Tag Archives: F-35 Fighters

Roundup: No First Ladies in Canada, so stop asking

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Because this is sometimes a media criticism blog, I’m going to sigh and rub the bridge of my nose, and maybe massage my temples a few times of this particular doozy of a piece in The Walrus about Mark Carney’s wife, Diana Fox Carney. The subhed refers to her as the “unofficial First Lady,” but in the story itself, it just refers to her as a “First Lady” along with other spouses of heads of state or heads of government interchangeably, and I just can’t you guys.

Guys. Stop it.Canada's "First Lady" is Queen Camilla. Stop trying to import Americanisms, even if you try and couch them in "unofficial" status.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-09-15T11:44:05.416Z

First of all, it matters that we’re a constitutional monarchy and not a presidential republic. That means that our “First Lady,” if we were to have one, would be Queen Camilla. If you were discounting the Canadian monarch, the next candidate would be the spouse of the Governor General (who once upon a time was called the “Chatelaine/Chatelain of Rideau Hall” as an unofficial title). Yes, this matters, in particular because the difference between a head of state and a head of government matters a great deal, particularly when it comes to the kind of role they play within government, and just because the American system fuses the two together, that’s pretty much unique in the world, and is a far cry from how our Westminster system operates. And right at nearly the very bottom of the piece, she writes:

In this way, being a first lady in Canada is fundamentally different from being one in the US, where the position, while unofficial, comes with an office and staff. In Canada, the prime minister’s spouse has no formal role or institutional support, and technically isn’t even the partner of a head of state. As a result, the title “first lady” doesn’t really apply in the same way.

No kidding! In fact, it undermines the whole gods damned point of your story. You just tried to compare apples and hedgehogs, tried to mash two fundamentally different concepts together, and then was like “Oh well, maybe she’ll get more active at some point!” No! We don’t elect spouses, and they don’t have a role for a reason. If she wants to have a role, she should seek a seat. (This especially goes for Poilievre’s wife, by the way). But trying to jam the spouse of a prime minister into the “First Lady” box is both fundamentally wrong, and a sign of really lazy conceptualizing of how our system of government works. The Walrus should absolutely know better.

Speaking of terrible reporting, the Globe and Mail put out a story yesterday that had the headline that “Liberal staffers strategized over $1-billion loan for Chinese ferries while Freeland dismissed federal connection,” which sounds like they were maybe somehow involved in the loan or procurement while claiming otherwise. But no. The story was about how comms staffers in ministers’ offices were trying to spin the story. That’s it. I saw lots of reactions on social media from people who read the headline and assumed that something hinky was going on that should be looked into by parliamentarians, but no. It’s about comms staffers spinning. Can we just not? This was not a story, and it especially was not a story about some kind of cover-up.

— Effin' Birds (@effinbirds.com) 2025-09-14T20:02:07.093Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Russia launched a massive attack against Zaporizhzhia, killing at least one and injuring at least seven so far. International monitors say that cluster munitions have resulted in over 1200 civilian casualties since the Russian invasion began in 2022.

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Roundup: A narrower, more revealing book ban

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Alberta’s amended book ban was announced on Wednesday, and lo, it is now being confined to graphic novels that depict supposed sexually explicit images, and wouldn’t you just know it, we’re back to the original four books that triggered this whole thing, three of those four titles being queer or trans-related. And nobody will actually say that out loud—not the premier, not the education minister, and wouldn’t you know it, not legacy media either.

To be clear, this move brings us back to the very pointed targeting of LGBTQ2S+ graphic novels that got us here in the first place.Books that were on the government's radar thanks to far-right advocacy groups like Action4Canada.

— Mel Woods (@melwoods.me) 2025-09-08T21:18:06.510Z

The Canadian Press didn’t mention anything about queer or trans materials, and they got quotes from Action4Canada, calling them a “parents advocacy group” instead of a far-right Christian nationalist organization, which they absolutely are. CBC’s reporting kept focusing on “explicit images of sexual acts,” and their televised coverage made zero mention of queer or trans materials, though the print story at least did quote the Fyrefly Institute for Gender and Sexual Diversity, who expressed concern that this could “disproportionately affect 2SLGBTQ+ representation,” but didn’t specify that three of the four main targeted books were queer or trans, which again, is important context to have. Neither of their coverage actually mentioned that if you look at the images that the government sent to the media about the offending images (which the government did actually provide), pretty much none of them were “explicit images of sexual acts” either, even if there was some nudity or allusions to sexual acts that were not graphic or explicit. I also have to wonder why neither the Alberta NDP (and Naheed Nenshi especially), or the Alberta Teachers’ Association could call this out for what it is.

There is a large portion of people who only really started to care about the Alberta book ban stuff when it was Margaret Atwood being pulled from shelves.I hope those same people are willing to stand up and defend queer and trans comics artists too, and call this what it is

— Mel Woods (@melwoods.me) 2025-09-08T21:41:10.098Z

Meanwhile, Maclean’s published a profile of six Alberta separatism supporters in an attempt to humanize them and show how they’re just ordinary people with real concerns. Those concerns? Vaccines, believing climate change is a scam designed to punish Alberta, immigration, and the general grievance addiction that social media addicts on the right have become dependent upon. They couldn’t even be bothered to correct the one gullible woman who believes that the National Energy Program is still running and siphoning the province’s wealth. No discussion about the fact that Alberta separatism is fuelled largely by Christian nationalism and white supremacy, which is really important context to have when you’re trying to humanize these people. It’s astonishingly bad journalism, but, well, that’s Maclean’s these days (just inhabiting the corpse of a once-great magazine).

https://bsky.app/profile/daveberta.bsky.social/post/3lygl7xvz7s22

In fact the #Alberta economy was impacted more because the world oil price dropped while the NEP was in place and actually continued to drop after the NEP was cancelled.#ABpoli

— True Oak (@trueoak.bsky.social) 2025-07-17T17:40:34.155Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Things have been escalating, as last night, a number of Russian drones entered Polish airspace and were downed by NATO air defences (Thread here). And the day before that, glide bombs struck in Yarova, where elderly villages were lining up for their pension cheques. And the day before that was the largest barrage of the war to date, with 805 drones and 13 missiles, and government buildings in Kyiv were hit for the first time. And Trump still isn’t doing anything while Putin mocks him.

Since January 20, Russian air raids in Ukraine have intensified dramatically

— Anne Applebaum (@anneapplebaum.bsky.social) 2025-09-09T20:08:04.868Z

https://twitter.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1965345997044744662

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Roundup: The same counterproductive demands, once again

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The “changed” and “humbled” Pierre Poilievre was back on his old bullshit yesterday, calling a press conference in Surrey, BC, to decry crime rates, blame the government, give some misleading bullshit about past legislation, and then take friendly questions from hand-picked outlets. Sounds familiar?

But seriously, we’ve been through all of this before. Calling for a terrorism designation for the Bishnoi gang is not helpful, and risks watering down terrorism designations in general (which is why it was a problem to do it for Mexican cartels at the behest of the Trump administration, not to mention designations shouldn’t be made for political expediency). Tougher penalties for extortion? Extortion with a firearm already has a maximum sentence of life in jail, so why they want a four-year minimum is not exactly doing anything more than current sentencing already does. Repealing the former Bill C-75 on bail? As we have said time and time again, this merely codified Supreme Court of Canada jurisprudence on the law of bail and made it tougher for those accused of domestic violence to get bail, so repealing it will do nothing. What is it going to take to drive home that these are not solutions, and will do nothing about the current uptick in police-reported crime (and again, these are small upticks that are well below historic norms)?

Meanwhile, Poilievre, Andrew Scheer, and others, spent their day engaging in supportive posts for transphobes, during Ottawa Pride Week no less. So yeah, up to their same old bullshit because they want to rile up the grievance mongers so that they can begin a new round of grifty fundraising. Poilievre has learned absolutely nothing from losing his seat and the election.

Conservatives are going all-in on transphobia today, as Pride Week in Ottawa is underway. #canqueer

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-08-20T21:13:56.179Z

Ukraine Dispatch

At least fourteen people were wounded in a Russian attack on the Sumy region, three people were killed in an artillery attack on the eastern city of Kostiantynivka, and a gas distribution station was hit in Odesa. Russians claim to have advanced in the Dnipropetrovsk region, while Ukrainians knocked out power in parts of Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia.

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Roundup: A “summit” that achieved nothing

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So, that Trump-Putin meeting went about as well as expected. Trump literally rolled out the red carpet for a murderer and war criminal, gave him a military flypast, and then invited him into his limo (even though Putin brought his own), which freaked out every single security expert on social media and television, because they were alone together, and nobody knows if Trump explained to him the security measures in the vehicle, or if anything else was said with no one else around to hear.

The meeting went nowhere, in spite of talk about an “understanding,” and in the press conference after, Putin went first, spoke at length, flattered Trump obsequiously, and Trump rambled at his incoherent best about how they didn’t come to an agreement, and they didn’t take any questions at the end. But they were chummy, and Trump still thinks he’s Putin’s best friend, and the war will continue, as we all knew it would.

I continue to be struck by Putin's confidence in the idea that he can play Trump. His whole remarks stuck to the idea that the only barriers to peace are Ukraine and Europe. Not even a hat tip to what Russia wants or expects from a deal. Just total bullshit and Trump flattery.

— Justin Ling (@justinling.ca) 2025-08-15T23:29:30.125Z

The fact that they didn't take questions seems to be a tacit acknowledgement that they got nowhere and have nothing to say. At best, Trump is going to be irate that the bombardment of Ukraine continues after today.At worst, Trump is going to be sucked into a vortex of time-wasting summits.

— Justin Ling (@justinling.ca) 2025-08-15T23:30:37.487Z

The Kremlin just dropped this clip of Putin and Trump getting chummy post-press conference.

— Justin Ling (@justinling.ca) 2025-08-15T23:41:32.030Z

Just to hammer this in:I don't know of an example in US history of comparable *in-person humiliation* for a US president. And of course for the country. Trump will soon realize how visibly he was "owned." In view of the whole world.

— James Fallows (@jfallows.bsky.social) 2025-08-16T00:17:22.899Z

The meeting was a disaster for everyone except two people. Trump got his photo op and his ego boost. Putin got his photo op, whitewashing of war crimes and no sanctions. No one in Ukraine, Europe or the United States benefited in any way.

— Anne Applebaum (@anneapplebaum.bsky.social) 2025-08-16T04:12:52.329Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Ahead of the meeting, Russia attacked Dnipropetrovsk with missiles, killing at least one and wounding at least one other. Ukrainian drones hit the Syzrn oil refinery in Russia’s Samara region.

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Roundup: The reality of enduring tariffs

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On his way into the Cabinet meeting yesterday, Mark Carney made remarks to the press that it looks like there is little chance that we’ll get any kind of trade deal that doesn’t include some kind of tariffs, and that the commercial landscape has changed globally, so his focus would continue to be on what he can control, which is building a strong Canadian economy. It’s a lot in three sentences, but it does look like he’s coming around to a more honest assessment of where we’re at. Well, at least slightly so—they’re still pursing some form of “trade and security” agreement, which is continues to be a waste of everyone’s time because there is no agreement to be had, as Trump is not a rational actor and won’t live up to any agreement he does sign, if that ever happens. But at least Carney is no longer signalling that the old status quo is just around the corner, so that’s progress.

Pierre Poilievre, meanwhile, is calling this a “unilateral concession,” and seems to be under the impression that he (or anyone else) could somehow secure a better deal with Trump, even though there is no deal to be had. Trump loves tariffs, and won’t be dissuaded, and we have to learn to live with that (because it’s going to be a long while before it sinks in that they are driving up costs for Americans, because a whole lot of them refuse to believe the truth). We need to be wide-eyed about this, and Carney needs to be more upfront as well. There is no deal to be had. They can go through the motions of negotiating but it won’t get us anywhere, and sure, we need to focus on what we can do…but that has to mean more than just putting all of our eggs in the resource extraction basket, which can’t be our only option.

— Effin' Birds (@effinbirds.com) 2025-07-15T21:22:14.842Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Russian drones and missiles struck Kharkiv, Kryvyi Rih, and Kyiv, but there was no damage at the latter. It looks like under the latest missive from Trump, NATO members will buy US equipment for Ukraine from the US, but the US won’t spend any of their own money to send weapons to Ukraine even though it’s in their own interests to do so. (Well, it was until the US became an autocratic state).

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Roundup: A major agreement with the EU

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At the Canada-EU summit in Brussels yesterday, Mark Carney signed a new security and defence partnership, and the joint communiqué was very, very long. A lot of stuff that might have been part of a G7 communiqué, but that wasn’t going to happen given how much time and energy was spent managing Trump and the Americans, and that included a lot of talk about upholding the rules-based international order, or combatting climate change, and that kind of thing, that would have caused Trump to throw another one of his public tantrums. But that’s the world we live in now.

This means that Canada is now on the road to participating in programmes like ReArm Europe, which seeks to drive down the cost of joint military procurement projects by increasing the scale of the buys, and helps to keep those industries in Europe rather than relying on the American defence-industrial complex, but the hope is that this agreement will open the Canadian market to those procurements as well (though I am curious to know how many Canadian firms are actually Canadian and not just American branch-plants).

Today will be the big NATO summit where increasing the expected defence spending target is the major focus, though there will likely be some sidebars around de-escalation with Israel and Iran. Ukraine will also be a focus, though president Zelenskyy is not expected to attend (though he was in the UK yesterday to sign new agreements on military production there, and to have lunch with the King at Windsor Castle). Nevertheless, that five percent target—to ostensibly be divided up as 3.5% operational spending and 1.5% in related spending that has some kind of a defence-adjacent component—is going to be incredibly difficult for the majority of countries to achieve, but especially to sustain. You already have some countries who met their two percent target by front-loading a bunch of procurement, but they have no idea how they’ll manage to stay at two percent, let alone 3.5%-plus going forward. (It’s also a dumb metric because it doesn’t deal with contributions to operations, and the disparity between the denominators among member countries is pretty vast, to say nothing about the fact that it’s easier to hit your targets if you crash your economy to drag your denominator down). One hopes there will be some cooler heads around the table, but it looks like the 5 percent is a done deal, which will create problems down the road.

https://bsky.app/profile/plagasse.bsky.social/post/3lsbzgrlhpk2u

Ukraine Dispatch

The attack on Kyiv early Monday wound up killing at least ten, including a child, as an apartment block was struck. Ukraine says that it attacked and set ablaze an oil depot in Russia’s Rostov region.

https://twitter.com/zelenskyyua/status/1937171580552966364?s=61

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QP: Repeating the same questions about the AG’s report

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Wednesday, and everyone in the Chamber was revved up from their morning caucus meetings. The prime minister was present, as were the other leaders, and Andrew Scheer led off, and boasted that the Conservatives would force a vote to get money that went to GC Strategies back (which I don’t think you can do legally). Mark Carney said that the government was focused on best-in-class procurement practices, which is why they changed the department. Scheer claimed that Carney must have somehow been involved because he was an economic advisor to the Liberal Party, along with other ministers still in the Cabinet, and Carney crowed about the new minister and that his deputy used to fly fighter jets. Mark Strahl repeated the same accusations and accused the government of making no effort to get wasted dollars back, and Carney said that the Conservatives are ignoring that there was just an election. Strahl tried again, and got much the same answer. Luc Berthold read the French version of Scheer’s script, and Carney repeated his best-in-class line in French. Berthold repeated the notion that the ministers involved got promoted, and Carney stated that he will be focused on best-in-class procurement.

Yves-François Blanchet led for the Bloc, and he wondered if the carbon levy rebates that went out in April was paid for already through the levy collected, and Carney said that it was a transitional payment because they cancelled the levy and people still needed it for the transition. Blanchet Said that the government is refusing to pay back Quebeckers if others didn’t pay into it, and demanded they now be compensated. Carney reminded him that Quebec has their own carbon pricing system, and that he respects their jurisdiction. Blanchet reiterated that the rebate was not paid for, and called it an injustice against the people of Quebec. Carney repeated that there are different systems and different transitions, so the system is coherent. 

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Roundup: The Auditor General on F-35s and ArriveCan

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Yesterday saw the release of the Auditor General and Environment Commissioner’s reports, and lo, these ones actually got a tonne of media attention and took centre stage in Question Period, which is a far cry from most of their recent reports. The reason, of course, is that the topics were sexy—F-35 fighter jets and the ArriveCan app gong show in particular, the latter of which the Conservatives have been salivating over for three years now, which made the day pretty much insufferable as a result. But there was more than just those.

  • The F-35 procurement costs have ballooned because of delays, pilot shortages, infrastructure, and inflation but acknowledged the Canadian government has little control over most of these factors.
  • CBSA failed to follow procurement and security rules when it used GC Strategies to contract out work on ArriveCan, and didn’t follow-up to ensure work had been done before more contracts were awarded.
  • Public Services and Procurement has been slow to modernise and downsize office space, and turn over surplus buildings for housing.
  • Indigenous Services has failed to process Indian Act status applications within the required six-month timeline, with a backlog having grown to over 12,000 applications.
  • The climate adaptation plan is falling short, with only one of its three pillars in place and little connection between spending and results.

I’m not sure that the F-35 news is all that surprising, but it does actually work to either justify a potential move away from the platform, or to reflect increases in defence spending calculations. The GC Strategies findings are also not unexpected, but one thing the Conservatives have been failing to mention is that CBSA is an arms’-length agency, so ministers had no real say over any of its contracting practices (as the Conservatives try to insist that any minister who had carriage on the file should be fired). Meanwhile, their narrative that this was somehow about “Liberal friends” was never mentioned in the report, nor was there any mention about partisan considerations, or indication that the firm had any connection to the government, so these are just rage-bait accusations used solely for the performance art, which is how most things go with these guys.

— Effin' Birds (@effinbirds.com) 2025-06-10T21:22:14.366Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Tuesday’s attack from Russia was one of its largest strikes on Kyiv, which also hit civilian targets in Odesa, and Kharkiv was subjected to a nine-minute-long drone attack that killed at least two and injured 54. Another prisoner swap took place yesterday, this time for an undisclosed number of sick and wounded soldiers.

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QP: GC Strategies, over and over and over again…

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Fresh from the Pride Flag raising on Parliament Hill, the prime minister was present for Question Period today, as were the other leaders. Andrew Scheer was present but did not lead off, leaving that up to Larry Brock, who put on his most serious tone to decry the Auditor General’s report on the “fraudsters” at GC Strategies and the dollars that they got from government, and demand taxpayers get their money back. Mark Carney thanked the Auditor General for her service and noted that the company has been prohibited from government contracts for seven years, and that “Canada’s New Government™” would uphold higher standards. Brock blustered that ministers responsible for those “fraudulent” payments are still in Cabinet, and demanded taxpayers get their money back. Carney instead praised them for supporting their legislation on tax cuts. James Bezan took over and thundered about the AG report on the F-35 procurement, and the increased cost projections and delays to necessary infrastructure for the planes, and demanded that the ministers responsible be held to account. Carney in turn wondered if Bezan held himself to account for military funding falling below one percent when he was in the government, before patting himself on the back for the military funding announcement. Bezan sputtered and insisted that the Conservatives “delivered” for the military, and demanded to know why Anita Anand was still in his Cabinet, as he blamed her for the findings in the report. Carney instead delivered an ode to the Canadian industry that they would be featuring in this military rebuilding. Pierre Paul-Hus asked the same condemnation about the report and Anand in French, to which Carney pointed to this first action he took was to review the F-35 contract. Paul-Hus then turned to the ArriveCan portion of the report and the GC Strategies condemnation. Carney noted that an independent process suspended their ability to bid for contracts already.

Yves-François Blanchet said that the final carbon levy rebate was paid out before the money was collected, then Quebeckers were also owed a payment. Carney responded that while he was “proud” to cancel the levy, Quebec and BC have their own systems and didn’t pay into it. Blanchet tried a second time, and Carney repeated that they didn’t pay into it. Blanchet put a price that of $814 million on that, and Carney noted that Blanchet himself created Quebec’s carbon pricing system, and that their not getting a rebate was coherent.

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Roundup: The relationship with the US has ended

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Day five of the election campaign, and two of the three leaders changed their plans in response to Trump’s tariff announcement—the Conservatives did not, and they can’t pivot because they don’t have media on their plane who can follow them if they have to change plans to respond to events, which is all the more reason why they never should have left them off.

Mark Carney returned to Ottawa to meet with his Canada-US Cabinet committee, and call several premiers including Doug Ford, before addressing the media. There were no campaign announcements today, and said that retaliatory measures will be announced next week when more tariffs are supposed to be coming from Trump, but his remarks were stark, and have been blowing up across a segment of American media—that the relationship we used to have of deepening economic integration and cooperation on security and defence is now over. That’s going to mean a significant retooling of our economy for “strategic economic autonomy,” and that this will be difficult, with no silver bullet. That also means shifting the auto sector for more global trade, which is apparently part of what he discussed with union leaders yesterday, so we’ll see if we get more details about what that could mean. Carney did say that Trump’s office has reached out to talk, so that will likely happen in a couple of days. Afterward, he headed to Montreal for a rally, and today, he plans to have an emergency virtual meeting with the first ministers.

Pierre Poilievre was in Surrey, BC, and his daily announcement was about raising the TFSA limit so long as it was tied to Canadian funds—but he made it sound like government would top-up funds (they won’t), it really only benefits those who can add another $5000 to these accounts, and more to the point, it adds a bunch of bureaucratic reporting mechanisms to prove the funds are Canadian. (Sounds like someone is adding red tape!) He did have a message to Trump to “knock it off,” which was weak and too late, but he keeps talking in terms that the relationship can simply go back to what it was if the tariffs get called off, when it can’t. Democracy has died in the US. There is no ability to trust this administration, and probably the next one. He is off to Nanaimo, BC, today.

https://bsky.app/profile/jrobson.bsky.social/post/3llefekfd522e

https://bsky.app/profile/jrobson.bsky.social/post/3llefekff3k2e

https://bsky.app/profile/jrobson.bsky.social/post/3llefekfkx22e

Jagmeet Singh, having pivoted his campaign stop, went to Windsor to announce his plan for entirely Canadian-made cars, and that he’d waive the GST on Canadian-made autos. The promise is likely impossible because supply chains were integrated for a reason, and we have too small of a market to support a purely domestic auto market (and cue all the jokes about Canadian Ladas). He is headed back to Toronto today.

In other election news, former Conservative strategist Kory Teneycke ripped Poilievre a new asshole at an Empire Club event on Wednesday about Poilievre’s inability to meet the moment in the campaign, which was why his poll numbers are tanking, and why he is heading for defeat—particularly because Poilievre has adopted way too many Trump habits to appeal to a certain segment of voters he wants to keep on-side. This as Doug Ford’s personal pollster has made it known that Poilievre’s numbers are grim in Ontario.

www.theglobeandmail.com/gift/66d740f…

— Kevin Milligan (@kevinmilligan.bsky.social) 2025-03-28T04:07:44.115Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Russia launched 86 drones plus a missile overnight Wednesday, which sparked fires and injured 21 people in Kharkiv, while shelling in Kherson killed two and damaged power supplies, in contravention of the supposed partial “ceasefire.” Russian forces have also been stepping up attacks on Sumy region. Putin wants a “temporary administration” to allow for elections in Ukraine to end the war, when all that needs to happen for him to end it is to simply send his soldiers home.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1905252833827364873

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