Featur e That he won was no surprise. It was the margin by
which he won that shocked pundits, beating out second place contender George Smitherman by 100,000 votes. Ford had received more direct votes than any politician in Canada ever before.
GEORGE SMITHERMAN Main character; begins as sole protagonist – viewpoint character; like Hamlet, given task to ‘know thyself’; ultimately fails, with sword in side
F
ormer deputy premier George Smitherman had been considered the frontrunner candidate since the sum-
mer of 2009. His entrance into the race was almost guar- anteed. He polled well at the beginning and developed a large amount of support, not just from the expected Liberal circles but from some right and left pockets as well. He played what was called the classic frontrunner campaign, letting other candidates speak and present plat- forms and watching to see how the electorate responded. He was criticized for this by some, but at an early point during which few regular voters were paying attention to the race. However once Ford emerged as the frontrunner Smitherman had his work cut out for himself and con- tinually struggled to define himself and his principles. Ultimately, Smitherman lost the campaign by being
of two minds towards everything. He seemed to craft his policy based on focus groups and a medley of advisory in- put as opposed to presenting himself as a strong character with a vision for the city. Never once did he step forward and identify three or four key platforms that he intended to introduce as mayor. He rolled out daily platforms that seemed based on catering to the special interest group de- bates that were to occur that evening instead of ones an- chored to his beliefs and passions. Smitherman concluded the campaign as a desperate non-person, reinforcing his detractor’s belief that he was a morally bankrupt career politician who was merely looking for his next source of power. To be or not to be his own man with his own poli- cies was his question. He never answered it.
ROCCO ROSSI Friar Laurence; kindly old man with wealth of experience who ultimately makes tragic blunders
B
efore running for office, when he was director of the Liberal Party of Canada, Rossi made himself known
amongst my circle of friends by going on facebook and clicking ‘Like’ beside everyone’s comments, birthday an- nouncements, jokes, etc. We mused that he was ‘the man who liked everything’. But as the mayoral campaign chugged along it soon became clear that not only did he like everyone but he was also the smartest guy in the room. This isn’t always a good thing. He wasn’t the most emo- tionally intelligent, nor the most visceral – both of which are talents required to be effective in partisan politics. And
30 Campaigns & Elections | Canadian Edition
to embrace them sometimes requires you to let go of your intellectualism. Just ask Michael Ignatieff. Rossi was guilty of over-campaigning, just like Smith-
erman. However every so often one could tell that Rossi did care passionately about a certain platform or issue and was running for the right reasons. The only trouble was separating the wheat from the chaff and figuring out which ones those platforms were and which of his reasons were the right ones. Ultimately, Rossi failed by trying to be too many things to too many people when all people wanted was someone who would be honest at saying who they really were. It didn’t help that he kept trying to sell himself as a political outsider, despite the fact his Rolodex contained every leader since Moses.
GLEN MURRAY Trinculo/Stephano/Calaban – a jester, a cook and a monster; together they seek power yet fizzle away due to foolish antics
T
his former Winnipeg mayor relatively fresh to To- ronto mused a bid at the mayoralty in late 2009 but
was instead offered the provincial Liberal nomination for Toronto-Centre, the seat vacated by Smitherman. He kept a low profile throughout most of the campaign but sur- prised some Liberals by endorsing left-wing council can- didates and receiving censure from Dalton McGunity for suggesting those who vote for Rob Ford, Ontario PC leader Tim Hudak and Prime Minister Stephen Harper were all bigots. I told a friend who was meeting with Murray to ca- sually ask, upon his leaving, the direction to the inter- section of Adelaide and Tecumseth. My reasoning was that this intersection, while not major, consisted of big enough streets that were Murray not to be able to iden- tify them it would prove he really hadn’t travel around Toronto that much and was ill-fit to be mayor. Murray failed to pass the test.
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