The private investigator says the Prime Minister’s Office did not accurately report to the ethics commissioner the information he passed on to them. He says he has no evidence as to the conduct of Ms. Guergis in his “possession or knowledge.” The concern, he [...]]]> I read this last night from Aaron Wherry over at Macleans:

The private investigator says the Prime Minister’s Office did not accurately report to the ethics commissioner the information he passed on to them. He says he has no evidence as to the conduct of Ms. Guergis in his “possession or knowledge.” The concern, he says, was “optics”.

But, the PMO’s chief parrot defends the decision, citing the evidence that Jaffer was using Guergis’ office and email accounts for his personal business dealings. So, since Harper hasn’t said a word yet about the reasons why Guergis was deposed, would that be his official reason why, since Soudas, his director of communications,  is apparently citing that? If so, what’s so secretive about that which causes Harper to refuse to cite it publicly?

Otherwise, it appears Harper threw Guergis out of the CPC on an allegation this PI guy claims he never made. I don’t know how much of this PI’s testimony you can take at face value; but if he’s correct,  then Guergis was thrown under the bus  because the negative publicity was apparently a public opinion liability, in Harper’s view, and he decided not to wait before finding out whether the allegations (whatever they are) were true or not.

Again, I’m not going to make Hurricane Helena into a tragic heroine here, because I don’t think she was Cabinet material, and she did some nakedly partisan things in the past (ie. reveal Dion and Ignatieff’s travel schedule to Afghanistan – a security no-no), but I wouldn’t mind at all if she decided to get mad at her treatment by Harper (The “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” attitude), and run as an independent in Simcoe-Gray to try to win the riding, or at least spoil the Conservative vote and allow the Liberals to come up the middle.

UPDATE @ 3:18 pm: Helena reacts to the PI’s testimony.

The Conservatives have dropped former cabinet minister Helena Guergis as the nominated candidate for Ontario’s Simcoe-Grey riding, according to a news report…The network quoted sources as saying Guergis was removed because the Tories are concerned an election could be called at any moment, [...]]]> This interesting bit of news regarding Helena Guergis hits the wire:

The Conservatives have dropped former cabinet minister Helena Guergis as the nominated candidate for Ontario’s Simcoe-Grey riding, according to a news report…The network quoted sources as saying Guergis was removed because the Tories are concerned an election could be called at any moment, and they need to have nominated candidates in all 308 ridings. Last week, the Ontario riding’s electoral district association had written a letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, asking that he not interfere in its right to choose a candidate.

2 trains of thought: Harper must really dislike the allegations that he’s been given with regards to Guergis and Jaffer – you know, the allegations he refuses to tell anyone – to drop her as a candidate before the public even know what allegations have been levelled at her. Heck, we dont even know if the RCMP are investigating these allegations or not.

The other thought is that there are rumors/reports that the national Conservative party high-ups commissioned a phone poll in Guergis’s riding of Simcoe-Grey, and that they found they’d lose it to the Liberals if Guergis remained the Conservative nominated MP – hence the excuse/reason for dropping her, before allegations are proved/disproved (by the way, interesting claim from Conservative sources about there possibly being an election soon – does that mean, as one of my Liberal blogging compatriots James Curran believes – that Harper and the Conservatives have no intention of turning over unredacted documents to Parliament and will go to an election over those after being found in contempt of Parliament?)

Regardless of when the next election is, I’ll be interested to see if Helena and a sizable portion of her Conservative riding association (who aren’t happy with the national CPC HQ) will break away and form an independent MP bid to stick it to her former masters at CPC Hq, or whether she’ll be a good soldier and stand down “for the good of the Conservative Party”

UPDATE @ 10:43 am: At the moment, it appears Helena still wants to run as a Conservative candidate, and rejoin the Conservative caucus.

Now, if you’re not familiar with Shelly [...]]]> So a Liberal associate of mine has passed along that the rumor mill going on at “the Hill” in some quarters is that the embattled Helena Guergis will be removed (or possibly “resign”, nudge, wink) this weekend, and that Shelly Glover would take her position in Cabinet.

Now, if you’re not familiar with Shelly Glover, I can point you to a few articles on her that have appeared recently in a couple media outlets.

My view is, if this is true, and Glover is indeed the replacement, I’m not sure that’s a bad thing, because she looks like another accident waiting to happen. Her over-the-top partisan rhetoric (which makes me consider her to be the Conservative female version of Pierre Poilievre) will of course thrill the Conservative Kool-Aid crowd, but then, so did Guergis’s rhetoric and actions at one time, and look where that adoration got her.

UPDATE: I note that as of this posting, Harper is hosting a press conference in less then half an hour – topic not announced. We’ll see soon if it has anything to do with the preceding rumour.

UPDATE @ 12:20 pm: Just been reading a Twitter note from a Liberal Hill staffer that Helena Guergis “resigned”. We’ll wait for official confirmation, but if true, I’m hardly surprised that Harper wouldn’t officially “fire her” – he wouldn’t want to make himself look bad for picking her in the first place and then having to fire her, now would he?

UPDATE 2 @ 12:32pm: From CBC reporter Rosemary Barton’s Twitter page comes this:

RT @CBCPolitics: CBC News has learned that Harper’s press conference scheduled for 12:40 ET will announce departure of Minister of State Helena Guergis.

The only thing left will be who replaces her, if true.

UPDATE 3 @ 12:56 pm: The PM is late for his press conference (nothing new), but here is the text of the resignation letter that Helena apparently sent the PM. Note that she says that she will continue to “serve” her constituents in Simcoe-Grey. Her constituents may not now be so willing to continue to let her “serve” them after the next election. This seat/riding is now a prime pick-up opportunity for the Liberals.

UPDATE 4 @ 1:05 pm: WOW! Guergis is out of caucus as well, due to “serious allegations about her conduct”, which were referred to the ethics commissioner and the RCMP. And the replacement is Rona Ambrose, not Shelly Glover.

May I also be so bold as to state Simcoe-Grey as a riding is now in play for the Liberals – whose candidate by the way is Andrea Matrosovs.

- Joannie Rochette, who won a bronze medal last night in the women’s figure skating, but would be awarded a gold medal for bravery/courage if there was such a thing.

- Helena Guergis, Minister of state for Status of Women, who decided to throw a tantrum over having to follow airport [...]]]> Compare and contrast:

- Joannie Rochette, who won a bronze medal last night in the women’s figure skating, but would be awarded a gold medal for bravery/courage if there was such a thing.

- Helena Guergis, Minister of state for Status of Women, who decided to throw a tantrum over having to follow airport security procedures that the rest of us regular people have to endure. Apparently, Guergis felt that being a junior Cabinet Minister gave her privileges to avoid those inconveniences, and was enraged when that wasn’t the case. I wonder how the folks in Helena’s riding feel of her performance of late.

UPDATE @ 11:58 am: Hah. Great line: “How can Helena Guergis be that stressed after Stephen Harper gave her a 63-day-long vacation?”

Simcoe-Grey MP Helena Guergis says the federal government’s latest prorogation was vital to give it a chance to “take a step back” to make sure it is on the “right [...]]]> A rather amusing interview from Conservative MP Simcoe-Grey MP Helena Guergis today on the reasons for prorogation and how her constituents apparently love it:

Simcoe-Grey MP Helena Guergis says the federal government’s latest prorogation was vital to give it a chance to “take a step back” to make sure it is on the “right track.” Guergis, who is also the Minister of State for the Status of Women, enthusiastically endorsed the closure of parliament until late winter during an interview Tuesday. She also dismissed the thousands of people who have joined Facebook groups opposing the move by Prime Minister Stephen Harper. “I am familiar with that, but that’s certainly not what I’ve heard when they (people) come into my constituency office and we have a conversation about taking a step back and recalibrating and taking a look at the global economic crisis,” said Guergis. “It is important that we take a step back and take a look at the agenda and make sure we are on the right track.” Instead of outrage, Guergis said people are “pleased” with the shutdown.

This is just the usual Conservative talking points bunk their MP’s have been doing, which Guergis is the latest example of, but I think you’re seeing another example of the strategy the Conservatives have attempted to use here to try to blunt prorogation criticism. That strategy has been to get the local Conservative MP’s to have an interview with the local paper, and claim in the interview that no one in their ridings cares about prorogation or “supports” it. The local reporter is less likely to give them scrutiny then the national media are, so their story goes reported in the paper with their point of view without any critical analysis.

Unfortunately for these MP’s, in the internet age with Twitter and Facebook (I was alerted to this story as an example from National Newswatch), lots more people then their local constituents can see their outlandish comments, which I believe is what has partially helped fuel the anger nationally at the Conservatives. What might play in their ridings to some doesn’t particularly play to the rest of the country who hears what they had to say on the Conservative justifications for proroguing.

Helena’s riding does have an anti-prorogue rally by the way: In Barrie between 1 -4 pm, for those folks who’d like to show her not everyone in her riding are “pleased” with prorogation. For the rest of the country, don’t forget to check out the other scheduled rallies at No Prorogue’s Rallies section.

UPDATE: Via Section 15, Here’s yet another example of a Conservative MP doing the local Conservative spiel as reported in his local newspaper – this time it’s Conservative MP Blaine Calkins.

UPDATE 2: A local perspective on Helena’s interview over at the East-End Underground, the Enterprise Bulletin’s blog. The folks over there are as amused as I am at Helena’s talking points.

In 2001, an aide did an interview with a Vancouver radio show in Jaffer’s name. Jaffer first said he’d done the interview, and then confessed…On election night last year, he gave a victory speech, then [...]]]> This was an interesting story on Helena Guergis and Rahim Jaffer being described as a “would-be power couple unplugged”:

In 2001, an aide did an interview with a Vancouver radio show in Jaffer’s name. Jaffer first said he’d done the interview, and then confessed…On election night last year, he gave a victory speech, then had to concede defeat to the NDP candidate when the final results were in. When he announced he would seek the nomination again, his riding association told him not to bother.

Guergis, too, has shown less than impeccable judgment. She had a series of meetings in Mexico in 2008 as minister of state for foreign affairs and international trade. She nibbled canapés at a reception in Guadalajara, without visiting Canadian Brenda Martin, who was imprisoned about 20 minutes away. Said Guergis: “That’s not my job.” On the Collingwood video, Mercer asked her how many had been laid off from local ski resorts (in her riding) due to the warm winter. She didn’t know exactly.

I’ll also mention a particularly odious event for me and other Liberal supporters when Guergis decided to reveal prematurely (against travel protocol) that then-Liberal leader Stephane Dion and Michael Ignatieff were headed to Afghanistan, and used that breach of security as a partisan instance to attack their positions and the LPC’s position on Afghanistan at the time, potentially endangering their safety. One half of this wanna-be “power couple” has been dethroned (politically); It would be very sweet to remove the other half and defeat Guergis in her Simcoe-Grey riding at the next election. That’s still going to be a difficult task, but not impossible, particularly when some controversy has erupted in her riding over what appears to be political favoritism in the handing out of money to a local private school, where a grant was turned down to the town of Collingwood for the building of public facilities under the same program.

We’ll see if that and this latest issue of her husband’s uncertain legal troubles carries over to an election campaign and resonates against her in her riding. I know the Liberals will be gunning for her riding, and among a long list of Ontario Conservative MP’s I’d like to see defeated, Guergis is near the top of the list. At the very least though, I’d like to see what’s left of her political power neutralized, and she can join Jaffer as a “power couple unplugged”.