Angry in the Great White North
The Gary Lunn Phone Call: Not so imaginary
Tuesday, November 29, 2005 at 12:37 PM

Read other posts by Steve Janke published by the National Post
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Based on some nagging doubts and some solid information, I decided to double check into the story about the mysterious phone calls being made in the riding of Conservative MP Gary Lunn.

As you might recall, there was a story posted at Free Dominion, alleging that people in Gary Lunn's riding were getting calls from someone pretending to be representing Gary Lunn, and during the course of the conversation, dropping the bombshell that Gary Lunn does not support Conservative Party leader Stephen Harper.

That was reported on Sunday, two days ago.

Yesterday, I called Gary Lunn's office and spoke to Logan, an executive assistant, who said he had not heard of this, and that it was not likely to be true. We all chalked it up to an internet myth.

Another day has gone by. I just got off the phone with Logan, and the story has changed somewhat. True to his word, he found his boss and talked to him about it. This is what he understands happened. Someone did make a phone call to a constituent. As far as he knows, there was only one such phone call. That constituent heard something during that conversation that made him or her concerned, and then that person called Gary Lunn, who assured the constituent that all was well, including Gary Lunn's genuine support for Stephen Harper (which Logan pegged at 150%, something that, after a moment, caused us both to laugh because it seemed like such a cliche).

So is there a story here? Apparently there is, but what it is, I'm not certain yet. The truth lies somewhere in between the extremes. Something did happen. But was it a dirty trick, or just a confused political discussion?

I'll keep checking. And if you are an MP, or work for an MP of any party, and you are reading this, you might do well to check if there is a pattern of weird mischievous calls being made in your riding.

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