BASS: Ladies and gentlemen, introducing Sen. Dale Bass

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To: Prime Minister Stephen Harper

From: Dale Bass

re: Senate appointment

Dear Prime Minister;

Please consider my application for a seat in the Senate. I’m pretty sure you will have one or two come up very soon.

There are many reasons why I am applying and why I feel I would be a perfect senator.

First of all, I wouldn’t cause any of those pesky problems Pamela Wallin, Mike Duffy or Mac Harb have caused you.

I live in Kamloops, B.C., and can prove it with my driver’s licence, health-care card and library card.

I used to have an Ontario health-care card, just like P.E.I. Sen. Duffy has, but that was when I really lived in Ontario. I don’t live there anymore — after all, you have to live in a province to qualify for its health-care system.

My travel expenses have been fairly controlled. I do fly back to Ontario once a year to visit some of the kids and grandkids and, if you need this on a travel-expense report, I can confirm I have spent more than the $90 Wallin has claimed flying to her “home” in Saskatchewan.

Just how is she getting home when the Senate isn’t sitting? Hitch-hiking? A one-way ticket from Ottawa to Saskatoon is $376 right now on WestJet and more than $500 on Air Canada.

Almost makes me think she really doesn’t go home very often.

I can show property-tax receipts with my name on them showing I live in B.C.

I bet Patrick Brazeau can’t do that — after all, he claims his main residence is his dad’s house in Quebec.

Really? A 39-year-old man who still lives at home? And you want him in the Senate?

Speaking of which, I’ve never boxed before, so you wouldn’t have to worry about me sullying the image of the Senate getting into the ring with that Liberal wannabe-leader-in-training Justin Trudeau.

As for causing headlines by having the police show up at my door?

Not gonna happen. I’m very careful when it comes to the RCMP in town because I’ve written some things about them that they haven’t really liked all that much.

That hasn’t stopped me from still talking with them, so you wouldn’t have to worry that my issues might lead me to do something stupid — like hightail it out a kitchen door to avoid the media.

And I’ve been a reporter long enough to know it’s really not smart to insult them by doing something stupid like answering their questions by telling them to behave like adults.

Kinda funny coming from a former journalist who made his first mark as a senator by telling a crude joke worthy of a testosterone-driven teenager about the premier of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Now, time for the truth.

The real reason I want a seat on the senate is I could really use the $132,300 salary.

It’s way more than I make now — I think it’s more than most people I know in Kamloops actually make — and I like the idea that I’d only have to show up in Ottawa once a year to keep my job.

The office staff senators get would really work with this plan because my secretary could just email me if something important was to come up and really — and I mean it better really — need my attention.

Heck, I could move to Mexico.

Nah, that’s already happened and, boy, those headlines were embarrassing, weren’t they?

Anyhow, back to the application.

Here’s the best part. If you give me the job and only want to see me once a year, I could stay here in Kamloops and spend my days doing all the cool things I’ve always wanted to do.

I’m developing quite the list of neat stuff to do and not having to worry about a pesky paycheque requirement would just make it so much easier.

Sure, I’d pop up for photo-ops when required, but the beauty of it would be that you’d know that I’m really living where I say I live.

I’d send you the photos to prove it.

Dale Bass is a reporter with Kamloops This Week. Her email address is here. Her blog can be found here.