Pierre Poilievre called a press conference yesterday in rural Saskatchewan to declare that he’s going to war with the government over the EV mandate, during which he said that he’s going to call it a “Carney tax” (for the nonsense reason that manufacturers that don’t meet their targets can face penalties), and he lied entirely about what the mandate does, right up to claiming that this is about killing rural and small-town life in Canada. It’s not only unhinged, but entirely indicative of the fact that Poilievre hasn’t learned a single gods damned lesson about why he lost the last election. These kinds of stunts for the sake of the attention economy aren’t exactly showing him to be credible about, well, anything.
He also once again demanded that the prime minister cancel the loan to BC Ferries for the ships they plan to get from China, because of the canola tariffs, which again, is not how this works. The prime minister can’t tell the Infrastructure Bank what they can and can’t do, because it was set up to ensure that it wasn’t ministers directing their investments. That’s the whole point of making it an arm’s-length agency. (And also, once again, no Canadian shipyards bid on this contract).
But Poilievre also decided to blame Carney for China’s bullying tactics, saying that they smell weakness. Erm, China bullies regardless. That’s why we shouldn’t be giving into their pressure tactics, because it’ll embolden them to do more again, and to do other things, like kidnapping more Canadians, and engaging in hostage diplomacy. Again, did Poilievre pay absolutely no attention for the past decade? Or is this yet more elaborate performance art for the sake of getting clicks on his social media, in the hopes that those clicks turn into gullible people opening up their wallets to him. The answer, of course, is the latter.
Ukraine Dispatch
Ukrainian forces say that they have stabilised their eastern front after that brief breakthrough by Russians earlier in the week. The latest prisoner swap with Russia returned 84 Ukrainians, many of them civilians.
Good reads:
- That farcical State Department report claims Canada is abusing human rights through the Online News Act. (The correct response to this is “Fuck off”).
- StatsCan accidentally published certain market-sensitive data early and then had to take it down, and now has to investigate what happened.
- Canadian women returned from custody in Syria after joining ISIS rang up hotel bills upon returning to Canada.
- All eyes are now on the government to see if they will signal an intention to intervene in the Air Canada labour dispute.
- Payments have begun rolling out for former First Nations children in care.
- Gun control groups are worried that Carney won’t follow up on his promise to implement the gun buyback programme, given the silence on the file.
- The House of Commons was hit by a cyber-attack by a known “threat actor.”
- Carney’s office says that he hasn’t opened a constituency office in Nepean yet because of “security considerations.”
- Doug Ford wants Ontario civil servants back in the office five days a week.
- An Alberta judge says he will go ahead and undertake a judicial review of the constitutionality of the proposed separation referendum question.
- Justin Ling prefaces today’s Trump-Putin meeting with all of the context and background you need.
- My Xtra column looks at the coming 80% cuts to Women and Gender Equality, and points out that this kind of austerity will only cause lasting damage to people.
Odds and ends:
For National Magazine, I look into the broader implications of the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal decision on the province invoking the Notwithstanding Clause.
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