Duckett's Cookie! or how your $700,000 is spent...

[dawerks]

Is it a wonder our healthcare is so screwed up?

Raj Sherman is suspended from the PC party for speaking his mind. They can't really get rid of him can they? The only thing keeping him around, is ta da! Political. It would cause a bi election and heaven forbid the Wildrose party leader get a seat.

Democracy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DxeCK5Ne_Q

[dj_rice]

Oh wells, he got fired, I guess thats the way the cookie crumbles

[Guillermo]

Originally posted by dj_rice
Oh wells, he got fired, I guess thats the way the cookie crumbles

ba-dum-dum

nice work, sir! :rofl:

[G-ZUS]

Good riddance. Hope one day he gets sick and has to wait A day in emerg to get some help.

[VWEvo]

Watching that video makes me so angry, what a disrespectful man.

[Jetta-2.0]

he like shoves the cookie in her face hahahaha im eating my cooookieee what a hump of retard

[syritis]

funny how they edit out the first response from him, probably where he said would have likely said "no comment"

I think the answer they gave the media was sufficient 'the media scrum (couldn't hear) will be in 30 min to answer your questions'

I think the media was being disrespectful for hounding him after he made it painfully clear that he wasn't going to answer any questions at that time.

[derpderp]

I love watching the question periods in the Alberta Legislative Assembly, all everyone does is pick on Duckett.

[01RedDX]

.

[old&slow]

I don't have any love for the guy but when did the media get this all important position that you absolutely have to stop everything you are doing and bow to their questions?
I guess he thought he was being funny but losing a job over that is somewhat silly!

[codetrap]

Originally posted by old&slow
I don't have any love for the guy but when did the media get this all important position that you absolutely have to stop everything you are doing and bow to their questions?
I guess he thought he was being funny but losing a job over that is somewhat silly!

There's saying "No comment at this time.", and then there's acting like a child who's angry over not being allowed to eat his cookie.

This guy showed a serious lack of maturity and professionalism is the face of the media, and they tried to work with him on it. His single minded determination to act like a spoiled child is what got him fired.

[sputnik]

I bet Duckett feels pretty crummy about what he did.

[SJW]

Originally posted by sputnik
I bet Duckett feels pretty crummy about what he did.

Nice try, thanks for coming out.

[lilmira]

He hasn't been doing much to fix the problem in our health care system. That didn't get him in trouble. But eating a cookie when the media is asking you questions, that's a big no no, he should be stoned. What he did was definitely inappropriate, he should have been fired long time ago for other reason in my opinion.

[SJW]

The whole board is messed up.

[Sugarphreak]

...

[spike98]

Originally posted by 01RedDX
Poor guy. His severance? Only $700,000 of your money.

Severance or contractual obligations? Totally different.

[civic_stylez]

No cookie pun needed...

That guy is a piece of shit...

[syeve]

I hope people doesn't have dillusions that the firing of this guy will solve anything. Our system is still broken. Nothing will change, he is just the distraction scapegoat of the week.

[BerserkerCatSplat]

Originally posted by Sugarphreak
Anybody else feeling like this was planned from the beginning?

Corporate strategy 101:
When the company needs to cut jobs, salary and overhead... hire an outside consultant (an axeman if you will) who is hired specifically to do the dirty work and make the unpopular decisions necessary to achieve the goals of management. This will anger the remaining company staff and therefore direct any negative perception away from management and to the axeman. Once the necessary cuts and layoffs have been made, the axeman is no longer required and intentionally breeches his contract in one last act of belligerence so that the staff will feel justified when he is removed and then openly accept a replacement.

This is text book corporate politics, I have seen this play out at my last company.... they brought a guy in from Britain, he ruled with an iron fist, we got shitty raises, he forced contractors to go to staff positions (very unpopular) then when he was finally turfed they brought in the nicest guy I have ever worked for.

From the day he was hired I suspected he was a planned scape goat... how convienent was it he is from Australia, or that his wage is extremely high. It reeked of a short term position from the start. It feels like they are playing Albertians for fools.

I completely agree. The whole "cookie" thing has been nothing but manufactured outrage from the start. Oh, no, he blew off reporters by claiming he was eating a cookie, how utterly offensive! It was just an excuse to get rid of the axe man as they intended from the beginning, and the $700,000 is proof of that.

[hampstor]

Duckett's base salary w/o benefits was over 500k - more than 3 times that of the premier, and more than 6 times that of an MLA. When you consider that he's paid by the province and he's the CEO of AHS; the reporters' questions were well within reason.

Dr. Chris Eagle is a good choice to replace Duckett in the interrim. However the superboard failed to improve healthcare in the province and I believe needs to be taken apart. Decisions need to be made by regional boards as they are closer and better understand the needs of their region.

Raj Sherman was in trouble for speaking out against the PC Alberta caucus - there's no doubt about that. I wasn't sure if he was going to be suspended from the caucus for that (like Guy Boutilier was). IMHO I think the nail in the coffin was his comments about Liepert. Sherman's bill to legislate ER wait times was debated in the leg last night very late. Last I saw, they were still debating at 6AM.

[Sugarphreak]

...

[G-ZUS]

Originally posted by Sugarphreak


His wage, the severance he will get... all part of an intricate plan to steer public perception away from the necessary restructuring and cuts that the province wanted to be made. The amount of money he is getting is because he was asked to be the bad guy for a short term job.

If him getting 600K a year makes you angry, if him being overly belligerent to reporters is disgraceful to you, if his 700K severance makes you want pull your hair out... the plan is working perfectly.

Now that he is gone they will make an attempt to show how good they are by showing how much they care about the health care system; expect a number of positive announcements for things like new beds and reduced waiting times to pop up over the next few weeks.


jeeze, I am starting to sound like Zenops... lol


Some new beds have already been opened

[clem24]

Originally posted by hampstor
Raj Sherman was in trouble for speaking out against the PC Alberta caucus - there's no doubt about that.

That's pretty standard. Among many professional bodies, usually one of the provisions is "thou shalt not criticize another member". It's unfortunate though that the public will see this as the PCs being sore losers.

Duckett wasn't fired because of the cookie, though the media likes to paint that picture. But judging from the FB status updates of my many friends working in health care, it seems like they all agreed this was a good move.

Not sure about all the conspiracy theorists regarding this as being planned all along. But yes, the cookie incident definitely *did* get him fired sooner rather than later.

And yes it is a shame that the $700k of our dollars was paid to him but a contract's a contract. A complaint should've been lodged when the contract was CREATED, not when it's honored.

[ZenOps]

"Let them eat cake"

[BigMass]

Originally posted by ZenOps
"Let them eat cake"

set up a guillotine, line em up, i want front row seats

[Tomaz]

I would never let ANYONE interrupt my cookie eating. I found it pretty comical he did exactly what I would have done too. Kinda reminded me of a twix commercial. :D

Anyway, in that position, he needs to know better than to act like that. It was only a matter of time before he was going to get the axe.

http://scientopia.org/blogs/childsplay/files/2010/08/cookie-monster.jpg

[bignerd]

When you are in charge of the health care that your public receives and you are paid exceedingly well to do it I think you are required to take 2, 3, 5 minutes to answer to them regardless of when the media scrum is. I am not sure but it also sounded as though he himself would not be at that scrum as the reporter kept saying people wanted to hear from "him directly".

He could of easily of ONLY said "No comment, the media scrum is in 30 minutes, thank you." and it wouldn't of been such a big deal but instead he insisted on shoving a cookie in a reporters face and answering "because I'm eating my coookie!!" in an utterly ridiculous voice over and over again.

[mazdavirgin]

Originally posted by clem24
That's pretty standard. Among many professional bodies, usually one of the provisions is "thou shalt not criticize another member". It's unfortunate though that the public will see this as the PCs being sore losers.

Ummm no... I don't know which professional bodies you are talking about but most do not have any such clauses. As a doctor, engineer, or lawyer you are free to criticize anyone in your professional body as long as it is not deemed to be libel or slander. As an engineer I am free to express my opinion that someone is incompetent. I can however be sued if my allegations are not true. However it won't be APEGGA that will sue me it will be the other member.

Let's call the kettle black here. The PC party hates public criticism and hung out the dry the only MP in their party that was actually trying to fix the system.

[HiTempguy1]

Originally posted by mazdavirgin

As an engineer I am free to express my opinion that someone is incompetent.

Huh, and all along I thought you were a chick...

[masoncgy]

lfbAgqB121w

:rofl:

[calgary403]

Originally posted by Sugarphreak
Anybody else feeling like this was planned from the beginning?

Corporate strategy 101
When the company needs to cut jobs, salary and overhead... hire an outside consultant (an axeman if you will) who is hired specifically to do the dirty work and make the unpopular decisions necessary to achieve the goals of management. This will anger the remaining company staff and therefore direct any negative perception away from management and to the axeman. Once the necessary cuts and layoffs have been made, the axeman is no longer required and intentionally breeches his contract in one last act of belligerence so that the staff will feel justified when he is removed and then openly accept a replacement.

This is text book corporate politics, I have seen this play out at my last company.... they brought a guy in from Britain, he ruled with an iron fist, we got shitty raises, he forced contractors to go to staff positions (very unpopular) then when he was finally turfed they brought in the nicest guy I have ever worked for.

From the day he was hired I suspected he was a planned scape goat... how convienent was it he is from Australia, or that his wage is extremely high. It reeked of a short term position from the start. It feels like they are playing Albertians for fools.

So.....he magically switched nationalities when he pleased? Was his name Cobb and on a third level of reality?

[dawerks]

Originally posted by Sugarphreak
It feels like they are playing Albertians for fools.

Considering the PC party has been in power for 30+ years, yeaah, you could say that.

It would be dead on. WE are fools. WE elect the same 'bums' every year and WE are happy about it.

Seems like a pretty good definition of fool.

[freshprince1]

Just watched the video for the first time...what a serious douchebag. If he wasn't doing it on purpose, he definately deserves to be sent packing. Even if the media was hounding him, he took a high profile position funded by taxpayer money in arguably the most controversial realm of governmental affairs right now. He should know what to expect, and be able to handle it.

[CUG]

That guy looks like he sleeps with a lot of dudes.

[Sugarphreak]

...

[syritis]

I agree that health care is in serious need of some reform, but i'm not sure how i feel about the media having this control over who looks like a hero and who gets fired in provincial politics.

[LollerBrader]

Originally posted by VWEvo
Watching that video makes me so angry, what a disrespectful man.

Good god. What an arrogant prick. I'd like to see him torn apart by wild dogs.

[911fever]

what a tool, how embarassing

[Modelexis]

Originally posted by HiTempguy1 Huh, and all along I thought you were a chick...
Girls cannot be engineers? :)

[HiTempguy1]

Originally posted by Modelexis

Girls cannot be engineers? :)

They certainly can be, dated one for two years. But, one that is an enginerd AND posts on Beyond?

http://knowyourmeme.com/i/27374/original/bosom_or_gtfo.png