Modeling Journey

Remember the three monkeys? The one shuts its eyes so that it cannot see; the other shuts its mouth so that it cannot speak; and the third plugs its ears so that it cannot hear anything?

Did the Harper government decide on a three-monkey strategy with respect to the Mulroney-Schreiber relationship? Seems that Stephane Dion is wondering it this happened, based on his call for the inquiry into Schreiber's latest allegations in the now famous Schreiber affidavit (which do doubt made Harper swear as well):

"In the letter, Dion asked Johnston to include the following:

The management, follow-up and response to correspondence sent by Schreiber to Harper, his staff and members of his cabinet;

The Department of Justice's decision not to proceed with an internal examination into the possibility of setting aside the Government of Canada's settlement with Mulroney;

The possibility of conversations or correspondence between the current Prime Minister or any of his staff or cabinet ministers, and Mulroney or his representatives, relating to this file; and

The possible politicization of the process surrounding Mr. Schreiber's extradition case."

See CTV.ca Dion wants Harper's office included in inquiry

Justice Minister Nicholson has an answer for one of Dion's questions:

"But in 2006, senior Justice Department officials explored the possibility of re-opening the settlement after news reports revealed that German-Canadian businessman Karlheinz Schreiber paid Mr. Mulroney $300,000 in cash, and related some of Mr. Schreiber's version of events.

"Research would be required to evaluate whether this new element justifies any attempt to set aside the settlement," Brian Saunders, then assistant deputy minister of justice, wrote in a Feb. 14, 2006 e-mail obtained by the CBC under the Access to Information Act.

Yesterday, Mr. Nicholson would not say what happened to that effort, or whether he was briefed on it.

"What information, what advice, what papers and letters that we have within the Department of Justice are in the form, generally of legal advice, and I treat them as such.
"And I don't get into a discussion [of that]," he said.

"I don't discuss what I get briefings on. I get briefings every single day in my capacity as Attorney-General and Justice Minister of this country." "

See globeandmail.com: Ottawa tight-lipped on Mulroney settlement review

But all is not lost. Perhaps the Ethics Committee might be able to explore some of the issues should it decide to call Mulroney and Schreiber to appear before it within the next two weeks - a kind of gift for conspiracy political junkies, no doubt:

"A parliamentary committee is debating a motion Tuesday to summon the two deal-makers in the Mulroney-Schreiber affair to state their cases before the probe into the corruption charges even opens.

While it has yet to be decided how the public inquiry will be framed, the House of Commons ethics committee wants to call former Tory prime minister Brian Mulroney and German-Canadian businessman Karlheinz Schreiber as witnesses as soon as possible."

See Schreiber, Mulroney could be called to testify ahead of inquiry

This story - that of Envelopgate and of Lettergate - is not over by a long long shot ...