Roundup: A new GG and a new NDP leader

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Today is the day that Julie Payette is sworn in, and will soon be known as Her Excellency, the Right Honourable Julie Payette, Governor General of Canada. To that end, she has been receiving the customary signals of office over the past couple of weeks, as she takes on the roles of the chancellor (or “Principal Companion”) of the Order of Canada, the Order of Military Merit, the Order of Merit of the Police Forces, and the prior of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem (with note that the Queen is the fount of all Canadian honours).

Payette will have an extremely busy schedule from here on in, acting in the ceremonial capacity that state functions demand, doing diplomacy domestically and internationally, becoming a patron to charities, and keeping on top of her constitutional duties. It’s a big job, but given Payette’s accomplishments I’m quite sure that she’ll be up to the task.

Payette is also the first GG since the 1950s who comes to the position without a spouse, so she has nobody to help share the burden of appearances with, so that will be an interesting change from the past few appointments, where there has been this sense of a two-for-one deal between the GG and their highly-accomplished spouses. It will also, unfortunately, mean that more people will be attempting to download the whole “First Lady” nonsense to Sophie Grégoire Trudeau when the closest Canadian equivalent was the “Chatelaine of Rideau Hall” (when the GG was male – I’m not sure what the male of equivalent of Chatelaine is), presuming that one doesn’t count Prince Philip given that he’s actually the spouse of our head of state (and we don’t have a “First Family” because we have a royal family).

Meanwhile, here’s Philippe Lagassé on the meaning of the GG as our Commander-in-Chief in Canada.

https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/913471460542435331

https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/913472033434034176

Jagmeet Singh, NDP leader:

While I will probably be filing a full column on Singh’s victory later, the immediate note is that this is the first federal party leader who is a person of colour and who is not of the Judeo-Christian faiths. Also, this now makes Justin Trudeau the oldest of the three main party leaders, which signals a generation shift in Canadian politics.

  • John Geddes has five takeaways from Singh’s speech, while the Canadian Press lists five challenges that Singh will have to deal with.
  • Éric Grenier walks through the data to show how Singh won on the first ballot.
  • John Ivison sizes up the Singh versus Trudeau match-up.
  • Paul Wells notes that this move seals the fact that the 2019 election won’t be a repeat of 2015, and notes the NDP’s affection for outsider leaders.

Good reads:

  • Edmonton suffered what appears to be a terror attack over the weekend, with four injuries but no fatalities, and the suspect was arrested with no shots fired.
  • There are questions about the suspect, and the ability to detect such lone-wolf attacks (let alone stopping them).
  • The government is now tracking opioid deaths on First Nations, which is something you think they would have been doing already.
  • Here’s a look at the aerospace industry subsidy game and things that Boeing gets while crying foul about Bombardier.
  • Despite the Royal Canadian Navy needing three supply vessels, only two remain on the drawing board due to “fiscal restraints.”
  • Canada’s military presence in Iraq is now complicated because we have been working with the Kurds, and there has just been an independence referendum.
  • Jason Markusoff remarks on the sense in Edmonton in the aftermath of the attack, and the ways in which if differs from other places that suffered similarly.

2 thoughts on “Roundup: A new GG and a new NDP leader”

  1. Pesky homophoness: you no doubt meant “Principal Companion”.

    “Châtelaine”. The masculine form is “Châtelain”. Both mean owner of a castle. In use, the feminine form suggests that the husband of the “châtelaine” is away to the wars while she holds the fort, as it were. There is also another meaning to the feminine form as a belt ornament for women from which hung keys, rings, and jewelry and which indicated the authority of the wearer.

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