Roundup: Danielle Smith goes draconian on LGBTQ+ youth

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Alberta premier Danielle Smith unveiled her province’s “parental rights” plan in a seven-minute social media video with no written materials, no legislation, and the press conference won’t be until almost 24 hours later, because that’s a responsible way to run a government. And that plan is the most draconian plan this country has seen yet to restrict the rights of trans and queer youth, all done as Smith coos about having empathy and being supportive when the plan is de facto conversion therapy for a generation of youth.

I’ll likely be writing about this more elsewhere in the next day or two, but reaction has been pretty swift, and a couple of notable ones I wanted to highlight, one being Hannah Hodson, who is a former Conservative candidate whom I believe has left the party over this kind of thing. As for federal justice minister Arif Virani, I’m at a loss as to just what levers he thinks he can use to stand up for the rights of these youth, but I guess we’ll see if they announce anything in the next few days.

It is curious just how much the “freedom” and “bodily autonomy!” crowd seems to want to restrict the freedoms and bodily autonomy of people they don’t like and how Smith is going along with it because she doesn’t want the leopards to eat her face like they did Jason Kenney.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Ukraine shot down 14 out of 20 drones launched by Russia, but a hospital in Kharkiv was struck. There was a large prisoner exchange, in spite of Russia’s unconfirmed claims that POWs were aboard a downed aircraft. There rumours that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy could sack the country’s top military chief because of disagreements over the handling of the war.

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau says that the government is “actively engaged” in trying to find a Palestinian-Canadian reported missing in Gaza while documenting the war.
  • Mark Miller announced another $362 million for temporary housing for asylum seekers, with $100 million heading to Quebec, and the amount for Toronto TBD.
  • Anita Anand says that CBC was not given a directive to cut their budget by 3.3 percent, while Pascale St-Onge says they were asked to participate in an “exercise.”
  • St-Onge announced $100 million for Telefilm Canada over the next two years.
  • Here’s an explainer of what we know so far (and don’t know) in the Global Affairs cyber-security breach.
  • Here is a look at how Canada and the UK are working together to address the risks posed by AI.
  • Former CSIS and CSE members told the foreign interference inquiry that detecting meddling can be difficult to detect because of the range of activities they undertake.
  • A Uyghur rights group has pulled out of the inquiry because of the accused MPs who have been given standing and could cross-examine their members.
  • A declassified CSIS report says that China did try to interfere in the last two elections (but doesn’t say anything about any degree of success).
  • Dentists and hygienists say they’re still waiting for details on the federal dental care plan, particularly around compensation.
  • Liberal MP Ben Carr says the best interests of the world would be served in Benjamin Netanyahu leaves office sooner than later.
  • Anthony Housefather and Yasir Naqvi are parliamentary secretaries once more, while Mona Fortier is now the (interim) deputy whip.
  • The Desmond inquiry released its report in Nova Scotia, calling for better sharing of health records and closing gaps in firearms licensing.
  • Doug Ford doesn’t want post-secondary institutions to raise tuitions, but he also doesn’t want to increase their funding, so they’ll continue to slowly starve.
  • Facing debilitating droughts, Alberta has started engaging in water-sharing talks between large users, while the minister won’t blame climate change. (Of course).
  • Kevin Carmichael profiles the pilot project that BDC is undertaking to help the mental health of entrepreneurs.
  • Paul Wells listens to Poilievre’s latest big speech and offers some perspective (but I would argue he’s missing a lot of context to the statistics Poilievre likes to quote).

Odds and Ends:

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