Ralph Klein’s chief of staff once described his boss as “a cat with nine lives.”

Klein committed a multitude of blunders during his 26 year career in civic and provincial politics that most politicians would not have survived. Some even called him the Teflon premier because no controversy seemed to stick to him for very long.

Martha and Henry and the Grundys, as Klein often called the average Albertan, could not hold a grudge. Here’s a look at nine headline grabbing mini-scandals of Klein’s colourful career.

1. Bums and Creeps

Klein never did call newcomers to Alberta “bums and creeps” when he was Calgary mayor. What he did say at a Calgary Newcomers Club dinner on Jan. 6, 1982, was his city does not welcome “bums” and he’ll protect Calgarians from “a lot of creeps” looking for work.

Although he never used the word “eastern” he claimed there were more Quebeckers in Calgary jails than First Nations people. What Klein was trying to say was the city did not need unskilled, uneducated, and unemployed transients from other provinces who would simply add to the unemployment lines, welfare rolls and jail populations. But the comment vilified Klein in central and Eastern Canada.

2. Flipping the ‘bird’

As environment minister in Don Getty’s cabinet in 1990, Klein took heat from environmentalists at a press conference to announce the approval of the controversial Alberta Pacific pulp mill. First Nations communities were upset the pulp mills were polluting lakes and streams, and environmentalists were calling for tougher pollution controls. And they didn’t always express themselves politely.

When bearded and parka-clad activist Randy Lawrence came up to the stage to give each of the officials at the press conference “the finger,” Klein flipped him the same gesture in return. A photographer captured the one-finger salute and, once again, Klein was in hot water for his unseemly behaviour.

3. Multi-Corp

The Multi-Corp scandal in 1995 nearly ended Klein’s reign as premier only three years after it began. Liberal Frank Bruseker pushed Klein’s career to the edge when he revealed the premier’s wife Colleen had purchased shares in the computer software company shortly after Klein had participated in a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the company’s Hong Kong office.

It turned out to be a sweetheart deal since Colleen wasn’t required to pay for the shares, which she acquired at below market price, until she sold them. Klein vowed to resign if Ethics Commissioner Bob Clark found him guilty. Clark eventually ruled there had been a technical breach of the law, but that it had been unintentional.

4. Shoot, shovel and shut-up

One of Klein’s most remembered remarks occurred in the midst of the 2003 mad cow crisis when he infamously told a meeting of Western Governors in Big Sky, Mont., that “any self respecting rancher would have shot, shovelled and shut up” after discovering one of his cows was suffering from bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE. “Instead he took it to an abattoir and it was discovered after testing in both Winnipeg and the U.K. that this cow had mad cow disease,” the premier said.