As usual, The Line nails it. Gerson's advice to the Liberals should be heeded - drop the bloody writ now and let's get this over with. If nothing else, it would remind Singh of the consequences of terminating CASA. I'm surprised at the number of writers who have said a confidence vote likely wouldn't happen until the spring, when the next budget would come down. But why on earth would the Tories wait that long to launch such a vote? Just drop the writ.
I'm not seeing any consequences of terminating CASA. I'm seeing the consequences of electing a leader based on tokenism. It did not take much of a pundit to see that he was a fraud. Rolex, Versace, and private schools rarely forge a "man of the people".
Ironically, Jagmeet Singh ran a highly-disciplined and enthusiastic leadership campaign, yet his actual leadership of the NDP has been anything but disciplined or enthusiastic.
God, PP is good at politics. He basically goaded Singh into doing this now and wins no matter what.
Trudeau can't leave. There is no way the NDP will let the Liberals complete a leadership race and give them a chance to get up off the mat. PP has guaranteed that he gets to run against Trudeau.
If Singh supports the government, PP continues to siphon off their voters due to their attachment to the very unpopular Liberal government. If Singh calls an election, he can still use this line of attack and he wins as he is 20 points ahead and his voters are motivated which means the polls probably understate his final victory.
The left is up against someone who is really good at his job. They are blind to the fact that he isn't trying to convince them to vote for them which is why they think his message sucks, think everyone dislikes him because they don't like them while he actually is very good at persuading voters who WOULD consider voting for him.
I do not see a guaranteed Conservative win; although, I really want a Conservative majority after the next election. Trudeau is sneaky, unethical and truth deficient. His ego is huge as a house, as is his total disdain for Pierre Poilievre. I posit Trudeau is capable of all manner of skulduggery (legal and not so legal), and certainly unethical, in order to win. Singh’s grandstanding will boost the Liberals’ not the NDP. The only thing that has really changed is the color of Singh’s headgear - Wednesday, it was shit-brindle yellow and yesterday it was NDP orange.
"Trudeau is sneaky, unethical and truth deficient. His ego is huge as a house, as is his total disdain for Pierre Poilievre. I posit Trudeau is capable of all manner of skulduggery (legal and not so legal), and certainly unethical, in order to win."
Penny, those are JT's good points; why did you not list his negatives?
Singh is absolutely terrible at politics and I don't know why people haven't been screaming this for years.
1) How do you sign a CASA without obtaining any cabinet seats?
2) Anyone with any common sense would have figured out that the Liberals would get all the credit for programs but any missteps would be equally tied to the NDP because they were supporting the government. Political insiders told Matt years ago that it was an atrocious political move. Whoever Singh is listening to should be dismissed immediately. If he isn't listening to anyone, the party needs to dismiss him immediately (probably should no matter what).
The real root of the problem for the NDP was the Avi Lewis led revolt after the 2015 election. They removed Mulcair (who might have actually won had he stayed on), learned the wrong lesson from the election and picked a young, good looking guy independent of competence thinking this was what the voters wanted. They then screwed off and did their own thing, leaving the party to flounder. Where is Avi Lewis and his cabal now?
On principle, NDP deserves to flounder. Forever. Bunch of fanatical loons, as proven by what they allowed Avi Lewis and his cabal to do. Where Avi Lewis and his cabal is now ? simply is in activities and positions to maximize personal profit.
Mulcair was the author of his own downfall insofar as when his leadership was challenged he failed to show introspection or evidence of a plan for improving party prospects going forward. That being said, the convention with the leadership review was quite fresh after the 2015 election, so obviously there was no much time for cool heads to prevail in the debate about his continued leadership.
I think the NDP were crazy for blaming their poor 2015 performance on Tom Mulcair.
Canada caught its second round of Trudeau-mania. The NDP did poorly because Justin Trudeau did so well. Personally, I think they'd have gone trounced even if they'd still had Jack Layton because neither man was Justin Trudeau.
We can say that the 2015 pro-Trudeau was wrong. We can say they were naive. But they existed and they were big.
I honestly wonder whether round two of Trudeau Mania would've happened without Jack Layton's passing. I can remember feeling at the time like Trudeau et al looked around at the political vacuum left by Layton's death and said "we can fill that".
I suspect the answer is "not a darn thing" would be different. Well, maybe a few things, but not much.
The country is generally to the right of the NDP. And Justin Trudeau is (or at least was) genuinely REALLY GOOD at getting people to vote for him.
He's better looking, he had the more established party behind him which was itself more in-line with the political centre while simultaneously being happy to convincingly steal popular policies from the NDP and was politically able to hang on to the right-of centre side of the LPC.
To keep that juggernaut down, Jack Layton would have had to be able to substantially move the NDP to the right... while not getting eaten on his left flank.
Mulcair did make critical mistakes in that campaign that eroded the NDP's initial lead. It was primarily Harper's fault that the consortium leadership debate forum was cancelled, as Harper was the first to pull-out. But the consortium was still willing to proceed with the debate without Harper, until Mulcair made the politically stupid decision to tie his own attendance to that of Harper. In politics you simply don't give a political opponent a veto on your own opportunities for *free media coverage*, or give up an easy opportunity to create photos of an empty chair for the rival party. That decision fairly or unfairly helped feed impressions that he wasn't a accessible democrat.
Also, although the NDP arguably ran on as much of a substantive platform as did the Liberals, it didn't help that the major Liberal policy announcements were more recent, and the Liberals helped to make themselves look more bold than the NDP with the deficit-spending and cannabis legalization pledges. Mulcair was too non-radical in a election that had a "change" theme like the next one is expected to.
Mulcair also like Harper went too far in setting low expectations for Trudeau's performance. Mulcair boasted that he would "wipe the floor" on Trudeau in debates, something that I cannot imagine Layton doing.
That all being said, I expect that he would make an excellent NDP Leader now, with the timeout that he has had, if he were to somehow stage a comeback.
I don't think the debate thing is a critical mistake because while I think a minority finds debates essential, I think the vast majority of voters simply aren't affected by them and they don't make any significant difference to the outcome. Furthermore the consortium debates have locked in a boring format where that rare "you had a choice sir" knockout blow is even more rare.
In short, it might bother people who subscribe to political substacks, but as has been noted... we're pretty odd about how we approach politics.
On the issue of Mr. Mulcair being too "non-radical", that's a decent enough point, except he's the leader of the NDP and is therefore constrained by that. The NDP has default strengths and default weaknesses like any party. Strength? They never have to prove they care about poor people. Given the same policy as the Conservatives, people will innately trust that the NDP cares more. But the flip side is that they're largely viewed as reckless on the financial side compared with the LPC or CPC.
Call it unfair, but Justin Trudeau can promise to spend like a drunken sailor and people will still tend to assume that the LPC is fiscally responsible. The NDP making the same or more cautious promises are a bunch of crazed yahoos who will wreck the economy.
As to the expectations? Yes, they underestimated Justin Trudeau's political skills. In retrospect, I think they were right that policies aside, he just generally sucks at the JOB of being Prime Minister. But the job of getting elected? He was WAY better at that than they imagined.
I think that Avi Lewis is going to be running for election for the NDP in BC - although it is a nice question whether his ideological brand will promote or hinder its election efforts.
Maybe he’s always been bad at politics but it’s just lost any plausible deniability. The CASA was always a death warrant for the federal NDP if they let it run its course. Might as well vote liberal if the ndp are just going to get into an agreement to prop up the liberals anyways.
I’m eager for the next election. I hope Trudeau is gone swiftly and in a clear and decisive loss. The sooner the better so we have some hope of moving on from the mess of the last years of the Trudeau government.
I have never seen nor heard any criticism of Jagmeet Singh's conduct as a Deputy Leader of the Ontario NDP, so I don't think he was always bad at politics. But evidently it is a stretch to go from a senior role in a provincial party to then becoming leader of a federal party - just not enough prior experience with the latter institution.
The NDP has always been politically incompetent. They only do well when Liberals collapse and soft NDP voters who vote Liberal to keep out the Tories come home.
But in Singh’s statement, he’s proven that the NDP is still politically inept. He spent more time talking about “fighting Conservative cuts” than about “Liberal sellouts”.
This is the same stupid strategy the NDP, even Broadbent,Layton and Mulcair, always trot out. Demonize and fear monger about the Tories and watch your soft voters in the metros and Eastern Canada flock to the Liberals. Stupid.
I’ve said this many times. If the NDP were serious, they would hammer the Liberals. But they aren’t so they won’t.
I believe Singh made his announcement as a damage control bandaid. Try to distance yourself from the Liberals by talking tough while absolutely nothing changes in reality. Singh seems to believe that he is guiding policy from the opposition benches and that belief will keep him there as long as he is able to drag things out. So yah. Bad at politics in a self delusional fashion.
Not so sure Singh gets this. The NDP elected someone who is not only bad at politics but is going down as the hypocrite that propped up Trudeau. I am sure there are a lot of N-Dippers who are shaking their head and wishing they had voted for Nathan Cullen.
Singh's move has the feel of trying to meet the emotional needs of his party: they want to be able to set policy, but they reject making the political compromises needed to win power and actually have control over that policy. They want to push the Liberals to commit to expensive, expansive programs and push wide-reaching social and economic policies; they don't want to have the hassle of responsibility for federal finances or making tough calls when union action conflicts with the broader interests of the Canadian electorate.
The CASA was a valuable bargaining point for obtaining the policy and program initiatives they wanted, but the NDP didn't like the cost it imposed in implicitly supporting other Liberal actions. They also weren't willing to accept the cost of exercising the leverage they had with the CASA, which was to force a vote of nonconfidence and an election. With the CASA, the NDP looked impotent and gullible. Now they'll merely look impotent.
As I understand it, not only is it possible that the NDP will prop up the Liberals for a further year, until the statutorily designated election date, but they may even extend that legislated date until the maximum time permitted under the Constitution - which, I think, is into 2026.
To expect a “politician” to decide things “on principle” is frankly naive.
Accordingly, if the NDP thinks that it will be better off running out the Constitutional clock, (not the statutory one), then that is what it will do.
So, in the result, Justin Trudeau may be around for quite some time.
I *think* they'd need to rescind the fixed elections law in order to do that, which means Parliament would need to sit and such a law would need to pass a majority vote. That said, we're getting well into unprecedented territory, here. JG
Jen, I would like to think that you are correct. But. My trust level for the Face Painter is non-existent.
So, to put it another way, what is the penalty for not obeying the fixed date? A complaint to, oh, the Ethics Commissioner? The Auditor General? Mere publicity is insufficient for this crew. Who knows? Perhaps the Emergency Act will need to be declared and bank accounts of political parties seized. Just spit ballin'.
Yes, I think that is right: they would have to tinker with the existing law, as the Liberals purportedly wanted to do to avoid a collision with Divali. And although I have lost track of where that particular Bill sits just now, the mechanism is available if it can glean the support of a majority in the House of Commons. And Senate approval of course.
Constitutionally speaking, it *might* be legal to ignore the fixed election-date legislation, but the blowback to doing so would be severe. The government already was sensitive enough to alter the legislation to delay by a few days, so they no doubt realize this.
Perhaps. But we are often surprised. As in the SNC Lavalin Affair. Moreover, you embrace my point: it is a political calculation. So if the the Bloc or NDP think that delay is good for THEM, then we will all have to await the Charter deadline.
The fate of the Liberal government doesn't depend on the NDP alone. If the Bloc (which has more seats then the NDP) votes with the Liberals on a confidence matter, the government will survive.
But the Bloc is currently polling ahead in Quebec and poised to gain seats. There's no reason for them to avoid an election unless they think propping up Trudeau for another year is going to increase their vote count.
They could, possibly, do it and say they are delaying a Conservative majority for a year. But I don't know how much benefit that would add once the campaign actually begins.
As the person/party who could have used their leverage to change the lot of Canadians many times over, Singh/NDP are uniquely culpable for where we are now. They have failed as both members of the opposition, and as the party who had potentially more direct influence on legislation that could help more Canadians. In a way, I hope it’s incompetence because that seems the most benign explanation.
This "benign explanation" assumes that NDP is a benign party. It has not been a benign party for a long time, since it morphed into the Not Democratic Party. It only represent political demagogues, NDP functionaries, Union functionaries. By the way, all paid out of public money.
Yesterday, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh was rushed to Ottawa General hospital for a massive blood transfusion that lasted hours. Apparently Jagmeet suffered 12 deep, painful paper (Conservative) cuts to both of his hands, while continually ripping and tearing apart the CASA agreement. Justin Trudeau sent a card and orange flowers to Jagmeet's room and Pierre Poilievre sent an apple. The Canadian Red Cross would appreciate any and all blood donations.
Well, if you don’t count foreign interference, bus loads of students, CBC propaganda, Elections Canada dismissing intelligence warnings, Elections Canada not counting all the votes, ad infinitum, well, sure honest elections..
The foreign interference in the last election *could not* have swapped the outcome of even a single riding. The vast majority of local voters make preferences based upon national trends, and the ridings with the alleged interference had gaps of victory far too large for any local activism to account for the difference.
Stefan, if you took that at face value then I have some ocean front property in Winnipeg that I would like to sell you.
The statements from the various parties with those conclusions examined the national election vote. They didn't examine the various party nominations that put in place many, many "sympathetic" candidates.
Oh, it's easy and very possible for foreign powers to manipulate nomination contests, and maybe that happened in the case of Han Dong's nomination. I sensed from Penny's comments that she was hinting that the fundamental party-wide election outcomes were manufactured - which is not possible based on what we know about how Canadian elections work. At worst, a couple or few MPs are illegitimate - assuming that parties' standard nomination contests have any integrity to begin with.
Yes, I (reluctantly?) accept the conclusions of which you speak but I really am uncertain as to whether there should be any conclusions about nomination contests given what we have heard about foreign students (i.e. not Canadian citizens) being "encouraged" to participate in nomination races, the lack of controls about who is eligible to participate in those nominations, etc.
If you accept that there are "some" (number unspecified but let's use your "couple") races where there was malign influence resulting in "certain" candidates winning, you also need to think about nomination races that were influenced and because the "correct" candidate won the nomination for a "safe" riding, the foreign actors did not need to use malign means to achieve the win.
In other words, it's complicated! But, beyond complicated, it ends up with foreign influence.
You “sensed” something that wasn’t there. I was “hinting” at nothing. I’ve observed (see that, “observed” not “sensed”) that you find it necessary to, shall we say, pontificate on all manner of things declaring others’ opinions invalid. I do not accept your authority.
He obviously was kidding for we all know that the elections are tainted, starting with the nomination process and right through the actual election process.
As usual, The Line nails it. Gerson's advice to the Liberals should be heeded - drop the bloody writ now and let's get this over with. If nothing else, it would remind Singh of the consequences of terminating CASA. I'm surprised at the number of writers who have said a confidence vote likely wouldn't happen until the spring, when the next budget would come down. But why on earth would the Tories wait that long to launch such a vote? Just drop the writ.
I'm not seeing any consequences of terminating CASA. I'm seeing the consequences of electing a leader based on tokenism. It did not take much of a pundit to see that he was a fraud. Rolex, Versace, and private schools rarely forge a "man of the people".
Ironically, Jagmeet Singh ran a highly-disciplined and enthusiastic leadership campaign, yet his actual leadership of the NDP has been anything but disciplined or enthusiastic.
He did seem VERY impressive in the early days... but dang!
I seem to recall a lot of TikTok skateboarding with bros for his campaign, nothing substantive
God, PP is good at politics. He basically goaded Singh into doing this now and wins no matter what.
Trudeau can't leave. There is no way the NDP will let the Liberals complete a leadership race and give them a chance to get up off the mat. PP has guaranteed that he gets to run against Trudeau.
If Singh supports the government, PP continues to siphon off their voters due to their attachment to the very unpopular Liberal government. If Singh calls an election, he can still use this line of attack and he wins as he is 20 points ahead and his voters are motivated which means the polls probably understate his final victory.
The left is up against someone who is really good at his job. They are blind to the fact that he isn't trying to convince them to vote for them which is why they think his message sucks, think everyone dislikes him because they don't like them while he actually is very good at persuading voters who WOULD consider voting for him.
I do not see a guaranteed Conservative win; although, I really want a Conservative majority after the next election. Trudeau is sneaky, unethical and truth deficient. His ego is huge as a house, as is his total disdain for Pierre Poilievre. I posit Trudeau is capable of all manner of skulduggery (legal and not so legal), and certainly unethical, in order to win. Singh’s grandstanding will boost the Liberals’ not the NDP. The only thing that has really changed is the color of Singh’s headgear - Wednesday, it was shit-brindle yellow and yesterday it was NDP orange.
"Trudeau is sneaky, unethical and truth deficient. His ego is huge as a house, as is his total disdain for Pierre Poilievre. I posit Trudeau is capable of all manner of skulduggery (legal and not so legal), and certainly unethical, in order to win."
Penny, those are JT's good points; why did you not list his negatives?
Singh is absolutely terrible at politics and I don't know why people haven't been screaming this for years.
1) How do you sign a CASA without obtaining any cabinet seats?
2) Anyone with any common sense would have figured out that the Liberals would get all the credit for programs but any missteps would be equally tied to the NDP because they were supporting the government. Political insiders told Matt years ago that it was an atrocious political move. Whoever Singh is listening to should be dismissed immediately. If he isn't listening to anyone, the party needs to dismiss him immediately (probably should no matter what).
The real root of the problem for the NDP was the Avi Lewis led revolt after the 2015 election. They removed Mulcair (who might have actually won had he stayed on), learned the wrong lesson from the election and picked a young, good looking guy independent of competence thinking this was what the voters wanted. They then screwed off and did their own thing, leaving the party to flounder. Where is Avi Lewis and his cabal now?
On principle, NDP deserves to flounder. Forever. Bunch of fanatical loons, as proven by what they allowed Avi Lewis and his cabal to do. Where Avi Lewis and his cabal is now ? simply is in activities and positions to maximize personal profit.
Mulcair was the author of his own downfall insofar as when his leadership was challenged he failed to show introspection or evidence of a plan for improving party prospects going forward. That being said, the convention with the leadership review was quite fresh after the 2015 election, so obviously there was no much time for cool heads to prevail in the debate about his continued leadership.
I think the NDP were crazy for blaming their poor 2015 performance on Tom Mulcair.
Canada caught its second round of Trudeau-mania. The NDP did poorly because Justin Trudeau did so well. Personally, I think they'd have gone trounced even if they'd still had Jack Layton because neither man was Justin Trudeau.
We can say that the 2015 pro-Trudeau was wrong. We can say they were naive. But they existed and they were big.
I honestly wonder whether round two of Trudeau Mania would've happened without Jack Layton's passing. I can remember feeling at the time like Trudeau et al looked around at the political vacuum left by Layton's death and said "we can fill that".
I suspect the answer is "not a darn thing" would be different. Well, maybe a few things, but not much.
The country is generally to the right of the NDP. And Justin Trudeau is (or at least was) genuinely REALLY GOOD at getting people to vote for him.
He's better looking, he had the more established party behind him which was itself more in-line with the political centre while simultaneously being happy to convincingly steal popular policies from the NDP and was politically able to hang on to the right-of centre side of the LPC.
To keep that juggernaut down, Jack Layton would have had to be able to substantially move the NDP to the right... while not getting eaten on his left flank.
I just don't see that happening.
Mulcair did make critical mistakes in that campaign that eroded the NDP's initial lead. It was primarily Harper's fault that the consortium leadership debate forum was cancelled, as Harper was the first to pull-out. But the consortium was still willing to proceed with the debate without Harper, until Mulcair made the politically stupid decision to tie his own attendance to that of Harper. In politics you simply don't give a political opponent a veto on your own opportunities for *free media coverage*, or give up an easy opportunity to create photos of an empty chair for the rival party. That decision fairly or unfairly helped feed impressions that he wasn't a accessible democrat.
Also, although the NDP arguably ran on as much of a substantive platform as did the Liberals, it didn't help that the major Liberal policy announcements were more recent, and the Liberals helped to make themselves look more bold than the NDP with the deficit-spending and cannabis legalization pledges. Mulcair was too non-radical in a election that had a "change" theme like the next one is expected to.
Mulcair also like Harper went too far in setting low expectations for Trudeau's performance. Mulcair boasted that he would "wipe the floor" on Trudeau in debates, something that I cannot imagine Layton doing.
That all being said, I expect that he would make an excellent NDP Leader now, with the timeout that he has had, if he were to somehow stage a comeback.
I don't think the debate thing is a critical mistake because while I think a minority finds debates essential, I think the vast majority of voters simply aren't affected by them and they don't make any significant difference to the outcome. Furthermore the consortium debates have locked in a boring format where that rare "you had a choice sir" knockout blow is even more rare.
In short, it might bother people who subscribe to political substacks, but as has been noted... we're pretty odd about how we approach politics.
On the issue of Mr. Mulcair being too "non-radical", that's a decent enough point, except he's the leader of the NDP and is therefore constrained by that. The NDP has default strengths and default weaknesses like any party. Strength? They never have to prove they care about poor people. Given the same policy as the Conservatives, people will innately trust that the NDP cares more. But the flip side is that they're largely viewed as reckless on the financial side compared with the LPC or CPC.
Call it unfair, but Justin Trudeau can promise to spend like a drunken sailor and people will still tend to assume that the LPC is fiscally responsible. The NDP making the same or more cautious promises are a bunch of crazed yahoos who will wreck the economy.
As to the expectations? Yes, they underestimated Justin Trudeau's political skills. In retrospect, I think they were right that policies aside, he just generally sucks at the JOB of being Prime Minister. But the job of getting elected? He was WAY better at that than they imagined.
I think that Avi Lewis is going to be running for election for the NDP in BC - although it is a nice question whether his ideological brand will promote or hinder its election efforts.
Maybe he’s always been bad at politics but it’s just lost any plausible deniability. The CASA was always a death warrant for the federal NDP if they let it run its course. Might as well vote liberal if the ndp are just going to get into an agreement to prop up the liberals anyways.
I’m eager for the next election. I hope Trudeau is gone swiftly and in a clear and decisive loss. The sooner the better so we have some hope of moving on from the mess of the last years of the Trudeau government.
I have never seen nor heard any criticism of Jagmeet Singh's conduct as a Deputy Leader of the Ontario NDP, so I don't think he was always bad at politics. But evidently it is a stretch to go from a senior role in a provincial party to then becoming leader of a federal party - just not enough prior experience with the latter institution.
Narrator: "He does not see it."
The NDP has always been politically incompetent. They only do well when Liberals collapse and soft NDP voters who vote Liberal to keep out the Tories come home.
But in Singh’s statement, he’s proven that the NDP is still politically inept. He spent more time talking about “fighting Conservative cuts” than about “Liberal sellouts”.
This is the same stupid strategy the NDP, even Broadbent,Layton and Mulcair, always trot out. Demonize and fear monger about the Tories and watch your soft voters in the metros and Eastern Canada flock to the Liberals. Stupid.
I’ve said this many times. If the NDP were serious, they would hammer the Liberals. But they aren’t so they won’t.
I was mildly hopeful in the beginning but Singh IS terrible at politics. What I wouldn’t give for an Ed Broadbent or a Jack Layton…
I believe Singh made his announcement as a damage control bandaid. Try to distance yourself from the Liberals by talking tough while absolutely nothing changes in reality. Singh seems to believe that he is guiding policy from the opposition benches and that belief will keep him there as long as he is able to drag things out. So yah. Bad at politics in a self delusional fashion.
Brilliant piece from Jen.
I'm pretty sure the Tories are going to try to make every vote a confidence vote as soon as possible to hold Jagmeet's feet to the flames - meep meep
Not so sure Singh gets this. The NDP elected someone who is not only bad at politics but is going down as the hypocrite that propped up Trudeau. I am sure there are a lot of N-Dippers who are shaking their head and wishing they had voted for Nathan Cullen.
Singh's move has the feel of trying to meet the emotional needs of his party: they want to be able to set policy, but they reject making the political compromises needed to win power and actually have control over that policy. They want to push the Liberals to commit to expensive, expansive programs and push wide-reaching social and economic policies; they don't want to have the hassle of responsibility for federal finances or making tough calls when union action conflicts with the broader interests of the Canadian electorate.
The CASA was a valuable bargaining point for obtaining the policy and program initiatives they wanted, but the NDP didn't like the cost it imposed in implicitly supporting other Liberal actions. They also weren't willing to accept the cost of exercising the leverage they had with the CASA, which was to force a vote of nonconfidence and an election. With the CASA, the NDP looked impotent and gullible. Now they'll merely look impotent.
An accurate description of the Not Democratic Party. Never was a serious party, and never will be. Always lives in a coocoo cloud.
As I understand it, not only is it possible that the NDP will prop up the Liberals for a further year, until the statutorily designated election date, but they may even extend that legislated date until the maximum time permitted under the Constitution - which, I think, is into 2026.
To expect a “politician” to decide things “on principle” is frankly naive.
Accordingly, if the NDP thinks that it will be better off running out the Constitutional clock, (not the statutory one), then that is what it will do.
So, in the result, Justin Trudeau may be around for quite some time.
I *think* they'd need to rescind the fixed elections law in order to do that, which means Parliament would need to sit and such a law would need to pass a majority vote. That said, we're getting well into unprecedented territory, here. JG
Jen, I would like to think that you are correct. But. My trust level for the Face Painter is non-existent.
So, to put it another way, what is the penalty for not obeying the fixed date? A complaint to, oh, the Ethics Commissioner? The Auditor General? Mere publicity is insufficient for this crew. Who knows? Perhaps the Emergency Act will need to be declared and bank accounts of political parties seized. Just spit ballin'.
Yes, I think that is right: they would have to tinker with the existing law, as the Liberals purportedly wanted to do to avoid a collision with Divali. And although I have lost track of where that particular Bill sits just now, the mechanism is available if it can glean the support of a majority in the House of Commons. And Senate approval of course.
Constitutionally speaking, it *might* be legal to ignore the fixed election-date legislation, but the blowback to doing so would be severe. The government already was sensitive enough to alter the legislation to delay by a few days, so they no doubt realize this.
Perhaps. But we are often surprised. As in the SNC Lavalin Affair. Moreover, you embrace my point: it is a political calculation. So if the the Bloc or NDP think that delay is good for THEM, then we will all have to await the Charter deadline.
The fate of the Liberal government doesn't depend on the NDP alone. If the Bloc (which has more seats then the NDP) votes with the Liberals on a confidence matter, the government will survive.
But the Bloc is currently polling ahead in Quebec and poised to gain seats. There's no reason for them to avoid an election unless they think propping up Trudeau for another year is going to increase their vote count.
They could, possibly, do it and say they are delaying a Conservative majority for a year. But I don't know how much benefit that would add once the campaign actually begins.
As the person/party who could have used their leverage to change the lot of Canadians many times over, Singh/NDP are uniquely culpable for where we are now. They have failed as both members of the opposition, and as the party who had potentially more direct influence on legislation that could help more Canadians. In a way, I hope it’s incompetence because that seems the most benign explanation.
This "benign explanation" assumes that NDP is a benign party. It has not been a benign party for a long time, since it morphed into the Not Democratic Party. It only represent political demagogues, NDP functionaries, Union functionaries. By the way, all paid out of public money.
Right? Right?!?
Yesterday, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh was rushed to Ottawa General hospital for a massive blood transfusion that lasted hours. Apparently Jagmeet suffered 12 deep, painful paper (Conservative) cuts to both of his hands, while continually ripping and tearing apart the CASA agreement. Justin Trudeau sent a card and orange flowers to Jagmeet's room and Pierre Poilievre sent an apple. The Canadian Red Cross would appreciate any and all blood donations.
Right ?...Wrong ?...maybe right ?...maybe wrong ?...fuck me , what a country this is...sigh...at least we still have honest elections , right .
Well, if you don’t count foreign interference, bus loads of students, CBC propaganda, Elections Canada dismissing intelligence warnings, Elections Canada not counting all the votes, ad infinitum, well, sure honest elections..
The foreign interference in the last election *could not* have swapped the outcome of even a single riding. The vast majority of local voters make preferences based upon national trends, and the ridings with the alleged interference had gaps of victory far too large for any local activism to account for the difference.
Stefan, if you took that at face value then I have some ocean front property in Winnipeg that I would like to sell you.
The statements from the various parties with those conclusions examined the national election vote. They didn't examine the various party nominations that put in place many, many "sympathetic" candidates.
Oh, it's easy and very possible for foreign powers to manipulate nomination contests, and maybe that happened in the case of Han Dong's nomination. I sensed from Penny's comments that she was hinting that the fundamental party-wide election outcomes were manufactured - which is not possible based on what we know about how Canadian elections work. At worst, a couple or few MPs are illegitimate - assuming that parties' standard nomination contests have any integrity to begin with.
Welllllllll...................
Yes, I (reluctantly?) accept the conclusions of which you speak but I really am uncertain as to whether there should be any conclusions about nomination contests given what we have heard about foreign students (i.e. not Canadian citizens) being "encouraged" to participate in nomination races, the lack of controls about who is eligible to participate in those nominations, etc.
If you accept that there are "some" (number unspecified but let's use your "couple") races where there was malign influence resulting in "certain" candidates winning, you also need to think about nomination races that were influenced and because the "correct" candidate won the nomination for a "safe" riding, the foreign actors did not need to use malign means to achieve the win.
In other words, it's complicated! But, beyond complicated, it ends up with foreign influence.
You “sensed” something that wasn’t there. I was “hinting” at nothing. I’ve observed (see that, “observed” not “sensed”) that you find it necessary to, shall we say, pontificate on all manner of things declaring others’ opinions invalid. I do not accept your authority.
I am definitely not an authority on the thinking of a complete stranger.
You're kidding, right?
He obviously was kidding for we all know that the elections are tainted, starting with the nomination process and right through the actual election process.