Corner Brook -
Premier Danny Williams and a couple helpers were in New York City Monday, rubbing elbows with some of the business elite of that major financial centre.
They booked a snazzy room, sent out invitations and laid on a nice lunch ... no doubt hoping someone would notice.
The premier and his band were there to promote the energy storehouse this province claims to be, and push the plan to get the Lower Churchill hydro project off the ground.
No doubt the big shots in NYC only got to see the charming side of the premier ... not his take-no-prisoners approach he employs when things don't exactly go his way.
The money men and women who run the show in places like New York City are more used to pushing their weight around than getting pressured by someone from some unknown speck of a province in the Great White North. Getting these financial people onside will be critical if the Lower Churchill project is to become more than a few squiggly lines on drafting paper.
Many politicians from this province have tried to get the deal signed and many have failed.
So far, the jury is still out on Premier Williams.
He keeps trying, but no money has been committed, and certainly no earth has been moved to launch what has been called the last great undeveloped hydro power source on the North American continent.
It will take billions of dollars to launch the project and the premier was in the heart of the city where that kind of financing and deal-making can be arranged.
However, the premier had to do his best sales job to get that kind of money committed, especially in these days where the world economy is just crawling out of an economic abyss.
