Has my publisher lost his mind?

So in another post here, our publisher Rob Koci says that Toronto mayor Rob Ford is “one of us.” Has my publisher lost his mind?

Well, obviously Rob is not referring to the Mayor of Toronto’s crack-smoking, drunken stupors, endless lying and police-photographed transactions with people being investigated for criminal offences. That stuff, Rob asks us to “hold our noses” over, while we mark an X next to Rob (or possibly Doug) Ford in the next election in this city.

So let’s look at the other claim across the page: that Rob Ford is the ultimate representative of hard-working, up-at-the-crack-of-dawn, renovation contractors.

In my experience, the vast majority of our contractor readers are the anti-Rob Ford. Our mayor was born with a silver spoon in his mouth – his father’s label-printing business in Etobicoke made him a multi-millionaire at an early age. I don’t know too many you that inherited your businesses. Renovation firms are notoriously difficult to pass on to the next generation.

And if one of you were to tragically destroy your company because of your personal drug use, alcoholism and lying, I highly doubt you’d have an outraged brother to bully his way in front of your disgusted clients to defend you.

I doubt you’d have 42 per cent of your clients giving you top marks on HomeStars and I doubt you’d have more than 33 per cent of your customers planning to hire you again.

In this business, the only thing that will keep you alive when you, as we all do, fall short, is to swallow your ego, face up to your angry clients, apologize, and fix it all on your own dime.

Rob Ford, at time of writing, is about to bill the taxpayer for his own legal defense. I don’t see anything that Canadian Contractor needs to stand up for in all this.