Roundup: Who they gave succour to

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Cast your minds back to summer of 2018, when prime minister Justin Trudeau attended a Liberal rally in rural Quebec and encountered a woman heckling him about refugees crossing the border at irregular points of entry. As part of this, she demanded to know when Trudeau would support “Québécois de souche,” a term tinged with racism as it applies only to those who descended from the early French settlers, essentially considering anyone without those particular roots to be some kind of contagion upon the state. Trudeau called out her intolerance, and she tried to sue for defamation.

A Quebec Superior Court judge dismissed her case, and pointed out the fact that she had tried to use the incident to make a name for herself among far-right circles, all while claiming that she has empathy because she’s a nurse, and will treat anyone. More to the point, the judge pointed out that she was deliberately trying to provoke the prime minister, and was thus the author of her own misfortune, and in dismissing the case, ordered her to pay legal fees.

So why bring this up? Because if you also think back to when the House of Commons returned shortly after this incident, the Conservatives all rushed to give succour to this woman, and tried to frame her aggressive questions and demands as though she was “just asking about the budget.” No, seriously. Conservative after Conservative stood up in the House of Commons to whine that “if Trudeau doesn’t like your questions, he calls you a racist.” Because in their minds, being called a racist is a worse crime than the actual racism that the woman was displaying. And it goes to show what the party is willing to stand up for, and who they are willing to protect if they think they can score points from it.

Good reads:

  • There are now five confirmed cases of the omicron variant in Canada, as G7 health leaders are closely monitoring the situation and sharing information.
  • Here is what we know about the omicron variant, and a profile of the Coronavirus Variants Rapid Response Network which tracks new variants as they emerge.
  • The government has tabled their tougher version of the conversion therapy ban bill.
  • Anita Anand will issue a formal apology to victims of sexual misconduct in the military on December 13th.
  • The government plans to table legislation on a digital services tax, even though they have agreed at the OECD not to implement it for two years.
  • At a peacekeeping summit in South Korea next week, the US plans to press Canada for more medical personnel, drones, and the promised 200 peacekeepers.
  • Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem says the central bank needs to do more for Indigenous people, particularly around labour markets and access to capital.
  • Professionals who treat substance addictions are calling for national standards for residential treatment centres, as they are currently not guaranteeing quality.
  • In a bit of self-congratulatory reporting, the Star ATIPed the panic at Library and Archives when they reported on outdated webpages still being up.
  • More warnings were delivered to MPs about some of their sartorial choices, including the fact that they can’t uses masks to promote causes or brands.
  • Following an internal party survey, some Conservatives are worried that Erin O’Toole plans to further centralize the nomination system to hand-pick candidates.
  • There will be yet more lawsuits within the Green Party’s internal ranks over leaked internal reports that cast some members of national council in a bad light.
  • Former Conservative MP Tom Lukiwski thinks Erin O’Toole should call an immediately leadership review, with no time to sell additional memberships.
  • Robert Hiltz makes the case for making parking more difficult in cities as a way of driving down car use, and increasing transit to combat emissions.

Odds and ends:

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3 thoughts on “Roundup: Who they gave succour to”

  1. Those who have been around for many decades will know that conservatives in Canada in whatever iteration have a past anchored in disrespect for any people not white and christian….oh! they would stand up and howl like banshees is confronted but in their deep historic bellies this demon exists. So it is not surprising to take note on occasion that some Con somewhere from the hoi polloi or in position of power makes the mistake of verbalizing their innate bias. We all remember very well Harper’s unfortunate remark about “old stock”. It is refreshing to have the cons exposed publicly by the judge. Cons really can’t stand the light of day. My first reference here was about decades. Early on some grandparents of todays cons used darkness to cover their activities and wore sheets to cover their faces. Anyone who supports the conservatives today must become aware of the roots of conservatism and the policies and attitudes they nurture.. A glance at affairs in the rapidly deteriorating nation to our south will see this proof in conservative rhetoric and actions on a daily basis.

  2. And this is who the media gives succour to — the CPC and its provincial offshoots — if they feel they can get “ratings,” play “both sides” to an argument (or ignore it altogether), and/or own the Libs. They refuse to do a deep dive into or expose conservatism in Canada for the rot that it is, preferring instead to jaw ad nauseam about pointless Trudeau/Liberal “scandals”. How many months did they waste on repetitive SNC nonsense, when they should have been pressing Scheer and the whole party on their support for the yellow vests? How many months did they waste on repetitive WE nonsense when they should have been pressing Poilievre and the whole party on their fondness for QAnon conspiracies that fueled the “friendly sausage maker”?

    Why won’t they connect the “mainstream” party’s willingness to court anti-vaxers with the gravel throwers from the campaign trail, instead of plumping up O’Toole as a “moderate” and pretending like they’re all followers of Max? Or highlighting that Max was once the *foreign minister* of what is still Harper’s party? Why won’t they do as deep of a dive (or any dive, really) into Harper and the IDU like they did assailing WE and Margaret Trudeau? Why aren’t they pressing O’Toole on his opposition to M-103, which he voted against *right after the mosque shooting happened and it took on a sense of urgency*?

    When the cons give succour to people like Diane Blain, the yellow vests, and Viktor Orban, and the media gives succour to cons, the media by definition is giving succour to those people. But hey, they’re all right Jack, after all as the CBS exec said of Trump, he might be bad for the country but he’s been great for the network. The morally bankrupt yet financially flush media in this country obviously feels the same about (the party of) Erin O’Trump.

  3. O’Toole stood on the HOC this morning and with a straight face lied once more to the gullible Canadian people on so many fronts, one would run out of space to enumerate them all. But Canadians and the chronically enslaved press, daily starved for grist hardly ever calls him out. This occurred daily in the press in the US during the Crump days where he was allowed to lie with impunity as he whiteballed and whitemailed the America people, half who ate it up like breakfast eggs and bacon and half who spit out his gruel to little effect. At least Dale has the guts here to attempt some redress to the National Posts and Sun “news” et al who continue to be active role players in the Con con.

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