Originally posted at A BCer in Toronto
Given the flurry of posts recently questioning the perceived Conservative leanings of online news aggregator/blogger/whatever Pierre Bourque (Olaf has another take) it was quite serendipitous I came across this passage in the Stephen Harper biography I'm currently reading by William Johnston, called Stephen Harper and the Future of Canada.
You'll remember the big scoop Ezra Levant of the Western Standard had during the last campaign, posting the full Liberal platform online before it was released by the party. The document of course came to Ezra courtesy the Conservative campaign, which got it from the infamous Liberal mole, no doubt.
The passage though indicates Ezra wasn't the Conservatives' first choice for a Conservative-friendly outlet to leak the platform to though:
The initial Conservative idea had been to leak the Liberal platform to Pierre Bourque's website, called Bourque Newswatch. That would conceal the fact that it was the Conservative Party that first received the leaked document from a mole. Bourque Newswatch was a popular Ottawa-based site which published political news and gossip, and it had on occasion published items the Conservatives wanted out in the blogshpere. But, when the war room finally got in hand the long awaited Liberal platform, no one could find Pierre Bourque to give him the scoop. In a last minute switch, they sent it instead to Ezra Levant's Western Standard; he was former communications director to Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day.
Interesting, that. What does it say about how Conservative-friendly you consider your first choice to be when your second choice is Ezra Levant and the Western Standard?
Johnson's bio (recently updated post Harper PMship) is an interesting read btw, watch for a review soon.
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