To get elected, there are a bunch of things you need to have going for you.

At the top of the list are the obvious: a good leader, a good party, good policy whose time has come, a good organization, and money in the bank.

Some decent name recognition usually doesn’t hurt either.

Most of the things on that first list are completely out of a candidate’s hands.

There was next to nothing any Liberal candidate running in 2006 could have done about the fact that Paul Martin appeared to be damaged goods, the Liberal brand was poison, and the party’s policies were considered irrelevant because of the timing of various unanticipated events (the Jane Creba shooting, the income trust investigation by the RCMP, etc.).

But individual name recognition is something a particular group of candidates can always bring to the dance, and those candidates are former journalists and/or media personalities.

Strangely enough, popularity “on the air” is no guarantee for popularity in politics.

In my own hometown of Hamilton, being the most popular radio host in town wasn’t enough to get Paul Hanover elected for the Ontario Liberals in the days of Bill Davis’ Big Blue Machine.

Even though Hanover was called “The Mayor of the Morning,” --- a popular radio host for three decades, whose name recognition couldn’t have been higher --- he failed in his bid for office because being a big name couldn’t trump being a Liberal in Hamilton in those days.

Same story for Ben Chin, the popular television journalist, whose individual achievements elevated the Liberal vote in a Toronto Danforth by-election, but weren’t enough to overcome the solid hold the NDP has on that part of town.

Ditto Peter Kent, one of the great journalists in Canadian history. But none of his past accomplishments and remarkably high visibility seemed to matter against a Liberal tide that swept almost every seat in Toronto in the last federal election.

To be sure, some journalists do win. Adam Vaughan successfully left CITY-tv for Toronto City Council. Jennifer Mossop did the same, quitting CH-TV 11 in Hamilton to become the Liberal MPP in Stoney Creek.

But I raise this issue now as a cautionary tale for two well- known radio personalities, who, rumour has it, intend to run at some point this year. Both gained their reputations at CFRB Radio.

Ted Woloshyn was the station’s morning radio voice for a decade. He’s currently mulling over the possibility of running for the Ontario Progressive Conservatives in a Mississauga riding.

“He hasn’t made a commitment yet,” says Woloshyn’s representative Ken Marskell. “He’s been approached to run federally as well, but if he runs anywhere, it’ll be provincially.”

And Christina Chernesky has been doing afternoon duty --- and still is --- while seeking the federal Liberal nomination in Mississauga Streetsville.

That's Wajid Khan's riding, but of course, he's now a Conservative, whereas he got elected as a Liberal.

That nomination will be contested. Chernesky expects the nomination meeting to take place any day now, and anticipates today will be the cutoff for selling new memberships.

In any event, if no one has told them yet, let me be the first. Just because the public adored you on the air doesn’t mean that’ll translate into votes.

It’s one of the regularly recurring heartbreaking lessons of doing politics in Canada.