Roundup: Another threatened frivolous lawsuit

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There is a weird little case of monkey-see-monkey-do happening between different conservative parties around the country that has accelerated with the three provincial elections, and Danielle Smith’s upcoming leadership review, and it would all be childish if the stakes weren’t so high. A few days ago, Scott Moe started claiming that the federal carbon levy was costing the jobs of teachers and nurses in the province—a transparently bullshit claim—but the talking point got picked up in Question Period by Pierre Poilievre, and soon other premiers were doing it, including Danielle Smith. Yes, it demonstrates an intellectual and moral bankruptcy that is stunning to behold, but also just how little imagination there seems to be among parties on the right in this country (not that the NDP has much imagination of their own, as they crib the notes of the “justice Democrats” in the US with alarming frequency).

After Blaine Higgs declared that he was going to launch a fresh legal challenge against the federal carbon levy—which will immediately be thrown out of court—Danielle Smith decided she couldn’t let that one go either, so she is now threatening a new legal challenge of the federal Impact Assessment Act, which has just been through changes after the Supreme Court ruled that the earlier version did not pass constitutional muster. And just like Higgs’ challenge that has no new legal arguments to draw on, Smith is also citing things that are not legislative in nature as she plans to challenge the amended law.

The federal government isn’t having it, and Steven Guilbeault has called her out over this, but I’m not sure her behaviour will change too dramatically once she’s on the other side of her leadership review because, well, she needs to prove to her base that she is doing more than just listening to them, but acting on their batshit crazy desires as well, so we’re going to see more of this nonsense going forward.

Applies to the vast majority of #cdnpoli.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2024-10-04T23:00:28.266Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Ukrainian force shot down nine out of nineteen Russian drones targeting critical infrastructure overnight Thursday. Russian advances have knocked out about 80 percent of the critical infrastructure in the logistics hub of Pokrovsk, which they are trying to capture. President Zelenskyy visited the Sumy region, which borders the captured areas in Russia’s Kursk region. Reuters has a photo gallery of the all-female anti-drone mobile air defence unit known as the “Bucha witches.”

Good reads:

  • From the Francophonie summit in Paris, Justin Trudeau is set to announce funding for French-speaking African countries.
  • Gary Anandasangaree says that work is ongoing to launch a “red dress alert system” for missing Indigenous women.
  • Internal emails show the CRA’s scramble around their last-minute decision around the reporting requirements for bare trusts. (You think?)
  • Here is a look at issues related to Canada building a cloud network for its top-secret data, and the various factors of reluctance in doing so (for good reason, guys).
  • The RCMP commissioner says there is an “investigation ongoing” around SDTC and documents obtained, but that could mean absolutely anything.
  • The Foreign Interference inquiry heard that the RCMP declined to shut down a Chinese money-laundering operation because they said it would have no impact.
  • Other documents submitted to the inquiry show that Canadian diplomats have engaged Chinese counterparts 31 times over the past two years on interference.
  • Senior officials told the inquiry that they will be briefing foreign diplomats stationed in Canada about what is acceptable during an election (before the next one).
  • The Supreme Court of Canada ruled unanimously that the Canadian Transportation Agency’s compensation rules for delayed flights is legal. (My story here).
  • Here is the tale of six MPs from all parties who have been working together to get former women MPs safely out of Afghanistan, in spite of man delays.
  • Here’s Peter Julian being utterly precious about the state of the House of Commons, as though the NDP didn’t directly contribute to where it’s at.
  • Here’s a look at what changes are being proposed for the Alberta Bill of Rights, and sure enough, a bunch of it is federal jurisdiction.
  • Rob Shaw describes how BC’s election campaign has proven resilient for John Rustad, in spite of his record of bat-shit crazy beliefs being aired repeatedly.
  • My weekend column talks to Senator Scott Tannas about his attempt to get the Senate to push back against the government’s abusive omnibus budget bills.

Odds and ends:

For National Magazine, my write-up to yesterday’s Supreme Court of Canada decision on the legality of the air passenger compensation regulations.

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