Category: Federal Politics

The Web We Weave.

by Peter Lowry

The wife’s health has not been the best lately and she spends much of her time in her electrified Lazy-Boy chair. It is where she keeps two Apple I-Pads in use. She alternates the I-Pads for charging. She will frequently want to show me something that she thinks will be of interest to me.

This morning, there was something political that she thought would be of interest. She knows how I despise conservative leader Pierre Poilievre and this was a picture of Poilievre in parliament and the headline said that he had been indicted for something.

I quickly identified it as fake news but I must admit it was well done. The person who created this amusing piece of garbage might have known some things about Mr. Poilievre but was woefully ignorant of some of the differences between how American and Canadian laws operate.

It was something of a coincidence that I had just read an opinion piece in the Toronto Star by a senior apologist for the conservative party, Jaime Watt. Watt heads up a public relations firm and seemed to be chortling over the purported successes of Mr. Poilievre as a guru of social media advertising.

He also seemed to be chortling over the potential demise of the CBC and Radio Canada if Mr. Poilievre ever gets to be prime minister of Canada. That annoys me.

I was born the year parliament created the CBC and as a youngster I delivered Globe and Mail newspapers to homes and apartments in the area of the Jarvis Street headquarters of the English language CBC in Toronto. I also spent many learning hours there thanks to an older brother who became a CBC producer in the early years of Canadian television.

Maybe Mr. Watt missed the revelation from the late Marshall McLuhan that the medium is the message. And what is your potential if you are the kingpin in a garbage dump? Of what value is your audience if you only reach the semi-literate?

Mr. Watt compares Poilievre to conservative Michael Harris of Ontario’s Common Sense Revolution of 1995. Michael Harris was a disaster as premier of Ontario as Pierre Poilievre would be a disaster as prime minister of Canada. He is an egocentric personality in the robes of Cassius.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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Liar, Liar.

by Peter Lowry

One hates to see the scion of the Weston family lying to our parliamentarians.  He blames his international suppliers now for his stores’ unconscionable profits. He says that his giant company is performing the way it should, with record profits every year. I do not know how he became so facile with the workings of a grocery empire such as Loblaws.

I also was taught about the grocery business as a young man. I had come home from the Canadian air force, trained in the use and care of weapons and munitions. I was looking for something more peaceful as a career. It happened to be a time of rapid expansion of grocery chains in Canada and there was a need for store managers and area supervisors. All I had to survive was some rigorous training while earning my salary by working in every department of some very large supermarkets.

I think I was shocked at the time with the waste in produce that demanded a 40 per cent mark-up across the board in that department. I learned more about meat than I really wanted to know when learning the basics in that department. Unloading trucks of canned goods was a very basic muscle-building job. Frozen food was only starting to come into the stores at the time and other departments had to pay for the new freezers. I think my favourite learning time was as a cashier and I learned a lot there.

And to this day, I enjoy taking the wife to the grocery store and checking out the prices and doing the math for her on which deal is the better. Two of my favourite stores here in Barrie are Metro and Zehrs. They are the best run and probably most profitable stores in the city. For value for your dollar, you cannot beat No Frills, which is part of the Loblaw empire.

And that is why I know that the Weston heir was lying to our MPs the other day. I have mentioned before that I have a favourite orange juice that we buy every week. It is the 2.5 litre jug of pure orange juice packaged in Quebec for Del Monte Canada. I get it on sale at No frills for $4.49 and regularly at up to $5.29. I was in Zehrs just last week and the price of exactly the same product and packaging was priced at $9.99. There is absolutely no rational way that the Del Monte company would have any part in the setting of those stores’ prices. Personally, I think there should be jail terms reserved for those who lie to parliament. And I am even more convinced that there should be heavy fines for companies that exploit Canadians at a time of extreme inflationary pressures.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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The Common Man?

by Peter Lowry

As the farmer who spreads manure over his fields, Canada’s federal opposition leader lays it on for his party’s right-wing supporters.  It is why Pierre Poilievre would feel at home with the right-wing C.D. Howe Institute in Toronto. While there would be no doubt that Clarence Decatur Howe helped Canada’s Mackenzie-King liberals launch Trans-Canada Airlines (Air Canada) and get through the Second World War, the institute named after him caters to the business interests to whom the MIT trained Howe paid homage.

What was incongruous in Poilievre’s address to the institute recently was his posturing as a man of the people. He does not know those whom he pretends to hold dear. He might have left the business people in the audience in the dark about how he would do it, yet, he promised them a pared down government that would cut government spending.

He made it clear—to the delight of his audience—that he is on-side with free-market capitalism. He was, as usual, down on the economics of the Trudeau government. He told the audience, hopefully to some surprise, that life in Canada today is a “living hell for working class Canadians.”  He forgot to point to the food industry people in the audience as part of the reason that the current demands on food banks were exceeding the food banks’ capabilities to satisfy.

It was surprising though that he made his usual spurious attack on the liberal government’s carbon tax. He accused the institute supporters who pay the tax of carelessly passing it on to the working class. Since the tax is not a tax in the usual sense of the word, it is returned in its entirety to the working class to provide them with some lessening of the pain of the prices effected.  Poilievre promised the business people that he will quickly put an end to that nonsense, should he become prime minister.

He further told the business people that a government under his direction will put an emphasis on accelerating access to Canada’s mineral wealth. That is the same hollow promise you can hear in any party’s platform.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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A Climate Change Critique.

by Peter Lowry

Help is here. After the past several years of feeling like a voice in the wilderness, there is support for the contention that capturing and storing carbon is a dumb idea. And, what I found was particularly infuriating, was the tar sands exploiters wanted our government to pay the costs of the sham.

And even better, it leaves conservative leader Pierre Poilievre adrift on a sea of BS. It was his pathetic support for carbon capture and storage that would leave him free to criticize everyone other than himself. His friends in the Pathways Alliance of tar sands exploiters have been so busy ramping up oils sands exploitation that they have actually increased Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions when we were supposed to be cutting back. The tar sands billionaires have moved into the state of being the single largest producers of greenhouse gas in Canada at 28 per cent of the total.

Mind you, the equal stupidity of the federal government throwing billions away on the Trans Mountain pipeline is inexcusable.

And, can you imagine, in his usual rush to gather media attention, Poilievre was even criticizing Justin Trudeau for imposing some carbon tax on our friends in embattled Ukraine. That is not only untrue but it is a stupid lie, which is what we hear so often from those cheap seats. Poilievre is actually making Justin Trudeau look good.

The current critique of Canada’s tar sands exploiters comes from the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) that represents some 44 countries and has spend the past 49 years studying and reporting on the world-wide energy consumption. The agency points out that the cold hard truth is that Canada is the only G7 country to actually increase greenhouse gas emissions since 1990.  The tar sand exploiters are bringing up more bitumen from the earth’s core every year. It is estimated that if every liter of greenhouse gas emissions were to be found space underground, it would cost as much as US$ 3.5 billion every year to capture and store the greenhouse gases.

The latest figures of world-wide demand for oil and gas are expected to reach a peak by the end of this decade. And yet many oil companies continue to expand production. It is as though the world-wide industry members are competing to provide the world with its very last barrel of oil.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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

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Posing as Poilievre.

by Peter Lowry

Is it better to have a leader of the conservative party who squints at you rather than continue to wear corrective lenses? This has been a puzzle. Why would you want a man who is so obviously uncomfortable with children to have them appear in commercials with him? What is the point?   In many years of working with politicians I have never seen such foolishness. What is best for any politician is to encourage them in the positives and to discourage the negatives.

Why lie? Watching Pierre Poilievre in recent years has been an interesting lesson in what politicians should not be: They should not be phoney. From the time during the pandemic and the parliamentary hearings had MP’s attending through Zoom at home, Poilievre had the whole megillah of staging on his home scene. While some politicians did not think it was bad to look like they lived in a tenement somewhere, Poilievre was always in his blue suit with white starched shirt and tie. The scene was properly lit and the background looked studious with false bookcases.

The clear message in these pretentions was that he considered himself important and we were seeing a false image. And it was when you listened to what he was saying, you got the clear impression that he was choosing his slander carefully. You were supposed to be in agreement with his sneering at other politicos and in agreement with his supposedly superior positions.

Like in the vindictive slogans of Donald Trump in the U.S. such as his “Lock Her Up” for his opponent Hilary Clinton. You never really knew why she should be locked up. Nobody ever proved she did anything wrong.

It seems to be the same for Poilievre’s “Axe the Tax.” The carbon tax, he is talking about is actually not a tax. It is a levy on high greenhouse gas emissions that are collected from industry and returned to Canadians, in entirety, in the form of a rebate to Canadian families, small businesses, farmers, and aboriginal groups.

But do not bother Pierre Poilievre with the facts. Poilievre thinks he is smarter than the people who are concerned about global warming. He doesn’t seem to believe that global warming is a problem. I doubt many educated Canadians will vote for him.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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The Theory of the Tax.

by Peter Lowry

Pierre Poilievre might not be the smartest politician in Ottawa. He stumbles around without his glasses, probably walks into walls and tells his foolish followers to “Axe the Tax.” What he does not seem to understand is that this levy, that he wants to axe, is based on the most successful tax the federal government ever kept raising. It was the tax on cigarettes. And it worked.

Frankly, it was not pictures of tumours in the lung that did the job. I was well aware of the medical reasons not to smoke long before I stopped smoking.

But the constant increases in the price of a package of cigarettes certainly caught my attention. It was a long cycle. I remember when 20 cigarettes cost less than 50 cents. When the cost past 50 cents, I scoffed and said “so what,” and kept on puffing. When I saw a person pay over $10 for a pack of cigarettes recently, I was glad I had quit long before that.

And that is the reason, we are told that today, less than one Canadian in ten lights up. It puzzles me though that our aboriginals account for so much of the smoking that seems to be on their reservations.

But the point of this commentary is that this carbon tax which Mr. Poilievre spends so much time attacking is not even a tax but it is having an impact in terms of reduced greenhouse gasses. And most of the seniors I know welcome the Climate Action Incentive that goes into their bank account every quarter. It might not mean as much to younger recipients but it is going to continue to grow—unless that Mr. Poilievre wins his dream of becoming prime minister of Canada.

I guess it depends on his caucus having the testicular fortitude to force him to keep that Climate Action Incentive flowing into Canadians’ bank accounts.

I really do expect though that some of that money needs to be diverted to charging stations across Canada for electric vehicles. Until we see an easy drive anywhere in the country with adequate chargers, it will be hybrid cars getting the nod.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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Telling Trudeau to Go.

by Peter Lowry

Belling the cat has always been the problem. Back in the 1960s, the conservative party of Canada had a problem with leadership. It was leader John George Diefenbaker, who declined to go quietly into the night. He was fighting with his own party. His nemesis was conservative party president Dalton Camp. I could not say it publicly at the time but I really liked Dalton. And, until he shot down the AVRO Arrow, I liked John Diefenbaker.

It left me in the envious position of giving liberal commentary on Toronto’s best radio news station for the penultimate conservative leadership convention at Maple Leaf Gardens in 1967. Dalton ran the events from the lounge in the Gardens and engineered the win by Robert Stanfield from Nova Scotia. One of the delights of the event was wandering around the darkened grey section of the Gardens and finding fellow liberals there, enjoying the show. I was always ready with liberal comments on the convention and even had some that were breaking news.

I was sitting in the board room of the liberal party’s advertising agency for the announcement by prime minister Lester Pearson of the next year’s liberal leadership convention. I had lost my bid for a seat in the Ontario Legislature but there were some interesting opportunities for the upcoming liberal leadership. I took the offer from Bob Winter’s group mainly because the Ontario party president was his campaign manager and he wanted me to look after the media and the convention.

Nobody had told Mr. Pearson that it was time to go—unless it was his wife who really hated politics. Nor did we feel any urge to suggest that Pierre Trudeau take his walk in the snow. He set his own schedule. He tried to rid himself of that demanding job twice. My advice to all politicians as well as with actors: Is leave them laughing.

I am concerned that Justin Trudeau does not have the acumen of his father. He has worn out his wife who probably told him it was time to go long before the marriage fell apart. Justin lacks the timing that his father had. When you pile on the failures in office, people start to believe your nay-sayers. Justin Trudeau’s time is up.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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

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Hype and Hypocrisy.

by Peter Lowry

Canadians are going to need a truth and reconciliation commission to understand conservative leader Pierre Poilievre and his failure to debate legislation with honesty. The other day I was watching a television clip of his discussion on Bill C-234 which is now before the senate. This polyester politician can lie so routinely to Canadians, it makes your stomach turn.

To tell you about this, you should be aware that Bill C-234 was probably written on the request of the leader of the opposition’s office. The basic intent of the bill is to eliminate the levy on greenhouse gas emissions for all propane and natural gas used on farms to heat buildings. In simple terms, this bill would cancel out the effort the government is making to reduce greenhouse gas emissions across Canada, and all the while, to eliminate the expense for those who cannot afford it.

The most amusing part of the Poilievre speech was his claim that a chicken farmer, who spends $40,000 over the winter heating his hen house cannot afford the added expense of the carbon levy. To begin with anyone spending $40,000 to keep their chickens warm and cozy is doing it as a business expense. And any hen house that expensive to heat would probably be the equivalent in size to a 40-home subdivision. He is talking about a million-dollar business. And it would definitely be included in those businesses that should be moving to lower-cost heating systems.

What I did not understand in Poilievre’s speech was that he talked about the heating oil levy as only being omitted in the Atlantic provinces. The Atlantic provinces probably still have many homes that need to move away from oil heating. The moratorium on the oil heating levy applies to other provinces as well as in the Atlantic provinces. It is for three years to give people using home heating oil time to find more efficient methods of heating their homes.

But Mr. Poilievre does not seem to be paying attention to what is really going on and it seems more important to him to misrepresent what the liberal government is doing. Canadians are starting to become impatient with Mr. Poilievre. He wants to blame the liberals for everything and has no solutions of his own.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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

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Whose Mess Is It?

by Peter Lowry

It was no fun. I recently spent some time digging into what the pollsters have been telling us. They can be such a dreary bunch. And if they don’t like something, they tend to lay it on. They sure have not been giving good news to liberals. They tend to blame it all on Justin Trudeau. We might as well blame him for everything else that is going wrong.

The other day, for example, we found that the Canadian Mint was going to introduce the new King Charles III Canadian coins. Not that many Canadians give a damn but how will they get those big ears on a dime? So, just blame Justin. He gets blamed for everything else these days. The first time I met Justin as an MP, he turned me off because I wanted to do something about the Canadian constitution. He sure doesn’t want to get involved in that circus.

I could always blame the conservative’s Poilievre. That poor schmuck actually wants to be prime minister. He is the one going around the country saying that “Canada is broken.” I guess I will never understand him. Imagining Canada with him as prime minister is a mean and cruel country.

It would be a Canada with no place for charity. He wants dog-eat-dog capitalism. He doesn’t like rules—not even those promoted by the Marquis of Queensbury.

And what is that damn fool going to do about global warming. He hates spending money on things like water bombers to fight the out-of-control wildfires that are consuming our forests. What would he do about the floods that destroy our roads and bridges? The damn fool thinks he can solve all our problems with more police and longer prison sentences.

The conservatives are sure spending a lot on this guy. They have spent the last year trying to make him into something that Canadians would vote for. He sure squints a lot without his glasses. The wife and kids look like they came from central casting. Now, if they could only come up with a humanity pill for him. Frankly, I don’t think he is a very nice person.

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to: [email protected]

The Brass of Brassard.

by Peter Lowry

The city of Barrie, that sits in the middle of Ontario, has two conservative members of parliament. One of the two is Barrie-Innisfil MP John Brassard. He told the local Internet newspaper the other day how pleased he was to vote in parliament for a conservative motion to eliminate the carbon tax for all home heating fuels.

Mr. Brassard claimed that by defeating the conservative motion, the liberals were condemning seniors and young people to a life of misery because they would bear the brunt of increased costs to heat their homes this coming winter. And that tells me that Mr. Brassard is deliberately lying to his constituents.

What he is neglecting to mention is that the levy on carbon-based polluting fuels is considered the most effective method to encourage Canadians to opt for renewable fuels such as electricity. Nobody suffers unduly from the carbon tax as it is not really a tax. This is because the Carbon Tax goes back to the seniors and lower income earners in the form of Climate Action Incentive payments. There is now a twenty per cent top up in payments to rural households because of their increased fuel costs and lack of public transit alternatives.

Nobody expects Canadians to make the change to lower emissions of Greenhouse gasses overnight. That is the reason that the carbon tax increases gradually over time.

Even with the gradual growth in the levy, there was some imbalances in the system because not everybody can switch to non-polluting fuels as quickly as they want. Home heating with oil proved to be a special problem. This is already an expensive way to heat a home and there were price barriers for many to move to systems, such as heat pumps, to replace the heavy pollution of oil heating.

When this became obvious, the government declared a moratorium on the heating oil part of the plan for three years so that more aggressive programs by both the federal and provincial governments can lower the cost of conversion for lower income Canadians. In some provinces now, the combined federal and provincial support programs can provide free heat pump conversion for low-income Canadians.

The point of this is that, good or bad, the carbon tax is a method of getting Canadians to convert to lower greenhouse gas solutions. It is less than helpful for people with no solution to climate change to tell us to ‘axe the tax.’

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Copyright 2023 © Peter Lowry            

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

[email protected]