Tag Archives: Randy Boissonnault

Roundup: Promising populist GST cuts

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In a speech to the Canadian Club in Toronto, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh laid out a pre-election campaign pledge of removing the GST on certain “essential” items like ready-made food, diapers, home heating, and mobile phone and internet bills—all of which he would finance through an “excess profit tax” on large corporations. It is possibly the dumbest economic policy possible, but our politics are moving into an absolutely brainless phase of populism.

Removing the GST on these items will have a negligible impact, particularly for those in low-income brackets. If anything, most of those reductions will benefit higher-income households, such as the GST cut on home heating (because wealthier households have bigger houses that take more fuel), and it when it comes to apartment buildings, the cut has little impact, or for places with electric heat, how exactly do you disentangle how much of the hydro bill is heat versus other electricity usage? I know that the NDP have been pushing this policy for years now, long before Singh was leader, but has anyone thought about it for more than five seconds?

In addition, making more exceptions to the GST are hard to administer, and it will reduce the GST rebates that lower-income households rely on. And promising the “excess profits” tax is basically an arbitrary exercise in determining what they consider “excess,” and that will basically be how much they think they can soak out of these companies, who will inevitably engage in creative accounting to suddenly lower profit margins or incur paper losses to avoid paying said tax, and all of the things the NDP had hoped to spend that windfall on will blow away like ashes in the wind. This isn’t progressive policy, but the NDP are going to pursue it anyway because they think that they can get the populist win here, when it’s almost certainly going to fail.

Ukraine Dispatch

A combined Russian strike hit a residential building and energy installations in Odesa, killing one on Thursday evening. As well, the Russian assault on Kupiansk in the northeast broke through the outskirts of the city, but were eventually repelled.

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Roundup: “Identity politics” on both sides

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As the facile analysis of the Trump victory continues across the political talk shows, there was one particular exchange on Power & Politics last night that I felt deserves a bit more attention, because I think it’s important to call bullshit on, which is the discourse around “identity politics.” There has been a lot written about, particularly over the past two days, about how the left has been too scoldy about said “identity politics” and pronouns, and it caused the public to turn against it, which is both ridiculous given the broad-based rage-and-resentment campaign underway, but it also excuses the very identity politics that the Trump campaign (and the current far-right) play into themselves, particularly with race.

Nevertheless, after this diatribe about identity politics, columnist Emilie Nicolas, who was on that panel, objected and pointed in particular to what is happening right now with young men, who are being raised on a diet of Andrew Tate podcasts and their similar ilk, along with some allusions to the gamer-to-fascism pipeline, who are being taught an absolute load of horseshit about alpha men, male dominance, and rank misogyny. And Nicolas pointed out that this is identity politics, and to insist that it’s only coming from the “left” makes this particular kind of identity politics invisible when that’s exactly what it is.

Trying to dismiss anti-racism, anti-misogyny and anti-homophobia/transphobia as “identity politics” that the general population doesn’t care about (as though the general population consists entirely of white men), while racism, misogyny, and white supremacy are given a free pass and not being called “identity politics” when in fact that is at the core of what they are, is actually kind of damning to those who think the “left” needs to cool it. I do get that the whole “scolding” aspect is something that does need to be re-thought as a tactic, but to pretend that “identity politics” is the domain of the left alone is both wrong, and intellectually dishonest in the extreme.

Ukraine Dispatch

A Russian guided bomb attack hit Zaporizhzhia, killing four, wounding at least 33, destroyed houses and damaged an oncology centre. Energy facilities in the northern Zhytomyr region also suffered damage in a drone attack. President Zelenskyy told a European summit that “peace through strength” is what is needed (which is in part what he is hoping to flatter Trump with), and also said that North Korean forces have suffered casualties when fighting Ukrainian forces in Kursk.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1854554730325787106

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QP: Concern trolling about climate targets

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Thursday, and neither the PM nor his deputy were in town to attend QP, and all of the other leaders decided to be absent as well. That left Andrew Scheer to lead off, giving a misleading condemnation of the emissions cap, claiming this was driving jobs and investment to the US, and wondered if the PM was getting a commission from the US energy department for all the jobs he was creating. Steven Guilbeault started that it was a cap on pollution, and that oil production was projected to keep increasing another 16 percent by 2030, and companies in the sector were making billion-dollar investments to ensure that the sector has a future while they fight climate change. Scheer insisted that this was a cap on production, and then used the Environment Commissioner’s report to concern troll about the slow progress on emissions reductions, before demanding an election, claiming the current path was “insanity.” Guilbeault noted that it was extraordinary that the Conservatives were talking about climate change, and repeated that emissions were going down after they had to pick up the slack after a decade of inaction. Scheer then cited a Salvation Army report about food insecurity and blamed the carbon levy before demanding an election, to which Soraya Martinez Ferrada responded in French that the Conservatives have an inferiority complex, noted that Canada had lower inflation than other countries and the Conservatives were jealous. Luc Berthold took over in French, repeated the concern trolling about emissions reductions, and Guilbeault repeated that it was extraordinary that the Conservatives were talking about climate change and that they have no plan. Berthold repeated the claims that the Liberals have done nothing for climate, and Guilbeault reiterated that the Conservatives would just let the planet burn because they have no plan for climate or the economy. 

Alain Therrien led for the Bloc, and railed about the amendment to the Supply Management bill in the Senate, claiming those senators were doing Trump’s bidding (seriously?!) and demanded the government call on senators to vote down the amendment. Karina Gould said that they were disappointed by the move and called on senators to vote it down. Therrien railed further about the amendment, and Marie-Claude Bibeau reiterated their support for Supply Management and encouraged senators to vote down the amendment. 

Alexandre Boulerice rose for the NDP, and he too railed about the Environment Commissioner’s report, and that the Liberals weren’t doing their jobs. Guilbeault suggested he actually read the report and insisted it showed progress because emissions were going down while the economy was growing. Lisa Marie Barron repeated the condemnation in English, and Guilbeault noted previous NDP support for carbon pricing and thanks to Conservative pressure, they are no longer progressive or environmentalists. 

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Roundup: Inappropriate behaviour but no traitors

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Of the testimony at the Foreign Interference committee yesterday was the prime minister’s current National Security and Intelligence Advisor, who spoke about the allegations surrounding MPs in the NSICOP report. She stated that, having seen that intelligence and its updates since the report, she’s seen no indication of “traitors” in our Parliament. What she saw in the intelligence was inappropriate conduct and a lack of judgment in certain individuals, but no espionage, sabotage, or putting of Canadian security at risk.

This brings us back to the next steps in terms of any bad behaviour by MPs or lack of judgment, and what should be done about it, and once again, the answer is and always has been that the party leaders need to get involved. That means security clearances, and full briefings on the materials, so that they know what has been alleged, and that they can take corrective action in some fashion. (And before you say anything, yes Poilievre has a clearance as a former minister, but he has refused to be briefed under the specious reason that if he gets briefed, he’ll be “gagged,” which is nonsense and he knows it).

But as Philippe Lagassé points out, the chair of NSICOP also should have done more to be transparent than simply say what was in the report is enough, and leave it at that. Most people didn’t and won’t read the report, and media outlets taking those two or three sentences without context elsewhere in the document didn’t help either. Elizabeth May demonstrated that he could have gone further and said more without breaching any kind of confidentiality, but he chose not to for his own reasons, and so we’ve had months of suspicion for little reason.

Ukraine Dispatch

A Russian missile hit the port in Odesa, killing six, injuring eight, and damaging a Panamanian-flagged container ship. A further drone attack in the same region hit an apartment building, injuring another five. A Ukrainian drone strike has hit another Russian arms depot, which includes arms provided by North Korea.

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Roundup: Straying far out of their lane

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After their big song and dance about wanting the federal government to stay in their own lane, the premiers decided to start weighing in on defence spending—an explicitly federal jurisdiction—yesterday, trying to insist that Canada should meet its NATO spending target sooner than the outlined plan. I’m really not sure how this is exactly the premiers staying in their own lane if they expect the prime minister to stay in his, but they certainly made no shortage of ridiculous excuses for their demands, such as this being about trade with the Americans and so on, but come on. Justin Trudeau did write a letter in response to Tim Houston and Doug Ford, saying the federal government is only trying to help the provinces improve the lives of Canadians, and that maybe they should sign on rather than be obstructionist.

Also from the meeting, Manitoba and Newfoundland and Labrador expressed an interest in resettling some the asylum seekers who landed in Quebec, but that hasn’t stopped Doug Ford from demanding more money for resettlement, nor has it stopped David Eby and Danielle Smith from demanding money for “newcomers,” when the specific issue is just what obligation the federal government has for asylum seekers before their refugee claim is approved, at which point they genuinely become a federal responsibility. This isn’t about helping to settle economic migrants or other mainstream immigrants, which aren’t the federal government’s sole responsibility, but they want to pretend that it is because they want to whinge for more money when what they’re trying to conflate has nothing to do with the actual obligations of the federal government. Again, it’s not really that tough to understand, but these premiers are going to be obtuse and engage in sophistry along the way.

Meanwhile, because several of the premiers are talking equalisation again, I cannot stress enough how badly the CBC described the programme in their article today. Provinces do not write cheques for equalisation. Not province transfers money to another province. It is paid for out of the federal treasury from the income taxes collected from all Canadians, and distributed to those provinces who fall below the threshold of fiscal capacity to have equal programming. Even more to the point, while not raised in the CBC piece, fiscal capacity has nothing to do with whether or not a province is running a deficit, because that would be absolutely absurd and no province would run a surplus if they thought they could get equalisation dollars if they didn’t. Regardless, this was extremely sloppy journalism from the CBC and reads to me like the reporter just relayed how one of the premiers described how the programme works rather than actually looking it up or asking someone who has a clue (and that’s not any of the premiers). Hermes wept…

Ukraine Dispatch

Russia and Ukraine exchanged 95 prisoners of war each yesterday.

https://twitter.com/zelenskyyua/status/1813524697964823028

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Roundup: It’s not logistically impossible

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For the past week-and-a-half, it has been nothing but handwringing over the Toronto—St. Paul’s by-election results, and the demands that Justin Trudeau either step aside, or to at least meet with his caucus. I took a full week for Trudeau to finally take questions from the media and said that he’s “committed” to staying on the job. And in response to the demands for an in-person caucus meeting now and not in September, Trudeau said he’s having one-on-one conversations with members of the caucus, and some of them are saying he needs to change “key players.”

And then comes along Liberal caucus chair Brenda Shanahan, who insists that it’s “logistically impossible” to have an in-person caucus meeting before September, to which I call bullshit. MPs can all get on a plane to Ottawa at any point, even if it means they have to cancel a barbeque appearance at some point. It’s not impossible, it’s a choice, and that choice is to not respect the members of the caucus, because frankly the leader doesn’t feel the need to be afraid of caucus because we have trained MPs to believe the falsehood that they are powerless and that the leader can push them around. That’s not actually true, and the caucus collectively has the power to vote non-confidence in the leader if they actually had the intestinal fortitude to do so. But therein lies the problem.

I’m also going to point out that all of the breathless reporting on Thursday about Chrystia Freeland saying that the Cabinet is fully behind Trudeau—of course they’re fully behind him. If they weren’t, they’d be out of a job. This isn’t rocket science, guys.

In case you missed them:

  • My weekend column where I talked to the author of the book Theatre of Lies about the situation we find ourselves in Canadian politics and what to do about it.
  • My column points out that one of the problems the Liberals face is how they choose their leaders, and that a proper Westminster system would have solved this by now.
  • My Loonie Politics Quick Take wonders just what Danielle Smith thinks she wants to “opt out” of around dental care.

Ukraine Dispatch

Ukrainian forces shot down 21 out of 22 Russian drones overnight Thursday. Ukrainian troops were forced to retreat from one neighbourhood in Chasiv Yar after their defensive positions were destroyed, risking further casualties. A Russian missile strike in Odesa killed a woman, while a guided bomb in Kharkiv region killed a man. Russians have started targeting Ukrainian air bases in advance of the delivery of F-16 fighter jets. Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán went to Kyiv for a frosty meeting as Hungary assumes the rotating presidency of the EU. Orbán then headed to Moscow, no doubt to get fresh orders from Putin.

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Roundup: Terrible capital gains narratives

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The communications around the capital gains changes have been atrocious. Chrystia Freeland is painting an apocalyptic picture of what will happen to Canadian society if we don’t make these changes, and the talk about fairness, where workers pay more taxes than those who can earn it on investment income is missing the key component of the discussion which is around the unequal treatment of different types of income that allows people to engage in tax arbitrage—picking and choosing which revenue models will net them the least taxation, which is a real problem for fairness that is not being discussed at all.

https://twitter.com/LindsayTedds/status/1801021913738698941

https://twitter.com/LindsayTedds/status/1801022109172256818

In amidst this comes Calgary economist Jack Mintz, whose sole entire schtick is to cut taxes to solve every problem under the sun. And of course, Pierre Poilievre was quoting him in Question Period, calling him the greatest economy in the country, which is pretty risible. It didn’t help that Poilievre made the basic mistake of believing that the tax rate is going up rather than the inclusion rate (the point at which it kicks in on the profit you’ve made), but he has doomsday scenarios to unleash into the world to make his case that this is a Very Bad Thing, when it’s nothing at all like he seemed to believe.

https://twitter.com/LindsayTedds/status/1801086926696415384

https://twitter.com/LindsayTedds/status/1801088499522937017

https://twitter.com/LindsayTedds/status/1801096926227497107

Everyone has handled this whole situation poorly, media included, and this has been al lost opportunity to try and have a proper conversation about these kinds of tax measures and changes.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russian missile attacks have left much of Kyiv without power and water. Russian missiles also struck an administrative building and an apartment block in Kryvyi Rih in the south, and killed nine and injured 29. The American government says they are aware of credible reports that abducted Ukrainian children are being put up on adoption websites.

https://twitter.com/zelenskyyua/status/1800901662820704467

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QP: Scoring more points on opioid victims

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The prime minister was in town today but not in QP, though his deputy was. Most of the other leaders were also away, leaving Andrew Scheer to lead off, where he asked for the date at which the prime minister would like make it illegal to smoke crack in a hospital room. Chrystia Freeland said that BC approached the federal government with a pilot project, the government shares their concerns, and they are working then to adapt the programme, but MPs shouldn’t score political points off of this tragedy. Scheer tried a second time, and Freeland gave a paean to working together to solve these problems, and that relayed that she spoke to premier Eby about their cooperation in working on this, while opioid addiction is a tragedy. Scheer then cherry-picked data on BC’s opioid fatalities, and ignored the increasing rates in Alberta and BC. Freeland again said that she has been in touch with the premier on the issue and they are working collaboratively, and not fundraising off of the pain and death of desperate people. Luc Berthold took over in French, and worried about crack use “exploding” in Montreal, and demanded a preemptive no to any similar projects in Montreal. Freeland slowly annunciated that abC has a pilot project and now has concerns that they will be working together to address, and that these tragedies require putting partisanship aside. Bethold tried to implicate the Bloc in any decriminalisation in Quebec, and Freeland repeated this is a tragedy, and said that what is really extremist and radical are white supremacist policies, and wanted Conservatives to denounce them.

Luc Therrien led for the Bloc, and raised a newspaper story about a “rapprochement” between CBC and Radio-Canada and demanded they never be merged. Freeland insisted that they will always support the French broadcaster. Therrien demanded that each half be made fully independent—which would never work because Radio-Canada requires CBC’s infrastructure. Freeland repeated that they will always support French in Canada.

Alexandre Boulerice rose for the NDP, and started shouting about the government’s environmental record, to which Freeland insisted that this government has done more for the environment than any previous government in Canadian history, but they are doing more. Don Davies took credit for the capital gains changes, and wondered why the Liberals are maintaining Conservatives’ “corporate giveaways.” Freeland noted it was great that the NDP supports tax fairness, and that nurses and carpenters should pay the same taxes as CEOs, and noted Conservative silence on this fairness.

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Roundup: The aftermath of coordinated social media posts

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It took only minutes from Pierre Poilievre’s ouster from the House of Commons during Question Period yesterday for the first boo-hoo fundraising email to be sent out to party donors, falsely claiming the reason why he was ejected as being “censorship” (it was because he did not respect the authority of the Speaker and refused to withdraw a remark when given four opportunities to do so), but it’s not like the truth has ever stopped Poilievre in the past. A few more minutes later, every Conservative MP started putting out tweets also giving a false version of what happened, and they used the word “whacko” over and over again, like toddlers, because of course they did.

The Liberals were quick to take to the microphone in the Foyer after QP, several in a row, denouncing Poilievre and his actions, and Marc Miller in particular used his talent for blunt speaking in disputing this narrative that Poilievre has somehow been “silenced,” and they quickly circulated the clip of him saying so as well—because everything is about the socials, and we all know it.

Meanwhile, you had journalists and every flavour of internet troll insisting that the word “whacko” had been used in the Chamber before, but the difference is that it hadn’t been directed to someone in the past, and that’s what makes it unparliamentary (and anyone who doesn’t get the difference doesn’t deserve to be on social media). It also looks like this was indeed the first time a leader of the opposition was named and expelled federally, but it has happened in provinces in the past, for what it’s worth.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russian guided bombs targeted railway infrastructure in Kharkiv, killing at least one person. The death toll from the attack on the educational institution in Odesa also continued to climb.

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Roundup: Overselling “soft populism”

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It was quite the weekend for uncritical media for Pierre Poilievre, after he had a bad couple of weeks of being called out for a series of egregious lies that could no longer be spun or both-sidesed. Nevertheless, the National Post was there to gush about his so-called “soft populism” that was full of comments of people insisting he was really within the mainstream and which studiously ignored his attempting to normalize far-right actors in order to capture the PPC vote, or his shifting the Overton-window to make their particular pronouncements acceptable discourse when they remain radical. Nobody wants to talk about his attempts to take MAGA Republican populism and just use the “good parts only” in the hopes that he can ignore the bad stuff that comes with it, but that’s not how real life works, and these are things we should be discussing.

Meanwhile, Poilievre released a fifteen minute “documentary” on housing over the weekend that the usual pundit suspects gushed over, not because it contained anything true, because it didn’t—it’s the exact same pseudo-intellectual “economics” that he got from crypto-bros on YouTube, but it’s done with higher production values and data-visualization crimes, conspiracy claims, internally inconsistent arguments, and the inability to distinguish between correlation and causation, but hey—it looked slick, so that’s what everyone is going to glom onto. And while I get that it’s the weekend, the Post wrote-up a recap with absolutely no critical pushback to any of its claims, while the CBC couched it in poll numbers and some government talking points, again, with no actual pushback to any of Poilievre’s misleading claims.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russians have been shelling Kherson, and killed at least two people over the weekend. Russian advances appear to be easing off on Avdiivka, while their claims of having captured Maryinka remain unsubstantiated. Former president Petro Poroshenko was denied permission to leave the country (because of martial law) when it was found out that he was planning to meet with Hungarian prime minister and Putin apologist Viktor Orbán. Ukrainian officials are investigating claims that Russians shot surrendering soldiers, which is a war crime.

https://twitter.com/kyivindependent/status/1731338721583079724

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