So much of the weekend was spent parsing what happened at Mar-a-Lago on Friday, particularly given that Justin Trudeau didn’t put out an official readout of the meeting (probably because Trump is not officially in government yet), while Trump posted about it on his social media where he called it “productive.” The takeaways appear to be that the tariffs threats cannot be avoided immediately, because Trump believes in them and wants to use them to balance the budget (good luck with that), but that we may be able to carve out exceptions. There was also talk about the border and fentanyl, according to Dominic LeBlanc, and talk about more drones and helicopters to patrol the border (but who knows where the helicopters and personnel will come from—we are not flush with excess capacity).
None of this was good enough for Pierre Poilievre, who took to the microphones on Sunday to claim that Trudeau went in a “position of weakness” (because that’s Poilievre’s go-to line these days), and lamented that Trudeau came home “empty-handed,” as though these things are done in a day, particularly with a mercurial chaos agent like Trump. Poilievre also says he wants a cap on asylum seekers, because he claims there are too many bad actors, and said he would allow a reprieve in the ongoing filibuster if there is a border plan that meets his approval on the table. But when asked what he would do different, Poilievre says he’s not the prime minister, and walked away. So…that happened.
In a fight between Canada and the US, with the incoming US President engaged in disinformation about the Canadian border, Pierre Poilievre sides with the US.
— Emmett Macfarlane (@emmettmacfarlane.com) 2024-12-01T19:19:43.012Z
Meanwhile, Doug Ford insists that the premiers are “unanimous” that they want us to accelerate defence spending to reach our NATO target sooner than later. No word yet on what fiscal demands they will give up from the federal government to reach that spending target faster (because the money has to come from somewhere).
“Stay in your lane,” the premiers kept telling the federal government about putting strings on healthcare funding or child care, but they want to dictate how the federal government deals with areas in its own exclusive areas of jurisdiction.
Rules for thee but not for me. https://t.co/VDZUq28vja— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) December 1, 2024
Ukraine Dispatch
A Russian drone hit a residential building in Ternopil overnight, killing one and injuring several others. Drones also targeted Kyiv the night previous, and killed three in a strike on Kherson. Russians claim to have overtaken the settlements of Illinka and Petrivka in Donetsk region. Ukraine says it will increase the use of unmanned ground vehicles over the coming year.
Last night, and throughout this week, our air defense forces, mobile fire groups, and all air defense units worked to protect Ukrainians from Russian aerial terror. Over 30 strike drones were shot down in a single night. In total, over the course of the week, Russia has used more… pic.twitter.com/40H5xmgjgZ
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) December 1, 2024
⚡️Russia loses almost 46,000 troops, over $3 billion worth of military equipment in November, Defense Ministry says.
The Russian military also lost 2,030 soldiers in one day, which is the highest rate of Russian losses in a day since Feb. 24, 2022.https://t.co/AsucznmPMQ
— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) December 1, 2024