Category: Federal Politics

Things to Come.

by Peter Lowry

When H.G. Wells wrote his science fiction book The Shape of Things to Come in the early 30s he was predicting the Second World War. You can see the influence the thinking throughout the book. There is a similar influence of the pandemic on much of what we write and plan today. We are letting COVID-19 influence our future.

It is certainly influencing our politics. In fact, much of the current anger and frustration with politics is rooted in the problems politicians had with trying to manage answers to the pandemics’ woes. If there was ever a time to measure politicians, it was during the pandemic.

My measure of politicians has always been if the person is faced with nothing but lemons, can he or she make lemonade? I think the classic answer to that was an incident with the famous Mayor Fiorella La Guardia of New York City. During a newspaper strike in the 1940s, the mayor was reading his favourite comics to the kids during his radio broadcasts.

And while I might have made fun of Justin Trudeau, popping in and out of Rideau Cottage like a cuckoo from a clock, I thought he did a good job of communicating with Canadians during the pandemic. Where his efforts failed though was in continuing the messages down through the provinces. Canada’s constitutional snarls really let us down in some key provinces. We can hardly keep the incompetents and narrow minded out of political office but maybe we could pass an emergency law that can take away provincial rights during a national emergency. That way, the provincal politicians would have the choice of getting in line or getting out of the way.

The pandemic is leaving us with mainly inadequate politicians and we are not seeing much coming forward but divisive politicians with their attempts at polarizing. We were witnesses to that happening next door in the United States and nobody promised it would not be attempted here. Pierre Poilievre, the front runner in the far-right wing of the federal conservative leadership race is a case in point.

What Canada so desperately needs in political leadership is someone who can point to a progressive future—in a land of respect for the environment, where a healthy, well-housed and educated population are free to pursue their goals in life.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

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Political Pitfalls.

by Peter Lowry

It’s a wonder that the way we vote hasn’t been blamed for bad breath. It has been blamed for everything else. Fewer people vote, blame it on first-past-the-post (FPTP). A party wins the election with just 40 per cent of the vote, blame it on FPTP.

Mainstreet Research annoyed Ontario voters recently by having automated telephone calls ask how they would like to exercise their vote. The result was also annoying. According to reports, it appears about a third of us want to vote for proportional representation—that is where politicians are appointed to sit in parliament according to the per cent that we vote for. About a third also opted for preferential voting—where your second, third or fourth choice can help one of the candidates to get over 50 per cent support. Luckily another third of us supported first-past-the-post. You would think that all the ballyhoo about voting, some sort of consensus would start to form.

Back in 2007, Ontario voters chose by about two-thirds to stick with FPTP instead of opting for a form of proportional representation. In that version, only some of the politicians were appointed. I got the impression at that time that our voters were opposed to the idea of having anyone appointed to the legislature.

It has been said that a definition of insanity is the repeating of the same thing over and over and hoping for different results. That is an excellent description of the conservative party’s voting system for leadership. They always use preferential voting—and never seem to like the results. This is the form of voting used with a large number of candidates and you indicate your preference from one to ten to find which one can first reach 50 per cent plus one. The problem is that they drop the poorest performers first. They then add the second choice of this loser to the count. What they are doing is adding the losers’ second choice or then third choice or fourth choice and so on, until somebody adds up to more than 50 per cent. In effect, it is the losers who really pick the winners.

The more reasonable alternative to this is when one candidate does not get more than 50 per cent on the first ballot is hold a run-off vote for the top two. At least this precludes drilling down among the losers.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

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Hell’s Bell.

by Peter Lowry

It was twelve years ago when we had to get in line to tell the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) why Bell Canada should not be allowed to buy CTV. What I was trying to explain to the commissioners at the time was that the cultures of the two organizations where like oil and water. Neither understood the other. Neither was competent to question the other. It was a marriage made in Hell.

But who am I to question the desires of Bell Canada’s board of directors? Bell got what they wanted. CTV got an interfering and imperialistic boss.

More than a few mistakes and missed directions have occurred since then. How could there not be missteps by a company concerned more with this quarter’s dividend trying to run a company seeking to connect effectively with Canadians.

Bell Canada is a company disliked and distrusted by many of us in Eastern Canada. CTV wants to be trusted. And that is particularly true for the news department. News and public affairs programming are a staple of a television network. You only have to look south of the Canadian border to see what it can do to a country to have divisive news and public affairs broadcasting based on lies. After all, it is difficult and expensive to try to maintain a lie.

It is like the Lisa LaFlamme fiasco that is currently filling the void of social media on the Internet. That is the type of problem that news departments in broadcast media build for themselves. They believe, and rightly, I think, that the credibility of a news reader is based to a large extent on the reporting credentials of the individual.

By building the credibility of their news readers, they boost their audience—and the larger the audience the more money they get from their advertisers. Which is what it always comes to in any business.

I haven’t watched CTV news or public affairs shows for the last ten years. That leaves me out of those who can judge Ms. LaFlamme’s recent performance. I’ll bet she is as good as she was 15 years ago.

But there is a serious falling away from both print and broadcast media. I don’t think they are tapping into Canada’s younger audiences. Hell, I would like to know how many of my regular readers are under 40.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

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Freedom and Friends.

by Peter Lowry

It reminds us of the yahoos who visited the Nation’s Capital last February looking for freedom. The people in this case found freedom but this Freedom is only allowed if the federal government and its agencies agree. We are talking about the Freedom Mobile sale to Videotron.

You have to admire the nerve of the Rogers’ and Shaw beneficiaries that assumes that the government is going to allow them to merge their fiefdoms. As you can imagine, they are not selling Freedom Mobile to that Péquiste, Pierre Karl Péladeau of Quebecor, unless the feds allow Rogers and Shaw to merge into Canada’s largest and money-grubbing telecom.

And why would any government allow the country’s largest telecom to be run as a one-man company. It was okay when Ted Rogers was alive. He took the risks that built an empire. His son is just enjoying spending his daddy’s money.

And with the recent outage of Rogers’ services, we learned how serious that foolishness could be. Who knew that the crashing of systems at Rogers would knock out cell phones and credit/payment systems across the country?

And you can lay the blame for that catastrophic black-out squarely on the Canadian Radio-television Telecommunications Commission (CRTC). The CRTC has become a lap-dog for the telecoms. It has neither the will nor the expertise to do its job. It should have made sure long ago that the Internet and wireless services remain separated from each other. For them to be inter-connected makes for a slip-shod and cheap network that was bound to fail.

I can remember many years ago when a shielded cable fell across a connecting board for the microwave network at Bell’s Elgin office in Toronto and knocked out the CBC’s national programming. It should have been a lesson for all. It certainly firmed up my decision, at the time, that I was not cut out to be a communications technician.

But I was trained for it and I was less than pleased many years later when my late friend Herb Gray (who was president of the privy council at the time) suggested to fellow cabinet minister John Manley that I should be appointed a CRTC commissioner. I got a stupid letter from Manley saying he did not think I was qualified. He should have asked.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

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A Problem’s Time Has Come.

by Peter Lowry

It was bound to happen. I assumed we would hear more the other day when I read American Express’ latest plan for its ‘cash back’ card. This was the most generous cash-back deal I had ever seen for a credit card. I wondered how many additional merchants would refuse to accept American Express.

There used to be some ‘Je ne sais quoi’ to using an American Express over the more pedestrian VISA or Master Card. I also remember the time when you needed a large vest pocket wallet to carry all 12 or so credit cards that you played like a piano and kept your credit playing the field.

But the people getting squeezed in these various rewards programs are the merchants who have to accept credit cards to stay in business. And don’t forget that even a debit card, either in card form or held in a smart phone, carries a small charge for the merchant.

It must have been this pandemic that shoved us towards a cash-less society. People must have felt that cash money was a source of COVID. Credit and debit cards are now in control. I am considered old-fashioned because, when I take the wife out to a restaurant, I always make sure I also have enough cash on me in case the restaurant’s credit card system in not working. Mind you, at current prices, I might have to arrange a line of credit to have that much cash on me.

And you know just whom to blame for this contretemps: Telus. Only a telecom giant would have the chutzpah to blow the whistle on the credit card industry. It’s been a long time coming but the battle of the giants is about to begin.

Of course, Bell, Rogers and Videotron have ‘no comment’ at this time but they will be on board promptly if Telus can get the cash flowing.

And I know what their customers will say: “What’s another 1.5 per cent when you are being ripped off by both the bank and the telecom?” I am currently grandfathered on my bank accounts as I have had them since before the banks realized they could charge for their clients’ account activity. And I only pay $10 per month for my cell phone anyway! I will wait and see if my cell supplier needs another 15 cents per month. It might not be a deal breaker.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to:

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GOV: The Conservative Version.

by Peter Lowry

It’s called Get Out the Vote (GOV). All political parties do the best they can at it. We beg people to get involved in it. It is the most critical part of campaigning. And we are doing worse at it today than 64 years ago.

I voted in my first federal election in 1958. The turnout across Canada in that election was 79.4 per cent of eligible voters. In the recent provincial election in Ontario the turnout was just 43 per cent. I would say that our GOV is slipping.

There are, of course, different types of GOV efforts. They can be municipal, provincial and federal and they can also be within organizations such as a political party. The rest of this article is about the current federal conservative leadership, in which voting is already underway.

It would appear that the conservatives have sent out 678,708 ballots to people holding conservative party memberships in time to be eligible to vote. It should be noted that there were only about 250,000 paid-up conservative party of Canada members when the leadership opened up to receive what I call temporary memberships. Based on past experience, they will be lucky to see 450,000 of those ballots come back.

I would say the biggest problem is for Pierre Poilievre’s team who have over 300,000 of these temporary members to corral and make sure they fill in their ballot and it gets in the mail back to the party. They will have few problems in Alberta where Poilievre is strong. I hear they are having ‘fill in your ballot’ parties. They do that because many voters lack access to a photocopier. Voters have to include photographic confirmation of their identity to go with their ballot. The process is not very secret.

Where the surprise comes is in the allocation of votes to electoral districts. If you are in a riding where there are 500 members voting, your vote has twice the value of a vote in a riding with 1000 members voting. Conservatives think ridings are equal, not voters.

To further complicate the voting, conservatives use preferential voting. All voters can number their votes and if their first choice does not win and has the lowest vote, their next choice moves up in the subsequent count. What it means is that if the voting goes, in this case, up to three counts, it will be the people voting for losers who will ultimately pick the winner. And that explains all the leadership contests for the conservative party of Canada.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to:

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Singing Singh’s Song.

by Peter Lowry

New democrat leader Jagmeet Singh is certainly not kidding. Justin Trudeau’s liberals will either carry out their end of the deal with Jagmeet’s party for their support or feel the wrath of an enraged Sikh.  And Sikhs have a well-earned reputation as warriors.

The first part of the deal between Jagmeet and Justin was for support for a dental program for children under 12 before the end of this year. There are other programs in the deal but this was the one with a clear date to be put through this year.

All the new democrats had to do was keep the liberals in office. All the liberals have to do is pass this program in the house. It is the ‘good faith’ part of the deal.

And it is more than that. It would not only cause a problem with an annoyed Singh if it did not happen. It would be the end of Justin Trudeau’s troubled reign. Justin might have a hard time imagining an election with no large crowds of liberals urging him on. The reality is that there are too many progressive liberals who are wondering just where Trudeau thinks he is taking us.

This children’s aspect of dental care is only a baby step towards a full, all-encompassing dental program and free prescription coverage for all Canadians as part of Medicare. And if Justin and his cabinet cannot get their minds around that then there needs to be some changes made in the liberal hierarchy.

What is keeping Trudeau in place today is the looming prospect of MP Pierre Poilievre winning the conservative leadership. The extremes of a Poilievre leadership would be an incentive to strengthen Trudeau’s position. Much can be forgiven the Trudeau liberals in the face of that quagmire.

Mind you, there was also the word from our finance minister and deputy prime minister that getting this first stage of the dental plan off the ground this year might be difficult. That is not what we want to hear from Cynthia Freeland. If she had more than an ounce of political smarts, she would be announcing how great the program will be. She has more than enough resources in her finance department to get the program before parliament this fall.  If she cannot, Trudeau better, very quickly, find someone who can.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to:

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Poilievre’s Poison.

by Peter Lowry

It’s not just an American disease. Canada can easily be caught in the same polarization. We are just as liable to see divisions driven into our politics, our families, our friendships and our country as the American mess on our doorstep. And don’t laugh at Donald Trump. Pierre Poilievre could be worse.  

And the truth will not set us free. Knowing Poilievre is wrong, sets nothing right. He is not a person to be caught up in the truth. He is a weasel believing only in his own fantasies and his own self-importance. He is planning a better life for nobody but himself. He is in an alliance with the rabble of the extreme right.

These are not knowledgeable Canadians with whom Poilievre has formed his team. They are the rabble who thought they could muscle Ottawa into redirecting our country. They wanted something, they called “freedom.” They wanted to put an end to people in Ottawa they thought of as gatekeepers. They had been buffeted by the changing rules during the pandemic. They wanted the rules set aside before the pandemic was over. They had no patience for common sense. Calm and confidence have been in short supply.

What Poilievre saw was some of that angst in all of us. The problems of the past year have been a strain on everybody. Instead of standing in our own ray of sunshine and opportunity, we have been beset by inflation, troubles in sourcing, supply chain limitations, border backups, airport confusion and then some asshole starts a war.

And what makes Canadians think they were standing in line before others. We are not the honest broker for the rest of the world. We have a few good politicians and too many fools. We have some smart business people who are looking ahead to the future and we have some idiots who are raping the consumer of her loonies. Nobody is proud of working in the oil business after pumping your own gas for over $2 a liter.

The manager of my nearby Metro store used to stand down by the checkout with a friendly smile on his face. Today, he hides in his office or back at the receiving door.

I hardly blame Pierre Poilievre for any of these problems. I just know that, sure as hell, he is not going to make any of them go away.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to:

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M. Poilievre Regrets.

by Peter Lowry

What kept MP Pierre Poilievre away from the conservative leadership’s last debate for this year? Did he have anything to lose? Did he not want to be the target one more time? What was worth the $50,000 fine for missing the event? Was there some point he was making? Will he ever tell us?

And was the debate even worth watching when the reputed front runner refuses to show? It was the Jean Charest show. An old pro, the former Quebec premier got in some final digs at his divisive rival. You have to admit, Poilievre is not you grandmother’s conservative.

It was just a trio of the old boys striving to put on a good show. It was Charest with sidesman Scott Aitchison from Parry Sound—Muskoka and the hapless Roman Baber—and God only knows what he was doing there.

But it was really all about the man who was not there. MP Leslyn Lewis was also not there and hardly forgotten. Not when the other candidates where thinking of her social conservatives and their second choice. Nobody was badmouthing her.

It was Charest who got in the best licks—in case they mattered. Everyone knew who he was talking about when he said that Canadians want a government with a real economic plan for the country.

What Charest had not forgotten was that there some 250,000 members of the conservative party in Canada when this leadership round was started. These were the real conservatives. They were not Patrick Brown’s South Asian diaspora. And they certainly were not Poilievre’s friends.

I hardly think it is fair to call his fellow travellers ‘truckers.’ The real truckers are hard-working types who want to make a living. What the Carleton MP has is a polyglot of the angry, the disenfranchised, the losers, the immature and the partnerships in the extreme right of Canadian politics. Probably about 50 per cent of Poilievre’s short-term sign-ups will remember or care enough to vote.

Even without a dog in the race, we will watch the results on September 10 with considerable interest. Maybe, sometime in the future, the conservative party is going to learn that its leadership rules do not seem to be producing the desired results.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to:

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This Troubles Trudeau.

by Peter Lowry

MP Pierre Poilievre is not Justin Trudeau’s problem. The Carleton MP is the conservative party’s problem. This extremist, poised to take over control of the conservative party, poses a smaller threat to Trudeau than former Quebec premier Jean Charest.

The truth of the matter is that Jean Charest coming down the middle of the road can spell ‘road kill’ for the federal liberals. Poilievre has locked himself on to the far right and that is not where Canada wants to go.

Poilievre has joined the convoy that disrupted trade last winter and tore into the heart of Ottawa. Poilievre promises trouble. Jean Charest promises opportunity.

And, surprisingly, the conservative party solved Charest’s major block in becoming leader. No, the party did nothing to block Poilievre. They removed the problem of Patrick Brown. Patrick had a deal with Charest. Patrick had 100,000 temporary conservatives signed up. Those short-term conservatives where there to vote for Brown first and Charest second. The danger was that their votes could leave Brown in second place—eliminating Charest.

If Charest is in second place coming out of the first round—and Poilievre has not won on the first round—Charest has a chance to win with the second-place votes from Leslyn Lewis. Those social conservatives don’t like Poilievre.

And don’t forget that Jean Charest has two helpers. He has Brampton’s mayor in Ontario and former prime minister Brian Mulroney in Quebec. Brian Mulroney knows where the bodies are buried in Quebec and he knows how to get them to vote. Whether Patrick Brown is running as an effective ‘get out the vote’ program with his South Asia diaspora, remains to be seen.

It would be so much easier to predict if the conservatives had not opted to stick with their convoluted voting system. It is supposed to be one voter gets one vote. To treat electoral districts as equal and voters as less than equal is not the democratic way to do things.

But nobody has ever accused the conservative party of being overly democratic.

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Copyright 2022 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to:

[email protected]