A small country that made the right choices

By Paul Wells - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 8:06 PM - 0 Comments

Casting about for news and commentary to improve my understanding of Kevin Rudd’s turnabout-may-or-may-not-be-fair-play-but-it’s-the-game-I’m-playing attack on Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who putsched him out of the job less than two years ago, I was amused to learn about this new book, released today, apparently, and written by the prominent political journalist George Megalogenis. It’s called The Australian Moment, and like so much down there, its thesis will be oddly familiar to Canadians:

“There’s no better place to be during economic turbulence than Australia. Brilliant in a bust, we’ve learnt to use our brains in a boom. Although the Great Recession continues to rumble around the globe, we successfully negotiated the Asian financial crisis, the dotcom tech wreck and the GFC. Despite a lingering inability to acknowledge our achievements at home, the rest of the world now asks: How did we get it right? Continue…

The Wessexes won the royal tour sweepstakes

By Patricia Treble - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 6:00 PM - 0 Comments

zakgollop/Flickr

In the royal family’s “divide up the world for Diamond Jubilee visits” sweepstakes, the winners have got to be the earl and countess of Wessex, a.k.a. Prince Edward and his wife Sophie. While William and Kate go to Singapore, Charles and Camilla hit Papua New Guinea (as well as Canada) and Princess Anne gets Zambia, the Wessexes land in the Caribbean. For 16 days. In winter.

The Windsor clan, minus the Queen and Prince Philip, who are staying home this year, kicked off the oh-so-complicated royal tour on Tuesday with the Wessex tour. The Diamond Jubilee schedule is getting so packed—Charles and Camilla just announced a Scandinavian visit for next month—that royal officials must be burning through Excel spreadsheets as they try to keep paths from crossing. Indeed, in early March, while Edward and Sophie are still on their sunburn tour, Prince Harry will be visiting the Bahamas and Jamaica, which may make for some intriguing photo ops. Continue…

Harper 2012

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 5:05 PM - 0 Comments

Josh Barro suggests a solution to the Republican Party’s current predicament.

On @mattyglesias‘s point re: moving successful public sector leaders to bigger markets, why not make Stephen Harper the GOP nominee?

Barro figures Mr. Harper has always wanted to the President of the United States and Yglesias says Mitt Romney would be better off running in Canada. Barro ventures Mr. Harper is “massively more charismatic and relatable” than the current Republican frontrunner.

Setting aside the citizenship requirement, this makes for some fun speculation: How would Stephen Harper do in a race for the Republican presidential nomination? Or, put another way, how would Stephen Harper do in a race for the Republican presidential nomination if he was able to carry his record from Canada? I’m tempted to say he’d do very well. But he would conceivably have to directly engage social conservative issues like abortion and same-sex marriage and that would require a fairly major deviation from how he has handled himself as a party leader here.

Ken Lewenza’s endorsement

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 3:18 PM - 0 Comments

The CAW president has apparently re-joined the NDP for the purposes of endorsing Peggy Nash. He’d already signalled his support four months ago when Ms. Nash launched her campaign. Ms. Nash previously worked for the union as an assistant to Mr. Lewenza.

Six months ago, Ken Lewenza publicly endorsed and argued for an NDP-Liberal merger. Ms. Nash is on the record as being against a merger and she has rejected Nathan Cullen’s proposal of joint nomination meetings.

Update 5:15pm. I asked a CAW spokeswoman whether Mr. Lewenza still supported a merger. Here’s the response. Continue…

Mobile games locked in Mortal Kombat

By Peter Nowak - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 2:27 PM - 0 Comments

(Warner Bros./AP Photo)

The PlayStation Vita, which launches on Feb. 22, has been getting a lot of press over the past few weeks, for a number of reasons. On the one hand, with gaming hardware continually getting more powerful, manufacturers are slowing down the rate at which they release next-generation machines. Home consoles such as the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 are now into their seventh and sixth years, respectively, which is considerably longer than the previous generation (the original Xbox, for example, had a four-year run before the Xbox 360 arrived).

Sony’s next-generation handheld is also getting a lot of attention because it is being released into a vastly different world than its predecessors. Over the past few years, smartphones and tablets have arisen to become mobile gaming powerhouses, leading observers to speculate on whether the death of portable systems such as the Vita is nigh. I spoke with Jack Tretton, CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment America, on the topic last week and he, of course, doesn’t see it that way. Continue…

Candice Hoeppner, political scientist

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 2:04 PM - 0 Comments

Speaking in the House before the vote to eliminate the long-gun registry last week, Conservative MP Candice Hoeppner recalled how she had introduced similar legislation in the last Parliament. She then proceeded to gloat.

Unfortunately, some individuals on the other side of the House broke faith with their constituents. They told their constituents they would vote to end the long gun registry but they did not. Instead, they voted in the interests of their party bosses. However, every cloud has a silver lining. We decided that we might have lost a battle but we were determined that we would not lose the war. We made an effort to get out and talk to Canadians. We knew that we needed a majority government. We needed a mandate from Canadians in order to end the wasteful long gun registry, and that is exactly what we received.

Listening to Michael Ignatieff’s demands that all Liberals vote to keep on criminalizing law-abiding gun owners meant that we exchanged Liberal Larry Bagnell for the Conservative member for Yukon. It meant that we exchanged Liberal Anthony Rota for the Conservative member for Nipissing—Timiskaming. It meant that we exchanged Liberal Mark Holland for the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence, the Conservative MP for Ajax—Pickering. They were great trades.

It was not only the Liberals who lost. Listening to the big union bosses in the backroom of the NDP did not work out so well for some of those members either. The good people of Sault Ste. Marie made what some would call an MP upgrade from Tony Martin to the Conservative member for Sault Ste. Marie.

This is an interesting version of recent electoral history. Continue…

The labour appeal

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 12:50 PM - 0 Comments

Paul Dewar details his labour policy, including a ban on replacement workers and a promise to reinstate the federal minimum wage and gradually raise it to a living wage.

A government led by Paul Dewar will legislate, at the federal level, Manitoba’s innovative “60 day rule,” to enable either party involved in an impasse to ask the Canada Industrial Relations Board to impose binding arbitration and end the strike or lockout. Since this rule was implemented in 2000, it has brought several protracted disputes to a fair and neutral resolution while creating a strong incentive for employers and workers to negotiate in good faith. Since its implementation, the number of days lost to strikes and lockouts in Manitoba has fallen by more than 2/3 compared to the previous decade.

This morning,  the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada announced its endorsement of Brian Topp. I confess I’m not well-versed in union politics, but this is apparently significant. Mr. Topp has also been endorsed by the United Steelworkers. (Though the Toronto Area Council of the United Steelworkers went with Peggy Nash.)

The United Food and Commercial Workers has endorsed Thomas Mulcair. The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers has endorsed Paul Dewar.

Debating the Office of Religious Freedom

By Paul Wells - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 12:34 PM - 0 Comments

Today we’re pleased to launch a new series debating the federal Conservatives’ plans for an Office of Religious Freedom at the Department of Foreign Affairs. Maclean’s is presenting this series in partnership with the Canadian International Council, a non-partisan, Canada-wide organization established to strengthen Canada’s foreign policy.

The debate we’re launching today concerns one of the most unusual items in the Conservatives’ 2011 election platform. Last year the party promised an Office of Religious Freedom to “promote religious freedom as a key objective of Canada’s foreign policy.” Nine months later, all signs indicate the government is set to launch this office. The cost is modest, $5 million, but the departure from the policies of previous governments is striking. And worth discussing. Continue…

The case for OAS reform

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 10:30 AM - 0 Comments

Human Resources Minister Diane Finley made her appeal for Old Age Security reform yesterday in Toronto. The Globe, Star, Postmedia and Canadian Press have their takes.

Here is the final third of the prepared text for her remarks, with all the usual caveats about checking against delivery (a full video of the speech hasn’t yet appeared online). Continue…

‘We need to finish the job of making ourselves a viable progressive alternative’

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 9:30 AM - 0 Comments

Brian Topp talks to the Toronto Star and challenges Thomas Mulcair.

He does not accept my point about restoring government revenues. That’s a pretty fundamental issue. If you don’t do that, you can’t follow through on your commitments. His proposal, to the extent that I can understand it, to divert revenues from our environment plan to general government revenues is wrong.

I haven’t heard him speak clearly on this issue of equality. Canadians are increasingly aware that the Conservatives have broken the government and there is much they can’t do together as a result. If Mitt Romney had filed that tax return that he released about three or four weeks ago in Canada, he would have paid lower tax than in the United States. That cannot stand. You cannot do what we need to do together as a society when the Conservatives have broken the government like that. It’s not about increasing taxes on “people”; it’s about reallocating money that is currently being spent on tax giveaways to people who don’t need help, in order to transfer the money to funds to people who do.

Mr. Topp also answers Mr. Mulcair’s proposal that the party needs to “renew.”

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and Stephen Harper on Iran

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 8:30 AM - 0 Comments

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Martin Dempsey, was interviewed by Fareed Zakaria last weekend and discussed his assessment of Iran’s nuclear capabilities and how the United States views the situation. Mr. Dempsey said it was “not prudent at this point to decide to attack Iran” and that sanctions and diplomacy are having an effect.

To this, he added several interesting points. First, he said the United States does not believe Iran has necessarily “decided that they will embark on the effort to weaponize their nuclear capability.” Then, he and Zakaria had this exchange.

ZAKARIA: When you observe Iranian behavior, does it strike you as highly irrational? Does it strike you as sort of unpredictable, or do they seem to follow their national interests in a fairly calculating way?

DEMPSEY: That is a great question, and I’ll tell you that I’ve been confronting that question since I commanded Central Command in 2008. And we are of the opinion that the Iranian regime is a rational actor. And it’s for that reason, I think, that we think the current path we’re on is the most prudent path at this point.

ZAKARIA: Do you think that the Israelis understand that the United States is counseling them not to strike, and do you think that they will be deterred from striking in the near future?

DEMPSEY: Well, I’m confident that they understand our concerns, that a strike at this time would be destabilizing and wouldn’t achieve their long-term objectives. But, I mean, I also understand that Israel has national interests that are unique to them. And, of course, they consider Iran to be an existential threat in a way that we have not concluded that Iran is an existential threat.

Compare and contrast that with the Prime Minister’s rhetoric on Iran. Continue…

Dancing about numbers

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 5:32 PM - 0 Comments

Alice Funke reviews the NDP membership numbers. Joan Bryden tallies reaction from the leading campaigns: including a claim from the Topp campaign that since the start of 2012 it has signed up more members in Quebec than the Mulcair campaign. Of 4,107 new members signed up in the province since January 1, Ethan Cox claims half came through the Topp campaign.

I reached out to a few campaigns for reaction. Below is some of what I heard in response. Continue…

The need for cooperation

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 3:59 PM - 0 Comments

Jamey Heath, a member of Nathan Cullen’s campaign team, responds to Bill Tieleman.

Critiques of Mr. Cullen’s proposal equate it with so-called strategic voting. Mr. Cullen is not proposing strategic voting because Mr. Tieleman is right: it does not work. He’s proposing cooperation … Every candidate proposes some form of cooperation with Liberals. Brian Topp has many things he’d consider: a coalition; an accord like the one in Ontario in the 1980s; an alliance case-by-case. He helped orchestrate 2008′s would-be coalition, when Peggy Nash was party president and Niki Ashton, Paul Dewar and Thomas Mulcair were all MPs who said yes. If differences are so vast, why does everyone agree the parties can work together? The issue isn’t if Liberals made some horrendous mistakes in government. They did. Rather, it’s that given everybody agrees they’d cooperate after an election, why not cooperate beforehand, too?

Vic Toews, meet Fake Ann Cavoukian

By Luke Simcoe - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 3:24 PM - 0 Comments

Luke Simcoe is a guest technology blogger. He will be contributing the occasional post on the Internet and the various kooks and cranks who inhabit it.

As Public Safety Minister Vic Toews watches the sordid details of his divorce get published online by an anonymous critic, he might find an unlikely shoulder to cry on.

Ontario Privacy Commissioner Ann Cavoukian has been one of the most outspoken opponents of the Toews-sponsored Bill C-30, which would grant police warantless access to Internet users’ private records. She’s called the bill a “a major intrusion into our personal lives” and a “gold mine for hackers.” But once this whole “Lawful Access” dust-up is over, Toews and Cavoukian might well be able to sit down, grab a drink and bond over being ridiculed on the Internet.

For the past two years, Cavoukian has been dogged by a satiric doppelganger on Twitter. Dubbed the Fake Ann Cavoukian, the account frequently lampoons the privacy commissioner’s policies. The real Cavoukian’s website says she “encourages the combination of privacy and security in a proactive, positive sum manner when developing new technologies.” In contrast, the counterfeit Cavoukian boasts that she has been “faking concern for privacy since 1997” and dismisses her detractors as “privacytards.”

Continue…

Bigger than Saint John

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 2:34 PM - 0 Comments

According to new figures just released by the party, the NDP now numbers 128,351 members.

Provincially, the numbers are as follows (with October 2011 figures in parentheses).

British Columbia 38,735 (30,000)
Alberta 10,249 (9,033)
Saskatchewan 11,264 (8,929)
Manitoba 12,056 (10,307)
Ontario 36,760 (22,225)
Quebec 12,266 (1,695)
New Brunswick 955 (-)
Nova Scotia 3,844 (1,300)
Newfoundland 1,030 (200)
PEI 268 (135)
Territories 924 (-)

I’ve asked the Liberals and Conservatives for their latest numbers. The Liberals were apparently at 60,000 last May.

The trouble with imaginary cooperation

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 12:46 PM - 0 Comments

Bill Tieleman finds various reasons to reject Nathan Cullen’s pursuit of joint nomination meetings.

First, electoral cooperation plans have always failed miserably. In the 2011 election, several groups promoted strategic voting – endorsing the candidate they felt had the best chance of defeating a Conservative, or retaining a close opposition seat threatened by a Tory. Project Democracy says over 405,000 people consulted their strategic voting website, and many others heard about their efforts. But while Project Democracy targeted 84 ridings, they were successful in only 26 of them, where non-Conservatives were elected. Conservatives won the other 58 ridings — or 69 per cent. Interestingly, Project Democracy admits it endorsed the “wrong” candidate in 11 ridings, meaning they promoted the candidate who it turned out had less of a chance to defeat a Conservative than another opposition candidate. Oops…

Second, it’s highly unlikely that the NDP or Liberal parties will agree to the joint nomination proposal. Aside from it requiring party constitutional changes, a majority of members would probably reject the idea.

Third, as Aristotle said: “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” In other words, you can’t simply add up Liberal, Green and NDP votes in any riding and presume they will all go to a “unity” candidate against the Conservative.

Note: Tieleman has endorsed Peggy Nash.

The Internet is the opposition

By Jesse Brown - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 12:33 PM - 0 Comments

Anonymous9000/Flickr

In today’s National Post, Andrew Coyne ponders the sudden “hysteria” that has erupted around Vic Toews’ Lawful Access legislation. Why has this Internet snooping bill suddenly inspired so much debate, controversy and activity, when a near-identical version introduced in 2005 by the Liberals was barely discussed?

After considering all possibilities, Coyne nails it: it’s the Internet, stupid. But here’s what he gets wrong: “The Internet” does not exist. Teh Internets (sic) do. Coyne considers the value of “the online community as a political force.” Interchangeably, he refers to this community as “anonymous… digital vigilantes.”

Continue…

Parliament, heal thyself

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 12:13 PM - 0 Comments

On Friday, MPs spent a couple hours—starting here, resuming here—discussing the rules and procedure of the House.

The ideas, amendments and complaints raised are likely all worth consideration, especially for fans of such stuff, but various matters of general interest came up: including time allocation, Question Period, petitions and statements by members.

Below, some chosen highlights. Continue…

How to salvage C-30

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 10:27 AM - 0 Comments

David Fraser offers four amendments.

There are many, many problems with the warrantless access to customer data in Bill C-30, known as the lawful access bill. The main problem pointed to by the proponents of the Bill is that it takes too long to get a warrant that requires an internet service provider to hand over customer name and address information that corresponds with an IP address. If that is really the problem they are trying to address, it would be best to address it by making the warrant-seeking process more efficient and limit warrantless requests to circumstances where there is a real emergency.

Ivor Tossell explains the dangers contained in the present bill.

Baird and Bibi

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 9:33 AM - 0 Comments

An early draft of John Baird’s speech to the United Nations last fall originally contained an expression of support for Palestinians.

But a lengthy paragraph that expressed positive Canadian sentiments toward the Palestinians was eventually trimmed over the course of a handful of early revisions and was eventually cut altogether. ”Canada is a leading supporter of the Palestinian people, having committed $300 million over five years to assist the Palestinian Authority to build capacity in the key areas of justice sector reform, security, and sustainable economic growth, as well as providing humanitarian assistance to Palestinians in West Bank and Gaza, including refugees,” the first draft stated.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will be in Ottawa next week to meet with Mr. Harper. The Star suggests Mr. Harper might subsequently announce a trip to Israel.

Threats and support for Vic Toews

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 8:28 AM - 0 Comments

A second video purported to be from Anonymous has been released.

The Canadian Association of Chiefs Police, on the other hand, apparently supports C-30, but it’s unclear how either side will be able to use this to bolster their respective arguments. The Harper government might appreciate the endorsement of its legislation, but it previously chose to ignore the CACP’s support for the long-gun registry. The opposition might disagree with C-30, but it still champions the CACP’s support for the long-gun registry as an important consideration.

Meanwhile, Michael Geist again offers some solutions.

NDP leadership: toward a Topp-Mulcair alliance?

By Paul Wells - Monday, February 20, 2012 at 11:47 PM - 0 Comments

How intriguing Daniel Leblanc’s new Globe story on the NDP leadership campaign is. Here are two Quebec MPs, each supporting a different candidate, who say the final choice must come down to one of two men: Brian Topp or Thomas Mulcair. (I keep listing Topp first for the sole purpose of getting a rise out of Mulcair, and I have watched him long enough to have no doubt it’s working. Punditry is fun.)

Françoise Boivin, Topp supporter: “It has to be either Brian or Thomas. I feel we have better odds of forming the next government with Brian Topp, but I don’t think we’d do badly with Thomas Mulcair.”

Tarik Brahmi, Mulcair supporter: ““I’m behind Thomas Mulcair. However, I’d prefer if the winner were Brian Topp instead of everyone’s second choice.”

Continue…

The case for Peggy Nash

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, February 20, 2012 at 3:54 PM - 0 Comments

The text of a note sent to supporters today by Nash campaign manager Riccardo Filippone. (I’ve only deleted the bit where Mr. Filippone asks for your money.)

Dear friends,

Did you hear John Ibbitson’s suggestion that the NDP must either “elect a leader with the best chance of entrenching the party’s recent political gains in Quebec and beyond or continue dreaming the social-democratic dream”?

Peggy’s answer to that? We can have both.

I have worked with Peggy since she was first elected to the House of Commons in 2006. Over this time, I’ve had the opportunity to gain insight into the impressive career that has led her to this point. At every turn, I see the realization of so many dreams she aspires to, on behalf of us all.

Continue…

The case for Brian Topp

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, February 20, 2012 at 3:46 PM - 0 Comments

Brian Topp draws perhaps the most profound compliment of the NDP leadership race to date.

NDP leadership candidate Brian Topp has concluded an energetic five-day swing through BC with a slew of new supporters including Todd Wong, the renowned founder of the Gung Haggis Fat Choy cross-cultural celebration. ”Brian has a wonderful humanistic quality.  I found him to be thoughtful and caring – not aggressive or aloof.  People that I admire and trust – they trust and admire Brian, and now so do I,” Wong said after meeting with Topp at a Chinese New Year’s celebration.

“Wonderful humanistic quality” improves upon Libby Davies’ gushing that Mr. Topp possessed a “cuteness about him.”