Michael Ignatieff, ex-leader of the Liberal Party, has a new job, returning to his true passion: this fall he’ll join the faculty of the University of Toronto and teach political science, among other things.

He was never meant to go into politics. He had built himself a comfortable career as a journalist and university professor, and he was held in high esteem. But then came the fateful day when a group of Liberal Party operatives convinced him that coming back to Canada and joining the Liberal Party was his undeniable destiny. He’d be as great and influential as Pierre Trudeau, they told him.

Mr. Ignatieff may have been swayed by the implications of such promises. What lifelong Liberal wouldn’t jump at the chance of becoming his party’s next Trudeau, especially when several high-level party insiders said that he was virtually a shoo-in?

But he soon must have realized what a big mistake he’d made. The bloodsport that is politics wasn’t at all what he’d imagined it to be. It was a dirty business, exposing him to personal attacks and ridicule. Surely, this wasn’t what he’d bargained for.

Over time, the attacks and abuse got worse, and towards the end of this most recent election campaign, Mr. Ignatieff showed visible signs of fatigue and frustration. On the final day of the campaign, and particularly on the morning of election day, anyone could have seen that his heart was no longer in it. In those moments he must have been hoping for a defeat so that he could finally free himself of that ordeal.

That someone of Mr. Ignatieff’s calibre failed to connect with voters isn’t the fault of the Conservatives and their attack ads, but solely the fault of a political system that reduces a serious process such as democracy to a vaudeville sideshow.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper is a no-nonsense sort of guy, one who finds it extremely difficult to let his hair down, smile and generally have a good time. He and Mr. Ignatieff are scholarly and intellectual introverts who’d much rather focus on accomplishing a task than performing before an audience like trained monkeys. Yet they both are regularly criticized for being who they are.

Doing that monkey bit simply wasn’t Mr. Ignatieff’s cup of tea. This is not to say that he didn’t enjoy himself meeting Canadians from coast to coast on his bus tour, but being forced to act in goofy ways, such as when he put on a pair of red running shoes and had to do a pretend jog for the cameras was way out of his comfort zone, and it showed. That simply wasn’t him.

In those circumstances he’d come across as phoney, and that’s when voters lost interest and decided to “walk into the orange light” instead.

It’s a shame, really, that intellectuals and thinkers like Mr. Ignatieff have almost no chance of making it in politics, which tends to be more about entertainment than substance.

Non-Liberals rejoiced when it became clear that Mr. Ignatieff hadn’t even managed to hang on to his own seat. While this is understandable in the partisan heat of the moment, Canadians should ask themselves which they’d prefer: the vapid void of Sarah Palin’s showwomanship, or the abundance of ideas flowing from the mind of someone like Mr. Ignatieff. Even those who didn’t vote Liberal must admit that any one of Mr. Ignatieff’s ideas has more potential to do good than anything Ms. Palin has done in the last three years.

Thankfully, Canada won’t lose Mr. Ignatieff. His new job at the University of Toronto will allow him to provide analysis and input on politics and policy in this country. Above all, back at the lectern, Mr. Ignatieff will be much happier again.