Revolutionary Moderation

I'm convinced



A few days ago, I suggested that Martin's public inquiry into the Quebec ad contracts was an effort in PR, not about rooting out the criminal masterminds. I no longer think this.



Martin put on quite a show Sunday, sitting in on Cross-Country Checkup. He convinced me. He convinced me that he's actually angry, he doesn't know precisely which heads need rolling, and the AG report didn't give him enough information to figure it out. He wants the inquiry because he wants the results. I think he believes that at the bottom of the whole trouble is going to be a person or people who acted illegally in order to enrich the Liberal Party, and he's pissed he's going to have to wear this black eye for a while.



I think that Paul Martin, finance minister, didn't like the way then-Prime Minister Chretien ran the show, and silently vowed then that when he was PM, things would be cleaner, more open, more transparent. Thus a public inquiry, before the opposition had time to call for one. Thus an appearance on a call-in show, something I cannot once recall Chretien doing.



Whatever I think of the Bermudan's politics, I'm impressed enough by his desire to do things openly, if in fact that's what I'm seeing.



A side note to Cross-Country Checkup callers: this scandal is not the same as the gun registry. A government has a right to set priorities and execute them. No one is saying that it was criminal to spend money on advertising in Quebec, that trying to convince Quebecers through advertising that Canada's a nice country to live in. Neither was the gun registry, however disliked and however expensive, criminally executed. Do not confuse what you thought of the project itself, and the political question of "is this a good way to spend our money?", with the inquiry's question, and I think the Prime Minister's question: "Was money stolen from this project and given to the Liberal Party? Who is responsible for that?"