1. The Friendship Issue

I have been married to Peter Newman for 10 years and can tell you that the Mulroneys are NOT friends of ours. I have never met either of them, not even at a social function. I am not aware that either of them have ever called our house. I have never seen even as much as a christmas card from them. So, if Peter and Brian are such good friends as insinuated in the "betrayed by a friend" headlines, don't you think the wife would know of this friend? So, for the past 10 years..no contact and no friendship with the Mulroneys.

It is my understanding that Brian and Peter were friendly during the 1960's and 1970's. By 1982 though, Peter had move to Vancouver Island and his only contact with Brian was to gather material for a book. It appears to me that they have not associated as friends for nearly 25 years and have had a professional relationship only.

One article misconstrued the facts in trying to demonstrate the degree of their friendship and reads "The Mulroney's helped scrape Peter off the floor after a divorce". Well, obviously I know a bit about Peters other marriages, and I can tell you that Peter would not have needed scraping off the floor in a previous divorce.

Marriage 1. 1950's ...the couple were barely 20 and married very quickly before they knew each other. Over the next 5 years they found they had nothing in common-he was into writing, she was into horses, and they divorced while still in their 20's. She asked for a separation but he had already decided it was over anyway so-- No scraping required there. This was the mid 1950's and Mulroney would have been young lad, Mila perhaps not born yet.

Marriage 2: Peter married a literary person and their whole life revolved around writing so that after 17 years there was no romance to keep them together and they mutually agreed to separate-- No scraping required here either.

Marriage 3: ended 1989 after 12 years, and he still lived on the west coast. His decision to leave, hence no scraping off the floor required here either.

See how things are misconstrued when people speculate!

2. Taping without his knowledge

Remember that during this time, Peter was preparing to write Mulroney's political biography so that he needed to keep accurate records. In fact Mulroney insisted on it. 99% of the taped interviews took place at the Mulroney office or residence, and a few calls to Peter at home were when Mulroney called him to say "I thought of something else for the book..." and he would say "Make sure you get this" etc. Obviously Mulroney is embarrassed that he said all of those things on tape and so is trying to soften the impact of them by saying they were just casual conversations. Reminds me of Clinton saying " I did not have sex with that woman". In my mind, it only worsens the situation when someone commits a behaviour and then lies about it. I think the newspapers are running with the "betrayal by friend" headlines because it sells. Peter meant for this book to be a insider look at what the life of PM is like, what he thinks, what he feels. Never before has this kind of access into the mind of a politician been made public.