[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[Valmy]

It's still good to have some conversations. The Americans don't post as much nowadays.

Yeah well, what is there to say?

[Jacob]

I am in no way trying to convince you that you need to like Poilievre.  As you say, respectful disagreement is part of democracy.

Let's do our best to keep it going.

But I am going to channel the Leader of the Opposition here.  What do you think he's going to do that will channel "peace, order and good government"?  What policies?  Be specific.

Because the thing with Trump is you didn't need to use your imagination - he told us what he would do.

It'd help if Poilievre made a point of advocating for specific policies altogether.

Until he does, I'll admit it's mostly guilt by association, guilt by inference... and guilt by lukewarm or absent repudiation.

Is google down?  I'm accessing the internet but Google isn't working for some reason.

Which is me saying I don't remember Musk endorsing Poilievre.  Now Musk is a Canadian citizen and there's nothing wrong with him doing so.  And Musk did endorse the fucking AfD in Germany, so he's certainly not being shy.

But much like above - I hate this kind of attack by association.  Even if I assume Musk endorsed Poilievre - so what?  Judge Poilievre by his own words and actions.  I've stolen this line from Preston Manning before "a bright light attracts a few moths" (and he probably stole it from someone else).

I wouldn't judge Singh, or Trudeau, by what their craziest, stupidest, followers would say.  Even if they're famous.  Something, something, nutpicking, something.

It'd just be nice if Poilievre would say "yeah, so Elon Musk is undermining democracy in the US and has endorsed a Nazi-successor party in Germany. He has also endorsed me, but I want to make it clear that I'm not a fellow traveller with the AfD."

I mean, not in those words because that would probably be a bad move politically - but it'd be really great to hear something to clearly state that Poilievre's Conservatives are on the other side of a line he won't cross.

So this is becoming a theme here.  Guilt by association.  Poilievre -> Harper -> Orban.

For sure; who you associate with matters and Orban's someone I would not want my leaders to associate with. Same with Putin.

That said...

I feel like the IDU has become like the Rothschilds for the left - that it's some kind of shadowy organization controlling things behind the scenes.  When, as far as I can tell, it's just a right-wing social club and gives Harper something to do in retirement.

The IDU has some 60+ members.  Some are, eh, more respectable than others.

But - so what?

Associating and building ties with disreputable people who explicitly is opposed to liberal western democracy and want to undermine our institutions and freedoms matter.

That said, as you pointed out Fidesz is no longer a member of IDU so I'm no longer concerned. But when GOP folks went to Budapest to consult with Orban and his officials, that was a bad sign. If Canadian Conservatives associate with anti-Democrats in Eastern Europe, that's a real concern too.

So at least we're back to stuff Poilievre has actually done.

I do think he's in a tough spot.  Poilievre is not just the leader of the opposition - he has said repeatedly that he has no confidence in the government and it must be defeated right away.  Trudeau took the unusual (but admittedly legal) step of proroguing Parliament for two months.  I could be wrong but I don't think Trudeau has reached out to Poilievre to try and present some kind of "united front" either - there's no national unity government in the offing.

If you don't think Poilievre's actions have been good then that's your call, of course.

Indeed. Poilievre's most recent direction seems to be to push "Stop the Drugs", which IMO plays into Trump's fentanyl BS justification for the tariffs.

Again - we will see.

Trudeau is still deeply unpopular.  The question in the upcoming election is whether the new Liberal leader (probably Carney) will be able to distance himself enough to make the election about something other than the Trudeau/Liberal legacy.  Clearly the Liberals want the election to be about anything other than that.

For sure. Your man Poilievre is still very well placed to win. So it makes sense for him to keep his head down and not rock the boat too much.

I think I saw a thing recently that said Singh wants to trigger an election in March, once the initial response to Trump's shenanigans have been agreed upon.

I think "besieging Parliament" is wildly overblown rhetoric.

(aside - something is up with Google at least on my network.  I'm here using Bing like a God-Damn savage.)

Protestors set up camps on Parliament Hill for about a month (plus other protests around the country).  They weren't exactly polite or following the rules (I remember in particular the non-stop honking), and needed to be cleared out, but it was hardly an armed insurrection.

As I mentioned, a few of the leaders (as much as they had leaders) did talk about having a new government - but they never actually said how that would happen, nor did they do anything about it.

If we can agree that they needed to be cleared out, I'm content. I'd be very pleased if Poilievre agreed with that as well.

Sure, CBC does more than news.  But news is probably it's strongest argument for existence.  It's surely stronger than showing (checks schedule for what's on right now) Crime Scene Kitchen, which is "a culinary guessing game in which bakers are tasked with decoding what type of dessert was made, when all that's left are a few elusive clues."  (nothing against shows like that - just why does it need to be subsidized)

You throw out phrases like "profit driven media owned by capital" just expecting people to accept that's a valid critique - but is it?  Almost all media around the western world can be described that way.  Are you saying that NBC News or ITV or any of the numerous newspapers around the world are suspect because they're privately owned?

and "Mandate to support democracy" - what does that mean?  What should that look like in practice?

In particular, given your concerns about Poilievre, which you say

too high chance that he'll enact policies that pulls us in that direction and make the breakdown of democracy

Does that mean the CBC should then focus its coverage to try to ensure Poilievre's defeat?

No, not at all. But they should definitely be there to pay attention to and report on anything dubious. You know, hold the government (and other powerful sectors of society) to account.

Their function is to be a guard rail, to keep our politics largely democratic and accountable. Their function is not to be a driver of politics. That Poilievre wants to remove that guard rail is a cause for concern.

Conversely, privately owned media either doesn't engage with politics or attempts to drive it (reflecting the agenda of the owner or the primary target audience). Which is fine, the free press should be able to do that.

But having a publicly funded media with the mandate for public service, truth, and investigative journalism is fundamentally important IMO, even if it doesn't balance various biases perfectly.

Or even if you don't personally think so, can you see the concern that maybe some within the CBC would think so?

I think that concern is massively overblown.

Exciting U15AA results my kid's team won and he walked away with a couple of assists.

[Grey Fox]

It's still good to have some conversations. The Americans don't post as much nowadays.

Yeah well, what is there to say?

That's fair. Your weeks away from losing your democracy. Spending time here seems farfetched.

[Admiral Yi]

Your weeks away from losing your democracy.

I'll take that bet.

[crazy canuck]

By some definitions, you have already lost it.

Democracy isn't just about having votes in in an election. They do that in Russia.

[crazy canuck]

Canadians think Carney will do a better job than Poilievre with Trump.

That is what the next election is going to be all about.  The Conservatives are going to have to figure out how to make their leader less Trumpy or the liberals are going to walk to a majority. Sidenote, it is pretty clear now that Carney will win the leadership contest.  Oh, how quickly politics can change.

From the Globe

A poll conducted for The Globe and Mail and CTV News by Nanos Research between Jan. 31 and Feb. 3 found that 39.6 per cent of Canadians surveyed consider Mr. Carney, the front-runner for the Liberal leadership, as the most qualified leader to negotiate with Mr. Trump and his administration. Twenty-six per cent of Canadians consider Mr. Poilievre as best qualified.

[Neil]

Well, the good news is that there's an awful lot of undecideds in there that they could potentially convince. 

I'm not sure what is driving people who believe either thing though.  Carney doesn't really have any kind of track record to judge by, and his party is the one whose main strategy has been 'let's try treating the most thin-skinned man in the world with visible contempt and see what happens'.  By contrast, Poilievre's 'maybe if we ignore this enough it'll all go away' doesn't exactly fill you with confidence either.  And these two are much better than the other party leaders.

[Grey Fox]

Your weeks away from losing your democracy.

I'll take that bet.

I don't gamble.

[Sheilbh]

I guess they left or got excluded at some point?

I looked into it. They left in 2024 and moved to the Centrist Democrat Union which is the international body for Christian Democrats while the IDU is more for Anglo-American Conservatives. There's some overlap in membership but broadly that's the divide and why the Tories, say, aren't in the CDU. If anything, Fidesz arguably moved to the more moderate organisation (Obviously it's not quite right to frame it that way as the Anglo right is just a very different tradition from European Christian Democracy.)

But basically Fidesz are back in the group with the CDU, Les Republicains, Fine Gael etc - all the European People's Party gang again.

Totally separate and I know this is very far from the main issue right now - but from the UK still find it slightly amazing that this is happening and parliament is not in session so the governing party can have a leadership election.

This feels like exactly the sort of moment that parliaments exist for in a parliamentary democracy. Have the PM make a statement to the house, opposition leaders and other MPs able to make statements and ask questions (I think it could even be helpful in dealing diplomatically with the US by demonstrating unity across parties).

[Valmy]

In honor of the Super Bowl:



Jesus is a hockey fan 

[Josephus]

Looks like Trump to announce tariffs on steel and aluminum tomorrow.

[Grey Fox]

Looks like Trump to announce tariffs on steel and aluminum tomorrow.

From Everywhere. That's kind of crazy. Aluminium plants take years to get going.

[Jacob]

We live in historic times, that's for sure.

[Valmy]

We live in historic times, that's for sure.

Histrionic times

[viper37]

Your weeks away from losing your democracy.

I'll take that bet.

Cuba has as much elections as the US.

Is it a democracy?

Saddam Hussein has 93-94% approval rate before the US led invasion.  did the US led a war against the Irakis nation?