This Hour Has 22 Minutes

Famous stunts

Poutine

1999-2000 - During the American election campaign of 2000, Rick Mercer approached Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush on a campaign stop in Michigan, asking for comment on the news that Bush had received the endorsement of Canadian prime minister "Jean Poutine". (The then-prime minister's name was Jean Chrétien, and he had certainly not endorsed Bush.)

Related Topics:
American - 2000 - Republican - George W. Bush - Michigan - Prime minister - Poutine - Jean Chrétien

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Bush accepted the endorsement with a short and grateful speech to the 22 Minutes cameras, which aired as part of the show's regular Talking to Americans feature. In his first official visit to Canada four years later, he joked that his "one regret" about the visit was that he'd "hop to meet Jean Poutine." View the clip

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Stockwell/Doris petition

2000-01 - Often cited as the show's best joke. The sketch was aired during the federal election campaign in 2000, and consisted of a staged rant by Rick Mercer.

Related Topics:
Election - 2000

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When former Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day ran for Prime Minister of Canada, he proposed a mechanism to call for a referendum. A petition on any particular subject which gathered at least 350,000 signatures of voting age citizens ("3% of the electors"), would automatically trigger a national referendum.

Related Topics:
Canadian Alliance - Stockwell Day - Prime Minister of Canada - Referendum

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Mercer's "rant" asked viewers to log on to the 22 Minutes website, and sign an online petition asking the party leader to change his name to Doris Day (after the singer/actress). Producers claim to have obtained in excess of 1,200,000 online votes. This was cheerfully admitted to be a stunt unhampered by the rigours of an Elections Canada-controlled petition. Although the skit had no effect on Alliance policy, it did obtain international publicity for the show and contributed to the general air of farce surrounding Day's election campaign. Day did, however, have a very appropriate response to the petition: "Que sera, sera."

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Oilers vs Canadiens

2003-04 - Shaun Majumder (as "Raj Binder," bottom left corner) was sent to report on the 2003 outdoors Edmonton Oilers and Montreal Canadiens old timers game, preceding the night's actual NHL regular season game. Raj actually sneaked into all the team photos, causing uproar from the event's unwitting organizers in the days after, when the photos were released to the press.

Related Topics:
Edmonton Oilers - Montreal Canadiens - NHL

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view clip

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