The House of Commons Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage met on May 6 and decided to study Canadian history and how Canadians acquire knowledge of our past.
Here are the terms of reference for this study, as decided on by the committee at that May 6 meeting: Continue reading Politics of History: The Terms of Reference
Statement from the Honourable Diane Finley on the death of Senator Doug Finley at age 66: Continue reading Senator Doug Finley: 1946-2013
A running tally of the polls published in the B.C. election campaign (the writ dropped on April 16), arranged here, with the most recent on top. In every poll, Adrian Dix and the NDP lead with Christy Clark and the Liberals in second. The biggest gap of 22 points between the two was found by Justason in a poll published April 29. The smallest gap was 2 points in poll published May 9 by Forum.
Continue reading A review of the polls in BC: Dix leads in all but the gap varies
“We have set out these bold goals and we are reaching our targets. I’m going to run in the next election on the strong economy. I’m going to run on (being) number one in job creation.”
– Christy Clark to her party’s convention in Whistley, BC, October, 2012
This morning, Statistics Canada released the final report card before Tuesday’s general election in B.C. on Clark’s 17-months-old Jobs Plan. BC is unequivocally not “number one” in job creation. In fact, it is not number one in any employment measurement used by Statistics Canada. And yet, it could be a lot worse, I suppose. So I’m giving the BC Jobs Plan a “C-” at this point. Continue reading The report card on Christy Clark's "BC Jobs Plan": A "C-"
This is the new “attack ad” from the BC Liberals aimed at Adrian Dix, the leader of the NDP. Several polling organizations have found the the BC Liberals well back of the BC NDP last week (the gap was anywhere from 4 points to 10 points). There is less than a week to go until election day on May 14.
This is pretty harsh attack ad. Here’s the setup from the BC Libs: Continue reading BC Liberal candidates star in hard-hitting anti-Dix attack ad
His name is Ted Cruz. He’s the freshman Senator from Texas. He was born in Canada. And here’s one of the most well-connected journalists when it comes to reporting on Republicans saying he could be running for president:
Cruz isn’t worried that his birth certificate will be a problem. Though he was born in Canada, he and his advisers are confident that they could win any legal battle over his eligibility. Cruz’s mother was a U.S. citizen when he was born, and he considers himself to be a natural-born citizen.
As Cruz considers a run, his staff keeps adding new speaking appearances to his calendar. This week, he’ll headline the South Carolina GOP’s Silver Elephant dinner; in late May, he’ll speak to Wall Street heavies at the New York GOP’s annual dinner.
Earlier this year, Cruz gave the keynote speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference, where he was greeted with a raucous reception and praised by Sarah Palin. She touted Cruz as a conservative who “chews barbed wire and spits out rust.”
An article in The Atlantic has some important information about how Cruz might get around that legal battle involving his Canadian citizenship:
In short, the Constitution says that the president must be a natural-born citizen. “The weight of scholarly legal and historical opinion appears to support the notion that ‘natural born Citizen’ means one who is entitled under the Constitution or laws of the United States to U.S. citizenship ‘at birth’ or ‘by birth,’ including any child born ‘in’ the United States, the children of United States citizens born abroad, and those born abroad of one citizen parents who has met U.S. residency requirements,” the CRS’s Jack Maskell wrote. So in short: Cruz is a citizen; Cruz is not naturalized; therefore Cruz is a natural-born citizen, and in any case his mother is a citizen. [Read the full piece which includes the legal opinion]
Meet the bleached-blonde, punk-rock-playing-bassist who made a mint in the software business, is a diehard “green” and is running for the BC Conservative Party in the Premier Christy Clark’s riding. His name is Duane “Chaos” Nickull and he’s the BC Conservative candidate in Vancouver-Point Grey, the same riding as Premier Christy Clark.
“What the frack goes on with the [BC] Liberal party?” says Vancouver 24 Hours columnist Bill Tieleman. Bill also notes — and I agree — “This has also been the most environmentally-minded campaign I’ve ever seen in B.C.”
Eight federal and provincial elections since 2011. In all but one, the incumbent party won. (And the one that lost, Jean Charest and Quebec Liberals, missed by a hair, losing the popular vote by less than one percentage point). Didn’t matter if it was a party of the left or right. Now, in BC, an incumbent that was trailing badly, is quickly narrowing a gap on a challenger: So I ask — What is about Canadian voters they appear so reluctant to change their governments?
UPDATE May 15, 2013: Christy Clark’s Liberals won in B.C. So make that eight for nine incumbents who won with a message of “it’s the economy.” Column, with link below, written two weeks before vote, still stands!
Just in from Liberal HQ:
OTTAWA– Liberal Democratic Reform and Intergovernmental Affairs critic Stéphane Dion sent the following letter to NDP Justice critic Françoise Boivin today in response to the NDP’s request for Liberal support for the motion passed by the Quebec National Assembly earlier this month:
Ms. Françoise Boivin, MP
152 Confederation Building
House of Commons
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0A6Madam Member,
On behalf of the Liberal caucus, thank you for your letter dated April 29, 2013. Continue reading Stephane Dion slams Mulcair for "irresponsibility" in criticism of Supreme Court
