T hey made the oddest of couples, the beanpole Dalton McGuinty and bearish George Smitherman.

The Ontario premier grew up a socially conservative, impeccably polite Irish Catholic from the Ottawa suburbs – probably convinced into adulthood he didn't even know any homosexuals.

The man who would become his unlikely political lieutenant was an out-and-then-some gay man, a hockey-playing, Whitney Houston-loving brawler who never went to college, started in politics as a lowly driver, confessed while in cabinet to a fondness for party drugs, and rose to become the second most powerful politician in the province.

Through McGuinty's years in opposition and during the first term of Liberal government, the partnership worked marvellously, easily surviving Smitherman's verbal indiscretions, emotional excesses and considerable appetite for attention.

Smitherman was the premier's alter ego, the fist in his dainty white glove, the attack-trained partisan, the let-George-do-it handler of tough jobs and dirty work.

Even so, it had become increasingly clear recently that Smitherman's continued presence was more liability than asset to the government, and that both men will be better off for his resignation from cabinet Sunday.

Smitherman quit as deputy premier and minister of energy and infrastructure renewal to free himself for a bid for the Toronto's mayor job.

It was two months ago that he clearly signalled he intended to jump to municipal politics – in part because he'd pretty much peaked at the provincial level, in part because his temperament and Toronto pedigree seemed well suited to city hall.

Still, that posturing alone showed an audacity bordering on arrogance by a minister whose free rein in cabinet had evidently inclined him to believe his personal ambitions topped the obligations of his day job and the needs of his premier.

Smitherman was further diminished – and his continued presence in cabinet questioned – with the auditor general's report on the spending and contract abuses at eHealth Ontario, much of which happened under Smitherman's watch as health minister.

It was his successor in health, David Caplan, who paid with his job, but most observers knew it was the premier's pet minister who'd essentially run out on the tab.

It may be that some cabinet colleagues, in addition to feeling the popular Caplan had been shafted, had grown alarmed at what problems might arise from Smitherman's assiduous wooing of the South Korean Samsung Group as an energy investor in Ontario.

That Furious George was, as the Star's Robert Benzie has reported, "gang-tackled" by his cabinet colleagues on the concessions he was making to Samsung was remarkable.

That word of this leaked out spoke volumes about the declining regard in which he was held.

The damage done to Smitherman over the eHealth scandal – and the boost it gave potential mayoral rival John Tory, who essentially launched the investigation with his inquiries while PC leader – had reportedly caused second thoughts about leaving Queen's Park.

But Smitherman is now all but out the door.

And the truth is there will be few tears.

As one Liberal said, "take away the gay and he's a centre-right guy who likes to throw his weight around."

For too long, Smitherman set an unfortunate example for more junior ministers of knee-jerk partisanship, robo-rhetoric over reflection, the bloviated shouting down of any and all critics.

For too long, too much power had been centred in the hands of one man, while talented MPPs twiddled their thumbs and the face of the McGuinty government grew more tired and cynical by the day.

Still, Smitherman did give the premier a parting gift.

One more chance to learn there's no such thing as an indispensable man.





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Jim Coyle's provincial affairs column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday.