A young woman, identified only as Eva, held a sign with a shoe hanging from it high above her head.

She was one of hundreds of people gathered on Front Street across from the Metro Toronto Convention Centre this afternoon, where protesters gathered to denounce former U.S. president George W. Bush ahead of his appearance tonight in the venue.

“Bush is a murderer and they allow him to enter Canada and I don’t think that makes sense,” Eva said. “It’s my shoe and if I wouldn’t get arrested I’d throw it at him.”

Eva’s sentiment was common among those in attendance. Amid shouting and signs and anti-war songs, protesters decried Bush as nothing more than a war criminal, and questioned the Conservative government for allowing him to appear for a speaking engagement, alongside his presidential predecessor Bill Clinton, in Canada.

“Coming out of the Second World War and the Nuremberg trials, launching a war is the greatest crime against humanity, and he’s done that,” Rolf Gerstenberger, president of Local 1005 of the United Steel Workers.

Many of the protesters in attendance sang along with songs denouncing Bush, while others took turns throwing shoes at a large tarp emblazoned with an image of the controversial ex-president. Others tried to take a more peaceful route, painting a peace mural and inviting others to add their own touch.

Ben Hackman, of the organisation Food Not Bombs, volunteered to help feed the protesters from a makeshift buffet table.

“I think there’s a lot of merit, if nothing else, to keeping our protesters well fed. Activism’s hard work,” Hackman said. “We need to support one another as much as we can.”

Hackman, like many of those he helped feed, thinks both Bush and Clinton spent their time as president “helping a small minority of people profit from the destruction of life.”

Which explains why he also brought a bag of shoes to offer to protesters, in the event that they got a brief glimpse of Bush.

‘Shoes Not Bush,” Hackman said, half serious. “It’s a side project.”