Posted by True Blue-Red Tory on 5/21/2005, 1:59 pm, in reply to "It's over for the CPC" Think back to the early 1980s. Back then, Joe Clark was the embattled leader of the Progressive Conservative party. His minority government had fallen in late 1979 on a non-confidence motion, and he subsequently led the Tories to defeat in the 1980 election that saw the return of Pierre Trudeau and the Liberals to power. Clark had enemies within the party, none bigger than Brian Mulroney. Mulroney had lost the 1976 leadership race to Clark, but he never gave up. And neither did his cronies. Every morning, some of them held court in the West Block cafeteria on Parliament Hill. Any member of the Ottawa press gallery could stroll over to the Hill, get some bacon-and-eggs, sit down and listen to Mulroney's pals stab Clark in the back, telling stories and spreading gossip that always put their party leader in a bad light. Among the Mulroney cronies at the breakfast table were Nova Scotia MP Bob Coates, who became Mulroney's first defence minister in 1985, Pat MacAdam, a long-time Tory aide whom Mulroney rewarded with a plum job at the Canadian High Commission in London, and Nova Scotia MP Elmer MacKay. Yes, the daddy of Tory MP Peter MacKay, and who got his prize when he was named solicitor-general. Toronto lawyer and Mulroney pal Sam Wakim was another player working behind the scenes against Clark.
Maybe, but the signs are growing — and there's a history within the conservative wing of Canadian politics of parties slaying their own.
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