Get the popcorn.
The gist of this story is:
During the debate show, a caller called in and accused Conservative Candidate Maurice Vellacott of sexual assault on a church secretary. Vellacott, immediately asked for the name and number of the caller for legal action and they had an idea of who this person was. I didn’t catch the name, but it was in the news brief. The campaign volunteer who [is alleged to have] made the call is George Laliberte. When they ran a reverse lookup of the number, they came up with the Liberal campaign headquarters of Chris Axworthy.
I’ve heard from someone who heard the exchange live – the word used was “brutal”.
Still no word from the Axworthy office, to the best of my knowledge – the story has been out for a few hours now, so this is probably indicative that they’re working on damage control.
Update: 4pm local time – Local news is reporting Axworthy has stated that he doesn’t condone what happened, and if the call came from his office, he’ll take action.
I’m not making any assumptions on the validity of this but …
Who, in their right mind, would consider such an act as a ‘good idea’
I’ll negate the moral arguments (after all we’re dealing with liberals here) and just think of it in a risk/reward way; there is a small chance that you will get away with it (radio shows deal with enough prank callers that they’re prepared to get the information to deal with it quickly), and even if you do get away with it and unsubstantiated claim on a radio show with no real person to back it up will be easily dismissed, on the other hand if you don’t succeed (which is likely) you’re going to damage and already hurting national campaign.
Seriously, worst pr ploy ever …
Kate back up the beer wagon. Strap in the kiddies this should be one helluva ride.
sympatico poll
How will you vote on January 23rd?
——————————————————————————–
Thanks
for voting
Conservative
43%
Liberal
29%
NDP
14%
Undecided
7%
Green Party
5%
Bloc Quebecois
1%
News release at Vellacott’s website:
http://www.mauricevellacott.com/newsroom.html
—
Tuesday night on Shaw Cable, a caller phoned in falsely accusing front-runner Conservative incumbent MP Maurice Vellacott of sexually assaulting his church secretary at North Park Church. The technicians who have no 7 second delay cut the call off. Vellacott responded quickly by looking directly into the camera, stating to the technicians that he needed to get the name and phone number of that caller for defamation proceedings.
After the cable show ended, Vellacott was handed the requested phone number by Shaw Cable producer Gracie Field. Upon arrival back at his campaign office he was told that a person had reported in and was 100% confident that it was the voice of George Laliberte. The caller maliciously and falsely accused Vellacott of being �removed from North Park Church because you were charged with sexual assault� on his church secretary. Laliberte is a friend of Chris Axworthy�s and apparently owes Axworthy some favours. When the 1-306-956-2570 number provided by the Shaw Cable staff member was dialed, it was found to be Chris Axworthy�s campaign office phone number. At that time Laliberte could not be reached at his home number of 1-306-683-3650.
—
More in press release.
Call the office, tell ’em what you think:
(306) 956-2570
THIS better be reported by the MSM…Unfortunately, in the last couple of days the polls are narrowing. People have to be reminded of what the Lieberals are willing to stoop to for power.
What amazes me is how much the MSM concentrates on what Stephen Harper MIGHT be thinking…I wonder if they will even run this story.
Unless someone sneaked into the Liberal campaign office, then there are some mental midgets in that office. With caller ID, could anyone honestly think they wouldn’t get outed? My common sense tells me this is a hoax, but then again I never imagined anyone associated with the Liberal campaign would tell federalist voters in Quebec to vote for the Bloc. If indeed the individual named is responsible, then he should be outed as another example of, not just desperation, but of the bigotry,dishonesty and stupidity that resides with some (not all) so-called progressive voters and supporters. Unbelievably mean-spirited!!
David Orchard is working for Axworthy.
It’s on Neale now, so it might get traction in the MSM. Might… possibly… could… potentially……
Yep, as expected, the Libranos have gotten filthy and rotten. In the form of an actionable tort, that of defamation for a political purpose, a Liberal was caught.
That’s more gasoline into the inferno engulfing the Liberals.
They’ll do anything.
They have no ethics. No conscience. No scruples.
Are these the people we want to have take so much of our money whilst dictating to us as to what we can and can’t say and do?
Choose your Canada.
These Liebrals are so shocked and desperate that they are making huge mistakes. This foolish attack on a CPC candidate is only a small scale example of the national Lib desperation.
It comes from the same mindset as PM’s “Notwitstanding Clause” red herring.
Sad.
Why does the name George Laliberte sound familier?
Bruce, maybe he’s related to Connie Laliberte?
Anyhow, as I said on Coyne, the conservative candidates (and their families) ought to use the remote car starters for a while. Just sayin’.
The news in Canada over the next 12 months will be sooo interesting, what with all those Commissions of Inquiry and police investigations north of the border and the SEC and FBI investigations to the south.
This does indeed look like the end of a once proud force in Canadian politics. Any ideas on what the Liberal Party of Canada will call itself when it re-builds? Progressive Liberal Party of Canada? Progressive Democratic Party of Canada? Liberal Democrat Party of Canada? Hmm.
Seriously though, I think this is the end for the Liberal party of Canada. For some reason I feel a bit sad. It’s not the party, it’s the people who took it over since Trudeau. These people belong in prison.
This is disgusting, but not surprising. I have seen how call-in shows are operated by campaign insiders at the provincial level.
I was not part of the fiasco, but witnessed it while working at a newspaper office where the campaign manager was also the publisher. What I witnessed was not, in any way, so blatantly libelous, but disturbing just the same. He called in as several different personas to raise the issues that placed his candidate in the best light.
It’s the way political party campaigns manipulate the media. Unfortunately, some media outlets swallow it, head to tail.
When I confronted the publisher about his actions, he said, “It’s all just part of the game.” And what party was he manager for? The provincial Liberal Party.
Somebody needs to these stories straight to Mike Duffy. He’s about the only guy in media I trust right now would cover it.
The Liberal party will survive because, as was so apropriately put in SpaceBalls “Evil always wins because Good is dumb”
We’re dumb enough to think that investigating all portions of the Government and demostrating that all departments’ contracts were as corrupt as those produced in adscam would have a negative impact on the Liberals. In 5 or 10 years they will have a new leader and bitch about important policies (like Free Trade), promise to eliminate them, get re-elected, and then benefit from the prosperity that those policies provide.
e-mail chris axworthy,
contact@chrisaxworthy.ca
Just sent this story to CTV… letting them know about the next story they’re going to bury.
One word. WOW!
Bruce Randall:
Probably because it sounds similar to Guy Laliberte who founded Cirque de Soleil?
The story just came out on CTV news…Lieberal slimes!
If the name Laliberte sounds familiar it’s probably because Rick Laliberte was an MP in northern saskatchewan. First with the NDP then with the liberals. Ran as an independant in the last elections but was defeated. No idea if Rick and George are related.
Oh Man! This just gets slimmer! I will be emailing Axworthy to tell him this!
This is why Canada MUST vote the Liberals into oblivion. Stand Up For Canada! Go Harper!
This is just off a Reuters story titled:
Martin admits he’s in election trouble
“Martin, trying to persuade voters that Harper is an extremist who would clamp down on personal freedoms such as gay marriage and abortion, has been by hit the inability of his own legislators and allies to stay on message.
Minutes after he spoke in Oshawa, local Liberal candidate Judi Longfield told reporters she would vote against gay marriage if Parliament decided to reconsider the matter.
She also said she disagreed with Martin’s promise to alter the constitution to make it impossible for Parliament to overturn decisions by the Supreme Court on freedoms such as gay marriage and abortion.”
If that’s not enough to bugger his day, Andrew Coyne has posted regarding the Axworthy bit in Sask.
Too much… I’m actually starting to feel sorry for Martin.
No pity, William. No pity!!!
Unfortunately for Paul Martin, he is now headed for what appears to be political “Berlin Bunker” territory.
The voters will be shortly appearing with their “katusha rockets” of ballots.
William, Why would you fell sorry for an elitist BILLIONARE who would rather spit at you (you peon!) than speak to you, who would put YOU in the jailhouse if you failed to pay taxes in Canada (where you live) but he, himself, pays no taxes in this country (Canada) where he too lives? pmpm lives at YOUR expense, travels on your dollar etc etc. Paulie is a common, useless, ‘small time cheap’ (no color in pmpm’s resume -eg he is no Billy the Kid! pmpm is , in fact a callow coward) crook in expensive suits. He is a flake and a fake – as my grandmother – who really was a Fine person – would say about people like pmpm; ‘you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear”. Save your pity for people who have been used and abused by this corrupt, stumbling, bumbling,FOOl of a man; save your compassion people for the Canadian people who have been decieved by the Liberanos, pmpm, and the MSM liberano/ND lapdogs.
Vote for Stephen Harper – show pmpm and his lemming minnions the crowbar hotel doors OR the emigration Dept – forced if not voluntary – just get out of the way. They can all go ‘overseas’ to live.
The execrable and untrue ambush on Mr. Vellacott is reminiscent of the June 9, 1954 hearing of the U.S. Senate’s “Army-McCarthy hearings”. On that day, when U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy made one too many slanderous accusations alleging Communist conspiracy affiliations against an innocent American, U.S. Army lead attorney Joseph N. Welch finally levied the grand-slam attack of righteous verbal rhetoric against McCarthy – nationally televised live coast-to-coast:
“Until this moment, senator, I think I never gauged your cruelty or recklessness….Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?”
When McCarthy tried to strike back, Welch cut him off and demanded the chairman “call the next witness.”
Pausing just a beat, the hushed gallery erupted in applause. The uncomprehending McCarthy, shot dead on live TV, turned to Cohn and stammered, “What happened?”
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/welch-mccarthy.html
FYI attorney Joseph N. Welch, who ultimately stared down the arrogant Joseph McCarthy in front of millions of live TV viewers, left another famous legacy for cinema buffs: Mr. Welch’s very realistic portrayal of a visiting trial-court judge presiding over a murder case in Otto Premlinger’s “Anatomy of a Murder” (co-starring with Jimmy Stewart, Lee Remick, Ben Gazzara, George C. Scott, and others).
“Anatomy of a Murder” is one of the best films of its genre, and is set in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula – and two involved characters (though not the murder suspect) are Canadians.
When did Axworthy become a Liberal? I remember my few years in Saskatoon and I thought he was an NDP no?
Well put Jema54, neither Martin or any other of the Liberal “elite” are deserving of any sympathy whatsoever! If the Canadian electorate show good sense on voting day, I’m sure how undeserving that Martin & his associates are will be further revealed after a closer examination of government records; the Auditor-General is sure to find more “interesting” transactions especially with the spending that is currently beyond the mandate of her office to examine.
Any feelings of sympathy should go to the Canadian people for having suffered through the Liberal malfeasance.
Wade E: You are correct, Flaxworthy used to be an NDP and run against Liberals until he ran for them.
Wade, Axworthy was a provincial NDP cab minister- resigned when Calvert took over- Calvert far left, Ax. a “moderate” or RW dipper- he jumped on the PMPM bandwagon, ran federally in 2004, lost, trying again: this time is different, he has high-profile Dave Orchard endorsing him, as well as brilliant strategists using libel and slander.
Barbara Yaffe, in today’s Vancouver Sun, says the Libs have quietly given Dingbat a severance package. It’s secret and will never be revealed, and any government coming in is bound by the agreement to keep quiet. No mention on how much or anything. I can’t access it because you have subscribe, but read it in the pub and had to have another glass of Granville Island Honey Lager – well, another couple of pints.
Reliable sources have informed me that Shaw Cable will be running the phone in show unedited with the accusation tomorrow night (Friday). However, I do not know what time it will run.
Iron Lady — I read that today too and promptly fired off emails to my MP (John Cummins) and PMPM. I sent one last week too, but no one answered. David F******g Dingwall should get nothing. I am willing to bet he can personally account for some of those 800 nights in Cancun too, because he is just THAT slimey. The CPP say they will block any agreement IF they get a majority government next week, so I am hoping for that.
CTV’s election blog inaccessible at the time of posting this. Maybe they’re upgrading. But nothing on this on Puff’s show today. Maybe at 5,but after what I saw on Live (as it not quite dead, but still a Liberal), I’m not sure I have the stomach for any more b.s. on judges and Harper’s hidden agenda to gain control of Canada through devious appointments to the benches.
Mr. Axworthy will take action??
I would suggest the same action one of his fellow Liberals took in Quebec. Quit before you are humiliated.
The optics of this are so bad it makes them look like a bunch of sleazy Liberals…oh yeah, they are!!!
This stinks. Sounds like Dem dirty tricks. In fact, they probably have researched this garbage from the Clintonistas down here.
I don’t know why I keep thinking the Canadians are more pleasant in their political activities.
>>What amazes me is how much the MSM concentrates on what Stephen Harper MIGHT be thinking…I wonder if they will even run this story.>>
as of 7:54 pm Google news has:
Global (49 minutes ago) carrying for Canwest from the Star Tribune,
and Canoe (12 minutes ago) carrying it from CP. No mention of Laliberte on CP. They are leaving it with Axworthy’s claim that ‘someone sneaked into his office” to make the call. “after someone used a phone in Axworthy’s campaign office …”
yeah. happens all the time.
of course, as usual, the site that got it first was us! LifeSiteNews. with 8 hours ago.
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/jan/06011901.html
plus a blogger, The Potent Pew, who got it from Officially Screwed.com who got it from CFRA. Officially Screwed noted that LifeSite got it and it was picked up by Nealenews which is sort of mainstream.
interesting isnt’ it?
All three Regina stations carried the story on their suppertime news.
RJM
“Why does the name George Laliberte sound familier?”
Maybe you live in Saskatchewan, and can remember a time when George Laliberte “discovered” that racists had put a white power slogan in an Aboriginal students’ lounge at the University of Saskatchewan.
—————————————-
Racists target Saskatchewan Aboriginal students
By Kenneth Williams
Windspeaker Staff Writer
SASKATOON
Faculty, staff and students at the University of Saskatchewan campus were in a state of shock and disbelief when it was discovered that a swastika, a symbol used by Nazis and white supremacist groups, and the words “white power” had been written on a chalk board in the Aboriginal students’ lounge.
The discovery was made on April 4, by George Laliberte, an education student. Unfortunately, this is not the first incident where racial remarks, written or spoken, had been hurled at the Aboriginal students on campus. At the beginning of the school year, during their welcome back powwow, racist remarks were shouted at the dancers. Just before Christmas, posters promoting special functions of the Indigenous council were defaced with swastikas. In January, just after the Students’ Union decided to allow the president of the Indigenous Students’ Council a seat on the student government, the Aboriginal students’ lounge was vandalized.
“We feel awful; we’re horrified and disgusted,” said George Ivany, president of the university. “We just can’t tolerate that stuff.”
He threatened to expel the individual or group that was responsible, if they are ever caught.
Cathy Wheaton, president of the Indigenous Students Council, however, is feeling unsure about her personal safety and the safety of other Aboriginal students on campus. The lounge is rarely locked because the council wants to keep it available for students to use.
“It is a student lounge and we try to keep it open as much as possible. We want to have that access all the time for the students when they need it,” said Wheaton. “It’s a quiet place for students to have coffee and to study. To lock it would defeat that purpose.”
The location of the lounge, which is right above a bar, is causing some concern. Female students aren’t in the lounge as much since it was vandalized.
Even though he doesn’t want the recent racist incidents swept under the carpet, Ivany wants to emphasize the many positive things the university has done for Aboriginal students. There’s the Indigenous Law Program, and other programs for education, nursing and community relations, he said.
The university is constantly trying to improve conditions on campus to make it a comfortable and safe place for Aboriginal students to study, said Ivany.
But a good reputation is easily ruined as “all it takes is a couple of ugly things like this to do so much damage,” he continued.
The Aboriginal students, however, are not facing this alone.
“We’ve received letters of support from other student organizations, students [and] professors. We had, right after the lounge was vandalized, some of the student leaders coming out to condemn the act,” said Wheaton.
Even so, she feels there’s more that needs to be done to make sure the students feel safe on campus. Despite what Ivany says, Wheaton’s not convinced that the university is doing everything it can to prevent more of these kinds of incidents.
“We want to put as much pressure on the university as possible so they’ll do something about this. There have been some meetings held and statements made, but I haven’t seen anything concrete,” she said. “I want to assure the students that they aren’t going to tolerate this and they’ll be doing something to do about this.”
Ivany, however, feels he’s doing as much as he can and wants to face this issue head-on.
“Acknowledging that it happened and taking positive to steps is how we should handle this [because] we have to treat this as a long term educational problem,” he said.
Even though campus security is investigating this latest incident, there is little chance of apprehending the person or people responsible unless they either come forward and admit their actions or they’re caught in the act.
“Nothing would give me a better sense of satisfaction than catching the culprits,” said Ivany.
There is some good news as a result of the acts. Wheaton admits that on top of the outrage expressed by others, there is now better communication between the Aboriginal students and campus security.
Source: http://www.ammsa.com/windspeaker/windeditorials97.html
I just heard the footage from this incident, and the caller sounded drunk as, well, you know.
If you decide to indulge alone during an election campaign, remove all forms of communication to the outside world from the room!
STP
After reading the sympatico poll I am astonished that the Liberals are still at 29% Have they really been able to buy that many people. Or is it just that that many people would be implicated in their crimes against the rest of us. 29% !!!! WTF!?! I just don’t GET them. And they have the GAUL (not a misspelling) To say WE are not Canadian, because WE have had enough of the continual sheep shearing of the Canadian public. Especially since the Liberal party of Canada’s idea of shearing the Canadian public tends more to Bestiality than animal husbandry. Gods! Gods! I hope we vote them ALL out of office.
Daryl
Has anyone pondered the remote, remote, outside chance that someone non-Axworthy-affiliated may have paid Georgie to do this?
Maybe the same one who paid that poor Oliver guy to take a fall. Something still fishy about that.
Posted elsewhere, but I just realized Kate had a link to this story…
What the heck is this “Allegations of Sabotage” BS headline?!!
There is a radio station recording, a Liberal campaign admission, and a self-serving qualified Liberal apology that a phone call was placed from Liberal candidate Chris Axworthy’s campaign headquarters in Saskatoon-Wanuskewin falsely accusing a sitting Conservative MP (and former pastor), Maurice Vellacott of sexual assault. Shouldn’t the headline read:
“Rape Allegation Falls Flat”
or
“False Sex Assault Charge Made from Liberal Campaign HQ”
or
“Liberal Candidate Denies Campaign Worker Made Malicious Sex Abuse Claim”
or
“Conservative MP Falsely Accused of Sex Assault from Liberal Candidate’s Phone”
or
“Conservative MP Wrongly Accused of Rape by Sask Lib Campaign”
or
“Former Pastor Accused Falsely of Rape”
or
“Liberal Candidate Promises to Assist Rape Claim Investigation”
or
“Desperate Rape Smear Backfires”
I caught this news story on Global TV from Saskatoon last night. However their coverage didn’t mention the little detail that Maurice Vellacott has never been a pastor at North Park Church.
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/jan/06011901.html
They also played up Chris Axworthy’s conspiracy theory, that someone snuck into his campaign office and used his phone.
The Conservative Party has just issued a press release: Tom Hengen, (ex-?) high-profile SK Liberal, has sworn an affiadavit stating that the “mystery caller” from teh Liberal candiadates campaign office is a well-known associate of the Liberal candidate.
Not only was there a swcandalous lie, a public character-assasination attempt by a stupid coward, then the candidate (Liberal!!!) lies by saying that some staranger did it!
ALL normal citizens should be OUTRAGED by this type of behavior!!!!!