Squeezed in the jaws of rising income inequality, many suburbanites were receptive to Rob Ford's simple and coherent message: cut waste in government, hold the line on taxes, and end the "war on the car." For them, Ford was the right man at the right time.

If there's a white-powdered lining to news that the mayor of the fourth-largest city in North America has a substance abuse problem, it's the opportunity to re-visit dangerous stereotypes about people who smoke crack. You've probably called them "crackheads" or "crack whores." You've probably used the word "crack baby." I probably have too without blinking. Why are we so comfortable using crack users as a verbal punching bag? The reason has roots in racism; Society didn't, and often still doesn't, respect the poor black people who are most associated with the drug.

To the endless delight of click-bait authors everywhere, Rob Ford is showing no signs of leaving the headlines anytime soon. The pundits have been smashing their keyboards in wild fury ever since, so what are some of the conclusions they've been drawing? The famous quip about scandals is that "it's not the crime, it's the cover up." But sometimes it's neither a crime nor a coverup, it's just that the politician is a horrible embarrassing moron that no one likes. But that's hard to say openly, let alone in an op-ed.