Roundup: Trying for a left-wing populist narrative

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It’s day one-hundred-and-forty-nine of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and Russian forces have been pounding Kharkiv, mostly by randomly shelling residential areas to inflict civilian casualties. But as this shelling takes place, the head of MI6 in the UK says that their analysis shows that Russia’s army is nearly exhausted, and that this will open up opportunities for Ukrainian forces to counter-attack in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, Turkey says that Russia and Ukraine are about to sign a deal that will re-open Black Sea ports and allow grain shipments to pass through again, and hopefully avert the threat of famines (and likely lower world grain prices). There are still a lot of questions—including whether Russia can actually be trusted—but we’ll see what happens in the coming days.

https://twitter.com/AnitaAnandMP/status/1550193058809090054

Closer to home, Jagmeet Singh is trying to play the populist card, and it’s just laughable. It’s like the satire of a populist’s talking points (not that the NDP hasn’t morphed itself from a principled left-wing party to a left-flavoured populist one more than a decade ago). Like Singh and his inner circle looked at Pierre Poilievre’s traction and said “get me a piece of that action,” so they tried to ape his talking points. It’s risible, and it’s a sign of the intellectual vacuum at the centre of our political parties (and no, Liberals, you don’t get to be smug about this one either as your party can’t communicate their way out of a wet paper bag).

https://twitter.com/theJagmeetSingh/status/1550180051152404482

There are no “Ottawa elites” who are “enraged” by your suggestion. Yes, it got a bunch of scorn from, well, everyone because the last thing you want to do when you’re facing high inflation is to just give everyone even more money. Targeted help, sure, but social assistance and disability are provincial programmes, whereas the Canada Child Benefit is too broad a programme that it has been considered stimulus by the government and every credible economist, which is the last thing you want right now. The GST credit can maybe be a vehicle as it’s more targeted, but you need to be specific about that. As for the notion that corporate price gouging has caused inflation is flat-out wrong (even if it has contributed in a small way). Taxing oil companies won’t solve inflation, and an “excess profit tax” is a fraught move because it gets very tricky to come up with a workable definition of “excess,” particularly given the fact that a) the economy is overheated so of course businesses are going to be making more profit, and b) the world price of oil has more to do with supply constraints and capacity constraints for refining, so just taxing it more doesn’t actually solve any problems. But this kind of ham-fisted economic illiteracy does nothing for Singh’s credibility, and just drags the discourse even further down.

Good reads:

  • While in Nova Scotia to announce a clean energy project, Justin Trudeau reiterated that Hockey Canada needs a real reckoning if they want to regain trust.
  • The federal government is asking the FAA in the United States to stop making its military flights—including the prime minister’s plane—trackable online.
  • Pascale St-Onge has agreed to freeze Gymnastics Canada’s funding after more than 500 Canadian gymnasts called on her to do so, citing the abuse in their sport.
  • The Supreme Court of Canada clarified some rules around what counts as first degree murder, as well as confinement.
  • Summer showboat season ramps up on Monday as RCMP commissioner Brenda Lucki appears at public safety committee about the Nova Scotia mass shooting.
  • The Conservative Party agreed to hold a third official leadership debate, but Poilievre says he’ll skip it and pay the $50,000 fine; Lewis may as well.
  • Poilievre also said he wants to expand the Toronto Island airport, but he couldn’t do it unilaterally, and his reasons don’t actually make logical sense.
  • Conservatives are calling on the government to extend their Afghan resettlement programme as they are due to wind it down.
  • Ontario is extending their wholly inadequate and half-assed three-paid-sick-days programme until March 31st.
  • BC has ended their agreement with CBSA to use provincial jails for the purposes of immigration detention.

Odds and ends:

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