RCMP kept files on former Liberal cabinet minister Walter Gordon

[CHIMO]

OTTAWA — RCMP intelligence officers secretly tracked politician Walter Gordon, who waved the flag of economic nationalism as a Liberal cabinet minister and advocate of an independent Canada, newly declassified records show.

The Mounties’ security branch analyzed Gordon’s political pronouncements, eyed his travels to Communist countries, monitored the outspoken figure’s views on the Vietnam War, and compiled copious notes on his family and associates.

The Canadian Press obtained the RCMP’s top secret, 272-page file on Gordon, who died in 1987, from Library and Archives Canada under the Access to Information Act. Some portions, though half a century old, were considered still too sensitive to release.

Because he was a federal cabinet minister, Gordon’s dossier was among the force’s closely held VIP Program files, a collection of 668 highly classified records on politicians, senior public servants, judges and other “high profile” individuals.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2013/02/21/rcmp_kept_files_on_former_liberal_cabinet_minister_walter_gordon.html

[Ken Burch]

1. As far as that goes, the RCMP STILL won't release the files on Tommy Douglas.

Like most police services worldwide, the Mounties are implacably opposed to anyone who advocates even the pathetically tame program of social change that the "Liberal" party there supports, let alone the NDP(who advocate Scandinavian-style social democracy at best).

[Ken Burch]

2. I'm a little puzzled by the statement that Gordon advocated "an independent Canada".

Canada was already an independent country(within the Commonwealth)during Gordon's political career(it had been since 1929).

Did The Star mean to say that Gordon advocated "a nonaligned/neutral Canada"? OR did they just mean "a Canada that didn't take orders from the U.S. on every foreign policy issue"?

That was a deeply unclear bit of writing.

[CHIMO]

3. Well

Some reading to start one out, after the Avro Arrow and Lester Pearson being put in his place by Johnson.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_L._Gordon

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Waffle