Yesterday was a long and very busy day, as everyone scrambled to get their say on the ongoing protest and blockade situation across the country, with a mounting economic cost to them. First thing in the morning, the AFN National Chief, Perry Bellegarde, and several First Nations leaders held a press conference to ask the Mohawk protesters to dismantle the barricades – not as surrender, but as compassion for those who would soon be affected by shortages – but one of those Mohawk leaders also noted that his band office has been locked out and protesters among his own people say they want him out. A short while later, Justin Trudeau gave a speech in the House of Commons to counsel patience and to reiterate that dialogue remained the best way to resolve the situation – something Andrew Scheer denounced as weak, and he continued to insist that the police end the protests, insisting that this was but a group of “professional protesters” and “radicals” and that the “real” position of the Wet’suwet’en people was for jobs and resource development (even though he later said he hadn’t actually spoken to any of them) – something that both Peter MacKay and Erin O’Toole also echoed, because police action has never gone badly before. Oh, wait. (Marilyn Gladu, for the record, wants the military to step in). Shortly after Trudeau’s speech, he had a meeting with Yves-François Blanchet, Jagmeet Singh, and Elizabeth May, and made a pointed remark that Scheer had not been invited because his remarks were “disqualifying” – which led to Scheer’s agitated breathy and high-pitched performance during QP. Oh, and while all of this was going on, some activists in Victoria tried to perform a “citizen’s arrest” on BC premier John Horgan (and they got arrested instead).

By the time the five o’clock politics shows rolled around, Carolyn Bennett had concluded a meeting with some of the hereditary chiefs – who stated on one of the shows that they wouldn’t actually negotiate until the RCMP were off of their territory – and Marc Miller refused to discuss whether that was on or off the table when asked, leading the pundits to make hay of that. (“He didn’t say no!” is the worst impulse in journalism, guys). Oh, and hilariously, Jody Wilson-Raybould offered her services as a mediator, as though anyone in the government would be willing to trust her. As the day wound down, Saskatchewan premier Scott Moe said he was holding a meeting of premiers today because Trudeau “refused to act” – though I’m not sure what exactly he proposes, unless it’s to try to direct provincial police forces to start cracking skulls, both violating the rule of law and making the situation worse. And that’s where we are.

Meanwhile, here is a good primer written by a lawyer and a law professor about what “rule of law” means and why it’s important – as Scheer and company keep misusing the term. Heather Scoffield sees the business impacts of the blockades and deduces that it will be impossible to resolve them both quickly and peacefully – it would have to be one or the other. Andrew Coyne counsels patience in threating the needle that the protests can both be illegal while still noting that using force will only create martyrs. Matt Gurney worries that if the blockades go on much longer, they could fuel populist anger and damage the cause of reconciliation. Paul Wells attempts to make sense of the day that was, and the Liberals’ high-wire act in the middle of it all.

Good reads:

• François-Philippe Champagne was in the Bahamas for the Caribbean Community meeting, making the case for Canada to get the UN Security Council seat.
• Bill Morneau announced that they planned to tinker with the mortgage stress test (which is a bad idea when the Bank of Canada is worried about household debt).
• Public Works wants MPs to decide on the future size of the House of Commons in the Centre Block, which could affect its heritage character.
• Public Works also accidentally leaked the information of 69,000 employees affected by the Phoenix gong show. Whoops.
• The Auditor General reported that there are problems at both CBSA and Correctional Services around workplace harassment, discrimination and violence.
• Similarly, the Correctional Investigator raised flags about a “culture of impunity” within Corrections, and that the organization is too resistant to change.
• Elections Canada tabled their report on the last election, and said that they detected no serious cyber-threats to the process.
• The Senate Ethics Officer ruled that Senator Oh broke ethics rules in accepting a free trip to China (and then being evasive about it).
• The Commons Trade committee set their timeline for study of the New NAFTA, and it was the NDP whose vote helped to speed it along.
• A bunch of Jody Wilson-Raybould’s emails concerning judicial appointments just happened to find their way to the Globe and Mail. (She denies involvement).
• Susan Delacourt writes about polls demonstrating how people increasingly treat politics like a spectator sport where they don’t want to get involved (and organize).
• My column notes the enormity of Andrew Scheer’s spending problem, and why it’s a wake-up call for the Conservatives to do something about their party governance.

Odds and ends:

My latest for the CBA’s National Magazine looks at 100 years of legal codes of conduct in Canada, and what needs to modernize them.

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