Roundup: Kenney’s dereliction of duty

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I find myself increasingly concerned for my native Alberta as COVID cases continue to skyrocket, to the point where the province is now recording more cases than Ontario, despite having a third of the population. As this is happening, the premier and health minister have been nowhere to be seen, not showing up at press briefings, and leaving the Chief Medical Officer of Health to deal with this herself – likely as a first step in shifting blame to her once the death rate starts to follow infections. Because nothing is ever Jason Kenney’s fault.

One of Kenney’s junior Cabinet ministers apparently let slip that they’re waiting for hospitals to reach capacity before they take any additional measures, but he quickly backtracked and said that wasn’t what he meant at all, and so on. But considering the trajectory of things, and the fact that the provincial government refuses to consider an actual lockdown and instead just tut-tuts at people and tells them to knock it off – while simultaneously telling them to go socialize in restaurants and bars because they’re a “structured setting,” is it any wonder that the trajectory hasn’t altered. Albertans like to think that the rules don’t apply to them at the best of times (and yes, once again, I am from there, and this is the mindset that we are taught from childhood), so the fact that the most the government can do is give them vague guidelines and tell them to exercise their “personal responsibility” means that they plan to do as little as possible. And seriously – this is the province that is so into “personal responsibility” that they brought back tertiary syphilis. It’s a dereliction of duty, but I despair that nobody will wind up punishing Kenney and company for it when the next election comes around, because they are all indoctrinated into believing that the province is a one-party state, and that anything less is treasonous.

Meanwhile, here’s Susan Delacourt on the fact that Justin Trudeau is still trying to keep measures voluntary across the country, and attempting to use the art of persuasion, even though that’s getting increasingly difficult in the current climate.

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau joined other G20 leaders in promising more pandemic help to poorer countries, and in pushing back against protectionism.
  • A transitional post-Brexit trade deal with the UK has been reached.
  • The head of the National Advisory Committee on Immunization says the lack of a national vaccine registry will hinder the COVID vaccine roll-out.
  • Here’s a look at the status of the government’s national housing strategy, three years into its decade-long plan, where seven provinces are now on board.
  • The Canadian Psychiatric Association says that the exclusion of mental illness from the medical assistance in dying is stigmatizing and treats mental illness differently.
  • Physicians who provide assisted dying also say that the attempts to keep the ten-day “reflection period,” as the Conservatives demand, only prolongs suffering.
  • Here is a good recap of the hysteria around the supposed “decline in French in Quebec” that dominated so much of Question Period last week.
  • Kevin Carmichael suggests that the government has better tools at its disposal to bring about the electric vehicle revolution than just funding the Big Three.
  • Chantal Hébert sees François Legault as an emerging leader among premiers to take more meaningful climate action.
  • My weekend column looks at how poor journalism and an inarticulate government has landed us in a full-blown moral panic over judicial appointments.

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One thought on “Roundup: Kenney’s dereliction of duty”

  1. So when does Dr. Hinshaw start wearing a bunch of scarves to signal her transformation into Dr. Birx? Jason Trump has fully co-opted her mandate and now she’s become Alberta’s medical equivalent of Baghdad Bob. Sad. Quite the “leader” who Erin Trump Jr. has backing him, but hey, who cares about sacrificing human lives to the unholy bonfire of Mammon when there are Libs to be owned. To borrow a line from Jimmy Buffett, some people say that there’s a Trudeau to blame, but we know… it’s never the premiers’ fault.

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