Daily Dot: Crosbie at 75

On Jan. 30, 1931, John Crosbie was born. Although he has been out of elected office for more than a dozen years, Crosbie still looms large; he comments, of course, frequently on politics, and has also been involved in other issues, from the takeover of FPI to municipal planning in his home community in Portugal Cove.

I've interviewed Crosbie many times over the years, most recently just after Christmas, about the death of his contemporary, Sen. Bill Doody. The interview that stands out the most, though, was one in the fall of 1989, which was exceptional for its duration, subject matter and circumstances. I was writing a piece for the Sunday Express, where I worked at the time, on the 1969 leadership convention of the provincial Liberal party. Crosbie, who was a federal cabinet minister at the time, wanted to put aside more than a few minutes for the interview, and we eventually wound up talking, at length, on a weekend afternoon in which he was with his family in a New Brunswick hotel room and I was on vacation in Ontario. It was a revealing and candid interview and I was grateful for it, and proud of the piece that came out of it.

Crosbie has never held back when handling his targets, and journalists are among them. When I was involved with the local chapter of the Canadian Association of Journalists, we asked Crosbie to attend a forum on the media; he came with all barrels blazing. He made a point afterwards of saying that the individuals in the room weren't on his hit list - just the folks in charge.

Comments

[Bill Doskoch]

On election night on NTV, Crosbie said: "Power corrupts, and fear of losing power corrupts absolutely."

His old political rival George Baker said, in a search for good news, that voter turnout was up, even in the prisons.

"I think George is inferring there's a lot of Liberals in the prisons," Crosbie said in reply.