Open for Business: Canadian Politics 2019

I would give my life with a smile if I knew it would make Ford and his allies drop dead tomorrow tbh

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/karen-wang-burnaby-byelection-1.4981998

this has been a fun story on the way to the possible collapse of the federal ndp (if jagmeet loses this byelection)

which tbh I'm basically actively rooting for at this point

obviously the tactics being deployed by his opponent are horrible but the NDP need a blaring signal that they're on the wrong track ASAP

Lol @ "merely a statement of fact".

She's officially out, now that Richard T. Lee is the Liberal candidate, right? Or is she still going to try to run as an independent?

her last tweet, a response to the controversy, was pretty egregious:

Every day I’m meeting more people on the doorstep from #BurnabySouth, having conversations with them and hearing their concerns 🗣 Want to be part of Team Karen and help me reach out to more Canadians in our community? Sign up here ➡️ https://t.co/cThQel1YtB pic.twitter.com/pyVRLPX37i

— Karen Wang (@karenxbwang) January 16, 2019

she's threatened to run as an indy but I doubt she will...there's also a horrible anti-trans candidate running with the people's party and polling at like 9%. Not great

i followed the burnaby story but I'm out of touch, what's the wrong track the federal ndp is on, generally?

imo they're much too timid and unprincipled an opposition force in general. they need a total messaging and leadership overhaul a la UK Labour. and nothing less than a pledge to keep the oil in the fucking ground. It's political suicide in....some parts....of the country but it's the right thing to do.

and in the long run I think sticking to key principles across the board would win them the respect and credibility they badly need

yup

I had high-ish hopes for jagmeet and he's been really poor at differentiating himself and the NDP from the government.

yeah. I was disappointed it was basically a coronation, but I was willing to give him a chance. his leadership has been a complete faceplant. we don't need another handsome, amorphous figurehead a la Trudeau heading up the only (currently) viable left force in this country.

thanks, buddy. the number of actual jobs in oil and gas at the moment + future prospects for the industry, you'd think they could afford to take a principled stand, maybe especially after ndp premiers in alberta and bc fumbled their wishy washy attempts at green policy while endorsing pipelines? is this leap manifesto actually good? https://leapmanifesto.org/ i see alanis morissette and arcade fire have both signed on, also judy rebick, naomi klein and the ndp socialist caucus.

i know i know end of the world looming but i'd support a federal ndp that sidelined environmental policy and advocated for aggressive tax reform, pharmacare and dental, canceling student debt, free education, childcare program, investing in social housing, card check, maybe withdraw from nato, even if some of that would be mostly just advocacy and handled by provincial governments (right?). i just mean, i'm skeptical of pushing for good environmental policy without or before setting up alternative economic/social policy. so, i have to hope jagmeet loses this byelection, right?

i'm skeptical of pushing for good environmental policy without or before setting up alternative economic/social policy

why_not_both.gif

building a green economy won't alleviate the inherent contradictions of neoliberal capitalism, though. but yes.

that post seems to be trying to disagree with something you didn't say, i think.

i agree, why not both.

Worth noting that Labour has been one of the two leading governing parties in the UK since WW2 and has actually led successful democratic socialist governments at the national level in the past (and have still yet to win an election under Corbyn). A little harder to feel confident in the NDP's federal prospects if they tacked harder left but, if the point is that they wouldn't do any worse than they're doing now and might at least push the Liberals more to the left, I could see that. I'm still up for giving Singh more of a chance but I agree that he hasn't been exceptionally impressive so far and I'm unconvinced by how he handled the Erin Weir situation.

I don't know if this exactly counts as politics but it does concern an investigation currently being handled by the OPP and reopened by the Chief Coroner and it is one gruesome story, about a 30yo man with serious mental health issues who died in prison for 'unascertained' reasons, according to the original coroner's report, with over 50 signs of 'blunt impact trauma'. A forensic pathologist says asphyxiation can't be ruled out. A fellow inmate says he watched four guards beat the man to death, after he had already been restrained. CBC's Fifth Estate has been investigating for a year and will broadcast a report in an hour and change, although reading this longform story seems pretty heavy in itself.

i.e. make up the shortfall with international student tuition

Btw, I'm not sure most universities will be able to make up the whole shortfall this way. The reality will likely be more painful. I'm anticipating more closures of 'less practical' programs, increased casualization of the faculty workforce (which was beginning to change at the end of the Liberals' tenure), and cuts to student financial aid. This thread, by a U of T English prof and former dept head, seems like a p good start:

A quick thread: why a 10 percent cut to ON tuition fees is disastrous news.

— Holger Syme (@literasyme) January 16, 2019

Are you still in town, Sund4r? Do you feel like sharing contact info? My ILX mail goes to a dead address, but I could mail yours.

I'm sure you're right about the additional funding repercussions. I'm wondering about my old department. A prof there commented on this as well: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-changes-to-ontario-tuition-are-unfair-and-short-sighted/

I am. I think my ilx mail should work.

Ending the six-month post-graduation grace period before students need to pay back loans just seems mean for the sake of it tbh.

Could you post here if you're messaging my ilx mail bc I don't check that email as often?

Just sent!

NDP (correctly imo) opposes Trudeau/Liberal policy on Venezuela: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/singh-ndp-liberals-venezuela-1.4991913

Good move.

Maduro has blood on his hands and I refuse to support a dictatorship simply because it aligns with my own political ideals, but there's no question that Canada shouldn't back the US's nth attempt at manipulation and destabilization in the region, especially when it involves Bolsonaro.

Yes

open for business indeed

https://toronto.citynews.ca/2019/01/31/leaked-document-privatization-health-care/

sigh

is there wide support in Ontario for privatized health care?

This one's up there with the most frightening dystopian scenarios, as far as I'm concerned.

AFAIK that's not a popular proposal anywhere in the country

Apparently the only less popular idea is killing all day kindergarten - since that idea was reversed the day after it first came out!

Sad lol re OSAP changes fact-checking: http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=132&v=0VywtVQ3hPU

goddamn fucking ONDP can't do anything right

https://ipolitics.ca/2019/02/06/ontario-ndps-improper-redaction-led-ford-government-to-leaker-sources/

RIP Paul Dewar :(

Just saw that on the news. I always liked him.

At the trivia contest I go to every year (47 tables tonight; we finished second, one point behind the winner), a variation on a standard American question: how many living Prime Ministers right now?

Extremely drunk 2:30 am answer: Turner, Clark, Mulroney, Chretien, Martin, Campbell, Harper, Trudeau Jr?

8 was also my guess but I'd be lying if I said I could name all of 'em

You've got it. The thing that jumped out at me is that there's probably never been eight living presidents (currently five, about normal), even though it's us that doesn't have term limits. That list includes Chretien, who was if office for 10 years, and Harper, who was just shy of 10. What really skews our list is Clark, Turner, and Campbell. I'm not sure if totaled a year between them.

"if they totaled"

Public healthcare for the win?! (Maybe our PMs are just younger?)

Definitely Clark--elected one day shy of 40, out of office within a year. Overall, I think ours are younger: Trudeau, Campbell, and Harper were all in their mid-40s when elected, so that's four out of the eight.

him, Martin and Campbell also did not last long at all, so that's probably making up for the longer term guys.

Yeah, US Presidents have term limits but also have minimum 4-year term guarantees, barring impeachment. (It still boggles my mind a little that when the President effectively 'loses the confidence of Congress', the government can just stay shut down for over a month without any change in leadership.) We would only have four living PMs if you excluded anyone who served for less than four years, as you guys are getting at.

Government-sponsored leftist logic:

❌ Wearing clothes from another ethnic group
❌ White with dreadlocks
❌ Blackface
❌ Men building pipelines
= cultural appropriation, racism, toxic masculinity

✅ Men wearing female dress and makeup
= diversity 🌈 https://t.co/xINlGwZnQe

— Maxime Bernier (@MaximeBernier) February 12, 2019

Idk what that would mean in practical terms but it is good to see.

I don't know about the rest of Canada but I'm taken aback by these results insofar as French reading comprehension in Quebec is frankly abysmal (granted, due to a wealth of complex historical factors):

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-canadian-high-students-among-top-performers-in-reading-according-to/

I don't know where you're getting that French reading comprehension is abysmal in Quebec.

I mean, this is totally anecdotal, but I happen to know a bunch of 11-12 years olds (my son's friends) and they all seem to be so much better at reading/writing than people were when I was that age, despite the fact that a significant amount of them have French as their second or third language. I get the feeling that the educational system has improved quite a bit in the last 20-30 years.

For older people, sure. There are definitely people my age and older who made it out high school while just barely being able to read. These tests are taken by today's 15 year olds though.

I went to a 'good' francophone school in Montreal and we learned jack shit in French class. The amount of concessions teachers were willing to make just to get us to read YA fiction or conspicuously simplistic novels was utterly tragic. At the Cégep level teens are taught works of literature that their French (from France) counterparts are asked to read at the age of 12. And by the time you hit university, a disturbing amount of students (including in literature programs) are incapable of picking up on more than just a given work's most obvious meaning. Far too much time is spent just correcting the most basic of linguistic mistakes – and I'm not just talking about FSL here.

The framing of the article is a little suspect. These results are actually a small drop for Canada compared to 2015, both in numerical score (524 to 520) and competitively. (Only Singapore beat us in 2015.) 2xp

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.cmec.ca/Publications/Lists/Publications/Attachments/365/PISA2015-CdnReport-EN.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwj3jJ_l1ZnmAhVHq1kKHccFBD8QFjAKegQIBhAC&usg=AOvVaw2xPbM03k4kkEdXOnYCHaQ0&cshid=1575382753353

(Young Québecois are killing illiteracy, clearly.)

The sole logically consistent QED, of course.

High school teachers and elementary school staff in Ottawa striking tomorrow. Issues such as class size, mandatory e-learning (?), and high-need student services seem to be on the table in addition to wages : https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/osstf-announcement-harvey-bischof-1.5377227
https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/ottawa-parents-scramble-for-childcare-as-clock-ticks-toward-school-strike-on-wednesday

*in ONTARIO, not just Ottawa; typo

Something something secularism: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/catholic-quebec-california-françois-legault-gavin-newsom-1.5393170

Reading international news, I keep marvelling at how the French can get 800,000 people on the streets and shut down Paris over (afaict fairly generous?) pensions and we can barely get a few thousand to protest Ford attacking core services for the vulnerable after getting elected on no platform.

starting to think we actually should break up Canada into several smaller countries tbh

canada too large

We'd still take after our neighbours, who make similar excuses for their quietism.

The Legault link didn't work so here it is.

(No, Simon, that's what they want you think!) xp

Ugh, what a two-faced piece of shit. I guess it's consistent with his logic according to which all muslims are unassimilable foreigners.

Tbf it's important to point out that much of this jingoistic, neo-theistic authoritarianism is cheered on by a genuine majority that is deathly afraid of heterogeneity and actively wishes to restore a premodern hierarchical model. If anything, this has historically been the norm, so we may have gotten used to a small miracle that is slowly coming to an end (or so I tell myself in my more pessimistic moments).

I'm not inclined towards pessimism or defeatism generally and I know it's not useful but the notion of a robust left program that even the slightest majority of the voting public of this country could get behind just seems like such a distant dream at the moment. I try to remember that tremendous change can and does occur very quickly but it's fuckin dispiriting man!

On the other hand, Quebec's social model is fairly solid when compared to those of most Western countries (tax rates are already quite high, even when set against France). It's just that we could do so much better and the push at the moment appears to be towards the exact opposite: hoarding by and for the few.

Scheer resigns

holy shit

Well hot damn. Let's see if they can get a proper terrible populist in.

Can't tell whether this is a good or a bad thing. Leaning towards bad.

same tbh

Guess he's gonna run for President instead

I'm cool with that.

I haven't been following Conservative party discourse, has this been brewing for some time or is this some excuse they just pulled out of a hat?

BREAKING: Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer is resigning after sources tell Global News he used Conservative Party money to pay for the private-school education of his children #cdnpoli https://t.co/OOWQDsVy4y

— Amanda Connolly (@amandacconn) December 12, 2019

Global News has learned that Scheer is resigning after it was revealed he had been using Conservative Party money to pay for his children's private school education. #cdnpoli #CPC

— Mercedes Stephenson (@MercedesGlobal) December 12, 2019

if he'd become PM, would this have been a genuine scandal for more than a week? I can't tell anymore.

Probably not. It comes across as a lame pretext to me.

I'm trying to think of something interesting to say, but I don't really know enough about the conservative party and have no idea in which direction they are heading. I feel like it could go either way (either doubling down on populism or trying to distance themselves from it). I'm guessing the main objective of the party for the next election is gaining votes in Ontario but I don't know what the best approach is for that.

I can't imagine them going less populist from here unless they're total morons (I know, I know)

Buck a beer for the whole country, simple as that.

in their last leadership election 141,000 members voted, scheer got 62,593, bernier got 55,544. think it was a ranked ballot situation. so the appetite for a far-right populist was fairly high (they also don't do one member one vote, they do it on a riding basis, with each riding worth the same number of points, regardless of population, this probably benefits rural votes - which i assume means it leans further right).

i would be unsurprised if they go for more of a bernier type next time - though maybe one who speaks english well

jason kenney probably wishing he wasn't premier of alberta rn

Bernier, who was at least 100% upfront about what he was after, was a total flop on his own, though. Seems more likely to me that they'll get a Ford-a-like who will be completely vague. (I haven't even noticed a difference in the price of beer!)

Is O'Leary free?

bernier was a flop but i would think that the idea of going third party and clearly damaging the chance of a conservative government by vote-splitting must play on voters' minds?

Is O'Leary free?

unfortunately, he remains unjailed

bernier ran a really different campaign for the cons leadership than he did with the people's party

one of those great libertarian goes alt right conversion stories

"I am putting my party first and my family first" - Scheer's resignation statement

you were definitely putting your family first you little rat lol

everyone ties for first in Justin's canada

Former SNC-Lavalin exec found guilty on five counts of corruption, fraud, and money laundering in Libya:

#BREAKING Former SNC-Lavalin executive found guilty on Libya corruption charges

Sami Bebawi, 73, convicted on all 5 counts including fraud, corruption of foreign officials and laundering proceeds of crime #cdnpoli https://t.co/dXtSw6l0eg pic.twitter.com/4zM82420bK

— Natasha Fatah (@NatashaFatah) December 15, 2019

Former resident Kabul head of Canada's aid program in Afghanistan on the failure of the mission: https://ottawacitizen.com/opinion/columnists/banerjee-why-we-still-need-a-review-of-canadas-role-in-afghanistan

In the light of the Afghanistan Papers, btw, I'm reminded of 'Taliban Jack' Layton's statement in 2006:

That mission is the wrong mission for Canada. There is no plan for victory. There is no exit strategy. There is no sign that it is making the Taliban weaker or the world safer. And there is no hope of changing the realities on the ground in Afghanistan--with the forces we have or can commit.

New thread: We Still Have a Government, Right?: Canadian Politics 2020