You win some, you lose some

When politicians go out to press the flesh with average folk, you never know what you’re going to get.

Bloc Québécois leader Gilles Duceppe, a congenial man when you're not on his bad side, had a few awkward moments along Ste. Catherine St. in downtown Montreal today.

With cameras and reporters following, he would greet anyone who met his sky-blue-eyed gaze. Some quickly turned away, embarrassed at the attention. Some pleasantly shook his hand and moved on.

But Duceppe’s experience with Westmount resident Denis Delaney gives a new twist to that old axiom that you can’t trust a politician. In fact, politicians might do well not to trust their "supporters."

Delaney darted through the crowd to have his picture taken with Duceppe and told the leader, "You have my vote!" Duceppe was delighted. (Westmount, an anglophone enclave, is not a sovereignist bastion.)

Except that in an interview later, Delaney looked sheepish and admitted, "You know, if it was the leader of the Liberals, I’d probably tell him the same thing."

- Andrew Chung