Tag Archives: Erin O’Toole

Roundup: Erin O’Toole’s revisionist history

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It was MP Day at the Foreign Interference Inquiry, and the big star of the day was former Conservative leader and serial liar Erin O’Toole, who has come to believe that as many as nine seats may have been lost as a result of foreign interference, mostly from China. That’s…an interesting number, considering that the party’s internal polling had long since concluded that their position on vaccine mandates was what cost them the election (though O’Toole being caught out in as many lies as he had been really didn’t help him any, one of the most egregious examples being on gun control).

Not only that, but O’Toole went on to claim that the member of the party’s national council who initiated the petition calling for a leadership review, who is Taiwanese, may have had motives based in foreign interference, which is also ridiculous. It also bears remembering that around the same time, O’Toole began in imperious streak of subverting the (garbage) Reform Act rules the party signed onto in order to punish those in caucus who were standing against him, resulting in him pushing out Senator Denise Batters, and this kept escalating until caucus called for a vote, again according to the (garbage) Reform Act, and at that point, he was done for. (This is all without anything related to the calls for his ouster from the collection of grifters, conspiracy theorists, and grievance tourists who were occupying downtown Ottawa at the same time). Trying to invent foreign interference motives for his demise is not just cry baby behaviour, it’s outright historical revisionism and fabulism to soothe his wounded ego, but I guess if you have no problem lying to everyone all the time, you’re probably pretty used to lying to yourself as well. Meanwhile the pundit class praises him for showing restraint in not using Trumpian “Big Lie” language. Unbelievable.

Meanwhile, as Kenny Chiu, Jenny Kwan and Michael Chong also testified, we have learned that the RMCP investigation into allegations of attempted Chinese intimidation of Chong has hit a dead end.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russian missiles struck Dnipro on Tuesday, damaging an educational facility. There was also a drone attack against Kharkiv early Thursday that stuck apartment buildings and homes, killing at least four. In all, Russia launched 3000 aerial bombs, 600 missiles and 400 drones against Ukraine in March. Here is a look at the security arrangements that over 30 countries have now signed with Ukraine.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1775410021712494814

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Roundup: A game of chicken over a public inquiry

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A game of chicken is shaping up around the demands for a public inquiry into allegations of foreign interference, that started with Dominic LeBlanc throwing it into the opposition’s lap to come up with a name they could agree to that could head it, along with terms of reference, knowing full well that it is going to be incredibly difficult to do, particularly because they all have competing goals, and some their demands are literally impossible, such as having an incredibly wide-ranging inquiry that could somehow complete its work in but a few months. Not going to happen.

Pierre Poilievre has decided to try and turn the tables and says that he wants the government to commit to said inquiry before he starts sharing names, which risks letting the government sit back and say that they already stated their terms. Committing to a public inquiry is one thing, but drawing up the Order in Council for it is quite another, and that requires having the commissioner(s) and terms of reference already decided.

This being said, the deadline of having this declared before Friday is wholly artificial. The government doesn’t need to table this in the House, and they can draw up the Order in Council at any time. If the aim is for the House of Commons to vote on the proposal, that’s a bad idea because then it launders the accountability for what happens, and lets the government off the hook if things go sideways, and MPs should know this because it’s fundamental to their very jobs, but they have become completely blinkered in this. At this point, I’m not expecting an announcement before Friday, and for this to drag on for several more weeks because there won’t be any agreement on names or the scope of the inquiry. That said, I do fully expect that we’ll have a summer full of “emergency” committee meetings on this and other topics, so I doubt the story will go away—just the daily demands in Question Period.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russians fired another 35 Iranian-made drones into Ukraine, with some 32 being shot down, but a “critically important facility” in Lviv was struck, with no further clues as to what it was. There are also competing narratives at play—president Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that they are destroying Russian forces in both the east and south, while the Russians claim that they are repelling the offences. Here is a look at some of the Canadian soldiers training Ukrainian troops at Camp Sapper in Poland.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1671118296374976513

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Roundup: Four very different by-elections today

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It is by-election day in four ridings, and each of them is going to play out slightly differently. The Liberals are pretty much guaranteed to hold in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount in Montreal, where Trudeau’s friend Anna Gainey is running, but Green deputy/co-leader Jonathan Pednault is also running. There has been a particular dynamic at play there as well around the recently-passed official languages bill, where Anglos in Quebec are particularly concerned about their rights being under attack. They are also likely to hold in Winnipeg South Centre, where the late Jim Carr’s son is running to replace him.

Potentially up for grabs in Oxford in Ontario, where the former Conservative MP has thrown his support behind the Liberal challenger because of the way in which Pierre Poilievre and Andrew Scheer put their thumbs on the scale in the nomination race because they wanted to get one of their insiders a seat, even though he’s from Brampton. That has the possibility of working against them because sometimes these safe rural ridings will still reject a parachute candidate (as evidence by when John Tory tried to run in a safe rural seat in a by-election when he was Ontario PC leader and had his ass handed to him by the local Liberal who was a local). Sometimes rural ridings can be a bit Royston Vasey. And then there’s Portage—Lisgar, where Maxime Bernier is running against the Conservatives, and they are trying to crush him once and for all to prove they can again “unite” the right, and they’re doing that by invoking WEF conspiracy theories, and pandering to convoy supporters, homophobia and transphobia, and anti-abortion sentiment, because that’s exactly what’s going to unite the right.

And there is still one more to come, as Trudeau declared the Calgary Heritage by-election will be held on July 24th. This one had been delayed because of the Alberta election, given that it would be confusion for voters in the riding, and the fact you’re drawing from the same volunteer pool.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Amidst fierce fighting, the Ukrainians have re-taken the settlement of Piatykhatky in the Zaporishshia province. Ukrainians also say that they have destroyed a Russian ammunition depot in Kherson. The UK military assessment of the counter-offensive is that both sides are taking heavy casualties, but the Russian losses are probably at their highest since the peak of their attempt to take Bakhmut. One of the side-effects of the destruction of the Kakhovka dam in Ukraine is that it has uncovered some ancient Cossack archaeological sites that the Soviets didn’t care about flooding when they built the dam, but they will likely be flooded again once the dam is rebuilt.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1670338729007874049?s=61&t=2SHRFoo_xxddaDpzippI_w

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Roundup: Hybrid sittings are now permanent, and Parliament will suffer

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I knew that this was now inevitable, but that doesn’t mean it’s still not infuriating. After invoking closure and ramming it through with little debate, the government has forced through the changes to the Standing Orders that will make hybrid sittings permanent. The government has ignored all criticisms about this move, and blinkered itself to the supposed benefits to this system that are largely a false economy, because it “feels progressive.” They tried to force this before the pandemic, and they certainly didn’t let a good crisis go to waste.

The biggest losers out of this are the interpretation staff. Working by Zoom is an absolute killer for them, both from acoustic injuries because MPs can’t be arsed to use their headsets properly most of the time, or simply ignore those rules when it suits them (as the Conservatives did when they pretended to have issues with their voting apps), and because the cognitive load from interpreting this way burns them out. The Speaker, meanwhile, can’t be bothered to enforce rules or guidelines, and merely gently chides MPs that they should be nice to the interpreters, but with no consequences, these behaviours continue undaunted. We’re now accelerating toward a crisis of bilingualism in Parliament because they can’t just hire more interpreters. They’re not graduating enough at a rate to overcome attrition even before the injuries, and fewer of them are going to stick around in order to expose themselves to injury and the possibility of permanent hearing loss. It’s morally repugnant and unconscionable that MPs behave this way, treating the interpreters like furniture, but they’re still in the fuck around stage. They’re going to find out really soon, and Parliament is going to be in a genuine crisis, because the Liberals and NDP in particular are too self-centred to look at the harm they’re causing.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russian authorities say they’re staging elections in occupied territories as a sign that they’re in control, as the Ukrainian counter-offensive makes progress but faces “tough resistance,” according to president Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Ukrainian officials also say they are still advancing on Bakhmut around the north and northwest.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1669255405610909698

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Roundup: O’Toole’s farewell hypocrisy

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Former Conservative leader Erin O’Toole gave his farewell speech to the House of Commons yesterday, and it’s been a while since I’ve heard something as grossly hypocritical as that. Using his sombre voice (which has the benefit of completely beguiling the pundit class), he decried “performance politics,” where they chase social media algorithms, using the Chamber to generate clips, and fuelling polarisation, and replacing discussion with “virtue signalling”—which is his way of whataboutery to insist that the Liberals and NDP are just as bad. He also decried the use of conspiracy theories around things like the United Nations.

The problem? He hired a professional shitposter, Jeff Ballingall, to chase those very social media algorithms he is decrying. He fully used the Chamber to generate clips, he fully endorsed a number of conspiracy theories, whether it was about the firing of the scientists at the Winnipeg Lab, or around the United Nations when he was pretending to be a “true blue conservative” during the leadership. And while this has been seen by some as a rebuke of Poilievre, there was absolutely no contrition about any of what he did, from the serial lying, to his autocratic power games at the end of his leadership. The most he said was “too many members on all sides of this Chamber, and from time to time I have been guilty of it myself, are becoming followers of our followers when we should be leaders.” That was it. That was his contrition to how much he has done all of the things he is decrying as he exits, the bravery of someone who no longer has to live with the consequences of his actions.

https://twitter.com/dwjudson/status/1668484357089099777

It amazes me that the pundit classes, who have been falling all over O’Toole’s speech, keep memory-holing the entire tenure of his leadership and what an absolute lying, tyrannical disaster that he was throughout. Ignoring who he proved himself to be in favour of the image that pundits so desperately want him to be is a choice. And as he heads off to spend more time in his basement podcast studio, it would be great if we could be clear-eyed about just who O’Toole is, instead of just falling for his sombre-voice trick.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Ukraine says it has liberated seven villages in Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia provinces, as the counter-offensive gets underway. Russians, meanwhile, have been shelling Kharkiv, as well as nine towns and villages in Donetsk. They also launched an overnight attack against the central city of Kryvyi Rih, and there are reports of dead and wounded.

https://twitter.com/defenceu/status/1668246754540630017

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Roundup: O’Toole claims privilege over foreign interference

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Yesterday in the House of Commons, Erin O’Toole rose on a point of privilege to say that his briefing from CSIS warned of “active” campaigns against him from China in four categories—that they are funding operatives to build propaganda campaigns against him, funding networks to amplify it, using WeChat for that purpose, and run voter suppression against his party and one MP in particular. His claim is that the government’s inability or unwillingness to act on the intelligence of foreign interference impacts his privileges as an MP.

I’m dubious that this constitutes an actual breach of privilege, because frankly, if disinformation campaigns, social media amplification and voter suppression are happening, well, his own party is just as guilty as the Chinese regime of doing exactly the same thing. I also fail to see what the House of Commons can do about addressing this supposed breach of privilege other than vote on sending a strongly-worded rebuke to the regime in Beijing. I also don’t necessarily trust that O’Toole is giving us all of the relevant details because he seemed to be very selective with what he wrote about his meeting with David Johnston on his Substack, and I cannot stress this enough, Erin O’Toole is a serial liar. Unfortunately, because he does it with a solemn tone and not, say, a clown nose and a unicycle, he manages to bamboozle a swath of the pundit class who are convinced that he’s the upstanding guy that they all want him to be rather than who he proved himself to be during his leadership, and that somehow, now that he’s no longer the leader, he’s gone back to being the guy they all want him to be. I don’t get it.

Meanwhile, the NDP used their Supply Day to call on David Johnston to step down so that the government will call a public inquiry. This while Pierre Poilievre is daring Singh to bring down the government, and Singh saying he won’t until trust is restored in elections (which is tactically stupid). The government insists they have confidence in Johnston, but it does raise the point that if everyone but the Liberals vote for this, it becomes politically untenable for the government to maintain the current course of action, even if it’s the right thing to do (because I remain unconvinced that a public inquiry will do absolutely anything more in this situation other than take three years, cost $180 million, and create a media circus with a daily drip of “revelations” that will amount to nothing but will nevertheless fuel said media circus). But this may wind up backing the Liberals into a corner and forcing them to call an inquiry, lest the damage get worse.

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Roundup: Claims O’Toole also was a target

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It is being alleged that Erin O’Toole has been briefed by CSIS that Chinese agents had been targeting him during his time as party leader because of his bellicose language about the regime. While there is no indication his family was also being targeted, his sister did live in Hong Kong for a number of years. Of course, I am taking the language in the article with a few grains of salt because the Johnston report pointed out that threats weren’t actually made to Michael Chong’s family, but that there was an indication that the agent in Canada was trying to gather information, so what exactly this “targeting” of O’Toole consists of I am keeping my powder dry on.

This has, of course, given rise to another round of cries for a public inquiry. Not one of them has articulated just how such an inquiry would make any iota of difference from the current process being undertaken by Johnston (aside from taking three years and costing a few hundred million dollars). How exactly does this situation require additional subpoena powers when the government has willingly turned over all of their documentation? If most of it will need to be behind closed doors because of the nature of the information, how exactly does this build trust? Nobody has yet articulated this, and “it just will” is not an answer—especially when the media and the opposition have been undermining trust in how these matters are being reported and discussed, and I fail to see how a public inquiry will change any of this.

Meanwhile, David Johnston took to the op-ed pages of the Globe and Mail to defend his decision to carry on with the review in light of the criticisms of his involvement, which has been pointed out seems to misunderstand the nature of how the political game is played these days. Of course, Johnston is hoping that he can get MPs and party leaders to be grown-ups and work together on this problem, but that’s unlikely to happen in the current climate and especially with the current players, and in that same token, writing an op-ed in the Globe seems a bit like that same kind of naïve hope that people will treat this as they did a couple of decades ago.

On a related note, the CBC has one of the worst examples of both-sidesing the supposed controversy around Johnston’s alleged conflict of interest—two professors who say it’s probably not a conflict, all things considered, but Democracy Watch (which has no actual credibility other than they are a reliable quote generator for lazy journalists) says it is, so it’s up to Canadians to decide. Seriously? This is exactly the kind of thing that has allowed misinformation and disinformation to flourish, because they refuse to call out bullshit when they see it. This is killing democracy, and they absolutely refuse to engage in any self-reflection about it.

Ukraine Dispatch:

A Russian missile struck a clinic in the city of Dnipro, killing two and wounding 30, after Ukrainian forces shot down ten missiles and twenty drones targeting Dnipro and Kyiv overnight. Meanwhile, the disaffected Russian group has allegedly shelled more targets in Belgorod region in Russia. Ukraine’s defence ministry is warning that Russia plans to simulate a major accident at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in order to thwart the coming counter-offensive.

https://twitter.com/zelenskyyua/status/1662024887731474432?s=61&t=P3QULyv63iAc0o1A98RiWQ

https://twitter.com/defencehq/status/1661975921455161344?s=61&t=P3QULyv63iAc0o1A98RiWQ

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Roundup: The thing about the interim ethics commissioner

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The issue with the appointment of Dominic LeBlanc’s sister-in-law as the interim ethics commissioner has been nearly inexplicable, until you actually look at the position itself. The optics are absolutely bad, and a very real problem because of the whole issue around perceived conflicts of interest. The problem, however, is that they may not have had much choice in the matter given how the role is structured legislatively. While LeBlanc had no role in the decision, the PMO told CBC that the Privy Council Office—meaning the non-partisan civil service—is responsible for the decision, which no member of the government has stated to date, and you think they would have, if they could communicate their way out of a wet paper bag.

The legislated criteria for who can be the ethics commissioner is very restrictive—you need to be either a former judge, the formal head of a quasi-judicial administrative tribunal, or the former Senate Ethics Officer. Unspoken qualification is that you would also have to be bilingual, which limits your field even further, particularly for former judges. And while the salary was commensurate of that of a federally-appointed judge, the posting for the new commissioner cuts that by a third to bring it in line with other officers of parliament, which is going to make it all the more unattractive, particularly to former judges who are going to take one look at it and decide that they don’t need the aggravation for the amount of money they’re being offered.

There’s a reason why Mary Dawson’s term needed to be extended two or three times while they looked for a replacement. There’s a reason why they pretty much had no choice but to go with Mario Dion when he applied, because there was nobody else (and Dion was not the best choice on offer). And when Dion resigned the post suddenly (two years early) for health reasons, they were pretty much screwed because they couldn’t extend him until a replacement could be found. The solution was the most senior person in the office—said sister-in-law of Dominic LeBlanc—who has been there for ten years. And there is already an ethics screen in place regarding LeBlanc, to keep her out of any conflicts. It’s likely that PCO’s determination was that this was the best of a bad situation, but it’s not good. The interim commissioner doesn’t qualify to become the permanent commissioner, so this situation is temporary. But ultimately, this is a failing of the legislation, because MPs were trying to play tough when they brought it in, and wound up shooting themselves in the foot over it. And now there is an untenable situation because they boxed themselves in. Good job, guys. Your posturing has really paid off.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Ukrainian forces report that the Russian advance on the outskirts of Bakhmut has been “halted—or nearly halted.” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy marked the one-year anniversary of the liberation of Bucha, and the discovery of the horrors left in the Russians’ wake, making another call for justice for war crimes.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1641810694852026369

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Roundup: Internet troll and wide-eyed naïf

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The occupation leaders started their turn to testify at the Emergencies Act committee yesterday, and it’s quite an interesting picture that they are painting of themselves. Chris Barber, for example, admits to being a racist internet troll who “saw the light” thanks to all of the love and hugs during the occupation (sure, Jan), but also tried to present himself as this wide-eyed naïf who couldn’t possibly understand the MOU about overthrowing the government, or who believed all the honking was just these truckers being excited. Yeah, so believable. There were, apparently, power struggles between the different groups and organisers, and things started to spiral out of their control. Gosh, you think? And when Barber was presented with an email with an assassination threat targeting Chrystia Freeland, he insisted he had no knowledge of this—because, you know, it was all peace and love. (Credit to Shannon Proudfoot for the troll/naïf descriptor).

Elsewhere, Doug Ford’s lawyers were at Federal Court to argue that the rule of law would be “irreparably harmed” if Ford and Sylvia Jones were forced to testify at the public inquiry or deal with any subsequent contempt proceedings, which…is a bit much. The judge in the case noted that the parliamentary privilege relates to criminal and civil courts, but does not specify public inquiries (because the basis of the privilege stems from a time when the Crown controlled the courts). Said judge also said he expects to have a decision by November 8th, which is two days before Ford and Jones are supposed to testify at the inquiry.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 252:

Russian authorities in occupied territories have ordered the evacuation of civilians in an area near Kherson, which the Ukrainian government considers a forced depopulation, which is a war crime. Russians also fired missiles into an apartment building in the port city of Mykolaiv, and have destroyed about 40 percent of the country’s energy infrastructure as winter approaches.

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Roundup: The allure of citizens assemblies

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Yesterday in the mother parliament in Westminster, a group of Extinction Rebellion activists “super-glued” themselves around the Speaker’s chair in the House of Commons. Their demand—somewhat ironically, to “let the people decide” on climate change. Now, it would be ironic given that they are literally in the chamber where the people do decide, but no, what they are demanding is a citizen’s assembly, which is antithetical to democracy. There is a particular romance around these assemblies, which are composed of selected individuals from a perfect cross-section of society, and they are supposed to work by consensus to come up with some kind of solution, under the guidance of experts. Of course, therein lies the problem with this whole system—the people did not elect this assembly, and there is no way to hold them to account for the decisions that they make. As well, evidence suggests that they are fairly manipulable with the right “experts” guiding them, which is why groups like Extinction Rebellion or Fair Vote Canada are enamoured with them—because they are certain that with the “proper guidance,” these assemblies will come to the “correct” decisions, without the mess or compromises of democracy, or more to the point, going through the trouble of organizing that democracy requires to actually make change. This is no way to make big decisions, and politicians shouldn’t pander to groups whose aims are anti-democratic.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 191:

Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency remain at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, and hope to have a full picture of the situation at the plant by early next week. Here is an explanation as to why this IAEA inspection is so important.

https://twitter.com/CFOperations/status/1565396106577690630

Programming Note: Because it’s a long weekend, posts will resume Wednesday.

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