The Walrus Blog

Brian Mulroney's Greatest Hits

“My biggest mistake in life, by far, was ever agreeing to be introduced to Karlheinz Schreiber in the first place,” Mr. Mulroney said. The former prime minister said his second biggest mistake was accepting cash payments from Mr. Schreiber.
-The Globe and Mail, December 13

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“My biggest mistake in life, by far, was ever agreeing to be introduced to G. Gordon Liddy in the first place,” Mr. Nixon said. The former president added that, on reflection, his second biggest mistake was probably ordering Mr. Liddy to break into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee and plant a wire, and then lying to the country about it for years.

****

“My biggest mistake in life, by far, was ever agreeing to be introduced to Christine Keeler in the first place,” Mr. Profumo said. The former British politician was unsure whether his second biggest mistake was having an illicit affair with Ms. Keeler; continuing the affair after learning she was linked to a Soviet spy; or lying about the whole thing to Parliament. “Those things were also rather bad,” he agreed.

****

“My biggest mistake in life, by far, was ever agreeing to meet Virgil ‘The Turk’ Sollozzo for dinner in the first place,” Godfather Michael Corleone told Peter at the Gates of Heaven. He said his second biggest mistake was ordering the steak tartare, which he found bland and a little dry. When pressed, Mr. Corleone conceded that shooting Mr. Sollozzo in the face, then going on to lead an organized crime family, was “at least third.”

****

“My biggest mistake in life, by far, was ever agreeing to be introduced to that serpent in the first place,” a supernatural apparition of biblical Eve told a stunned crowd of onlookers at 42nd and Broadway today. She then admitted that accepting the forbidden apple from the serpent and eating it, thereby condemning all of humankind to eternal sin, was also “kind of questionable.”

Posted in Bright Lights

  • Sean P.

    “My biggest mistake in life, by far, was ever agreeing to play with those cute little puppies in the first place,â€? Mr. Vick said. In a rare moment of openness, he then conceded that maiming, torturing and killing them was “almost certainlyâ€? top five. “But let’s be honest,â€? he added, “PETA’s reaction was a little extreme.”

  • Miles More

    Well this is a with-it post, with interesting similarities across five cases. How clever.

    There is one important difference of Mulroney to the base cases. For Eve, Corleone, Profumo and Nixon, each was on their respective acropolis when each made their biggest mistake. Mulroney, on the other hand, needed Schreiber’s help to make it up to the the PMO.

    Arguably, if Karlheinz had not financed the fly-ins from QC to the PC convention, Joe Clark would have gone on to an illustrious career as kindly but bumbling Tory complement to Pearson.


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