TORONTO

"I am clean as a whistle."

And Mayor Rob Ford insists if his challenge to have every member of council drug-tested had been accepted, he could prove this.

He even offered to pay for the testing.

"I want everybody to take one," he said in an interview, adding that although he has admitted to having used crack cocaine, he does not use it now.

Ford's motion was laughed at.

"What's wrong with it?" Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti yelled during Wednesday's crazy council meeting.

"I have nothing to worry about. Maybe you do?" Councillor Doug Ford hollered at some councillors.

In the end they voted to not even allow Mayor Ford to introduce the motion in what was one dysfunctional day in the council chambers.

But some great scenes for the movie were written, as Toronto remains the focus of the globe.

"The mayor is world famous and has built quite a brand," TV icon and entrepreneur Kevin O'Leary said on John Tory's Live Drive on Newstalk 1010. "I was in a taxi in Dublin the other day and the driver asked me about him."

They're even covering the story on Al Jazeera in all its salaciousness.

Around the world a Toronto city council meeting even bumped the starving people in the typhoon-stricken Philippines.

But even after being raked over by council, and having more troubling, unproven allegations against him released by the court, Ford is still the mayor of Toronto.

The untested assertions of more Animal House behaviour is catching many eyes but nothing has changed.

There are many outraged Torontonians who want him out.

They can't get him out.

Ford is not leaving no matter how much is dug up on him from a five-month surveillance.

Even audiences in Qatar, New Zealand, Ethiopia and all of the other parts of the world following this drama, tragedy and comedy understand this.

He's elected and his term goes until Nov. 30, 2014.

He's also eligible to run in the next election on Oct. 27.

So the show goes on.

And what a show at City Hall.

"I effed up," said the mayor.

"What can I say? I am sorry."

There were a lot of other highlights.

And so many bizarre antics --only some coming from the mayor.

Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong said he felt threatened by the mayor.

There was Councillor Gord Perks' equally laughable: "Members, I am heartbroken."

Not often it can be said the guy making most sense on the council floor is my pal, Mammoliti.

"I don't think we should be wasting council's time with a motion to ask him to step away when he's clearly not going to do that," Mammoliti said. "Only a person with a problem can admit it and I prefer we talk with the mayor about this privately and not air it out so publicly. We need to do this compassionately."

Finally a voice of reason.

It's Ford himself who must come to terms with his own personal issues and decide for himself how to tackle them.

For now, he has not been charged and is the elected mayor.

Still, his admission that he has purchased illegal drugs within the past two years is alarming, even if those purchases were not for his use, as he contended to me.

No one easily believes anything coming from someone who has smoked crack cocaine.

But a toned-down, quieter, caring discourse with the mayor is the way to go forward if there is an interest in bringing this all to a fair and reasonable conclusion that works for everybody.

It's understandable many on council want their pound of flesh, want the circus to end or at least get some face time of their own under the big top.

"It was kind of like what they did to Jesus," Doug Ford said of what he describes as a modern-day crucifixion.

Even Doug realizes Jesus didn't admit to lying, smoking crack, buying drugs, excessive boozing.

The only alcohol mentioned in the Jesus story was that little incident of turning water into wine.

But Mayor Ford told me he's not too worried about all the personal attacks and is coping.

"I'm fine," he said. And Doug, who acknowledged that his brother has been engaged in some bad behaviour, said he draws the line at suggestions there was involvement with an escort.

"I can guarantee you, that didn't happen," he said.

It won't matter to Ford Nation either way.

"I think if there was an election tomorrow, Ford would win by a landslide," said O'Leary of Dragon's Den and Shark Tank fame. "It's remarkable."

Anybody up for a drug test?

Updates from Toronto City Hall Thursday: