Tag Archive: Jane Philpott

Failure-ology

— 03.06.2020 08:23 AM

Why did Justin Trudeau lose a million votes in the 2019 election? Why did he lose his majority? Why did he lose his standing in the world, and with Canadians?

Because of LavScam.  Because of the Aga Khan, and unbalanced budgets, and no electoral reform, and serial scandals.  Because of things he did personally, too: Aga Khan, LavScam, and Gropegate, and elbowing a female MP, and blackface, and the unrelenting solipsism and conceits.

All that.  But it has been the arrogance of Trudeau and his cabal, too.  Konrad Yakabuski writes up an indictment about that, here.  Highlights below.

One of the great ironies of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government is that it has proved so ineffective in the one area where it so emphatically promised to outdo its predecessors.

It was always presumptuous on the part of Mr. Trudeau and his former principal secretary, Gerald Butts, to suggest they would run a more effective government than any of those that came before them. But by dropping the ball so spectacularly on so many key files, Mr. Trudeau’s Prime Minister’s Office set itself up for the failure that has now befallen it.

…The Trudeau PMO has never seemed clear on its own priorities. So how could it expect the senior bureaucracy to be clear on them? At both the micro-policy level (electoral reform, balancing the budget by 2019) and macro-policy level (reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, supporting economic growth while fighting climate change), the Trudeau government has continually sent mixed signals to the bureaucracy about how seriously it takes its own promises.

When it has sprung into action, the Trudeau PMO has typically made a mess of it. The SNC-Lavalin affair, which started out with a straightforward move to bring Canadian law on deferred prosecution agreements in line with that of other developed countries, nearly destroyed Mr. Trudeau’s government all because the PMO failed to abide by its own deliverology credo.

It is perhaps no coincidence that the Trudeau government’s most notable successes – the implementation of the Canada Child Benefit and medical aid in dying, and the negotiation of new health-care funding agreements with the provinces – were overseen by low-key ministers who kept their eyes on the ball rather than their Twitter feeds. Social Development Minister Jean- Yves Duclos and Jane Philpott, Mr. Trudeau’s first health minister, were focused on results, not retweets.

Overall, however, execution has proved to be the Achilles heel of this government. It has proved inept at buying fighter planes or fixing the Phoenix pay system. It promised a bigger role for Canada in global affairs but has earned a reputation abroad for being fickle and stingy. The Canada Infrastructure Bank extends its record for overpromising and underdelivering.

Indeed, the scariest words in Canadian English may have become: “I’m from the Trudeau government, and I’m here to help.”

 


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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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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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My latest: what #LavScam now means for Scheer, JWR, PMO, the RCMP and the media

— 08.18.2019 06:39 AM

Joseph Nye Welch: remember that name.

He was an American lawyer, and chief counsel to the US Army. He died long ago. But even from the grave, even after so many years have gone by, Welch has something to important to say about the sordid, seamy scandal known as LavScam.

The Ethics Commissioner had something to say, too, as it turned out. And this week, he said it: “The authority of the Prime Minister and his office was used to circumvent, undermine and ultimately attempt to discredit the decision of the Director of Public Prosecutions as well as the authority of Ms. [Jody] Wilson-Raybould as the Crown’s chief law officer.”

That sentence – and the commissioner’s finding that Justin Trudeau and his thugs did, indeed, conspire to stop the criminal prosecution of a Québec-based donor to his party, SNC-Lavalin – has myriad implications for many people. Here are just a few.

• Andrew Scheer: When the LavScam story broke in the Globe and Mail, the Conservative Party leader was criticized by some in his own party for demanding Justin Trudeau’s resignation. It is clear, now, he was right to do so. It’s also equally clear that Scheer need not worry himself about Trudeau’s puerile threat to sue him for defamation. Truth, after all, is an absolute defence to a libel claim.

• Jody Wilson-Raybould: Everything that the former Attorney-General said – and Trudeau petulantly refused to let her say all she had to say – was also true. All of it. She was, in fact, pressured by Trudeau and ten of his minions (including his Minister of Finance) to cut a sweetheart deal for SNC-Lavalin on 22 separate occasions over a four-month period. She spoke the truth. And, in so doing, Wilson-Raybould revealed more integrity and courage than Trudeau could ever hope to possess in ten lifetimes.

• Trudeau’s Office: His most-powerful aide, Gerald Butts, resigned at the height of the LavScam scandal. At the time, it was unclear why. Not now. Butts should tender his resignation again – as should Katie Telford, Ben Chin, Mathieu Bouchard, Elder Marques and others in PMO. Bouchard and Marques, both lawyers, additionally deserve the scrutiny of the relevant law societies for their role in LavScam.

• The Mounties: It is known that the RCMP seized Butts’ government-issue laptop and cell phone when he first resigned. It is also known that Butts, Telford and the others “lawyered up,” and retained counsel for an anticipated criminal probe. And then…nothing. While Scheer and others demanded a criminal investigation, the RCMP gave every indication they were having an extended, collective nap. The Ethics Commissioner’s extraordinary report will force them awake. Or should.

• The Media: For various sycophantic media voices – most notably the Toronto Star’s Susan Delacourt and HuffPo’s Althing Raj – the SNC-Lavalin affair has been a trifling matter, and Wilson-Raybould deserved to be exiled by Trudeau and his lackeys. The damning Ethic Commissioner’s report should oblige Delacourt, Raj and other Trudeau-flatterers to radically revise that assessment.

But what, one might ask, of Joseph Nye Welch? How is LavScam relevant to him, and vice-versa?

Watching Justin Trudeau simultaneously accept the Ethics Commissioner’s report – and then condemn it, all dewy-eyed sincerity – Welch might have said what he famously said to Joseph McCarthy, during the Democratic Senator’s hunt for communists and subversives.

“Until this moment, I think I have never really gauged your recklessness,” Welch might’ve said to Trudeau. “You’ve done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?”

Justin Trudeau, at long last, does not.


Comments (15)

#LavScam: RCMP confirm probe underway into Trudeau and PMO

— 08.15.2019 09:22 AM

Finally.

After seizing Gerald Butts’ government-issue laptop and cell phone – after all of the senior PMO staff lawyered up – one would’ve thought the criminal probe was already underway.

At least they have now confirmed that it is.

How helpful is it that your party and your leader are the target of a major criminal investigation during an election? Not very.

Could they lose the election because of this? They could.

Do they deserve to lose because of LavScam?

Oh yes. Yes, yes, yes.

Here’s the official statement from the Mounties:

“The RCMP is examining this matter carefully with all available information and will take appropriate actions as required.”

I just did a Sun hit on this very issue. I’ll post it as soon as it is available.


Comments (19)

My latest: Butts, back, big bother

— 07.23.2019 11:41 AM

Kick me.

Here’s a little-known fact: The “kick me” sign — which is usually affixed to some hapless soul’s back or behind, for laughs — was apparently devised by merry-making Scots during the 16th Century.

They did it to celebrate April Fool’s. “Kick me” thereafter became so popular, it spread to the British Isles and then rest of the world.

And so, this week, the Liberal Party of Canada stuck a “kick me” sign to its collective keester, and invited all of us to do precisely that.

The occasion? Not April Fool’s, although it certainly felt like it could be. No, the “kick me” moment heralded the inauspicious return of Justin Trudeau’s former principal secretary, and his forever-BFF, Gerald Butts.

Butts showed up for some Liberal campaign meeting. People noticed.

Yes, that Gerald Butts. He of the SNC-Lavalin meta-scandal — the one who helped propel #LavScam into hashtag hagiography.

He — the one who told us a million times that he’s a coal miner’s son. Him, the one who also told the chief of staff to the Attorney-General of Canada that Trudeau’s cabal wanted to short-circuit the criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin, a Liberal Party donor.

Him, “Gerry,” who famously said of interfering in the coming corruption trial of SNC-Lavalin that “there is no solution here that does not involve some interference.”

Him. Gerald Butts. He’s back.

Now, before everyone starts reaching for the smelling salts, there is a passable pretext to justify the return of Butts. For one thing, he’s smarter than all of PMO put together. And, the wheels started to come off PMO the moment Butts left.

The Liberal Party commenced sliding precipitously in the polls. Patronage scandals sprouted up like weeds. And, of course, there was this stirring bit of oratory, which ranks up there with the Gettysburg Address: “We have recently switched to drinking water bottles out of water, when we have water bottles out of a plastic sorry away from plastic towards paper-like drink-box, water-bottle sorta things.”

So, on the one hand, it makes a bit of sense that Butts is back. But, on the other, it doesn’t at all.

Two reasons.

One, Butts — fairly or not — became the face of LavScam. And not in a good way. Former ministers Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott came to embody decency, honesty and a belief in the independence of our prosecutorial system.

Butts, meanwhile, came to be seen as a guy who may have done something wrong. Why would he have resigned if that were not so?

LavScam hammered the Liberal Party in public opinion. It shredded Justin Trudeau’s promise of sunny ways. And it left his oft-made claims to be a feminist — to be the indigenous reconciler, to be the guy who’d bring back ethical government — in tatters after he expelled Wilson-Raybould and Philpott for having the temerity to speak up for the rule of law.

There’s a second reason why Gerald Butts’ return is dumb, dumb, dumb. And it’s that hoary old chestnut, Liberal arrogance.

“Liberal arrogance” has recurred so many times in Canadian politics, it practically deserves its own entry in Mel Hurtig’s Canadian Encyclopedia series. Liberal arrogance — that Grit belief that they alone know what is best for Canada, and are in fact synonymous with all that is good in Canada — is deadly.

Liberal arrogance has felled many a Liberal government. It is the greatest Grit weakness. And the return of Gerald Butts signals its unfortunate return, in marquee lights.

Butts is back. LavScam is back. Liberal arrogance is back.

Kick them: they deserve it.


Comments (19)

About that new CPC spot

— 06.07.2019 07:33 AM

It’s good, but:

• it tries to cover too many subjects in too few seconds

• it’s pretty busy, visually

I think there’s enough stuff here for three different spots: the Liberals abandoning ship, the scandals, and the mistreatment of women.

It’s that last one that deserves its own spot. In recent days, Justin Trudeau has been frantically making big announcements aimed at one key demographic: women. Without female votes, his octopus is cooked.

(Andrew Scheer needs more female votes to win. Refusing to march in a single Pride parade won’t help him get any.)

That’s the wound I’d keep picking at: Justin Trudeau’s appalling treatment of women, from Elbowgate to the beer festival groping to LavScam. I’d pick at it until it becomes infected.

Anyway. Here’s the Tory ad. Comments are open.


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JWR is vindicated, again

— 05.29.2019 10:10 AM

There is enough evidence against SNC-Lavalin for the engineering corporation to be tried on fraud and bribery charges, a Quebec court judge has ruled. 

SNC-Lavalin spent months lobbying the federal government to avoid finding itself in this position. It hoped to use a new legal mechanism — a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) — to pay a fine rather than risk conviction. 

But its efforts ignited a major political scandal in Ottawa when the former attorney general, Jody Wilson-Raybould, accused the Prime Minister’s Office of pressuring her to arrange a deal for SNC-Lavalin. 

The court’s decision was handed down in Montreal on Wednesday. It followed an extended preliminary inquiry into accusations from federal prosecutors in 2015. 

They allege SNC-Lavalin paid around $48 million in bribes to Libyan officials between 2001 and 2011, a violation of the Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act.

Federal prosecutors also allege SNC-Lavalin defrauded a number of Libyan institutions out of $130 million over the same period.


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