The Ground Continues to Shrink Under the "Robocon"-mongers

This is a news story that has seemingly escaped the notice of many of those obsessed with the so-called "Robocon" robo-call scandal. And considering that it pertains directly to something routinely treated as a smoking gun strongly supporting the notion that someone in the Conservative Party organized a campaign of misleading robo-calls with the party's knowledge.

That would-be "smoking gun" was a claim, in an Elections Canada affidavit, that Michael Sona had talked about organizing misleading robo-calls. It turns out this isn't true.

Elections Canada investigator Al Matthews submitted an affidavit in March 2012 that made this precise claim. But Matthews has since backed away from that allegation, insisting that it was a mistake.

“In an earlier [sworn affidavit] I wrote that Sona called [Matthew] McBain ‘about a campaign of disinformation such as making a misleading poll-moving call,’” Matthews wrote in a subsequent affidavit later in May 2012. “On checking I realize that in both interviews Mr. McBain … did not recall Sona as relating the call to ‘disinformation’ or about a ‘misleading poll moving call,’ only that he wanted to set up an autodial call that would not track back to the Burke campaign.”

It seems worth noting that such an autodial call would be illegal according to CRTC regulations -- something that Sona may not have known at the time, but very likely knows now.

This allegation against Sona has been seized on by "Robocon"-mongers time and time again as a smoking gun suggesting decision-makers in the party knew about it and condoned it. Sona was the communications director for the Marty Burke campaign, so had the allegations against Sona been true it might not have been that unreasonable.

Unfortunately for them, it apparently isn't true.

It's enough to make you wonder just how much more of the allegations aren't true.

The Left's Smoking Gun on Robocalls... No Smoke, No Gun. Well Done.

This story isn't what the left thinks it is... not even remotely

As much as I want to take the Robocalls "scandal" seriously -- I've tried, really I have -- there are people who are making it exceedingly difficult.

For the most part, these are the individuals who insist that Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party are to blame for concocting a scheme to "steal" the 2011 election. They have absolutely no evidence of this whatsoever, and for their own purposes, no evidence is necessary. In fact, like any conspiracy theorist, they treat the lack of evidence as, itself, evidence.

Likewise, organizations such as leadnow have been doing everything within their power to... actually make sure that it's as hard as possible for Elections Canada to get to the bottom of this affair. Comically, all while demanding a judicial inquiry all the while... a judicial inquiry which they would certainly seek to similarly exploit for their own partisan ends.

It's just the way they do things.

Now, with their 31,000 contacts with Elections Canada having been revealed to have yielded only 700 complaints with even the faintest pretenses of legitimacy.

Now they're trying to pass off objections raised by former MP Inky Mark -- who objected to the creation of the Constituency Information Management System -- as if it were a smoking gun in the robocalls affair. Except that it isn't.

Mark notes that he objected to the creation of CIMS because it could be used to undermine the autonomy and independence of local candidates. “If they get mad at you and don't want you to access your own data, you're done,” Mark said. “I figured that out right off the bat and said I don't want to be under their control, so I just quit basically.”

“I always have thought independently, even with [election] signage at home,” he continued. “I always knew that I had to do my own thing, because ... they can control you 100 per cent, and that's exactly what happened with CIMS.”

Is this actually evidence that the Conservative Party had anything to do with the fraudulent calls reported during the 2011 election? Absolutely not. Anyone who thinks it is is simply allowing their imagination to run away with them.

Interestingly enough, Mark's complaint -- that it gives the party too much power -- isn't even one restricted to the Conservative Party. The Green Party -- and its leader, Elizabeth May -- has been haunted by complaints, by potential challengers to May for various nominations, that they, too, were denied information by the party.

In fact, May has been accused of using internal Green Party information to her own benefit, and denying it to her opponents.

No one would take that as evidence that Elizabeth May is involved in any fraudulent election calls, and with good reason... because it isn't. Yet there are those who are so desperate to use Inky Mark's comments on the Tories' CIMS as just this kind of evidence -- which, again, it isn't -- not realizing that they're basically making these kinds of implications by extension.

That's just how sad the Robocalls affair has become. There is a story here, hopefully Elections Canada will get to the bottom of it, but those who claim to be the most alarmed about it are doing nearly everything they can to make sure this never happens.

There's a reason for this: as long as Elections Canada has never gotten to the bottom of this, and never cleared the Conservative Party of involvement, they'll be able to continue deceiving Canadians by implying the Tories are behind it all.

To that end, they can't afford the truth to ever be uncovered. And so, they misdirect Canadians with a procession of false smoking guns.