Buckets' Official List of Grewal news stories (in progress)

Since the emergence of Jim Holt's letter to local Conservatives defending Grewal (here), the Conservative strategy for the rehabilitation of Grewal has become clear: first, to create a canonical list of six scandals that have embroiled Grewal; second, to assert that these scandals were part of an organized Liberal smear; and third, to argue that those scandals have been resolved in Grewal's favour.

This basic communications strategy has been seen in several places, first in Holt's letter (here):

In essence, there have been six topics which have been at the centre of an attack on our MP over these past few weeks.

1. Immigration Bonding Accusations
2. Taping of Liberal attempts to have our MP cross the floor
3. An incident at the check-in counter at Air Canada
4. Old Allegations re Immigration Investment Issues
5. Release of "New Tapes" by Gurmant
6. Claims re Missing Donation Receipts

The same basic points are made in Nina's interview with the Surrey Now (here, with my notes here), then in Grewal's own interviews with the Surrey Now, the Surrey Leader, and most recently the Western Standard.

Part of this is misdirection. Limit the discussion to the six topics, which may result in other things being ignored. In fact, however, Holt's list has missed a few stories involving Grewal. I therefore offer you Buckets' Official List of Grewal news stories (this is in progress, I'll try to fill in links and dates as time passes):

1. Grewal's claim to have been an advisor to Liberian dictator, Sam Doe (here and here)
2. Grewal's claim to have been an honorary vice-consul for Liberia (here)
3. Stories about his disputes about a provincial nomination in 1996 and his taping of meetings (here)
4. Grewal's claim that his life was threatened following the the 1996 BC election in which he was a BC Reform candidate (here)
5. Grewal's decision to hire Rachel Marsden under a fake name to work in his constituency office, against the advice of Conservative central office (see here, here, here, etc.)
6. Stories about the way Grewal and his wife both filed nomination papers in two ridings in the lead-up to the 2004 election (here)
7. Grewal's independent system for temporary visa bonding (= Holt #1), on which see here
8. Stories from Grewal's accusation that the Liberals were trying to bribe him and revealed that he had tapes (=Holt #2)
9. Stories about the intermediary who said that Grewal had approached the Liberals through him (here, here, etc.)
10. Stories about NDP and Bloc calls for an RCMP investigation into the tapes (e.g., here, here)
11. Stories that the Conservatives had decided to surrender the tapes to the RCMP (May 24) (here, etc.)
12. Stories about whether the Conservatives would release all of the tapes to the public (e.g., here and here)
13. Stories about the release of the tapes on May 31st
14. Stories about whether the May 31st tapes had been altered (beginning June 1)
15. Stories deriving from the Conservatives' admission on June 2 that the tapes had been altered … accidentally (e.g., here)
16. The airport incident (=Holt #3) (June 4)
17. Grewal's taking of stress leave (June 7) (e.g., here)
18. Old Allegations concerning Grewal's own immigration under the Investment programme (June 9) (here) (=Holt #4)
19. Stories that the Conservatives' audio expert judged the recordings unedited (June 9) (here)
20. Stories that Conservative MP John Reynolds filed complaints against three Liberals with the Ontario and BC Law Societies (June 15) (e.g., here)
21. News that Grewal surrendered further tapes to the RCMP (July 9) (=Holt #5) (see here)
22. Stories about missing campaign donation receipts (July 12) (=Holt #6)
23. Stories about Conservative MPs denouncing Grewal (July 14) (e.g., here)
24. Grewal's claim that Harper knew and approved of the taping (July 29) (here with here) and then retraction of that claim (July 30) (here)
25. Stories that the Conservative party had unsuccessfully attempted to get one of their MPs to retract his criticisms of Grewal of July 14 (see above) (e.g., here)
26. Stories related to his announcement that he would not stand for re-election in his riding

[edited and rewritten several times with new links ]