A Few More Nails for Martin's Political Coffin

The more I've taken the time to look into PM Paul Martin's past, the more I am surprised by his slippery approach to business, and politics. There is an excellent article in today's Toronto Star on Martin's habits of “implausible deniability”.

The article highlights Martin's claim to not having any knowledge of the tainted blood scandal dating back to the early '80s, despite Martin, during that period, being on the board of the Canadian Development Corporation, which held a controlling interest in Connnaught Laboratories. It was the blood products from that company that were found to be the major source of the tainted blood.

The article also points out Canadian Steamship Lines union busting tactics in Australia in 2003. Again Martin claimed to only know what he read in the papers, despite having regular meetings with CSL management under the supervision of Ethics Counsellor Howard Wilson.

And earlier this year it was shown that the government misreported, by a factor of 1000, the amount of money CSL had received from public coffers. Yet again Martin dodged the issue by claiming ignorance.

How much smoke does the Canadian public need before it starts yelling fire? Clearly the current PM either has a problem when it comes to honesty, or he's remarkably incompetent. If Paul Martin has been lying repeatedly to the Canadian public about important issues, particularly over the amount of money a company he owned received from Canadians, can he be trusted to run the country?