Voices, Votes, and Vices For about 36 hours I had the most popular podcast in Ontario, and maybe

Canada.

Its not as though anyone listened to more than a short clip that was presented, out-of-context, by a third party, or that anyone even remembers much about it to this day. In fact, my podcast popularity wasnt the result of a viral campaign for a cologne or a cat playing piano. Instead, I was notorious (rather than famous) as the podcaster who had the temerity to run for office in Ontario and not try to hide his past.

I suffered through spun accusations of being a Nazi sympathizer, hating the unemployed, disrespecting police, firefighters, foreigners, Catholics, and anyone who enjoyed bringing their children to Las Vegas.

I was a candidate, in a riding I couldnt win, running against a leader of the opposition party. I had started the campaign polling at 15% of the popular vote and had climbed up to 17% when the accusations started flying.

The Past 3.5 Years in a Nutshell After being a classroom teacher for over a decade, I found myself in an elected position in my union local. That meant being behind a desk representing members on issues including Health and Safety, Benefits, and medical accommodations.

Its a job I loved, and still do, but there was a vast difference from classroom teaching. The shift which hit me the most, after a period of time, was going from an environment which demanded impromptu creativity on a daily basis to one where procedure outweighed improvisation.

I missed being a performer, and any teacher will tell you that performance is half the job.

I turned to blogging and podcasting as a means to express my creative drought. As my union days became longer, writing became less practical and my scripted podcasts soon became largely impromptu.

Beyond that, I was quickly adding new shows to my roster, growing to five different podcasts

a week (all in my spare time) that helped me exercise my creativity and express ideas and opinions that I would never get to explore otherwise.

Growing from this world of content creation and social networking were new communities and more ideas. The process is invigorating. The learning is constant. The rewards are countless. I became pretty well known in the Canadian podcasting community and shared a mutual respect with many of its pioneers that started up long before me.

Being in the middle of a crazy Venn diagram that included teacher, unionist, and digital content creator was not without its benefits either. I was asked to deliver workshops around Ontario to educators on the risks and rewards of social networking and social media. I was invited to participate on a panel by provincial parent group. I appeared on several podcasts, a public television parents show, and CBC Radios morning flagship show Q.

To date I have 332 episodes of my personal podcast lovehatethings, 152 of a weekly panel podcast called Dyscultured, 61 of TV Eh?, a podcast I co-host about Canadian television, 52 of Best Episode Ever, a weekly look at retro television, and 27 of a conversational podcast I have called Talking is Dead.

Lovehatethings is my first and most personal podcast. Three times a week I ramble about whatever issues or ideas go through my brain, often only seconds before I record. It is, now anyway, all impromptu. My purpose is to communicate, entertain, and provoke thought.

Sometimes I invoke parody and satire. Sometimes I swear in frustration, gesticulating wildly to a microphone. In all cases, I pride myself on honesty, authenticity, and being openminded enough to know that many wont agree with me. I welcome comments and encourage conversation.

My ability to speak honestly and frankly on these and other issues was lauded by many people and recognized by others. It was this recognition that led to a conversation, in March 2011, about a potential run for candidacy in the Ontario provincial election. A friend in the union asked if I had any interest in running for candidacy for the Ontario New Democratic Party in the riding of Niagara West-Glanbrook.

I had been a supporter of the NDP for years and was involved with my local riding association. I knew that the basic tenets of any NDP platform would be ones that I was willing to support. I thought, quite simply, this is something youve never been asked to do, and something you may never be asked to do again. Give it a shot and learn something, win or lose.

I submitted my application to be a candidate to the provincial party. On it, I gave about as much full disclosure as I could without providing transcripts of hundreds of hours of audio. I listed my podcast titles in full, with accompanying URLs, and wrote plainly beside them: I frequently drop f-bombs on some of these podcasts and have been honest about being an atheist on numerous occasions.

I was quite willing to be rejected and go on my merry way. I was quite willing to accept the fact that I would be considered too risky as a candidate. I was ready to be asked if I would take my existing podcasts offline and stop podcasting months in advance of the election. I would have rejected such a request and, again, gone on my merry way.

Instead, I was pleased to find out that I had been approved by the party as a viable candidate. With a non-contested candidate meeting soon after, I was the Ontario NDP candidate in the riding.

I was proud to stand by a party that saw through such risks and favoured the work I had been doing with labour, social justice causes, and activist groups. I was ready to devote my summer and fall to being a spokesperson for the party in my riding. I was still doing my full-time job in the union office, campaigning until 9pm most nights, and then heading home and recording episodes.

I even started a daily podcast about the campaign itself, thinking it was a unique way to document the experience.

Two weeks after the writ was dropped, I was acknowledged by most pundits as winning debates or being the front-runner in all-candidate question forums. The three lead parties in the province were starting to clump together in provincial polls and it looked like a minority government was likely. Considering the Ontario Liberal Partys decisive majorities in the previous two elections, it looked like a fundamental shift was in the works at Queens Park.

No doubt the Liberals had archived innumerable quotations from my podcasts that they could bring up under the right circumstances. After enough hours of talking, one is bound to use enough figurative language to prompt some reaction.

I wouldve been surprised to get through the campaign without some reference to the f-bombs or atheism, but, as I said, these arent things I hide or am ashamed of. Instead, they ripped words, invented truths, and painted me in whatever disgusting posture they wished.

Monday September 19th, 2011 - The Straight-Shooting Atheist Under the headline NDP candidate's controversial podcasts, a hit piece by QMIs Patrick Maloney calling me out on being atheist and being dismissive of religion. With the spinninglike-a-top lead of An NDP candidate whose personal blog has called religion a pastime and likened serious devotees to Coke and Pepsi drinkers is standing by his straight-shooting style led to an article with handpicked quotations including: I hope that by listening you would respect that Id be as honest as I can with you, that Im open to dialogue. On his Catholic childhood, he stated: I went to Catholic school, I went to Catholic church. I was even an altar boy for a period of time and am proud to say I was never molested once. On withholding donations amid church sex scandals, he said: Thats what they live on brand loyalty. Its the biggest brand-loyalty sell that youve ever seen in your life. You think that Coke and Pepsi are good at it? ... Churches dont even have to advertise on television and you still go every week. I dont want to call religion a hobby because a lot of people are going to get offended. But for the most part thats what it is. For most people its a pastime. Its not always on the front of someones mind and if it is, it borders on an obsession and thats no more healthy or unhealthy than any other obsession. You can believe whatever you want to ... Im just not in that space anymore. On their own, the allegations didnt amount to much. In this case, there wasnt much that was intentionally misinterpreted. My guess is that the reporter was pointed to a podcast or two by a political spinster and obliged with what he thought was a valid story during an election

campaign. By the way, who has to stand by a straight-shooting style? Do I have to defend honesty?

I immediately suspected the Ontario Progressive Conservative party of the attack and, to this day, cannot confirm where the first swipe came from, but, being the Toronto Sun, the traditional PC link seemed unavoidable.

My responses were as open as I could make them: Its different, I know, (but) I am nothing but proud of the podcasts I have done, Marco said Monday. I would hope Id never have to go back and apologize. I hope that by listening you would respect that Id be as honest as I can with you, that Im open to dialogue. Marco said if elected, he hopes to continue recording podcasts. In fact, I concluded by saying that I thought a weekly riding-based issues podcast would be a great way to communicate with constituents and Id look forward to doing that.

Had this story come out 60 years ago, it probably would have been enough to sink the campaign. I was a bit frustrated that after the work Id done all summer and fall to focus on the issues in the riding, that this would misdirect people who had never had the chance to meet me.

While the implications of the article were clear, it was nothing that wasnt half-expected. I would never be apologetic for being honest, if not a bit satiric, ironic, with touches of humour thrown in. Tuesday, September 20th, 2011 - The Political Maelstrom The NDP should dump candidate Anthony Marco (Niagara West-Glanbrook) over comments posted to his website saying he can't condemn Nazi politics because it's just other people's religion. - Ontario Liberal Party Press Release http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/September2011/20/c4952.html So started the most frustrating day of my life.

In the fall of 2010 I ranted about a Florida preacher who was set to publicly burn the Quran as a protest. I got behind the microphone to speak on the issue of why burning books doesnt get rid of ideas. Further, that if someone persisted in devoting their entire lives to convincing someone

to change their beliefs, they were wasting their time. After all, there are plenty of examples of activism and initiatives to educate that stand on their own without banging ones head against the wall.

The Ontario Liberal Party teed up on a single quotation from that podcast. Not only did they refuse to provide context for it, they even intentionally misrepresented the quote at face value, and most of the mainstream press just rolled with it. "For some people the old politics of Nazi Germany might be their religion. And just as I can't condemn other people's religion, I can't, I don't agree with them, but you can't stop somebody from believing in something... You're the one who is pretty messed up if you're going to devote your entire life to trying to convince somebody not to believe what they believe." The spin hounds, led the entire way by Shit From Hell [shitfromhell.com] wannabe punk rock star and Liberal Party war room General Warren Kinsella (who, by the way, is also columnist for Toronto Sun) recruited Bernie Farber, the Liberal candidate from Thornhill, and a former leader of the Canadian Jewish Congress. Id never heard of him before, and am not likely to want to meet him after this.

Farber opined: "I've devoted my life to this cause, and there is no place in Ontario politics for someone who doesn't understand that Nazis and everything they stood for deserves condemnation... He needs to go." - Ontario Liberal Party Press Release

Lets backtrack from the spin a bit and re-read the first sentence of the quotation again: For some people the old politics of Nazi Germany might be their religion.

Everyone ignored the conditional in that sentence. Everyone ignored that the example was one that could have replaced the old politics of Nazi Germany with days and nights of Xbox Live or NFL football.

I was being accused of equating Nazi politics to religion when the simple truth was that I was saying that any obsession which placed borders on values could be likened to religious fervor.

Why didnt I state it so eloquently in the podcast? Because the podcast is impromptu,

extempore, and adopts a conversational tone that shouldnt sound scripted, prepared or disingenuous.

What followed was a deluge of press requests for comments, and assaults of questions on my party leader and a time where most people would want to run and hide.

I didnt want to hide.

I wanted to use the same tools I used for the podcast to turn around rip a strip off of the hacks and spin doctors who would paint a picture of me in such a disparaging light. I was quite happy to have people call me on the actual messaging of any of my blog posts or podcasts, but I was not willing to have words put in my mouth.

I was at work and wishing nothing else but to get back behind my basement microphone and go on the offensive. I was stuck behind a desk feeling compounded levels of frustration mounting. I knew that was what they wanted. The chance I would go off would keep the story going for days.

Being a candidate running for office, you have to be willing to sign over certain impulses at the door. One of them is reining in the urge to spout invective-laced diatribes at another partys hacks.

To the credit of the NDP press room and my campaign manager, they shifted my frustration and convinced me of a more traditional approach by crafting some responses to address the questions that we knew would be coming; it was agonizing.

My speaking style has evolved to where I feel I can connect far better with someone by being genuine. My crash course in hurricane journalism didnt give me any information I didnt already know or suspect, its just that Id never been in the eye of storm. I quickly discovered that the tried theories were all proved true.

The reporters wanted the best quote, not necessarily the truth, though I was speaking truth. The truth wasnt the story. In fact, the quotation wasnt even the story; the allegation, during an election campaign, was all that was needed for the media cycle. Our hope was, that by giving a

strong few statements, the issue would play out and be forgotten.

To that day, I had never been thankful for the silo-ing of our media outlets. On that day, it was a boon and a curse. I only had to do six interviews. One QMI interview shot out to a hundred or more outlets. One Torstar talk shot out to another hundred. One Metroland call covered a group of weeklies. A few additional calls covered most of the other dailies around the Hamilton and Niagara region.

On the negative side, my face was splattered across websites and news under the word Nazi. And the web means forever. And the forever makes the attack and spin heinous instead of just unfortunate. Hell, I even made the Huffington Post Canada.

Warren Shit from Hell Kinsella found a pic from a video clip Id recorded a year earlier on TVO Parents which had the most unflattering side view of my fat ass you can find on the net. His minions gobbled it up with every insulting fat comment they could post.

Really? Fat jokes? Ive been fat since I was a kid. Im now 42. If you cant do better than a fat joke, maybe you should take your low-rent Cyrano de Bergerac brigade to another province where they appreciate the crude and mundane... Oh, wait! Youve already found the Ontario Liberal Party. Nevermind.

All of the media outlets, essentially, got the same quotations from a frustrated candidate trying desperately to sound upbeat and optimistic. We hoped wed be able to get back to the campaign. Tuesday Evening, September 20th, 2011 - With a little help from my friends I have been speaking for years on the value of online relationships. I know some people Ive never met face to face better than some of my extended family. By sharing stories with each other using social media and shunting that content out to our networks, we become part of peoples lives even though were not in the same room.

I never felt so grateful for my group of friends than I did on that Tuesday evening.

Not only did they defend me and say things that I knew I shouldnt be saying, but they went on

the attack. There were comments on articles, blog posts, tweets and kind wishes on Facebook. There were discussions where my friends were supporting each other because they felt that a shot at me was a shot at them.

As dismissive as people can be about online relationships, those people are misguided. Communication has been redefined by technology. We dont need a church basement card game mixer with punch to share gossip or ideas any more. We talk, we laugh, we share online. We meet in person when we can and we relish those opportunities, but we are all busy people. Given the choice of digital communications or becoming best friends with the latest network reality show or cable network pundit hour, Id much rather converse with real people.

When speaking to educators around the province, I always talk about the risk/reward offset of getting involved online. For me, the rewards have always outweighed the risks. Even after the events that Ive already spoken of, and the events Ive yet to relay, my friends buoyed my spirits that night and the remainder of the week.

Wed hoped wed stemmed the red tide.

We were wrong.

Wednesday, September 21st, 2011 - The Cringe-Worthy Candidate Late Wednesday morning, more spin from the Ontario Liberals and Shit-From-Hell Kinsella in the form of a press release with a series of random quotations from the lovehatethings blog and podcast. All without context, all without purpose but for character assassination. In one posting titled The Real Reason, Marco takes a shot at all Ontarians, calling them lazy: "The real reason the economy is so messed up is because we're lazy." (The Real Reason blog post, lovehatethings.com, undated) Never said Ontarians once. Read the quote. We are lazy however. 50% of Ontarians and 40% of Canadians couldnt get off their asses to even vote in the last provincial and federal elections. If thats not the height of laziness, I dont know what is.

In a podcast, Marco says Canadians are just pretending to be polite: "Foreigners often call us polite but really we're just making fun of you behind your back so we don't hurt your feelings." (Anthony Marco, Podcast 95, 2:25, lovehatethings.com) How can this not be taken as satire? Did anyone really believe that were literally laughing behind the backs of foreigners without knowing were doing it? When discussing a made-up game show concept, Marco discloses what he thinks tourists do in Thailand: "...and the winner gets a trip to Thailand where they get to engage in one of the great Thai pastimes, auto-erotic asphyxiation." (Anthony Marco, Podcast 98, 9:00, lovehatethings.com) Recorded shortly after the apparent suicide or accidental death of David Carradine of presumed auto-erotic asphyxiation in a Thai hotel. Used by the Liberals two years later out of context... sorry Kwai Chang Caine, apparently too soon. In another podcast Marco, a teacher, talks about children in Las Vegas: "First of all, why do people bring their f***ing kids to Vegas?" (Anthony Marco, Vegas Podcast 10, 3:06, lovehatethings.com) Really? Was it that I dropped an F-bomb or that the Liberal Party believed parents should take their kids to Las Vegas? On the importance of voting, Marco says: "If you've never found cause to drag your ass off your couch to get to a polling station and cast a ballot, I'm going to be the last one to criticize because I've been there and my couch has the indentation to prove it. My last word on the elections is that I hate the electoral process..." (Anthony Marco, Podcast 17, lovehatethings.com) A quotation from three years earlier, made after some long discussions on our first-past-the-post system of elections and frustrations about poor voter turnout. At the time, I hated many of the processes involved. Three years later, Id softened a bit on the hating it, but the attacks of the week gave me a whole new reason to re-invigorate some of my stance.

A system wherein anyone with opinions is assaulted as somehow treasonous for speaking the truth is despicable. A system wherein spin is gospel is deplorable. It may be the best system

we have, but that doesnt mean we cant try to make it better. Such a system indicates deep foreboding for future candidates, but more about that later.

Strangely enough on the second day of the Liberal assault, fewer reporters called. Many still had the minds awash with the Nazi word to care about much else. I had a couple of calls to return that combined questions for both days, but I was getting the impression that the reporters, who were getting to know me, knew this was Liberal folly.

They started to ask me questions like: Why do you think the Liberals are doing this to you? Eureka! The first great question of the episode. The answer was simpler than you might think, though it was two-pronged.

My leader, Andrea Horwath, had been running a great campaign and was climbing in the polls. PC leader, Tim Hudak (my riding opponent) was slipping provincially and marginally in our riding. With the spectre of their first non-majority government in eight years ahead of them, the Libs attack was meant to occupy Andrea and try to force me out. If I could be forced out of the race, their candidate would pick up most of my votes.

The plot became evident and I started incorporating it into my response to the press. Stories started to embody a touch of cynicism against the Liberals. They painted me as anything from a goofball, to cringe-worthy or a bad candidate. These characterizations didnt bother me, because others were locking on to something closer to the truth: I was too honest to be a politician.

The press were getting bored, but I was still frustrated that I hadnt been able to go off on someone. Kudos to the campaign team for keeping me in line and friends for backing me up. At least the allegations were getting more ridiculous on their face.

At an agricultural debate in Abingdon, Ontario that night the local news cameras were there. I thanked them for showing up to cover a sparsely attended Q&A on rural Ontario. We all, however, knew who they were there to talk to. After the Q&A, where I did quite well, the television reporter came rushing over to talk. I had to assure them they could relax; I wasnt going anywhere. They were asking the right questions.

I got to speak about how my podcast had apparently become an integral part of the Liberal Party platform as they had now spent three days on it - more than any other single issue. I resolved I would remain positive and persist throughout the rest of the campaign speaking to policy and platform.

The regional newspaper reporter that night, who had seen through the persistent smear campaign asked enough pointed questions to the Libs candidate running against me to be able to exercise the following headline the next morning: Liberal candidate refuses to support her Ontario partys directive. The candidate was told to steer clear, and when asked if she endorsed the party request, didnt know how to respond. In the same article: Marco considers what the Liberals are doing to him character assassination, and wonders why they are targeting him in a riding that has overwhelming elected Tory leader Tim Hudak in past elections. He guesses the Liberals seen a political opportunity to unseat Hudak by smearing him, while bolstering their candidates position in the race. It wouldnt surprise me if they are seeing his (poll) numbers slip in this riding as well, said Marco. And what better way to get a Liberal candidate than to take out the other opposition. Thats the only thing I can think of. I must be a banner section of their policy document. Who would know in advance I would take up that much time out of the short time we have after the writ has been dropped, when there are so many other issues that we should be talking about. Kevin Werner - Hamilton Community News Beyond this, I was pleasantly surprised to find one reporter that not only understood the ridiculousness of the spin, but also the tone and premise of many of the podcasts: He [Marco] goes on to suggest (presumably tongue-in-cheek) that his listeners should burn books by teen pop star Justin Bieber, if they are really looking for books to burn. His suggestion is surely in the same vein as Jonathan Swifts 1729 satirical essay, A Modest Proposal, in which the author suggested that economic troubles in Ireland could be curbed

if the Irish would sell their children as meat. Pieter Van Hiel, Marcos Modest Proposal September 21st, 2011 niagarathisweek.com I went home that night and ranted and recorded up a storm to be published at a later date. The ability to continue to record and get my thoughts out was an incredible gift during these escapades. I slept a fitful sleep wondering what was coming; I couldnt have guessed.

Thursday, September 22nd, 2011 - We Could Be Heroes When I saw 11am come and go on Thursday morning, I was cautiously optimistic. Both of the previous days saw the incriminating press release come out around that hour in order to maximize the media cycle. I even had a nervous laugh with a co-worker. I was ready to be assaulted by the Libs. I was even half-ready for the PCs to jump in. What I wasnt ready for was an assault by two labour groups who were evidently in Libs back pocket.

At 1:30pm press releases were put out, first by the Ontario Provincial Police Association saying they were disappointed in my remarks, yet without including any remarks. This was followed up by the Ontario Professional Fire Fighters Association which put out a press release which did include a quotation.

During a Remembrance Day podcast a couple of years ago, I proposed that while it is honourable to fight for you country if you believe in the cause, it is never honourable for anyone to die. I followed that by expanding on an idea that we seem to find ways to call anyone who does a good deed heroic this days.

The substance of their angst was that I disrespected police, fire fighters, doctors, and all first responders by saying: "There are a lot of very honourable, very righteous, very heroic people who die on a daily basis for what they believe in. And I think we throw the term 'hero' around a little bit too loosely these days. I think we need to really tie it a lot more to a belief system, as opposed to a job. I'm tired of hearing, and no offense to doctors or firefighters or policemen, but automatically calling occupations as heroic, I'm tired of hearing about that. Doing your job isn't necessarily heroic, there can be heroic

elements in there. There can be, but there doesn't have to be. You don't automatically become a hero just because you put on a uniform of some sort or have a title before or after your name." I was dumbfounded. I understand if these organizations were responding to their favourite Shit From Hell Kinsellas rhetoric in doing this. After all the Fire Fighters had been rolling a truck around the province supporting Premier Dalton McGuinty. While their organization has every right to kiss Liberal Party ass to protect future collective bargaining, it would have been nice if they didnt choose to throw a union vice-president, executive member of Hamilton and District Labour Council, candidate endorsed by the Hamilton, Niagara and Oakville District Labour Councils under the proverbial pump truck.

Ive been a vocal advocate for labour in this province for years! That the presidents of the Police and Fire Fighters associations were too blind to not assassinate a fellow labour advocate was shameful. Since their assault, Ive had first responders of all types, even members of their own associations, get in touch saying they agree with my statement.

The clothes dont make the person. Their actions do. My actions have been honest and untainted by a motivation to demean my fellow workers. Though I respect and admire the work of all first responders, I cannot say the same for the callous actions of the Fire Fighters and Police Association presidents. I would expect attacks from Liberal Party hacks. I would expect better from both of you.

I waited for the deluge of interview requests, and waited, and waited. By 5:30pm only one request had come in. The interview was with a reporter Id spoken to previously in the week from the Toronto Star. It lasted two minutes. Any other reporter who wrote a story simply parroted the press releases and never asked me anything.

I spent the night in and out of the campaign office. More sign requests were pouring in. More messages of I didnt know who I was going to vote for, but after seeing their smears, youve got my support. Give me a sign!

While canvassing that night, my campaign manager, Jim Bryan, who was a rock throughout the entire week, did an interview with the St. Catharines Standard. Not being the candidate himself, he had the opportunity to be a bit more free in his opinions, leading to what was the best quote

on the days events. On Thursday, his campaign manager, Jim Bryan, said what Marco was saying in the podcast was that a uniform doesn't make a hero, it's what is in a person's heart and soul. He said Marco didn't say police and firefighters are not heroic. "We've always supported firefighters and police and first responders Good God, we're the NDP, we're behind working people," Bryan said. stcatharinesstandard.ca After four straight days of out-of-context quotations, libelous allegations, and slanderous soliloquies, I was pretty sure I was out of woods for the weekend. Spin doctors will tell you that Friday is a bad smear day as people would rather read style sections on the weekends.

A Week Away Almost a week and a half after the first smears hit the press, and a week before the election, things had settled in the riding. That is to say we were still dropping literature, putting up signs, and prepping for one more all-candidates Q&A. Compared to the previous week, lets just say all was quieter on the Niagara West-ern front.

The provincial debates had happened and the resulting television event was so uninspiring in its scripted predictability, I couldnt watch for more than two minute snippets.

There were a couple of articles that didnt make deadlines during the original week of smears and the residual message became a bit odd. In the Grand River Sachem, a regional weekly covering Glanbrook and Binbrook, the previous weeks Nazi story that had appeared online as Liberal candidate refuses to support her Ontario partys directive got strangely twisted by the same reporter into Trombetta mum on Marcos comments.

While the roots of the article were similar to what had appeared almost a week earlier online, some of the text was inexorably twisted: Marco swiftly apologized for the comments, adding he would never excuse or downplay the genocide. Its true that I would never excuse or downplay the genocide, but I never once apologized for my podcasts or my thoughts in them.

The article also contained a bizarre telephone game version of the Liberals accusation of me the week earlier: During the 9:28 commentary, Marco refused to condemn the Nazis book burning because he felt it would be difficult to dissuade people from their beliefs. My entire podcast was about condemning book burning!

I cant imagine how the same writer who seemed to get it online the week before would have the message so twisted in print seven days later. It was then I suspected that after filing the article, he probably lost control of it and a local editor cobbled a skewed version together for their local edition. The sad truth was that the more damning print version was placed directly on top of my paid ad in that edition of the paper.

And then the lightbulb appeared above my head when I realized that the parent publisher of the Grand River Sachem, the Metroland/Torstar print empire, just announced that they were endorsing the Liberal party: Liberals Best Choice for Ontarios Future. Apparently the message went out down the chain and messaging was redirected a week before election day. The National Post wrote an article about another NDP candidate being smeared in the Windsor area over a week later when they referred back to the allegations against me the week before: Liberal party representatives wouldnt agree to an interview Friday. But they sent the Windsor Star an email saying they received a tip about Charifs post from someone claiming to be a New Democrat disgruntled over the Anthony Marco scandal. Marco, the NDP candidate for Niagara WestGlanbrook, compared Nazism to religion a year ago in a profanity-laced podcast. NationalPost.com Id become scandalous! Again they screwed up the same Nazi quotation that everyone had screwed up the week before by ignoring the conditional in the original. The item I found most amusing, in an industry that prides itself on sources, is that the media reported that the Liberals wouldnt agree to an interview, yet apparently were willing to accept a story about an anonymous tip from someone claiming to be disgruntled. Wherefore investigative journalism? The truth was irrelevant to the Post as was the real story: why were the Liberals so ready to smear opposing candidates? Why did they distrust the electorate that had voted them in twice before?

While I havent lost faith in democracy, Ive lost it in politics, not that I had much anyway. There are people on all sides that are nice and people on all sides that are assholes. There is a grand romanticized notion that honesty and authenticity on behalf of politicians was once considered a breath of fresh air in the cloistered theatres of parliament.

Now, honesty, even in the briefest of forms, scares the hell out of political parties and the spin doctors who run them. Ultimately, for all the surface outrage that many claimed to feel after my words were spun, there were growing numbers, every day, of people who actually listened to entire podcasts or read entire blog posts and called bullshit on the spin doctors.

Ive lost faith in old media, though I respect many of the reporters. That any newspaper or media outlet chooses to publicly endorse a political party is the height of hubris. To hold an established news paper or television station as a source of trusted objectivity during an election campaign, only to have them pick sides at the end, makes all they have said to that point appear suspect. Its why I choose to listen and read the people I trust instead of the people paid by advertisers.

I never did, nor will apologize for expressing the opinions held in my podcasts or blogs. I am willing to retract a fact I find is wrong. I am willing to learn things to the contrary. I will continue propagating what I believe is the only real option for independent media: social media.

The Future Heres the scariest part of the story, and the piece that was missed by almost everyone except a couple of academics and, not surprisingly, podcasters and bloggers: who will be our candidates of the future?

With everyone migrating to online lifestyles, do we have any hope for campaigns that arent just slag heaps and spin fests within a decades time? What kind of restrictions are we putting on candidates of the future?

I can only imagine that our next-generation candidates, whove grown up online, will have to be one of two things: 1) woefully disadvantaged and subjected to spin due to their shared ideas and creativity, or 2) ideal candidates because theyve rarely shared thoughts or opinions publicly.

The basic formula, if you have any aspirations to a life of elected public service, is this: 10 Guidelines for Future Candidates Using Social Media Now 1. Dont ever curse online. Even when its what you would say conversationally. 2. Dont ever share or re-share something that might be vaguely contentious today or in the future. 3. Dont share ideas about religion, politics, poverty, or re-share anyone who does. 4. Dont write, record, use pictures or video to share content online. 5. Dont keyword tag anything you create. 6. Dont express an opinion of any type whatsoever, unless it already falls into the platform of a party you plan on running for. 7. Dont be creative, ironic, satiric or engage in any kind of parody. 8. Social media is anathema to old media unless its spun-off a big media website pushing advertising to you. Your media skills online will never be respected by typewriter hacks whove forgotten more about journalism than youll ever know. As a matter of fact, most have forgotten everything about journalism. 9. Dont be yourself. 10. If you have an online presence that contravenes any of the above, erase your online history, change your name to Safey McSaferson and move to an anarchist commune where everyone just takes turns leading. I fear for the choices well have in our future candidates. I want a proven communicator to represent me in a riding, regardless of the colour of their lawn sign. The proven communicators of the future will have to possess a grasp of social media - and social media sometimes gets messy. Im not saying they have to break taboos at every opportunity, but knowing that someone cares about the truth more than their office makes them worth voting for.

I was never expecting to win my riding in the provincial election. What I promised, as a candidate, was simple. I made no bones about letting people know what I believed. I was honest with everyone I met along the way. I promised, and I believe I would have, raised the level of discussion and debate at Queens Park while raising the level of engagement within the riding.

I am happy as a teacher, a unionist, a podcaster, a sharer of ideas and thought, a son, a brother, an uncle, and a friend. If I never add Member of Provincial Parliament to that list, Im certainly not going to fret over it. Is it possible that the Liberal party's campaign managers will lose sleep over the damage they've done to an innocent man's name? If they were dishonorable enough to ruin Marco's reputation for political capital, I suspect they won't care one bit. In light of all this, it's a good thing Jonathan Swift isnt running. We'd doubtless be reading angry press releases about Swifts evident support of child trafficking and cannibalism. Pieter Van Hiel, September 21st, 2011, niagarathisweek.com

Epilogue October 6th, 2011 - Election Results for Niagara West-Glanbrook Tim Hudak Katie Trombetta Anthony Marco Meredith Cross PC LIB NDP GRN 50.7% 26.2% 18.6% 2.8% 24,778 12,808 9,070 1,372

We achieved the highest totals ever for the Ontario NDP in this riding. The NDP was the only party whose popular vote percentage went up in the riding since last election.

Ontario Professional Fire Fighters Association President Fred Leblanc and the OPFFA RV has attracted quite a lot of media attention from reporters covering the Premier on the Liberal bus. President LeBlanc has given several reporters tours of the RV and answered questions about [their] reasons for supporting the Premiers re-election. - opffa.org

Jim Christie, Acting President of the Ontario Provincial Police Association, was also acting Chief Administrative Officer for the duration of the campaign as the standing CAO was a candidate for the Ontario Liberals in Barrie while on paid leave: Karl Walsh, the OPPA's chief administrative officer and former president, took 10 weeks of paid leave between his nomination

and the 30 day writ period, according to a letter circulated by interim president Jim Christie. ottawacitizen.com

Bernie Farber did not win for Liberals in the riding of Thornhill. Apparently there was no place in Ontario politics for him and he had to go.

Warren Shit From Hell Kinsella continues to snipe from his old school high horse surrounded by a force field of smug self-gratification belying lost punk rock dreams.

Dalton McGuintys Liberal Party, after all the smears, character assassinations, and petty underhanded manipulations did not get a majority government, though he remains Premier of Ontario. As Samuel Johnson divined: The future is purchased by the present.

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