Is there a remedial school for politicians?

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MTLBlog: Justin Trudeau is Canada's First PM to violate federal ethics laws

Earlier on YYC: Does Canada's Prime Minister Actually Exist? ​Or is he the product of an oligarch's rich imagination?


Is there a remedial school for politicians?

And who does Michael Wernick think is going to be shot?

Trudeau is making George Soros seem like a bad judge of character. He didn't befriend Justin to end up all eggy in the face. No doubt both Soros and Freeland liked that Justin was content to leave the heavy stuff to their expertise, but surely they wanted him to stay in office.

Something big is going to have to be arranged to bolster Trudeau's image. I hope to heck Michael Wernick hasn't been chosen to play John the Baptist in that regard. Yes, Jesus did end up being crucified -- but not for being cute and ditzy.

Have we been given a hint of things to come in Wernick's opening statement to the House of Commons justice committee?

Recorder: 'I’m worried someone is going to be shot'
Read the full text of Wernick's statement in which he "defended the Liberal government during the first round of hearings by the House of Commons justice committee".

Well, there's certainly no doubt at all that somebody is going to have to wave a magic wand and turn Justin into an exemplar.

Meanwhile: A little added insight into the true situation with SNC-Lavalin:

CTVNews: What is a remediation agreement? Meet the legal tool sought by SNC-Lavalin

• First of all, they can only be applied to economic crimes, like bribery or fraud. They cannot be used in a situation where there's been serious bodily harm or death, or in cases that resulted in injury to national security or national defence. The agreements also can't be used in cases where the offence is connected to a criminal or terrorist organization. The prosecutor must also believe there's a reasonable possibility the firm will be convicted and that the case is in the public's interest. Finally, the attorney general must consent to the negotiation.

That last bit is, as Shakespeare would put it, the "rub".

Wilson-Raybould didn't consent, she wasn't compliant, and she had her reasons. She needs to be allowed to state what those reasons were, but obviously the PM and his apologists feel more comfortable with her not doing that.

CTVNews: Top bureaucrat denies Wilson-Raybould faced 'inappropriate' pressure on SNC-Lavalin affair 

• Wernick said he did convey to her the "context" that: “there were a lot of people worried about what would happen, the consequences. Not for her, the consequences for the workers and the communities, and the suppliers".
• .... had she felt undue pressure, Wilson-Raybould could have gone to Trudeau, or the ethics commissioner, and she didn't.
• Despite the decision being made, the attorney general still had the capacity to intervene and direct federal lawyers to go in the direction of remediation. Wilson-Raybould never did this."

Basically, Trudeau tells Wilson-Raybould that it's best to go for remediation because otherwise jobs could be lost -- but then he cagily adds that the decision is hers alone to make.

Next, former sidekick Butts reinforces Trudeau's story in an equally backhanded way. So hardly surprising that Wernick, the faithful bureaucrat (who probably wants to keep his job), follows suit.

But I suspect the reason Trudeau wanted Wernick paid attention to was because of what else he planned to say -- that he is worried that "someone is going to be shot".  That's pretty darned ominous. Who does he think it might be?

The obvious irony is that Wernick expresses shock and concern at the violent rhetoric of pipeline protesters, yet shows none whatsoever at Wilson-Raybould having been thrown under a great big bus.

She threw herself under the bus sings the toneless trio.

And, guess what, this whole thing was never about potential job losses, so it had to be about the political relationship with SNC itself.

Macleans: SNC-Lavalin’s demise would not be the calamity its defenders claim

• Its contracts wouldn’t disappear. Its valued employees would still be valued. And the work just might go to companies that haven’t been accused of corruption 
• If a road needs to be built, that road will still need to be built regardless of who is left to bid on it. The work would still exist. There are roughly 30 major construction and civil engineering firms in Canada. We do not lack engineering talent. Absent SNC, either new firms of this nature will form, or existing firms will likely expand to meet the opportunity for work.
• In such a scenario, the experience and contacts of those 9,000 SNC employees would be in very high demand. It’s hard to picture an outcome in which so many highly trained, highly educated and experienced professionals in a country eager for their work wind up roaming the streets selling pencil stubs from tins.
• ...SNC’s collapse [could] lead to several small or medium-sized firms from around the country in a much stronger position to compete for government work.

Global News: An absurd, fascinating, partisan and remarkably helpful tale on Trudeau and SNC-Lavalin

• Wernick said. “In my observation, in my experience, they have always, always conducted themselves to the highest standards of integrity.”
• Whoa, sunshine, back up just a bit there.
• Justin Trudeau is the first and only prime minister in our history to have been found to have broken a federal law while in office and that law was an ethics law. How’s that for “highest standards of integrity”?

I'm assuming that last reference is to Christmas with the Aga Khan.  I thought Scheer's happy little tantrum over it was a tempest in a teapot at the time, but since then things have slid from worse to worser and now it's too easy to expect the very worst from the Trudeau administration.

Trudeau does seem to come across a sly manipulator. I almost said "master manipulator" but his skill does seem pretty much stuck at the 5-year old level; he doesn't know how not to get caught at it, which can be cute when you're a kid, but not so much when you're a Prime Minister.

​In fact, none of those three kids, Trudeau, Butts and Wernick, quite possibly should ever have been allowed out of the playpen!