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Thursday, July 9, 2009 04:44 PM
Harper's G8 hat trick
Going into the G8 summit that began yesterday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper was said to be isolated among his peers. Meanwhile, back home, the question on websites all day was did he or didn’t he — eat the communion wafer he was handed at the funeral of former governor-general Romeo Leblanc, that is? (Whatever the answer, there was no shortage of critics to be found to criticize him.)
Through it all, Mr. Harper kept his eye on the ball: his job is to represent Canada’s national interests, not to curry popularity with his counterparts. And, in carrying out that responsibility, the Prime Minister had a very good day in Italy yesterday.
On climate change, Mr. Harper found himself very much within the international consensus of an 80 per cent cut in emissions by 2050, with the communiqué setting a baseline of “1990 or more later years,” reflecting the fact that Canada, the United States and Japan reject the Kyoto baseline of 1990. Both he and President Barack Obama also signed up to the EU proposal of a 2-degree cap as the minimum to prevent irreversible global warming. And Mr. Harper was certainly not isolated in his view that the inclusion of China and India was key to meeting that goal, as The New York Times reports:
“Other Group of 8 leaders emphasized that any solution to climate change depended on the developing world’s joining the battle. Without China and India, said Arkady Dvorkovich, the chief Russian negotiator, any further discussions would not lead anywhere….Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi of Italy, the meeting’s host, said it made little sense for Group of 8 countries to take on onerous commitments if “five billion people continue to behave as they have always behaved.”
On stimulus, too, Mr. Harper was far from being isolated, as British Prime Minister Gordon Brown implied in an interview with The Globe and Mail yesterday. Rather, it was the beleaguered Mr. Brown who was forced to give way to hard-liners like German Chancellor Angela Merkel, with the communiqué asserting that each country should decide the timing of its fiscal tightening “once the recovery is assured.” This had to be welcome news for Mr. Harper, coming on the same day the IMF reported that Canada will outperform nearly all industrialized countries (and Britain by a long-shot) this year and next. Mr. Harper must have been further cheered when parliamentary budget officer Kevin Page supported his view that the focus now should not be on another stimulus package, but, rather, on spending the stimulus aid that has already been approved.
On international aid, Mr. Harper also emerged with the upper hand at the summit. Like former prime minister Paul Martin before him, Mr. Harper is a sceptic when it comes to pledges made at these gatherings. With Italy and France backsliding on the commitments they made to Africa at the Gleneagles summit four years ago, Mr. Harper joined with the leaders of Japan, Canada and Britain to insist that the G8 agree henceforth to publish annual progress reports on aid, which was agreed to in the communiqué.
Link to this postWednesday, July 8, 2009 05:20 PM
Who knew...
That there was such respect for Catholicism among Canadian journalists and editors?
Tuesday, July 7, 2009 10:26 AM
Keep your eye on the Bloc
It’s hard to understand Michael Ignatieff’s thinking in criticizing the Conservatives for attacking the Bloc’s position on mandatory sentences for those convicted of sex offences against minors.
Sure, the Liberals hope to make gains in Québec, but his opponent in that province is the Bloc, not the Conservatives. Moreover, it’s never smart politics in the rest of Canada to side with a party dedicated to breaking up our country, as Mr. Ignatieff himself seems to have concluded in repudiating his signature in support of the coalition.
It’s also never a good idea to get in the middle of a knife fight; as La Presse editor Andre Pratte reminds us, a knife fight is exactly what you have in Québec between the Conservatives and the Bloc.
In today’s lead editorial, Mr. Pratte writes:
“The Bloc is in a poor position to play the role of offended virgin — they who spent the last election campaign accusing the Conservatives of wanting to send children to prison.
Let’s recall the facts. Stephen Harper suggested that young offenders found guilty of violent crimes should automatically be treated as adults. You can agree or not with the idea — we were opposed — but you cannot claim that Mr. Harper dreams of sending “young bodies to adult prisons.” That’s what Gilles Duceppe maintained, neglecting to mention that young people would be held, as today, in youth institutions, or that the law included an opt-out for Québec.”
Perhaps Mr. Ignatieff thought his attack on the Conservatives would play well outside Quebec. And maybe it will. However, here in British Columbia, the Liberals hope to win back the support of ethnic suburbanites who abandoned them in the last election, in part, over their approach to crime. And, out here, the big story over the weekend was (and still is) the rape of a six year old girl whose brother abandoned her after being threatened by the knife-wielding rapist — not the kind of guy the leader of a national party would want to be seen comforting in any way.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009 09:05 AM
It's Harper-Obama at the G8
The Sunday Times of London is reporting that several European publications are bidding for photos of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, a man who's been much in the news in recent weeks. According to the Times, the aim is to publish the photos -- which show, among other things, Mr. Berlusconi "grinning broadly as two young women kiss in front of him at his Sardinian estate" -- just before the G8 summit, which begins on Wednesday under Mr. Berlusconi's chairmanship.
The media being what they are, one can expect that much attention will be paid to these photos, and to the host of the meeting. I, on the other hand, will be watching for additional signs of an emerging axis between Prime Minister Stephen Harper and U.S. President Barack Obama -- quite the opposite of the clash many were predicting after Mr. Obama's election in November.
For example, Sunday's New York Times reports that Canada and the United States are working closely together to moderate OAS actions in regard to the Honduras coup. According to the Times, the two countries dissuaded the Organization of American States from adopting sanctions, and persuaded them to settle for a milder resolution encouraging member countries to "review their relations" while diplomatic efforts continued. They were not, however, able to persuade President Zelaya not to return to his country on Sunday.
This, of course, was the scenario feared by Canadians who long opposed our country joining the OAS. However, since most of these voices are on the left, it's unlikely we'll hear much criticism from them in coming days, now that Mr. Obama is in office.
Thursday, July 2, 2009 02:57 PM
Where's Canada?
Today’s New York Times and Washington Post both front news of a massive U.S. military offensive in Afghanistan, the Obama Administration’s highest foreign policy priority. Operation Khanjar, involving nearly 4,000 U.S. Marines in Helmland province, is seen as the first test of President Obama’s new counterinsurgency strategy.
Helmland province, which is adjacent to Kandahar where Canadian troops are serving, has been the responsibility of British forces; they, too, have paid a dear price in blood, and have little progress to show for their efforts.
Yet, rather than pulling out their combat troops - as our MPs have decided - the Brits are still debating whether to increase their military commitment in Afghanistan, as are the Americans.
Canadians have never had a satisfactory explanation of why our troops are in Afghanistan - neither under the Liberals nor under the Conservatives. Near as I can make out, the Liberals ramped up our commitment to that country after deciding not to go to war in Iraq, in order to stay in the Americans’ good books. How ironic that, if and when the Obama Administration comes calling and is met with a firm nyet - as now seems likely - Canada will have gained sparse political credit in the U.S. from the sacrifices borne by young Canadian men and women.
Thursday, June 25, 2009 11:45 AM
Let's not invite a crisis
Romeo Leblanc was appointed Governor-General in a simpler era, as was former Conservative cabinet minister, Ray Hnatyshyn. Now and for the foreseeable future, by contrast, we live in an era of minority governments.
This past fall and into the early winter, Canadians got a lesson on how we are really governed in our constitutional monarchy — if the experts are to be believed. To the surprise of many, it turns out that, under the reserve powers that are part of the unwritten Constitution, the Governor-General has unlimited authority to prorogue Parliament, and to hire and fire a government. We also learned that, in carrying out the duties of the office, the Governor-General is not bound by precedent.
Though His or Her Excellency is assisted by presumably well-qualified advisers, this means that we must find a better way to appoint governors-general — which will not be easy. With one year left in Michaëlle Jean’s term, therefore, the Prime Minister will have to take great care in whom he appoints to the office. In particular, Stephen Harper must avoid appointing anyone who is seen as his loyalist, or who has a grudge of any sort against the Leader of the Official Opposition. And he must eschew appointing anyone with a partisan background to the office.
Imagine, if you will, had a former Liberal cabinet minister been serving as Governor-General last fall. And, if that doesn’t scare the daylights out of you, imagine Prime Minister Michael Ignatieff facing a similar situation after the next election, with a former Reform MP residing at Rideau Hall.
Monday, June 22, 2009 09:54 AM
Let Iggy be Iggy
On Saturday, under the headline “Ignatieff's honeymoon is over,” La Presse reported a four-point decline in the percentage of Quebeckers who think Michael Ignatieff would make the best prime minister of Canada.
The poll, taken in the midst of last week’s parliamentary wrangling, marked the second consecutive month-over-month decline since April, when 45 per cent of Quebeckers chose the Liberal Leader. Today, only 35 per cent are of that view — still way ahead of Stephen Harper, who’s the favourite of only 14 per cent (24 per cent chose Jack Layton). And, though the Liberals still lead the Bloc by five points, Gilles Duceppe’s forces are ahead by the same percentage among the province’s all-important francophone voters.
What should be equally if not more worrisome for Mr. Ignatieff and his advisers is the end of the Liberal Leader's media honeymoon last week. And the almost-universal negative tone of the chattering class reaches its zenith today, with fellow-intellectual Andrew Potter suggesting that Mr. Ignatieff should be using the summer to assess whether he really belongs in Canadian politics.
Assuming he’s not ready to thrown in the towel, my advice to Mr. Ignatieff would be to dispense with the tactical game he’s been playing, presumably on the advice of advisers convinced of the inevitability of a Liberal victory in the next election. What Canadians are waiting to hear is where Mr. Ignatieff would like to take our country, and why he believes he’s the man to take us there as our prime minister.
Saturday, June 20, 2009 05:46 AM
Milewski's the one
I didn’t get to see much of Don Newman’s coverage of the last week of the Meech Lake accord in June 1990, having been involved in the negotiations from dawn to dusk, and often late into the night. I can make one observation, however.
Mr. Newman won a Gemini award for his coverage - which is about as good as a television journalist can get. At the same time, many Canadians were outraged at what they viewed as the CBC’s pro-Meech bias, judging from the mail we received in those days. The disconnect, I think, was attributable to the proximity between Ottawa-based journalists and the people they cover.
When The Globe and Mail’s estimable Mideast correspondent, Patrick Martin, was co-hosting CBC radio’s Sunday morning program, he tells me, they used to fly in a team from Toronto to cover any big Ottawa issues. In the Canadian foreign service, we rotate officers every three years, lest they begin to identify too much with the country in which they are based. For Canadian journalists, on the other hand, Ottawa becomes a semi-permanent assignment.
To break the cozy relationship prevailing between the parliamentary press gallery and the people they cover, CBC needs an outsider to host its flagship Politics program. It has such a journalist in Terry Milewski.
Mr. Milewski was a thorn in the side of the Chrétien government for his coverage of the pepper-spraying of demonstrators at the APEC summit, and he was unfairly put in the dog house by CBC management. Since he recovered his career, he’s been a thorn in the side of the current Conservative government.
His appointment to host Politics would shake things up. No doubt it would also be good for ratings. All it would take is some guts on the part of CBC’s current management.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009 06:16 PM
The winner? Canada
There will be plenty of time for the chattering class to weigh in on whether the Prime Minister bested the Leader of the Opposition, or whether Mr. Ignatieff came out ahead of Mr. Harper. God knows, there's been more than enough of that in the past few days. Maybe, just this once, we'll be spared this kind of schoolyard analysis. Because, in truth, there's only one winner from the events this week in Ottawa.
Canadians will be spared a summer election - an election that fewer of us wanted than still believe Elvis is alive. The economic recovery, such as it is, can continue to gather steam.
We'll get a much-needed independent review of the weaknesses of the EI system and possible improvements.
Most important, the leaders of our two main parties have shown they can work together in a minority situation. This bodes well for the future, since it appears that we are fated to live with minority governments for some time.
It also suggests that we are blessed in having two potential prime ministers who, at the end of the day, know how to behave as mature adults - once they've exhausted all other alternatives, that is.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009 12:36 PM
A summer session?
After watching Michael Ignatieff transfer the onus for precipitating a summer election to the Prime Minister, my bet is that the House of Commons will be sitting this summer. Assuming, that is, that Stephen Harper is not prepared to see his government defeated on the basis of Mr. Ignatieff's framing of the issues at this morning's press conference. Which I would also wager.
Mr. Harper says he's planning changes to the EI program in the fall. He should have no problem advancing his plan by a month or two. Mr. Ignatieff says he's willing to see the session extended. In these circumstances, he should have no problem accepting a summer session of the House of Commons, unless his real goal is a summer election.
Spector Vision Contributors
Norman Spector
Norman Spector, a former chief of staff to Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, is also a former academic, federal and provincial deputy minister, ambassador and newspaper publisher. He's been writing in The Globe and Mail since 1995 and in Le Devoir since 2003. For the past three years, Norman has been providing a daily review of the Canadian and international press on his website Norman's Spectator . His book, Chronicle of a War Foretold: How Mideast Peace Became America's Fight, was published by Douglas and McIntyre in 2003. The following year, he contributed an afterword to William Kaplan's A Secret Trial, published by McGill-Queen's University Press.