Did Rob Ford Pull a “Mr. Snrub” and Pretend to be His Own Fan on a Call-In Radio Show?

Yes, this is Photoshoppery.

Remember that Simpsons episode when Mr. Burns showed up in a terrible disguise as “Mr. Snrub, from…someplace far away” at a Springfield town hall meeting to suggest that the town give some money to his nuclear power plant?

What sort of person would think that such obvious astroturfing would fool anyone in real life? That person would have to be on crack.

Which brings me to this segment from Bill Carroll’s show on Toronto talk radio station AM640, when an “Ian from Etobicoke” called in to defend our Peter Griffin-esque mayor, Rob Ford:

In response to the stunning similarity between Rob Ford’s and Ian’s voices, Carroll said “This guy, if he’s not the mayor, he could play one on the radio.” And he could — he does sound a lot like His Worship (the proper honorific for the Mayor of Toronto, even if it is Rob Ford). Carroll, whose work in radio means that audio is his medium — he says “I’ve spent my entire career listening to voices, editing tape, interviewing people. I’m almost like a blind guy” — is “90 to 95 percent” sure that “Ian” is actually Rob Ford calling in.

This isn’t the first time that Mayor Ford has used astroturfing to support his positions. Dave Price, who’s now Ford’s director of operations and logistics, used to call in to the mayor’s radio show as “Dave from Etobicoke”, “Dave from Scarborough”, and Dave from various other locations in Toronto and surrounding areas to carpet bomb the Ford brothers with praise. You might be interested to know that Dave was also Rob’s high school football coach and his campaign manager during the 2010 mayoral election.

For those of you with good ears, you can compare “Ian’s” voice from the recording above with these recordings of Rob Ford’s voice. Luckily for us, as a public figure and a guy with his own talk radio show, it’s easy to get samples of Ford’s voice. I’ve provided some below — enjoy!

Rob Ford Voice Samples

“I cannot comment on a video that I’ve never seen, or does not exist”

“Can you get off my driveway, please?!

Takin’ Care of Constituents

Explaining His Comments About Immigration

For those of you not familiar with Toronto, the mayor has a weekly radio show on Sundays called The City, in which he and his brother Doug (who’s on city council, but operates as if he’s the co-mayor of Toronto) operate in permanent campaign mode for free. I listen to it occasionally, and it’s always pure unintentional comedy gold. Here are the three most recent broadcasts…

The City, October 13 Edition

The City, October 20 Edition

The City, October 27 Edition