Roundup: Counting down to Kenney’s referendum

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Alberta is a little over two weeks away from Jason Kenney’s bullshit “referendum” on equalisation, which won’t actually accomplish anything, but will send his rhetoric into overdrive. (This is also when he will be holding his equally bullshit “Senate nomination election,” which is also blatantly unconstitutional, but that is a rant for another day, and I’ve filed numerous columns on the topic already). This referendum will do nothing about equalisation – it won’t do anything about amending the constitution, and if he thinks he’ll bring the federal government to the table to renegotiate the terms of equalisation, Justin Trudeau will once again remind Kenney that he was sitting at the Cabinet table when Stephen Harper and Jim Flaherty imposed the current formula. It’s a waste of time and money, all in the service of Kenney trying to continue to drum up anger at Ottawa as a way to distract the province from his own record of failure.

Meanwhile, here is Andrew Leach with a few thoughts:

Good reads:

  • Surprising nobody, Dr. Theresa Tam says that the more contagious Delta variant means that we need more vaccinations than OG COVID to reach herd immunity.
  • Alberta, Saskatchewan and BC are looking for Johnson & Johnson vaccines – but there aren’t any in Canada because we returned the tainted batch we got.
  • Cyber-criminals are not only selling fake vaccination certificates, but then using the personal information they gather to scam purchasers (which is kind of fitting).
  • After a court-ordered reconsideration, Jonathan Wilkinson has decided to pursue a joint federal-provincial review of a proposed Alberta coal mine expansion.
  • Wilkinson is currently in Milan for pre-COP climate talks, and is working with German officials to convince more countries to step up their climate finance pledges.
  • The government is likely to ensure that the vaccine mandate for civil servants includes those working from home full-time.
  • Civil society groups are calling on the government to rethink its planned online harms bill following the consultations currently underway.
  • Michael Spavor made his first public statement since his return from China.
  • The Supreme Court of Canada ruled that Doug Ford reducing the number of wards in Toronto while the election was underway was not unconstitutional.
  • Xtra interviews new NDP MP Blake Desjarlais, Canada’s first Two-Spirit MP.
  • John Michael McGrath looks at the Supreme Court of Canada decision on the Toronto City Council vote, and what steps the province can take next.
  • Joshua Hind notes the NDP’s focus on social media clowning and how that detracts from the serious work of policy or just getting votes instead of likes.
  • Susan Delacourt tries to make sense of Trudeau’s trip to Tofino.
  • My weekend column points out the problem the Liberal Party created for itself with Kevin Vuong when they decided to forgo a proper open nomination process.

Odds and ends:

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2 thoughts on “Roundup: Counting down to Kenney’s referendum”

  1. It is time for the Liberal Party to take a serious examination of Justin Trudeau’s style. Now is better than later. A new leader will be able to show Canadians that the Liberal vision is best without the constant histrionics of “hate Trudeau”. His negative bag is full to the brim. It happens to every leader and especially PM’s. A refresher is needed. Thank you Justin, your run is done.

    • BS. His run was done after SNC too, wasn’t it? Now he needs to resign because of a handful of virtue-signaling pearl-clutchers in the corrupt media who couldn’t give a rat’s tail about this issue otherwise? He will leave when he chooses to leave and not a moment earlier. The party has said so themselves. I doubt this will even be an issue by the end of the week. Besides, nobody else is going to carry them in Quebec the way he does. Blanchet got lucky this time thanks to whatsername the pollster. So if you like the idea of PM O’Toole or Poilievre, by all means encourage the LPC to install Freeland or Iggy Carney.

      That being said, perhaps this was a test to see if the media would learn their lesson after their “histrionics” failed to defeat him yet again. Maybe this was his middle finger to all of them, his “walk in the sand.” Remember his father boycotted the media in 1983 and flipped the bird to protesters out west. If the Indigenous tribes think they could do better under O’Toole or Skippy or Kenney, let them have at it, let them throw in their lot and throw away their vote. Let the histrionic ingrates freeze in the dark.

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