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UPDATED: The Third Rail: Your Daily Campaign Lookahead (Day 33)

After a (non-metaporical) fog-filled late night foray into deepest darkest Ontario late last night, Conservative Leader Stephen Harper is in Waterloo this morning, where he'll hold a "campaign event" at Sports Systems Unlimited. This afternoon, he heads to St. Catharines for a rally at Club Roma.

At some point during the day, #CLSH, as he's become known in the twitterverse, will also likely face questions on this remarkable-for-so-many-reasons essay that ran across the Sun news chain this morning, which alleges that his former deputy chief of staff, Patrick Muttart, attempted to plant, via his former PMO colleague Kory Teneycke, now Quebecor's vice-president of business development, a photo that purported to show Liberal Leader Michael Igntieff quite literally on the front lines of the Iraq war in 2002.

Yeah, that one left some of us scratching our head as well -- particularly the suggestion that the endeavour was a deliberate attempt by the Conservative Party to kill the credibility of Quebecor's nascent all-news channel. I've sent a query to the Conservative War Room asking whether Muttart has any role within the current campaign - formal or informal, paid or unpaid -- and whether they were aware of his alleged dealings with SunTV. I'll let you know what I hear back! (Last response, an hour or so ago, was "Checking".)

UPDATE: And here's that response from the Conservative War Room: 

The campaign provided Sun Media with information that had been acquired during Internet research, namely a photograph described as that of Mr. Ignatieff. The campaign made clear to Sun Media that the identity in the photograph could not be verified and that our own efforts to verify the photograph had been exhausted. Sun Media informed us that it would conduct its own verification and due diligence. Sun Media concluded that the identity could not be verified. The Sun made the right decision.

Case closed? Oh, somehow I doubt that - but let's watch and see how the day unfolds, shall we? 


Speaking of Ignatieff, he'll be steering the Big Red Bus back towards the increasingly crucial electoral 416/905 battleground later today - figuratively, that is; I assume he's not actually driving the thing, although come to think of it, that might explain a lot - for a "Rise Up For Canada" rally in North York with a very special former prime ministerial guest: the one and only Jean Chretien! Before that gets underway, though, he'll hold a town hall with high school students in Sault Ste. Marie.

NDP Leader Jack Layton, meanwhile, continues to ride the orange tide, which wanders westward today with stops in Winnipeg and Edmonton, and back in Quebec, Gilles Duceppe continues his Wild Palms-in-reverse "Everything must stay!" tour.

For all the latest updates, keep your eyes glued to the ticker. 

A sampling of what you'll find there: 


Tags: blackberry jungle, day 33, third rail