Blamestorming

What do you do with a disaster like Stephane Dion's cave-cam fiasco?

You sack a videographer who was given 25 minutes to tape a 20-minute clip, because the brain trust was re-writing his speech hours after they were supposed to be done. According to the Halifax Chronicle-Herald:

On Friday, Liberal sources said, [Johanne Senecal, Dion's chief of staff] moved to fire Mick Gzowski, the party’s veteran videographer.

She did that although he didn’t have enough time to professionally produce the video because Mr. Dion’s inner circle did not finish the text of his speech in time, Liberal staffers say.

"They gave the video guys 25 minutes to shoot 20 minutes worth of video," a veteran Liberal staffer said.

An investigation will show the video crew isn’t to blame, the staffer said.

"Email traffic will show they were screwing around with text hours later than they should have been."

Ms. Senecal could not be reached for comment Friday. She was motivated to fire Mr. Gzowski, one staffer said, because the Liberal caucus was looking for blood.

A staffer said Mr. Dion and his team have lost the confidence not only of the Liberal caucus but also of Liberal staff.

"I am a f---ing Liberal and I don’t think they’re competent enough to run the government," the staffer said.

I don't know if Gzowski is the same Liberal staffer who did Dion's video diaries during the election campaign. I have to confess, I rather liked those, and I wish the Conservatives had done the same. They were lively, energetic, well-edited, mercifully brief, entertaining and they came about as close as possible to turning a sow's ear into a silk purse.

Oh well. Gzowski shouldn't be too upset about being scapegoated. He'll probably get a quiet severance package. And, really: everyone from Dion's office, including Senecal, has about a month left of employment anyways before the whole office is, uh, retired. Gzowski at least has a head start over the others for finding a new job.