The Scene. To his credit, Christian Paradis did not avoid the House this afternoon. No doubt knowing he would face a new round of questions about the latest in an unfortunate series of circumstances, the former minister of public works and current minister of natural resources took his seat along the front row all the same.

No doubt knowing he would not have to rise to answer a single one of these questions, he surely did so quite comfortably.

“Mr. Speaker, in September 2007, one week before it closed, the request for proposals for renovation of the West Block North Tower was amended and the qualifications needed to bid dramatically downgraded,” Liberal Marcel Proulx said first, reviewing the newest revelation for the benefit of the House. “Experts in the construction industry have said this would have benefited only one bidder, LM Sauvé.”

Nearly every other day of the last month has brought some new curiosity such as this—another clipping to tape to the wall in search of connections. Were it not for Richard Nixon, it might all be the stuff of whispered conversations around the booths at Hy’s. As it is, 38 years after those two-bit burglaries, we sit around the press gallery wondering how properly to attach the suffix “gate” to the situation.

Once more it is difficult to know whether to curse or thank the 37th president of the United States.

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