rest – although there are still some in Ford Nation who think it’s all a conspiracy. Crazy town, indeed.

3 thoughts on “Review: Crazy Town, The Rob Ford Story”

  1. Unfortunately the crazy ride has continued since then, but hopefully the train will finally come to a stop in October and we can all disembark.

  2. The fact that Kathy’s son Mike has changed his last name to FORD, refuses to do interviews and still expects to win the ward (against a pretty awesome candidate name Andray Domise) says it all. I thought the Kennedy thing in the book was hyperbole until this. Please let this nightmare end on Oct. 27. Let them all ride off into the sunset (or Deco Labels) never to be heard from again.

  3. I agree Erin, please let it be over Oct. 27th.
    I know he’s not getting a vote from anyone in my household but he does have a fan base which is incredibly scary.

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