TORY RACE TAKES A U-TURN

Pot-smoking preacher joins list of leadership hopefuls

OTTAWA - Is Canada's oldest political party being ridiculed?

One candidate for the Progressive Conservative party leadership is a
pot-smoking preacher, another a self-described eccentric. Another,
59-year-old former prime minister Joe Clark, is launching his improbable
comeback from an office next door to a Viagra clinic.

Some of the other 15 candidates are so bizarre and obscure nobody knows who
they are.

One candidate, radio jingle writer and inventor Scot Paterson of Ottawa,
looked out at his empty news conference and said: ``I just hope you people
in the audience keep your questions short.''

By July 31 it's put-up or shut-up time. The far-out 15 each must submit a
$30,000 deposit or be candidates no more.

Some senior Tories say the party is being made a mockery because it allowed
the contest to be so wide open between the time Jean Charest departed for
the Quebec Liberal leadership and July 31.

``These guys think they're entitled to their 15 minutes of fame. So what?''
remarked veteran Tory organizer Tim Ralfe. ``If you want an open democratic
process, you open yourself up to that.''

To others, it's a sign of how far the once-proud Tory party has fallen - to
fifth place in the House of Commons and on the bubble of relevancy.

Rev. Brother Michael Baldasaro, 49, of the Church of the Universe, lives in
a trailer with no electricity next door to PCBs stored on an abandoned
Cambridge steel mill site. He held a news conference yesterday to declare
his candidacy.

Baldasaro, looking like a rock group ZZ Top reject, explained that he's on
a long-term disability pension after ``my head was run over by a front-end
loader. I'm a little slow, okay?''

But before he held the news conference, he smoked a joint. He considers
marijuana a healing ``tree of life'' and smokes it every day ``if I can.''

The former steel mill was given to him as church headquarters by fellow
Tory leadership candidate John Long, a businessman who says the media are
``running scared'' from the current ``global depression'' because reporters
are afraid of the banks.

``He (Long) gave the church sanctuary and for that I thank him,'' Baldasaro
told reporters. ``He is wonderful. He encouraged me to run.''

Beyond bizarre, some candidates who've declared thus far just seem to be
AWOL. The Star could not track down candidates Frank Abbass of Toronto,
David C. Allen of Brantford, Michael Hewton of Cambridge or Tim Wright of
North Bay.

Even those with some credibility are being scoffed at. Clark and fellow
candidate Hugh Segal, once chief of staff to former prime minister Brian
Mulroney, are jokingly referred to in Ottawa as ``yesterday's man and
yesterday's man-servant.''

Ralfe said all that's important is that after July 31 (the actual
one-member, one-vote contest is slated for Oct. 24) the $30,000 deposit
will guarantee that only real candidates remain.

Jan Dymond, co-chairperson of the Tory leadership selection committee, said
the party had no choice but to attach the $30,000 deposit to a formal
deadline for candidates.

But now Baldasaro has filed papers and intends to challenge the deposit in
court on the basis of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski