Thursday, May 21, 2009

Mulroneyism

New word suggested over at the comment section of ITQ's coverage of the Oliphant inquiry today.

Mulroneyism – A statement that is legally accurate, but that intends to mislead on the central issue.

Example
Question: Did you have dealings with him?

Mulroneyism: We met for coffee a couple of times. (Truth: We had a secret business relationship and he gave me envelopes full of thousand-dollar bills during several clandestine meetings at which I also drank coffee.)

Usage
"Bollocks! That is such a Mulroneyism."
"What a liar you are. Everything that comes out of your mouth is a Mulroneyism."

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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Its true!! Good one:

Mulroney: "I declared the full $225,000 on my tax return and pay full taxes...er... I don't feel it is necessary to correct the record...okay, I only declared half and spread it over 3 years."

MULRONEYISM!!! ha ha

Bert said...

Yeah, this is almost as bad as the Liberal Federal Sponsorship scandal. That only cost Canada a few paltry million dollars. It's MUCH better if you can catch a Conservative like Mr. Mulroney doing something questionable.

Yappa said...

Hi Bert -

The Liberal party's sponsorship scandal was disgusting and a terrible blight, but it is no defence for the self-serving corruption of Brian Mulroney.

The Liberal party took full responsibility for the corruption. Paul Martin called an incredibly widely focussed commission to get to the bottom of it, and they did. The commission even went too far, resulting in a successful appeal to the federal court. There was no cover up there.

On the other hand, Canadians have suspected (with good reason) since the mid-80s that Brian Mulroney was taking money under the table. His favors to Airbus, Bear Head and Eurocopter seemed to be reaping him handsome rewards, and he and Mila threw cash around in huge quantity. (eg the $1M+ they paid in cash to renovate their home in 93-94.) We have never got to the bottom of Mulroney's corruption, and this incredibly narrow commission has just created more frustration. We are more certain now that Mulroney was getting kickbacks, but know no more about which kickbacks or how much than has been unearthed by the media.

The reason for having wide-ranging commissions to unearth the truth is to try to prevent this sort of thing from happening again. It's very important.

I don't even see why you as a Conservative should take such a partisan stance. Stephen Harper's party isn't Brian Mulroney's party. Harper has insulated himself from the scandal. Heck, the scandal was such a long time ago that most of those implicated are dead. Furthermore, whatever else I think about Harper, I have no worries that he's skimming money - he seems very much the opposite of Mulroney.

These financial corruption scandals are not about Liberals or Conservatives. Let's face it; they're about Quebec. If we just let them slide (as both Chretien and Harper seem to have done with Mulroney) then we'll just have more of it.