The guys at SCHotline were granted unfettered access to U.S. Ambassador to Canada and rumored South Carolina gubernatorial candidate David Wilkins. They traveled to Ottawa for three days and have posted their account of day one. Here are the highlights:

We were with him twenty four hours a day we even stayed at his personal residence in Ottawa. No reporter/interviewer has been granted such total and unfettered access to the Ambassador.

After arriving in Ottawa I was driven to the Ambassador’s residence “Lornado” - named after a favorite novel of the original owner. It is a ten acre estate that is perched atop the Ottawa and Gatineau Rivers and offers remarkable views of the Gatineau Hills in Quebec. It has 32 rooms and I was assigned a room on the third floor overlooking the river. [...]

Ambassador Wilkins’ office has all the flavor of South Carolina and Canada. There is a clock with the South Carolina state seal on one wall and a map of Canada on another wall. Looking out his window you can see Parliament Hill but if you look on that same wall you will see a picture of the South Carolina Statehouse. There is no doubt he keeps his eyes on Canada but his heart is in South Carolina.

The Ambassador has an interview with nationally syndicated columnist Deirdre McMurdy talking about the copyright laws in Canada. Canada has the weakest copyright laws of the G-7. Just recently it passed an anti-camcorder act in parliament but has yet to act on strengthening the full copyright laws. Needless to say, the US and other nations would like Canada to change its laws and this is one area Ambassador Wilkins is working on. You can see the whole article here. Copyright act key to Canada’s industrial strategy.

Around 4:30 PM the Ambassador tells me he forgot to tell me but I will need to leave the office because he will be receiving a classified briefing from a top level law enforcement agent on world affairs. Soon a woman comes to his office holding about 8″ of paper with a folder marked TOP SECRET. I wait outside in the hall while he receives his briefing.

The time arrives for us to go back to the residence and freshen up before the reception of the night. This night it is to benefit the U.S.-Canadian Forum on Mental Health. There are about 160 people in attendance and the Ambassador has agreed to open his house and show some Southern Hospitality. He makes a speech about the house and then talks about the friendship the United States has with Canada. After they all leave we sat down to eat the leftover hors d’oeuvres but before we do he asks his wife to say a blessing for the food. He tells me this is a just a typical day that starts early in the morning and keeps on going into the evening.

“We host one or two of these events a week like this,” he says, while eating some of the leftover shrimp. After we are finished he helps gather up the plates to take them into the kitchen. He then asks the staff to have breakfast ready at 7:15. He looks at me and says we need to leave by 7:40 for the radio station where he is being interviewed tomorrow. So ends our first day in the life of the Ambassador.

Read the full story…

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Photo: Wilkins speaks with MLA John van Dongen. Courtesy of Canada.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 18th, 2007 at 9:02 pm and is filed under Republicans. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.