About four hours after Harper addressed the Commons about extending the Iraq mission, everyone gatherer again, all leaders present and full benches behind them. Thomas Mulcair led off, asking about the October statements that bombing in Syria would only happen with the permission of that government, and asked what changed. Harper responded that ISIS was taking refuge in Syria, and that we were following the lead of our allies in bombing across that border. Mulcair asked about the change in statements on painting targets, but Harper insisted that the government would act about the threat of ISIS. Muclair asked about how many new soldiers would be added, to which Harper insisted that those would not change. Mulcair asked for an exit strategy, and Harper responded by being “clear” about the threat that ISIS poses to Canada and the world. Mulcair wondered how Harper could still claim it wasn’t a combat mission, and Harper responded by wondering how the NDP could not support the mission. Justin Trudeau was up next, asking about the planning horizon for the combat role. Harper responded that the motion was for up to twelve months, and that they would continue to evaluate the situation. Trudeau wondered if our Special Forces would be operating in Syria, to which Harper assured him that the motion was only for them to continue training in Northern Iraq. Trudeau then wondered how Canada would communicate with the Assad regime to ensure that our fighters would not be targeted by Syrian air defences. Harper insisted that our allies were already doing it.
Tag Archives: Terrorism
Roundup: Witnesses of dubious expertise
As the hearings on C-51 resume, the government has come out swinging with what they consider to be a star witness – the sister of slain soldier Patrice Vincent, who of course thinks that the bill is necessary. The problem, of course, is that she really has no credentials other than being victim of a tragedy, and if you ask me, the government is pretty unseemly in exploiting her grief to push legislation that actual experts are not convinced about. It’s not the first time they’ve used this tactic, and it hasn’t always worked – remember Amanda Todd’s mother, who wasn’t ready to hand over civil liberties to try and halt the spectre of cyber-bulling. Not that it stopped Stephen Blaney from touting Louise Vincent over and over again in QP yesterday, and he’s likely to repeat her praise for the bill today and going forward whenever criticism is levelled at the bill. Other witnesses yesterday included former Conservative Senator Hugh Segal, who wants more oversight in the bill, and at least one other small-c conservative commentator, who has her own doubts about the bill, in case you were wondering if all of the opposition was coming from the “loony left.” Elsewhere, Conservative MP Michael Chong is now adding his voice to those who want more oversight, while the National Firearms Association, who have expressed a great deal of scepticism over the bill, has pulled out from testifying.
QP: OMG Jihadi Terrorists!
Monday after a break week, and attendance was pretty scare, particularly among the leaders. In Mulcair’s stead, David Christopherson shouted a denunciation of Bill C-51. In response, Stephen Blaney calmly explained that terrorists were targeted by the bill, not lawful protesters. Christopherson shouted about the Canadian Bar Association opposing the bill, to which Peter MacKay assured him that they were listening to experts, and touted the provisions for judicial warrants in the bill. Christopherson then changed topics, and shouted a question of when the Iraq mission extension motion would be tabled. Jason Kenney said that a motion would be tabled “soon,” and then denounced ISIS. Nycole Turmel asked the same again in French, got the same answer in French, and for her final question, Turmel noted the opposition of the government of Quebec to C-51. Blaney responded that he had already met with his counterparts. Marc Garneau led off for the Liberals, and noted the weak job numbers and wondered where the plan for permanent job creation was. Pierre Poilievre insisted that the only job plan the Liberals had was to raise taxes. Ralph Goodale asked about the cuts to infrastructure funds, but Candice Bergen gave a non sequitur response about family tax cuts. Goodale demanded more money for Build Canada, to which Poilievre repeated his red herring about higher Liberal taxes.
Roundup: Rushing through the bill…again
With the clock ticking down to the end of the current parliament, the government is going to start lighting a fire to getting C-51 passed over the next two weeks, before the Easter break. That means accelerating the committee hearings to largely stuff them in the next week, with lots of witnesses in single sittings and little time to hear from each of them. It’s not a surprise that the government would use this particular tactic again to ram though contentious legislation, as they’ve done repeatedly, because they apparently have little capacity or desire to actually do the due diligence that they’re supposed to when it comes to these kinds of bills. Not surprisingly, there’s going to be plenty of opposition to large parts of the bill, and some of those who do support parts of the bill are at least concerned that there’s not enough study of the ramifications, or that there is enough needed oversight. But will the government make changes? Unlikely. Adding their voices to the opposition to the bill over the weekend was the Canadian Bar Association.
Roundup: Freezing out the ambassador
It’s a very curious tale that didn’t seem to get much attention yesterday, but the Globe and Mail had a very interesting and lengthy dissection of the relationship between the Canadian government and the US ambassador to Canada, and it’s not good. It’s also one of those cases where it’s hard to assign blame, because so much of what’s terrible seems to be coming from both sides. First Obama took nine months to announce a replacement, which was seen as a snub, and then when Bruce Heyman was appointed and arrived in Canada, he basically said he couldn’t help with any of the big files – Keystone XL and the new Detroit-Windsor bridge – and wanted us to bend on other files like intellectual property. Oh, and he told a crowd at his first big outing that we need to pretty much get over Keystone XL. So the Canadian government froze him out – Harper won’t meet with him, nor will the cabinet, and since Harper still meets with Obama at international summits, and John Baird had a good relationship with John Kerry, it was all well and good to go around Heyman, who in turn started going around the federal government and has been focusing on premiers instead. It’s all perfectly dysfunctional, and perhaps a sign of the dysfunction at the top, and problems in the world’s biggest trading relationship.
Roundup: Blowback on gun comments
The backlash from the Conservatives’ fundraising appeal for rural gun owners is starting, from NDP leader Thomas Mulcair, to Quebec premier Philippe Couillard, to Ontario’s former attorney general. In fact, numerous legal authorities are reminding Canadians that they don’t have the right to use deadly force to protect their homes – unless it’s a case of self-defence, but those situations are rare, and use of force must be proportional in order to not be criminal. And then the PMO started backpedalling about things Harper did or did not say, and how they are aware of criminal misuse of firearms, all while the gun lobby is chafing that the government hasn’t gone far enough for their liking. See the swamp that the government has stepped in, while curiously trying to import a culture war that doesn’t actually exist in Canada. It has also been pointed out that Harper made the gun comments in part of a broader discussion of rural issues while in Saskatchewan, and that he missed the mark on some of the more pressing concerns in that area as well.
Roundup: Contradictions over a niqab policy
It’s definitely starting to look like there’s a either a rift forming in the NDP when it comes to their position on the niqab, or they’re saying one thing in English and another in French, trying to please both audiences in contradiction to the other. Alexandre Boulerice went on Quebec media to talk about the need to keep it out of the civil service, and that we need a national Bouchard-Taylor-esque commission to determine reasonable accommodation for religious minorities around the country – because that worked so well in Quebec, and apparently the rest of the country has the same insecurities around multiculturalism that we need to develop some kind of nonsense term like “interculturalism” to cover for assimilationist policies. Meanwhile, in English, MPs like Paul Dewar and Pat Martin are saying there’s no issue with the niqab and no party policy around it, and Thomas Mulcair has been dancing around the issue when asked directly, talking only about how the Federal Court judgement on the citizenship ceremony issue went to process – a ministerial decree – than the substance of the niqab issue. And if you thought that Boulerice was just freelancing that opinion, it was being tweeted out by the party’s official French Twitter Machine account, and give the degree to which communications are centralised in that party (possibly worse than the Conservative centralisation), it would seem to indicate that such a message has been officially sanctioned, and that the party looks to be trying to please different audiences in the country with contradictory messages. Meanwhile, The Canadian Press took their Baloney Meter™ to the Conservative claims around the niqab ban for citizenship ceremonies (spoiler: It’s full of baloney).
Roundup: Talking over criticism
We saw more testimony on C-51 yesterday, pretty much all of it scathing in one way or another – not that the Conservatives on the committee were really open to hearing such criticism, and went so far as to mischaracterise some of the comments on the evening political shows, and talking over those witnesses while in committee to attempt to make their points for them. One of the witnesses yesterday was AFN national chief Perry Bellegarde, who wants the bill withdrawn for not having consulted with First Nations, because he sees it as an assault on their rights, saying that they have been labelled as terrorists for standing up for their rights and lands. (I can’t recall this government ever having done that, for the record, and I think his argument is a bit of a stretch, but maybe that’s just me). A former head of SIRC – and former Progressive Conservative cabinet minister at that – called the bill a constitutional mess, which is a pretty good indication that the criticism on the bill is coming from all sides – not just the environmentalists and civil libertarians. The Conservatives, meanwhile, have blocked the Privacy Commissioner from appearing at committee, but they insist that he was “consulted” on the bill. The problem there is that he didn’t see the bill before it was tabled, which is really tough to call it consultation since he couldn’t see the language of what he was supposed to be consulted on. John Geddes profiles the two law professors who have taken the lead in pointing out the many flaws in the bill, who also appeared yesterday.
QP: Don’t question, just support C-51
Because Thursday is the new Friday, none of the major leaders were in the Commons, leaving it up to Megan Leslie to lead off, asking about Turkish reports that a Canadian helped those three British teens cross into Syria. Stephen Blaney wouldn’t comment, but invited her to support Bill C-51 instead. Leslie tried again in English, and got much the same answer. Nycole Turmel then asked about the extension of the mission in Iraq, to which Jason Kenney insisted that they hadn’t made a decision, but when they do, a motion will be tabled. Turmel and Leslie then wondered when a budget would be tabled, to which Kevin Sorenson decried Liberal and NDP tax increases. John McCallum led off for the Liberals, detailing the history of racist comments by John Williamson, and demanded that he be kicked out of caucus. Pierre Poilievre stood up to say that Williamson apologised, and that Justin Trudeau should apologise for his comments about the Holocaust (which, it bears noting, he didn’t actually mention). After another go around of the same, McCallum pressed one last time, and this time Tim Uppal repeated the very same talking points.
Roundup: A poor excuse for a culture war
Apparently we’re calling it a “culture war” now, this little fracas going on about the niqab and the Prime Minister decreeing what a woman can and cannot where, and when they can and cannot wear it. Face-coverings, for example – bad at citizenship ceremonies where a woman’s identity has already been determined and she’s completed all of the steps for citizenship, but okay in the civil service (or so says Tony Clement). Both of the opposition leaders are trying to press the narrative that Harper is “fostering intolerance” with his particular decrees, along with the way that he has singled out Muslims with references to mosques in his statements on countering terrorism. The NDP and the Conservatives are trying to cast Trudeau’s speech on Monday as over the top, and accusing him of bringing up the Holocaust when he in fact didn’t – only the immigration policy at the time as it dealt with Jews, and that was as an example of places that the country has failed in the past. For his part, Harper insists that the “overwhelming majority” of Canadians agree with him about niqabs – except that’s the thing about minorities, and why we shouldn’t subject them to the whims of the majority. It’s one of the hallmarks of a liberal democracy, as Harper should well know. Trudeau also tried to play his own rhetorical games, saying that Harper accused the Muslim faith of being anti-woman, when he was referring to the culture that insists that women wear niqabs. (Harper, incidentally, doesn’t seem to be pressing Saudi Arabia, where this cultural practice originates, on their misogyny). So really, everyone is playing political games here, and that’s as surprising as finding out that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. Paul Wells notes, however, that it’s the first time in that the Liberals have given a Liberal argument in years – since the last three leaders, in fact. So while we are getting some discussion on an issue like this, I’m not convinced that this really qualifies as “culture war” territory, at least not like we’re seeing south of the border.