Saturday, August 24, 2013

This Day In Snookland....The Bonfire Of The Harmonies.

SeveranceIsAsSeveraneDoes
CultVille


Bob Mackin, writing in The Tyee, has the story of the payout for recently severed Snoodlandian Deputy Minister, Mr. Graham Whitmarsh.

The number is $461,643 which, of course, is all that you will hear from any and all screamers that follow up on this story, however briefly, over the weekend-deadened newscycle.

But, to his credit, Mr. Mackin (who we assume was under the thumb of that 72 hour FOI release rule thingy and was thus forced to publish today or get scooped on his own stuff come Monday) goes a little deeper:

...Whitmarsh (then Deputy Finance Minister) and David Loukidelis, deputy attorney general, were involved in the controversial $6 million deal to pay Dave Basi and Bob Virk's legal bills in October 2010, triggering surprise guilty pleas by Basi and Virk in the corruption trial related to the privatization of BC Rail...


Which is good to know.

But in our opinion the normally very thorough Mr. Mackin missed a spot.

Specifically, Uncle Bob neglected to note that the very fine fellow who was scheduled to take the RailGate stand back in the fall of 2010 when the Geoff Plant-defended six million dollar deal went down was a most excellent former public servant named Gary Collins.

And...

When Mr. Collins suddenly resigned in the wake of the Ledge Raids way back in the first term of our Gord, he almost immediately went to work for a now-defunct airline named Harmony.

And guess who else also once worked for Harmony and it's owner, an uber fine fellow named Mr. David Ho?

Well, that's a story we have hidden away in our PublicEye-assisted, cultish, whiny and extremely sanctimonious archives:


....Former RailGate era Finance Minister Gary Collins once worked for David Ho's now defunct Harmony Airways.

....Current Deputy Finance Minister Graham Whitmarsh, who helped Deputy AG David Loukidelis put together the super-secret $6 million dollar plea-copping bonus-baby deal that ensured that former Minister Collins would never have to testify, under oath, in front of transcripts of RCMP surveillance wiretaps, at the RailGate trial, also worked for Harmony back in the day.

But here's something we didn't know, courtesy of Sean Holman's fantastic archives over at Public Eye.....

.....Current Deputy Finance Minister Whitmarsh was 'relieved' of his duties at Harmony on Nov. 30th 2006.

....Former RailGate era Finance Minister Collins resigned from Harmony just one day later on Dec. 01 2006.

****

As you might expect learning of the business connection between Mr. Collins and Mr. Whitmarsh led me to ask the following question of Mr. Whitmarsh's then boss, the finest of all fine men who ever worked for our Gord, Mr. Colin Hansen, on the very last day of 2010:

"How, exactly, was it NOT a conflict of interest to have Mr. Graham Whitmarsh, who is a former business associate of Mr. Gary Collins, work out a deal that prevented Mr. Collins from testifying in open court, under oath, about his role, or lack thereof, in the (now established) illegal leaking of documents and information to private concerns regarding the longterm leasing of public assets then under the control of BC Rail?"


Now.

To the best of my knowledge no answer was ever provided.

Which is not the least bit surprising.

But what is truly astonishing is that a question such as this was never, again to the best of my knowledge, ever put to the good Mr. Hansen by a member of the Lotuslandian proMedia.

'Nuff said?


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Regarding the cult of whine and the sanctimony?....This...And, of course, this!


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10 comments:

RossK said...

(The following comment edited by the Site Owner)

From a person, who had first hand knowledge of Gary "xxxxx" Collins at his present work place,who said that our xxxxxxx friend was,in his words, scared xxxxx that he would have to testify at the BC rail trial.

Funny how he was in the batters box and the thing suddenly fell apart.

Some fine outstanding legal type (if there is such a person) should explorer ways to bring about a civil theft charge against both Campbell and Collins.

Also, there was a very sickening story, complete with pictures xxxxx, in which he (Mr. Collins) was sniveling about being denied a chance to testify in the BC Rail case along with a load of BS that was truly disgusting..It was in the Saturday, February 19, 2011 Globe and Mail and was written by Mark Hume.

CGHZD

cfvua said...

More. Hush. Money.

Bob Mackin said...

Good work. Tis the same David Ho who pleaded guilty in Feb. 2012 to unlawfully confining a prostititute and possessing a gun (the cocaine charge was dropped in the plea bargain). Same David Ho who hosted parties on his boat that included Rich Coleman and Francesco Aquilini.

RossK said...

Thanks CGHZD and cfvua--

Don't know about the hush.

But, clearly, the severing of all previous ties to Railgate is almost complete.

Almost.

(there is still that small matter of the fine fellow that Mr. Basi liked to call 'The Mexican' - scroll down)

_______
Thanks Bob--

Thought you might want to fill in those additional details...There is also the small matter of the 'lease' of a certain golf course that was used in a bait and switch that facilitated the levering of a big chunk of real estate out of a certain park.

A small question for you...Was it the timing of the FOI doc. release that forced you to go with this on a Saturday?

.

RossK said...

just to be clear...It was the golf course itself, not the lease, that was used for the levering...

.

Anonymous said...

Good sleuthing and connecting of dots Ross K.

On anther day, and at another time, I hope the fine Mr. Mackin can access the rather impressive league of civil servants who have been terminated without cause in the last few years. Stellar resumes all...

Not surprising to see how quickly, and shamelessly they were replaced by fawning acolytes.

Whoever has the gig doing exit counseling has a sweet gig.

If you are a sadist.

Lew said...

Your question to Mr. Hansen probably wasn’t picked up on his radar, which was acting up on him around that time. Even missed the whole lead-up to the HST, as I recall.

As for ties to the BC Rail goings on, it seems that our friends at OmniTrax still haven’t shaken the stench down south. The Chicago media seems to be paying more attention to it than our own fine local version.

http://www.illinoisobserver.net/2013/07/26/canadian-bribery-scandal-taints-emanuel-illinois-port-deal/

krank! said...

Let's see if HMLO has the stones or the female equivalent to put the heat on in regards to this. Time to belly up to the bar, Dippers, and put the boot in. Imagine ol' fat Dave or Glen with this material. Irrelevance is staring you in the face!

scotty on denman said...

Pronunciation: sanc-TIM-ony or SANC-timony?

Anonymous said...

Also on August 24 Mackin asked: "Was Cybersnooping the Secret Event of 2010 Olympics?"

The NY Times would seem to shed some light that way...

Drug Agents Use Vast Phone Trove, Eclipsing N.S.A.’s

from the slides

p.20 "Plus, we really pissed off the Hells angel's in Canada"