Angry in the Great White North

Stephane Dion is running for the Liberal Party leadership. I have to admit I like the guy. His ability to get Quebec separatists worked up has always been a pleasure to watch.

His website is full of the typical leadership propaganda.

But the interesting thing is in the registration:

Domain stephanedion.ca
Registrant Name Federal Liberal Association of Saint-Laurent/Cartierville
Registrar Webserve Canada (Canada Technology Enterprise Inc.)
Renewal Date 2008/11/16
Date approved 2005/11/16
Last changed 2006/04/04
Description
Registrar Number 1046415
Registrant Number 1361197
Domain Number 1361202
DNS1
mag2.magma.ca
DNS2
mag1.magma.ca
DNS3
mag3.magma.ca
DNS4

DNS5

DNS6

Administrative Contact
Name Stephane Dion
Job Title Member of Parliament
Postal Address Federal Liberal Association of Saint-Laurent/Cartierville P.O Box 5371 Succursale Saint-Laurent Saint-Laurent QC H4L 4Z9 Canada
Phone +1.5148551441
Fax +1.5148551441
Email angelo.gianluca.cairo@umontreal.ca

Notice that Stephane Dion is listed as the administrative contact, but the email is for Angelo Gianluca Cairo.

No problem there. Cairo is actually Dion's executive assistant.

Here's a quick bio for Angelo Gianluca Cairo from the Canada Research Chair in Electoral Studies (CRCES):

Gianluca Cairo is an M.Sc candidate in the Department of Political Science at the Universite de Montreal. His research interests include voting behaviour, political attitudes and values and public opinion toward political institutions. His current research focuses on the political impact of declining social trust in Canada since 1990. Gianluca is a proud graduate of the University of Toronto (2002).

Now I have to wonder whether one of the aspects of the electoral process Cairo studied is the likelihood of terminal suckiness in a candidate:

Domain stephanedionsucks.ca
Registrant Name Gianluca Cairo
Registrar Webserve Canada (Canada Technology Enterprise Inc.)
Renewal Date 2007/06/09
Date approved 2006/06/09
Last changed 2006/06/10
Description
Registrar Number 1046415
Registrant Number 1554987
Domain Number 1554992
DNS1
ns40.servepower.com
DNS2
ns41.servepower.com
DNS3

DNS4

DNS5

DNS6

Administrative Contact
Name A. Gianluca Cairo
Job Title
Postal Address 795 Rue Tait Montreal QC H4M2L1 Canada
Phone +1.5145921615
Fax +1.5145921615
Email g_cairo@hotmail.com

Technical Contact
Name A. Gianluca Cairo
Job Title
Postal Address 795 Rue Tait Montreal QC H4M2L1 Canada
Phone +1.5145921615
Fax +1.5145921615
Email g_cairo@hotmail.com

The site itself is not active, and as far as I can, has never been active.

Does Stephane Dion know that his executive assistant has registered StephaneDionSucks.ca in June of this year?

Is Cairo hedging his bets, quietly collecting info for a takedown site?

Is Cairo working for another candidate on the sly?

Or was the site registered with Dion's knowledge, protecting against such a site being registered and used by Dion's opponents? But then why just "sucks"? Why not "lies" or "cheats" or "blows"? And why the Hotmail email address instead of the University of Montreal email address used for the leadership site? And who does he think would do this? Volpe? Ignatieff? Some Parti Quebecois troublemaker?

I really hope it is the last case. If it's anything else, then Cairo is a prime example of the "declining social trust" he was researching with CRCES.

I'll try to get in touch with Cairo and find out what the full story is here.