Roundup: Deleting the message

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The Conservatives decided to delete their tweet yesterday that depicted a black migrant crossing to Canada – over a bridge made of Trudeau’s #WelcomeToCanada tweet, and through a broken chain-link fence. There was backlash that the tweet was racist, and it certainly was intended to stoke the xenophobic tendencies that they have been flirting with. I will point out once again that their continued reliance on the talking point that this is about the “orderly” asylum system would probably make most of Europe laugh and pat them on the head condescendingly, because it’s pretty precious that they think Canada should get the special status of an “orderly” system that no other country gets.

https://twitter.com/cmathen/status/1019323971274248193

Meanwhile, Maclean’shas a look at the history of the Safe Third Country Agreement, and how it’s basically just waiting for Donald Trump to blow it up if he actually learns about what it is and what it does. Chris Selley, on the other hand, points out the ways in which both the federal government and the new Ontario government are mishandling the whole file, which is fair criticism. But I do think we can’t take our eye off the fact that the Conservatives are flirting with xenophobic populism for partisan gain, and playing cute with it, pitting one group of newcomers against another, and patting themselves on the back for their “compassion” for certain groups of refugees that they use solely as props to hammer away at the regime they’re fleeing. This has been their modus operandi since Jason Kenney was immigration minister, but they’ve poured it on a little thicker since they saw that this kind of populist rhetoric worked for Trump and Brexit (never mind the fact that we have solid proof of election interference in both, and definitive proof of broken rules in the Brexit referendum). This is worrying for our democracy, and we should be very wary of their adopting these techniques.

Good reads:

  • It’s (allegedly) Cabinet shuffle day, for what it’s worth.
  • Justin Trudeau has asked Marc Garneau to look into the situation with Greyhound’s withdrawal from Western Canada, and if there are solutions to be found.
  • Trudeau, incidentally, also had harsh words for Putin but kept mum on Trump’s behaviour at the Helsinki meeting on Monday.
  • The Council of the Federation is meeting today, and topics will include Pharmacare and internal trade barriers.
  • Ralph Goodale says the government won’t pursue the deportation of Abdoul Abdi.
  • Ontario Superior Court has struck down the prohibition on charities that they can only spend ten percent of their activities on political (but not partisan) issues.
  • The Canadian Embassy in Washington was caught off-guard by the visit by three Conservative senators to US Attorney General Jeff Sessions back in April.
  • Here’s a look at how the government focus-grouped children as young as six when coming up with warning labels for recreational cannabis packages.
  • Kevin Carmichael’s conversation with Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz continues, on the theme of credibility.
  • My column looks at some of the senators who are pushing back against Senator Peter Harder’s vision of a Senate that resembles a rubber stamp.

Odds and ends:

Lawrence MacAulay’s chief of staff has resigned to run in the next election (or possibly in the coming by-election in Leeds-Grenville).

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2 thoughts on “Roundup: Deleting the message”

  1. There was a time when conservatives, even though we disagreed with their policies, were upstanding, honest citizens that deserved our respect. In the past coup;e of decades, however, power seems to have overtaken principle, and they have found as constituency that they can cultivate, and they aren’t fussy about how they do it.

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