It's hard to see Mayor Rob Ford, Premier Dalton McGuinty and Prime Minister Stephen Harper crafting an effective plan to combat gang violence in Toronto.

In fairness, no municipal, provincial or federal leader has ever done that over the many years the problem has been building.

But since you go to war with the army you have, here's why I don't think these three are the best generals.

Ford, an effective retail politician with a good heart - as evidenced by his personal devotion to disadvantaged youths through his football coaching program - isn't intellectually up to the job.

His main perception of being mayor was to end the fiscal gravy train at City Hall and he's accomplished most of what he promised on that score with two years to go in his term.

But with that done, Ford's not a consensus builder, visionary or inspirational leader.

While he's good at helping constituents and comfortable meeting them at barbecues, he's nervous and inarticulate when speaking in public, as evidenced by his appearance on Danzig Street in the wake of the horrific gang-related shooting there.

At times like these, people look to their mayor to be in charge, to inspire confidence and to demonstrate he's going to lead the city in addressing problems.

Ford muttered clichés about Toronto being a safe city - later in the day he issued a press release declaring a war on gangs - and has been unimpressive since.

His call for gang members to be deported is a head scratcher, since while a well-run immigration and refugee system is part of an effective anti-gang strategy, most gangsters were born here. They can't be deported.

In fairness, even if Ford tried to reach out to council to develop a consensus on dealing with gangs, he'd be shot down by opponents like Adam Vaughan and Shelley Carroll - potential rivals who never miss an opportunity to mock him - and who contribute as much as Ford does to the circus-like atmosphere that dominates council these days.

Unlike Ford, who views gang crime as primarily a policing and law-and-order issue, Premier Dalton McGuinty, while paying lip service to toughening the justice system, sees the gang problem, as he does every problem, as something best addressed by throwing our money at it. (See all-day kindergarten, etc.) Certainly, effective social spending, along with hiring more cops and fixing the justice system, is a legitimate response to gang violence.

But McGuinty's reckless spending means he has run out of our money to enact the very programs he advocates.

While the gang story was making headlines last week, McGuinty's government was taking a pounding on two more financial fronts.

First, the testimony of Dr. Chris Mazza at the legislative inquiry into the Ornge scandal reminded everyone that while Ornge executives were treating the province's air ambulance service like a personal candy store, Health Minister Deb Matthews was apparently locked in her bathroom, unable to arrange even a meeting with Mazza to find out what the hell was going on.

Then McGuinty's cabinet ministers cheerfully admitted the Liberal party made a purely political decision in the dying days of last year's election to blow $190 million of our money cancelling a natural gas plant, to save a few Liberal seats.

Given such outrageous waste, can you imagine McGuinty proposing a tax increase to fund new social programs to support children living in vulnerable communities where gangs flourish? He'd be tarred and feathered.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper deserves credit for toughening the justice system because longer sentences and more prison space are needed to combat gangs.

But Harper seems more at home, personally and intellectually, in his adopted city of Calgary, which he calls the greatest in Canada, as opposed to Toronto, where he was born.

One gets the sense he doesn't feel any particular urgency to help Liberal Toronto address its gang problem.

And while the Tories are strong on law-and-order, they're not good at acknowledging we could throw every gangster in jail tomorrow, but that won't address the societal ills breeding the next generation coming up behind them.

Of course Ford, McGuinty and Harper can't solve Toronto's gang problem alone.

But it's disturbing to have to admit to people living in Toronto's gang-infested communities that the best thing for them to do for the foreseeable future, is duck.