Way back in the before time, when I was a young’un, in my circle of friends there was an arrogant little shit by the name of Scott Browntree.
In addition to being little, and more than a little arrogant, Scott always had an undeserved sense of self-entitlement about him and a very annoying habit of being the one to say, “I told you so”. What made Scott totally unbearable, and on the receving end of many a good pounding, was that on most occassions he was just flat out lying.
Ricky – “Hey, Gudmundson, bet you can’t put that bee in your mouth”.
“Fuck-you, can too!”
I put the bee in my mouth.
Bee gets pissed off and stings me on the tongue causing extreme pain and agony, Ricky, John, Melvin, Phillip and Brad laughing their assess off. Scott – “I told you so”.
Hargraves – ”Brownie – You Die!”….and would lay a beatdown on Scott.
Wouldn’t matter. Whether it was putting bees in our mouths, climbing garages or putting on “cans” and kicking each other in the nuts – on the rare occassion when something did go wrong, Scott was there with his, “I told you so”.
We could never figure out would possess Scott to say, “I told you so”, when he didn’t. Or, even if he did, no one likes to be on the receiving end of those four words anyway. Perhaps the only four words that one hates more are: `we have to talk`, `your test is positive`, or `we`re moving to Regina`.
Regardless, Scott kept coming back for more.. Each time with his ”I told you so”. We’d retaliate and beat the hell out of him, go home for the day and basically run the same scenario the next day. Not much else going on in a trailer park in Sutherland circa 1970.
So today, here we have Hugh McFadyen filling in for Scott.
“There were a lot of naysayers back in 2007 – I’m glad they are being proven wrong today.”
uhhhh…… Hugh.
Let’s be clear about this.
It was Today’s NDP with Gary Doer as the Premier, and Greg Selinger as the Minister of Finance, that put together the deal that allowed TNSE to build the MTS Centre.
That deal placed the operations of the Centre in the hands of TNSE, not government. It also divested government of the risk associated with operating the Centre, and any sports team. In short, when the deal was done the Province was no longer on the hook for future losses or cost-overruns.
The reason that the Jets left back in 1996 was that the economy had been drivin into the ground by your fiscal policies, and the business model for the operations of the Arena and any sports team was fatally flawed. Additionally, your government signed off on a deal to cover the operating losses of the then, Winnipeg Jets. Kind of like a Glendale of the 90s.
Fast-forward to 2007, you’ve gone from Gary Filmon’s Chief of Staff to working with Mike Harris on privatizing Hydro, over to London, and then back to Manitoba.
In the 2007 election, you made it a campaign promise to bring back the Jets.
At that time, you promised to provide, “both capital and operating support” and back a bond issue to bring back the Jets.
By back-stopping a bond issue, it would have placed the government in the same boat as Glendale, and, there is little doubt that, under such an arrangement should the team run into trouble the government would have to pony up.
So your, “I told you so” is not only annoying, it is also false.
I’m thinking at the very least, an atomic-wedgie is in order here.
