OTTAWA — Official Ottawa has been on edge for days now, positively twittering in anticipation and counting down the hours until the SPEECH.
The excitement was over John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential candidate, who two weeks ago decided he wanted to come to Canada – not to Toronto or Calgary or Montreal, but to Ottawa – to speak about free trade.
And it was – this is no exaggeration – the political event of the parliamentary season in Ottawa, which appropriately ended Friday with not only the rising of the House of Commons for its summer break but the McCain speech.
Never before had a presumptive presidential nominee spoken in Canada.
So special was the McCain event that the tables – $2,000 for some and $5,000 for the premium tables – sold out in about 10 minutes, according to Mark Adler, the president of the Economic Club of Canada, which put on the event.
Guests were not issued invitations, but rather told to show up 30 minutes before the lunch, present picture identification and be checked off from a list before being issued their invitations and table numbers.
And so nearly 400 people (as many as the fire marshals would allow) jammed into the ballroom of the venerable Fairmont Château Laurier, a venue that exemplifies political Ottawa – Pierre Trudeau gave his concession speech there in 1979, and his victory speech in 1980 – and is also one of the easier local venues to secure.
Mr. McCain was accompanied by a phalanx of dark-suited security guards and advance-team types, who tried to elbow Canadian parliamentary reporters out of the way, even trying to entice one reporter, Global TV's Hannah Boudreau, with an offer of a free lunch if she left the area where the cameras were located.
She didn't.
So she was there to see Mr. McCain in person. The senior senator from Arizona is much smaller in person than he appears on television and looks a lot younger than his 71 years. (However, it was jokingly said in the introduction that Mr. McCain keeps up such a hectic schedule that 70 is now the new 50.)
His Canadian audience gave him a standing ovation when he walked into the ballroom, which would have played well back in the United States. In fact, Mr. McCain didn't eat with everyone else, as he was in a special reception, having his picture taken with some of the luncheon sponsors.
Such a draw was he that an entire planeload of Mike Harris Tories came in for the lunch from Toronto; there were oil and gas guys from Alberta and senior business people from Saskatchewan.
There were few real politicians, however, as some Tories feared they'd look too partisan if they showed. Foreign Affairs Minister David Emerson was the only cabinet minister there, sitting with Tom d'Aquino, head of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives and a big free trader.
Few Liberals were in the crowd: Opposition whip Karen Redman and local Ottawa MPs David McGuinty and Mauril Bélanger.
Ms. Redman said that, when she mentioned to some friends that she was attending the McCain speech, they were curious why she was going to see that “French-fries guy” – suggesting that not everyone was as excited as those in political Ottawa.
Although Tory staffers seemed to stay away (there was a rumour they were told to because of the NAFTA-gate affair, in which Canadian leaks damaged the campaign of Democrat Barack Obama), the Prime Minister's senior policy man, Mark Cameron, was there as a guest of TD Bank. As well, Chief of the Defence Staff General Rick Hillier attended, as did former Liberal deputy prime minister John Manley.
There were very few women in attendance.
Mr. McCain received a standing ovation on his way out, achieving rock-star-like status as two of Jean Chrétien's former senior aides, Bruce Hartley and Stephen Hogue, waited for him to exit the hotel. As he left, entourage in tow, the two staunch Liberals yelled over to him, “Senator, Senator.” He came over and autographed their invitations.
They looked thrilled. Ottawa is rife with political junkies, no matter what stripe.
