Roundup: Let the equivocation begin

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With three weeks left in the race, we’ve started seeing Thomas Mulcair start equivocating – or clarifying in any case – some of the policy planks he’s been running on. In many of those cases, it’s starting to make his promises look far less impressive. Take childcare – he is now talking about sitting down with provinces and using some of their existing spaces toward his “one million spaces” goal. One example was with Ontario, and the two years of full-day kindergarten offered in this province, so how does that get counted into with is childcare pledge, and the funding questions that go along with it? Add to that, with some 900,000 spaces already in existence across the country, does that mean that his plan will simply be to add another 100,000 spaces over the next eight years and make sure that they simply cap the fees at $15/day? Or is it still supposed to be a million new spaces? With his cap-and-trade announcement, he says that provinces can opt-out so long as they meet or exceed the federal objectives. But does that not then become essentially the Liberal position, where the provinces take the lead while the federal government establishes the targets? And didn’t he denounce that very notion? Mulcair has even started back-pedalling a little on his criticism of “useless” senators, saying it was only the institution he was denouncing (which, I’m sorry, is absolutely not what he said at the time). As crunch time approaches I’ll be interested to see how much more “clarifying” happens between the different parties, and how much of that clarifying goes against what they were saying the whole time.

On the campaign:

Good reads:

  • The Liberals released their costed platform (PDF here), which received praise from the likes of Kevin Milligan and Kevin Page.
  • The moderator for tonight’s Munk Centre foreign policy debate wants the three leaders to skip their talking points and “go deep.” Good luck with that.
  • The former Commons Law Clerk has said the Conservatives’ promised “tax lock” legislation is useless and possibly even unconstitutional.
  • The Conservatives promised more support for our Special Forces.
  • Access to Information documents show the NCC’s advisory panel was against the Victims of Communism Monument to begin with.
  • Jason Kenney has falsely accused the Liberals of supporting pot in convenience stores, imposing “illegal drug injection sites” and brothels, all in one paragraph.
  • Here’s a look at how parties are scrambling to fill the nominations of those candidates who’ve dropped out or been forced to drop out.
  • Looking for the promises made to date? Here they are for the Conservatives, Liberals and NDP.
  • Shannon Gormley dismantles the government’s “bogus refugee” claims.

Odds and ends:

Here’s a good explainer on that controversial Quebec childcare study.

Scott Feschuk parses the stump speeches of the three main leaders.

Conrad Black sounded off on a number of topics, including Harper’s position on the Senate. Some of it was pretty saucy.