LP_468x60
ontario news watch
on-the-record-468x60-white
and-another-thing-468x60

When what passes for the conservative movement in this country does something abominably stupid, such as freak out about the cost of a swing set (ostensibly because the Liberals complained about a $16 glass of Conservative orange juice once upon a time?), I like to say that if there is a right-wing conspiracy in this country, then someone deserves their money back.

I say this because the left would have you believe that enormously profitable Canadian corporations are in league with conservative elected officials to screw over the little guy and enact a white supremacist agenda.

Then you look over at what the CPC is actually doing, and you see that they are putting together websites making fun of the PM's tendency to take personal days, using a joke that stopped being funny last decade.

I understand that a car full of clowns is scary for some people, but to the rest of us they're far too goofy to be considered a threat.  And so it is with the conservative movement in this country: If you're going to try to make the case that some secret injustice is being perpetrated by the right, you must absolutely provide evidence that the right is competent enough to organize and execute such a plan, even badly.

Bog-standard conservative yelling about wasted public dollars, even when that yelling plays fast and loose with actual facts, simply does not evoke associations with the Trump administration, and yet Chantal Hebert seems to be trying to do just that.

It is, of course, possible for a nominally conservative government to be threatening and ridiculous.  The actual Trump administration can preside over the ripping of children away from their parents and Twitter fights with late-night TV talk show hosts simultaneously.

But if anyone's doubling down on a fake-news narrative, it's got to be the left.  Not just because they are suggesting Scheer's evasions are tantamount to Trumpian falsehoods, but because they themselves are trying to push the narrative that Canada is being beset by an epidemic of falsehood, and that this not their own incompetence is the reason why Doug Ford won.

To ignore the fact that the Liberals ran an absolutely wretched campaign here in Ontario requires a level of intellectual dishonesty that I don't even think Trump himself would be capable of.  And yet, that's exactly what Liberal campaign manager David Herle did on the latest installment of his podcast, where he had the temerity to state (in public mind you) that "Kathleen Wynne offered a superior product to sell."

Yet as risible, and as typical, as Herle's failure to acknowledge his own failings is, it remains comparable to the distractory tactics of the CPC.  It is only when you consider the Liberal establishment's incompetence when it comes to dealing with the fake news problem and the other unsolved problems that fuel the anger of the Trumpets  that a clear distinction emerges.

The half-assed manner in which Kathleen Wynne attempted to call out Doug Ford.  Gerald Butts intervening on Twitter to shut down one single Catherine McKenna parody account after a Canadian quasi-celebrity was fooled by it.  Outsourcing the fact-checking of Canadian Facebook because we apparently aren't up to the task of doing so ourselves.  These are the solutions dreamed up by the West-Wing binge-watching blue checkmarks currently occupying the Trudeau PMO, to a problem that they told us was eating away at the fabric of our democracy.

Were Trudeau and his army of fact-checkers to actually rip those who are insufficiently verified away from their social media, and were they to actually follow the example of the Chinese basic dictatorship that they so admire, it would actually send the message that they were willing to back up their apocalyptic rhetoric with commensurate action.  But that would make it harder to fundraise off the threat of Conservative "negative and divisive politics", which is, not so coincidentally, the same sort of grift conservatives are frequently accused of.

The first person, or group of people, who can demonstrate that they can govern well, as opposed to just doing so in a way that meets fundraising targets, will find that they are the ones who are beating back the populist threat, and that's the realest news you'll hear all day.

Written by Josh Lieblein

The views, opinions and positions expressed by columnists and contributors are the author’s alone. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of our publication.


 

Parliament's summer recess has begun, and with it comes the silly season in Canadian politics, described on Wikipedia as follows: "Issues raised during this period are likely to be forgotten by the election, so candidates may rely on frivolous political posturing and hyperbole to get media attention and raise money."  Don't tell me Wikipedia is an unreliable source.

Of all the reasons the Liberal government has given the Opposition to engage in "frivolous political posturing" this year, one of the most foreseeable has been their change to the Canada Summer Jobs program, requiring applicants to attest that their organization "respect[s] individual human rights," in particular women's reproductive rights.  While the government has insisted that this refers only to an organization's "core mandate," not the personal beliefs of its members, over 1,500 applicants have declined to check the box confirming their attestation, and subsequently have been rejected.  Even if they were never planning to hire anyone to wave blown-up photos of dismembered fetuses in anyone's face, they could not bring themselves to engage in what they view as "compelled speech."

In using the Canada Summer Jobs program to remind Canadians, again, that they are pro-choice and feminist, the Liberals have politicized what was previously just another slush fund, and they haven't done it well.  They have kept themselves wide open to questions about why this Islamic non-profit, whose director has called publicly for the "eradication" of Israel, is still eligible for funding, while the annual cherry festival in Bruno, Saskatchewan, is not.  Should the Liberals end up a one-term government next year, it will be no trouble for the incoming government either to remove the pro-choice attestation entirely, or add a few attestations of their own.  I expect the Tories have already written a sample paragraph requiring applicants to promise not to undermine Canada's strategic industries.

Yet amid the (justifiable) backlash over the attestation, all of Parliament has been operating on the assumption that the Canada Summer Jobs program itself is valuable.  After all, many small businesses depend on it to pay for summer hires, and we wouldn't want Sarnia Concrete Products Ltd. to miss out.  But when governments subsidize the salaries of full-time employees of major for-profit companies, we call it corporate welfare.  The only significant difference between the two types of subsidies is the word "corporate."  In both cases, the government assumes responsibility for directly creating jobs, and recipient companies come to expect it of them.

There's more room to expect government support in the non-profit world.  As of 2009, government funding accounted for one-fifth of non-profit revenues in the "core non-profit sector," which does not include hospitals and universities.  Specific programs, like Canada Summer Jobs, can make a decisive difference to smaller non-profits.  For want of $3,000 without having to toe the Liberal line, the Bangor Sawmill Museum in Meteghan River, Nova Scotia, now unable to hire a student guide for the summer, will be closed for the season, and possibly beyond it.

It's shameful for an organization to be forced to express a political point of view that has nothing to do with their purpose, whether they agree with it or not.  But if the Canada Summer Jobs program can be weaponized in this way, so can any of the many task-specific grants available to the non-profit sector.  Were the government, via a politically disinterested arm's-length board, to take a more efficient route and provide a single, reliable percentage of direct support subject to clearly defined standards of good conduct, such as not calling for anyone's eradication non-profits would have less need to make work for seasonal employees, and be free to spend the money as they see fit, on personnel or equipment or supplies.  They'd appreciate having fewer grant applications to fill out, itself enough work for one full-time hire.

As for young people by which I mean those who have not finished high school, although the feds will cover anyone between 15 and 30  improved school volunteer programs might be a better source of character-building.  Mandate volunteer hours on a per-year basis, not as a graduation requirement, to reduce the chance of procrastination.  Make sure every student receives a list of local organizations that need volunteers, so they don't have lack of information as an excuse.  The onus is on schools, to say nothing of parents and kids themselves, to make students helpful to the community.  It should be the last thing anyone asks a politician to do.

Photo Credit: National Post

Written by Jess Morgan

The views, opinions and positions expressed by columnists and contributors are the author’s alone. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of our publication.