Ottawa

The spin stops here

The Globe gets hold of Conrad Black’s political analysis from prison.

On Nov. 28, he is very interested in reports of a potential opposition coalition government: “Stephen will not go down with this ship like Joe did,” he writes, referring to Joe Clark’s minority government defeat after only nine months. “No matter how humiliating, he will scale it back in the interests of avoiding chaos, and say it will be a future election issue and lambaste the other parties as wastrels and cowards and so forth.”

On Dec. 5, he asks Mr. Plamondon to provide him with perspective on the coalition from “up there,” saying, “I can’t measure it well from here. Why does Stephen look like such a jackass? I can see why the others do.”

While he says little about his prison experience, he is engaged by the election: “It’s hard for me to follow it closely from here, but I still can’t see Quebec wasting too many votes on the Bloc, and Dion is hopeless. If Harper limps back with another minority surely he will have a gain of at least ten seats, and so should last longer than another 18 months. I assume Ignatieff is the next leader, and he will win unless Stephen gets a personality transplant or a timely miracle occurs in his favour. … Every good wish to you. Yours, CONRAD.”

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