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Friday, January 28, 2005
NORMAN'S SPECTATOR
From today's edition of NORMAN'S SPECTATOR, where the articles are hotlinked.
TOP STORY
Church told to butt out
The National Post/Ottawa Citizen front Elizabeth Thompson and Anne Dawson:
“The Roman Catholic Church should keep its nose out of the government's same-sex marriage legislation, Foreign Affairs Minister Pierre Pettigrew suggested yesterday.”
RUNNER-UP
Fraser backs up Gomery
The Globe and Mail’s DANIEL LEBLANC reports:
“Auditor-General Sheila Fraser and two opposition parties are throwing their support behind Mr. Justice John Gomery in his showdown with Jean Chrétien, leaving the former prime minister increasingly isolated in his efforts to oust the outspoken head of the sponsorship inquiry, sources say.”
ALL THE POOP THAT’S FIT TO POST
Most papers today report on yesterday’s ceremony at Auschwitz. The world needed more Canada then, but did not get it.
The Guardian also reports that the US and UK have agreed an Iraq exit strategy—as they say in the Queen’s English.
In French, the governing party is divided, which has a familiar ring. Le Monde fronts Chinese peacekeepers in Port-au-Prince, where I thought we were playing a role.
Speaking of which, The Washington Post reports no sign of Canadian election observers observing the Iraq election.
The Independent asks, “Is the world safer now?”—and you can probably guess the answer.
The Iraq election lead in Figaro and in the London Times. The New York Times scores an exclusive interview with President Bush.
Yesterday, I missed this interesting piece in the Times on NAFTA. (Hat tip to blogger Paul Tuns.)
The Los Angeles Times reports the FBI is extending its reach. Yikes.
The Daily Telegraph reports the spooks are also planning to spook the Brits who returned from Gitmo.
The Telly also reports that the Greatest Brit, unlike his Canadian counterpart, is still alive and kicking. Which is, I guess, what makes it news.
The Globe and Mail’s Doug Saunders—who kept me chuckling with his reports from Libya before and during Paul Martin's visit--distinguishes himself from the crowd again with his un-funny report from Auschwitz. (Memo to Ed: Have you looked into cloning this guy?)
In commentary, Jeff Simpson says Nova Scotia is a nice place to visit but it faces an uphill struggle in attracting immigrants.
Former ambassador Michael Bell is surprised at how well Mohammed Abbas is doing. He should be. Like most of his counterparts at Foreign Affairs, he swore by Yasser Arafat until nearly the bitter end.
Today, the boys and girls of Pearson won’t be happy to learn that Madame the Commissioner of Official languages is looking into French at our embassies abroad.
No surprise that Rick Salutin is dubious about Iraq’s elections and George Bush too, but, as usual, its dressed up in some faux-intellectualism for those who like this sort of thing.
The Globe editorial board is right to be dubious about George Bush’s fiscal fitness:
“Long-run deficits are far from benign. They raise the cost of capital, restrict economic growth and undermine the currency. Just ask Ottawa. The net result will be bad for the United States. It will also be bad for Canada and bad for the global economy, which depend heavily on a robust U.S. economy for their well-being.”
Paul Koring analyzes yesterday’s pre-figuring of our foreign and defence policy that somehow landed on the front page of the Globe.
The Gazbags like what they read. And, have no fear, Paul Martin says today to those who have doubts, there will be chickens in the navy and the air force pot too.
Joe Comuzzi is sweating same-sex marriage—I mean, what does a minister do when his conscience does not align with the Prime Minister’s fundamental beliefs political imperatives?
Judy Sgro’s accuser had a bad day. Ottawa released its guidelines for spousal support. The feds and Québec are close to a parental-leave deal.
I can’t wait to see if Québec mommies and daddies and baby diapers are asymmetrical—as the diabetes and cancer appear to be in le pays d'hiver--or are just like the rest of us in ROC?
Speaking of the health of Quebecers, Le Devoir reports that Jean Charest’s office has confirmed he and his family were invited to dinner chez Paul Desmarais at Manoir Richelieu on December 27.
While Charest has been shrugging off criticism of his government, Desmarais has been lobbying fiercely on the location of the new hospital planned for Montréal.
The Gazoo reports things are pretty ratty in existing hospitals, but what I’d still really like to know is what role Desmarais played in taking Jean Charest out of federal politics.
André Picard looks at Michael Decter’s health report. Here’s the lead in the Citizen and the Post, for comparison:
“Canadians must finally confront whether medicare's rising costs are too excessive and are bleeding funds away from other social programs, an advisory panel to governments has concluded.”
And what’s this?—The NDP government of Manitoba is appealing a court decision requiring it to pay for abortions? How do they think women got these clinics in the first place?
In BC, a Campbell aide has taken the high jump in record time. And Svend Robinson is on the come-back trail.
The former MP with a taste for expensive jewellery has even started commenting on judicial sentencing, if you can believe it, and he’s egging on the Madame Desfarges of Vancouver.
GOMERY:
You won’t read this in the Toronto Star and it’s buried in Kathryn May’s report in the National Post, but The Globe and Mail reports that opposition leaders and Sheila Fraser are lining up against removal of Judge Gomery. Big deal.
As I argued yesterday—and Susan Riley writes much better today in the Citizen—Stephen Harper is out to lunch in blaming Paul Martin for Gomery’s woes.
Besides, they’re missing the point.
The first objective of the former prime minister’s hacks and flacks and lawyers is to soften up Gomery and Bernard Roy before the three Jeans running the joint/dipping into the sponsorship slush fund--Pelletier, Carle and Chrétien--take the hot-seat.
In particular, the kick-assers would like the three Jeans questioned by Neil Finkelstein, who they hope will be an ass-kisser—given his deep links to the former PM’s closest confidants.
By the way, Finkelstein also worked for the brother of Chrétien’s lawyer when Ian Scott was the AG of Ontario in the Peterson government
You won’t find that in the columns of friendly journalists, such as Chrétien biographer and golf buddy Lawrence Martin, who's lending a helping hand in this classic “campagne de salissage” meant to remove Gomery’s jeans and leave him neutered.
Nor will you find it on the website of the Liberal kick-asser who claims to have destroyed Kim Campbell and Stockwell Day single-handedly and is leading the charge on behalf of Chrétien.
Bernard Landry is not being helpful, and he’s even saying Jacques Parizeau was half-right in his “money and the ethnic vote” speech. If you need any evidence of how badly Chrétien’s national unity strategy worked out in the end, here it is.
As to Paul Martin’s strategy, I see that Allan Gregg has finally figured out the health deal with Québec which, at the outset on CBC, he described as “clever.”
In the current Walrus, he’s now accusing the PM of creating no less than a “Frankenstein Federalism.” The Post and the Citizen pick up the story.
Aside from being totally out of his depth (Memo to Allan: immigration is an area of concurrent jurisdiction and has been since 1867), what’s truly amazing is that Gregg is donning the cape of Pierre Trudeau, the guy Joe Clark was fighting with his advice back then.
Which, come to think of it, is what makes him perfect for Peter Mansbridge’s weekly panel--in the tradition of Dalton Camp, the Toronto Star and Morningside.
Just so you know where I’m coming from, here’s the first column I wrote on the Gomery Inquiry, Michael Bliss’ review of a book in which I wrote about the Commission, and here's my column in today’s Vancouver Sun.
In the Citizen version of Kathryn May’s report, Marcel Masse—who was a public servant and later served as minister responsible for national unity—testified that, like his successor Stéphane Dion, he didn’t know about the sponsorship program.
Buried toward the end of the article, you’ll find more confirmation of the partisan political objective underlying the program that you won’t find elsewhere:
“Mr. Masse said Mr. Chrétien appointed him after the "close call" of the 1995 referendum to find out what went wrong and ensure it never happened again. He and six other ministers concluded the big mistakes were "lousy communications" to counter separatists' views and little federal presence in Quebec.
Their report recommended a new agency, which became the Communications Information Office, to develop and implement the government's communications strategy. It also called for a major buildup of the federal Liberal party in Quebec, picking new organizers, candidates and "winnable" ridings and urged the prime minister, ministers and MPs to be visible and visit Quebec more often.
He acknowledged it was "inappropriate" and unusual for a cabinet report to mix "partisan politics" with public policy but argued the government was "scalded" by the referendum and its mistakes were political.”
ODDS AND SODS:
Yesterday, the Supreme Court affirmed a man’s constitutional right to masturbate in his living room with the curtains drawn. Wendy Cox files the CP version from Vancouver, but she, too, does not clarify whether the ruling applies equally to women.
The Toronto Star beat the cops, whom it beats up on regularly in print, in court. Tonda Maccharles is assigned the unenviable grunt work of chasing the foreign policy review leaked by the Grits to the Globe. The Mayors want their Maypo gas tax.
In the Globe, the oil patch is anxious about the Martin/Williams spitting match.
In the Star, the two are meeting today in Ottawa with the premier of Nova Scotia the Hamm in the sandwich, and Susan Delacourt reports the Martinis are upbeat on the prospects for a deal.
With Parliament returning next Monday after its two- seven-week Christmas break, she also reports they’re bullish on winning the same-sex vote—notwithstanding BQ sabre-rattling.
Speaking of spitting matches, the English-language papers seem to have missed a fine one between two Québec heavyweights after the Liberal caucus meeting.
In the hair department, Liza would have had a tougher fight on her hands had she been up against Pierre Pettigrew of Paris.
Speaking of whom, the National Post fronts his novel definition of separation of Church and State:
“The Roman Catholic Church should keep its nose out of the government's same-sex marriage legislation, Foreign Affairs Minister Pierre Pettigrew suggested yesterday.”
In the underneath the hair department, Sheila Copps criticizes the current crop of politicians for not looking at the “big picture”—which I must have missed in today’s Post column.
As to Frulla, I think she’s met her match in Jean Lapierre, who’s been doing a fine job since returning to the floor of the Commons. But there’s a mini-sponsorship scandal brewing in this aquatics meet, and it bears watching—in both official languages.
Speaking of hair, Barbara Yaffe reports on the front page of the Vancouver Sun and in the Post that Belinda and Peter have confirmed they’re an item, though Belinda is taking a mature approach to the relationship:
"Maybe I should say, spending time together; dating is more of a teenaged word."
In the Star, Carol Goar says lefties are getting old. Chantal Hébert says so are Grits.
Richard Gwyn says Paul Martin reminds him of Joe Who—whom the Star scribe now admires. I must have missed a few columns.
The editorial board poops on striking doctors and is positive about Iraq’s elections which would not be happening had the Star’s advice been followed.
The National Post fights back against bloggers, by re-printing a first-rate piece from Slate. Peter Foster is unhappy that Ontario is raising its minimum wage.
The editorial board poops on Paul Martin for accusing the Cons of “racial profiling” by advertising in ethnic newspapers:
“The Liberals' latest propaganda tactic is a crude exercise in hypocrisy. In election after election, the Liberals have monopolized ethnic votes by pouring millions into multicultural projects, co-opting influential community leaders and bending immigration policies to reward their friends. If anything, Mr. Harper's approach is more enlightened: Rather than buying off multiculti constituencies with favours and cash, he is appealing to them on a substantive policy issue. In other words, he is treating them as sophisticated, independent voters, rather than as anonymous party-machine cogs to be bussed in to campaign events at the behest of local powerbrokers. Which approach should immigrants find more "offensive"?
First with the Reform Party, then with the Canadian Alliance and now with the Conservatives, the Liberals have smeared their opponents as anti-immigrant. Now that Mr. Harper's party is actively working to reach out to immigrants, the Liberals are scrambling to paint that, too, as a sign of bigotry. It's a shameful strategy that no Canadian -- recent immigrant or otherwise -- should fall for.”
Also in the Post, Bruce Garvey writes about Natan Sharansky--George Bush’s latest discovery, and a man whose views on the Mideast Garvey obviously knows nothing about beyond what he’s read in the spin coming out of the US.
Posted by Norman Spector on January 28, 2005 | Permalink
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Comments
Well, I scrolled and scrolled, but screeched to halt upon seeing the blurb about Belinda and Peter. So they're an item, eh?
Let's hope Belinda uses her seat in The House of Commons to do more than just cruise parlimentary stud-muffins.
Posted by: John Palubiski | 2005-01-28 11:27:18 AM
I still don't understand why the articles aren't hyperlinked. Norman says in a comment box below that he does this thing as a favour to the Western Standard and has no need of drawing people to his site. So what's the big deal about cutting and pasting the HTML into the Shotgun version?
Posted by: Robert | 2005-01-28 1:42:37 PM
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