Gerard Kennedy Hill Times Interview

For those who didn't catch it, Abbas Rana of the hill times provided this interview yesterday. My favourite was his answer to the question about his French speaking ability:

I would say that it has never been a barrier to me both understanding and presenting the concerns and the interests of Quebecers or Franco Ontarians or Acadians because I've done that for a long time in French.... Most people in the race are seen to have a drawback or two, that's my principal drawback. It's one that I can fix and people can judge for themselves where others may not be as fortunate.

Franco-Ontarians? Acadians? How many people think outside the Quebec box when talking about the French language. Great. And yes, it is a weakness, but it's one that he can fix (unlike foot-in-mouth disease, or not actually being a Liberal, which I think are chronic conditions).

And his plan on party unity?

Basically offer a very clear leadership on unity in the sense of including people and making sure that there are no Kennedy Liberals, just Liberals.

If we don't elect this guy, we are a bunch of turkeys who deserve to lose.

R v Krieger and the Legalization of Marijuana

The Supreme Court released its decision in R v Krieger yesterday, overturning the pot activist's conviction and sending him back to trial. Good stuff. Sometimes it takes bold jurors to demand we sit up and recognize which way the wind is blowing - and no matter how many politicians talk about decriminalization and how many polls show we largely support it, judges simply can't do that, and jurors can. I hope he obtains the same result in his fresh trial, except this time putting an end to it.

Of course a lot of people see it as a stroke for decriminalization, which it is, although that has nothing to do with the Court's decision. But forget decriminalization. We should legalize it.

Decriminalization will simply not provide us with most of the benefits that are hoped to come from it. It will not eliminate enforcement, and may actually increase it (speeding ticket styles). It will not create any tax revenues. It would not even protect people like Krieger, whose activities are well beyond the scope of any proposed decriminalization regime. Growing or moving any serious amount would still be illegal, and still be done by suckers like Krieger or the Hell's Angels.

Legalization, on the other hand, will genuinely eliminate that aspect of distribution, and will of course provide the opportunity to tax both consumption and profits in production. Canada already has an international reputation for quality in this product and in a globalized economy it makes sense for us to leverage that competitive advantage.

But I also really see legalization as a way to undermine and attack the distribution and use of more dangerous drugs. I think the 'gateway drug' argument is crap when it comes to users, but it holds some water for dealers. For users, the amazing availability of alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, and a host of abusable OTCs make the idea of a criminal gateway drug ludicrous. The correlation exists of course, but because those who say 'no' to pot are probably the kind of people who say 'no' to meth and coke too. It's not like every non-smoker is a heroin addict just waiting to take that first step down the road to hell.

Dealers, on the other hand, do need a gateway. They start off small time, and work their way up. So remove small time, and their industry becomes a very difficult one. The supply of losers at the bottom of the pyramid, who are required to keep the tournament winners at the top rich, dries up. The pot smokers pick up legally, and find that they don't really have any connections for when they want something else - they no longer know a guy who knows a guy. So in terms of the labour market in dealers, the connections between the distribution channel and consumers, the average risk and the overall profitability of the enterprise, legalization of marijuana would really hurt the Angels, and really profit users and the government.

But everyone wins when the Angels lose. So lets stop talking about it, and do something. And when we do something, let's do it right instead of trying to appease people still living in the reefer madness of the 50's, and fully legalize and regulate marijuana like tobacco.

Kennedy - Up front giving hope for the future

Who knew the Hamilton Spectator had such quality reporting? In an article called 'Party Renewal Slow as Liberal Party Aims Low', James Travers had this to say:

"Less obvious is what's happening backstage while Gerard Kennedy, Stephane Dion
and Martha Hall-Findlay are up front giving hope for the future."

It's sad but true that the back room machinations are more important than the up-front hope for positive change. But everyone is free in round two, and so once again I would like to urge delegates to reject the old guard, backroom politicking, and to reject the two candidates who, more than any others, owe their current level of support to the success of these tactics.

By the time we get to the next election, it will have been barely a year since the party lost power. Whether a year is enough time for Canadians to forgive the party its excesses will very much depend on how we comport ourselves at this convention. If we say "Yes" to the old boys in the back room, Canadians will say "No" to the same party they said "No" to in February.

If that happens we will all be losers, even those who feel like winners on December 3rd.

Stephane Dion to Support Gerard Kennedy?

The Hamilton Spectator has suggested that 'shifting alliances' have led Dion away from Rae and towards Gerard Kennedy. As a practical matter, since the final DSM number place Kennedy in third, materially ahead of Dion, unless Dion shows some big movement in the second round he will be looking for a new home. As a tactical matter, the joint delegates would not be enough to win, but the combined Dion/Kennedy camp would have incredible momentum and be almost impossible to beat.

Dion has been in attack mode recently, and he has been targeting Iggy and Rae. Nothing for Gerard. All three of them are ahead of him - why would he not target only the frontrunner, or all three? Why only two? Maybe there are just not enough attacks to go around, but I think Kennedy has learned from his Ontario experience, and has been careful to keep the level of debate high and not sink to personal attacks. He may be the only leading candidate whose door is still open to Dion (or, rather, whose Door has not been shut by Mr. Dion).

Also, I think the Dion and Kennedy will make an amazing leadership team. Dion long has had the job of advancing the Federalist cause in Quebec as the QC lieutenant to a PM that was not popular in Quebec. Frankly I think Gerard will become much more popular there as the people get to know him, but for the time being if he is to have much success there he will need the support of a Quebecker with credentials. That pairing would be tough to beat. There is strength in unity: that's a principle that applies to the Liberal party as well as the nation, and its a principle that all the candidates give lip-service to but only Gerard Kennedy is putting into practice.

Save the Court Challenges Program

Find out more about the Court Challenges Program. The site includes summaries of some of the many cases on which the lawyers from the program have worked. Many of them involve enforcement of language rights under the Charter. I'm not surprised Stephen Harper doesn't see the benefit in them, because as an anglophone who hasn't really left the country he's probably never known what it's like to be standing in front of some police officer or faceless bureaucrat who doesn't care to take much trouble to try to understand your broken attempts at communication. Of course, Steve has probably traveled in Quebec, but it's one of three provinces where official service in both official languages is legally required - his language rights are being protected!

(PS he also doesn't understand China and Taiwan, but if he can't even get Quebeckers, you wouldn't expect him to understand that situation).

Kinsella out to lunch

I normally enjoy Warren Kinsella's ramblings, but yesterday he suggested that the debate showed that the Liberal party was the "party of fear." Which is just a crock. Going negative on candidates (he's too right win, he's too boring, he can't win Ontario) does not play on fear, it plays on lust for power. If the Liberals want to win, they can't have someone whose flaws make them inevitable losers. None of us are afraid of Bob or Iggy, we just think they won't win and so we shouldn't choose them.

Then, in a move that is equally a crock but also completely unrelated (except that it uses the word 'scared', which is like 'fear') he notes that Steve doesn't scare Canadians any more, and possibly never did.

Really? I bet he still scares soldiers, who know he will send them off to die on any white house approved mission, and immigrants, who he doesn't like, and women, who might need abortions, and gays, who might need a court challenge to prevent his government from discriminating against them, and everyone who lives in a city and sees every day the need for transit, housing, social services, pollution reduction, and all kinds of things that aren't black and viscous and that Steve's oil-patch ideology therefore cannot see any value in.

I'm going to skip the liberal leadership and jump right to the next election, where I predict that Steve will once again be completely shut out of every single riding in each one of the nations three largest cities. There is a great divide in this nation, and it's not English/French. And that's scary, Warren.

Breaking it up, and Picking Up the Pieces

The Globe has an interesting article today contrasting the performance of Gerard Kennedy and Stephane Dion at the debate, where they say the two neck-and-neck candidates adopted completely opposite strategies. They're bang on.

Dion was hard hitting, and even when on the defensive he was on the attack. He clearly wanted to score points off Bob and Iggy, and I thank he did a good job of it. I enjoyed his performance, but then again I'm a litigator.

Gerard Kennedy on the other hand refused to attack any of his opponents (outside of a joke reference to Bob's revealing appearance on Mercer) and, as some commentators have noted, he almost completely escaped scathing attack himself.

I think that Iggy, and to a lesser extent Bob, are indeed polarizing figures within the party. Dion seemed to be trying to establish his own pole. Gerard showed that he can be passionate without attacking his fellow liberals. He also showed that the strategy is intrinsically successful: he wasn't attacked by the other candidates, and there will be no wounds to heal when he asks them for their support in the second and third rounds.

I believe the party needs to heal old wounds, and unify under a candidate that stands for genuine renewal. The only candidate that showed he could accomplish those objectives was Gerard Kennedy.

Best of the Debate

It was an exciting debate. I think Martha Hall Findlay came off like a real champion. Stephane Dion got in more great digs than anyone - and I understood every one. Gerard spoke with passion and (like Dion) had some real content in his comments and not just soundbites. For more, go see Jason, he kept up an excellent report. So now, the best of the debate:

"Gentlemen!"
-Martha Hall Findlay, leading by example.

"I'm proud to be a Liberal, and for me it didn't take a leadership race to say so."
-Stephane Dion, calling it like it is.

"I wasn't part of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. I was part of 'mixed company', a group of street youth finding a way to express themselves..."
Gerard Kennedy to Bob Rae, on their differing experience in cultural organizations.

"I'll be damned if in 2006 the Liberal Party will have a convention without a single, strong female voice..."
Martha Hall Findlay, on being Martha Hall Findlay

"I've heard my colleagues talk about a great vision of Canada - some of them as though they'd just discovered it."
-Joe Volpe

"I played hockey too."
-Scott Brison

"Question simple"
-Martha Hall Findlay, on foreign policy in the middle east.

"I was a Liberal on this before you were a Liberal on this."
-Scott Brison to Joe Volpe on same sex marriage

"We have to choose our words carefully when it comes to foreign policy."
"That's all well and good, but we also have to know where we stand."
"I didn't change my position on that three times last week."
-Exchange between Bob Rae and Michael Ignatieff

"If you want to know what Stephen Harper thinks about the environment this week, find out what George Bush said about the environment last week."
-Scott Brison

"This was a random question."
-The moderator, after audience response to the same-sex marriage question.

Iraqi death toll 650,000

A report from the obviously biased and partisan Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health says that 650,000 more Iraqis have died because of the US led invasion than would have otherwise.

The White House notes that the methodology has been largely discredited and that the numbers are certainly exaggerated. Which is great because, if it's only a quarter of a million or so dead, then it's still Mission Accomplished!

Ignatieff: Qana attack a War Crime

According to an article by Graeme Hamilton in today's National Post, Michael Ignatieff - speaking in French on a popular Quebec talk show - renounced the 'lack of compassion' shown when he commented in August that he wasn't 'losing sleep' over civilian deaths in Qana (Lebanon). He went on to remind everyone that:

"I was a professor of human rights, and I am also a professor of the laws of war, and what happened in Qana was a war crime, and I should have said that. That's clear."

I don't like the guy, but you've got to admire his guts. He also is apparently unafraid to admit he was wrong and apologize, which is something certain North American heads of state have had a great deal of difficulty with.

I wasn't there, and I'm not familiar enough with the facts or with the law to make a personal assessment. But to be honest, I'm more interested in the immediate spin, which in the article cited included comments by representatives of two prominent Jewish organizations, and also by Iggy's own director of communications, Leslie Church.

"That's appalling. To call it a war crime is totally, totally unacceptable." - Frank Dimant, executive vice-president of B'nai Brith Canada.

Actually, Frank, it's committing war crimes that is totally, totally unacceptable. Calling something a war crime is totally acceptable if it is indeed a war crime; it would only be unacceptable if it's clearly not a war crime. So, Frank, please tell us how you define war crimes, and then tell us your understanding of what happened at Qana. Then we will be able to judge. By simply attacking the speaker you convey the implication that the content of what he said is accurate, because if it were clearly not you could refute it with facts.

"For somebody as well-informed and experienced as Mr. Ignatieff, he should know that is not a reasonable charge to level against Israel." - Shimon Fogel, chief executive of the Canada-Israel Committee.

Why not? Is Israel simply immune from such charges because of the persecution Jews have suffered throughout the centuries? That position is unreasonable. Is it unreasonable because anyone saying something like what Ignatieff said will be pilloried and attacked relentlessly? That sort of behaviour is unreasonable too. But Iggy's comments seem pretty reasonable. He's the international law scholar, and he thinks its not just possible but "clear".

"He meant that this was a tragedy of war, that this was a deplorable act in war, that this was a terrible consequence of war." - Leslie Church

That's just weak Leslie. First of all, most deplorable acts in war would constitute war crimes, so that's not much of a clarification. As for the first and last comments, They're just BS. A tragedy is something that can't be avoided, usually something that is virtually certain because of the intrinsic character of those suffering the tragedy. Terrible consequences imply amorlaity - consequences simply flow, without reference to the cause. Well there was a cause, and it was bombs, not fate or karma.

Bombs don't fall by accident, they're dropped by airmen under the orders of senior officers under the direction of the civilian authority in Israel. Those aircraft and munitions have sophisticated targeting systems and all the bells and whistles that collectively create shock and awe. I'm sure mistakes still happen, but it is generally on the person claiming the mistake to prove it, rather than to take as unstated assumption that it was a mistake and then go out and viciously attack the person who foolishly thinks people should be held responsible for their actions.

We should also recall that the explanation given at the time was NOT that it was a mistake (which was the excuse given for the shelling of the UN observer post - an excuse that strains credulity and that, if false, would seem to confirm that act as a war crime) but rather that there were rockets being fired from nearby and that this was a legitimate act of self-defence. Putting those potential targets on par with tremendous civilian casualties is intrinsically suspect, and creates at least a triable issue on the question of whether or not the act constitutes a crime under international legal norms.

And now that I have also exposed myself to unreasonable attack by making such reasonable statements, I do want to emphasize that I personally am not saying the attack was a war crime. I am neither well-grounded enough in the international laws of war nor the particular facts of this situation to say so. All I am saying is that someone who is much better informed on both counts than me thinks it is "clear" that it was a war crime, and those who have rejected his views have not yet, to my knowledge, made rational responses to the charge.

I hope that some readers will make rational responses, which would include describing what constitutes an unacceptable attack on civilians, how such attacks might be justified, and whether or not the facts of this case seem to fall within or outside of the principles enunciated. It would also include meta-commentary on how others are responding, and whether their responses are rational and deserving of attention. But given the level of discourse on this subject generally I expect I will just have to delete this post by lunch. Which is fine, because then my response to the Cat's challenge will move back to the top of my blog where it belongs!

The Cat's Challenge: Our Future under Ignatieff or Rae

The Cat has sent out a challenge. I look into my crystal ball and predict the lay of the political land based on the leadership victory of Michael Ignatieff or Bob Rae.

The Assumptions

The only way to take back government is to have some real change that will motivate Liberals to got out and vote, and steal some votes from the other parties at the same time.

No Liberal can out-right Steve, and so the conservative stronghold is safe for one more election come hell or high water.

The Bloc has about 45 safe seats in QC, which leaves relatively little up for grabs, nonetheless a key battleground. Assume Harper scores points by plying them with cash and by making the right noises about devolving power (so sorry that there was no action, potential voters, but I just didn't have the time...).

Once it has a leader, the Liberal party will be spoiling for a fight, and will probably go into the next election either unprepared or having not given enough time for the more obvious failures of the Harper government to become apparent. The folks who supported him last time will either be pleased with his performance or willing to give him more time. We will be in trouble from the starting gate.

The attacks will be easy and obvious. Steve is not pandering to well heeled liberal bloggers who want to ruffle through the subtleties of Iggy's 2001 commentary on invading Iraq (although we can expect two or three good 5 second soundbites to make it national). So, although I'm sorry to disappoint, I will not be musing about past writings and positions of the candidates as if Joe Canadian will be on the floor in Montreal. This election will be won 28 seconds at a time. Stand Up For Canada indeed.

The Predictions

Michael Ignatieff Victory - this is another conservative minority in cruise control. The main things that will be pissing Canadians off about Steve are things like his too-close relationship with the Americans, and not-surprisingly-related hawkishness. Iggy will therefore struggle to make a different voice heard, and in the end will simply fail to inspire those we need to vote to win back the house. Between "I don't care" and "he's no different" and "let him pay his dues first" and "I'd vote NDP before I vote for a warmongerering torturer like him", he will be the candidate to yawn about across the ROC.

His commments on Quebec will do him well there, but balanced against money and devolution of powers will not likely win him no more than a few extra seats. If any. Not nearly enough for a majority, although I suppose the minority could tip in our favour. I just doubt it, because Canadians in general and Quebeckers in particular are sick of the Liberals and need to be inspired out of their sickness or beaten out of it by the chinese water torture of Tory policy.

The attacks are a piece of cake - he's too new, too from away, too academic, too boring to listen to, too concessionist to Quebec (or not enough). Harper will stand on his record (not great, but we won't have had time to get fed up with it) and compared to Iggy's zero direct experience Steve will seem like a tried, tested, and true leader. Watching the CBC will remind you of February.

After his failure to win the government, the party will either dump him or bide their time for three years to see if he grows into the job. Even odds on whether he sticks around to find out.

Bob Rae Victory: This is a surefire way to a tory majority. Every tory - every single one, without exception - believes this, and frankly they can't all be wrong. It doesn't matter how many delegates Bob got in Ontario - members are not the same as voters. Those who liked the old Bob will vote for the real thing (Jack) instead of the new Bob-Lite (a registered trademark of The Power Corporation). Those who hated him will go tory. Those who can't do either will stay away in droves. The same supporters that voted in his delegates will vote for him again, and will constitute about 2% of the total voting age population. DELEGATES ARE NOT VOTERS. I cannot emphasize this enough. He has no strength in Ontario. How many party members voted for him last weekend? How many teachers work in Ontario? QED.

The attacks again are a piece of cake. He's a turncoat, a pinko, and a miserable failure as a premier. You can't fit justifications based on a global downturn into a 28 second spot, so all of you who (like me) thought he did an admirable job in a tough situation can go get stuffed.

After his loss he will be dumped in relatively short order, and people like me will try to build a moat around the 416 to keep the blue at bay for five years.

The Challenge:

Cat, include the other two potential leaders in the top four. What is this, ROB TV?

Rona Ambrose and Stephen Harper Leave Canada in the Warm

We were promised a made in Canada plan, but we got no plan at all.

Environment Minister Rona Ambrose spoke to the commons committee today (reported here), and admitted that for all the bile they have been directing at the Liberals and some Japanese city for the past couple of years, they have no plan and no clear intention of formulating a plan.

Rona: "Our government will not set arbitrary targets like the previous government did. It is important that we put in place achievable targets." That's right, it is important! So where are they? They could have been invented before the election if you had been serious about it; and you've had 8 months since then. Where are the new, achievable targets? Where's the plan for achieving them? If it's so important to put achievable targets into place, why use your first major appearance to tell us that nothing has been done?

Rona: "It's very important to our international partners that we start to think about what we're going to do beyond 2012" No, it's important to think about what we're going to do right now. If we think about 2013, we should think about what a bigger mess we'll be in then if we spend our energy now coming up with reasons to put off doing something. Something like setting targets and making a plan for achieving them.

Globe: "The Environment Minister said that the oil-and-gas industry would be 'a key contributor' to any emissions reduction plan, though she did not go into specifics." Right - so key that it can be completely ignored while your government intentionally strives to increase regional discontent and distrust by pushing ahead with regulating Ontario's automotive industry while ignoring Alberta's oil patch. You know, we could all get together and try to make some positive change, or we could just use the environmental portfolio to further injure and divide our already badly beaten confederation.

Gavin: Saying you hate Kyoto is not the same as making a Made in Canada plan. Saying old targets were not achievable is not the same as making new targets. Saying the old plan stunk is not the same as planning. And saying the old government stunk is not the same as governing.

Stuff the election rhetoric and the partisan sniping. You're not in opposition anymore, you're the government. Start acting like it.

Dalton McGuinty Don't Be an Idiot!

Dalton is ticked at Harper for imposing emissions standards because he thinks it will hurt Ontario's auto industry. Wake up, Dalton!

Now, I happen to believe that safeguarding our lungs and planet is an important objective and we should be prepared to swallow some bitter pills in achieving it, but that's not why this position is stupid.

See, more and more people and countries are increasingly concerned about these problems. So, more and more people will need green(er) solutions to their problems. The choice is not about curbing or not curbing emissions; the choice is one for our government and industry to make co-operatively and intelligently and it looks more like this:

1) Embrace change, lead change, and set our industry on firm footing to be a global leader in the provision of these greener solutions to Canadians and the world.

2) Resist change, and in five or ten years discover ourselves to be laggards in the growth industies and dinosaur champions of the old industries, while wondering why there's a yellow haze over Toronto from May to September.

It's not so tough a choice (unless you're the tobacco industry and have no other oprions but to spend your blood money in a incredibly protected but still lucrative rear-guard action). When you figure it out, forward this post to the recording industry, and tell them to pass it on.

Gerard Kennedy in Quebec

Well, my guy Gerard Kennedy got clobbered in Quebec. It makes me wonder a few things:

Firstly, is his French that bad? I'm not fluent and therefore not a good judge, but his wife and kids speak French so I'd be surprised if it's worse than Dion's English. Maybe the French are just snobbier about that sort of thing. If someone has a link to a French language speech he has given I'd like to check it out.

Secondly, what does this Quebec problem really represent? It had always been my simple Ontario vision of Quebecois that they were either sovereigntists or liberals. Even assuming Steve and the tories can make a real dent, how many NON-BLOC ridings are there? Because we're not fighting over the whole province, just those ridings. Obviously I'm speaking here of the Liberal party winning the next general election, and not Gerard's prospects in particular, but I'm sure you can see the connection.

Thirdly, BC and Alberta combined are more populous and more wealthy that Quebec, and this difference is trending up. I don't quite understand why the same people who constantly obsess over qhat Wuebec thinks and how Quebec will vote are often people who are completely willing to toss off the entire Western half of the country as being undisputably blue. The new Cosnervatives are not quite the old reformers, and if they want to really be a national party they will have to ultimately accord the west the status it deserves: important, but not dominant, in the federation. I think we can win plenty of seats out there if we have the right leader and policies.

Finally, and completely unrelated to Quebec, Calgary Grit posts a pretty interesting chart here. It's the first round results from the last Ontario leadership convention, and if the results don't strike you as being eerily similar, then you probably don't understand the phrase 'eerily similar':

Gerard Kennedy 30.1%
Joseph Cordiano 21.8%
Dwight Duncan 18.1%
Dalton McGuinty 17.6%
No one else over 6%

The old ways

I will admit before I start that I was hoping to be sent to the convention as a Kennedy delegate for Trinity Spadina, but Gerard did not do very well in my riding and got to send only one delegate, who is not me. I want to say that because some of what follows may sound like sour grapes, but it's not (I wanted to go but wasn't expecting to make it since I'm new in the riding and don't really know anyone). I won't name names but those familiar with the riding will know who I'm talking about and so I also want to make it clear that I think they're all good Liberals and worthy delegates, and the ones that I met personally during the Federal campaign struck me as nice people to boot.

That having been said, the delegate selection in Trinity-Spadina was about as old-school back-room Liberal as they come. I helped count ballots, of which there were about 300, and of those about 70 were marked almost identically. They were presumably marked undeclared (for reasons which will be obvious: only Iggy polled more votes than undeclared in Trinity-Spadina, where we will send 3 undeclared delegates). And, with very little deviation, they selected the same two Kennedy delegates, the same single Bob delegate, the same single volpe delegate, the same three undecided delegates, the same two ignatieff delegates, and after that I guess the voter actually picked based on their own personal opinions.

Bear in mind that there were about 120 delegates standing for election, and so the average support for each delegate would presumably be 10% or less. So when over 20% of the ballots are for a slate - not a candidates slate, but a slate of insiders - the results are pretty much in the bag. Each camp will only send one or two delegates, and the highest individual delegate on each camp's list will not be the person that got the most support from that campaign's supporters, but rather the person who got the support from the undeclared slate. I think there will only be two delegates of 14 going that weren't on the slate (one for Iggy, since he got enough votes to send 4 delegates and the slate was not quite as consistent for him, and one for Bob, which is his daughter Judith).

Again, I'm sure they're good people and good liberals, but there's something that's just not right about that. I wouldn't have been able to go anyway, because I was near but not at the top of GK's delegate list (excluding the two insiders) and he could only send one. So this doesn't effect me directly, except as being an example of the kind of thing that discourages people from participating and reminds people that your average person just doesn't get their voice heard in the Liberal party. And that's bad news for a party that needs renewal.