Pubdate: Wed, 14 Apr 2010 Source: Kamloops This Week (CN BC) Copyright: 2010 Kamloops This Week Contact: http://www.kamloopsthisweek.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1271 POLITICAL ROT SPREADS ITS ROOTS AGAIN Erstwhile solicitor general Kash Heed may not have known anything about some truly sleazy election campaign leaflets that were distributed to a specific ethnicity in his Vancouver-Fraserview riding the dying days of the May 2009 provincial election. Heed says he had nothing to do with the printing and distribution of the leaflets, which were sent to Chinese-Canadian voters and claimed the NDP would legalize drugs and prostitution and install an inheritance tax if elected. The scare-mongering material did not identify who authorized it, which is illegal. Therefore, Elections BC banned the flyers - but not before many reached their intended audience. NDP candidate Gabriel Yiu, who lost the election to Heed by less than 800 votes, firmly believes the mailout was organized by malevolent Liberals and timed so his campaign team would not have time to respond. He may be right. A Richmond company, North America Mailing, arranged for the flyers to be delivered through the mail. The owner of the firm is Dinesh Khanna. The Vancouver Sun has identified his son as Amit Khanna, who worked on Heed's campaign. For some reason, the elder Khanna will not divulge who paid for the distribution of the material. That silence speaks volumes. Heed may have won the election via legitimate votes at the ballot box. But it appears as though his victory may have been aided by the sleaziest of politics, by an unfounded smear campaign that contributes to the rot in politics that never seems to go out of style, regardless of the party banner behind such reprehensible behaviour. If it emerges that Heed's campaign staff was behind the perverse political power play (and need we really add an "if"?), it behooves the former solicitor general to step down and create a byelection so that he and Yiu can square off in a fair election fight - regardless of whether he knew about the dirty tricks. Heed speaks often of his accomplishments as leader of the West Vancouver Police Department. He should know, then, that a leader rises and falls on the merits, or lack thereof, of his soldiers. Will Heed ultimately show the class and honour that is so often missing in politics today? Will his leader, Premier Gordon Campbell, insist on it, once the origins of this sordid mess are revealed? - --- MAP posted-by: Jo-D