All things Canadian.....

Frequent commenter 'Real Mike' sent me the following thoughts on the 'sensational' Mulroney tapes:

Brian Mulroney should not be embarrassed by telling the truth. It is too bad he uses foul language but few of us don't and it will be no surprise to those who know him. It would be surprising if most of the subjects of the tales in Maclean's did not talk colourfully themselves; it is that they didn't have the gossiper Newman.
Lets look at the attributed quotes in Maclean's:
On Trudeau - yes on overseeing regional disintegration, yes on economic ineptitude, yes the Americans probably wanted to shoot him, yes he was vainglorious, yes he was no statesman, yes the Toronto Star is ignorant, yes Trudeau was a coward for World War II behaviour and could be called unpatriotic and many other worse names for this despicable period of his life, yes "his record as a prime minister is absolutely mediocre"
On Clark - I think most conservatives would agree with the conclusion that Clark was a poor leader and bad for conservatism; it is surprising that Paul Martin hasn't yet nominated Clark to the Senate to join Hugh Segal to help embed conflict within the Conservative caucus
On Turner - it seems that Turner was stuck on that "I had no choice" line; the Liberals were goners in 1984 and so was Turner; he is a Liberal that one can have some sympathy for after all he did resign from Trudeau's cabinet when Trudeau was embarking on some of his economic ineptitude
On Chretien - he either underestimated Chretien or more likely overestimated the sense of the Canadian public and supposed impartiality of the mainstream media; he seemed very perceptive of Chretien, too bad Ontarians weren't or didn't care
On Manning - he was right - he didn't understand Reform or the West for that matter
On Others - Copps never became a leader because she has no judgement; Mulroney would have done much better than Campbell in 1993, it would be hard to do worse (I would guess a minority Liberal or minority PC); can't say whether Campbell has a pecker or not but it safe to say that it wasn't up for her; McTeer is two-faced, it is actually complementary having someone like her hating you

Personally, I don't find these quotes surprising at all.

Could you imagine what was said about Martin by Chretien and vice versa behind closed doors? Really, the more interesting discussion is about Peter Newman - see Bound by Gravity for more on that.