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New Canadian Politics Thread

zeke said:
I think they were trying to bully us before we handed her over to the US.

Now that the US is taking ownership of it, i'm not sure they'll bother with the canucks anymore.
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Canada will be made a example of. Target a important Chinese national, your citizens are getting the death penalty or life in prison.
 
zeke said:
International credibility.
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I don't see how they would lose any more than they have to this point by continuing to detain them. If anything, they want people and other countries to know that they will resort to hostage diplomacy if one of their nationals is threatened.

I would even say that they lose credibility (and face) by releasing them without any sort of quid pro quo to justify it.

I dunno, I don't see a light suddenly going off in China along the lines of, 'shit, we look really bad randomly detaining Canadians, we better let them go'. Especially cause they would view having the Michaels as leverage over Canada, Canada still controls Meng's fate (to an extent), and releasing the Michaels is giving up on that leverage before the ordeal has made its way through the Canadian courts. Aside from a handful of Western nations, most everyone has been silent about it.

Ultimately I think the priority for China is to demonstrate strength here, and releasing the Canadians before securing Meng's release doesn't accomplish that.
 
i think they can still walk it back and claim enough of a legal basis for their actions.

in the end i think china has spent a lot of effort trying to gain international credibility and i'm not sure they'll tank it for no reward.
 
Wayward DP said:
I don't see how they would lose any more than they have to this point by continuing to detain them. If anything, they want people and other countries to know that they will resort to hostage diplomacy if one of their nationals is threatened.

I would even say that they lose credibility (and face) by releasing them without any sort of quid pro quo to justify it.

I dunno, I don't see a light suddenly going off in China along the lines of, 'shit, we look really bad randomly detaining Canadians, we better let them go'. Especially cause they would view having the Michaels as leverage over Canada, Canada still controls Meng's fate (to an extent), and releasing the Michaels is giving up on that leverage before the ordeal has made its way through the Canadian courts. Aside from a handful of Western nations, most everyone has been silent about it.

Ultimately I think the priority for China is to demonstrate strength here, and releasing the Canadians before securing Meng's release doesn't accomplish that.
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One thing China does potentially have to lose if they keep kidnapping and holding hostage random citizens of countries they have a dispute with is the willingness of Westerners in general to work for Chinese companies in China, or travel there to spend money as tourists.

Maybe they don't care about that, but I know China certainly won't be on my list of travel destinations anytime soon.
 
LeafGm said:
One thing China does potentially have to lose if they keep kidnapping and holding hostage random citizens of countries they have a dispute with is the willingness of Westerners in general to work for Chinese companies in China, or travel there to spend money as tourists.

Maybe they don't care about that, but I know China certainly won't be on my list of travel destinations anytime soon.
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I mean, this is true, but I just feel like Xi's whole shpiel is "look at how strong China is" and "China are adults now", and anything he does that is seen as 'backing down' would hurt him domestically.

On the other hand, I definitely will not be going to China any time soon, despite my long-held desire to do so. So yeah, there are repercussions.
 
Had little interest before, zero interest now. I spend my money in democracies. Vote with your wallet kids.
 
So according to the globe, Trudeau tried to pressure the previous AG to pressure federal prosecutors to stay criminal charges against SNC.

Appearantly she didn't and was canned as a result.

If true, this would probably be the last straw for the electorate.
 
Altair said:
So according to the globe, Trudeau tried to pressure the previous AG to pressure federal prosecutors to stay criminal charges against SNC.

Appearantly she didn't and was canned as a result.

If true, this would probably be the last straw for the electorate.
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you're a day or two behind on this one.

but yeah, I agree its a big deal. no, I disagree that it will be the last straw.
 
Wayward DP said:
you're a day or two behind on this one.

but yeah, I agree its a big deal. no, I disagree that it will be the last straw.
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I make it a habit to not jump on everything the second it hits the press. But after a couple of days of the PM and the PMO and Jody Wilson-Raybould not outright denying it, starts to give it more validity.

If investigations are launched into this, in the middle of a election year, with the economy slowing down and the liberals and conservatives already close in the polls, I think that's the last straw.

Adscam destroyed the liberals for a decade, and if true, this will show up at the ballot box as well.
 
I doubt it's the last straw, since Scheer is, well, Scheer, and the NDP are desperately doing all they can to destroy their party. But it's definitely not good.
 
Altair said:
I make it a habit to not jump on everything the second it hits the press. But after a couple of days of the PM and the PMO and Jody Wilson-Raybould not outright denying it, starts to give it more validity.

If investigations are launched into this, in the middle of a election year, with the economy slowing down and the liberals and conservatives already close in the polls, I think that's the last straw.

Adscam destroyed the liberals for a decade, and if true, this will show up at the ballot box as well.
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I mean, it seems very clear that the PMO tried to pressure the AG to make the prosecution go away. Kudos to Jody for telling them to get bent though. There isn't really any scenario in which the Libs come out of this unscathed as far as I can see. But I just don't think the average Canadian cares enough about this kind of thing for it to make a huge difference. Maybe I'm wrong on that point. It will likely contribute to the perception of the Libs as out of touch, corrupt, elites.

I see it more as another transgression that is part of a theme rather than the straw that broke the camel's back. But we'll see. I have a hard time listening to anything Andrew Scheer says and not wanting to offer him a cookie and glass of milk, but who knows.
 
Wayward DP said:
I mean, it seems very clear that the PMO tried to pressure the AG to make the prosecution go away. Kudos to Jody for telling them to get bent though. There isn't really any scenario in which the Libs come out of this unscathed as far as I can see. But I just don't think the average Canadian cares enough about this kind of thing for it to make a huge difference. Maybe I'm wrong on that point. It will likely contribute to the perception of the Libs as out of touch, corrupt, elites.

I see it more as another transgression that is part of a theme rather than the straw that broke the camel's back. But we'll see. I have a hard time listening to anything Andrew Scheer says and not wanting to offer him a cookie and glass of milk, but who knows.
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Ya, her demotion made zero sense until this story broke.

But as for the election, nobody is going to vote for Scheer. Even conservatives aren't voting for scheer. The way Scheer gets to 24 Sussex is by people voting Trudeau out. One of the thing Trudeau has always had going for him was his brand. This, biggest if true, is going to damage that brand. He's going to need to campaign with him and his office being forced to explain why he tried to force the AG to put political pressure on fed prosecutors to get a corrupt construction company off of criminal charges.

Its really the timing that's terrible. Had this happened a year ago, it would have blown over by election time, but this will only really start to blow up right before the election campaign starts, when voters start to tune in to what ottawa is doing.
 
Altair said:
Ya, her demotion made zero sense until this story broke.

But as for the election, nobody is going to vote for Scheer. Even conservatives aren't voting for scheer. The way Scheer gets to 24 Sussex is by people voting Trudeau out. One of the thing Trudeau has always had going for him was his brand. This, biggest if true, is going to damage that brand. He's going to need to campaign with him and his office being forced to explain why he tried to force the AG to put political pressure on fed prosecutors to get a corrupt construction company off of criminal charges.

Its really the timing that's terrible. Had this happened a year ago, it would have blown over by election time, but this will only really start to blow up right before the election campaign starts, when voters start to tune in to what ottawa is doing.
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eh, trying to help SNC-Lavalin may score him some points in Quebec. don't actually know how that will go over there (could also be the opposite, ala adscam)

the timing is far from ideal but there is still more than half a year before the election. this will be old news by then.

and, as you accurately point out, Scheer is Scheer
 
This will likely blow over. Now if it was the Conservatives in power, not a chance it would go away.
 
anne25 said:
This will likely blow over. Now if it was the Conservatives in power, not a chance it would go away.
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I'm not sure if it's a Liberal vs. Conservative thing. I think it's all about how you handle it.

Take adscam, for example. Paul Martin made a big deal about it, apologized endlessly for it and vowed to fix the problem...and was crucified at the polls. If it'd been Jean Chretien or Stephen Harper in his shoes, they probably would have just ignored, dodged and minimized it until it faded away from public attention.

That latter approach seems to be the way Trudeau's opted to handle this SNC-Lavelin matter.
 
anne25 said:
This will likely blow over. Now if it was the Conservatives in power, not a chance it would go away.
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Adscam was tiny (monetarily) and didn't blow over. Harper had a pile of scandals blow over (in & out, bernier leaving classified files at his girlfriends place...a woman with heavy ties to quebec bikers, Afghan detainees handed over knowingly for torture..and Harper refusing to turn over documents pertaining to what was known about the issue, then proroguing parliament to avoid parliamentary investigations into the incident). It's weird considering the one that didn't blow over (his senate appointees playing fast and loose with expenses) was easily the most minor of the Harper scandals.

Canadians are weird that way.
 
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