Lyin’ Brian spills the beans

In the waning days of the election, Erin O’Toole took time out from avoiding questions to campaign alongside former Conservative PM Brian Mulroney.

Mulroney told the partisan crowd that he and O’Toole were a lot alike because, before the 1984 election that brought him to power, nobody liked him either.

We prefer to think O’Toole more resembles the 1992 Mulroney, voted the worst PM ever, who fled the scene just before the Conservatives suffered the biggest electoral defeat in Canadian history. Or perhaps the “Lyin’” Brian who literally absconded with paper bags full of payoffs from corporate lobbyists.

O’Toole has been campaigning as the kinder, gentler Tory, but Mulroney offered a glimpse of their hidden agenda:

“That is the kind of leadership and vision that Erin O’Toole is going to bring to the new Canada he is going to build. There will be tough and deep structural changes to be made for our country, if we are to enhance prosperity and influence of Canada. Some of these decisions may make Erin unpopular…. But Canadians are very resistant to change, but I know that he and his government will persist and will implement their agenda, and will be looked upon then and throughout history with favour.”

Given Mulroney’s record in government – introducing massive austerity measures and attacking public services, negotiating NAFTA giving corporations new rights and powers, being one of the neo-con “3 Amigos” along with Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan – his praise should strike fear in the hearts of all Canadian workers.