Thursday, October 16, 2008

Tony Clement Revises History

I can't find a transcript yet, so I'm paraphrasing.

Tony Clement, Conservative Health Minister, was on the Agenda on TVO last night. Olivia Chow and Gerard Kennedy were there as well, all of them discussing the results of the election.

Steve Paikin, interviewing, asked Tony Clement if the current atmosphere of Conservative victory was appropriate. While everyone could agree that the NDP and Greens had improved their situation and that the Liberals had lost while the Bloc carried at least of the victory of preventing Harper's majority, could it really be argued that the Conservatives were victorious when their goal in calling the election was to get a majority?

Tony Clement gave an answer that, if I recall correctly, even amazed Steve Paikin.

"We didn't want an election. We were forced in to by the opposition."

Sadly, I had other things on my mind so I can't very well remember anything beyond Paikin's surprise.

This is how the Republicans do things down south. Let's all tell blatant lies with straight faces and dare anyone to argue with us.

How anyone but a rabid, frothing-at-the-mouth, Conservative partisan can believe a line like that is beyond me. According to the polls, no one was in a position to make electoral gains except the Conservatives. The Liberals didn't want an election and took great pains to support the Conservative government at every confidence motion.

And Tony Clement wants us to believe his talking point: the Opposition made us do it.

I suppose, when faced with a $300M plus bill for an election, you'd damn well better have a talking point ready when people ask why you bothered. I think that's even more than the bill for the Sponsorship Scandal.

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3 comments:

susansmith said...

Paikin never challenges any politician with their shit - so it's a great show to go on and lie to the public.
Remember when May went on and said, that she didn't call Canadians stupid. Well she clarified that, and than went on and lied. She said that she DISagree with that assessment. Once again Paikin had that surprised look, but nope, he let her get away with that big whopper too!

Zorpheous said...

When you find the transcript, please post it. We need to start meticulously document all the CPC lies.

Sources, names, dates.

Anonymous said...

That's funny. A friend asked me the other day about wasn't it the opposition (the NDP or Liberals) who caused the election to be called. I told her no, Stephen Harper called the parliament "dysfunctional" and asked the GG to allow him to call an election.
So, here they are back in the same boat with a "dysfunctional" parliament. Is Harper going to call another election tomorrow?