Roundup: All About Eve, Part 2: The Revenge

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It was a move that shocked pretty much everyone – Conservative parliamentary secretary Eve Adams crossed the floor to the Liberals, and called out Stephen Harper as “mean-spirited” and a bully. Of course, Adams is not without controversy, with her botched nomination and allegations of shenanigans, and the news from the Conservative Party that she was denied a further attempt to contest a nomination – not that it impacted her parliamentary secretary role or duties, which they apparently still had confidence in her carrying out. This makes her look to be self-serving in her decision to approach the Liberals, though it sounds like she approached Trudeau before the final no from the Conservatives. There are also suggestions that her relations with Harper started to deteriorate after a meeting last month, but it’s all still unclear at this point. For the Liberals, Adams played up her roots in the Progressive Conservatives – a party which is no longer and whose bona fides are fading from the modern Conservative Party (which, to be fair, has also tossed social conservatism in favour of base populism). Trudeau is trying to re-capture those blue Liberal voters who voted Conservative in the past couple of elections, as well as to get the Red Tories who still exist, particularly in Ontario but also in Alberta, to vote Liberal instead. Now she’s going to try and contest one of the still open seats in the GTA, but if any Liberals want to send a message that she’s not welcome in the party for her past Conservative sins, well, this is their chance to let their displeasure be heard. As for Adams, she leaves from a prestigious position with the government to the third party, and she goes from strict message control to a place where she’s going to have to do a lot more heavy lifting as she takes on a critic portfolio. Maybe she can make something of it and prove herself. She’s got about 14 sitting weeks to make something of her change. Then there’s the question of Adams’ spouse, Dmitri Soudas, former right-hand-man of the PM and former director of the Conservative Party. He says he supports her move, and has already made threatening tweets to Conservative MPs who have tried to be too snarky about it, but the Liberals have stated that he will have no formal role in the campaign other than supporting Adams with her nomination. It was, however, pretty rich of the Liberals to cast questions about this dynamic as sexist, because they were a “power couple” and that makes it relevant. I personally am curious about some of the wider-ranging implications, such as how the Soudas-Leo Housakos power structure will carry on, as that is currently part of the cabal at the centre of Senate leadership. The loss of Soudas from the Conservative fold could resonate there as well. Paul Wells offers some snarky – but entirely deserved – comments on the whole affair.

https://twitter.com/d_soudas/status/564867569836765184

https://twitter.com/d_soudas/status/564910542037319680

Good reads:

  • There was a cabinet shuffle – Nicholson to Foreign Affairs, Kenney to Defence, and Poilievre to Employment. Safe choices all, but one can’t help but think that giving Kenney Defence is a bit of a snub, since he wanted Foreign Affairs so badly, and Nicholson – unilingual and petulant – is not exactly suited for the job.
  • Here’s an interesting look at how turning over Hill security to the RCMP could have a detrimental impact on Parliamentary privilege. That the Liberals seem keen to go along with the plan is concerning.
  • Lawyers groups want to know why the government isn’t tracking any data on the diversity of judicial appointments, seeing as they can’t address any shortcomings without statistics.
  • Media organisations are taking the government to court to try and get interview access to Omar Khadr.
  • Scott Gilmore writes about helping set up an intelligence agency in Timor when he was a diplomat, and how the lack of oversight there is an object lesson for CSIS.

Odds and ends:

Acquired emails show that the RCMP were still hunting for believed accomplices of the Ottawa shooter well into the evening of October 22nd. The confusion doesn’t bode well for the bid to have them fully take over security on the Hill.

The tax information kits that CRA is sending to MPs so they can help their constituents contains subtle nudges to direct people to the recent Conservative family tax measures.

Stephen Harper and Angela Merkel met to discuss a diplomatic solution to the situation in Ukraine.

https://twitter.com/inklesspw/status/564868285175697408