Mr Ivison, in his Oct. 14, 2009 National Post online article “Conservatives embrace culture of entitlement,” made the following comment:
“… the Liberals proved to be more than adept at spending other people’s money, even stealing millions of taxpayers’ dollars during the sponsorship scandal, …”
The lamentable comedy of errors that was the Sponsorship Program provides no basis whatsoever upon which to accuse “the Liberals” of “stealing” anything, much less “millions of taxpayer’s dollars!”
At great expense and an extensive inquiry considering millions of pages of documents, detailed investigations by forensic accountants, and hundreds of hours of cross-examined testimony, the Gomery Commission came to the conclusion that no such thing occurred.
Enabled by an inadvertent breakdown of process and chain-of-command, the thefts that did occur were due to a handful of individuals, particularly middle-level bureaucrats, and unscrupulous ad-agency executives, who, in a number of cases, and after further extensive (again) criminal investigations, have been accordingly convicted of such crimes.
But, after all this, after all this time, money, and considerable effort, there arises no foundation whatsoever for any such accusation against “the Liberals.”
Mr Ivison’s accusation is simply false. It is an absurd and unconscionable leap to attribute such criminal acts to “the Liberals” in any way.
Yet this hoary old fraud remains an article of faith in the Conservative camp. Typically pursued with an air of high moral outrage, these sordid tactics are driven not by any burning sense of justice (as they are not just in any sense) but by purely partisan posturing devoid of any regard for truth.
It is regrettable that Mr Ivison would allow himself to fall prey to such an on-going and dishonest slur.
