Tag Archives: Canadian History

Senate QP: Questions about NATO math

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I haven’t been able to attend Senate Question Period in years as the move to a separate building, and a shift of their usual timing to coincide with Commons QP have kept me away, as has the fact that they pretty much always rise at the same time as the Commons, which never used to be the practice, and for which I write a peevish column at the start of every summer. This year, however, they are sitting later to pass Bill C-5, so I am actually able to take it in. It’s been a long time since I’ve been here.

Taking in #SenQP for the first time in *years*.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-06-25T18:04:29.258Z

After statements and routine proceedings, things got underway in earnest as  Senator Housakos led off, and he raised the PBO saying that he has received little information on the NATO two percent announcement, and that they have now agreed to the five percent goal at this week’s summit, And wondered how they could take this credibly. Senator Gold lamented that there was underfunding over decades, and that this was because of a changing world, but also noted that only 3.5 percent of that was over a decade, while the other 1.5 percent was for other things. Housakos again questioned the credibility of the numbers, and Gold returned to the boilerplate assurances they are doing what they can, but also noted that DND hasn’t been able to spend their current allocations.

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Roundup: A disinformation fest in the English debate

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Day twenty-six, and the second day of debates. Both Mark Carney and Jagmeet Singh had photo ops in Montreal before the debate, while Pierre Poilievre stayed quiet. And it looks like no one is downing tools today, in spite of it being a statutory holiday—Carney will be in Niagara Falls, followed by Colborne and Brantford. I didn’t get Poilievre’s itinerary, while Singh starts the day in Yamachiche, Quebec, and then ends the day in Burnaby, BC.

In other campaign news, the Conservatives had other incumbents release the second part of their Arctic defence policy, and it appears that they didn’t consult with any Northerners or Inuit for this part either.

And then the English debate, or as it should more properly be called, a disinformation fest. The sheer volume of utter horseshit uttered was absolutely astonishing, and yet nobody was challenged or called out on hardly any of it. Steve Paikin as moderator had a fairly light tough for much of it, and allowed a lot of talking over one another, but did keep things moving at a fairly good clip in order to have a couple of rapid-fire rounds at the end, though near the end, there was a “Leader’s Choice” segment where each leader could ask a question of one another, and everyone chose Carney to attack (quelle surprise), while Carney picked Poilievre, and returned to the security clearance issue (which Poilievre yet again lied about). I also note that at the top of each thematic section, Paikin asked a different question of each of the leaders, so they weren’t answering the same and made it hard to compare them.

https://bsky.app/profile/emmettmacfarlane.com/post/3ln2atae4lk2y

Poilievre is again lying about "printing money" and inflation. Carney: "I know you want to run against Justin Trudeau. Justin Trudeau is not here." #debate

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-04-18T00:41:27.247Z

Poilievre lying about being "gagged" if he gets his security clearance. He would merely need to be responsible in his commentary, which he refuses to do. #debate

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-04-18T00:46:11.096Z

As for the leaders themselves, Carney again kept his cool, even when constantly being talked over, and just kept trying to make his point with “If I may,” before they shut up. I also noted that he would keep saying how many points he had for responses before listing those points, but he also did have the occasional misspeak (for example referring to TMX as “Keystone.”) Poilievre pretty much spent the whole exercise lying about absolutely everything, shamelessly, and was not challenged on about 99 percent of it, which doesn’t help the average viewer. Singh was a little less hyper than last night, and we avoided any tantrums tonight, because the moderator did give him the chance to talk about healthcare, but also challenged him on it about the jurisdictional issue, which Singh, of course, talked around rather than answering. And as for Blanchet, he kept trying to make a pitch for a minority parliament where he can exert influence. He also demanded that whoever becomes prime minister call the other leaders to meet one week after the election in order to discuss the various crises we’re facing. (Here are the recaps from The Canadian Press, CBC, National Post, and the Star, and six takeaways from the debate).

https://bsky.app/profile/emmettmacfarlane.com/post/3ln2afzfgac22

Poilievre's dodge on Indigenous incarceration was astounding. Just absolutely amazing that he could get away with that. #debate

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-04-17T23:42:39.614Z

Paikin actually corners Singh on how he would deal with provinces who don't want to spend his healthcare dollars the way he wants. Singh just talks around it, doesn't actually say how he would force the provinces. #debate

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-04-18T00:19:58.773Z

https://bsky.app/profile/emmettmacfarlane.com/post/3ln2bndu4ds2h

The other notable part of the evening was that the post-debate scrums were cancelled, because of an ostensible safety issue after Rebel media started trying to accost other journalists, including trying to interrupt CBC’s broadcast before the debate. The fact that the Debate Commission’s chair didn’t even realise that Rebel and Ezra Levant had registered as third party advertisers with Elections Canada should have meant an automatic disqualification, but he said he was so afraid of losing another lawsuit meant he just caved to their demands, which is yet again another sign of democracy being under assault in this country.

Debates Commission has cancelled the post-debate scrums after this English leaders debate. This cancellation follows an altercation prior to the debate involving Rebel News and other journalists. #elxn45

— davidakin (@davidakin.bsky.social) 2025-04-18T00:23:05.379Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Russian missiles struck Kharkiv, killing one and injuring at least 57, as president Zelenskyy notes that Russia has shifted from targeting energy facilities to civilian targets. Russians on the front lines appear to be shifting to using mass-assault tactics as they try to advance. Ukraine says they have signed a memorandum as a first step toward a mineral deal with the US, which would involve setting up an investment fund for Ukraine’s reconstruction.

https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1913102312286900366

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Roundup: Reviving an abandoned capital gains plan

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Day eight of the campaign, and in spite of there being policy announcement, it was another fairly low-key day, or maybe it just felt like that without the usual wall-to-wall coverage. Mark Carney continued to hold private events in his riding, and took to media questions. There was no announcement of where Carney will be today.

Pierre Poilievre was in the GTA, and announced a plan to waive capital gains taxes if they are re-invested in Canadian companies. If this sounds familiar, it was because the Conservatives floated this in 2006, only to abandon it because it was impractical. Poilievre insists that this could be “economic rocket fuel,” but there is no lack of irony with the fact that it comes with an absolute mountain of red tape in the form of compliance paperwork. Poilievre heads to Fredericton, New Brunswick, later today.

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1906432179493883989

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1906433266069963227

Ok here is the capital gains tax deferral idea (story from @stevenchase.bsky.social 17 years ago). Looks like the exact same promise from Mr. Poilievre today as from Mr. Harper in 2006. I wonder if anything has changed to now make this feasible?www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-bu…

— Kevin Milligan (@kevinmilligan.bsky.social) 2025-03-30T16:31:49.860Z

"The problem, Mr. Flaherty has acknowledged recently, is it's proven "difficult and complicated" to enact the capital gains pledge.That's a euphemistic way of admitting what experts have long warned: that the pledge is too vague, open-ended and costly to translate into law."

— Kevin Milligan (@kevinmilligan.bsky.social) 2025-03-30T16:33:04.102Z

https://twitter.com/JohnPasalis/status/1906408130826674682

I notice the CPC, despite spending two years calling for an election, have no backgrounders for their election proposals. So here is my comment on their latest cap gains proposal: it is really stupid. Want more details? Release a backgrounder

— Dr Lindsay Tedds (@lindsaytedds.bsky.social) 2025-03-30T17:39:44.686Z

Jagmeet Singh was in Port Moody, BC, and promised to have CMHC offer low-cost loans to first-time home buyers, yet another demand-side solution to a supply-side problem. Singh is campaigning in Victoria today, before heading to Edmonton.

Meanwhile, the Paul Chiang controversy continues to simmer as the Liberals refuse to turf him, in spite of the fact that there can be no justification for the kind of behaviour he exhibited in instructing people to turn over his would-be Conservative rival to Chinese authorities for a bounty. (That would-be rival is now the Conservative candidate in nearby Don Valley North). That Chiang himself has not resigned is as much of a problem. The cut-off for nominations has not been reached yet, and they could still find a replacement in time (though not much time) rather than continue to let this complete lapse in political judgment continue to haunt them throughout the campaign. Carney is not Teflon, and the Liberals shouldn’t treat him as such.

Ukraine Dispatch

Russian drones attacked Kharkiv for a second night in a row, injuring two and damaging a kindergarten and private houses.

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Roundup: Why Statute of Westminster Day matters

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Yesterday was Statute of Westminster Day, which most people don’t have a clue about in spite of it showing up on their calendars. It’s a hugely important day in Canadian history because it was a turning point in our sovereignty as it relates to our relationship with the UK—the creation of the Canadian Crown as a separate and distinct entity from the UK Crown. Canada and several other realms (Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Newfoundland, and South Africa) were all granted Separate Crowns because they decided that the Crown was indeed divisible (and in Canada, further divisible among the provinces), and that meant things like being able to control our own foreign policy.

Today is Statute of Westminster Day, which is the birthday of the Canadian Crown as a separate entity from the UK Crown. It’s an incredibly important day for Canadian sovereignty, but mostly gets passed over, or under-taught in schools. #MapleCrown

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2024-12-11T15:00:49.015Z

The problem, of course, is that we’re not taught this. We may be taught that that the Statute gave us more control over our foreign affairs (at least, I was in my social studies classes in Alberta), but it was couched more in terms of the aftermath of the First World War—the Canadian Crown was entirely absent from that discussion. And if you look at Parliamentary accounts on Twitter, for example, not one of them mentioned the Crown as the reason why we gained that autonomy and independence. It’s the whole gods damned reason why, and we don’t celebrate that at all. It’s a real problem as to why we don’t have a grasp of basic civics in this country, and something we need to rectify.

https://twitter.com/OurCommons/status/1866908079763120189

Ukraine Dispatch

Russian troops overran or captured several Ukrainian positions near the strategic city of Pokrovsk. Ukrainians struck a Russian airfield near the Azov Sea with US-made missiles, and a Ukrainian drone hit police barracks in Chechnya.

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Roundup: Building communes? Really?

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Something you may have noticed is the propensity by which Poilievre likes to describe Trudeau as being a communist or a Marxist—there was even video posted on social media of him describing Trudeau as such while door-knocking (in spite of all evidence to the contrary). The so-called “convoy” occupation made frequent references to the current government as being some kind of communist dictatorship, again, in spite of all evidence to the contrary. And once again, Poilievre was at it yesterday when he described the federal government’s plan of leasing properties for housing as “building communes.”

Aside from the way he wrote that as describing Trudeau as being in power perpetually, this tends to back to one of Poilievre’s most ridiculous obsessions, which is equating any form of socialism with the so-called “national socialism” of Naziism, yet again, in spite of all evidence to the contrary (this has become a recurring theme).

In no way is Trudeau, whose government faces a minority Parliament, a dictator, communist or otherwise. In the same way, Stephen Harper was not a dictator, and all of the people freaking out who insisted he would never relinquish power had all made fools of themselves by insisting otherwise. But Poilievre’s continued insistence on this kind of behaviour is not only dishonest, it’s the continuation of a campaign of unrelenting lying that legacy media obstinately refuses to address, let alone even acknowledge.

Ukraine Dispatch

Rather than deal with the Kursk incursion head-on, Russia decided to launch hundreds of drones and missiles across Ukraine on Monday, killing at least four people as the strikes targeted 15 regions including Kyiv, and damaged energy facilities that led to more rolling blackouts. A second round was launched overnight. It appears that at least one Russian drone crossed into Polish airspace on Monday, but no word yet on if it has been found.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1828129805537325206

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Roundup: A political problem means classified briefings

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The naming-names debate continued apace yesterday, starting at the public safety committee, where Dominic LeBlanc pushed back against Conservative theatrics demanding the release of the names (to atrocious behaviour from all sides), while at that that same meeting, the director of CSIS and the RCMP deputy commissioner also warned that releasing those names will cause both reputational damage to individuals who can’t defend themselves on the basis of allegations that aren’t backed up, and it can also damage ongoing investigations. There is no due process that comes with naming names for the sake of it.

Ultimately, however, this remains a political problem for the parties, because they need to know who among their ranks was compromised, and that requires all leaders to have the appropriate security classifications (and apparently for privy council members who are no longer ministers, there is a Treasury Board-esque process now that requires renewal, which is an extremely odd and concerning process because MPs are not government employees and they use intelligence in a different manner, so they shouldn’t need to use the same process). And as Philippe Lagassé points out, this isn’t necessarily a problem for law enforcement so much as it is for the parties. If the leaders get the classified briefings, they know which of their MPs may be compromised (and it’s is a “may,” not an “is” because we’re dealing with unverified intelligence that may not be true), and give them the space to either sideline them, prevent them from contesting the next election under the party banner, or to give those MPs the ability to try and exonerate themselves outside of the public eye where their reputations could be irreparably damaged. But again, this relies on the leaders doing the right thing and getting briefed, not hiding behind the bullshit excuse that they would be “muzzled” if they did.

There are a couple of other problems here. One is that in talking with people familiar with NSICOP, that they have had a tendency to exaggerate things in their reports because they also have an agenda of trying to make themselves look better and to take more of the spotlight, so we should take some of these allegations with a grain of salt. As well, some of those allegations are back to the problem that we heard about in other places where some of the intelligence was rejected by the National Security Advisor because they believed it was normal course of diplomatic engagement and not interference, which is something the Hogue Commission is struggling with. We don’t have a complete picture for a lot of reasons, and everyone is jumping to conclusions and needs to dial it down.

Programming Note: I’m away for the weekend, so there won’t be a Saturday post.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Ukraine shot down 17 of 18 Russian drones overnight, with the damage of the final drone in the Khmelnytsky region.

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Roundup: The PBO immolates what little credibility he had left

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It looks like the Parliamentary Budget Officer, Yves Giroux, decided to extend his “winning” streak and cover himself in glory at the Commons’ finance committee yesterday, and once again immolated what credibility he has left. Defending his report, claiming he had access to a confidential report from Environment Canada that he was “gagged” from releasing (which the Conservatives jumped on and launched a thousand shitposts about, because committees are now only about content generation), lamented that the government doesn’t publish more climate modelling of their own, and how he hates how his reports are politicised, even though he’s been at this job for years and knows full well that PBO reports are always politicised, because that’s why MPs like them—so that they can both wield those reports as a cudgel, while hiding behind the shield of the PBO’s non-partisan “credibility” to keep the government from attacking it.

https://twitter.com/LindsayTedds/status/1797780078203671008

https://twitter.com/prairiecentrist/status/1797691621708054916

While this Tony Keller column lays out four major problems with the original carbon price report that the PBO produced—which again, Giroux continues to not really apologise for—energy economist Andrew Leach has some additional comments, driving home both how shallow the analysis is, and the fact that it’s not replicable because the PBO studiously refuses to explain his methodology, relying on “trust us, that’s our job.” But as we saw on P&P and again at finance committee, he complained that the government should be doing this kind of modelling work when it’s literally his one statutorily legislated job to do.

And to be helpful, Jennifer Robson provides some unsolicited advice on how the PBO could make his methodologies more transparent, if he actually wanted to do that (which I doubt, because so many of his reports rely on his pulling a novel methodology out of his ass, according to the many economists I’ve interviewed in the past). But that’s also part of the point about why he has no credibility left, and why he should start drafting that resignation letter.

https://twitter.com/lindsaytedds/status/1797817128483254759

Ukraine Dispatch:

A civilian was killed in a Russian strike on a recreation facility in Kharkiv. Here’s a look at what to expect from Ukraine’s peace summit to be held in Switzerland next week.

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Roundup: Hoping to master the algorithm

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As I often rail about terrible government communications and Parliament being reduced to a content studio for social media clips, I was struck by two stories over the weekend. The first was a look into the Liberals’ trying to use social media more effectively to bring back Millennial and Gen Z voters, which means staffers are directing their ministers to tailor content more specifically to these platforms, and ministers using influencers more to get their messages across. While I’m less concerned about the latter because I do think that can be helpful and savvy, it’s the former that concerns me more because we have too many politicians chasing the algorithm as it is, and the algorithm is bad and fickle. If you listen to Aaron Reynolds of Effin’ Birds fame talk about using social media to build his business, he will warn that tailoring your business to specific algorithms is doomed to fail because those algorithms change and can wipe you out, and politicians chasing the algorithm is not only cringe-worthy, it’s frankly bad for media literacy and democracy in general.

The other story was that Conservative MP Branden Leslie produced a Facebook video chock-full of fake news clips that purport to show a future where Trudeau has resigned, but amidst the complaints that using news branding for this kind of deep-fake content is problematic and deeply unethical, Conservatives are defending it as perfectly justified because “nobody could mistake it for reality.” This from the party that is actively building a dystopian alternate reality built on disinformation for their followers to believe in, because they want them to forgo things like critical thinking in order to simply swallow whatever falsehoods the party wants to tell them, and now they’re asserting that people won’t be taken by the very falsehoods this video perpetuates, after they have been training that same audience to swallow falsehoods? Sorry, but you can’t have it both ways. This is nothing good, and a sign that there is no moral compass in the party whatsoever.

Throughout this, I am reminded of something Paul Wells said last week that really struck a chord with me:

I think the social-media revolution has constrained government’s attempts to explain themselves, and radicalized citizens’ responses, more than it’s helped anyone do anything good. And I think most political organizations’ attempts to master these tools end up looking like the tools are, quite thoroughly, mastering the organizations.

This is exactly right, and it’s why I worry that the Liberals trying to push more to social media to reach those Gen-Zers is going to make this actively worse, while the Conservatives are already using the worst features of these platforms to their most unethical extent. This is the state of political communications these days, and it’s very, very scary, and it’s dragging democracy down with it.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russians bombed a big box store complex in Kharkiv on Saturday, killing 14, wounding 43, with 16 others still unaccounted for, even though Ukrainian forces are pushing them back from areas outside of the city.

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Roundup: Evacuation alerts starting early

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Fort McMurray spent the weekend under evacuation alert because of forest fires in the area, and we’re still not even at Victoria Day yet.

Of course, the brain-rotted conspiracy crew are all up in the replies accusing the federal government of paying people to start those fires because reasons, but climate change is serious business, and it amazes me that certain parties remain steadfastly opposed to making necessary changes, or pretending that one day magical technology will do the job without any effort.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russian forces claim to have captured five villages on the border of the Kharkiv region as they make their way toward the city, forcing more than 1700 civilians to flee the area. (I wonder how all those Republicans who held up aid for seven months feel about this).

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1789670737596272953

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Roundup: Ministers in the Upper Chamber

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Something rather unusual happened in the UK, which I figured I would explore a little bit here for how it relates to our shared Westminster system of government. There was  Cabinet shuffle in Westminster yesterday, and prime minister Rishi Sunak appointed former prime minister David Cameron to the House of Lords, and to be his new foreign secretary. Cameron is a particularly interesting choice, given that his spineless decision to call the Brexit referendum to appease certain segments of his party blew up in his face and created much of the foreign policy chaos the government finds itself in,

One of the big questions around this kind of appointment is how MPs get to hold a minister who doesn’t sit in that chamber to account. There are mechanisms in the Lords for asking questions of the government, and while usually that’s directed to the Leader of the Government in that Chamber, this gives Lords an opportunity to ask questions of the foreign secretary directly. There was talk of creating a mechanism to use Westminster Hall, which is the “second chamber” used for debates in Westminster, to allow some sort of mechanism that’s not the Commons, but it never got off the ground the last time this was an issue. For the record, because of the way Australia’s parliament is structure, it is fairly common for several ministers to sit in their Senate, and to answer questions during their Senate Question Time, or however they term it there.

As for Canada, the last time we had a fairly major minister in that Chamber was Michael Fortier, starting in 2006 when Harper formed government and felt he needed a minister from the Montreal area, but didn’t have any MPs from there. So, he chose Fortier, his campaign co-chair, and made him minister of Public Works, which was a bitter twist of irony considering this was just post-Sponsorship scandal, and the complaint was there wasn’t enough accountability for that department. Fortier was later appointed minister of international trade, and faced questions from the Liberals in the Senate, but there were complaints the Bloc and NDP couldn’t use the same avenue, though they could ask questions of his parliamentary secretaries in the Chamber, or question him at committee. Previously, Joe Clark had appointed his minister of justice from the Senate, as he had no Quebec seats at all, while two of our prime ministers—John Abbott and Mackenzie Bowell—were senators and not MPs, so we do have that bit of history to draw on as well.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Ukrainian forces say that Russians have intensified the bombardment around Avdiivka, as well as tried to make a push around Bakhmut again. In Romania, the F-16 pilot training hub for Ukraine and NATO allies has now opened, but training Ukrainian pilots likely won’t start until next year. Here’s a look at how the information warfare happening has created confusion with legitimate news sources, particularly when they can’t get independent verification.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1724172638132576649

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