Saturday’s sudden death of Peter Kormos brought to my mind the many times we worked together in an outstanding capacity between 1998 and 2003.  Peter always supported my outside-the-box ideas as NDP communications director.  He was my media star.

I write this to remember Kormos and to explain something.  Remember his genius at delivering to the waiting microphones and cameras, and explain the context behind a few of the TV images that eulogized the popular politician.

Like, why was Kormos leading a pony around Queen’s Park, a prominent image in CITYtv’s montage?  Why was he sprawled out on a chaise lounge sipping an umbrella-topped drink and being fanned by doting staffers?

I never laughed as hard or as long as I did when Kormos brought my dog and pony stunt to life.  It was March 2003.  Janet Ecker was finance minister to Ernie Eves’ premiership in the year of the Magna Budget.  Some Tory operative’s best idea for escaping public scrutiny of the province’s finances in an election year was to present the annual budget via television at the Magna auto parts plant to a stage-managed crowd. 

Prorogation may have its warts, but what bigger pock on democracy is there than the outright removal of the budget from the Legislative Chamber on Budget Day?

That’s when we landed Kormos in front of the grand old parliament building resplendent with two four-legged props on budget day.  Midnight, my friend’s Pomeranian did a wonderful spinning trick. Princess, the rental pony, delivered in spades, (so agile she could have walked up the front steps to the main door, I found out later.)  Kormos was a delight to script.  He gave grace to the written word, one of his loves.

The NDP’s Dog and Pony show dominated the news, mocked the governing Conservatives and sent opposition, heir-apparent Liberals, ignored, scowling and pouting, back to their offices.  It was an event, the veteran MPP from Welland told me fairly recently, that people continued to mention to him a full decade later.

Kormos was always a player in these efforts and relished my schemes.  I had him selling pencils outside Old City Hall in Toronto defying rigid laws proposed against panhandling.  He paraded a team of NDP colleagues to the parliamentary parking lot to squeegee MPP car windows, protested nursing fee increases in a rocking chair marathon.  Wherever there was action there was Kormos, master of creative media arts, always hungry for the next bite.

My team conjured up the ‘lawn chair press conference’ where Kormos held court basking in the sun and calling for two new statutory holidays a year.

For all his depth, Kormos remained ever the nuanced actor, who embraced the simple idea that fun communicates, fun sells.

In a previous blog I said to keep an eye on the Ontario government's international travel plans.  The government could stop provincial parliament in its tracks for four months, but it couldn’t stop booking trips and missions for soon-to-be-outgoing ministers.  In listening to the Throne Speech Monday a bemused smile visited my face in hearing of the government’s plan to expand its markets through trade missions and the like.

Why, just last week on Ontario News Watch I had to note that international outreach may be just the ticket for Dr. Eric Hoskins, the new minister of economic development and trade and a premier wannabe.  His boss, Premier Kathleen Wynne, may know exactly what she’s doing keeping Hoskins busy away from home.  But aren’t we in tight times?  It’ll be interesting to chart the expenses he chalks up.

I’ve been predicting that a new style will come to government under Wynne’s hand.  Testosterone levels in the place are way down.  Watching the legislature this morning I’m like a lot of folks, I guess, offering my advice to the television screen.

To Kathleen Wynne:  Ramp up your French tutorials to high speed.  It’s clear you’ve been working on your second language, now bump it up in priority.  Practise every day.

Tim Hudak:  Stop advancing shaky policy ideas.  A lot of people in the mushy middle who wanted to take you seriously can’t now.  You could have taken a soft right turn and won over more minds. Ontario isn’t ready for the radical right again under a team that’s 50 Shades of Mike Harris.

Andrea Horwath:  Study Hudak for style points on delivering questions in Question Period.  That guy is a master of performance.  And watch out for the media.

I did say four leaders.  Where is the Green Party in Ontario?  My advice to its leader, Mike Schreiner, is to be activist and relevant again.  Take actions that signal you aren’t content for Greens to be merely a fringe party or a parking lot for protest votes.

You stay or you pay.

A politician should have to serve for a full term unless death or unlawful activity cuts short the career.

If you run for a four-year term, you serve a four-year term, or until the next election is called.  That’s your obligation as a candidate, what you signed on for when you ‘answered the ad.’  Let’s just say it’s in your contract with the voter.  I won't disagree if you tell me four years is too long.

Politicians who leave mid-term for their own convenience lay open seats to be filled in expensive by-elections.

We have two such examples in the Province of Ontario right now with Dwight Duncan (Windsor) and Chris Bentley (London), both MPPs and cabinet members making quick exits.  They’re flying the Queen’s Park coop: A premature evacuation?

That’s an expensive exit strategy!  The cost of a provincial by-election must be in the quarter million dollar range.  Under my scenario these elected legislators continue to serve as MPPs until the next general election or they pay the cost of refilling their seats. 

People living in an area represented by an early-quitter are disadvantaged for up to six months.  Their legislative legs just walked out on them and they have no voice in parliament. Then all of Ontario joins in to fork over the dough to run forced by-elections.

Suggesting that candidates pay the cost of a by-election is neither new nor is it unprecedented.

I learned as a municipal candidate that it is possible a government will demand payment for the cost of a by-election.  I go back to a letter I received from the City of Toronto Clerk in 1999 informing me that if I won the contested seat (a vacancy due to a death in office) the city would come after me for the cost of a new by-election.  “For your information the cost of a by-election is between $165,000 and $200,000,” said the letter from top bureaucrat, Novina Wong.

Okay, this was over a logo dispute that was tame compared to the one that bubbled up in Surrey BC recently.  The town launched and then withdrew a lawsuit against a local t-shirt maker who parodied Surrey’s logo on apparel. 

Here I still have in my possession a letter suggesting I pay for a by-election for reasons both silly and nonsensical. So what about these guys who step down early from their well-paying, elected posts and saddle the public with an expensive election exercise?  

The cost of many a by-election could be avoided altogether if politicians stayed put and lived to the terms of their agreement, as many have.  I concede this does make it hard for them to jump to other levels of government mid-term.  Jury's still out on whether that's good or bad.

Clearly a recipe is needed if one wants to stir the pot on Premier Dalton McGuinty’s prorogation of the Ontario Legislature this week.  The public eye glazes over at the mere mention of proroguing in all its minutiae.  As important an issue as it is, political leaders have failed in their attempts to foster anything but a mild reaction from citizens to the Liberal government’s manipulative and cheeky political ploy.

Prorogation has landed on the public with a muted thud.  What that represents is an inability of the opposition parties to effectively grab the media’s attention.  What we got was more of the same rhetoric one expects to hear from opposition quarters.   A static email and phone campaign targeting Queen’s Park isn’t compelling.  One needs to be creative to capture a busy mind.

I hate to say it, but most people view politicians as men and women who get paid pretty well to achieve a whole lot of nothing.  Having a campaign to call MPPs ‘back to work’ is a doomed message.  Most people believe a politician’s place is in the constituency troubleshooting voters’ real life problems.

Here’s how I would advise a political leader on raising the profile of the complicated and dull prorogation issue:

My first event would take place at 11 a.m. the day following McGuinty’s stunning announcement.  Members of the press have been burning the midnight oil.  They’re tired, hungry, probably fuelled on coffee and junk food. 

My media event would be a perogi, er, ‘proroguee’ party, for the media – something a little different.  I’d find volunteers in the vibrant Polish community to prepare some of the most mouth-watering varieties of perogi you’ve ever tasted. 

I’d have a body of real people there bolstering my leader’s point: the senior, the student activist, those who were counting on now-defunct pieces of legislation. 

The press conference would explain to the media the analogous point.  And the point is?  “We politicians have stuff on our plates. The legislative session went faster than this plate of perogi and the public thinks that’s wrong.” 

Then lunch for press and invited guests, with cleverly packaged take-out portions for deadline-pressed reporters who can’t stay.

The press corps comes up with dandy puns, slogans and headlines.  Scribes could go to town with this one, not to mention photographers and cartoonists.  Using simplicity, fun and creativity, a message has sturdier legs, a better reach.

As a follow-up, while legislative proceedings idle, I would question the political junkets and trade missions that this lame duck government no doubt will continue, notwithstanding. 

The leader would emphasize the “work to be done” theme juxtaposed against the image of government freeloaders at the international travel trough.  Sirloin tip versus home spun soul food.

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