Politics in 2018
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Army.ca Fixture
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Not a very positive review of "Canada's Back!"
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-canadas-back-when-its-convenient/
KONRAD YAKABUSKI
PUBLISHED 1 DAY AGO
UPDATED APRIL 5, 2018
The world now knows what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau meant when he said: “Canada is back.” We’re not the helpful middle-power willing to punch above our weight, after all. We’re more like the spoiled teen who engages in voluntourism to pad her résumé. It seems we’re more out to impress people than take on the thankless tasks required of an adult.
Our friends have come to see us as high maintenance, fickle and even hypocritical. Helpful? Not so much. We get up on our high-horse to proclaim our “feminist” foreign policy while continuing to sell armoured vehicles to one of the world’s most misogynistic regimes. We don’t have the guts to admit why we’re really selling arms to Saudi Arabia and hide behind the excuse of done deals.
We naively trumpet a return to peacekeeping without so much as a basic understanding of the modern meaning of the term. When we learn what’s really involved, we stall and waver, until that is no longer possible. We make a commitment to supply helicopters and personnel in a danger zone, but offer no date for deployment, fearing body bags before the next election.
We are becoming a laughing stock in diplomatic circles for the haplessness and tone-deafness of our Prime Minister on foreign soil and the failure of his entourage to insulate him from himself.
“The government’s actions and rhetoric have been inconsistent, at times contradictory and mostly focused on messaging and advancing the Liberal brand than fixing real problems,” according to the 2018 Foreign Policy Report Card produced by Carleton University’s School of International Affairs in partnership with the Canadian Foreign Policy Journal. “For a political party that promised to elevate Canada’s position in the world, the Liberal government under Justin Trudeau has achieved remarkably little in the first half of its tenure to meet that goal.”
Was Mr. Trudeau really ever that interested in the hard work needed to enhance Canada’s influence on the world stage, especially if it involved taking any political risks? During the 14 months that Stéphane Dion served as his Foreign Affairs minister, Mr. Trudeau held only a single face-to-face meeting with him, according to a new book by former Dion adviser Jocelyn Coulon. And that meeting only happened because the two men were stuck on a flight to Europe together.
“On the plane, Dion brings up several topics, including re-engaging with Russia,” Mr. Coulon writes in Un Selfie avec Justin Trudeau. “Trudeau is hesitant and reminds [Dion] that there are two schools of thought within cabinet on the topic [of Russia]. According to a witness at the scene, it is not a deep conversation and Trudeau grows irritated by Dion’s insistence.”
Mr. Dion, it seems, was a constant thorn in the side of the Prime Minister’s Office, pushing a seemingly uninterested Mr. Trudeau to leverage Canada’s middle-power status on a host of issues. In return, Mr. Dion was demoted from chairing the cabinet committee on the environment, because he pushed for more ambitious greenhouse gas reduction targets, and ultimately turfed from cabinet altogether.
On Russia, of course, that other school of thought was championed by Chrystia Freeland, who had antagonized President Vladimir Putin as a journalist. By the time she replaced Mr. Dion at Foreign Affairs in early 2017, however, saving the North American free-trade agreement had become her all-consuming priority. She has, hence, paid only fleeting attention to other files under her authority.
Even if her NAFTA work pays off soon with an agreement-in-principle with the United States and Mexico, it is unlikely to lead to a refocusing of Canada’s foreign policy or a revival of the Pearsonian diplomacy the Liberals once talked about. This government seems to have neither the courage nor wherewithal of its high-minded diplomatic pretensions.
Consider the tepidness with which Mr. Trudeau greeted this week’s report from his own Special Envoy to Myanmar. Bob Rae called on Ottawa to press the international community to launch an investigation into crimes against humanity committed by Myanmar’s military against the largely Muslim Rohingya minority. Canada, he said, should let in thousands of Rohingya refugees and triple its aid to the region. “What we do, or don’t do, in response to the Rohingya crisis will be a litmus test for Canada’s foreign policy,” Mr. Rae insisted.
In a statement, Mr. Trudeau thanked him for his “thoughtful recommendations” and added: “In the coming weeks, we will assess the recommendations in this report and outline further measures we intend to take.”
Canada is willing to be back, it seems, as long as it’s convenient for us.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-canadas-back-when-its-convenient/
KONRAD YAKABUSKI
PUBLISHED 1 DAY AGO
UPDATED APRIL 5, 2018
The world now knows what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau meant when he said: “Canada is back.” We’re not the helpful middle-power willing to punch above our weight, after all. We’re more like the spoiled teen who engages in voluntourism to pad her résumé. It seems we’re more out to impress people than take on the thankless tasks required of an adult.
Our friends have come to see us as high maintenance, fickle and even hypocritical. Helpful? Not so much. We get up on our high-horse to proclaim our “feminist” foreign policy while continuing to sell armoured vehicles to one of the world’s most misogynistic regimes. We don’t have the guts to admit why we’re really selling arms to Saudi Arabia and hide behind the excuse of done deals.
We naively trumpet a return to peacekeeping without so much as a basic understanding of the modern meaning of the term. When we learn what’s really involved, we stall and waver, until that is no longer possible. We make a commitment to supply helicopters and personnel in a danger zone, but offer no date for deployment, fearing body bags before the next election.
We are becoming a laughing stock in diplomatic circles for the haplessness and tone-deafness of our Prime Minister on foreign soil and the failure of his entourage to insulate him from himself.
“The government’s actions and rhetoric have been inconsistent, at times contradictory and mostly focused on messaging and advancing the Liberal brand than fixing real problems,” according to the 2018 Foreign Policy Report Card produced by Carleton University’s School of International Affairs in partnership with the Canadian Foreign Policy Journal. “For a political party that promised to elevate Canada’s position in the world, the Liberal government under Justin Trudeau has achieved remarkably little in the first half of its tenure to meet that goal.”
Was Mr. Trudeau really ever that interested in the hard work needed to enhance Canada’s influence on the world stage, especially if it involved taking any political risks? During the 14 months that Stéphane Dion served as his Foreign Affairs minister, Mr. Trudeau held only a single face-to-face meeting with him, according to a new book by former Dion adviser Jocelyn Coulon. And that meeting only happened because the two men were stuck on a flight to Europe together.
“On the plane, Dion brings up several topics, including re-engaging with Russia,” Mr. Coulon writes in Un Selfie avec Justin Trudeau. “Trudeau is hesitant and reminds [Dion] that there are two schools of thought within cabinet on the topic [of Russia]. According to a witness at the scene, it is not a deep conversation and Trudeau grows irritated by Dion’s insistence.”
Mr. Dion, it seems, was a constant thorn in the side of the Prime Minister’s Office, pushing a seemingly uninterested Mr. Trudeau to leverage Canada’s middle-power status on a host of issues. In return, Mr. Dion was demoted from chairing the cabinet committee on the environment, because he pushed for more ambitious greenhouse gas reduction targets, and ultimately turfed from cabinet altogether.
On Russia, of course, that other school of thought was championed by Chrystia Freeland, who had antagonized President Vladimir Putin as a journalist. By the time she replaced Mr. Dion at Foreign Affairs in early 2017, however, saving the North American free-trade agreement had become her all-consuming priority. She has, hence, paid only fleeting attention to other files under her authority.
Even if her NAFTA work pays off soon with an agreement-in-principle with the United States and Mexico, it is unlikely to lead to a refocusing of Canada’s foreign policy or a revival of the Pearsonian diplomacy the Liberals once talked about. This government seems to have neither the courage nor wherewithal of its high-minded diplomatic pretensions.
Consider the tepidness with which Mr. Trudeau greeted this week’s report from his own Special Envoy to Myanmar. Bob Rae called on Ottawa to press the international community to launch an investigation into crimes against humanity committed by Myanmar’s military against the largely Muslim Rohingya minority. Canada, he said, should let in thousands of Rohingya refugees and triple its aid to the region. “What we do, or don’t do, in response to the Rohingya crisis will be a litmus test for Canada’s foreign policy,” Mr. Rae insisted.
In a statement, Mr. Trudeau thanked him for his “thoughtful recommendations” and added: “In the coming weeks, we will assess the recommendations in this report and outline further measures we intend to take.”
Canada is willing to be back, it seems, as long as it’s convenient for us.
FSTO
Army.ca Fixture
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Andrew Coyne seems to think that our current government is much more than just incompetent when it comes to international security and foreign affairs.
http://nationalpost.com/opinion/andrew-coyne-serious-questions-remain-around-atwal-affair-despite-partisan-silliness
Like much of the nation, I have been riveted by the high-stakes test of wills between government and opposition over who should brief whom about what with regard to l’affaire Atwal.
As I need hardly recapitulate, the Conservatives had demanded the prime minister’s National Security and Intelligence Adviser, Daniel Jean, appear before a Commons committee to answer questions about his timely intervention on behalf of the prime minister’s ass during what is now universally known as His Disastrous Trip to India.
Among other embarrassments, the trip had been all but derailed by the revelation that a former member of a Sikh terrorist group, Jaspal Atwal, convicted in the 1986 attempted murder of a visiting Indian cabinet minister on Vancouver Island, had twice been invited by the Canadian High Commission to attend receptions in the prime minister’s honour.
That was before Jean, a career civil servant and the most senior member of the national security establishment, contacted members of the national press to suggest, off the record, that Atwal’s appearances had in fact been orchestrated by rogue elements within the Indian government to make the government of Canada look soft on terrorism and sow discord with India.
The theory was widely mocked, including by former intelligence officials, and frankly didn’t make a whole lot of sense: even if Atwal’s presence in the country were due to some elaborate high-level plot to sabotage the prime minister’s visit (he had in fact been granted several visas over the years, the latest of which was last summer) it did not explain how he got on the invite list — especially since a Liberal MP, Randeep Sarai, had already confessed his responsibility.
But this was not some flack from the Prime Minister’s Office spinning this, but the country’s top spook, so my colleagues felt obliged to report it, taking care to describe Jean only as a “senior government official with knowledge of security issues,” and the like. Until the next morning, when I suspect they woke up feeling used.
So when it all blew up, and blew up again — the prime minister backing Jean in Parliament, the Indian government bluntly expressing its dismay at this “baseless and unacceptable” suggestion — it was hardly surprising the Conservatives would demand to hear from Jean, by now outed as the source. When the Liberals refused, citing national security, the Tories held up parliamentary proceedings in protest.
There followed a government offer to give Tory leader Andrew Scheer a classified briefing — for which, as a Privy Councillor, he is eligible — countered by Scheer’s demand that MPs also be briefed on the unclassified bits, to which the government eventually agreed on condition that … well, it all gets a bit eyeglazing at this point. (The Liberals suggested they might be amenable to Jean appearing before the new, top-secret, multi-party, bicameral National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians. If he did, we’d never know it: its members are forbidden by their lifetime secrecy oath even to divulge whether he appeared before them.
That both sides are playing politics with this, the Tories seeking to prolong the prime minister’s India agonies, the Liberals doing their best to tie up their inquiries in national security knots, is not in doubt. But underneath all the partisan silliness there are some serious issues involved, and serious questions raised by Jean’s intervention.
First, who was responsible for the decision to involve him so overtly on such a political file? Was it on Jean’s own initiative? That would be odd, and improper, for someone in his position. Or did the prime minister’s office put him up to it? That would be even more improper.
Second, what is the truth of what he is reported to have said? Was there really a plot to embarrass the prime minister by high-level Indian officials seeking to poison Indian-Canadian relations? That’s a huge charge, and one worth investigating, despite — or because of — the Indian government’s assurances. Or if it is not true, then why did Jean say it? Was he making it up? Wrongly informed? Hallucinating?
Third, what is the evidence backing this theory? The reporters say Jean offered none. The Tories wonder nevertheless if it was based on classified information, which might thus have been put at risk. Or if no classified information was disclosed, then why all the stonewalling and foot-dragging? Why the reluctance to let Jean answer questions from parliamentarians? Why should MPs have less information than reporters?
So that’s national security, Canada-India relations, the rights of Parliament and the impartiality of the civil service potentially in play, to say nothing of the issues raised by the incident Jean was attempting to explain away: the presence of a convicted terrorist, posing for pictures with Liberal cabinet ministers, at official functions — and not just in Canada, where Atwal was a fixture at Liberal events, but on Indian soil. During a visit whose purpose was ostensibly to mend fences on this very issue.
It’s probable this was just a colossal screwup. And yet the government has left hanging the unsupported accusation that elements of a foreign power were responsible — a power with whom we ostensibly have friendly relations. Only rather than make the accusation itself, it has relied upon the shadowy allegations of a shadowy civil servant, whom it has spent the past several weeks shielding from scrutiny.
This will not do. As I said, there are serious questions raised by this affair, and they demand serious answers: about what was said, and why, and at whose behest. At the very least Jean needs to account for his own actions. He may shed light on others’ as well.
http://nationalpost.com/opinion/andrew-coyne-serious-questions-remain-around-atwal-affair-despite-partisan-silliness
Like much of the nation, I have been riveted by the high-stakes test of wills between government and opposition over who should brief whom about what with regard to l’affaire Atwal.
As I need hardly recapitulate, the Conservatives had demanded the prime minister’s National Security and Intelligence Adviser, Daniel Jean, appear before a Commons committee to answer questions about his timely intervention on behalf of the prime minister’s ass during what is now universally known as His Disastrous Trip to India.
Among other embarrassments, the trip had been all but derailed by the revelation that a former member of a Sikh terrorist group, Jaspal Atwal, convicted in the 1986 attempted murder of a visiting Indian cabinet minister on Vancouver Island, had twice been invited by the Canadian High Commission to attend receptions in the prime minister’s honour.
That was before Jean, a career civil servant and the most senior member of the national security establishment, contacted members of the national press to suggest, off the record, that Atwal’s appearances had in fact been orchestrated by rogue elements within the Indian government to make the government of Canada look soft on terrorism and sow discord with India.
The theory was widely mocked, including by former intelligence officials, and frankly didn’t make a whole lot of sense: even if Atwal’s presence in the country were due to some elaborate high-level plot to sabotage the prime minister’s visit (he had in fact been granted several visas over the years, the latest of which was last summer) it did not explain how he got on the invite list — especially since a Liberal MP, Randeep Sarai, had already confessed his responsibility.
But this was not some flack from the Prime Minister’s Office spinning this, but the country’s top spook, so my colleagues felt obliged to report it, taking care to describe Jean only as a “senior government official with knowledge of security issues,” and the like. Until the next morning, when I suspect they woke up feeling used.
So when it all blew up, and blew up again — the prime minister backing Jean in Parliament, the Indian government bluntly expressing its dismay at this “baseless and unacceptable” suggestion — it was hardly surprising the Conservatives would demand to hear from Jean, by now outed as the source. When the Liberals refused, citing national security, the Tories held up parliamentary proceedings in protest.
There followed a government offer to give Tory leader Andrew Scheer a classified briefing — for which, as a Privy Councillor, he is eligible — countered by Scheer’s demand that MPs also be briefed on the unclassified bits, to which the government eventually agreed on condition that … well, it all gets a bit eyeglazing at this point. (The Liberals suggested they might be amenable to Jean appearing before the new, top-secret, multi-party, bicameral National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians. If he did, we’d never know it: its members are forbidden by their lifetime secrecy oath even to divulge whether he appeared before them.
That both sides are playing politics with this, the Tories seeking to prolong the prime minister’s India agonies, the Liberals doing their best to tie up their inquiries in national security knots, is not in doubt. But underneath all the partisan silliness there are some serious issues involved, and serious questions raised by Jean’s intervention.
First, who was responsible for the decision to involve him so overtly on such a political file? Was it on Jean’s own initiative? That would be odd, and improper, for someone in his position. Or did the prime minister’s office put him up to it? That would be even more improper.
Second, what is the truth of what he is reported to have said? Was there really a plot to embarrass the prime minister by high-level Indian officials seeking to poison Indian-Canadian relations? That’s a huge charge, and one worth investigating, despite — or because of — the Indian government’s assurances. Or if it is not true, then why did Jean say it? Was he making it up? Wrongly informed? Hallucinating?
Third, what is the evidence backing this theory? The reporters say Jean offered none. The Tories wonder nevertheless if it was based on classified information, which might thus have been put at risk. Or if no classified information was disclosed, then why all the stonewalling and foot-dragging? Why the reluctance to let Jean answer questions from parliamentarians? Why should MPs have less information than reporters?
So that’s national security, Canada-India relations, the rights of Parliament and the impartiality of the civil service potentially in play, to say nothing of the issues raised by the incident Jean was attempting to explain away: the presence of a convicted terrorist, posing for pictures with Liberal cabinet ministers, at official functions — and not just in Canada, where Atwal was a fixture at Liberal events, but on Indian soil. During a visit whose purpose was ostensibly to mend fences on this very issue.
It’s probable this was just a colossal screwup. And yet the government has left hanging the unsupported accusation that elements of a foreign power were responsible — a power with whom we ostensibly have friendly relations. Only rather than make the accusation itself, it has relied upon the shadowy allegations of a shadowy civil servant, whom it has spent the past several weeks shielding from scrutiny.
This will not do. As I said, there are serious questions raised by this affair, and they demand serious answers: about what was said, and why, and at whose behest. At the very least Jean needs to account for his own actions. He may shed light on others’ as well.
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Two thoughtful pieces, that are bang on the money. The Trudeau team is incompetent at best, and I am tired of the smugness that we portray on the international scene.
Does anyone remember that we are meant to be informed by the POGG statement.....and the GG part of that is perhaps the most important?
Does anyone remember that we are meant to be informed by the POGG statement.....and the GG part of that is perhaps the most important?
J
jollyjacktar
Guest
Altair said:
And there is an ever increasing number of Canadians whom are not pleased, Trudeau zealots aside. I don't believe this trend will turn around much either towards 2019 and the next election cycle.
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jollyjacktar said:
Bear this in mind, please ...
... and there are over eight of those "long times" until the 2019 election.
Prime Minister Trudeau is served by a brilliant campaign machine ... they are just not very good at governing.
Also, remember this:
... things look rosey for the CPC right now, but whio knows what will happen in 80 "long times?"
J
jollyjacktar
Guest
That is true, ER, but looking at past performance/satisfaction of voters as a guide there seems to be a steady downward trend for both. Their election machine might be well oiled and powerful but if more voters decide the Emperor is in fact butt naked and not wearing Ermine, can said machine convince those who've moved away that he does indeed wear Ermine.
Voters such as me don't count. I've never liked Trudeau brand going back to the Snr as CEO, nor shall l ever. That being said, I'm not in anyone else's camp either.
Maybe the younger might pull it off. We'll see come next election, yes.
Voters such as me don't count. I've never liked Trudeau brand going back to the Snr as CEO, nor shall l ever. That being said, I'm not in anyone else's camp either.
Maybe the younger might pull it off. We'll see come next election, yes.
- Reaction score
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Won't make a guess on the drama teachers future, however if this follows all the way thru then Notley's completely toast.....not that NDP are not already toast in Ab.
"Kinder Morgan cites B.C. opposition as it suspends ‘non-essential’ spending on Trans Mountain pipeline"
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/alberta/article-kinder-morgan-cites-bc-opposition-as-it-suspends-non-essential/
Cheers
Larry
"Kinder Morgan cites B.C. opposition as it suspends ‘non-essential’ spending on Trans Mountain pipeline"
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/alberta/article-kinder-morgan-cites-bc-opposition-as-it-suspends-non-essential/
Cheers
Larry
- Reaction score
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Trudeau got what he wanted, no pipelines. The legislation would have killed any new ones, and he let BC and Quebec kill Trans Mountain and Energy East. Don't need a $300K study to find out why our oil and gas industry is in shambles.
The exodus of foreign investment continues, now at levels only seen during the oil price crash/recession in 2008: http://business.financialpost.com/news/economy/foreign-direct-investment-in-canada-plunges-on-oil-exodus-1
The exodus of foreign investment continues, now at levels only seen during the oil price crash/recession in 2008: http://business.financialpost.com/news/economy/foreign-direct-investment-in-canada-plunges-on-oil-exodus-1
The fallout will go far beyond Notley. Investment will leave Alberta by the billions. They won't have to worry about carbon re-capture. No one is going to invest unless they see a reasonable chance of a profit and with no line going east, no line going west and you can bet that the NG line will bog down as well one of the greatest sources of cash for all Trudeau's pet projects is going to dry up.
J
jollyjacktar
Guest
PuckChaser said:
All of a sudden it's just like his father's time with the National Energy Program. The old man must be laughing in his grave at the shambles this will cause Alberta. The wheel goes round.
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All you have to do is walk over the border into Quebec from the US??Altair said:
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PuckChaser said:
This will not end well for anyone in BC or Alberta. And will have ramifications well into the rest of Canada.
Colin Parkinson
Army.ca Myth
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CPC changed the legislation for NEB, Fisheries Act, NWPA (twice) and CEAA, they do a crappy job of it, due to poor consultation and rushing, Liberals are now changing all those Acts again, while they did a decent job of consultation, they are trying to please to many people and adding bizarre crap that is going to make only the lawyers happy. When CPC gets in, they will be forced to change those Acts yet again, hopefully keeping the good bits from the previous changes and dumping the crap. As it is, when the debt piper comes calling, we won't be able to enforce the Liberal Acts. Trying to warn my program that the money won't keep coming.
- Reaction score
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Stephen LeDrew - Past President of the Liberal Party of Canada.
(In)famous for his "Dumb as a sack of hammers" comment about bill C24
https://youtu.be/7gj27W5E2rw
If the youngster has lost LeDrew has he not lost the Party? Or at least, those folks that used to think of themselves as "Liberals"?
(In)famous for his "Dumb as a sack of hammers" comment about bill C24
https://youtu.be/7gj27W5E2rw
If the youngster has lost LeDrew has he not lost the Party? Or at least, those folks that used to think of themselves as "Liberals"?
J
jollyjacktar
Guest
Excellent video. One more who has come to realise the Emperor's butt naked and most certainly not clothed in Ermine. I hope this bus keeps rolling and people wake up.
But the end result stays the same: they got away with it, they being Dalton and company and they cost the Ontario taxpayer a billion or more in doing so. And to that has to be added the cost of the investigation and trial which has to be in 7 figures as well. Four months, no fine, and 100 hours is a joke.
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