Tag Archives: Mark Carney

Roundup: His photo-ops were different, you see

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Jamil Jivani has returned from his trip to Washington, and before briefing Dominic LeBlanc or anyone from the government, he turned to the pages of the National Post to pen a self-congratulatory op-ed for the trip that nobody asked for, and that op-ed says pretty much nothing but a collection of platitudes about the GM plant in his riding, and looking for ways to continue the partnership with the US, as though the US isn’t the problem. It’s empty, and has apparently accomplished absolutely nothing

What is hilarious, however, are the fact that conservative posters over on social media have been taking his photos from his meetings with various players in Washington and declaring this to be “leadership,” as opposed to photos that say nothing other than he met with them. And yes, these are the very same voices who denounce the fact that prime minister Mark Carney has travelled across the globe several times over the past nine months and has met with all kinds of world leaders, because of course, that’s just a useless photo op (per Pierre Poilievre’s talking points in Question Period), but Jivani’s pointless photo ops? Totally different. Because of course.

Meanwhile, Kirsten Hillman can’t actually say if she thinks Trump wants to preserve the New NAFTA because his positions change from day to day, and there is no consistency from anyone around him, so that’s fun. Here is more about Hillman’s time in Washington as she wraps up her diplomatic career.

Ukraine Dispatch

There was a massive drone attack on Odesa overnight, which followed a previous massive attack on energy facilities with over 400 drones and 40 missiles earlier in the weekend. The US says they want the war over by summer, but Russia can go home at any point, and these deadlines do nothing but encourage Russia.

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Roundup: No federal backstop for Smith’s threats

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Alberta premier Danielle Smith’s threats around withholding funding for her province’s justice system if she doesn’t get her own way on judicial appointments is attracting broader attention, and there was a particular exchange at a Senate committee the other day that bears pointing out. When asked about this thread, federal justice minister Sean Fraser essentially said that if Smith does this, it’ll be a choice, but also that the federal government is not going to swoop in and backstop this funding lapse with federal dollars.

https://bsky.app/profile/senatorpaulasimons.bsky.social/post/3me4zvsm23k27

This is a good thing. Frankly, if the federal government did this, it would set a terrible precent because all provinces are underfunding their justice systems, and if they backstop Alberta because Danielle Smith is acting like an entitled baby throwing a tantrum, then every other province will cut their own funding and hope for a federal backstop, and once again, things will get worse in our system because provinces aren’t living up to their obligations. They’re not right now, but this would make things infinitely worse. Of course, if this does happen, the federal government will actually have to get off their asses and loudly point this out repeatedly that this is the provincial government’s fault. They should be doing it right now, with the whole nonsense going on around bail reform, but this would be infinitely worse. Court delays for simple matters? Thank Smith. Criminals going free because they can’t get trial dates? Thank Smith. Did that accused murderer get released because they couldn’t actually hold a trial with no functioning court house, no prosecutors and no court staff? Thank Smith. That’s the kind of thing that they need to be doing as is, but they lack the gonads to do so, but they would need to step it up even more if Smith did pull that trigger.

Meanwhile, the Canadian Bar Association is speaking out about Smith’s unconstitutional demands, and other law organizations are joining them, while also explaining how the judicial appointment process works, and why Smith is wrong to characterize them as “activists” who act on the federal government’s behalf. It also bears reminding that the UCP purged the provincial judicial nomination committees in favour of partisan appointees, and that two sitting judges are under investigation for donating to the party, so maybe Smith’s concerns about supposedly political choices are just her projecting and admitting she wants to fix the process for her own political ends.

Ukraine Dispatch

Two people were injured in the overnight attack on Kyiv early Thursday. Ukrainian forces made a successful strike against one of Russia’s missile launch sites. The “peace talks” have seen another agreement on exchanges of prisoners of war.

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Roundup: A sit-down meeting to foster cooperation?

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Yesterday, prime minister Mark Carney had a sit-down meeting with Pierre Poilievre about, well, we’re not entirely sure. Both of their readouts are very different spins on their conversation, but I guess it was about looking at ways to cooperate over the next few months? But let’s take this with a shaker’s full of salt.

Carney is certainly looking to get bills passed through the current minority parliament in a way that won’t be drama with every vote, particularly as he is now down two MPs (soon to be three), while Poilievre has no actual interest in going to an election anytime soon because a) he can read the polls just as much as anyone else and Carney’s favourables are particularly high right now, and b) he wants the NDP to be able to actually fight an election so that they can peel voters away from the Liberals, as the Conservatives need a relatively strong NDP to make that happen, and they are in no position right now. So he needs to save some face while playing along with Carney, so that translates to this faux conciliatory tone, while his “specific suggestions” are always to destroy all environmental laws, and to inevitably drive investment away through uncertainty and increased litigation—such a winning strategy! In any case, I suspect that they will have agreed to pass certain bills, possibly with amendments, by a certain date, before Poilievre gets to carry on with his little song and dance about imaginary taxes and “red tape,” because he has demonstrated time and again that “cooperation” means “do what I say.”

Meanwhile, Jamil Jivani headed to Washington, and apparently got a briefing from Dominic LeBlanc before he left. That said, Carney was throwing some shade around about how Jivani is not the party’s trade critic, and that he was mostly doing it for media attention. Mélanie Joly also noted that he has never said anything about the job losses at the GM plant in his riding, so she was not exactly convinced by his desire to help. In any case, Jivani had his meetings, and tweeted that he had a message from Trump, which was that he “loves” Canadians. Gee, thanks.

Ukraine Dispatch

At least seven people were killed when Russia shelled a front-line town in Donetsk. There are evacuations taking place in Zaporizhzhia region as Russians advance on more settlements. More power cuts are expected as they expect more attacks on Kyiv. Zelenskyy says that 55,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed so far, which is a lot less than the Russian casualties, which total over a million deaths and injuries.

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Roundup: The smell in the convention hall

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With the Conservative convention now over, we can prepare for a whole bunch of legacy media pundits insisting that Poilievre is “setting a new tone,” and that he’s demonstrating he needs to “change,” and a bunch of other equally risible nonsense. Poilievre is not going to change, no matter if you think one speech signalled an intention to or not. Aside from the fact that in all of his adult life, he has refused to change, the fact that he spent his speech talking about Trudeau and not Carney or Trump should be the dead giveaway. Legacy media keeps insisting that this time for sure he’ll change, but rest assured he won’t.

Yes, the quote that Conservatives began weaponizing in 2015 definitely created the Quebec separatist movement that dates back to the 1960s.

— Max Fawcett (@maxfawcett.bsky.social) 2026-02-01T17:53:57.593Z

And while we get voices like Jenny Byrne who keep insisting that everything the party says needs to come back to affordability, to the point that she thinks they should blame the inability to get a deal with Trump on that (and funnily enough, Trump gets no blame there). There was also another push for a bunch of more failed American-style laws in their policy debates, but I will note the attempt to undo the conversion therapy ban and to change the policy on abortion laws both failed to get enough support, so that’s a minor positive. The grassroots also pushed back at the central party for putting their thumb on nomination races, and insisted on changing the rules around it to be fairer, so that’s a rare positive in all of this.

The smell in the room, however, was the presence of the Alberta separatists, who made their presence known, and who were not denounced by anyone in any official capacity. Danielle Smith continues to give them succour, and when those separatists boasted that members of her own caucus have signed their petitions, she claimed that she “doesn’t police the responses of my MLAs,” well, we all know that’s not true either. Smith also continued her bullshit lines about Trudeau “relentlessly attacking” her province, when he in fact bent over backwards to help them when oil prices crashed, and was repaid by this. Federal Conservatives also mouthed these grievance talking points, and wouldn’t denounce separatism either, so that’s healthy, and a conversation the party should be having with itself right now.

Danielle smith repeats disinformation about 30 percent plus being in favour of this.

— Orlagh O’Kelly (@orlaghokelly.bsky.social) 2026-02-01T19:45:19.591Z

Ukraine Dispatch

A Russian drone struck a bus carrying miners in Dnipropetrovsk, killing twelve people, which is one more way of targeting energy workers.

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Roundup: Another meeting that ends in all smiles

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The premiers’ meeting went off as expected—all smiles and talk of unity ahead of the New NAFTA review, and hey, Mark Carney even announced the launch of the Team Canada Trade Hub to provide coordination for trade diversification efforts as certain premiers go on their own trade mission abroad. There were also some timelines around certain trade barriers like credentials recognition and harmonization of health and safety requirements, even if those timelines may not be until next year. (But that’s something, right?)

In his remarks to the premiers, Carney invokes Sir John A Macdonald and the railway, before talking about "how we build," and being in "true partnership" with Indigenous people.The railway *might* not be the best example of "how we build" (600+ deaths) or partnership (dispossession of land).

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2026-01-29T15:19:08.664Z

There was some added side drama as Danielle Smith said that they may be taking Kitimat off the table as the destination for the hoped-for pipeline, but that doesn’t necessarily open up better options on the northwest coast of BC, given that it was determined that it was too dangerous to put a pipeline to Prince Rupert, even though a bunch of people seem to think that’s where it should have wound up in the first place. (Again, this is why Poilievre’s “approve a pipeline today” cries are so ridiculous, because there is no actual route even planned yet).

The other thing on everyone’s mind was the piece in the Financial Times that confirmed that the Alberta separatists were in meetings with the State Department in the US, and David Eby referred to their actions as “treason.” (Incidentally, this activity doesn’t meet the Criminal Code definition of treason). Smith, however, refused to condemn them because they’re politically useful to her, and Carney sidestepped any kind of denunciation, saying that the topic hadn’t come up in his conversations with Trump, when what he should be doing is summoning the ambassador and threatening to PNG him.

— Effin' Birds (@effinbirds.com) 2026-01-29T22:27:01.937Z

Ukraine Dispatch

A Russian drone strike killed three in Zaporizhzhia, while Trump says Putin agreed not to attack Kyiv for a week due to the cold (and I’ll believe that when I see it). An exchange of war dead was carried out, with 1000 Ukrainian bodies turned over for 38 Russians. The Kremlin says they invited Zelenskyy to Moscow for “peace talks.”

"Kremlin says Russia has invited Ukraine's Zelenskyy to come to Moscow for peace talks."Guys. Come on. www.reuters.com/world/europe…

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2026-01-30T05:36:13.695Z

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Roundup: Letting Trump’s lackeys spin the narrative

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Because everything is so stupid all the time, there was a whole ridiculous bit of drama yesterday as US treasury secretary Scott Bessent went on TV to claim that prime minister Mark Carney aggressively walked back his Davos speech on the phone to Trump, when the rest of us didn’t know there even was a call because there was no readout. When Carney came in for his caucus meeting yesterday and was asked about it, he disputed the characterisation, said he meant what he said at Davos, and then turned it into one of those quasi-flattering but also quasi-shady remarks akin to calling Trump “transformational,” in saying that Canada was the first to recognize the changes to global trade that Trump instituted. I’m sure he thinks he was very clever about it too.

Nevertheless, the point stands that the lack of a readout from PMO about the call means that it let the Americans get out ahead in terms of spinning the call and what was said, and as this administration does with everything, is to just lie. Part of this is also transparency, so that we know when there are calls with world leaders, particularly given the situation we’re in with Trump, and the fact that they had a thirty-minute call on a range of topics that included Ukraine is actually kind of important to know, but Carney has refused to be transparent and has said he’s not going to provide readouts for these “informal” calls going forward. So you just keep letting Trump and his people lie about what’s being said? I do not understand why they refuse to understand how to deal with this kind of behaviour.

Amidst this are a bunch of conservatives, some MPs, some designated talking heads on media shows, who were so very eager to take Trump’s side and blaming Carney for harming the relationship, or in trying to insist that it’s Carney who is holding up a tariff deal instead of Trump being mercurial and untrustworthy. I get that for a lot of these people, it’s “anything to own the Libs,” and they will contort themselves to almost the point of treason in order to get that thrill they’re looking for, but for the love of Zeus, have some self-respect.

Ukraine Dispatch

A Russian drone struck a passenger train near Kharkiv, killing five, while drones attacking Odesa killed at least three. There was also a strike against a natural gas facility in western Ukraine. The US says that Ukraine needs to sign a peace deal with Russia to get security guarantees (but Russia has no interest in a peace deal).

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Roundup: Badly rebranding the GST rebate

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Prime minister Mark Carney opened the day at an Ottawa-area grocery store, announcing that as an affordability measure, the government is going to increase the GST rebate by 25 percent for the next five years, and rebrand it as the “Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit,” which is a mystifying name, and like they didn’t learn a gods damned thing from the “Climate Action Incentive” fiasco. (Honest to Zeus, you guys!) But yes, giving low-income people money is a good way to go about it, and the Conservatives say they’ll support it, for what it’s worth, even though they continue to insist that the real culprit are those imaginary “hidden taxes” that aren’t taxes, and which have a negligible impact on the price of food.

This rebranding shows they didn't learn a fucking thing after the "Climate Action Incentive" fiasco.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2026-01-27T04:57:18.254Z

More money and top ups to GST credit is good as myself, @gillianpetit.bsky.social and @jrobson.bsky.social wrote about before policyoptions.irpp.org/2022/09/gst-….Renaming it is unnecessary and has unnecessary risks. I don’t understand

— Dr Lindsay Tedds (@lindsaytedds.bsky.social) 2026-01-26T16:49:53.171Z

Conservatives still pushing the bullshit line that it's "hidden taxes" driving up food prices and not climate change.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2026-01-26T18:01:22.926Z

Carney also promised to tackle the “root causes” of food price inflation, but he remains fairly vague about what they are. “Global supply chain shocks caused by tariffs, weather events from a changing climate, and geopolitical disruptions have caused food prices to rise faster than overall inflation.” This is fine enough in the abstract, but when you’re being assailed daily over certain prices, I would prefer some better explanation. He went on to say “Orange juice is up 12% year-over-year, ground beef is up 19%, and coffee and tea are up by 24%,” but could have added that orange juice is up because the crops were devastated by hurricanes, that ground beef is up because drought on the prairies means herds needed to be culled, and coffee and tea are up because of growing conditions in the countries where they are produced. And while it’s all well and good to signal that he plans to help support the construction of new greenhouses and to fix supply chains in this country, that doesn’t actually solve the broader climate issues that he needs to be honest about and explicit about for it to sink in.

From there, Carney jetted off to Toronto to have a pizza lunch with Doug Ford, in order to soothe Ford’s hurt feelings over the whole Chinese EV thing, and they denied that there was ever any tension. Ford later sang the praises of the federal auto strategy, which seems to indicate that maybe he should have waited for a phone call before throwing a tantrum in public, but hey, what would Ford be if he wasn’t constantly infantilising himself with these kinds of antics while insisting he’s the “fun uncle” who doesn’t have to handle adult responsibilities.

The pool readout from Carney's pizza lunch with Ford.Zeus wept.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2026-01-26T22:09:06.947Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Russia has once again attacked Kharkiv, leaving 80 percent of the city and surrounding area without power.

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Roundup: More threats, more attempts at vassalage

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Because everything is so stupid all the time, we began the weekend with more threats from Trump that he was going to slap 100 percent tariffs on Canadian products if we come to a trade deal with China to avoid them trans-shipping into the US. Oh, and they had “Governor Carney” in them, because of course they did. This was, of course, days after he said it was a great idea that we were pursuing a deal with China, because he would to, and he is doing so. So why the change of heart? (Because he’s addled?)

Cue Dominic LeBlanc, and others, to tell the Americans that no, we’re not pursuing a free trade deal with China, but that this was a fairly discreet tariff issue, which Carney himself repeated for the cameras on the way into the Liberals’ caucus retreat on Sunday. Nevertheless, this has a bunch of people panicking about the future of the New NAFTA review and the potential that the deal could be torn up entirely, because of course they remain our largest trading partner even as we try to diversify (and yes, because of geography, and because Canadian industry is frankly lazy, they are likely to remain so). But it got most of the premiers lined up in support behind Carney, for what it’s worth.

And then, of course, everything backed down, with a bunch of TACO jokes aside, but there is nevertheless a very serious underlying concern that if Carney and the government were to try and walk back their agreement to appease Trump, that this would essentially confirm that we have become little more than a vassal state to the US. We’re not entirely there, but Carney has made so many appeasements in the pursuit of a trade deal that isn’t going to happen that we are in very serious danger of that being the case if we relent on anything more.

— Effin' Birds (@effinbirds.com) 2026-01-24T22:10:01.975Z

Ukraine Dispatch

More than 1300 apartment buildings in Kyiv are still without power after last week’s attacks. Some people in Kyiv, particularly those with disabilities, are trapped in their apartments amidst the blackouts. President Zelenskyy says the security guarantees document with the US is ready to be signed and ratified (not that any agreement with Trump is worth the paper it’s written on).

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Roundup: The Donbas of Canada

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The mask is off. US treasury secretary Scott Bessent was on a far-right TV show to mouth the faux grievances of Alberta, and is providing succour and support for the separatist loons in the province, making it abundantly clear that the US plans to do to Alberta what Putin did with the Donbas region in Ukraine. We’ve watched the Americans also make these promises to independence-minded politicians in Greenland, some of whom naively believe that the US will simply recognise their independence from Denmark and leave them be when that isn’t their plan at all. And you can bet that they’ll start making these same promises to the Parti Québécois if they form power in the province in the next election, because they would absolutely love to break up Canada so that they can absorb the pieces.

So far, the government is downplaying this, with François-Philippe Champagne saying he’ll “remind” Bessent that they are working with Alberta to develop their resources, which is frankly not nearly enough. The US is openly meeting with separatists—those separatist organisers are openly bragging about their “high-level” meetings in Washington—and one of the top members of Trump’s Cabinet is openly supporting them. At the bare minimum, the US ambassador needs to be summoned, and if he doesn’t properly explain and apologise, then he should be expelled in order to send a message that this kind of interference is absolutely unacceptable.

And then there’s the problem of those separatists who are taking it upon themselves to “negotiate” in Washington. You might think that someone like Danielle Smith might denounce them for these actions, but she has bent over backwards to ensure that they have the easiest ride possible to their referendum, because Smith thinks that she can leverage it for her benefit. And Carney has been utterly silent, believing that his bending the knee to Smith is what is going to solve the separatism issue, even though these people have no interest in actual policy resolutions and have made hating Ottawa (and anyone named Trudeau) their whole personality. This is going to need a much stronger hand, and a forceful pushback against this American interference before it can fester even more than it already has.

— Effin' Birds (@effinbirds.com) 2026-01-23T23:56:01.434Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Kyiv and Kharkiv have come under Russian attack in the early hours of the morning. The constant attacks have worsened the power grid situation, as temperatures have been falling as low as -16ºC.

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Roundup: The domestic speech and the response

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Back on Canadian soil, prime minister Mark Carney gave a speech to a domestic audience in advance of his Cabinet retreat, in which he used the location of the Plains of Abraham—where the retreat is being held, at the Citadelle in Quebec City—to praise the foundation of Canada (which the Bloc took exception to), our pluralism and shared values, and our choice to offer a vision of something different to the world. Oh, and he clapped back at Trump saying we live only because of the US. It might have been nice, but he kept veering off onto weird tangents about praising digital asbestos, or federal social programmes like pharmacare that he hasn’t done a single thing with in the past year and has outright stated he’s not interested in expanding. And if anything, the speech exposed a streak of hypocrisy—Canadian values, and pluralism, but we just signed a “strategic partnership” with a country genociding an ethnic minority. We’re going to create thousands of good-paying union jobs, but we just signed “strategic investments” with a country that employs slave labour. If you’re going to pat yourself on the back for your values, maybe try and at least pretend you’re trying to live up to them?

This Carney speech is giving me whiplash. Hooray for Canadian values! (But we’re also going to do deals with people who commit genocide and practice slave labour, and scapegoat immigrants).Hooray for our social programmes, but let’s do more digital asbestos!

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2026-01-22T19:04:50.878Z

Meanwhile, Pierre Poilievre released his own statement in response to Carney’s speech at Davos. The gist of Poilievre’s remarks is that of course Carney isn’t doing enough, that we shouldn’t alienate the Americans and by that we should engage with allies in the country who will help us post-Trump, and that he plans to move a motion next week to pass his ridiculous Canadian Sovereignty Act bill at all stages. (Transcript here).

And make no mistake—that bill is ridiculous. The primary gist of it is to tear up any and all environmental regulation to build more pipelines (who cares about a market case of First Nations consent?), to incentivise the reinvestment of capital gains in Canada (which was a plan so complex that Jim Flaherty walked it back after trying to do it during the Harper years), paying provinces a “bonus” for eliminating any remaining trade barriers, and to require the government to stop letting innovators in this country sell their intellectual property to Americans (and good luck with that one). It’s stupid and unfeasible and will only create a tonne of new problems while solving absolutely none, but he somehow thinks this is genius.

— Effin' Birds (@effinbirds.com) 2026-01-22T15:05:14.665Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Russian strikes hit locations in Zaporizhzhia, as well as Kryvyi Rih. At Davos, president Zelenskyy gave a speech highly critical of Europe’s indecisiveness and inability to organise enough to project any strength. (Transcript here).

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