Roundup: Virtue signalling over Khadr

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It’s official – Omar Khadr got his apology and settlement, but the terms of which are confidential (as is par for the course in most settlement offers), and now the Conservatives are really steaming mad. For his part, Khadr says that he hopes the apology and settlement will restore a bit of his reputation and help people take a second look at his case to see that there was more going on, but also notes that he is not really profiting from his past. While the ministers where quite neutral in their tone, when the parliamentary secretary accompanying them translated in French, he took the partisan shots that the government didn’t, which was odd. Later in the evening, the government put out further clarifications, no doubt bombarded with accusations of bad faith.

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Later in the afternoon, Andrew Scheer took to the microphones to offer a take so utterly disingenuous that it borders on gob-smacking. Essentially, he argued that a) they should have spared no expense in fighting Khadr’s suit, and b) that the remedy for the Supreme Court of Canada decisions around Khadr was his repatriation, which is a complete and utter fabrication. And there’s a part of me that would have like to see them argue that case before the Supreme Court, if only to watch the justices there flay them before laughing them out of the room.

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And then the rest of the weighing in, including Stephen Harper, who wanted to pin the blame on the current government, while Conservatives continued to virtue signal that no expense should be spared to give the appearance of fighting terrorists, never mind that this decision is about Khadr’s Charter rights being violated. For a law-and-order party to decide they want to cherry pick which Charter rights don’t apply to people they consider icky, well, that’s a pretty big problem right there.

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Here are some further legal opinions on the settlement, while Craig Forcese offers a reminder of some of the legal points at play, including where successive governments screwed up and made this settlement necessary where they could have repatriated him earlier and put him on trial here, an opportunity now lost. There is also a reminder that the government didn’t disclose the details of earlier settlements with former terror suspects who were cleared of wrongdoing. Terry Glavin has little patience for how this was handled on all sides, while Susan Delcarourt sees signs that people are still open to being convinced about Khadr.

Good reads:

  • At the G20, the topic of paying terrorist ransoms came up again, while Catherine McKenna hopes that 19 of the 20 leaders will sign the climate statement.
  • Justin Trudeau also announced that he’ll be addressing the conference of US governors next week – the first Canadian to do so.
  • The unit for injured soldiers is facing its third leadership change in a year.
  • China’s ambassador says that his country is unlikely to invest in Canadian infrastructure because we have too many regulatory hurdles.
  • John Geddes takes a deep dive into just who Andrew Scheer is.
  • Kady O’Malley looks at why the NDP leadership contest rules make it up for grabs.
  • Paul Wells muses about the strategy behind the government is taking the slow path on several of their files and promises.
  • Stephen Gordon tracks government spending as compared to the Liberal platform promises, and tracks where things diverged and some of the reasons why.

Odds and ends: