Roundup: Paying $85,000 for the privilege of being humiliated

Posted on by

As if that “big” meeting the premiers had with those mid-level White House officials who ended up trolling and humiliating them couldn’t get any worse, well, it did. It turns out, they paid a lobbyist connected with Don Jr. $85,000 to arrange said meeting, where they didn’t get properly briefed, and froze out the Canadian ambassador (who had a meeting in the White House with actual senior officials earlier that day) in the process.

Because I can’t do it justice, here’s more (full thread starts here):

I’m not sure that I can stress this enough—premiers have absolutely no business trying to conduct foreign negotiations. The federal government not only has been handling the situation, but they have told the premiers not to constantly react to everything coming from the Trump administration because it’s chaotic and incoherent, and then they went and tried to get their own meetings? Them meeting with senators and governors sure, I can understand, because they are more on their level as counterparts, but it’s also pretty useless in the current environment because Trump has absolutely everyone cowed.

I’m also going to point a finger at the media for emboldening these premiers because they keep saying things like “there’s a vacuum of leadership” at the federal level and so on, which is not the case. Trudeau is still on the job, even if he’s on his way out. Ministers are still doing their jobs. We have an ambassador in Washington doing her job. They have explicitly told the media that they are not going to react to everything for very good reason. There is no actual need for the premiers to step in and start freelancing. Doug Ford’s “Captain Canada” shtick was him positioning himself before an election, and thanks to uncritical media coverage, waaaaaaaay too many people fell for it. But the media needs people to light their hair on fire at every utterance, and the premiers have been only too happy to step in and fill that role, or to give the bootlicker position (because both sides!), and the federal government just winds up sidelining itself in the process. We’re handing Trump so many little wins because nobody can keep their powder dry.

Ukraine Dispatch

A Russian drone attack damaged port infrastructure in Odesa for a second day in a row. Another Russian drone pierced the outer shell of the Chernobyl nuclear plant, and while radiation levels are normal, there is a danger if power goes offline at the site for too long. Russians also claim to have taken control of two more settlements in Donetsk region.

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau appointed businesswoman Daniele Henkel to the Senate for Quebec.
  • Trudeau has not responded to Trump’s suggestion that Russia be admitted to the G7 (while Chrystia Freeland and Pierre Poilievre objected).
  • The official title of the “fentanyl czar” is actually “Commissioner of Canada’s Fight Against Fentanyl,” which is a fraction less offensive to Canadian sensibilities.
  • Trump is talking about auto tariffs as of April 2nd, because of course he is.
  • The federal government is suing an IT subcontractor for $1.6 million for “unjust enrichment” after they padded their timesheets.
  • It looks like the “GST Holiday” had a fairly negligible effect for businesses.
  • The Conservative caucus held a meeting in Ottawa for the first time since December, as they launched new attack ads against Mark Carney.
  • Danielle Smith’s Cabinet is starting to fracture, with ministers calling for the health minister to be shuffled in the wake of the AHS corruption allegations.
  • Former Imperial Oil executive Ross Belot explains why the oil sands aren’t making a comeback, and why new pipelines aren’t the answer.
  • Patricia Treble makes the case that the King of Canada needs to do some very visible diplomacy in the next year in advance of his planned state visit to the US.
  • Jennifer Robson has some lessons from the pandemic on how to fix programmes like EI in advance of a possible fresh economic crisis.
  • Justin Ling calls on Ontarians to vote Doug Ford out.
  • My weekend column calls out the premiers as the first line of defence for resilience against Trump, and that means that they need to do their gods damned jobs.

Odds and ends:

Want more Routine Proceedings? Become a patron and get exclusive new content.

One thought on “Roundup: Paying $85,000 for the privilege of being humiliated”

  1. Another Russian drone pierced the outer shell of the Chernobyl nuclear plant

    Oh for heaven’s …, look at a map.

    Chernobyl is roughly 90km due north of Kiyv and maybe 250km west of any Russian combat forces. Even the Russians are not that incompetent nor stupid enough to attack a derelict nuclear reactor site in the middle of nowhere.

Comments are closed.