SO ARROGANT HE DIDN’T EVEN BOTHER TO CENSOR HIMSELF.

Well, wasn’ t that kind of Gerald Butts? In his testimony on Snc-lavalin before the House of Commons justice committee Wednesday, the prime minister’s former principal secretary made it clear that he didn’t want to call anyone names. He had a completely different take from Jody Wilson-raybould on much of what was said and what had happened in the months leading up to the Liberal cabinet shuffle, but he deliberately shied away from calling her testimony false or calling her a liar.

It’s a difference in perspective, he said. We’re all people. We all make mistakes. Demoting WilsonRaybould in the cabinet shuffle was just a coincidence. There was no pressure on her.

In fact, he was so mellow about the whole thing that it came as a bit of a shock when, towards the end of the question and answer period, he noted with what seemed like frustration and a hint of anger: “Had everybody on the team done what the prime minister asked of them, then we would not be having this conversation today.”

Well, indeed.

So, no hard feelings, no pointing fingers or anything, but if that witch WilsonRaybould had just shut up, sat down, and done as she was told by the people who matter, we wouldn’t be in this stinking mess to begin with.

I have absolutely no doubt that Butts believes this to be true and absolutely no doubt that it is true. The disturbing part is that he doesn’t seem to realize that it’s exactly this attitude that has appalled and turned off Canadians since the Snc-lavalin scandal was uncovered. It is exactly this attitude that has made voters question whether the Trudeau government was ever even serious about cleaning up politics and respecting and cultivating female leaders. Butts watched his words so carefully, but he was too arrogant to realize that he ought to have censored himself when it came to his view on what this is all about.

Come to think of it, there were several areas where Butts might have been wiser to hold his tongue.

For instance, Butts mentioned that he worried about the 9,000 jobs that would be lost if Snc-lavalin were prosecuted (and presumably convicted). Green Party Leader Elizabeth May, with probably the best question of the day, asked him what the evidence was to support this alleged threat to jobs and why he believed it to be true when Snc-lavalin has $15 billion in back orders and is in excellent financial state.

Butts had no answer. He replied, “I cannot recall anything specific. … I cannot cite a specific study being done on a specific day by a specific person.” He insisted he’d just been — in general — briefed.

No one was expecting him to recite by heart the geographical co-ordinates of the economists on whose research his assertion was based, but the fact that he couldn’t offer even the slightest bit of solid evidence to back up an argument that was central to his entire statement was surprising and baffling . The only explanation I can think of is that he believed if he repeated the statement about 9,000 lost jobs roughly 9,000 times, it would become true. He certainly gave that a valiant try.

Speaking of good efforts, Butts put his heart into pushing the idea that the reason he (a non-lawyer) was so desperate for WilsonRaybould (a lawyer) to have the benefit of outside legal advice that she didn’t ask for and didn’t want, was that the Remediation Agreement legislation was so new, they desperately needed help interpreting it and figuring out what was legal.

Which is convincing for a few seconds until you realize that it was Butts’ government that drafted the legislation in the first place.

The time to have sought wise counsel from legal experts about the thing was BEFORE slipping it into a budget bill and having it become law. I know it may not seem that way, but the goal when drafting legislation is to make it clear and understandable. The way Butts was going on about it, you’d have thought the Remediation Agreements legislation was some mysterious tome that only secret retired-supreme-courtjustice decoder rings could untangle.

In his testimony following Butts’, top civil servant Michael Wernick said that it was made clear to WilsonRaybould that she was the decider. Which tracks with what Butts said.

Wilson-raybould was totally the decider. She was merely given context about the fact that as the decider, coming to the wrong conclusion would make all the ensuing fallout her fault. Anyone who told her this has been true to his word.

ATTITUDE ... APPALLED AND TURNED OFF CANADIANS SINCE THE SNC-LAVALIN SCANDAL WAS UNCOVERED.