And now for the local media.
Again, as much as I like and generally agree with local radio talk host (and former MP in the Mulroney government) John Gormley, he scored a big, fat, miss this morning on the Grewal tapes, by loudly dismissing them as “shenanigans” and “how politics is done in today’s Canada”.
I cant help but be reminded of a few of the topics covered on John Gormley LIve in the past week or so; the trashing of Saskatchewan provincial parks by teenage partiers during the May long weekend, the lack of “responsible parenting” in the town of Rosetown and just yesterday, the growing problem of graffiti in Saskatoon.
Well, perhaps it’s time that John revisits those same topics from the perspective of the messages young people hear in the media about behavior and ethics in government – the very government that writes and enforces the laws they flaunt.
Until you, John, are willing to hold lawmakers in the highest offices in the land to the ethical standards that Canadians deserve, and our constitution and laws demand, you might reconsider your outrage and denunciation of parents when a bunch of drunken teenagers drag an RCMP officer into the water at a lake party.
The two are not unrelated.
I agree. Lawmakers do need to be held to the highest ethical standards. So a pox on the Liberals and a pox on the Conservatives for sleazy recordings.
Neither party has been shown to exactly be the boy scouts that Canada deserves.
Taping a conversation may not be the epitome of ethical behaviour, Todd, but what other option is there when the person you were talking to simply says “I never said that” or “We never spoke” (as in the Inky Mark case)? A proof is a proof, and when you have da proof, it’s proven, right?
>Until you, John, are willing to hold lawmakers in the highest offices in the land to the ethical standards that Canadians deserve,
>and our constitution and laws demand, you might reconsider your outrage and denunciation of parents when a bunch of drunken teenagers drag an RCMP officer into the water at a lake party.
>The two are not unrelated.
Clearly the parents bear no responsibility for the behavior of their progeny, it must be the liberal government’s fault that some peoples children don’t know how to behave.
How would conservative control of the government result in kids behaving better? The deatils so far seem a little sketchy.
Ah.. I get it. Sometimes it’s okay to be on the shady side of ethics. Got it.
Both the Liberals and Conservatives suck right now in my opinion. I think most Canadians are tired of all the games going on. What I’d like to see (and I think a lot others) is some actual work get done, let the inquiry continue and then let’s elect a new government. In the meantime, all the rest of this is just a 3 ring circus.
And all this time I thought I made it clear who I was speaking to. I’m not addressing Liberals, or Conservatives, or NDP, or Bloc members.
My comments were directed at the media pundits’ who espouse a double standard when it comes to breaking the law in the name of “politics”.
If you’re going to give a public pass to politicians and their staffers who flaunt the criminal code, then you’d better think twice before lecturing a bunch of teenagers who have simply choosen to do the same thing in a different setting.
Wow those Librano$ talking points have really sunk into Todd.
Wow those Librano$ talking points have really sunk into Todd.
By the way, there is nothing inherently unethical about taping a conversation. People in and out of government do it routinely, when they have concerns that their version of events may be questioned at a later time.
How many times do you think your calls to “customer service” have been taped in the interest of “quality control”?
How many times do you think you appear on surveillance video as you go in and out of government offices or places of business?
Ah yes, Todd
Are you a volunteer Spin Meister trying to work your way up to be circus master?
Bread And Circuses.
Martin distributes the bread.
MSM runs the circuses. Showcasing the more entertaining but trivial sideshows.
Headlines today:
CBC :
Ivory Coast violence leaves 41 dead
Doctors separate legs of ‘mermaid’ baby
CTV:
Gay couple thrilled with an ‘Amazing’ wedding
Ont. lawyers ready for Homolka hearing
Toronto Star :
Summer: So far, so good
11,000 city teachers begin work-to-rule
Globe and Mail:
Dutch vote on EU constitution
Harper defends MP’s taping
My question how many Adult Canadians know that Paul Martin got 161 million dollars?
1-3% is my guess now if Preston had done it that would be 95%
I think it must be tough being a liberal parent assuming you haven’t aborted all your children.
If they say
I can do X everyone else does it.
[all politicians are not crooks]
you can’t punish me I’m your parents grand child.
[I have to vote liberal my parents did their parents did etc etc]
Yes what I’m doing is wrong just don’t tell anyone.
[MSM’s]
People should learn that if they support corruption they deserve it when it hits them in the head.
The naked ape might want to put some clothes on. His brain is acting chilled.
Out here on the worst coast, a bunch of 20-somethings have physically attacked a Sikh boy, because it’s funny to hit on somebody different, and besides, laws don’t count anymore, do they.
Hey those twenty somethings that attacked that sikh boy are bad, but what with the sikhs fighting in India and all it just makes all people really bad. Oh well I guess there isn’t anything we can do about, except reelect scumbag corrupt liberals.
Paul Wells and Liberal Party Advisor John Duffy
While you’ve been on the phone to customer service, Kate, have you heard the phrase:
“Your call may be monitored for quality assurance.” ?
If it isn’t illegal to tape someone without their knowledge, it’s definitely on the shady side of ethics.
Sorry Liberal Party Advisor Mike Duffy.
Am quite enjoying Conservative Joe’s common sense take on today’s issues:
http://www.conservativejoe.com/index.php
The angle obviously being taken by MSM is “a pox on all their houses”. CBC’s “Your Call” right this very minute is doing it’s best to downplay the Liberal involvement as “normal minority maneuvering”, while portraying Grewel as “sleazy”.
I’ve been trying for days to figure out the desired outcome. It’s one thing to rationalize these events as “gutter politics”, to quantify ALL politicians as sleazy in the hope that people will just stick with the “devil they know”. I truly believe that this will not happen. No doubt, the prevailing attitude is that this is sleazy business, but it is invariably attatched to the idea that “something has to change”.
On Gormley? He’s an entertaining egomaniac. Consistency has never been his strong suit.
Right on Todd
We should extend the courtesy to all libera,..er uh, all criminals when trying to obtain a confession from these corrupt pigs we should advise them that we are taping them for future court cases against them.
We wouldn’t want to be on the “shady side”, heavens no those darn opposition members.
I guess the only thing to do here is re elect the criminals,(cough) liberals we wouldn’t want people actually exposing crime in office ,…better to hide the crime, that makes for a more balanced and progressive country!
PM just stated in QP that the member (Grewel) “phoned my office” to arrange a crossover. There should be documented phone records to prove this, right?
I don’t know why you’re coming down on me. I agree — the Liberals are crooks. I just don’t agree with secretly taping conversations either. It makes all politicians look like weasels and I’d rather not elect a weasel either.
Dosanje is an absolute riot to listen to in QP today. “Missing transcripts, incorrect translation, tape splices”
TRANSLATION:
LA LA LA I CAN’T HEAR YOU LA LA LA I CAN’T…….
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.
I for one applaud Grewal for taping the conversations, comparing his actions to the Liberals who were captured on the recordings can only come from someone suffering from an ability to reason, or as a result of an inherent bias. It is very revealing of personal moral values, when comparing such an effort to document wrongdoing, to the wrongdoing itself.
Considering the sway the Liberals hold over much of the electorate, it seems as actions such as this will be the only way to convincingly expose the Liberal government for what it is.
What’s next, crticizing whistle blowers for gathering documentation prior to making their allegations, restricting the RCMP from doing any undercover investigations?
>Out here on the worst coast, a bunch of 20-somethings have physically attacked a Sikh boy, because it’s funny to hit on somebody different, and besides, laws don’t count anymore, do they.
Yes, now that you explain it so clearly, that attack truly is the fault of the liberals. Heck, I bet those bad guys were being egged on by the PM personaly.
Did anyone get any video footage of that rat bastard Paul Martin slinking away from this cowardly attack that he so clearly provoked?
Oh, by the way, you neglected to explain how conservative control of the government would result in kids behaving better. Please tell us how this magic works. Inquiring minds want to know.
You know, liberals are always accusing conservatives of only seeing the world in black and white.
Yet, when a conservative uses a tactic that could be considered “gray” (or shady according to Todd) suddenly it’s liberals seeing the world in black and white.
It was sneaky of Grewal to tape the conversations. But it was ILLEGAL and absolutely wrong to try to bribe him to switch sides / abstain from the vote. There is no gray for the Liberals in this case.
Let’s see…who’s job is it in Canuckistan to catch lying thieving criminals like the Libranos? The RCMP?
I see…you naive Canucks think the RCMP is going to wiretap the Liberals?
Man you are all stupid.
Naked Ape – you could use a bit of brushing up on your remedial reading skills.
IMO, the Conservative party would be well served to run on a platform of repealing , or at the very least massively overhauling, the Young Liberal, I mean, Young Offender’s Act. Kids are absolutely not afraid of the consequences of their actions.
This is in response to taping conversations:
When companies tape your phone conversations they are supposed to tell you first, otherwise they are breaking the law.
Also, police have to get permission first before recording a suspect’s voice.
Both the Liberals and Conservatives look awful in this tape brouhaha.
The floor is now open for suggestions how to ethically document Liberals in the act of offering appointments for votes.
None? That’s what I thought.
The law states that it is entirely lawful to tape any conversation when you are one of the participants in the conversation.
IMO all elected officials should heed what Harper said today:
” Parliamentarians should act at all times as if they are on the record.”
So, in other words instead of the media and Liberals screaming because they have been caught in the act they should be screaming about these people cleaning up their act.
Harper also was quick to note that the Conservatives didn’t ‘authorize’ Grewal to do what he did. Sounds as though they weren’t all that excited about how it would play either.
Yes, advising the Liberals that they were being taped probably would have resulted in them maintaining the same course of discussion. Yes, the courts would have probably quickly given permission for Grewal to tape the conversation. In other words the Liberals should be given free reign to continue business as usual, must be part of the “Canadian values”.
“Sleazy recordings”?!! Something like the Toronto Star accusing Harper of forcing Martin to indulge in “seedy vote buying”!
Could someone please explain to me why taping a conversation between two political oponents is wrong, no matter what the purpose? Could someone please explain to me, that even if a “sting” was set up by Grewal, why even that would be somehow wrong, And, if Grewal did not offer himself up for bribes, why were his overtures not immediately rejected? Could someone please explain to me, why Liberal officials in this case did not immediately dismiss Grewal, or simply tell him, in a 2 minutue conversation, that they’d be happy if he crossed the floor to sit as an independant but that it was “illegal” for them to offer him anything in exchange.
Let’s put this in another way… so that the Liberal Apologist and morally bankrupt can understand it:
I am a teacher. A grade twelve girl comes to me in June and says that she wants higher grades but is unable to understand her math. She says that she’d “do me a favor… do anythig to pass” if I could assist her. Then, for two hours, instead of helping her with her Algebra, I discuss in theory, how she could help me. “Well, you know, we have to be careful right now… but after you graduate I could use some ‘assistance’, so ‘if’ you pass this course, maybe we can arrange something after grad. I’d be willing to ‘talk’ to you, perhaps at my cabin at the lake, but that’s just hypothetical… right! I’m open to just about anything… but it’d sure be nice if you passed your Algebra!”
The teacher is supposed to do his job… period. And that job does not include even entertaining for a second “favors” for grades. Why, have John Gormley and the media tried so hard to put Grewal and the Liberal Scum on an equal level of moral equivalence. There is none. The Liberals are wrong wrong wrong… but they are wrong so often that even Gormley begins to miss the point after awhile.
Just one more reason for the revolution to begin.
Free medicare or FREEDOM (pick 1)
A man with a gun is a citizen
A man without a gun is a subject
Tell Naked Ape to go and check what Dewey did in the thirties. It has been downhill ever since.
I can’t believe that Canada is going to let a Cabal buy and sell her democracy. It’s disgusting. Some of the French even bothered to vote to maintain their sovereign rights (such as the are). Eight million Iraqis braved death for a chance to exert their democratic rights. The Ukrainians had their Orange Revolution against (non-existant, of course) Russian tyranny and institutional corruption. The North Koreans don’t have any rights except starving to death and praising the Great Leader every time a gun is to their heads. Yes, I digress, but not much.
How is it that Canada seems so comfortable selling their democracy to a Mafia? Too da** lazy to freaking vote? Too busy to care? Honestly, could someone please explain this to me? You guys might want to start investigating what the Liberals have put in the water. Truly not intended to offend, just trying to understand what planet my Canada is living on.
Editing error — I am not Canadian.
It’s both legal and ethical to record conversations. Do you doubt that? Fine. Call me up and have a conversation with me on a very serious topic, with ramifications for your future. I promise I won’t make a recording of it. I’ll just tell everyone what I think I remember of what you said, with no way of determining whether I’m getting it right. Happy?
Inky Mark didn’t record his conversations, and look how he was treated. Grewal was simply acting sensibly to protect himself. Oh, I keep forgetting, Libranos have the right to beat up the rest of us and it’s wrong for us to protect ourselves. Right, Todd?
Umm Belinda got a cabinet post so don’t you think it’s obvious that turncoats were being rewarded? The news for you, ebt, is that most people in Canada don’t give a flipping flip when it also makes the Conservatives look bad for doing secret recordings. Stick to Gomery and pound away at the Liberals. Show Canadians the pluses of voting for the Conservatives. But start indulging in cloak-and-dagger routines and skulking around and the rest of the country will think you’re no better than the rest of them.
Translation:
Don’t embarass the media by doing their job for them.
Belinda, Brisson, even the Health Minister himself – the tapes use these as examples to Grewal as how the reward is “99.9% certain”…in his own words.
How would you feel right now as a long serving hardworking loyal Liberal backbencher. ?
Shafted. Betrayed? Gullible? Stupid?
Oh my.. so all this is concern for the Liberal backbenchers? 😉
Seriously, I agree with all of you. The Liberals suck. But you’re going to lose as many people as you convert by covertly taping conversations.
If I were a politician, I’d probably tape everything. Seems the way to go these days.
Tonight on CBC Newsworld.
Votes are for sale. Only it’s Olympic 2012 votes and it’s a BBC documentary.
Apparantly we must go abroad for any vote buying scandals beacuse as posted elsewhere
Nothing to see here move along, move along.
You’re probably aware of Monte Solberg’s blog. If only a broader segment of the Canadian voter population would read this… (www.montesolberg.com/blog.htm)
Good God, what I wouldn’t do to inject Canadians with a magic attention-span enhancing drug.
Todd – this is about Gomery. It was Gomery that first brought the announcement that the Bloc and Conservatives could no longer support the government and were going to bring it down.
That resulted in cancellation of opposition days by the Liberals to buy time.
When that failed, the Liberals ignored several defeats of non-confidence motions.
With the assistance of the same media that is now trying to smear Grewal, they bought themselves a few more days.
At the same time they were “negotiating” with Grewal to attempt to get the vote they eventually bought from Stronach.
Gomery-Grewal are NOT SEPARATE EVENTS. They are a continuum. Had there been no Gomery, there would be no Grewal tapes at all.
Liberal vote buying and rewards:
Stronach (Mr. Dither’s Blondie), Brison, Cadman (member’s Bill moved to the top of the list by Cotler), Parrish (now welcome back to the caucus without having to apologize), Danny Williams (we’ll wait to see what he was promised for pressuring the 2 federal Conservative MP’s with threats of turning “his” province against them in the next election), Mayors Miller and Vancouver (money for their Cities for simply influencing their citizens).The NDP. McQuinty?
Conservative MP’s Richardson, Grewal x2, Inky Mark…didn’t bite or benefit.
It’s not the taping that’s illlegal. It’s the intent. The judge would have extreme difficulty with this one.
Did Grewal say to his wife. “We can’t lose, just phone with the recorder going and if they offer me a deal, the recording will prove it. [That’s OK]
Did Grewal say to his wife. “We can’t lose,
just phone with the recorder going and if they offer me a great deal, I’ll accept and destroy the recording. [That’s not OK]
I think Grewal did the former. [OK] He phoned to see if offers were being made by the Libscams and he knew a recording was required to avoid being sued for milllions by the Liberanos.
Grewal did well and deserves our thanks.
My fear is that so many judges are in the Libs pockets that even concrete proof seems less than adequate.
How do you explain no legal action when Allan Cutler blew the whistle on phantom contracts he refused to sign in Guite’s office around 1994?
How do you explain no legal action, but a smoothing over, regarding 146 million in missing HP/Compaq DND computers about 2003?
Recent HP newsletter states HP paid back 146 million. [why? they took over Compaq]. Also, they have agreed to team up with [Mumbles.govt..] to bring perps to justice.
An enraged Albertan Seperatist wants to know why Jean Cretien and Paul Martin should not be sentenced to several years in jail for misdirecting hundreds of millions of dollars of Canadian’s taxes, duties and fees?
Yeah, me too!
Could there be a can of worms in Lotteries and gaming revenues, given proven practices?
73s, TonyGuitar
Kate, this is as much about Gomery as Brian Mulroney who cost the PC’s the election which allowed Chretien into power which caused adscam which allowed Martin into power yadda yadda. Stick to where the money went and stop the sideshows. If the Conservatives want power, focus on wrondoings and don’t commit your own.
This is in response to IrC:
If Gurmant Grewal wanted to prove that the Liberals were trying to bribe him, he should have went straight to the police or the RCMP. The RCMP would then get him the permission to tape the conversation.
And to those who distrust the RCMP: why *exactly*?
To Allison:
It is not legal to record conversations, even the one you’re apart of, unless you ask their permission.