TORONTO

Mayor Rob Ford may end up surviving this ongoing scandal in the end but there’s still little honour about hiding behind your mother.

Ford’s six months of lying weren’t good. The crack smoking admission was shocking.

A new video with him saying “I need f---ing 10 minutes to make sure he’s dead” is as curious as it is disturbing.

But this might have been the worst yet.

Of all the things that have happened in the runaway Ford train, having his mom on live TV doing his fighting for him might have been the lowest yet.

It can’t score much cred in the hood.

Was Doug not available?

Oh yeah, I forgot. You burned him Tuesday when he was out fighting on your behalf with the chief of police of all people and you decided to finally tell the truth.

So with no one out to deal with it, it was Mama Ford’s turn to step up and blame the meanies in the media.

It’s understandable that Diane Ford is going to want to stand up for her son but after a video is released where the mayor is talking about killing, it’s not she who should be doing the explaining.

She can’t send you to your room and then after a timeout you get to come out and play, Robbie.

You’re the mayor, for heaven’s sake. This mess is your making.

And only you are going to be able to get yourself out of it.

Having your mommy fighting your battles is just not manhood.

But his lawyer said last night that Rob was not aware of the interview with his mother and sister. “Why would they even do that?” Dennis Morris said of Diane and Kathy.

He said the reason the mayor didn’t talk about the new video is because he told him not to.

“I don’t even know if he can recollect,” he said. “But it is a new low in journalism. The video didn’t have the pop people thought it would have.”

I know Rob is close to his mom and I get that. But I told Dennis to tell Ford he still should get out and do his own bidding instead of blaming it on everyone else.

Ford always gets a fair shake here and he dodged me on this video for two days and I would not be true to the readership if I didn’t write what I really think.

I don’t want to add to the frenzy or pile on but I have to say you can’t have a video appear like that without proper explanation.

It’s not nice to have a private moment hijacked but it’s also alarming to hear our mayor in talking in such a way.

And remember: No one told him to say he has nothing left to hide.

The CP24 scoop with the interview with Diane and sister Kathy was good TV but it allowed for the mayor to dodge the real question.

What the hell is going on in this video that someone was shopping around for $5,000 and was first reported about on torontosun.com Thursday?

“I’m going to kill that f---ing guy,” an incoherent Ford can be seen spewing angrily. “I’m telling you it’s first-degree murder … He dies or I die, brother.”

First-degree-murder?

It just can’t be glossed over.

“When he’s down, I’ll rip his f---ing throat out” and “I’ll poke his eyes out” and “I’ll make sure that motherf-----’s dead.”

What is this all about, Rob?

Saying you were “inebriated” is not good enough because everybody can make their own judgment of that.

It’s the fury and rage that is difficult for me to watch. I have been on the receiving end of similar Ford rants. But I also know, a few minutes later, or a week later, it’s as if it never happened.

But this did happen.

“It looks a lot worse than it really is,” said someone close to him. “Sometimes he goes off on tangents. He doesn’t mean any of it.”

The spin is it was nothing more than “joking around about what it would be like to get into the ring with Mike Tyson” for charity.

“It was just blowing off steam but someone set him up to make it look like it was something else,” said a pal.

They certainly did. No question. It’s not nice.

But what’s it all about?

Morris said the problem is “there is no context to the video” and “it’s just a rant” in private with friends.

“These things happen,” said Morris. “You can’t tell where the tape starts or ends or who is in it or when it was.”

He said a “police officer” was in contact with him Thursday but there is no major concern about the video from his end.

It means the Ford saga continues and he soldiers on. What’s coming next? Stay tuned.

It could very well be this video looks worse than it actually is, but for me when it talks of murder, it should not be anonymous friends and a paid lawyer out talking about it.

It should be Rob Ford himself that should explain it and he should have done it early to save the city waiting.

I gave him two days to comment to me on this video and offer some sort of excuse and he has still not given it to me.

I still have no idea what this video is about.

And I am not going to ask his mother.