There’s an episode of The Simpsons where Homer becomes a Krusty the Klown impersonator for hire. At the opening of a new Krusty Burger, he savagely attacks the Krusty Burger version of the Hamburgler for stealing Krusty Burgers. Watching the beating, a child in the crowd says “Stop! He’s already dead.”
That’s the way I feel about Alison Redford. The announcement that Premier Dave Hancock has asked the RCMP to look into Redford’s use of government aircraft makes me think, “Stop! She’s already dead.”
Redford has already resigned in disgrace, mostly for being insufferably arrogant. She has been trashed mercilessly by two of the also-rans running for the leadership of the PC party, mostly by the oily Thomas Lukaszuk, who was one of her biggest supporters and his best political ally. This week, while Tories were running from her like she had the ebola virus, she resigned her seat in the legislature. That wasn’t good enough for the cowardly premier Hancock, who has asked the RCMP to investigate the auditor general’s claim that she had ‘ghost passengers’ listed on the manifests of government planes so she could ride without being surrounded by the hoi polloi.
Now, let’s look at this. If there really were doctored documents that ensured the princess premier would travel alone, and if the premier knew about it or authorized it (she denies it, and the fact she asked the auditor general to look into government travel tends to back up her claim), how is this possibly a criminal matter worthy of the precious time of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police? Surely this is light years away from being a criminal act. Stupid and arrogant, sure. Obnoxious, certainly. But criminal? Ridiculous.
The sad fact is that people seem to hate Redford with a passion, and it’s now seen as perfectly OK to pile on her mercilessly. Ralph Klein used government planes as his own personal taxi service. Nobody complained, because King Ralph was a beloved, rascally old alcoholic who playfully threw money at homeless people and told them to get a job. What a kidder! Redford, however, is a patrician snob who probably would have thought the idea of throwing money at homeless people to be in ‘poor taste’. What a killjoy.
Hey, I’m no fan of Redford. But nobody in recent Canadian political history has risen so high, so fast, and crashed so shamefully as has Alison Redford. Calling in the cops to investigate was is, at worst, petty use of government dollars is shameful. The Tories are using the RCMP as a shield to deflect attention away from their own culture of entitlement that allowed Redford to run rampant. And by calling in the cops, the PCs can now say they can’t comment on any matter that is ‘before the courts’ (which it isn’t). Also very conveniently, the RCMP is unlikely to make a decision on charges until after the PCs elected Jim Prentice as their new leader.
Redford’s use of government aircraft is disgraceful, and she has paid a high political price for her hubris. The PC party’s tossing Redford under the bus — then putting the bus in reverse, running over her again, then getting off the bus and kicking her, then calling in a tank to run over her again — is equally appalling.