The smelly story so far
As a reward for his biased, below-the-belt "reporting" of the political scene -- plus a natural propensity for arse-kissing -- "Duff" was rewarded by his good friend Steve "Stephen" Harper with appointment to the Senate of Canada as a senator from Prince Edward Island.
The Canadian constitution requires a senator to maintain his principal residence in the province which he purports to represent. Sadly for Duffy, although he was born in PEI and resembles a PEI potato -- a huge PEI potato -- he has lived for decades in Kanata, a suburb of the world's second-coldest capital. He has a large house there, with a large ($360,000) mortgage.
Nevertheless, the "honourable" senator from PEI signed a declaration that his principal residence is (what turned out to be) a summer cottage in Cavendish PEI. That would make him eligible for a housing allowance to defray the costs of maintaining the aforementioned residence in Kanata.
When this came to light in the course of enquiries into expenses claimed by Duffy and three other senators (one Liberal, two Tories), the ace reporter claimed he'd had trouble understanding the declaration he'd signed. Perhaps he failed to comprehend the implications of the word "principal", since its homonym -- "principle" -- is clearly not in his vocabulary.
Anyway, it was all a big "innocent" mistake, and a couple of weeks after the "error" was revealed, Duffy trotted out the old contrition act. Without actually using the word "sorry", he said on national TV that the whole thing had become a "distraction" from his onerous duties as senator, and he and his wife (nice touch) had decided they would repay the $90,000 or so in housing expenses which he had "mistakenly" claimed and received.
Fast forward to March, when the Senate committee looking into the matter was about to present its report. By the way, someone asked, did Senator Duffy ever give back his ill-gotten money? Oh yes, said Marjorie LeBreton (government leader in the Senate) and Steve Harper, he did the right thing -- the honourable thing -- and all the money has been repaid.
What no-one said -- not Duffy, not Harper nor his many minions -- was that it wasn't the arch-troughster who actually ponied up the funds with which to reimburse the Canadian taxpayer. The cheque was actually cut by... wait for it... one Nigel Wright.
Nigel Wright? Who he? Ed.
Nigel Wright is a wealthy Bay Street capitalist who, as a reward for [Get on with it! Ed.] has for a couple of years been the Chief of Staff in the office of... wait for it... Prime Minister Steve "Stephen" Harper!
Wright is also an old and dear friend of Senator Puffy. When he somehow learned that Duffy, in spite of his $132,000 Senate salary and generous expense allowance, was impecunious, Wright generously offered to give the skint senator the $90,000 needed to cover his enormous fundament. That's "give", not "lend".
Looks like Wright was wrong to help out his fat old friend in this way. First of all, it's just not done to make a large payment in cash (or cheque) to a sitting legislator for no reason at all. And even if the gift itself is not illegal, the recipient would -- under the Senate's conflict of interest code -- be required to report the gift within 30 days of receiving it. In this case the deadline would have been sometime before April 25th. Need I add that no such report was ever made.
Why did Wright do it? Did the Prime Minister know? The deal, according to Duffy himself, was made in the course of "negotiations" between Duffy's lawyer and "the Prime Minister's Office". Duffy would pay back the housing allowance and the government would "go easy" on him and (presumably) not make him resign his Senate seat even though he is clearly not eligible to represent Prince Edward Island.
The way Walt sees it, the only way Prime Minister Harper could not have known about the deal to save Duffy's fat face (and that of the PM who appointed him) would be if Harper wilfully closes his eyes to the business of his own office. We know that Harper is an avid piano player... just like the piano player in the brothel who says "I don't know what goes on upstairs".
The federal Ethics Commissioner will investigate as soon as her bucket of whitewash can be refilled.
Further reading: "The only right thing left for Mike Duffy to do now is resign" by one of Walt's favourite commentators, Andrew Coyne, in today's National Post.
* The headline originally read "More on Mike Puffy" but it's funnier now. Ed.
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