The Crux of the Matter....

"The crux of this matter is the lack of due process and a flawed system that allows personal vendettas to be indulged.
"She (Stewart Olsen) and Sen. LeBreton could not abide the fact that I was outspoken in caucus, or critical from time to time of their leadership, or that my level of activity brought me into the public eye and once garnered the praise of the prime minister."
Senator Pamela Wallin

The charges brought against this suffering idealist who had nothing but the best of intentions in pursuing a course of action that would benefit the political party she was part of, and by extension the country, as well as her service within the Senate to public issues dear to her heart, were insultingly undemocratic. Charges that her travel spending represented "gross negligence" are simply without an integral base; politically driven to drive her from her prestigious seat in the Senate.

The blame placed squarely at the feet of two other, female senators, both of whom have the favour of the Prime Minister of Canada. "I hate to disappoint my colleagues, but I can't imagine Carolyn Stewart Olsen and I ever spent more than two minutes talking about Sen.Wallin", commented Marjorie LeBreton. Despite the presumed vendetta by herself toward Ms. Wallin relating to rumours the embattled senator lusted for Ms. LeBreton's Senate government house leader position.

"I didn't start any fire in any kitchen. I simply reported to her what was reported to me by the Senate administration. The claim that she made that I had anything to do with the difficulty she's in now is false, false, false", continued Ms. LeBreton. And turning to address Senator Wallin, Ms. LeBreton rebutted: "I'm not responsible for your expense claims. I'm not responsible for leaking your expense claims."

The public, reading charged news stories geared to emphasizing the quality of character of those appointed to sit in Canada's Upper Chamber, were apprised that the senator for Saskatchewan charged travel expenses to the sum of $532,508 in the space of just under four years. That is am amazing sum, a half-million dollars for travel expenses; gold-plated in anyone's estimation.

Of that total, $90,000 was charged for political partisan events, $31,000 for mere stopovers of a night or more in Toronto.The Senator representing the Province of Saskatchewan in the Parliament of Canada spent 35% of her invaluable time in Toronto, 27% in Saskatchewan and a wan 22% of her time in Ottawa. Ottawa, just incidentally, is where the House of Commons and the Senate Chambers are located.

The capital of Canada is where the nation's business takes place.

Those massively excessive travel expenses are difficult to accept as normal business expenses for a Senator, but evidently it was considered normal for Senator Wallin to flit about the country and outside the country to rack up that massive travel expense claim. The new travel rules that she claims petulantly to disfavour her, and which provided audit guidelines were deliberately put in place to target her.

And that was because her fellow senators have it in for her. She will carry the public blame for wasting tax dollars on self-aggrandizing trips resulting from Senator Wallin's global popularity as a speaker and fund-raiser. It has, of course, nothing whatever to do with her murky moral compass that appears to have gone off-kilter, hampered by an excessively burdensome ego that requires stroking on a regular basis.

Senator Pamela Wallin is escorted by assistant Mark Fisher as she arrives at the Senate on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Wednesday. (SEAN KILPATRICK / CP)

She is a victim. Most certainly she now suffers because of her loyalty to the party she has always supported, because of her generosity to the public weal and championing of vital social causes, a heroic picture of grand suffering. She fell victim to her unappeasable ego.

But the fault in all of this lies elsewhere other than her own sense of lavish entitlement.