So, Let's Define "Sleaze", If We May...

Apparently, tough questions reserved for Conservatives alone

Let's take a quick survey here. Which of the following scenarios is sleazier?

Dragging an alleged big-money offer to a deceased politician out from the grave for partisan gain, or asking the people flinging those accusations the kind of tough questions that various confusing ambiguities regarding the situation demand?

Garth Turner, you're up first:

"The lowest and sleaziest moment thus far in a sad tale: Mike Duffy asking Cadman’s daughter, live on TV, if her dying dad was “fuzzy on drugs” when he told her about the Conservative offer. To her credit, she did not tell him to get stuffed."

At face value, Turner would seem to have a point. It seems like a fairly sleazy question.

Then one remembers that Cadman was, at the time, dying of skin cancer. He was literally within the last few days of his life, likely being administered pain killers to help him cope with the notable agony dying of malignant melanoma.

The question addressed to Jodi Cadman should be considered a tough question for a reason. Tough questions aren't obligated to be tough.

While perhaps dabbling on the side of the uncouth, the question warrants consideration.

Especially when one considers that the claims being made by Jodi and Dona Cadman actually contradict the public statements of Cadman himself -- who publicly denied being offered anything in return for his vote -- it becomes especially prescient.

Meanwhile, Turner and his colleagues in the Liberal party have been going to town on "Cadscam" (as its been dubbed by various partisan bloggers) despite all the confusing inconsistencies in the entirety of the tale.

(And if one doesn't suspect that Turner himself is eager for a little revenge after being thrown out of the Conservative caucus, consider these comments:

"When I was a Conservative member of parliament, before that party threw me out, I heard the prime minister call Chuck Cadman a poor MP The prime minister said Mr. Cadman was more concerned with ethics and with the country than he was with political organization and power.

Mr. Speaker, I have always wondered why the prime minister was so angry at the late Chuck Cadman, but now we know a lot more. Was it simply because he could not be bribed?"

Disgusting.

Was the offer of a million-dollar life insurance policy to a dying MP in exchange for his vote sleazy if it indeed happened? Absolutely.

But is dragging the entire allegation -- and Mr Cadman's memory along with it -- back through the mud again under extremely curious pretenses sleazy? The answer to this question is equally absolute, and the answer to this question is yes.

One has to remember that this is the same party that insisted a Commons Ethics Committee had to be called over rehashed (and extremely unconvincing) accusations against Brian Mulroney by Karlheinz Schreiber. Now, they're insisting that an Ethics Committee has to be called over another would-be scandal, this time based on rehashed (and extremely confusing) accusations.

It's pure sleaze. The situation itself is sleazy enough. One has to wonder how Garth Turner thinks he will benefit by heaping another helping of sleaze right on top it.