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Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch
Again though the question at the end of this investigation is simply if he did or didn't receive money from the Conservatives and how true the statement is that "He had opened the door to the Prime Ministers office". On that point I don't believe the testimony of his former associate that he "Was so pumped up" that he made his statement by mistake, I believe that Jaffer the SalesMan probably at some point bragged that he had access to the inner sanctum of the government and the ear of the Prime Minister.
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I find it interesting that for Conservative supporters the litmus test in this whole affair is "Did Jaffer receive money?".
To me it's clear that he tried very hard to capitalize on his relationships with former colleagues and tried very hard to profit from them. It seems like a no brainer that he was acting as a lobbyist. Not a successful one, but that is not the test. Was he a registered lobbyist? Yes/No.
And secondly, it seems clear from the email correspondence that is coming out that several (I believe 6 or 7) ministers met with Jaffer and/or directed their staff to meet with Jaffer to discuss 'Projects'.
Why did none of these individuals raise the Lobbyist issue or conflict issue at that time? They had to have known they were against the rules. It seems they didn't care about optics or their own "Transparency Act" until Harper decided to toss Jaffer in front of the bus.
So while Conservative supporters can say they like the way Harper's handled this, in my opinion all Harper did or has done, was to deny any problem for as long as possible. Remember this had been going since at least September 2009, meetings, phonecalls and Jaffer's use of his wife's email, which SEVERAL prominent Cons knew about.
It was only after it became clear that there was a paper trail that led to government Ministers, that Harper tried to get out in front of it - first by denying Jaffer had any special access - although the evidence we see clearly shows he enjoyed unprecedented access, and finally by dumping Geurgis and contacting the RCMP and Ethnics Commissioner - although even then we found out that he didn't exactly do what he led us to believe he had done.
I guess perspective is everything.