February 2019 - Loonie Politics

The Ontario PC once and would-be leader finally pulls the plug on his aspirations after a wildly unpredictable ride

Is he in? Is he out?

Welcome to another roller-coaster ride in the Ontario PC Party, courtesy of former leader turned leadership candidate Patrick Brown. Or, as some of us like to call it, "Monday."

After several polls indicated Brown was either ahead or slightly behind in the Progressive Conservative leadership race, news broke that he was considering dropping out.

Hold on. The same person who resigned on Jan. 25 after CTV News reported two allegations of sexual misconduct, who went into seclusion for a few weeks, started rebuilding his shattered public image when important details in CTV's story began to unravel, improved his standing during a Global News interview, re-entered the leadership race on the final day (Feb. 16), and was officially green-lit five days later?

Yes, indeed.

First came the unconfirmed report from media outlets, and individuals like the National Post's John Ivison, that Brown was "seriously considering" pulling out.

However, according to his spokesperson, Alise Mills, the family had dealt with personal attacks but he "has not stepped down" and "[i]t's up to the media to end the speculation that they've stirred up."

That news was followed by information from TVO host (and, more recently, social media doyen) Steve Paikin. He wrote that Brown was "considering dropping out" after a late-night organizational phone call on Feb. 25, expressing "frustration at the constant attacks on his friends/family" and his mother having "been hospitalized."

But hold on: Paikin tweeted a few minutes later that Brown's campaign had officially said, "there is no resignation, no withdrawal, we're just dealing with the constant attacks."

What on earth was going on?

This was followed by the Toronto Star's Robert Benzie. He wrote about a May 2 email exchange between Brown, then-PC executive director Bob Stanley and then-PC president Rick Dykstra related to a Hamilton West-Ancaster-Dundas nomination meeting. The former PC leader reportedly wrote, "Let them all fight it out. And get me the result I want. But no disqualifications here. Kitchen is too hot." (Hamilton police are investigating this bombshell allegation.)

From there, it turned into an even bigger political typhoon.

News organizations produced varying accounts of 'Yes, he's staying in' and 'No, he's leaving the race.'

CBC's Mike Crawley and Meaghan Fitzpatrick attempted to create direction for this rudderless story. Paikin tweeted two hours later that Brown would be dropping out after all. The Toronto Sun's Antonella Artuso and James Wallace quoted a source who said, "It certainly looks like he's stepping down."

Even J. David Wake, Ontario's integrity commissioner, stepped into this pit of snakes by announcing he would investigate PC MPP Randy Hillier's complaint against Brown for supposed financial irregularities.

Hence, Brown went from being a politician who few knew about to a politician who few wanted to hear about again!

The media circus came to a screeching halt when Mills issued this tweet: "Statement from Patrick Brown to follow shortly."

Everyone waited. Within two hours, she tweeted that his statement would be issued "after meeting with his campaign staff later today."

More waiting.

Finally, the announcement arrived. Brown was dropping out to concentrate on three things: "holding CTV accountable," "focus on policy" and "protecting family and friends."

Having watched, observed and commentated on Canadian politics for two decades, I can honestly say this whole episode has been one of the most bizarre things I've ever seen. Brown's decision to drop out was the icing on the cake.

Maybe it's all for the best. Too many dark clouds of controversy swirl above Brown's head. The remaining leadership candidates Christine Elliott, Doug Ford, Tanya Granic Allen and Caroline Mulroney can all legitimately claim they'll put a fresh coat of paint on the old, tired Big Blue Machine.

Is this Brown's last stand?

Maybe, unless the political rodeo decides the bucking bronco deserves on more chance at glory.

Troy Media columnist and political commentator Michael Taube is also a Washington Times contributor, Canadian Jewish News columnist, and radio and TV pundit. He was also a speechwriter for former Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

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.

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Well, that about wraps it up for Trudeau, doesn't it? Either Jody Raybould-Wilson is lying, or she's deluded, or the Prime Minister needs to resign. It's that simple.

Her testimony Wednesday was clear and consistent in its general tone and its agonizing detail. She was repeatedly pressured to interfere in the prosecution of SNC-Lavalin on grounds that are specifically legally excluded, from the national economic interest to the Liberals' partisan fortunes. And when she resisted with increasing bluntness she was fired and her deputy minister was told one of the first items for her replacement would be to discuss a "Deferred Prosecution Agreement" for SNC-Lavalin withâ€¦ the Prime Minister.

Cries of "resign" are too common in politics. But if it's true, a number of people must step down and will be lucky to escape prosecution. So let us take the possibilities in order.

First, perhaps she is lying. But for what purpose? And how? I'm not raising this possibility because I think it plausible. I'm just trying to be systematic given how much is at stake.

Frankly I cannot see any motive for Raybould-Wilson to lie. She wasn't cornered politically, cutting a deal with prosecutors or angling for a book deal. To suggest that she concocted this whole tale because she totally misunderstood a series of communications or was petty and resentful seems to take us into the realm of delusion not deception. And in any case her testimony does not bear the "stamp of imposture" let alone derangement.

Crucially, she took notes, very wise when you start to think something sinister is happening. Vague allegations of pressure, dim recollections of meetings and conversations, a sense of hint and innuendo, these could be put down to error, misinterpretation or even misrepresentation. But she gave verifiable dates and places, and credible aides-memoire containing precisely the slimy phrases people would use in meetings and phone calls whose purpose and number (roughly 20) was already well-nigh inexplicable if they were not to put improper pressure on the Attorney General of Canada over a DPA for SNC-Lavalin.

So is anyone prepared to call her a liar? In one sense they already did. From former Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister Gerald Butts to Clerk of the Privy Council Michael Wernick to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, they insisted there was no improper pressure. But it was always done with just enough vagueness to confuse the issueâ€¦ until she laid out the names, dates and places.

Now that the rubber has hit the road, do they dispute that these discussions happened? Hardly. Wernick admitted meeting Raybould-Wilson on Dec. 19 and raising the dire economic consequences if SNC-Lavalin did not get a DPA. Surely he knows the law says "the prosecutor must not consider the national economic interest" when granting one. But he insisted it was "lawful and appropriate" for him to, you know, mention it anyway.

Which gives you some idea how far they'd get denying the conversations took place at all. But then what do they claim went on in those meetings and, crucially, what is their supporting evidence? Raybould-Wilson's notes have a dismal plausibility. So what have Butts, Wernick, Trudeau's Chief of Staff Katie Telford, Finance Minister Bill Morneau's Chief of Staff Ben Chin, and indeed Trudeau himself, to offer? It's hard to forge such things. But blank paper now looks very bad. Have they got anything convincing?

If not, well, is Raybould-Wilson perhaps insane? Again I ask not because it seems likely but because, as C.S. Lewis pointed out in a very different context, there really are only three possibilities. Either she is lying, she is a lunatic or a bunch of people better call their own lawyers while walking in the snow.

Obviously she does not give a general impression of madness. But there has been more than a hint that on this particular issue she was delusional, that she imagined the whole thing, misreading helpful practical discussions about context as threatening and improper and a cabinet shuffle demotion as a firing from her old job. She is, someone whispered, "difficult". Not a team player. Sort ofâ€¦ unhinged.

Regrettably for this line of argument, if Raybould-Wilson suffered a DPA paranoid delusion it was remarkably detailed and plausible. It is those denouncing her whose interpretation seems imprecise yet also incompatible with the known facts and our understanding of human nature and politics. It is they who had every reason to lie, and whose conduct exhibits all the "tells" from shifting stories to inexplicable resignations to pompously belligerent rhetoric including Wernick's about political assassination. Besides, we need the same evidence for her delusion as we would for her deception: Credible, documented accounts of what happened that contradict her version.

OK, there's one last line of defence, the PM's famous relativism. "I completely disagree with the former attorney general's characterization of events," he smirked Wednesday, apparently denying not her truth but the very concept of truth, just as he once shrugged off accusations of groping with the postmodern trope about different people experiencing things differently.

"'What is truth?' said jesting Pilate, and would not stay for an answer." But if we do, and if Raybould-Wilson is not lying or nuts, she was the target of an orchestrated campaign to pervert the course of justice directed from the very top. In which case Trudeau must resign. So must the PCO clerk, along with all Trudeau's staff who were involved. And Morneau's staff who pressured her, while Morneau himself only hangs on if he somehow persuades us he knew nothing about it. And the RCMP must investigate.

It is that simple.

Photo Credit: Jeff Burney, Loonie Politics

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This week, the governing Liberals proved beyond a shadow of a doubt what many of us predicted they would prove sooner or later: that the sunny, hopeful party of Justin Trudeau is the same wretched hive of corporatism and self-interest that it was 15 years prior. That shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone who has observed Canadian politics for long enough. What should come as a surprise is that these Liberals suck at it.

Ex-Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould's long-awaited testimony to the House of Commons justice committee was a masterclass in humiliation. She had the good sense to keep careful track of everything that apparatchiks from the Prime Minister's Office to the Privy Council Office to the Office of the Minister of Finance said to her and her staff in the matter of the disgraced SNC-Lavalin. She had the nerve to lay it all out for the committee, and Canadians, to hear. She had the patience to wait until Trudeau had no choice but to free her up to speak. If anyone in Ottawa is certain to have more than one vertebra, it's her.

And Trudeau himself? When tips came in that he'd be holding a media availability on the night of the testimony, we immediately reloaded our popcorn buckets, anticipating even more entertainment. And we got it to a somewhat lesser extent when he said that that he "completely disagreed" with the testimony that, moments later, he admitted he had not seen.

Such public self-soiling demonstrates that Trudeau's skill with political optics has been greatly exaggerated. He's been better at it than either Stephen Harper or Andrew Scheer, without question. But that's a bit like pointing out that I am taller than Danny DeVito: technically true, but deeply misleading.

When a high-profile cabinet minister becomes insolent, and shows no sign of letting up on their insolence, party heads and their flunkies have two options: neutralize or destroy. For the first option, there was no better portfolio to offer JWR than Justice, so perhaps they could have promised to make good on one of her cherished causes in exchange for her obedience. For the second, if they had any dirt on her that was better than her being "difficult," they would have leaked it sooner, perhaps to one of those op-ed writers that PMO chief of staff Katie Telford knows.

A true Magnificent Bastard would have employed a tactic like these, were they available, before JWR had a chance to win the hearts and minds of #cdnpoli junkies. Trudeau, clearly, is not that bastard. Nor is Telford. Nor is ex-Principal Secretary Gerald Butts. Nor is Finance Minister Bill Morneau. Nor is Clerk of the Privy Council Michael Wernick. Take your pick. I've got six more.

The Liberals not named in JWR's testimony aren't faring much better. Global Affairs Minister Chrystia Freehand, the highest-ranking party member not to have any evident involvement, has signaled her solidarity with Trudeau. During the committee hearing, MPs Randy Boissonault and Iqra Khalid repeatedly asked JWR why she did not speak to Trudeau about the inappropriateness of the pressure being exerted on her which, of course, she did. The cabinet and the backbench are mostly with Trudeau. Unless there really is a Magnificent Bastard sharpening their knives in the shadows, there appears to be little chance that he leaves his leadership any day soon.

That, as far as we know, takes us to October's federal election. Barring any surprises of sufficient magnitude to rehabilitate Trudeau's image, how will he convince Canadians to trust him a second time? By not being a Conservative, he says, with the sort of oozing arrogance that only a Liberal could possess. Because Harper.

Speaking of which, how is Not Actually Harper But Close Enough handling this one? Calling for Trudeau's resignation, naturally, as well as an RCMP investigation "into the numerous examples of justice the former Attorney General detailed in her testimony." That was unnecessary. All he had to do when asked for comment was say "I have nothing to add to that," then exit to bask quietly in his opponents' bumbling. JWR may have done 90 percent of his job for him in the span of a few hours.

Of course, that's no guarantee of anything. There's still a very good chance that Scheer will not be prime minister by this fall. But between Trudeau's dodginess and his incompetence at being just dodgy enough, there's a good chance that he won't, either.

Photo Credit: CBC News

Written by Jess Morgan

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Jody Wilson-Raybould controls the narrative over the SNC-Lavalin controversy. But how do we know what's really true?

Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. (John 8:32)

There was a time in our society when this important biblical passage meant something. Honesty was the best policy. Always follow the straight and narrow path in life. Young George Washington couldn't lie to his father about chopping down a cherry tree (although that was nothing more than a myth).

Sadly, this is no longer the case.

The majority of people remain good, honest and decent. But a not-so-insignificant minority will deny, ignore, twist or even lie about the truth. The repercussions are meaningless to them and they care not a whit about the ill effect it has on our democratic institutions.

Take the controversy between former Liberal cabinet minister Jody Wilson-Raybould and the prime minister's office with respect to the SNC-Lavalin controversy.

It's alleged the PMO tried to influence or pressure Wilson-Raybould to intervene in a criminal proceeding involving the Montreal-based engineering/construction company.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the PMO have denied pressuring her, although they've apologized for not defending her in public.

Wilson-Raybould, a former Justice minister, attorney general of Canada and Veterans Affairs minister, has maintained radio silence for most of the past two weeks due to attorney-client privilege.

The notable exception was her Feb. 20 statement in the House of Commons. "I understand fully that Canadians want to know the truth and want transparency," she said. "Privilege and confidentiality are not mine to waive, and I hope that I have the opportunity to speak my truth."

The standing ovation Wilson-Raybould received from opposition parties in Parliament, juxtaposed with the silent, stone-faced looks from her Liberal colleagues, was a powerful and stunning image few Canadians will forget.

One of them is telling the truth (more or less) and the other is lying. Which is which?

I thought former lawyer Bryan Dale crafted it nicely in a Feb. 21 tweet: "I still don't trust anyone who speaks of 'my truth'. I don't want her truth, I want the truth." His second line is exactly what most Canadians want, need and/or expect to happen.

But will it come to fruition?

The Liberal government has been skating around this controversy to the point where giant figure eights on the ice could be easily seen in space. For instance, they denied the original Globe and Mail bombshell report about SNC-Lavalin, but that's no longer a strong defence in light of what's come out.

Trudeau initially claimed he didn't directly influence Wilson-Raybould to intervene but wouldn't immediately tackle the allegation of the PMO pressuring her.

Conversations about SNC-Lavalin have changed from almost nothing to an admission of spirited debate. Party unity has been demanded, but some Liberal MPs have clearly broken ranks and defended their colleague.

Since the Liberal version of the truth is so badly tainted in the eyes of many Canadians of different political stripes, Wilson-Raybould's version of the truth will become the default position. No matter what she says or does from this point.

Does that mean we can trust her truth?

It depends on your perspective.

If you believe that one party or individual has to be right and the other has to be wrong, her impending testimony at the House of Commons justice committee seems stronger.

If you're content with most of the truth coming out of the SNC-Lavalin controversy, she still comes out ahead because she seems more honest and ethical.

If you don't trust anything politicians or parties say, no one comes out ahead. But her version doesn't lose any credibility with less cynical individuals.

Wilson-Raybould, therefore, has an enormous political advantage over Trudeau and the PMO. She controls the political narrative, can bide her time and get her thoughts together.

That may just mean the truth will set her free.

Troy Media columnist and political commentator Michael Taube was a speechwriter for former prime minister Stephen Harper.

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Should Justin Trudeau resign as prime minister?

The question's been posed now by Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer, after a jaw-dropping and frank bit of testimony by the former attorney general and justice minister Jody Wilson-Raybould on Wednesday.

In that testimony Wilson-Raybould took a can full of gas and a handful of matches and did her damnedest to set alight the collective pants of the residents of the Prime Minister's Office. And, you know, she did a pretty bang up job for one afternoon's work.

If you were among those thinking the last few weeks of simmering scandal on how SNC-Lavalin wasn't given a sweetheart deferred prosecution, despite pressure from the PMO placed on the former attorney general, was a big nothingburger, I have bad news. If you thought this whole thing was a creation of the media, I'm afraid you'll have to hang onto your Butts â€” though not Gerry's â€” because things just got wild.

Wilson-Raybould sat in front of the committee and not only confirmed all the bad things we had been hearing, but added detail showing how much worse the reality was to the vague sketches we had read up to this point.

At the very top she said, "For a period of approximately four months between September and December 2018, I experienced a consistent and sustained effort by many people within the government to seek to politically interfere in the exercise of prosecutorial discretion in my role as the attorney general of Canada in an inappropriate effort to secure a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) with SNC-Lavalin." And then it went downhill from there. (You can read her full opening statement here.)

What's clear now, after Wilson-Raybould's testimony, is that many, many people in Trudeau's office tried to "find a solution" making SNC-Lavalin's corporate prosecution go away. Putting pressure, through suggestion, half-concealed threats, sly references to jobs â€” those of Quebecers and maybe someone else's, if you catch my drift Jody â€” and then even the prime minister himself, in Wilson-Raybould's words, reminding her of his position as a QuÃ©bec MP, and that SNC is an important employer, Jody, and you know how much Quebecers like jobs, Jody.

The former attorney general went through a series of her interactions and her staff's interactions with Trudeau, with his chief of staff Katie Telford, with his (former) principal secretary Gerald Butts, with the clerk of the privy council Michael Wernick, and on and on, and how each of them in their own way told her how important it was, in not quite so many words, that this whole SNC thing go away.

And what her hours of testimony lay bare is to what lengths this government works not for you, or I, but for the interests of all the big corporate forces politicians in this country have always looked out for. That no matter what the law said, or what the prosecutors on the ground said or what the attorney general said, what was important â€” I'm making inferences here again â€” was winning seats. Holding power, keeping the narrative intact, playing for Team Trudeau, was what was important.

She detailed one phone call, while she was not long for her post as justice minister, with the top bureaucrat, the supposedly non-partisan Michael Wernick. He told her several times how important the jobs at SNC were, and how important the prime minister thought they were, and implied that her job was perhaps at stake if something couldn't be done to protect the company from a lengthy trial.

By the end of the day today, Trudeau found himself in Montreal, at a party for Rachel Bendayan's volunteers, nominally to thank them for their help getting her elected in this week's by-election. He was more of a bring-down, lamely insisting his was the party of jobs and Canadians would make the right choice come October's election. Nothing says party quite like questions in French and then English asking whether you think you should resign your job.

And lately, that's been his role. The spoiler, the downer, the sad grump thrown in to ruin everyone's day.

But despite all this, is Scheer right? Does the prime minister need to resign? I'm not sure that's a question for me. That's a question for Trudeau.

It's maybe time for him to have a really good think about just what it is he's doing in the office and why he wanted to do it in the first place. Standing grim-faced in front of a bunch of downtrodden volunteers, while the MP just off a victory stands grinding her teeth at his side is probably not why he got into this.

So if I may, I'd like to fumble about in clichÃ© for a moment. Feb. 28, 1984 â€” likely today 35 years ago, when you're reading this â€” Trudeau pÃ¨re, took his mythical walk in the snow. Pierre Trudeau would announce the next day that he was retiring, that he was done as prime minister.

But, that wasn't his first walk in the snow. He'd made previous walks. The one I want to focus on was in December 1979. After losing an election to Joe Clark, and announcing he planned to resign, Trudeau decided he would stay on after all, and Clark's government fell before a leadership convention could be held. (It was a different time.)

When Trudeau Sr. got up in front of the press the next day, after his walk in the frigid night, he was dull and somewhat listless. But said something interesting, something his son echoed this Wednesday night. He said the Liberal Party had "a vision of Canada which I feel is the correct and just vision of Canada."

Justin Trudeau tried to make a similar point Wednesday when he was asked for his thoughts on Scheer's call for him to resign.

"Canadians will have a very clear choice in a few months time about who they want to be prime minister of this country and what party they want to form government in the general election," Trudeau said.

He then went on to list the last few year's job creation and economic growth, and how those were thanks to his party. Then contrasted that with the dastardly awful Conservatives, and the spectre of Stephen Harper.

He also had at one point either the gall or the obliviousness to talk about the Tories' polices as ones that "consider the best way to create economic growth is still to give advantages to the wealthiest." Which, like, my dude. What exactly do you think SNC-Lavalin getting out of a bribery trial with a fine and a wrist slap is, but an advantage for the wealthiest?

But back to my little historical diversion. At one point, the since-retired Jeffery Simpson wrote* of the 70s how Trudeau Sr. "had read the press notices after his resignation and had not liked what he had seen: the general impression was of a man and a prime minister who had failed to fulfill the promise expected of him when he took office in 1968."

Sound familiar?

This government, here now in 2019, was formed around the idea that Trudeau was its core, its heart. And they would govern from the heart out. And by doing so, by putting Trudeau's good intentions, best wishes, sterling ethics, and love, at the centre of everything, they would do government better. Differently. For Canadians.

What Wilson-Raybould showed us was how diseased that heart has become. How one company with enough leverage, and cachet, and brute lobbying muscle could get the whole engine of the executive to put not Canadians first, but an undeserving corporation.

Someone needs to take a long walk and figure out just why it is they're doing this. Because if Trudeau's in this just for the likes of SNC-Lavalin, he may as well get out now and save us the trouble of wasting another four years.

***

*As quoted in John English's biography of Pierre Trudeau, Just Watch Me,p437.

Photo Credit: National Post

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New Democrats are hoping that Jagmeet Singh's victory in the Burnaby-South by-election will be the game changer that they need. Because looking at the other results in York-Simcoe and, even more so, in Outremont, the game needs changing.

Singh had to wait 164 days after the seat he was seeking became vacant to secure his election to the House of Commons. That is 62 days more than Stephen Harper had to wait in 2002 for his own by-election. In fact, on average, party leaders seeking a by-election only had to wait 70 days almost 100 days less than Jagmeet Singh had to wait.

Whatever games Justin Trudeau was playing by delaying this by-election, it didn't prevent Singh from winning his gamble. But it did prevent Singh from gaining access to the national stage that is the House of Commons for longer than he should have. It also somewhat prevented Singh from being a major part of the national political narrative, as he was focussed on winning in Burnaby-South.

While finishing a distant 3rd in York-Simcoe was neither surprising nor unexpected for the New Democrats, the results in Outremont were bitter-sweet to say the least. Outremont was wrestled away from the Liberals in a by-election in 2007 by Tom Mulcair, then the newest recruit of Jack Layton. The NDP went on the win Outremont again in 2008, making it its first seat ever won in a general election in Quebec. This, in turn, paved the way for the 2011 Orange Wave.

Liberal cabinet ministers, Melanie Joly and Louis-Philippe Champagne leading the way, declared the results and the Liberal victory to mean that the Orange Wave was done. Over. Finished. Leaving aside the fact that the Orange Wave happened on May 2nd 2011 and that everything after that was no longer a wave, it is quite remarkable to see the resurgence of the Liberal arrogance. After a night where they lost 10 points in the two other ridings at play.

The truth is, with 26% of the vote share in Outremont, the NDP scored its best results in that riding in an election not contested by Tom Mulcair. This is more than one voter out of four casting their vote for a party pronounced dead in Quebec time and again. Not bad. The NDP only needs a 7 point shift with the Liberals to take that riding back, a riding that was seen not that long ago as an unassailable Liberal fortress.

That said, while 26% is a much better result than the three previous by-elections held in Quebec since 2015 (where the NDP received an average of 9% support), it was still an 18 point drop for the NDP. In the seat of their former leader, no less. Not good. No Quebec NDP MPs would survive that kind of drop in 2019.

Still, the Outremont by-election, which was always the Liberals to lose, is providing a glimmer of hope that the New Democrats can preserve their Quebec beachhead. To do so will be a major challenge for NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh.

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The latest report from the Samara Centre for Democracy tackles the issue of civic literacy in this country, which, let's face it, is abysmal. Even when provinces mandate some level of civics education, it's generally pretty terrible (if not outright garbage), but it is a fairly complex problem to try and solve. It's obvious that it's not something that just high school classes are going to solve though it would certainly help if we had much more comprehensive civics education and that it needs to be part of a broader push to tackle things media literacy as part of the broader ambit of civics, which Samara does acknowledge. But for all of their attempts to get a grasp on the topic, there is a gaping hole in the report, which is the role of political parties as part of the civics ecosystem.

The report identifies four dimensions of civic literacy institutional knowledge, topical knowledge, political ability, and media literacy as the measurements to gauge a person's level of understanding, which can lead to political engagement. The breakdown of each bears some examination for example, institutional knowledge counts things like the three branches of state, the functions of political parties, and the methods by which public leaders are elected. Some of these are clearly deficient when the report also mentions that a 2008 poll found that nearly half of all respondents thought that the prime minister was directly elected, and every single day, someone insists that banning political parties will somehow "fix" democracy. Topical knowledge includes things like knowing who the current prime minister or premier is (one study cited in the report showed that only 60 percent of Canadians could identify their premier in 2015, as opposed to 90 percent in 1984). For media literacy, it lists examples like recognizing fake news, evaluating exiting beliefs and identifying bias something that is definitely of concern in the current political climate.

What I found slightly more alarming was the political ability breakdown, where the examples include voting, protesting, writing to elected leaders, engaging with appropriate government agencies and using media to advance a cause. Why is this concerning because it privileges protesting as political ability, but nowhere here or in the entire report is joining a political party ever mentioned. Joining a party is one of the most important aspects of our political system, yet it is one that is constantly devalued anytime discussions about civil literacy or political engagement come up. The grassroots of a party should be where people engage with processes like nomination races and policy development (and thanks to the ongoing bastardization of our system, leadership selection as well), but it's constantly ignored every time we talk about how people should be engaging with the system, likely because there is a fear of encouraging partisanship when it generally isn't the problem. It's when partisanship turns to tribalism that it becomes a problem.

The report looks at places where civic literacy can be developed not only in schools (which again, need to do a hell of a lot more than they currently do), but in the home, with community groups, and as part of the citizenship process for newcomers. There are a couple of things to unpack here as well with regard to in the home, the report notes that socio-economic class is a determinant of civic literacy, and the higher your class or status, the more likely you are to be civically literate. But this is something that should not be a barrier, and which can be overcome if you have the right kind of grassroots engagement.

Back in 1978, Anne Cools (who later was appointed to the Senate) ran for the Liberal nomination in the riding of Rosedale in Toronto, and she did it by engaging with the riding's poor and disenfranchised communities, which turned into one of the largest nomination races in the country's history after the party brass realized what she was up to and had to work to get the rest of the riding on-side with the nomination race for their preferred candidate. (You can watch how this unfolded in the documentary The Right Candidate for Rosedale, which is available on the National Film Board's website). While Cools ultimately didn't win, it's a slice of history that shows that parties and candidates can engage and enfranchise Canadians at the grassroots level of politics, and it gets them into the process.

Which leads me to another aspect of the report the engagement of newcomers in the process. One of the patterns that we keep seeing in recent years is during contentious nomination races or leadership contests, newcomer communities will be mobilized to the advantage of certain candidates, with membership forms in bulk (and occasionally memberships paid for them, though better safeguards are coming into place to prevent it), in order to get the numbers needed for the candidate mobilizing them. The problem of course is that these kinds of interactions are not only shallow, they're utterly cynical these newcomers aren't being introduced to the system and engaging at the grassroots level where they can debate and come to any decisions on their own, but rather, they are weaponized. This is something parties should be extremely vigilant in policing and strict in punishing, because it has the exact opposite effect of civic literacy.

While it's important that Samara take a look at the issue of civic literacy, unless they can get over this particular blind spot, it only creates further problems with the ways in which we are engaging in the political process. It may seem fine to condescend to people and tell them that sure, protesting or signing a petition is political engagement, it's rarely how change happens. Instead, people need to know that being inside a party is often the best way to agitate for change, whether it's with the candidate in their riding before the name appears on the ballot, or in party policy development, or in engaging with the elected caucus, joining a riding association is often the most effective way to go about it. In fact, because this is often ignored, it's allowed the party leaders and their offices to amass power that they shouldn't have precisely because we've stop teaching people how to engage at the grassroots. Civic literacy needs to teach these lessons, and it should be highlighted by groups like Samara if we have any hope of stopping the decline in our country's political system.

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No matter how you may feel about Singh's political skills or his personal views, he deserves kudos today. He fought an uphill battle, and won. His leadership is legitimized, even if elements in his own party feel differently.

He was severely underestimated and undermined, and he can enjoy a laugh at the spiteful Thomas Mulcair's expense. You can almost picture Mulcair being restrained and unmasked like some Scooby-Doo villain, and shouting, "And I would have gotten away with it too, if it hadn't been for those meddling kids!"

I came out early, before it was fashionable, on the relatively pro-Jagmeet side of things back in December. I did so because I can understand something of what it is like to be expected to govern a group of absolute ungovernables.

Have you ever sat down and thought about what it must be like to take a position on the environment when your base sees no contradiction between "Prosperity for all!" and "Ban fossil fuels!" How about taking a position on infrastructure projects when your people believe that we must guarantee jobs while making it practically impossible to build anything, anywhere?

It must be something like believing that we must protect the tar sands while ending corporate subsidies, or taking a "tough on crime" stance while making exceptions for men like Conrad Black. So right-wingers who are tough on Jagmeet ought to cut him a little slack, knowing what they know.

Of course, had Singh lost, the party could have gone on being a mess of contradictions without him. The NDP's most radical members are basically disappointed that he isn't Jeremy Corbyn or Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, and they're going to keep on trying to decapitate leaders until they get some reasonable facsimile thereof.

But, much like Conservatives who are less than thrilled with their leader, the only thing less palatable than compromising on your principles is throwing away any chance at winning the next election. We need only recall the rush to elect a new leader of the PC Party of Ontario around this time last year and the party's freakout over the thought of Doug Ford (horrors!) running away with the leadership. Why, he'll absolutely tank the campaign!

But where Singh and Ford diverge is that Singh will not use his new seat in the House as a bully pulpit to crush critics the way Ford did through goons like Dean French. He will try and fail to reconcile with his lame Corbynista knockoffs, likely appearing at an antifa protest or doing an AOC dance break post on Instagram.

This is because he will misinterpret the party base's half-baked attempts to stab him in the back as something other than the confused thrashing of a party without the first clue of what it stands for, where it came from or where it's going. If Singh had any capacity to channel anger, or to manifest anger, he'd do about as well as Andrew Scheer has done during the SNC-Lavalin blowout. His gentle, chilled out demeanour isn't going to match Trudeau's ability to show up unnanounced on TSN.

I have no idea what the NDP's platform is going to be, what their number of target seats are, or what new tricks Singh has up his sleeve that he didn't use during the long period where he was outside the house to get the media to pay attention to him. I don't see what the upside of him remaining is. I wish him well, and all the luck in the world, and if effort counts for anything, he'll leave Ottawa with his dignity intact, if nothing else.

Photo Credit: Vancouver Sun

Written by Josh Lieblein

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Remember how in The Wizard of Oz the Munchkins joyously celebrated the Wicked Witch's demise.

The Munchkins were so happy, in fact, they broke out into song, a song which included the lyrics: Once there was a wicked witch in the lovely land of Oz. And a wickeder, wickeder, wickeder witch there never, never was. She filled the folks in Munchkinland with terror and with dread.

I'm bringing this up because Canadian conservatives reminded me of those blissful Munchkins in the way they rejoiced after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's principal secretary, Gerald Butts, resigned.

True, conservatives didn't sing out "Ding-Dong Butts is Gone" but their seemingly unrestrained joy at Butts's abrupt departure, indicated to me that he was their version of a Wicked Witch.

In other words, just as the Wicked Witch filled the folks in Munchkinland with "terror and with dread", so too, it seems, did Butts terrorize Toryland.

One news headline I saw even stated: "Tories are 'joyous' about departure of 'feared' Trudeau advisor."

And Andrew MacDougall, a one-time spokesman for former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, tweeted this out after Butts's resignation: "The reason so many Tories are joyous today is because they feared @gmbutts."

Seeing this reaction, the question I kept asking myself was: why would any conservative be afraid of a guy like Butts?

Certainly, to me he never came across as particularly fearsome.

I never saw him oversee a savage media campaign, never saw him display any evidence of a killer political instinct, never saw him show any particular ferocity when degrading an opponent.

And yes, there are political operatives out there who do have fearsome reputations, who do engender dread in their opponents.

As matter of fact, I've worked with some really tough political consultants and believe me they could eat a guy like Butts for breakfast.

Now, don't get me wrong here.

I'm not saying Butts didn't have political skills.

He did.

Certainly he deserves all the credit in the world for helping to steer the Liberals to electoral victory in 2015.

Plus, in his capacity as Trudeau's senior advisor, Butts seemed to offer solid guidance when it came to plotting the government's overall political strategy. (Though he also deserves some blame for Liberal fiascos such as Trudeau's hilarious fashion misadventures in India.)

So yes, as an opponent, Butts deserved to be respected.

My point is, he shouldn't have been feared.

At least, the conservatives shouldn't have feared him. Indeed, they shouldn't be scared of anybody.

Why?

Well, fear is an emotion that saps confidence, that curbs aggressiveness, that counsels constant caution.

And, if you're an Opposition party, if you're trailing in the polls, you simply can't win a political campaign based on fear or timidity.

Basically, if you're afraid of your opponent, you're halfway to losing the battle even before it starts.

As Napoleon, once put it, "He who fears being conquered is sure of defeat."

To win in politics, you need to get into the ring and have the confidence to go on the attack, and to be a brawler.

And this is important advice for the Conservatives to heed, because their joy at Butts's departure should be tempered by the fact that Trudeau might replace him with someone tougher.

Keep in mind, the Liberal bench includes many experienced, battle-hardened, campaign veterans from the Chretien era, who Trudeau unceremoniously cast aside so he could bring in his younger, hipper, more gender-balanced, photo-genetic team.

What if Trudeau, stinging from all his current problems, brings in one of those tough-as-nails advisors to steer his campaign?

Will the Conservatives panic? Will they cower?

If the answer to those questions is "yes," then they'll be granting the Liberals a huge psychological advantage.

Simply put in politics, you should never fear your opponent; you should get your opponent to fear you.

Photo Credit: CBC News