Friday, February 29, 2008

"Um, is this thing on?"

There's something amiss here.
Tom Flanagan, Harper's eminence grease, and Doug Findlay, his in-house hatchet man, are alleged to have offered the dying Vancouver Independent MP Chuck Cadman a $1M insurance bribe to bring down the Libs in a non-confidence vote in 2005. Cadman, who did not vote with the Cons, was purportedly worried about money. The bribery charge is made by Cadman's wife, Dona, in an upcoming biography of Cadman by author Tom Zytaruk. Dona Cadman is now running as a Con in her husband's old riding. !!!

Read the transcript or listen to the audio of author Zytaruk's tape of a 2005 interview with Harper, then leader of the Opposition :

Zytaruk: "I mean, there was an insurance policy for a million dollars. Do you know anything about that?"
Harper: "I don't know the details. I know that there were discussions, uh, this is not for publication?"
Zytaruk: "This (inaudible) for the book. Not for the newspaper. This is for the book."
Harper: "Um, I don't know the details. I can tell you that I had told the individuals, I mean, they wanted to do it. But I told them they were wasting their time....But they were just, they were convinced there was, there were financial issues.

Zytaruk then asks how official these 'individuals' are.

Harper: "No, no, they were legitimately representing the party. I said don't press him. I mean, you have this theory that it's, you know, financial insecurity and, you know, just, you know, if that's what you're saying, make that case but don't press it...."

I just don't see Harper copping to knowledge of an illegal bribe to a journalist, do you?
I mean, he was about to base an election campaign on Liberal bribes and kickbacks.
There's definitely something missing here.

7 comments:

RossK said...

Mr. Cadman's daughter confirmed this morning to CBC Radio-One's CluffMaster Flash.

Was interesting that Val Meredith was also on, presumably for the defense.

Ms. Meredith essentially admitted that she could see how it could have maybe happened because of what power does to people.

Mr. Cluff, never one to sully his producer's pre-written question list by actually listening to what his interviewee's have to say did not follow-up and nail Mr. Meredtith to the wall.

Real Audio here

(Ms.Meredith's excuses about how abuses of power are OK because of all the power involved begins at the 6':45" mark)

.

Q said...

What's more strange, Harper being careless about Con business or Mrs. C. running for the Cons?

At least Canadians are seeing Con values behind the curtain.

They'd sell a rat's asshole to a blind man for a wedding ring :(

Alison said...

Ross : Meredith's remarks were quite damning really in a that's-just-how-we-do-things-around-here kind of way.
Thanks for the link. Mrs C, Jodi, and Holland were all very credible, weren't they?
I wasn't implying that either they or the journalist were lying - not sure if it came across that way to you - only that it seems very unlikely that Harper would cop to knowledge of a bribe, so there's still something missing here.

Q : We'll see if she still is by the end of the week. Very gutsy of her, don't you think? Can't see what's in this for her - she has no hope of winning as an independent.

Anonymous said...

Jodi told As It Happens last night that she did not know this was in the book until a day or two ago. Presumably her mother knew it was in the book. I'm not sure if Jodi's mother knew Chuck had told Jodi about it.

Paul Martin wrote the intro, and presumably the Liberals knew that it was coming out, and maybe they've been waiting for it.

Why would Harper admit they talked about financial considerations? I dunno But somewhere I've read that Flanagan mentioned meeting with Cadman as a mistake or something in his recent book, without giving details of what they offered.

Anonymous said...

I'ts not that it's implausible, Alison, I'ts just too good to be true. Obviously something happened there. People this high up on that side of the political spectrum don't have to worry about Law, ethics or morality because...

When the accusations fly, the smart con wears:

Jesus© brand "The Shit don't stick here body spray"™ (!Now with guaranteed post accusation employment scent!) For cons, Christians and cunts. (british useage)

Our powerful and fast acting formula penetrates debates deeply, distorting the truth and lifting the stains from your tarnished image, leaving it sparkling clean.

Used by the infamous and Powerful everywhere.

Ricky Larch

Anonymous said...

I'ts not that it's implausible, Alison, I'ts just too good to be true. Obviously something happened there. People this high up on that side of the political spectrum don't have to worry about Law, ethics or morality because...

When the accusations fly, the smart con wears:

Jesus© brand "The Shit don't stick here body spray"™ (!Now with guaranteed post accusation employment scent!) For cons, Christians and cunts. (british useage)

Our powerful and fast acting formula penetrates debates deeply, distorting the truth and lifting the stains from your tarnished image, leaving it sparkling clean.

Used by the infamous and Powerful everywhere.

Ricky Larch

RossK said...

Hey A--

No misunderstanding....I just wanted to tell you all about Meredith.

In fact, I think you might be right...there might have been an attempt at an innoculation-type thing because they had to know that somewhere down the road this thing was going to be re-birthed in all it's messy, unabortioned glory.

But, a 'kerning'? Not sure if I can buy that yet.

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