Something Doesn't Add Up

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After Michael Sona was convicted of election fraud, Stephen Harper had nothing to say, even though the judge in the case concluded that Sona did not act alone. Michael Harris writes:

After all, the fraudsters who broke the law almost certainly used information from the Conservatives’ Constitutent Information Management System, CIMS, to come up with the lists used in making the illegal calls. Isn’t the PM worried about the alleged theft and abuse of this proprietary information, if it was a theft? Might it not happen again? If we take him at his word that the whole thing wasn’t done by the Conservative Party of Canada with a little help from its friends, why wouldn’t he want the culprits brought to justice?

The Conservatives' electoral record is far from clean:

With multiple convictions for cheating at elections, including former cabinet minister Peter Penashue and the PM’s former parliamentary secretary Dean del Mastro, there is a new stench in the air.

Robert Fife of CTV News is reporting that 10 top managers at disgraced engineering firm SNC-Lavalin and their wives wrote personal cheques to two federal riding associations that were not in electoral contention. The cheques to the non-contender ridings totalled $25,000.

Thirty thousand dollars was then transferred from these loser ridings to the riding of Christian Paradis, then Harper’s Minister of Public Works and Government Services. Paradis is now Harper’s Minister of International Development. SNC Lavalin would not say if the managers were reimbursed by the company.

On these subjects, Harper has had nothing to say. And then there is the question of the auto bailout:

Between Ottawa and Queen’s Park, just under $14 billion of public money was forked over to the automakers to stave off bankruptcy. The Auditor General’s report issued last week shows it was not a well-planned rescue mission: it was more like dropping money out of airplanes, or throwing candy canes to kids off Santa’s float.

Despite the laughable claim of strong financial management skills, the Harper government did not require the companies to issue detailed reports on how they used the government’s $2.8 billion loan for capital expenditures and warranty claims.

That’s bad enough. But AG Michael Ferguson also found that there was absolutely no documentation on another $528 million given to General Motors. Parliament was, if not left in the dark, then certainly in the candlelight when it came to getting information on this debacle. The public reporting was beyond poor.

This is a prime minister who claims he possesses superb financial management skills and who gives lawbreakers no quarter.

Something doesn't add up.