Roundup: A double standard on barring speeches

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There was a story in the Star yesterday that I hadn’t actually noticed happening, which is that Liberal MP Yvan Baker has been barred from speaking in the House of Commons until he apologises for saying that the “Putin wing” had taken over the Conservative Party on March 20th. Baker says he has no intention of apologising for what he considers to be the truth, and the Speaker, as usual, makes little tut-tut noises about what Baker said, never mind that there is a giant double-standard at play.

If Fergus is concerned about MPs alleging that their colleagues “stand four-square behind dictators,” it’s funny that the consequences only seem to apply to Baker. After all, Conservatives on a frequent basis have said that Trudeau is in the pocket of dictators, and that he allowed foreign interference on their behalf because it benefitted his party. (There is absolutely no public evidence of this). And most egregious was that Conservative MP Rachael Thomas has said on the floor of the Commons that Justin Trudeau is a “dictator,” and she faced absolutely no censure for saying it, which makes it really hard to see why Baker is being singled out for being hyperbolic—the point was about which elements of the party’s base that Poilievre is pandering to as opposed to saying that Poilievre is under Putin’s sway—when nobody else is. (I will note that Conservative MP Mark Strahl was barred from speaking for several weeks because he refused to withdraw the remarks that someone was lying, which is a big no-no under the rules of Parliament—rules which are now being absolutely abused—but he did eventually do so).

What is perhaps the most galling in all of his was the statement that Andrew Scheer gave to the Star, in which he says “Liberals should not whine and complain because they were caught spreading disinformation and lies to divide Canadians and cover for their own total failures on Ukraine.” Erm, serial liar and promoter of conspiracy theories Andrew Scheer is lecturing Liberals on the subject, when he faces zero consequences for lying in the House of Commons on a daily basis. We already knew he had absolutely no sense of shame, but it definitely extends to a complete lack of self-awareness as well. Just utterly ridiculous.

Ukraine Dispatch

It was another bloody weekend in Ukraine which saw waves of drone attacks targeting Kyiv last night, the pounding of Zaporizhzhia with guided bombs earlier, the death of a top judge after an attack on Kharkiv, and an attack on a hospital in Sumy that killed ten. President Zelenskyy says that the front lines are “very, very difficult” as autumn descends on the conflict.

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau was in Iqaluit to sign an agreement with the territorial government about Inuit child and family services to help more children stay in communities.
  • Mélanie Joly addressed the UN General Assembly, and focused on authoritarians who justify their actions under the rubric of “freedom,” among other issues.
  • Jonathan Wilkinson is offering Jagmeet Singh a briefing on carbon pricing so that he can “better understand” how it works.
  • Ahmed Hussen has announced $10 million in humanitarian assistance for civilians impacted by the fighting in Lebanon.
  • Pascale St-Onge is planning on taking parental leave when her wife gives birth in November, and will likely be out of the public eye for several weeks.
  • National security agencies warn of “salad-bar extremism,” by which would-be terrorists take a grab-bag of issues, sometimes contradictory, as their justification.
  • Economists like Stephen Gordon don’t see the justification for the Bloc’s demanded OAS enrichment for seniors under the age of 75.
  • Residential school survivors are decrying what they consider a “cut” in government supports, as well as demanding some 23 million documents.
  • While in Canada, French president Emmanuel Macron said that leaders shouldn’t “change their values” in the face of poor polling numbers.
  • Marc Garneau talks about being unsure whether his messages ever got through PMO to the PM, and not being asked for advice on issues when he was a minister.
  • Anaida Poilievre was on a local personal trainer’s podcast, talking about her life, that she and Pierre are into stoicism, and she wants to make human trafficking her issue.
  • The Saskatchewan election campaign is set to get underway today.
  • Justin Ling talks to some of the architects of the carbon levy and how mistakes were made along the way that made it harder to sell.
  • Paul Wells delves into the plans to create a new health emergency response agency, and the government’s delayed responses to the COVID review.

Odds and ends:

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