Tragedy hit a Montréal family this week when daughter was washed overboard from a tall ship sailing out of Lunenburg for the Caribbean. It’s a sad story anyone would hate to see happen to a friend, neighbour or relative and our sympathies go out.
But, The Globe and Mail reports, without a hint of criticism, a related story of political interference and abuse. The woman in question, Laura Gainey, was the daughter of a professional hockey player of some fame, apparently, in the 1970s and so the news story has had tremendously disproportionate media coverage (print, television, radio). The today we learn that Ken Dryden, MP, because he and the woman’s father played on the same team for a few years three decades ago, pressured, with the assistance of Bill Graham, MP persuaded the Minister of National Defence to put pressure on the US Coast Guard and to send Canadian Forces search crews to continue the search long after it would normally have been abandoned.
We all can imagine how the media would respond if a Bay Street investment banker or advertising executive pressured the defence minister to circumvent established policy to pursue, at a huge cost to the taxpayer, a futile search.
Ken Dryden showed us he wears his heart on his sleeve in the recent leadership campaign and proved it again this weekend, but his actions were wrong. I hope his involving Bill Graham was because of Bill’s experience in the navy and not because Ken thought the LO, Stéphane Dion would be too busy.
More inappropriate than Dryden’s error in judgement is the Globe’s double standard in failing to call celebrity political interference and abuse what it is. Shameful. And how soon will the media forget the equally sad story of a 11 year old refugee claimant who died after falling through the ice on a Scarborough pond the same weekend?
But, The Globe and Mail reports, without a hint of criticism, a related story of political interference and abuse. The woman in question, Laura Gainey, was the daughter of a professional hockey player of some fame, apparently, in the 1970s and so the news story has had tremendously disproportionate media coverage (print, television, radio). The today we learn that Ken Dryden, MP, because he and the woman’s father played on the same team for a few years three decades ago, pressured, with the assistance of Bill Graham, MP persuaded the Minister of National Defence to put pressure on the US Coast Guard and to send Canadian Forces search crews to continue the search long after it would normally have been abandoned.
We all can imagine how the media would respond if a Bay Street investment banker or advertising executive pressured the defence minister to circumvent established policy to pursue, at a huge cost to the taxpayer, a futile search.
Ken Dryden showed us he wears his heart on his sleeve in the recent leadership campaign and proved it again this weekend, but his actions were wrong. I hope his involving Bill Graham was because of Bill’s experience in the navy and not because Ken thought the LO, Stéphane Dion would be too busy.
More inappropriate than Dryden’s error in judgement is the Globe’s double standard in failing to call celebrity political interference and abuse what it is. Shameful. And how soon will the media forget the equally sad story of a 11 year old refugee claimant who died after falling through the ice on a Scarborough pond the same weekend?
