Headline: “He ‘destroyed my life,' girlfriend says.”
Then she returned the favour.
So many questions remain unanswered in the wake of the Profumo-like scandal that brought down former cabinet minister Maxime “Mad Max” Bernier this week:
What was he doing in Julie Couillard's house so long after they had broken up? Why did he leave sensitive documents there? Then, when he realized they were missing, why didn't he ask for them back? Why did she take so long to say she had them?
And why did she have to do it so publicly? “Honey,” so many of the pundits seem to be saying, “why you gotta go and be like that?”
If you ask me, he did it to himself. He set the trap, carefully arranged the sticks and leaves over the pit, then stepped on it and fell in. If ever a man was “hoist by his own petard,” it was Mr. Bernier (with Ms. Couillard the petard).
To me, the whole thing looks like a “booty call” gone horribly wrong.
At first, I was perplexed by the timelines of their relationship. They broke up in January, supposedly, perhaps even December (she decided to end it, she says, “shortly before Christmas”).
Yet they were seen together after that at numerous political functions.
I finally figured out why: She was honouring the kooky edict she claims he delivered in the early days of their courtship, that no matter what happened in their relationship she would continue to pretend to be his girlfriend – to be his “official” girlfriend – for at least a year. Otherwise, she said, Mr. Bernier was afraid it would be bad for his image. He didn't want it to seem like he changed girlfriends, Ms. Couillard says, “like you change your shirts, as they say.”
But clearly, something a little less, or more, than “official” happened that one day in April, because it goes above and beyond the call of booty – I mean, duty – for him to wind up back at her place, with a bunch of sensitive government documents in his briefcase. Documents he then proceeded, with what can only be described as a willful, fateful wantonness or self-destructiveness, to leave behind!
Why didn't he call for them in the next day or two? My wife, Pam, thinks he must have been drunk (that's how so many of these “reunions” seem to happen) and had no idea ex post facto where he left them. But I think if you've experienced a recidivistic tryst with an ex, and then you can't find some papers in the next day or two, you have a pretty good idea where they are.
Anyway, it doesn't matter. My point is: Even after they broke up, she honoured her promise to him. She set aside her feelings of disgust, boredom, bitterness, anger, whatever led her to give him the boot in the first place, and allowed herself to be squired around to numerous (what had to be heinously dull) functions as his “official” girlfriend.
Quite menschy, in my view. Noble, even. The last thing you want to do when you've broken up with someone is go around to a bunch of parties pretending to be his girlfriend.
But she did, because she promised she would, and she honoured that promise. Even though they were broken up, she was loyal, she had his back.
If only he had her back. And if only he'd been as much of a mensch as she was, he'd probably still have a job.
If he had just defended her a bit when the news broke that she used to date some bikers, and said, “Hey, you know what, I did know about her past, but she's still a wonderful woman, and she's put it all behind her.”
