new tory mp rob clarke already being muzzled

A segment of last Tuesday's (day after by-elections) edition of CBC's Politics with Don Newman, featured newly elected Tory MP for Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, Rob Clarke and federal Agriculture Minister (and political minister for Saskatchewan) Gerry Ritz. It seems like the PMO has wasted no time in muzzling the newly elected Tory MP. To me, it seemed like Clarke was regurgitating answers he memorized from some sort of PMO-crafted script of "appropriate" media responses. Ritz had him on a tight leash. Considering the present one-man-Harper-government in Ottawa, I wouldn't be surprised if this was in fact the case.