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Ford campaign sends lawyers to muzzle satirist

By John Michael McGrath
Ford campaign sends lawyers to muzzle satirist
A screen shot of the Google cache version of robfordformayor.ca

Few things bring greater attention to a low-profile (and in this case, low-grade) satire than receiving a cease and desist letter in the age of the Internet. That’s what seems to have happened to Oliver Ogilvie, proprietor of the satirical blog robfordmayor.com. The site features a fake diary written from Rob Ford’s point of view and covers such thrilling topics as bowel obstruction and erotic encounters with other municipal politicians. Some of Ogilvie’s friends started sharing his story on Twitter, and it’s safe to say that the Web site has probably received more hits today than, well, ever.

That is, until it was taken off-line. “We appreciate him taking it down,” says Ford campaign spokesperson Adrienne Batra, adding that they sent the cease and desist letter because “some of the hits were pretty personal, and it was getting out of hand.”

The original Web site is indeed gone, but the almighty Google cache preserves all, at least for a while, so we can still see what got the Ford campaign so excited. The post about the Wendell Brereton fracas is rather homoerotic, and there are a few cracks about Ford’s wife never being home, not to mention the numerous jokes about Ford’s eating habits.

They are, it’s true, personal hits. We wouldn’t advise anyone take a crack at a politician’s spouse. But honestly, we’d barely heard of this guy’s Web site before today and hadn’t bothered checking a link until hearing about the legal fuss. Sometimes it doesn’t make sense to swat a fly with a sledgehammer.

• Gorfed [Twitter] • robfordmayor.com [Satirical] • robfordformayor.ca [Legit]

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