Hello,
For 31 years, only one place on Chinese soil has been allowed to remember the Tiananmen Square massacre: Hong Kong.
But the demonstrations were quieter today than in years passed. Authorities had banned the candlelight vigil in Victoria Park, citing the need for physical distancing because of COVID-19.
Of course, the ban also comes after a year of pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong and an upcoming national-security crackdown in the city. As a preview of the impending legislation, Hong Kong lawmakers passed a bill that would put anyone in jail for up to three years if they were found to be insulting China’s national anthem.
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TODAY’S HEADLINES
Today’s announcement from the federal government is that seniors will receive special one-time payments in July to help them deal with the COVID-19 pandemic. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also said new modelling shows that the spread of the novel coronavirus has slowed quite a bit (outside of hot spots in Ontario and Quebec).
As protests against police brutality sweep Canada and the United States, Mr. Trudeau was asked about a video from Nunavut that shows an RCMP officer hitting an Inuit man with his truck. The Prime Minister declined to address the officer’s conduct, but repeated his usual lines that he does believe systemic discrimination exists in Canada.
On those protests: Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives are set to pass a package of reforms to address police conduct, but it is not clear whether the legislation will go anywhere in the Republican-controlled Senate.
Jim Mattis – former general and Donald Trump’s first defence secretary – broke his silence and criticized the U.S. President for using the military to crack down on mostly peaceful protests. “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people – does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us,” he said.
Former politician Stockwell Day has left the board of Telus after saying on CBC that systemic racism doesn’t exist and that being mocked for wearing glasses is similar to being discriminated against for the colour of your skin.
And two days out of his job as governor of the Bank of Canada, Stephen Poloz already has one post-retirement gig lined up: a seat on the board of pipeline firm Enbridge.
Wes Hall (The Globe and Mail) on addressing systemic racism: “We need to treat breaking the cycle of systemic racism with the same level of determination, creativity and ingenuity we have applied to confronting the challenge of the global COVID-19 pandemic. It is not enough to say, ‘Ugh, this is horrible’ and tweet. Each of us needs to take meaningful action to dismantle the system we inherited and apply an unparalleled effort to build a better one. We cannot allow complacency or inertia to rob us of this historic opportunity.”
Robyn Urback (The Globe and Mail) on the United States and freedom: “As the country struggles to contain protests ignited by the death of George Floyd, the United States has become what red-meat, freedom-loving Americans are supposed to despise: tyrannical, oppressive, intolerant and violent.”
Andrew Coyne (The Globe and Mail) on Donald Trump as a vehicle for nihilism and rage: “A genuine autocrat might send troops against protesters, as Mr. Trump threatened to do on Monday night, or demand that state governors relax public-health measures to suit his schedule or shutter social-media sites because they flagged one of his more hideously inflammatory posts. But Mr. Trump is not even a sincere authoritarian. It is all performative, invoking powers he does not have, pulling levers that are not connected to anything – just another grift to keep the suckers in their seats, to see him through the news cycle, to live to con another day.”
John Ibbitson (The Globe and Mail) on the need to resume travel across the Canada-U.S. border: “This country’s economic survival depends on an open border with the U.S. The real question is how to reopen. And the answer is uncomfortable, because it involves gradually abandoning quarantines and easing restrictions on physical distancing.”
Jesse Kline (The National Post) on the conservative case for demilitarizing the police: “Conservatives know that if you give government an inch, it will take a mile: bureaucracies will expand, spending will balloon, the state’s mission will creep into every aspect of our lives and individual liberties will suffer as a result. This is exactly what has happened with America’s police forces, which are now armed with surplus military equipment and no-knock warrants, and all-too-often appear to operate above the law.”
Celina Caesar-Chavannes (Policy Options) on how to make policy that really makes a difference to systemic racism: “Herein lies what is the biggest impediment to collective progress. Exclusion. The exclusion of voices of dissent and unusual suspects around the table. The ones who will speak truth to power, call out your [crap] and hold you accountable. The exclusion of ideas that are considered ‘too extreme’ because you are too lazy to see the other side of the coin.”
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Chris Hannay