Filed under "don't give them any ideas"

Apparently the Cons' attempt to sidestep questions about Leo Housakos by rewriting his biography has failed miserably.

But as long as Housakos is entirely malleable about changing his public face to suit Stephen Harper's interests, I'm sure he can get out of trouble by making one more change to his biographical information. After all, who in the opposition would dare to point out any concerns about corruption if he was named, say, Terry Fox?

Equal dishonesty

For those worried that the Cons might have one class of information for the public and another for internal consumption, the CP reports that at least some top Cons are just as honest with each other as they are with the rest of us. But that's not to be taken as a positive:

(Harper Senate appointee Leo) Housakos sent colleagues a letter yesterday declaring his remarks had been taken out of context. In his letter, Housakos said he'd merely told a Canadian Press reporter that he had not been involved in last year's campaign because he held a non-partisan position at Via Rail at the time.

He also said he told the reporter that there was a good feeling within the party, which was due to the "excellent work" of Paradis and Claude Durand, the party's director of operations in the province.

Housakos said he would never blame any individual or group for the failure to gain seats in Quebec.

But a tape recording of Housakos's 10-minute interview Wednesday contains no reference to either Via Rail, Paradis or Durand.

It does contain Housakos's assessment of what went wrong in the 2008 election.

"Many mistakes were made the last time. I also think our Quebec team -- our MPs -- did not deliver the goods the last time," Housakos said.

Of course, it remains to be seen whether Housakos will follow the party's usual standard procedure of claiming that the tape was doctored and/or suing in an effort to have it hidden from the public.

But if the Cons' Quebec MPs are paying the least bit of attention, then Housakos' attempted cover-up only seems likely to aggravate his initial insult. And one has to wonder whether at least some within the Cons will start waking up to just what happens when a government is obsessed with papering over reality.