Calls Bush 'Moron,' Keeps Job
Toronto - Prime Minister Jean Chretien's chief spokeswoman offered to resign Friday after being quoted as calling President George W. Bush a moron.Chretien said that Bush was his friend - "not a moron at all" - but that he would not accept the resignation of Francoise Ducros.
Ducros' remarks, said to have been made to a reporter this week at the NATO summit in Prague, the Czech capital, and overheard by other reporters, made headlines in Canada and the United States and prompted demands from Canadian opposition politicians that she be fired.
Chretien said no one in the U.S. delegation had referred to the comments during several meetings at the summit and he joked that Ducros uses the word "moron" regularly, probably even against him.
"She said to me she had a private conversation and she was defending in the discussion somewhat the president of the United States. She doesn't remember having used these words," Chretien said. "She said to me that if it's causing too much of a problem, she offered her resignation, and I did not accept that because it was a private conversation."
Ducros said in a written statement that the comments attributed to her "in no way reflect my personal view of the president of the United States."
The White House has brushed off the remarks but the incident is unlikely to improve the already rocky relationship between Bush and Chretien, who is clearly uncomfortable with the U.S. president's threats of war against Iraq and stance on other issues.
Former Canadian Prime Minister Joe Clark, leader of the minority Conservatives, told Parliament that the relationship with the United States is too important to risk, adding, "We need the cooperation of the ... president whom the prime minister's spokesperson calls a moron."
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