Roundup: Anecdotes about emigration

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It was a CBC story that caught the attention of Pierre Poilievre, and which his deputy leader brought up in Question Period, being one centred around census data showing a growing number of Canadians who are relocating to the US, and which tries to focus the attention on those who insist that they’re moving because Justin Trudeau has been so terrible. But this is also a story from a particular usual suspect, so it’s thinly sourced and written by a certain usual suspect who had a habit of this kind of sloppy work (and no, it’s not because he has any particular political agenda—it’s because he thinks he’s being edgy and that he’s tackling “big” things, even though he’s been relatively terrible about it.

To be clear, the story has no breakdown in the data to show much of anything useful about just who is moving, particularly from certain age groups and demographics, nor where they are moving to. This could be a case of retiring Boomers heading to Arizona and Florida and saying farewell to Canadian winters for good, but we don’t know. It does point out that a third of those who emigrate to the US were themselves Americans by birth returning home, and less than a third are immigrants to Canada from elsewhere who have since decided to move to the US, but for some of them, that could have been their plan all along. One of the profiled couples are fairly young and say that housing prices are an issue, but given how restrictive their immigration policies are, it’s hard to see how that many people are able to move just because housing is cheaper. This could also be a largely Ontario-driven phenomenon, but again, we have no breakdown in the data.

This is a big issue, but there is no attempt to get more clarity in the data. Instead, the focus is on getting anecdotes about how they hate Trudeau and want to move because of it, which is both an attempt to make this a federal story instead of a provincial housing one (and the usual suspect writing this piece has a history of doing that), but also because he thinks it’s going to get attention to the piece, and that’s exactly what it did, no matter how thin those anecdotes are, and the plural of anecdotes is not data. We shouldn’t need to remind a reporter at the gods damned public broadcaster of this fact, but things are off the rails there, and this is the kind of bullshit we get as a result.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russian missiles hit three sites in Kharkiv overnight, as Ukrainian forces work to shoot down seven missiles and 32 drones. While Russians continue aerial attacks on Kharkiv, they have also increased their troop concentration in the region, looking like they will make a push toward the city. Word is coming out that president Joe Biden has quietly given the okay for Ukraine to use American-made and supplied weapons to strike military targets inside of Russia.

https://twitter.com/kyivindependent/status/1796418752411840609

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau said that Russia should be allowed to participate in WWII commemoration events (erm, except they didn’t participate in D-Day).
  • Mark Holland says that he’s frustrated with the dental associations for not signing up to the dental care programme, saying he’s already addressed their concerns.
  • Reuters got the details of the calls between Macron and Trudeau about granting exemptions on sanctions for certain aircraft parts made with Russian titanium.
  • After all of the accusations about the partisan ad for Speaker Fergus’ event, it turns out that the Deputy Speaker was in an ad in his robes, which he denies involvement.
  • At the Procedure and House Affairs committee study on harassment of MPs, there was blame cast on both sides for MPs sending their flying monkeys out to attack.
  • Three Liberal MPs’ offices in Toronto have now been vandalised, while one of the MPs, Julie Dzerowicz, has been advised to maintain a “locked-door policy.”
  • The Bloc have tabled a bill to invoke the Notwithstanding Clause to override the Supreme Court of Canada’s Jordan decision about trial delays.
  • The NDP are championing the cause of flight attendants who have to do unpaid work, such as overseeing boarding and unboarding, as they only get paid in the air.
  • Newfoundland and Labrador plans to sue the federal government claiming that the equalisation formula is unfair and needs to be changed.
  • Doug Ford suggested that immigrants were behind the shootings of Jewish schools, and then did a non-apology later in the day. (No, seriously).
  • Stephanie Carvin and Thomas Juneau explain the intelligence/policy breakdown outlined in the recent NSIRA report on foreign interference.
  • Emmett Macfarlane calls out the Newfoundland and Labrador equalisation lawsuit for the obvious bullshit that it is.

Odds and ends:

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