My latest: Trudeau’s Seinfeldian campaign launch

— 09.13.2019 02:33 PM

Nothing.

That’s what Justin Trudeau had to say when he launched this, the 43rd federal general election. Zero, zippo, zilch.

Oh, sure, he said some stuff. He stood there in front of Rideau Hall, a focus-grouped gaggle of ethnically-diverse Canadians behind him, and he sprayed the usual Trudeau-esque word salad all over the unimpressed ink-stained wretches.

“I’m for moving forward for everyone,” he squeaked, oozing boyish charm. “We’ve all got a choice to make: keep moving forward and build on the progress we’ve made, or go back to the politics of the Harper years.”

Odd, that. Firstly, last time we checked, Stephen Harper isn’t running in this election. And, secondly, if the Liberals’ oxymoronic brain trust think Stephen Harper’s name still evokes fear and loathing from coast to coast to coast, they’re on drugs.

Smart Conservatives say that Harper ain’t reviled like he was four years ago. Not even close. Keep talking about Harper, Grits.

But that isn’t what was so bizarre about Justin Trudeau’s campaign launch. What was bizarre was this: nothing.

Meaning, that’s what he said: nothing. Apart from the jab at a guy who isn’t running, Justin Trudeau didn’t put the minutest amount of effort into defining the so-called ballot question. He didn’t say why he wants to keep being Prime Minister.

Years ago, Ted Kennedy blew his shot at the presidency when he couldn’t answer that eminently-reasonable question, posed to him by CBS’ Roger Mudd. Conversely, on Wednesday, all the other major party leaders said why they wanted the top job.

Invoking her inner Trekkie, the Greens’ Elizabeth May called us Earthlings, and said it’s all about climate change. The NDP’s Jagmeet Singh said the vote is about the little guy and gal, and he’s all for the little people.

Andrew Scheer cheerfully reminded everyone to read up on how Trudeau is stonewalling a police probe of LavScam – and then said the election is about pocketbook stuff, and helping folks get ahead. Which he’ll do.

It’s Politics 101, more basic than never getting photographed while eating something: on Day One, you get your guy or gal to bound up to a microphone and say what the election is all about, and why you are the best guy or gal for the job. And then you charge off to your campaign plane or bus, and head out to the hinterland.

(Unless you’re May and Singh, that is, in which case you will be campaigning on bicycles, or using a brisk walk.)

Justin Trudeau didn’t do that. He did what Teddy Kennedy did: he said nothing, basically.

In fairness to the Liberal leader, there’s not much he can say. After mishandling relations with India, China and the US – to wit, where’s the new NAFTA, Justy? – foreign affairs ain’t anything to brag about. Likewise, domestic affairs: Trudeau has helped to elect seven, count ‘em, seven conservative Premiers across Canada.

Same with ethics: he’s the first Prime Minister in history to be found guilty of violating two federal statutes (over LavScam and the Aga Khan) while still in office.

Fiscal probity? It is to laugh: he giddily broke his solemn promise to balance the budget. Ditto electoral reform. Feminism? Um: Gropegate, elbowed a female MP in the chest, exiled two women who (a) are way smarter than him and who (b) wouldn’t do what he told them to.

And so on, and so on. Justin Trudeau has nothing to say, and nothing he said. So he stepped out into the Ottawa sunshine, that cloying grin playing on the face that isn’t as youthful as it used to be, and said what he’s done to improve Canada, and what he’ll do to improve it if re-elected.

Which, as we say, is nothing.


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#LavScam latest: Trudeau lies, shifts blame to bureaucrats

— 09.13.2019 06:24 AM

Globe:

Legal and political experts are rejecting Justin Trudeau’s statement that it is up to Canada’s top bureaucrat to decide whether to lift the veil of cabinet secrecy over the SNC-Lavalin affair, saying that waiving confidentiality is a political decision in the hands of the prime minister.

Retired judge John Gomery, who led a public inquiry into the federal sponsorship program in 2004 and 2005, said he was initially rebuffed by senior bureaucrats when he asked for access to cabinet minutes related to the national-unity initiative, which was marred by fraud and corruption. The Liberal prime minister of the day, Paul Martin, eventually over rode the senior bureaucrats and agreed to provide access to all available information.

“It is a political decision,” Mr. Gomery said in an interview. 

…Yan Campagnolo, a professor of common law at the University of Ottawa, said that except in matters before the courts, the decision to release cabinet secrets is made at the political level through an order in council adopted by cabinet ministers.

“Outside the context of litigation, the only individual with the political authority to authorize the disclosure of cabinet confidences is the prime minister,” he said.

“The Prime Minister is the only person with the authority to broaden the scope of that order in council if it is deemed too narrow,” Mr. Campagnolo said.


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Perhaps the bus hadn’t finished running over people Trudeau dislikes

— 09.12.2019 06:35 AM

Insert wheels coming off bus metaphor here!

The Liberal Party’s media bus struck their campaign plane Wednesday night, leaving visible damage on the plane’s wing.

Global News’ Bureau Chief Mercedes Stephenson was on the bus as it went underneath the plane’s wing, slowly scraping the entire length of the bus.

Media were on the bus leaving the airport after they had landed in Victoria, B.C. from Vancouver.

Liberal Party Leader Justin Trudeau was in Vancouver for the first rally of the Liberal campaign and is expected to stay overnight in Victoria.

It is unclear whether the damage caused to the plane has made it unable to fly.


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#LavScam latest: cops interview former AG, Trudeau Libs stonewall

— 09.12.2019 06:30 AM

And, Trudeau lies and pins the blame on bureaucrats. From the Globe:

Former justice minister and attorney-general Jody Wilson-Raybould met with RCMP investigators this week to discuss political interference in the criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin Group Inc., and is calling on the Trudeau government to waive cabinet confidentiality for her and all other witnesses to allow a thorough probe into potential obstruction of justice.

Ms. Wilson-Raybould told The Globe and Mail on Wednesday that RCMP officers from the national division in Ottawa, which handles sensitive political matters, had a formal interview with her in Vancouver on Tuesday.

“I have had a meeting and I have been interviewed by the RCMP, and that meeting happened yesterday [Tuesday], and I am not going to comment any further on the nature of those conversations,” she said. “Of course I am concerned about the government’s decision to deny [the RCMP’s] request for access to other witnesses. As a matter of principle, the RCMP should be able to conduct thorough and necessary investigations.”

Ms. Wilson-Raybould said the meeting was at the request of the RCMP after several telephone conversations with her following the release of a report from Ethics Commissioner Mario Dion in August.

Mr. Dion said Prime Minister Justin Trudeau violated the Conflict of Interest Act when he and senior officials improperly pressed Ms. Wilson-Raybould to order the Public Prosecution Service to settle a fraud and bribery case against the Montreal-based engineering and construction giant…

The government says Privy Council Clerk Ian Shugart, who reports to Mr. Trudeau, will not waive cabinet confidentiality to allow the national police force to speak to witnesses and obtain cabinet documents relating to SNC-Lavalin.

The Liberal Leader rejected a call from Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer on Wednesday to allow anyone with knowledge of the SNC-Lavalin matter to discuss it freely with the RCMP.


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Campaign 2019 day one, in tweets

— 09.11.2019 10:17 AM


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#LavScam shocker: Trudeau PMO blocking Mounties’ obstruction of justice investigation

— 09.10.2019 09:54 PM

I’d say the election just found its defining moment, wouldn’t you?

These guys make Donald Trump look like a rank amateur.

The RCMP has been looking into potential obstruction of justice in the handling of the prosecution of SNC-Lavalin Group Inc., but its examination has been stymied by the federal government’s refusal to lift cabinet confidentiality for all witnesses, The Globe and Mail has learned.

This means individuals involved in the matter cannot discuss events or share documents with police that have not been exempted from the rule of cabinet confidentiality, according to sources, who The Globe agreed not to identify so they could discuss the RCMP inquiries.

In Canada, the principle of cabinet confidentiality is intended to allow ministers to debate decisions freely in private. As a result, discussions involving cabinet matters must be kept secret unless a waiver is granted. In the SNC matter, the Liberals say that the Clerk of the Privy Council, who heads the bureaucratic agency that serves the Prime Minister’s Office, made the decision not to offer a broad waiver to either the RCMP or to the Ethics Commissioner, and that the PMO played no role.

A source who was recently interviewed by the RCMP told The Globe that investigators indicated they are looking into possible obstruction of justice. The Criminal Code says obstruction of justice occurs when an effort is made to “obstruct, pervert or defeat the course of justice in a judicial proceeding.”

The national police force will pause the operation because of the coming election campaign. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is scheduled to go to Rideau Hall Wednesday to ask the Governor-General to dissolve Parliament and call the vote for Oct. 21, and the RCMP has a policy to suspend politically sensitive operations during campaigns.

Justice Department spokesman Ian McLeod said the decision not to offer a broader waiver for the RCMP “was made solely by the Clerk of the Privy Council as guardian of cabinet confidences.” Mr. Trudeau’s director of communications, Cameron Ahmad, said the PMO was not involved in the decision.

Ethics Commissioner Mario Dion faced the same obstacle as the RCMP in his investigation into the SNC-Lavalin affair earlier this year, stating in his final reportthat nine witnesses were unable to provide full testimony because government allowed only a limited waiver on cabinet secrecy.

Mr. Dion found that Mr. Trudeau breached the Conflict of Interest Act. His report said the Prime Minister and senior federal officials improperly pressed Jody Wilson-Raybould when she was justice minister and attorney-general to order the director of public prosecutions to settle bribery and fraud charges against SNC-Lavalin without a trial.

The Department of Justice confirmed Tuesday that the RCMP received “the same access to cabinet confidences and privileged information” as the Ethics Commissioner and the justice committee of the House.


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How Justin Trudeau could lose

— 09.10.2019 08:48 PM

In it for you.

It’s the New Democrats – now a sad shadow of their former selves – who, ironically, came up with the best slogan for the 2019 federal election campaign: in it for you.

That’s what just about every election campaign is about, this one included.  Which party best understands the lives of everyday Canadians.  Which leader actually has the best understanding of the struggles your family faces every single day.

Justin Trudeau is at a big disadvantage, here.  That’s because Justin wasn’t simply born with silver spoon in his mouth.

It was more like a silver shovel.

Trudeau is the guy who likes to talk about the middle class, a lot.  But he has never, ever actually experienced the middle class.  Trudeau has never had to worry about paying the rent, or coming up with the next mortgage statement.  

He has never wondered where he’ll get the dough to pay a hydro bill.  He has never wanted for anything.  His life has been one of mansions, private jets, and hanging out with celebrities like the Aga Khan.

Against Andrew Scheer – who grew up in a big immigrant Catholic family, and whose family didn’t have the wealth Trudeau did – the Liberal leader will likely appear privileged and out-of-touch.  Scheer worked as a waiter and a salesman.  

Trudeau, meanwhile, wears a $15,000 IWC Portuguese Regulateur watch and drives a Mercedes-Benz 300SL he got from his Dad.  (Which, apparently, can sell for millions.)

Who is in it for me – who best understands my life?

If the 2019 election ballot question becomes that question, Justin Trudeau is deep, deep trouble.  Smart Liberals know this. That’s why Trudeau rolls up his sleeves, and loosens his tie, and rarely wears a suit when on the campaign hustings.  That’s why he talks about the middle class all the time.

But not all Liberals are smart.

Last week, some less-than-smart Grits revealed a big poster of Finance Minister Bill Morneau wearing an expensive, tailor-made bespoke suit, tugging at what looked like French cuffs and pricey cufflinks.  It didn’t exactly scream “middle class.”

By this week, Liberals had pasted over that unhelpful image with campaign posters.

But the deeply-dumb Liberals weren’t done yet.  Shortly afterwards, some of them actually cooked up a hashtag to mock Andrew Scheer’s comparatively-humble beginnings.  One of them, a Liberal MP – the heretofore unknown Gagan Sikand, soon to be the former MP for Mississauga-Streetsville – actually tweeted this: “Scheer Was So Poor he had to buy his Conservative Values second-hand from Stephen Harper.”

Sikand, a lawyer, actually wrote that.  He actually tweeted that.  It was the 2019 campaign’s Beer-and-Popcorn moment: people with more, making fun of people who have less. 

Lots of other Liberals went online, too, giddily promoting the “Scheer Was So Poor” hashtag.

It recalled late 2005, when this writer was huddled on a cold bench at a hockey rink somewhere, waiting out a son’s early-morning practice.  A revelation hit me: the Liberals were Starbucks, and the Conservatives were Tim Horton’s.  The Tories were going to win with a campaign that was aimed at the Tim’s crowd, not the latte-sipping elites who frequent Starbucks.  And win they did.

No one should ever underestimate Justin Trudeau’s retail political skills.  No one should ever discount his party’s organizational chops.

But if this race truly becomes who is really “in it for you?”

Then Justin Trudeau is going to lose it.

 


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