weird nostalgia for Meech Lake

Here at the sprawling Maclean’s Ottawa nerve centre, we sometimes while away the hours asking one another whatever happened to Stephen Harper’s throne speech commitment to introduce “legislation to place formal limits on the use of federal spending power in areas of provincial jurisdiction without provincial consent and to provide for opting out with compensation.” Amazing as that may seem, this odd hobby makes us only the second-geekiest news bureau in Ottawa. The geekiest, hands down, is Le Devoir’s, which wasn’t content with mere water-cooler chat about the spending-power-limitation promise; they actually called around to find out.