This is where they draw the line

More on the $100 million honeypot: The story du jour is that it was Mulroney what done it. That's according to Martin himself. Problem: somebody forgot to tell his operatives, who were telling reporters it was set up by the Liberals in 1995. Indeed, as CP reports,

Liberals couldn't even apparently agree on what the fund was used for by Chretien, who was said to have personally approved each of its expenditures. One said it was used to fight separatism in Quebec, while others said it helped fund goodwill events across the country. None seemed to know where to find its contents in the public record.

Not that anyone seems unduly perturbed over on the government's side. Not Stephane Dion:

"I'm not sure how it was working. I know when there were specific problems to fix, I was pleased to use it when it was possible," said Dion, who was the intergovernmental affairs minister under Chretien. "It was generally for things that filled Canadians with pride that needed to be properly financed, and quickly."

Not Pierre Pettigrew:

Health Minister Pierre Pettigrew says money from the fund was always properly documented. "It needed to be approved by Treasury Board," he said. "It had to go through all the normal things, and it was all published in the public accounts of Canada."

And not Reg Alcock, the guy who's supposed to be piloting the space-age new "expenditure management and control system" with "real-time tracking mechanisms" (couldn't they just buy a copy of Quicken?):

Treasury Board President Reg Alcock defended the fund, saying the money was being used to fund "worthy public events." "All of the transactions have been reported. And it's been funding things like Terry Fox, Canada Day. They've been reported through their departments and reported in public accounts. So I'm not sure what the concern is."

Sounds a lot like... the sponsorship program. Except it's different, of course. Nobody actually stole any money here, so far as we know. And that seems to be the line the Liberals are drawing: it's all right for the Prime Minister to have kept $100 million stashed away in a secret fund that doesn't show up anywhere in any budget, to be spent on no one knows what, without controls or checks of any kind, just so long as no laws were broken. Of course, there is such a thing as criminal negligence. POSTSCRIPT: Great line from Greg Weston's column today: "Paul Martin's first federal budget as prime minister is not so much the Liberal government's plan to spend our money, as it is a promise to stop stealing it." POSTERSCRIPT: An anonymous senior government official also shrugs off the honeypot as no big deal:

He said it's common for governments to sometimes hide a cash reserve to maintain the upper hand in public-sector negotiations and out-of-court settlements... One expert called the existence of secret reserves anything but normal. “It surprises me,” said Ann Rooney of the Canadian Association of Chartered Accountants. “This is exactly the kind of area where transparency and accountability should be crucial.