What a giant this man is: Irwin Cotler.  

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I’m sorry, but Tom Mulcair is kind of pathetic.  He is.

Mulcair has tweeted that Donald Trump is a “fascist,” quote unquote.  He says he wants that “to be on  the record.”

Gotcha.

To me and not a few other people, fascism is the ideology of murder.  Its characteristics are total state control of the economy, uniformed paramilitary forces, and – as noted – organized murder on a massive scale.  You will know you are dealing with a real fascist when they want to kill you. For an opinion, or your religion, or the way you look or the way you are.

Donald Trump is an asshole, to be sure. He says things that are outrageous and racist and offensive and crazy. Yes.

But he isn’t yet openly advocating the forced sterilization of “sub-normal” people – like this other politician did, back in the Thirties.  He hasn’t started calling disabled people “morons” and “prostitutes” who are a burden to the taxpayer – like this fan of Third Reich medicine did, way back when.

Tom Mulcair knows all that, anyway.  Just as we know that he is revealing himself to be a desperate, pathetic man, frantically trying to depict himself as “left wing” to preserve his job.

Save your money writing reports about why you lost the election so badly, Team Orange.  You lost because of the execrable judgment of Tom Mulcair.

Mulcair diminishes suffering of REAL victims of fascism, to save his hide in a leadership review. Pathetic.#cdnpoli https://t.co/abWivYNQCJ

— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) March 31, 2016

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To wit: why bother?

A snippet, below.  Your speculation is welcome, as always.

Children, someone once observed, are the only known form of immortality.

That rarely deters the makers of monuments, the curers of disease, the inventors and discoverers, the authors of books and songs and art: all valiantly attempt, in some small measure, to defy death. But we cannot ever hold mortality’s strong hand (per The Bard). The “undiscover’d country” awaits us all.

Politicians, and political folk, remain mulishly undeterred. They do not ever embrace politics to achieve riches: unless one is a crook, and also very lucky, there really aren’t any riches to be had. They do not do so to be loved: for many, all that lies ahead is hate mail, and the insults of strangers at baggage carousels. They don’t do it for their health, either: plenty of them start drinking too much, exercising too little, and – in a small minority of cases – even smoking crack.

Finally, they don’t succumb to the political life because it will bring them closer to their family. For a disproportionately-large number, politics routinely ends in divorce, and alienated offspring. It is, indeed, an unspeakably lonely life (per Kim Campbell).

So why does any sensible person do it?

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…was on a plane that just crashed in Îles-de-la-Madeleine, on the way to a family funeral.  Jean and I worked closely together on the Hill in 1984, and I can’t say enough about how much he knows about politics.  Hope he and his family are okay.

 

 

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To summarize:

• Donald Trump forces you into pens
• Donald Trump bans you when you ask questions
• Donald Trump calls you disgusting names
• Donald Trump defends his staff when they assault you
• Donald Trump gets hundreds of millions in free coverage from you every month, but none of his opponents do

Here’s a suggestion: stop covering him.  Stop chronicling every bit of idiocy that issues from his sphincter-like mouth.  Deny him the very air he needs to breathe.

Do that, and this thing will get a bit more fair.  Until then, however, you are as much a part of his campaign as his campaign manager – you know, the one they just charged with assaulting a reporter.

 

 

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A columnist at the Toronto Star is in high dudgeon, this morning, swinging his metaphorical sword about the supposedly grimy, grubby business of political fundraising.  You can read it here, if you like.

My response is in the form of a question and answer.

Q: Mr. Columnist, who is the principal beneficiary of all the fundraising that political parties are forced to do?

A: Um, the media, of course.

Yes, the media. That’s where the vast majority of funds raised goes.  Sometimes as much as 80 per cent of it.

To put a fine point on it, in case you are having difficulty believing it: the guy who is complaining is the same guy who is benefitting.  Bit rich, that, eh?

Democratic ad buy guru Tobe Berkovitz confirmed this reality, in my book The War Room: “[Ad buy] is where most of your campaign’s money is going. If you do it efficiently, then it’s going to be good. But if you’re not doing it efficiently, then you’re going to end up wasting a fair amount of money.”

No doubt: Wynne had great messaging last time, Tim Hudak didn’t, and voters responded accordingly.  But, equally, there is no doubt that the Star’s columnist is not being entirely honest with his readers, this morning: to wit, the Number One Beneficiary of all that grimy, grubby fundraising is him.

Premier Kathleen Wynne, I heard, put it best in a scrum she had about the issue this morning.

“Running campaigns, interacting in terms of advertising with the public, signs, all of it costs, costs money – and, most people can’t fund that process themselves.  Nor would we, I think, want a system where only people wealthy enough to fund their own campaign could take part.  So, that funding needs to come from somewhere…We made a decision as a society, a long time ago, that we wouldn’t fund political activity solely through tax dollars.”

Wynne went on to say that she is bringing forward some pretty comprehensive changes to Ontario’s political fundraising rules in the Fall.  That’s good.

But, in the meantime, make no mistake: the reason why political parties – not just Wynne’s, all of them – spend so much time fundraising is because the media don’t give us air time, or space on the page, for free.  They charge us plenty, and they almost always jack up their rates during election periods.

The fact that they are now complaining about that? Well…a bit hypocritical, isn’t it?

 

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Damned if I know.  Lawrence Martin takes a stab at answering the question, here.  It’s a really good piece, but I found the very last sentence bewildering.  It’s like he didn’t know how to end it, and just tacked it on.

Anyway. When my Dad died, twelve years ago this Spring, Justin Trudeau – who I didn’t really know – reached out to me, and gave me some good advice that I followed.  He sent beautiful flowers to the church, and was very kind.  He was a regular reader of this web site, it turned out.

(Stephen Harper,  by the way, was similarly kind, calling me and my mother to offer condolences and support.)

How does any of this matter? Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t.  Maybe it was just politicians being political.

But in Trudeau’s case, however – and particularly in light of some recent experiences I’ve had with the man – I actually think he isn’t (per Martin) an open book, at all.  I actually think he is even more of a mystery than I had previously considered.

Being enigmatic – being a riddle – sometimes works to your political advantage (cf. his father) and sometimes it doesn’t (cf. Richard Nixon).  It depends.

We will all see how it works out for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, in the fullness of time.  But, increasingly, my suspicion is that the selfies – the Twitter, the Instagram, all of that – are a deliberate distraction, a sleight of hand, designed to distract us from…what?

I actually don’t know, which may be the point.

 

 

 

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Outstanding (and frightening) investigative reporting work by the Times, here.

What I found most interesting was this section:

“Intelligence officials in the United States and Europe have confirmed the broad outlines of the external operations unit: It is a distinct body inside ISIS, with its command-and-control structure answering to Mr. Adnani, who reports to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the self-proclaimed caliph of the Islamic State.

The unit identifies recruits, provides training, hands out cash and arranges for the delivery of weapons once fighters are in position. Although the unit’s main focus has been Europe, external attacks directed by ISIS or those acting in its name have been even more deadly beyond Europe’s shores. At least 650 people have been killed in the group’s attacks on sites popular with Westerners, including in Turkey, Egypt and Tunisia, according to a Times analysis.

Within the hierarchy, Mr. Abaaoud was specifically tasked with mounting attacks in Europe, according to the French police report and intelligence brief.“

If Adnani’s name sounds familiar to Canadians, it should.  He is the IS leader who had very specific things to say about Canada in the Fall of 2014, just after the assassinations of two CAF members.  He said “what lies ahead [for Canada] will be worse — with Allah’s permission.”

He went on to say his network would “target the crusaders in their own lands and wherever they are found.” He said they would use explosives, guns, knives, cars, rocks “or even a boot or a fist.”

“Indeed, you saw what a single Muslim did with Canada and its Parliament of shirk [sic], and what our brothers in France, Australia and Belgium did, may Allah have mercy upon them all and reward them with good on behalf of Islam,” he said.

“And there were many others who killed, ran others over, threatened, frightened and terrorized people, to the extent that we saw the crusader armies deployed on the streets in Australia, Canada, France, Belgium and other strongholds of the cross.”

As in my Hill Times column, this week, we are at war with the Islamic State.  You can call the war, and the Islamic State, whatever you like.  But no one should be under any illusion about who they are, or what we are doing.

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We would have liked to attend the Heritage Dinner tonight, but we’ll be at Leon Korbee’s funeral visitation tonight instead.

 

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The first casualty of war isn’t truth. It turns out it’s meaning.

Ipso facto, is “Canada” in a state of “war” with “the Islamic State?” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Foreign Affairs Minister Stephane Dion emphatically state that we are not.

Said the Prime Minister on CBC radio: “A war is something that can be won by one side or the other and there is no path for ISIL to actually win against the West…They want to destabilize, they want to strike fear. They need to be stamped out.”

Said Dion, outside the Commons: “If you use the terminology ‘war,’ in international law it will mean two armies with respecting rules and it’s not the case at all. You have terrorist groups that respect nothing. So we prefer to say that it’s a fight.”

So, are they right? Trudeau’s argument is somewhat existential, or at least philosophical: he seems to believe that a war is only a war if it can be won. Dion is more preoccupied with semantics: it can’t be a war, because the Islamic State isn’t a state, and wars can only be waged by warring states.

Let’s dissect Dion’s assessment first, shall we? The Islamic State – which itself (naturally) lacks a name upon which all can agree – has many names. It has been variously referred to as ISIL (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant), ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham), Daesh (an acronym derived from its Arabic name), terrorists, the enemy (my personal favourite, because it is truest) and so on. When our side cannot even figure out what to call the other side, confusion is inevitable.

But leave that aside for a minute. The trickier challenge is this: what, exactly, is the best way to describe what exists between us and Daesh/ISIS/ISIL/the enemy? Are we at war with them? Is it war’s lesser variant, an armed conflict? A mere “fight,” as Dion suggests? Is what Daesh/ISIS/ISIL/the enemy are doing properly classified – as Messrs. Trudeau and Dion do – as “terrorism,” stirring up fear, destabilizing, and so on? How about this: is it safe to say that we have a really strong disagreement with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the putative head of the caliphate-to-be? No? Are we cross with him, yet?

It could be that the Canadian government – unlike many of its allies – does not want to describe our disagreement with Daesh/ISIS/ISIL/the enemy as “war” because that would confer status on the other side. It would ascribe legitimacy to them.

In international law, as our Foreign Minister implies, “war” has a very specific meaning. Its etymology is Old English (wyrre) and Old French (werre). Merriam-Webster (likely Messr. And Trudeau’s preference) says it is “a state of usually open and declared armed hostile conflict between states or nations.” The Oxford people (properly, in my view) state that it need not be between states – they say it need only be “a state of armed conflict between different countries or different groups within a country.”

If a tour of dictionaries isn’t sufficient, the United Nations – which is an authority in war, because it is the entity theoretically most preoccupied with preventing war – provides us with insight into why Canada’s Liberal government is so insistent that we are not in a state of war with Daesh/ISIS/ISIL/the enemy. The UN Charter specifically forbids war, except for self-defence, or if authorized by the Security Council itself. Which explains why so few nations, Canada among them, describe themselves “at war” with anyone anymore.

The United Nations (and, unsurprisingly so, to conservatives) is ultimately of no help in our definitional quest. The U.N. doesn’t even use the word “war” in the relevant section of its Charter. It is instead only concerned with what it calls “threats to the peace, breaches of the peace, or acts of aggression.”

There. We have met the U.N. threshold, then: Daesh/ISIS/ISIL/the enemy have repeatedly threatened our peace, they have breached our peace, and they have committed acts of aggression against us. And, as much as we do not want to admit it, the Islamic State meets the definition of “state” – they are politically organized, and they control territory.

So, we are at war with the Islamic State, the circumlocutions of the politicians notwithstanding. What now? Does anything really change?

No. The word games, at day’s end, are just that: games. This is indeed a war, with combatants, and casualties, and myriad horrors. There is a body count, and it grows.

Dance on the head of semantical pins if you like, politicians. Indulge in your preference for interminable semiology and exegesis. The rest of us know full well what this is.

We don’t, however, know how it will end.

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