Mar 14 2019 — Don Martin — CTV Power Play — It’s no longer about the truth, if it ever was. It’s about ameliorating or amplifying the consequences of a political poop that defies polishing. The crystallization of that reality came Wednesday at an emergency justice committee meeting. MPs were supposed to deal with former attorney general Jody Wilson Raybould’s willingness to re-appear and continue tormenting […]

Mar 14 2019 — Susan Delacourt — Toronto Star — Up until six weeks ago, it looked like Justin Trudeau had fine-tuned his operation into election readiness for 2019. The SNC-Lavalin affair has blown those best-laid plans to smithereens, to say the least. Now, with a budget on the immediate horizon and an election just seven months away, Trudeau has some immediate repair work to […]

Mar 14 2019 — Neil Macdonald — CBC — Back in December, NDP MP Charlie Angus approvingly retweeted a Christmas wish on Twitter calling for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to fire then-Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould. “The Justice file has been completely bungled” quoted Angus, who accused Wilson-Raybould of all sorts of malevolence. But of course that was then. To hear Angus tell it now, […]

Mar 13 2019 — Andrew Coyne — National Post — By the time Jody Wilson-Raybould testifies before the Commons justice committee again — if she ever does — it will have been almost a month since her first appearance. Already her detailed, documented account — of an intense, sustained and coordinated campaign among a number of senior government officials to pressure her into shutting down […]

Mar 13 2019 — Graham Thomson — iPolitics — Alberta Premier Rachel Notley will absolutely call a provincial election next week — unless, of course, she doesn’t. And at this point it’s looking increasingly like she will wait. Or will she? Welcome to the intense and exhausting world that is the on-again-off-again pre-election speculation in Alberta. Trying to figure out exactly when Notley will […]

Mar 13 2019 — Christie Blatchford — National Post — And the world moves on. Aided and abetted by newer news (the terrible crash of the Ethiopian jet), the fact that the collective attention span is that of an agitated toddler and the Liberal majority on the Commons justice committee, it may well be that LavScan or LavScam, as the SNC-Lavalin imbroglio has come to […]

Mar 13 2019 — Chantal Hébert — Toronto Star — No one will accuse Transport Minister Marc Garneau of having rushed to judgment on whether to ground Boeing 737 Max 8 planes from Canadian air space until more is known about the causes of last Sunday’s Ethiopian Airlines crash. By the time Garneau appeared on Wednesday to announce he was reversing his earlier stance that […]

Mar 13 2019 — Glen Pearson — National Newswatch — The Trudeau government’s SNC-Lavalin controversy is a goldmine of sorts.  For opposition parties and hyper-partisans, it has proved a gift from the gods, great enough to effectively move polling numbers and turning the next federal election into something of a free-for-all. For the media, the intricate mix between elected representatives and senior bureaucrats and the […]

Mar 12 2019 — David Climenhaga — Rabble.ca — Memo to Conservatives, New Democrats and others who are crowing about how Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appears to have been revealed as a harsher and less cuddly politician than he has been thought to be till now: Be careful what you wish for. If Trudeau is revealed as a tough guy who is not particularly […]

Mar 12 2019 — John Ibbitson — Globe and Mail —

Mar 12 2019 — Chris Selley — National Post — The NDP is officially on the offensive in Quebec. On Monday in Montreal, newly minted deputy leader Alexandre Boulerice promised the party’s “environmental plan … will put an end to half-measures.” Brigitte Sansoucy, chair of the NDP’s Quebec Caucus, suggested they would offer “concrete solutions for Quebecers (on) issues like employment, agriculture and support for […]

Mar 12 2019 — J.P. Lewis — The Conversation — Social media has made every day a huge news day. Responses to political developments are regularly framed in apocalyptic turns. It is not only a challenge to determine whether news is real or fake; all news is immediately contextualized as the 1927 Yankees of bombshells. Social media has made every day a huge news day. […]

Mar 12 2019 — Andrew MacDougall — Maclean's — Imagine you’re a politician. Even better, you’re the leader of a political party. The leader of the main opposition party, even. And yet, most Canadians wouldn’t know you if they tripped over you in the tool aisle of the local Canadian Tire. What to do? Especially when the Prime Minister—your target—is blessed with a famous […]

Mar 12 2019 — Susan Delacourt — Toronto Star — Members of Parliament face a lot of hard decisions, but an easy one is sitting right now before Liberals on the Commons justice committee. On Wednesday, MPs on the committee will be asked to vote on whether to hear again from former minister Jody Wilson-Raybould, on what is now known as the SNC-Lavalin scandal.

Mar 12 2019 — Craig Anthony Johnson and Iftekharul Haque — The Conversation — Over the last month, the Canadian government has been embroiled in a political controversy, involving allegations that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau put undue pressure on Jody Wilson-Raybould, the country’s former justice minister and attorney general, to negotiate a deferred prosecution agreement with Québec engineering giant SNC-Lavalin Group.