Canada PoliticsWho is more embarrassing: Rob Ford, Mike Duffy or Dalton McGuinty?
I guess you can call this a 'worst of the worst' sort of poll.
Last week, Forum Research and QMI teamed-up to gauge Canadians' thoughts on the growing list of controversies plaguing our governments.
The pollster gave respondents three choices and asked them which one was the "most embarrassing" scandal:
i.) The Rob Ford scandal where he is alleged to have been video taped smoking crack cocaine.
ii.) The Mike Duffy affair where the Senator claimed approximately $90,000 in imporperly claimed living expenses and ultimately reimbursed taxpayers with money gifted to him by the prime minister's chief of staff.
iii.) Former Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty's politically charged decision to cancel plans to build two gas plants during his 2011 election campaign. The boondoggle cost taxpayers in Ontario at least half a billion dollars
33 per cent of respondents said that Duffy — and the Senate expense scandal — was the most embarrassing.
"As the most national and least local of these donnybrooks, the Senate scandal has the most legs and it has hit hardest in Atlantic Canada, where the chief protagonist, Mike Duffy, used to come from," Forum Research president Lorne Bozinoff told QMI.
The unfortunate truth is that Bozinoff could have included even more choices: Robocalls, corruption in Quebec, a London mayor alleged to have use public money for his son's wedding, etc...
[ Related: Are Canada’s political scandals ruining our reputation overseas? ]
I don't think any of us are under any illusions thinking that this is Canada's golden age of politics.
But maybe we shouldn't be so down on ourselves. A quick review of international headlines is proof that we're not the only country experiencing political scandals.
On Monday, former Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi was convicted of paying for sex with an underage prostitute at a party at his villa in 2010.
[ Related: Berlusconi convicted in sex-for-hire trial, sentenced to 7 years and lifetime ban in office ]
In May, in the U.K., a senior Conservative MP was arrested on suspicion of rape and sexual assault. In Turkey, the government is accused of trying to mute anti-government protests. In Australia, the government is embroiled in a military sex scandal.
And, in recent months in the United States, the sheen of the Obama administration is finally wearing off as they face tough questions about their handling of the terrorist attack in Libya, the IRS' scrutinizing of some right-wing non-profit groups and of the National Security Agency public surveillance programs.
If you subscribe to the theory that misery loves company, Canada has a lot of company with regard to political scandals.
(Photo courtesy of Canadian Press)
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