When did it become a sting (pt. 2)?
As has been much discussed on this blog and elsewhere, one of the underlying questions is at what point Grewal decided to turn his encounter with the Liberals into a 'sting'. Below, I suggested that the fact that Grewal prefers to talk to Dosanjh in Punjabi (even when Dosanjh tends to opt for English) suggests that he did not yet think that non-Punjabi speakers would have to hear and understand the tape.
Another consideration points in the same direction. As is now known, the Conservatives have released a second version of the tape of Grewal's meeting with Dosanjh and Murphy. There are 15 minutes that are different between the two tapes. One of the differences is between the two is how they begin. The new tape (hopefully now unadulterated) begins with 30 seconds of dead air. The old tape begins with Grewal's voice saying "Meeting with Mr. Ujjal Dosanjh (Health Minister) and Mr. Tim Murphy (Chief of Staff in the Prime Minister of Canada's Office) on May 17th, Tuesday, at 1:00 pm." (click)
posted by buckets at 6/03/2005 11:16:00 PM
5 Comments:
The fact that he does not talk in English even when UD does suggests to me that he planned to release the tapes all along and he wanted room to move. He could always question the tranlation of a said passage. If he spoke in English, it would be harder.
He decided to turn it into a sting after the meeting in which he discovered that he was never going to get a deal like what Belinda ended up with.
Vindictive?
I still wonder whether or not the CPC caught him red-handed and then to redeem himself with the party, he spun this around himself and released the tapes, saying it was a sting.
As I indicated in an earlier comment, two things jumped out at me. First, Murphy and Dosanjh met with Grewal in his Ottawa office. Second, that when identifying himself to Grewal's staff on the phone, Murphy refered to himself as Tim.
My guess is that a Tory saw Dosanjh and Murphy enter Grewal's office and got suspicious. After all, it is not everyday that the chief of staff in the PMO visits opposition MPs. If someone noticed and asked one of Grewal's staff a question or two, maybe about phone calls, and hears that Grewal had received at least one call from a "Tim", they could then possibly suspect that the Tim was Tim Murphy.
It's just a guess but I thought I'd throw it out there.
maritime: we do know that Murphy & Grewal were interrupted during their conversation for tea. There is a brief exchange with the tea server: Paul from Nova Scotia (I'll post on that in a moment.)
martime liberal,
That he was caught was my suspicion all along. If this was truly a sting from the get go, it would have been better planned, coordinated with better tapes.
I agree with what you and buckets are piecing together here - he WAS trying to cross. When the Belinda news broke, everyone who was a loyal Conservative began looking for other defectors and he was caught. A meeting with Tim Murphy is innocent and forgettable on Monday, and grounds for a body cavity search by Tuesday lunch.
Once he's caught, he says anything to save his hide. And the CPC goes along with it in order to cover the further embarassment of ANOTHER MP or 2 crossing the floor. And of course, the oppotunism to try to embarass the Liberals in order to swing the vote presented it self.
Now the CPC and Grewal have lied themselved into a very bad place. I can hardly wait to see how they try to wriggle out of it.
Remember, that first press relaese wast called a "suicide note" by the press secretary that released it by handing out to reporters and the National Press Club
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