Roundup: A $7 million ad buy to tell on themselves

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Over the past several days, the Alberta government has been on a very strange campaign where they are in essence, telling on themselves by lying about the forthcoming federal emissions cap. How so, you ask? They keep insisting that this is a production cap on the energy sector, which is not what it is intended to be, particularly because the sector has been saying that they fully plan to be net-zero by 2050, and that these kinds of rules, while disliked by economists, would essentially force these companies to put their money where their mouths are. And, well, they have certainly been admitting that all of those promises to meet those targets through things like carbon capture have been pretty much all talk.

When Danielle Smith and her ministers tried to justify their ad campaign, well, things got even worse for them.

Meanwhile, the Alberta government bought the front pages of newspapers across the Postmedia chain at a cost of $7 million in order to decry this same policy, and in another telling lie, claim that it would increase grocery prices, because that’s the anxiety that they want to hit on in order to really stick it to the federal Liberals. But again, the problem here is that the driver of those higher grocery prices is climate change, and in particular, recurring droughts in food-producing regions, including in Canada, with a few flash floods or hurricanes along the way that also damage crops or livestock.

Ukraine Dispatch

A Russian attack on the southern city of Mykolaiv has killed one and injured at least sixteen. A drone attack was also launched against Kyiv. The town of Kupiansk in the Kharkiv region, and three surrounding settlements, were ordered evacuated. Russians claim to have taken the village of Levadne in the Zaporizhzhia region over the weekend.

Good reads:

  • Over the weekend, Justin Trudeau named outgoing Halifax mayor and former Liberal MP Mike Savage as the next lieutenant governor of Nova Scotia.
  • Daniel Rogers, currently the deputy national security advisor, has been promoted to be the new director of CSIS.
  • Steve MacKinnon is calling for a ninety-day freeze on work stoppages at Montreal ports while they meet with a special mediator to hammer out their differences.
  • Canada and the US have both listed Samidoun (aka the “Palestinian Prisoner Solidary Network”) as a terrorist entity.
  • Here is a look at how Indian agents targeted Narendra Modi’s opponents in Canada, while here is a look at a criminal gang alleged to be operating on their behalf.
  • Here is a recap of last week’s revelations at the Foreign Interference inquiry.
  • Dominic LeBlanc appeared at the inquiry on Tuesday, as did Katie Telford, who said her office wasn’t made aware of two incidents until this past summer.
  • Sources™ say that Quebec TV executive Marie-Philippe Bouchard will replace Catherine Tait as the next president of CBC.
  • The Governor General’s spouse has taken to Facebook to criticize the Quebec media for their hypocrisy in coverage of her recent visit to Quebec City.
  • A new Liberal campaign director was finally appointed over the weekend.
  • Liberal MP Sean Casey is openly calling for Trudeau to step down, while Anthony Housefather wants a “robust caucus discussion” on the leadership issue.
  • Former Ontario Liberal minsters, now MPs, discuss whether the current mood has any similarities to the end of the Wynne provincial government.
  • Pierre Poilievre had an unclassified briefing on the India allegations, while Jagmeet Singh wants more actions to ban certain groups and others to face sanctions.
  • Jessia Davis delves into her archives for an explainer on terrorist designations in Canadian law—how they happen and what it all means.
  • Justin Ling talks to a group that deals with deradicalization about what works, and why they need more dedicated funding to keep doing their work.
  • Althia Raj hears from Liberals in caucus  who are trying to force Trudeau’s ouster (and the CBC seems to be confirming this rumour).
  • Susan Delacourt notes the polls showing an increase in Poilievre’s unlikability.
  • Paul Wells gets the government’s expert panel report on how we handled COVID and what to do next, and finds they are already in the process of burying it.
  • Wells also makes some keen observations about the state of the Liberal Party as members of the caucus organise a possible ouster of Trudeau.
  • My weekend column pushes back on a certain columnist’s cockamamie notion that the Senate is itching for a fight with a future Poilievre government.
  • My column looks at how the rules of the House of Commons no longer serve when a leader of the opposition breaks them deliberately so that he can play the victim.

Odds and ends:

My latest for National Magazine on the pair of Supreme Court of Canada decisions that clarified bankruptcy rules to prevent fraudsters from keeping ill-gotten gains.

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