Blue Like You

Archive for July 27th, 2007

Probably the best thing that happened today for Warren Kinsella was Colle-gate. I’m sure he’s quite pleased to be upstaged at this moment.

Anyway, Warren posted my little email on the subject along with many others (July 25th). My own apologies to my faithful Conservative readers, but I really do admire him for apologizing for his mistake. Even though we are on opposite sides of the political spectrum, I think it shows character when a person can admit that he’s not perfect - and do it before an Auditor General tables a report.

I think it’s pretty safe to assume that Ex-Minister Colle is ‘taking one for the team’ here.

Whether or not that will have any impact on the October election is up to the citizens of Ontario.

Interesting though, that during a phone-in show at noon on Toronto’s CityNews, Auditor General McCarter was the guest. The phone question was: “Will you vote for the Liberals in the upcoming election?”

At the end of the program, the votes were tallied:

YES - 491

NO - 1401

There is an online poll on the main City News site. Here’s your chance, Libloggers.

And Ontario, you get to deliver the final verdict in October.

The court now recalls the Globe as a witness for the prosecution. I know this particular court may seem a bit one-sided, but I honestly have been looking for a defense witness.

Oh, wait, here’s one!

Anyway, back to the Globe (Clearing the Slush):

…The Premier would have us believe that the commissioning of Mr. McCarter’s report and subsequent resignation of Mr. Colle demonstrate his government’s commitment to accountability. But only those with very short memories will accept that storyline. Far from reacting promptly to concerns about the slush fund, Mr. McGuinty’s initial response was dismissive. Not only did he stonewall demands for an investigation; he went so far as to imply (albeit with a quick retraction) that opposition members questioning the multicultural program were doing so out of racism. Only when it became clear that his refusal to commission a report would harm his party heading into this fall’s election campaign did Mr. McGuinty relent…

Again, McGuinty’s motives are questioned regarding his Minister’s ‘resignation’. Far from being accountable, it appears to have been an expedient way to name a scapegoat and distance himself from the smell.

- Lunch break.

I now call on a Star witness for the prosecution - Ian Urquhart, who asks why it took Dalton McGuinty so long to deal decisively with this problem? Instead, McGuinty played some kind of denial game.

So why didn’t McGuinty fire Colle then instead of stonewalling demands for his minister’s head for three weeks in the Legislature and suggesting his critics were racists?

McGuinty ducked that question in a press conference yesterday, but it is likely there are three answers to it.

Urquhart lists those possible reasons as (a) stubborness (b) unsuccessful attempt to dismiss the allegations as “mere caterwauling by the opposition and the media”, and (c) with an upcoming election, McGuinty is in “survival mode”.

The Star piece continues:

“Auditor general finds no ties between grants and politics,” trumpeted a press release from the premier’s office.

That’s true, to a certain extent. The auditor general did report that “a few” of the recipient groups had Liberal ties but added: “We found no evidence that the organization received the grant as a result of this.”

However, another allegation was beyond the purview of the auditor general to investigate: that the Liberals dispensed the money to curry favour with various ethno-cultural groups.

After all, the citizenship grants weren’t handled like a normal government program, with bureaucrats involved. Rather, it was run out of Colle’s own office.

But Colle was not a rogue minister, and he didn’t find the money for the grants in the men’s room of his ministry. It was given to him to distribute by the minister of finance, and McGuinty himself participated in at least one of the ceremonies in which the cheque was presented.

The court will now take a brief recess.

Lots of damning editorials in MSM today, but the most critical may be the Globe. Actually, it’s interesting that the most vehement attacks seem to have come from both the Globe and Star.

Lorrie Goldstein has a piece in the Sun (Colle-gate is shades of a new Adscam), but it’s little more than a slap on the hand compared to the others. The Post seems to be MIA.

Anyway, let’s start with the Globe’s Murray Campbell (McGuinty must shoulder blame for the whole sorry mess). He starts by suggesting that “the first wheel finally fell off Dalton McGuinty’s government“, meaning that Dalton appears to have ducked previous potential scandals until this moment. The remark, however, reminded me of that ominous moment on the 2005 federal campaign trail when a wheel suddenly fell off the wagon Paul Martin was driving…

Campbell’s whole piece is worth the read, but here are the highlights:

…The furor over the year-end grants to groups seen to be friendly with the Liberal Party began last April with a story that the Bengali Cultural Society received $250,000.

The story had legs because one of the organization’s executives was vice-president of the riding association of Liberal MP Maria Minna.

The next day, we found out that the Iranian-Canadian Community Centre was given $200,000 just three weeks after it registered as a charity and that its directors included a Liberal candidate in the coming election.

The opposition called for Mr. Colle’s head. Instead of acceding, the government embarked on what Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory characterizes as days of “denial, ducking and stonewalling.”

The grants issue dominated Question Period until Mr. McGuinty could stand it no more and recessed the legislature three weeks early, a few hours before Mr. Colle was scheduled to be grilled before a legislative committee.

The Conservatives asked about 270 questions in that period. They received no answers and, worse, were on the receiving end of insinuations that they were motivated by racist attitudes.

It gets worse:

In the coming weeks, you will hear a lot from opposition politicians about the cricket association that asked for $150,000 after it was invited to apply for funding and the next day received $1-million. It had so much money that it spent $20,000 to throw a celebratory dinner (at which Mr. McGuinty spoke) and then socked away $500,000 in five-year, investment certificates.

Actually, I’m going to be doing this in installments today, because I have a lot to say, and I know most people hate reading long posts.

More to follow.

…then I think this is reasonable. It’s his body, right?

Whitmore had previously agreed to be chemically castrated in 2005 after his release from jail, but the procedure was never done because probation officials couldn’t find a doctor willing to have Whitmore as a patient, his former lawyer, Dan Brodsky said yesterday.

The newspaper said Whitmore may have also made a half-hearted attempt at self-castration while at the Regina Correctional Centre in May by trying to cut off his penis with a tin can.

Isn’t it Canada’s responsibility to ensure that safe castration is accessible on demand, and that there are doctors readily available to do the procedure?