[Stephen Dame]

Paul Martin was Minister of Finance. How is it possible that he had no knowledge of what was going on??? Isn't the Finance Minister usually responsible for money going in and out of gov't??? Correct me if I'm wrong because I'm not that interested in politics but this seems strange to me.

Martin and Chretien hated each other due to their stances on Meech Lake and the fact that Martin's folks, led by David Herle, called Chretien a "Vendu" at the 1990 Liberal leadership convention. A "vendu," in politically-centric Quebec is like calling somebody an MF'er times a 1000 in English.

Chretien didn't trust Martin and his Meech-like ideas about Quebec, so he kept him out of the loop, sometimes forcibly. The money for the program came from a contingency fund. Martin and Chretien simply okay'd the money going out, they didn't know what happened to it after it left Ottawa.

Gomery found that Chretien's former cheif of staff and his political friends then created a kick back scheme, which it says right on the first page of Gomery's summary; Martin and Chretien knew nothing about. The accused even testified that he told everyone involved that "JC was not to know."

Martin was entirely exonerated by the judge, Chretien was found indirectly responsible because the buck has to stop somewhere, and as he said: "I take responsibility for all the goods and bad that happened during my administration."