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Saturday March 01,
2008
Rats with resumes
and their lame apologists
Update: Here's the tape
(Requires Real Player) of author Tom Zytaruk's 2005 interview
with Stephen Harper and here's the Toronto
Star saying that Harper has "a penchant for lowball
politics"
============
The National Post's Jonathan Kay thinks a good resume
is synonymous with goodness itself.
Link:
Before we give the slightest credence to the Chuck Cadman story, how
about we check Tom Flanagan's resumé? Does this respected
veteran
expert in governance, politics and the workings of Ottawa sound like
the sort of guy who would be stupid and/or reckless enough to make a
bald-faced million-dollar bribe to an MP known for iron-willed
integrity?
Uh, nothing there
guarantees
he wouldn't be. Being respected, experienced, and a prolific writer
cannot in any way be equated with being honest and principled. Ask any
university prof with a drink or two under his belt. But Tom
Flanagan
seems better known for his
somewhat callous views on North American aboriginals.
Chuck Cadman
would definitely refuse to take a bribe, because, as Kay
readily admits, he is known for his iron-willed integrity. And he also has a
pretty nice resume.
Since one is generally known by the company one routinely keeps, it
might be prudent to consider that Cadman's kin may be equally upright.
Flanagan, on the
other hand is a confidant of Stephen Harper who, until recently at
least, was thick with "Lyin' Brian" Mulroney,
and who entrusted John Baird, implicated in the Larry O'Brien scandal,
with a cabinet position. That's two tainted prime ministers and a
cabinet minister. Talk about your resumes!
Would Flanagan risk going to jail,
asks Jonathan Kay. I'll answer that with
another question: does he think himself above the law? Many
respected
and experienced people have imagined themselves to be. Conrad
Black
comes quickly to mind. One might as well ask if the Queen would
bestow
a peerage on an embezzler. Obviously she would.
Read The
man behind Stephen Harper to learn that not everybody is as
impressed with Tom Flanagan as the National Post.
Kay thinks
such a huge offer "doesn't compute". Well, a million dollars
might
be an overwhelming sum to him, but to a government numbers cruncher who
deals in billions,
it's chicken feed. Kay thinks the insurance company wouldn't pay
out. But
even if that were a fact, it doesn't prevent someone from saying it
would. Surely Kay knows about fine print.
An article
at Georgia Straight decries the muted response from the
same media that exploded the Liberal sponsorship scandal:
...
the
Globe and Mail somehow managed to bury this story within the pages of
the paper. The slavishly pro-Stephen Harper National Post also
didn't
put this story on its front page on Thursday or Friday ...
and suggests what
should happen next:
Subpoena
everyone connected to the Chuck Cadman bribe allegations, including
Stephen Harper
Cadman's son in
law has weighed in, saying it's not so much what he thinks as what he
knows: CKNW
For all
their failings, would Harper and his pals be so utterly callous as to
offer a dying man an insurance policy as a bribe?
Well, they replaced
the child care program with billions of dollars worth of weaponry.
And, with regard to Israel, it isn't likely they're going to denounce
Deputy Israeli Defense Minister Matan Vilnai for his genocidal
threats against Gazans. But I'll bet some Zionists will be
plenty upset with his improper use of the word "holocaust".
And now
that we're talking about Israel, I see that Vilnai is frantically backtreading (Canwest): His spokesman said: "Mr.
Vilnai was meaning 'disaster'. He did not mean to make any allusion to
the genocide."
Did you catch that? He didn't say Vilnai doesn't
mean genocide; he just didn't mean "the" genocide.
And you know what? Vilnai also has a resume.
So does Abbas, who opined that maybe Israel is trying to thwart the
peace process. Whatever would make him think that?
The American organization, The
Council for the National Interest, sent around an email today
expressing concern about Vilnai's threat and stating that it "joins
the Palestine Center, Electronic Intifada and other organizations in
calling for the security of Palestinians inside the Gaza Strip."
It promises a "full report" on Israeli action next week.
That's something, I guess.
yayacanada
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