Orders of the Day - Questions about Jason Kenney and the ethnic vote? Over to you, InfoAlerteBot!

The InfoAlerteBot wranglers were burning the midnight oil last night in an effort to craft an appropriately penitent response to the inadvertent disclosure of the Conservative Party's pre-writ ethnic advertising campaign, which was inadvertently dispatched -- by hand, twice -- to NDP MP Linda Duncan, thanks to what appears to have been a particularly unfortunate identity mix-up by a now former staffer in the office of Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney.

The result? One of the few Bot-dispatched missives that appears to be an actual set of talking points -- and not, as is usually the case, a thinly disguised news release strategically imbued with the cachet of "internal memo". It even takes into account the possibility of follow-up questions, which is a first, as far as I can recall.

(My favourite part is where it acknowledges, albeit in the most passive of voices, that the minister "gave the instruction" to hit up Conservative riding associations for a bit of pre-writ cash, but "fully expected" that it would be done "after hours and on the appropriate letterhead.")

From: Alerte-Info-Alert
To: Alerte-Info-Alert
Sent: Thu Mar 03 16:45:13 2011
Subject: Letter from the Member from Calgary Southeast / Lettre du député de Calgary Sud-Est

Letter from the Member from Calgary Southeast

Today, a letter regarding Conservative Party business was mistakenly printed on House of Commons letterhead. The letter encourages riding associations to make a financial commitment for the next election.

• This is very serious and unacceptable.
• The employee responsible for this matter has offered the Minister his resignation and the Minister has accepted it.
• Minister Kenney has taken responsibility for this and has apologized for his former employee's actions.
• Using parliamentary or government resources for partisan activities is completely unacceptable.
• Minister Kenney will be raising this matter with the Speaker of the House, the Ethics Commissioner and the Board of Internal Economy.

If asked if Minister Kenney instructed this employee to send this letter:

• Minister Kenney gave the instruction to have riding associations contacted.
• But as is always the case in these matters, he fully expected that this would be done after hours and on the appropriate letterhead.
• As previously stated, this employee has offered Minister Kenney his resignation and Minister Kenney has accepted it.

If asked on the purpose of the deck:

• Since its creation, the new Conservative Party has made earning the support of Canadians of all ethnic backgrounds a priority.
• We will continue this important work and will make no apologies for it.

In what may well be an (as it turns out, somewhat awkwardly timed) attempt at "breaking through" and "building the Conservative brand" within a particular cultural community, the prime minister heads across the river tonight for a rare-ish evening appearance at the Canadian Museum of Civilization.