Roundup: No, the Supreme Court did not allow an extreme intoxication defence

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We are now on or about day eighty of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and it looks like Russian forces took heavy losses to the tune of as many as 73 tanks in a two-day battle that saw them destroyed in a failed river crossing. So that’s something. Meanwhile, a twenty-one-year-old Russian soldier is now on trial for war crimes for killing civilians. It also looks like some six million Ukrainians are now displaced out of the country by this point, most of them in neighbouring countries, and that situation is starting to take its toll.

As for the potential expansion of NATO with Finland and Sweden about to make their applications, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan says he is not favourable to those countries joining—and applications must be approved unanimously by member countries. This may be a ploy to extract concessions by Sweden in particular, as it relates to Turkey’s domestic political interests.

Closer to home, you will have no doubt seen a bunch of headlines saying that the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that “extreme intoxication is a valid defence in murders and sexual assaults.” That is not true, and is extremely misleading. The court in fact stated that extreme intoxication is not a defence that can be relied upon. What they did state was that the section in the Criminal Code that said that a state of automatism brought about by intoxication was not a defence was in fact unconstitutional, because it removed the principle around needing criminal intent. (There was a second, related decision that ruled on a few other related issues). There is a difference between extreme intoxication and a state of automatism, and it should behove news outlets to make a proper differentiation so that they’re not spreading misinformation—which they essentially are with these headlines designed to induce a moral panic. So please disregard them, because it is explicitly not what the court ruled. (I will have a piece delving deeper into its issues out in a day or two).

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau met with Princess Margriet of the Netherlands, unveiling a plaque at Beechwood Cemetery.
  • François-Philippe Champagne is pressing G7 allies to establish a quick-reaction cybersecurity group to build resilience given the invasion of Ukraine.
  • The expert panel making recommendations on the next steps for the Medical Assistance in Dying regime has tabled their report to Parliament.
  • Parks Canada is losing two-thirds of its funding this year, while they come up with a new long-term plan to manage its infrastructure and historical assets.
  • The CRTC will be getting a new chair as its mandate is about to expand (and the outgoing chair is hugely compromised with conflicts of interest).
  • There are concerns that the federal government has been slow to reinstate programmes like authorizing travel documents for refugees already in Canada.
  • Pope Francis has announced he will visit Quebec City, Iqaluit and Edmonton in July as part of his apology tour for residential schools.
  • The federal government is advancing $416 million to BC to help rebuild from last summer’s wildfires, while the budget has more money to train firefighters.
  • Chris Ragan walks through the history of central bank independence, and why Poilievre’s attacks against its governor are extremely bad for the country.
  • David Moscrop looks into the book and TV answers that Conservative leaders gave in their Wednesday debate, and why some of those were cynically prepared.
  • My weekend column looks at what is missing from the Conservative leadership race, and finds it’s an actual definition of what conservatism is supposed to mean today.

Odds and ends:

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