Scott Reid’s defence of John Fenik

Adrian O’Connell | Jun 18, 2015

Scott Reid's letter in defence of John Fenik (June 11) reminded me of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar with Scott in the role of Marc Antony and John involuntarily cast as Brutus.

Reid's dramatic epistle begins with his unctious defending of Fenik from a variety of unspecified rumours of treachery most foul, said to be circulating among the plebian mob of electors in Frontenac/Addington and even in the forum of local scribes - rumours which serve as a sub plot to divert attention from revelations courtesy of the Auditor General of much more sinister pecuniary plotting in the Senate. Egad! Where will it all end?

In Act Two, Scotty generously beams John up to the level of "my friend and intellectual sparring partner", a dubious honour - which might make one feel fuzzy and warm all over were it not for Reid's lengthy history of attempting to incite the mob through his periodic missives, to attack the poor, immigrants, visible minorities, pointy-headed scientists, public servants and lately, even the Supreme Court of Canada, largely at the behest of his leader, the great Caesar, Stephen Harper, who bestrides the Rideau like a colossus. Forsooth, yon Harper has a lean and hungry look these days!

As tension builds towards the denouement of this national tragedy, Scott and his fellow conspirators belatedly have come to realise that their soothsayers may have got it all wrong, having based their political and economic analyses largely on time spent poring over the musings of the Fraser Institute and the entrails of two-headed fish caught downstream from the Athabasca Tar Sands.

Enter stage left, a kinder, gentler Reid, who proceeds to heap laurels not only on his friend John, who is, he declares, like him, an honourable man and an idealist but on all his fellow gladiators in the arena. This euphoria, however, is quickly dispelled in a cloud of pathetic fallacy when a rough hewn fellow, clad only in tartan, emerges from the Perth Kilt Run to utter his fateful warning; beware the Ides of October, (or whatever date the Prime Minister has in mind for the election) before being dragged away by handlers from the PMO.

The drama then ends, not as a tragedy, but as a farce, with multiple incidents of backstabbing as well as the immortal line, "I come not to praise John Fenik, but to bury him in the next election."