| canada.com |
Monday, September 25, 2006
Toronto mayor David Miller is the target of an attempted smear campaign on the Internet, canada.com has learned.
Someone anonymously posted a message in an online forum Monday claiming that a student newspaper at the University of Toronto was about to publish allegations that Miller had an extramarital affair with a campaign volunteer.
The posting was flagged by a site administrator and removed.
According to the gossip, a 23-year-old U of T student bragged about the affair to friends, who leaked the story to The Varsity.
Miller campaign spokesman Rob Sinclair says he has heard nothing about the Internet chatter, which he calls "absurd."
“This sounds like someone’s idea of a very sick joke,” he says. “It’s a sick prank and not worthy of comment.”
Sinclair would not confirm if the student identified in the bogus posting is a Miller campaign volunteer.
The student, who attends U of T’s Trinity College, could not be reached for comment.
At Miller’s profile on Wikipedia, billed as “the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit,” an entry also referred to the impending scandal.
“On Tuesday September 26th 2006, allegations of an affair David Miller had with a recent University of Toronto undergraduate emerged in the University's Varsity newspaper,” read the posting, which was removed shortly after it first appeared.
The Varsity’s news editor, Mike Ghenu, says there is no such story running in the newspaper, which doesn’t even publish an issue on Sept. 26.
“That would move a lot of papers, wouldn’t it?,” said Ghenu. “I’m flattered that someone chose our paper.”
Miller is married to lawyer Jill Arthur and has two children. His main opponent in the upcoming election is city councilor Jane Pitfield.
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