Mistakes were made

Let's follow up on yesterday's post with another telling moment from the exchange between Dwain Lingenfelter and Brad Wall on Monday. For obvious reasons, it isn't often that Wall actually seems to talk about his failures in business. But in the extended back-and-forth session, he apparently decided to include his own spin - and what he had to say is rather remarkable:

Hon. Mr. Wall:...Mr. Chairman, I remember, I remember two of the visitors that came to the hall of fame. I did have a management contract through my company, TCB Communications, Mr. Speaker, which worked quite well. My last client was able to offer me a full-time position at the city, and I took that, Mr. Speaker. And I would say this as well, that two of the visitors at the hall of fame, two of the visitors, two of the first visitors to cut the ribbon was Brian Sklar and the current Leader of the Opposition.

Oh yes, yes. Oh yes. He never ever misses a chance for a photo op, Mr. Chairman.

You know what? You know what, Mr. Chairman? It was the previous NDP government that approved the grant. Those kinds of grants to business are what we've ended on this side. Mr. Speaker, Mr. Chairman, mistakes are made. This side's learned from the mistakes. That side shows up for a photograph at the mistakes, Mr. Chairman.

Now, there are plenty of areas worth discussing that I won't get into since they don't seem to entirely capture the problems with Wall's stance. So I'll just note in passing the absurdity of Wall criticizing a country musician for appearing at a country music museum and the hypocrisy in Wall deciding after the fact that the grant he applied for is the type he believes shouldn't exist.

Closer to the point is the sense that Wall is turning parody into reality with his attempt to assign responsibility for the failure of his museum. "Dwain Lingenfelter is such a poor manager that he even allowed serial business failure Brad Wall to fritter away $150,000 of public money. Vote Brad Wall for Premier."

But even that's not quite right, since the Simpsons' caricature of a Republican campaign at least has the good sense to keep the words out of the mouth of Sideshow Bob. In contrast, it's Wall himself who has the nerve to attack others for offering him an opportunity - and the result is a gobsmacking combination of self-righteousness and evasion of personal responsibility.

After all, Wall doesn't even hint at any possible "mistakes" involved in his application for the grant or operation of the museum. (Though of course the best-known mistake - that of catastrophically optimistic projections with no basis in reality - isn't one that Wall can pretend to have learned from.)

Instead, Wall effectively claims that the sole problem with the failure of his museum was that he was offered an opportunity in the first place - such that his spectacular failure in no way damages his own sense of personal infallibility. Or to phrase the apparent combination of blame and perceived merit put another way, "It's their own damn fault for believing me when I said I knew what I was doing. Suckers had it coming."

From my standpoint, that attitude brings the problems arising out of Wall's museum management far closer to the present day than they'd belong otherwise. To the extent the issue was simply Wall having made some bad business decisions which he'd know to avoid now, it would be simple enough to see the issue as one which should stay in the past. But if he's actually trying to peddle the line that even his most obvious personal failures should be laid at the feet of the NDP, then there doesn't seem to be any limit to the degree of denial involved in his decision-making.

Which is of course a serious problem now that he has far more than a mere $150,000 in public money at his disposal. And Saskatchewan voters will surely have to consider carefully how they'll see their voting decisions once Wall is comfortably ensconced in a cushy corporate job far removed from the smouldering wreckage of Saskatchewan, telling his new bosses "It's their own damn fault for ever giving me power. Suckers had it coming."