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What was Jody Wilson-Raybould thinking when she left cabinet?

If the answer is clear, the cost is not. Wilson-Raybould had to leave a government that had put “inappropriate” pressure on her as minister of justice. In herj’accuse, she airily invoked Watergate and the Saturday Night Massacre.

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“I am a truth-teller,” she declares, claiming a monopoly on truth, even if her truth brings down her government.

Conservatives and New Democrats applaud, lamenting “moral calamity” and seeing corruption on the level of Donald Trump’s America. Commentators work themselves into a rich lather of outrage with a particularly Canadian scent.

Jane Philpott says her principles will not allow her to stay in cabinet, either. She was a star of the government – a confident practitioner with a social conscience and an affecting story of personal loss. It is about integrity, she says.

So, both Philpott and Wilson-Raybould have walked away. Maybe they know something we don’t. Maybe they deserve the Profile in Courage Award. Or maybe this is about impulse, affront and self-righteousness – how to feel sanctimonious today while things fall apart tomorrow.