That Charmingly Impulsive Man
There are those among us who could be described as money grubs, those who will see fit to accentuate their presence by becoming, among other things, a money grubber, who see profit to themselves as commensurate with their status, if they also have power, for he who wields one may find it convenient to yield to the other. That, of course, describes the charming Karlheinz Schreiber for one, who found a soul-mate in the right-dishonourable Brian Mulroney, former prime minister of Canada.
As the representative of an international munitions manufacturer, Mr. Schreiber had the perceived power to influence people both with his outgoing personality and his gracious promises of money to be sprinkled about liberally toward those who cared to become involved with his intriguing schemes. And it was clear that those around Mr. Mulroney were indeed intrigued with such possibilities and they took the trouble to draw Mr. Mulroney into the enterprise, with no great trouble on their part.
Who might one believe; a twinkle-eyed rotund little snake-oil salesman, or the story of innocence proffered by a man with a corporate law degree, skilled in diplomatic finesse and the structure and strictures of governance who had the foresight to understand that there would come a time when he stepped down from his high office and thought it could be done in style, with cash to spare, because he owed it, after all, to his family who were accustomed to living in a certain measure of comfort...?
"I genuinely regret that my conduct after I left office gave rise to suspicions about the propriety of my personal business affairs as a private citizen", said the once-honourable. A:"after I left office"? Perhaps not quite 'after' as he claims, and the departed Mr. Schreiber described otherwise. B:"suspicions about the propriety?" these are no mere suspicions, they are a certainty. C:""personal business affairs as a private citizen"? Hardly that at all, having been voted into office as a public personage.
He hangs himself with the disingenuousness of his smarmy self-abnegation, a man seeking sympathy when none is due him. Justice Oliphant's conclusions were straightforward and restrained in his judgement, fulfilling his mandate to weigh the spoken evidence and the allegations and the realities that Mr. Mulroney could no longer conceal. Raw cash was passed on three separate occasions in three separate venues, in under-the-table deals whose portent remains a mystery.
This is conduct unbecoming a prime minister of any country, much less that of Canada's 17th prime minister. The man's greed became the undoing of an otherwise-credible career in the office, besmirching the legacy he so very much thought should be left to posterity. That the amount received is contested by this man is of little moment. Hundreds of thousands of dollars, whether two, or three, is substantial enough.
But it is a mean, sorry amount of cash to accept to dirty oneself, and if it is not too much of a stretch of imagination, there might have been more, much more, which an arduous RCMP investigation was unable to reveal. And which Mr. Mulroney took great pains to carefully conceal, as evidenced by his denials during the Airbus investigation when averred he had little-to-no knowledge of Mr. Schreiber. A man who had, in fact, easy and frequent access to his office.
Slimy politicians can claim innocence when being questioned by claiming the 'right question' to lead to an honest response was not raised, and this is precisely what Mr. Mulroney descended to. Revealing himself to be possessed of a tricky personal ethics code and a moral base that proved, in the end, to be incredibly base. And while Mr. Mulroney celebrates the conclusion of an unfortunate affair when he succumbed to "poor judgement", Canadians' dim view of the man has been validated.
As the representative of an international munitions manufacturer, Mr. Schreiber had the perceived power to influence people both with his outgoing personality and his gracious promises of money to be sprinkled about liberally toward those who cared to become involved with his intriguing schemes. And it was clear that those around Mr. Mulroney were indeed intrigued with such possibilities and they took the trouble to draw Mr. Mulroney into the enterprise, with no great trouble on their part.
Who might one believe; a twinkle-eyed rotund little snake-oil salesman, or the story of innocence proffered by a man with a corporate law degree, skilled in diplomatic finesse and the structure and strictures of governance who had the foresight to understand that there would come a time when he stepped down from his high office and thought it could be done in style, with cash to spare, because he owed it, after all, to his family who were accustomed to living in a certain measure of comfort...?
"I genuinely regret that my conduct after I left office gave rise to suspicions about the propriety of my personal business affairs as a private citizen", said the once-honourable. A:"after I left office"? Perhaps not quite 'after' as he claims, and the departed Mr. Schreiber described otherwise. B:"suspicions about the propriety?" these are no mere suspicions, they are a certainty. C:""personal business affairs as a private citizen"? Hardly that at all, having been voted into office as a public personage.
He hangs himself with the disingenuousness of his smarmy self-abnegation, a man seeking sympathy when none is due him. Justice Oliphant's conclusions were straightforward and restrained in his judgement, fulfilling his mandate to weigh the spoken evidence and the allegations and the realities that Mr. Mulroney could no longer conceal. Raw cash was passed on three separate occasions in three separate venues, in under-the-table deals whose portent remains a mystery.
This is conduct unbecoming a prime minister of any country, much less that of Canada's 17th prime minister. The man's greed became the undoing of an otherwise-credible career in the office, besmirching the legacy he so very much thought should be left to posterity. That the amount received is contested by this man is of little moment. Hundreds of thousands of dollars, whether two, or three, is substantial enough.
But it is a mean, sorry amount of cash to accept to dirty oneself, and if it is not too much of a stretch of imagination, there might have been more, much more, which an arduous RCMP investigation was unable to reveal. And which Mr. Mulroney took great pains to carefully conceal, as evidenced by his denials during the Airbus investigation when averred he had little-to-no knowledge of Mr. Schreiber. A man who had, in fact, easy and frequent access to his office.
Slimy politicians can claim innocence when being questioned by claiming the 'right question' to lead to an honest response was not raised, and this is precisely what Mr. Mulroney descended to. Revealing himself to be possessed of a tricky personal ethics code and a moral base that proved, in the end, to be incredibly base. And while Mr. Mulroney celebrates the conclusion of an unfortunate affair when he succumbed to "poor judgement", Canadians' dim view of the man has been validated.
"The conduct exhibited by Mr. Mulroney in accepting cash-stuffed envelopes from Mr. Schreiber on three separate occasions, failing to record the fact of the cash payments, failing to deposit the cash into a bank or other financial institution, and failing to disclose the fact of the cash payments when given the opportunity to do so, goes a long way, in my view, to supporting my position that the financial dealings between Mr. Schreiber and Mr. Mulroney were inappropriate."
Justice Jeffrey Oliphant, 1 June 2010
posted by Pieface | 6:33 PM
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