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And: even if all of the government’s arguments were true, they still wouldn’t make the case for interfering with a prosecution. The maxim is not that an attorney general may not be pressured unless the prime minister has a good reason. It is that she may not be pressured, period.

That’s true as a general principle. It is doubly true when, as the evidence suggests, the reasons were transparently political: the fears, expressed to Wilson-Raybould and her chief of staff on several occasions, that an adverse decision on SNC-Lavalin would harm the party’s political interests in Quebec. And it is triply true when the pressure takes the form, as in the Dec. 19 conversation with the clerk, of threatening her dismissal.

And these are the “respectable” arguments! Of even less relevance are the many and disgraceful attacks on the former attorney general’s conduct, motives and character.

Certainly it is hard to see the sort of obvious error that might conceivably justify the attorney general overruling her

Why did she not resign if she were under such pressure, it is asked, pointedly, as if this was enough to disprove all the evidence that she was, or as if she were under some sort of moral or even legal obligation to — spoiler: there is no such obligation — or as if the issue were not others’ misconduct, but her reaction to it.

The same applies to attempts to impugn her record as attorney general, notably the leaked “revelation” that she recommended an appointment to the Supreme Court the prime minister disliked. That may or may not provide an alternate explanation of why she was removed as minister of justice and attorney general. But her demotion is only a small part of the overall story: the attempted interference in a prosecution is the issue, and would remain so, whatever her fate, and whatever the reasons for it.

And again, with regard to speculation about her motives (was she resentful at being demoted? is she trying to bring down the prime minister?) or attacks on her character (is she naive? difficult? selfish?): true or not, they do not alter one iota the truth of her testimony, or the impropriety of what they reveal. They are just more red herrings, in a veritable sea of them.