Roundup: Budget madness!

So, that was the budget – or Economic Action Plan 2013™ – A Responsible Plan For Jobs, Growth and Long-Term Prosperity© as the government would otherwise brand it. And there’s not a whole lot to it, with little in the way of new spending, little in the way of tax cuts or measures, extending a few of their existing incentive programmes, and one particular measure for First Nations, tying training dollars to making it mandatory for those receiving income benefits (which Thomas Mulcair dubbed as “workfare” and a slap in the face). It’s also going to fold CIDA into Foreign Affairs as a whole, but it’ll still keep its own minister, so Julian Fantino’s job is still safe. (Scott Gilmore considers this a good move because it will enhance the coordination of our foreign aid, which is often met with the two departments not speaking to one another). Canada Day, Winterlude and the Tulip Festival are being wrested away from the more independent NCC and being handed over to the Department of Heritage, which could be worrying if you hear the horror stories that I do about the competence of the staff in that department. Justin Trudeau predicts the budget will create friction with the provinces after it declared it would create the skills training program and that the provinces have to pitch in – while the government has consistently removed itself from a productive relationship with said provinces. And as if on cue, Quebec calls the budget a “frontal attack” on its economic interests, and “economic sabotage.” iPolitics gives you the nine most inane pieces of wisdom out of the budget. And if that wasn’t enough budget madness for you, iPolitics also has an e-print edition of budget coverage.

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Roundup: A Métis victory

The Métis of Manitoba won a Supreme Court ruling yesterday that states that the government didn’t fully implement the 1870 promise that led to the creation of Manitoba in the first place. And while there was no remedy attached – so no, Winnipeg, you don’t have to worry about being displaced – it will be interesting to see how this moves forward now that there is this recognition.

Jim Flaherty met with private sector economists yesterday and declared that he was confident in the budget – whenever it may be tabled – thanks to good job numbers.

Jason Kenney says that the lower-than-promised refugee resettlement numbers are due in large part to the civil war in Syria. After promising to resettle a large number of Iraqi refugees who had fled to Syria, well, we can’t process them effectively with a civil war in that country having wreaked havoc with diplomatic missions and resettlement logistics.

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The fight for second place: The Halifax debate

The fourth and second last Liberal leadership debate took place at the Pier 21 Museum in Halifax. The big difference this time is that we had one candidate self-eliminate, being of course hot republican mess George Takach, who dropped out last week to support Justin Trudeau. That said, the bottom three were still the bottom three and should all have been eliminated by now if we were conducting this leadership race by the RuPaul’s Drag Race model that I’ve been advocating, and the middle tier would be in the make-or-break points in their bids for leadership. But alas, that is not the case.

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Roundup: Awaiting the Whatcott decision

It’s going to be an interesting day as the Supreme Court rules on the Whatcott trial, which will be a major ruling around hate speech laws in this country.

The police records for Senator Patrick Brazeau’s arrest warrant have been released, and all of the details are here – grabbing, punching, spitting, stair-pushing, and so on.

In other Senate news, the CBC polled Senators as to their residence, and of the 104 Senators, 17 refused to respond as to where they lived – 16 of those Conservatives (the sole Liberal being Mac Harb, who is currently under investigation). They have an interactive  chart of their responses. Meanwhile, Senator Patterson, who is also having his residency questioned, made the mistake of running away from reporters yesterday, but when they caught up to him said that he is a resident of Nunavut (he is the former premier of the NWT when they were a single territory), and that he’s cooperating fully with the audit. It has also been noticed that Harper was less strident in his defence of Senator Wallin and her repayment of undisclosed expenses yesterday. Oh, and while Charlie Angus may rail on about how the awful Senate is keeping everyone in the dark, it may be worthwhile to remember that there a) hasn’t been time to complete any of the audits, and b) that MPs’ expenses are just as opaque if not more so than those of Senators, so if he wants transparency then he can open up his own books while he’s at it.

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Magic Bean Economics and tragicomedy: The Mississauga debate

The third Liberal leadership debate was held today in Mississauga, and while the format was somewhat more successful than the previous debacle, it really did reinforce the candidate ranking that has emerged over the course of the debates. The one-on-one questions could have been better served if each exchange were another minute longer, and the moderate stepped in when they tried to talk about themselves in the form of a question. Because really, take the format seriously. The three-person debates worked quite well, and got the best traction of the debates to date.

Remaining in the bottom four were David Bertschi, George Takach, Martin Cauchon and Karen McCrimmon. If this contest were like RuPaul’s Drag Race, as it should be, then Bertschi and at least one other would have been eliminated by this point, but alas, they are still hanging around. And once again, they reminded us why they are in the bottom four.

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Domesticity politics: the Winnipeg non-debate

“I’m sorry my dears, but you are up for elimination.” Ten words that should have been spoken, but one again, were not as the second Liberal leadership – well, “forum” – happened in Winnipeg. It was not a debate, but a series of one-on-one interviews with failed candidate Harvey Locke, whose uninteresting and frankly dull interview style did nothing to advance the plot of the leadership race. Someone pointed out that leaders do more one-on-one interviews than they do debates, so from that viewpoint it made a certain amount of sense – but one would think you’d need a competent interviewer and some actual questions of substance.

There isn’t a whole lot to be said about each of their answers, other than the fact that several of them had a tendency to ramble aimlessly around the topic without offering a substantive answer, and it didn’t help that the interviewer didn’t call them on it or try and keep it engaging.

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Roundup: Like clockwork, here comes the decorum distraction

Like clockwork, Nathan Cullen unveiled yet another new idea for improving decorum in the Commons – giving the Speaker the powers to suspend misbehaving MPs and dock their pay. You know, something that’s unlikely to get signoff from everyone, while he ignores the name-calling that his own caucus engages in, or the fact that the Speaker has plenty of powers already but doesn’t wield them because it becomes a very slippery slope to determine what constitutes “misrepresentation of facts.” And, like MP Michelle Rempel tweeted in response, “Here’s a thought – we’re all adults, maybe we could take personal ownership for how we conduct ourselves in the House.” Because that might be too novel of an idea in an era where we infantilise MPs to the extent that they can’t even speak for themselves without being handed a script. (Aaron Wherry wonders about the question of incivility based on yesterday’s QP here).

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A few too many: the Vancouver Liberal leadership debate

Sunday was the first of five Liberal leadership debates, and it certainly showcased a few things – mostly the seriousness with which we should be paying attention to some of the also-rans, and how the field needs to be whittled down. Because it does. The nine candidates were about four too many in this round, and it should be whittled down even more as they proceed. I almost have this vision of the remaining debates being run like RuPaul’s Drag Race, where every week, the bottom two candidates must debate for their lives, at which point RuPaul will declare to one queen candidate “chanté, you stay,” and the other to “sashay away,” until we are down to the top three.

But a boy can dream.

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Roundup: 50 officials, few answers

For his one-hour appearance at Finance Committee last night, Jim Flaherty brought along fifty – yes, fifty – department officials to help him answer questions on Omnibus Budget Bill 2: The Revenge. Because they were so concerned about the cost of answering Order Paper questions that this exercise was perfectly justified. What made it worse is that the sole hour seemed to be eaten up with either fulsome praise for Flaherty from the government side, and attempts to get him to talk about a future stimulus programme if the US goes off the “fiscal cliff” from the NDP. Nice to see that everyone is taking this seriously.

Here is everything you need to know about Harper’s trip to India, and why our trade deals are stalling.

Despite the strange firing of that local reporter in his riding, Conservative MP James Bezan stands behind his criticism of the CNOOC-Nexen deal. Good to know.

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