Rightful suspicions

CBC reports that the Cons have put a final touch on the year's Canadian Wheat Board shenanigans by granting unprecedented bonuses to all Board employees. But whether or not the bonuses will succeed in winning friends among the employees, the farmers who'll ultimately decide the Wheat Board's future don't sound particularly impressed:

Ritter said he was disturbed to hear that some critics believe the bonuses are "hush money" and an attempt to buy the silence of employees on the debate over the future of the board...

The bonuses were the talk of farm country Friday, according to one Saskatchewan farmer.

Gordon Wilson said he went to visit his local equipment dealer in Kindersley, Sask., Friday morning, and there were 20 other farmers there — all talking about the Christmas bonuses.

"If the employees deserve a bonus, they should get it, but at Christmas when the federal government and the Canadian Wheat Board are having a fight, I'm not sure if the logisitics (sic) of that seems right to me," Wilson said.

It's tough to say just what ulterior motive was at play: the "hush money" theory could well be the largest part of the motivation, ot maybe the plan is to portray the CWB as inefficient and wasteful by adding a gratuitous cost into the mix. But if it's nearly beyond doubt that there's more to the payout than is being stated up front, it appears to be entirely beyond doubt that farmers don't think the Cons can be taken at face value. Which suggests that the Cons' self-proclaimed reputation for honesty has taken a severe beating due to their attempts to undermine the Wheat Board - and that as a result of their war against a single-desk Board, they won't likely be believed in other areas either.