I’m not sure what to think anymore. Gomery’s report actually uses the word exhonerate in regards to Martin’s involvement or knowledge of Adscam. Now he claims he is the only one that can clean Ottawa of courruption.
I don’t buy it. I do not doubt Gomery’s thouroughness or his integrity, but what does it say when the Minister of Finance is so clueless as to not notice the gossip going on in the party and thinks nothing of Liberals financing irregularities?
Is the Liberal party now suddenly squeaky clean? And how can I in good conscience vote for a party that still has the “culture of entitlement” that lead to this scandle in the first place?
So did Gomery miss something or is the PM really that incompetant?
I’m willing to give Martin a pass on this. As finance minister he had to focus on the big picture. I don’t expect him to know the details of what was going on in a specific program.
You are right about the ‘culture of entitlement’ though. The liberals need to be turfed to the sidelines for a while to clean up their act. The problem though, is who is capable of replacing them? I’m not impressed with either Harper or Layton.
It’s seems Gomery’s take on it is that the operation was carefully kept to the PM’s Office. One commentator yesterday on CBC suggested the turning point that may have made Gomery think this might have been the testimony of Stephane Dion, who was mostly unaware of how the program worked, despite being both a Quebec minister and the minister for intergovernmental and constitutional affairs at the time. You’d think that’d be the minister who new about a ‘national unity program’. If he didn’t (because hte PMO was keeping a tight lid on it), it’s not surprising other ministers didn’t either.
Remember, as well, that the minister of finance doesn’t audit the spending of depatments. He just draws up the budget. If the PMO was keeping this all quiet, it’s possible for Martin to know nothing more than how much money the program takes in, and vaguely what the program is for.
Gomery seems to follow this reasoning. I’ve not read the report, though.
I think wolfstu’s got it right. I really believe this was all Chretien and his patsy Gagliano. Martin may have had some idea, but I seriously doubt he was really involved. But the problem that LionelHutz405 points out is a good one: even if you wanted to vote for someone else, who? The homosexual-hating idiot Harper, or the smile-for-the-camera and smarminess of Layton? Just when I thought there was a change on the horizon in Canadian politics, it seems we’re still stuck with the same situation we’ve had for the last 13 years or so.
Does Harper hate homosexuals? Really? Where is the proof? He did vote against Gay marriage legislation but favoured a “same sex union” idea. It may be a lot of hoopla over a word but I don’t see it as hate. Just an old fashioned mind set of “not my word”.
I dunno. I think that Harper isn’t a great leader but to seriously think that if the Conservatives won a minority government Canada would suddenly become a fascist state seems like the result of Liberal scare mongering.
What damage can the Conservatives really do while in power especially as a minority governement?
Perhaps we should bite the bullet and see what they can do. If we give the Liberals another run we can’t break the cycle. Besides when it comes to poor leadership or lack of leadership does Martin really outshine the rest?
To add to wolfstu’s comment, there were two impressions I got from the release of the Gomery Report. The first was that Cretien and his top aid ran this out of the PM’s office. The report really seemed to pin it all on Cretien. It wasn’t a situation where the PM suggested a corrupt system, or encouraged a minister to do wrong. But I really got the impression this was his little pet project. The second thing to keep in mind is that the Finance Minister sets up the budget, and distributes finances, but isn’t necessaryly kept in the loop on what each department is doing with the money.
Now, it seems to me that as Finance Minister Martin could have picked up on a weird flow of money. This was several hundred million (I believe) and could have been caught. But at the time Martin and Cretient were NOT friends. Their little spat has been going on long before this started, so I’m not surprised at all that it was kept away from him. If anything, it seems like Cretien’s gient ego such I’m sure in his head he thought he would run this sponsorship program, save Canada and be the hero.
So in the end, this doesn’t seem like a “Liberal Party Scandal.” Or an example of “Liberal Party Entitlement.” I’m also not convinced that the was intented to run this way. I actually (niavely) believe that Cretient set this up to promote unity, but without oversight it spun out of control.
This article from CTV really sums up the Conservative Party. Its not a lack of leadership, its not existant, there’s nothing there, and they’ve got two guys trying! From the article:
Could you possibly waffle more? “We are waiting for the polls to see if we should do anything.”
And on the other side of the aisle we have the NDP who haven’t even come up with a plan yet. They’re so gleeful from the last budget that they’re happy to ride this out as long as they can.
I would love to see a change in Government, but neither the NDP nor the Conservatives fit the bill. If you want change you’re better off joining the Liberal Party and voting at their next convention.
After the Federal and Provincial Liberals I’ve had to suffer through it is unlikely I’ll vote Liberal for quite some time.
I agree the Leadership on the other side blows… but I don’t see Martin being anymore of a leader. He too seems to go by the polls but is unable to be a leader and waffles and Dithers far too much.
Screw that, let’s start running Bloc candidates in the rest of Canada. No one ever seems to ask, “What would the Bloc do?” They’re the only party that seem to have the popular support of their constituates. They have a better chance than the NDP. And unlike the Conservatives, we know exactly what the Bloc plan to do with Canada. That’s it, I’m voting Bloc.