Rob Ford's social media team is down a player.
A volunteer lost his official Twitter privileges for retweeting a message that suggested the mayoral candidate was "telling the truth about AIDS" in a controversial outburst four years ago.
"It was a bad mistake by one of my campaign workers," Mr. Ford said. "There's hundreds of people and it's hard to keep track of what everyone does. But it does not reflect how I think."
On Wednesday, George Smitherman slammed Mr. Ford for saying during a 2006 council debate on AIDS funding that, "if you are not doing needles and you are not gay, you wouldn't get AIDS probably, that's bottom line. These are the facts."
Later one of the Ford team's official twitter feeds -- @RobFordTeam -- retweeted a message to Ford's followers that read "Smitherman should spend less time attacking Ford for telling the truth about AIDS, more time coming up with actual policies."
Smitherman spokesman Stefan Baranski sent out a news release drawing attention to the offending retweet, prompting Joshua Somer, the author of the original tweet, to pen a lengthy defence on his website, RadioFreeCanada. Got all that?
While Toronto's incestuous little political twitterverse (of which I'm a member) chewed over the retweet controversy, Mr. Ford was busy calling people. With land lines. Who probably vote. His campaign claims 7,591 took part in a Rob Ford telephone town hall Thursday night.
Pushing the retweet issue was the latest punch from a newly aggressive Smitherman campaign. After months of quiet stumping, we asked the question that's been on everyone's mind: Where is Furious George?
This week he's been everywhere, and he's been furious. Ripping into Mr. Ford for his four-year-old AIDS diatribe. Slamming a relatively harmless plan for the TTC to consolidate its office staff as a "secret" plot to erect a "gleaming new headquarters." Refusing to let a volunteer's retweet slide. He's got the fury, now we await the sound -- actual policy. A big announcement is in the works for May 28, Mr. Smitherman says.
Finally, speaking of angry, how about that David Miller? With that weak segue, we point you to a great little tidbit picked up by Toronto Election News. Seems the mayor is writing letters of recommendation for allies seeking re-election.