Via Tom right here at thepolitic and Damian at Daimnation, a story from the Winnipeg Sun regarding Alan Rock’s Gun Registry. Sheila Fraser, the Auditor General, is preparing a report to be issued in February. It is expected to paint a picture of rampant, scandalous spending. Peter McKay, the Conservative MP expects that the Registry will make AdScam look like peanuts.

“It will be like dime-store shoplifting when one starts to compare the money that was involved in this gun registry that’s unaccounted for,” MacKay told Sun Media.

The brainchild of Allan Rock, then Minister of Justice, the Gun Registry was introduced under the false pretence of saving lives. It has been a fiasco of enormous proportions almost since its inception, even among Liberals. It is said that the Registry cost Rock the leadership bid in 2003.

Allan Rock is also the minister under whose watch Andrei Knyazev, a Russian Embassy Secretary, had been caught driving drunk by Ottawa police twice before he struck two women joggers in an Ottawa neighbourhood in January 2001, killing one (Catherine MacLean) and horribly maiming the other (Catherine Dore).

Knyazev had a history of car accidents and was known to Ottawa police.

Ottawa police say they caught Andrei Knyazev driving drunk on two previous occasions. The federal government ensured no charges were laid and even apologized to the Russians for asking Knyazev to take a breathalyzer test.

Under the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, Ottawa police could not detain Knyazev nor demand evidence from him, but the incidents were reported to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Such reports go to the minister’s desk. Both times the drunken diplomat was granted dispensation. Under the circumstances, Rock should have evicted Knyazev from Canada long before he killed at the wheel –instead Canada apologised to Knyazev. By the time of the fatal accident in 2001, Rock was already out of the Justice portfolio and taken over Health’s, where having done nothing memorable he improved on his record significantly.

Rock’s record in policy and decision-making in Canada is so impressive that it caught Paul Martin’s attention. In early 2004, Paul Martin appointed Rock Canada’s permanent Ambassador to the United Nations, where he’ll be able to propagate his skills among his new diplomatic peers. The federal government website boasts that Rock

has a decade of experience in government and policy-making. A member of Canada’s parliament from 1993-2003, he served in the federal cabinet as Minister of Justice and Attorney General, as Minister of Health, and most recently as Minister of Industry.

Of course, Rock is not the first Liberal crony who gets strongly rewarded with a posh life in Manhattan and gets to exalt Canada’s name with his outstanding public and personal record. In this instance, Rock’s apologetic disposition toward Russian diplomats in Canada (He’s never apologised to Canadians) made him a perfect fit to land the job in New York.

If you would like to contact our illustrious Ambassador in New York City to congratulate him on his great job, or to thank him for his contributions in the protection of the citizens of our country, please go here.

Cross posted from Civitatensis