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The soft treatment accorded Senator Mike Duffy begins to make more sense with recent revelations. Duffy billed Tory campaigns while campaigning for the party in the 2011 elections. He did this, according to reports, while also receiving an allowance for supposedly being in Ottawa on Senate business.

The likelihood is that the party, realizing there may be a double-dipping scam in the works, wanted to cover him on the residence expense controversy to shut down the story. The gift from Nigel Wright of $90,000 allowed Duffy to escape further scrutiny.

What arrangements Duffy made with party headquarters (which organized his campaigning) we don’t know. But we do know there is a lot more to this story, a story which focuses public attention on the Conservatives’ moral character like never before.

Much has been written about their odious record on ethics and abuse of power. But there’s a common thread to the narrative that is more offensive. At almost every turn you can find attempts by them to subvert the system to their advantage. The real scandal here isn’t excessive expenditures by Senate members — though given the involvement of the Prime Minister’s Office, it is serious enough. The real story is serial violations of the public trust. These Conservatives haven’t just breached it, as one MP said this week. “They’ve stomped all over it.”

There are countless examples, some still coming at us. One which did not get the notice it deserves — due to being overshadowed by Duffygate — is the ad campaign the Harper machine has launched for a job grants program that does not yet exist. The ads, running in prime time and costing exorbitant sums, are being paid for with public funds. The program is nowhere near being approved by Parliament, let alone by the provinces.

It’s an outrage right out of ‘fake lake‘ territory. It’s almost in a league with the Tories’ use of civil servants as stand-in stooges for a bogus citizenship ceremony a couple of years back. The full North Korean, as it was called.

The gaming of the system by the Harper gang started a long time ago, back in the 2006 campaign, with its surreptitious twisting of the rules allowing the party to exceed campaign spending limits. It became known as the in-and-out affair.

The list keeps growing. It needs to be updated every month. There’s an attitude in the Prime Minister’s Office, something to do with the arrogance of power, which has made these people think they can get away with breach of trust forever.

The subterfuge extended to other campaigns, a notable manifestation of which might turn out to be the various attempts at vote suppression now being investigated. One Conservative campaigner has been charged so far. I wouldn’t be surprised if there are many more.

Many offences have been forgotten with time. On the Senate, the Duffy imbroglio is far from unique. In the run-up to the 2011 campaign, Conservative senators used public funds to try and demonize political opponents. Mass mail-outs were sent out at the direction of national party headquarters labelling opposition members as ‘soft on crime’. Dirty work on the taxpayers’ dime.

Much has been written about how the public service has been brought to heel by an unprecedented muzzling and vetting system. Insiders say the Privy Council Office, the prime minister’s support shop — which traditionally is not supposed to involve itself in political activities — has been politicized like never before.

A stark example of breach of trust involving public monies being used for political gain was the Clementgate affair. The auditor general determined that the Harper government misled Parliament to win approval for G-8 spending monies of $50-million or so. It then turned around and used the funds on dubious pork-barrel projects in Tony Clement’s riding to improve his electoral chances.

Attempts at undermining the democratic system have seen the Harper machine put Conservative logos (until they got caught) on cheques for stimulus funds as part of their Economic Action Plan. It has seen the gagging of the science community — a community that is not exactly thrilled with its environmental policies. It has meant document tampering, suppression of research and the PMO’s denying the legislative branch of its historic right to information — this to the point of being found in contempt of Parliament.

It has meant one remarkable example after another (F-35s, the treatment of the parliamentary budget officer, to name two) of denying the press and public access to basic information. The prime minister still refuses, in a display of apparent cowardice, to hold an open-ended press conference. The results of his campaign against Statistics Canada were seen in the recently released census data, viewed as lacking in credibility.

In this government, oversight bodies have been reduced, as have databanks, as have the number of auditors, as has access to government websites.

Call campaigns have been waged against opponents like MP Irwin Cotler and in Saskatchewan on the issue of changes of electoral boundaries. The government has become the first to regularly use attack ads between writ periods. They’ve stacked the government with partisan patronage appointments after having promised to go in a different direction. They’ve snuffed out bids for democratic challenges to nominations — Rob Anders’ Calgary riding being one example.

The list keeps growing. It needs to be updated every month. There’s an attitude in the Prime Minister’s Office, something to do with the arrogance of power, which has made these people think they can get away with breach of trust forever.

They won’t. The Duffy case is but one example of a record which, should voters catch on, will spell doom for this government.

Lawrence Martin is the author of 10 books, including six national bestsellers. His most recent, Harperland, was nominated for the Shaughnessy Cohen award. His other works include two volumes on Jean Chrétien, two on Canada-U.S. relations and three books on hockey.

The views, opinions and positions expressed by all iPolitics columnists and contributors are the author’s alone. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of iPolitics.