Roundup: Brown’s whistleblower goes public

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We’re now in day one-hundred-and-thirty-five of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and it sounds like Russia might be taking an “operational pause” to regroup before they return to hammering Donetsk province…though there was still some shelling in the region. The Ukrainian flag is once again flying on Snake Island, which is a strategic access point to ports like Odessa. For his part, Putin says that he’s just getting started, and is daring the West to meet him on the battlefield, so that’s going well.

Closer to home, the Patrick Brown saga continues, as the woman who was in his camp and reported the alleged financial misdeeds to the party came forward and said she blew the whistle, and detailed the allegation that a company was paying for her work on the campaign and that Brown knew about it (which he and his camp have denied). As this goes to the Commissioner of Elections, the Liberals, keen to make some mischief, sent in their own complaint to the Commissioner, asking him to investigate the Conservative Party as a whole in the event that they benefitted financially from any memberships the Brown camp sold that may have been done improperly. So that’s going well.

The party is also contending with how they will count votes for Brown that are received, given that they’re not reprinting ballots, and don’t want to just not count his votes in any way in case that alters the maths of the preferential ballot in some way, so…they’re consulting. And we’ll see what that says. Meanwhile, members of the Conservative committee vetting leadership candidates apparently warned the organizing committee not to approve Patrick Brown’s bid, but were overruled, so that’s also interesting.

Good reads:

  • Anita Anand was at the General Dynamics plant in London, Ontario, to announce 39 Canadian LAVs are being sent to Ukraine.
  • François-Philippe Champagne says the government isn’t planning to buy out Philip Morris’ minority stake in Medicago to get its vaccine approved by the WHO.
  • Two-and-a-half years after promising it, there is no sign of the planned Canadian Consumer Advocate from this government.
  • Everyone is rushing to assure people that Boris Johnson’s ouster won’t affect the ongoing free trade talks between Canada and the UK.
  • The federal definition of “fully vaccinated” has been updating to at least three doses, but they’ve given up all leverage in encouraging people to get boosters.
  • The federal government has finally filed their appeal of the Alberta reference on the Impact Assessment Act at the Supreme Court of Canada.
  • The AFN’s general assembly has voted in favour of a forensic audit of the organization, vindicating national chief RoseAnne Archibald.
  • Senator Patricia Bovey wants the federal government to take more action to crack down on fake Indigenous art, and other copyright breaches.
  • Liberal backbenchers who voted for the NDP drug decriminalisation bill think the government is moving too slowly on dealing with opioid deaths.
  • A number of Conservatives have been meeting with “freedom” protesters with far-right extremist ties, but get very huffy when called out on it.
  • The Greens have written a provision in their next leader’s employment contract about facing continual reviews from their National Council (which is a bit strange).
  • Paul Wells as a collection of thoughts on the RCMP disclosure issue, the state of media, a PMO departure, and the state of Maclean’s.

Odds and ends:

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