Category: POLITICAL

POILIEVRE. AGAIN

How do I talk about Pierre Poilievre without sounding like, well, Pierre Poilievre?

I started this article on Friday and tossed it in my trash bin Saturday morning, mostly because of the tone I was taking, and because I had let him get under my skin again.  So I walked away.

Maybe I should just have confidence in my fellow Canadians to discern for themselves what kind of person he is.  And maybe they already have.  Maybe that’s why he’s not prime minister.  

But that said, he’s not gone.  Not yet.  Not by a long shot.

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FEDS TO PUMP MONEY INTO MILITARY

The federal government has indicated that they will begin to spend billions of dollars more on national defence.  In fact, billions and billions.

If you think that’s something that should have been done all along, you’d not be incorrect.  If you’re someone who wonders about stuff like this, and further wonders where the money is going to come from, you’d not be alone.  And if you’re afraid it may come at the expense of social programs or other areas of governmental involvement, and you wonder which ones?

Join the club.  Get in line.  Here’s your t-shirt.

I suppose there’s another category of person out there, the type that feels government should get out of everybody’s face and simply allow economic Darwinism to be the prevailing thought, then good for you, but sorry, you have no place in any reasonable discussion around the military budget specifically, or the federal budget generally.  Go home and count your money, and please try to stay out of the way of the grownups.  In other words, stay out of our face.

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BAT 365: MIXING COFFEE AND POLITICS

It didn’t take long for the BATs — Boys At Timmy’s — to go sour on Mark Carney.

That’s not entirely accurate though, because in order to go sour on something, you must first have had some, albeit grudging, degree of sweetness, although that’s way too strong of a word to apply to the hard men who hold court at Tim Hortons franchises across this great land every afternoon of the week.  Long accustomed to being the primary political thinkers in their respective communities, they never really took to Carney in the first place.  Instead, when they saw the political winds shift biblically from the Conservatives to the Liberals, they decided to hold their fire and seek cover, at least and until their natural instincts of baked-in oppositional thinking kicked back in.

To see them, and to hear them rise from the metaphorical ashes and begin their campaign of perpetual sour grapes is sort of like watching a healthy ecosystem re-balance itself, like a creek snaking its way through a modern subdivision.  Except for the healthy part.

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GENERALLY SPEAKING

As Canada’s top soldier, the Chief of Defence Staff serves at the pleasure of the prime minister.  That means that, while Canada’s top soldier, you’re not the top dog when it comes to chain of command.

And that means that when you appear in public, or comment in public, it’s a really good idea that you exercise the prudence necessary to ensure that you articulate the policies, goals, and aspirations of Canada’s military in a way that’s consistent with what the political masters are saying, in this case both the prime minister and the Minister of National Defence.

So, for Lieutenant-General Jennie Carignon, it means that she needs to keep all the ducks in the proper row, as she’s ultimately accountable to Prime Minister Mark Carney and his defence minister David McGuinty.

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ROB FORD: TRAINWRECK ON NETFLIX

A Netflix series takes a look at the story of Rob Ford, Toronto’s mayor for a single term ending in 2016.

The brother of current Ontario Premier Doug Ford. Robs’s story is one of scandal, bombast, embarrassment, and cringe. Yet at the same time, his demise is as tragic as tragic gets, and offers an insight into the man inside the man who captured international headlines some ten years ago.

Trainwreck: Mayor of Mayhem. Streaming on Netflix.

A DANGEROUS WOMAN GETS MORE DANGEROUS

Alberta lost around 5,600 people to Covid-19 during the epidemic that swept the world five years ago.  That’s close to 12% of the national total, not bad for a province with just about 10% of the national population.

It’s not clear what those numbers would have looked like had many Albertans not picked up their Covid vaccinations while in the heat of the battle, despite being citizens of Canada’s most vaccine-resistant province, although Saskatchewan has emerged as a bit of whack-job as well when it comes to common sense and vaccines. Alberta, after all, is the province that chased away Dr. Deena Hinshaw, the province’s chief Medical Officer of Health.

Alberta, as you may already know, exists fully a century behind the rest of us when it comes to a lot of the important stuff.  As proud as they are of themselves as being the Texas of the North, that distinction only really applies to oil patches, cowboy hats, and an innate ability or inclination to just simply get everything wrong when it comes to their attitude around a lot of the important stuff, like the environment, or the basic stuff surrounding life and death.  And sadly, many in that province would rather die than admit they were wrong about something.

Totally in keeping with both herself and the hatchet-job government she leads, Premier Danielle Smith has announced that, henceforth, Covid vaccinations of the future will be available only if you pay for them, and not as a result of the government providing them.  The Alberta government estimates that the shots will cost around $110/dose, but Smith and her cronies will escape public discontent since everyone will blame it on the Trudeau Liberals.  Or the Carney Liberals.  Or any Liberals, really.

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