If it's true it doesn't matter what you say about a politician as long as you spell his name right, Peter Goldring's timing was impeccable.

That said, it just doesn't seem like things are going to play out well for Goldring, who until Monday was the Conservative Member of Parliament for Edmonton East.

Just as the Alberta provincial Legislature was debating Premier Alison Redford's tough new drinking and driving law, and Alberta's bar and restaurant owners were working themselves into a swivet about what it was going to do to their profits, Goldring got up on his hind legs at his annual constituency fundraising dinner (roast beef, spud pierogies and fermented liquids) to complain that the law was intrusive and certain to be challenged in court.

Vancouver writer Michael Barnholden is the author of Gabriel Dumont Speaks (Talon Books 1993), On The Ropes (Coach House Books 1997) and Reading the Riot Act: A Brief History of Riots in Vancouver (Anvil Press 2005).  He recently released Circumstances Alter Photographs: Captain James Peters' Reports from the War of 1885 from Vancouver's Talonbooks. He is currently the managing editor of West Coast Line.