Rose's Cantina

The media has been a-flutter recently, ever since Quebec media mogul Pikachu Peladeau announced he was running for the Parti Quebecois in this weird winter provincial election. It's like he is some kind of weird Sigfried and Roy character who has mesmerized all the typists and deep thinkers with his bedazzle. Or a Moses who is standing on the banks of the Ottawa River ready to part the waters, once and for all. Quebec will separate, Pikachu has ordained. So it is, and so it shall be, for now and all time. Put on the brakes a minute. Settle down, already. Nobody's going anywhere. The day after we wake up, and the PQ wins, if that happens, the sky will not fall. Poutine will not lose its flavor. Molson Canadian will taste just as good. We've seen his ilk before, he's a paradox. Handsome in that French sort of way, Pikachu is a wearer of shiny Hong Kong suits and slave to meticulous grooming, save for a serious case of bed head. He is a friend of Brian Mulron...

On a warm summer's night in June 1984, I sat my office at the corner of Wellington and Metcalfe watching Pierre Trudeau's last address to the Liberal Party of Canada. All of my colleagues were gathered to hear him in person at the Ottawa Civic Centre. As a consultant, nobody had bothered to think of me when the tickets were handed out, and I was too proud to beg. So I walked down to the Press Club and bought a six pack from Denny, then took it back to the Langevin Block. It was just me, a few commissionaires and a lone RCMP officer rattling around the stately old caramel building. There weren't many of us left in Trudeau's office after he took his long walk on a cold night. There had been a lot of excitement among the Liberal faithful who were eagerly jostling for new digs with a new leader. Perhaps it was a career killer, but I chose to stay with Trudeau until the very end. It just seemed like such an outstanding moment in history and I wanted to drink it in....

Watching Mike Duffy on television last night as he agreed to repay his housing premium reminded me of another television gem -- when Brian Mulroney was before a House of Commons committee talking about taking money from German businessman Karlheinz Shrieber. Both admitted taking money they shouldn't have. Both refused to take blame for their action. The difference between the two scenarios, of course, is that Mulroney didn't have to pay money back, just the income tax on it. The Puffster and Brian Mulroney are very similar characters, full of hubris, needing to be loved, playing the angles, engaging in some pretty dodgey behavior particularly when under the influence. And neither of them sees anything wrong with what they do, so  full of themselves and their entitlements. Duffy needed money to renovate his cottage, so he took advantage of the people of Canada. Mulroney needed money to keep Mila in the style to which she was accustomed so he kept the Shreiber money. B...

I have a slight political hangover this morning, kind of like the feeling you get just after Christmas when the presents are delivered and you realize that you have no idea  how you will pay for them. I've always been a convention junkie from the time I worked at the Tory leadership way back in the mid-seventies as a volunteer VIP security officer. It was the weekend Joe Clark got elected when we first saw the evil genius that was Brian Mulroney who was paying delegates off with hooch, hot pizza and hookers, with a side of Ginette Reno. Since then, I have travelled the country in search of serious political tail. I have eaten from lavious seafood buffets while being screeched in by John Crosbie. I have taken the bus with life-sized cardboard cutouts of my favorite political characters. There are convention memories I hold dear, and some I'd rather forget. I often found myself fighting off, or succumbing to, the advances of men twice my age. I once got into a nea...

Breaking News. Live with Kelly will be visiting the lovely Banff, Alberta to do a series of shows the first week of April. Today, the show announced that Ben Mulroney will be sharing the stage, as co-anchor with Kelly Ripa. I'm thinking the town should change its name to Barf, Alberta. Did nobody tell Gelman that everyone in the country, with the exception of the Mulroney family and the suits at CTV, hates Ben Mulroney? He's the reason that Canadian Idol was cancelled. Canadian Idol was a good show but it was ruined by Ben Mulroney. And John Dore. People don't hate Benny because he's Lyin' Brian's son. Canadians hate him in his own right. Aside from his creepy Vlad the Impaler looks, Ben is smarmy, oily and creepy. And he's a lawyer. I don't know why CTV keeps putting him forward like some sort of cub from the Lion King. We can't escape him. He's on ETalk, he's always on Canada AM , he even hosts Canada's red carpet. America...