The Language Commissioner’s look into whether or not John Baird’s personal Twitter Machine account constitutes government business and thus possessing a greater emphasis on bilingualism is opening a can of worms, especially because it invites little more than scripted tweets that bureaucrats go through approvals to write rather than the kinds of spontaneous communications that we can now get with ministers that we otherwise can’t. If we clamp down on this medium, we really are dooming ourselves into a political discourse full of nothing but bland pabulum for all time.
James Moore is “impatient” with the pace at which provinces are dealing with interprovincial trade barriers, which is to say they’re doing almost nothing, and have little ambition to do more. Of course, the reason is because they’re vested in their own protectionist regimes, which is probably why the federal government will need to exercise some constitutional force in order to get them to start moving on it.
Given all of the condemnation that Canada has been doing about the actions of ISIS in Syria and Iraq, one wonders just what else we are prepared to do. The NDP want more humanitarian assistance and help for refugees, while the Liberals aren’t opposed to more military intervention. Mulcair wants any deployment brought before Parliament (which is not actually a “longstanding tradition” and is really only for take-note debate, because a binding vote on deployment is actually harmful to Responsible Government and the ability to hold the government to account). But one does have to wonder that if they’re as big of a threat as Harper says, why we’re not offering more military aid than a couple of transport planes. Meanwhile, the head of CSIS says that we can’t be complacent about the danger posed by those Canadians who have been radicalised and who are heading over to Syria to fight.
On the Arctic Tour, Stephen Harper broke ground on a new research station that was first announced in 2007 and won’t be completed until 2017. Michael Den Tandt writes about Harper’s Arctic strategy, and some of the politics behind it.
Stephen Fletcher says that Parliament hasn’t had a proper debate on assisted suicide, even though the government points to the fact that it debated and defeated a Bloc private member’s bill on the subject a few years ago. And Fletcher’s right – the bill was limited, flawed in his opinion, and two whole hours of debate on its merits as opposed to the broader and more nuanced topic as a whole is not a real debate. (Not that much of what is said in the Commons these days can pass for real debate, but that’s another story). He has his own to PMBs on the subject, but they won’t see the light of day as he’s near the very bottom of the Order of Precedence, so until the Supreme Court hears that upcoming case, we’re not likely to have that discussion.
Justin Trudeau declares Harper to be “on the wrong side of history” with refusing to call a national inquiry into missing and murdered Aboriginal women.
Energy economist Andrew Leach takes on the “unmuzzle the scientists” debate and reminds us of the difference between democracy and technocracy, and the roles being played between ministers and scientists of various disciplines in order to show that it’s not as black-and-white of an issue as it is being presented, and why “unmuzzling” may have ulterior motives that are best left outside of the scientific realm.
And Maclean’s has an excellent look at the state of the referendum in Scotland.