One further point that most people do not understand. As someone who is part of a family that set up a foundation in our name, there is no way that any member of our family has now or will ever have access to money that is currently invested in the foundation. There were three primary reasons for setting up the foundation in the first place. The first was taxes. After we sold a family business, part of the proceeds from that sale went into the foundation, to minimize the tax implications. The second, was to have funds available to my husband and I, and eventually the extended family to donate to charities we support. And finally the third, was to ensure that these funds could not be used for anything other than doing good in the world. In other words. No member of the family has access to these funds. This whole China/Trudeau Foundation connection is all smoke and mirrors.
We hear Chinese influence and election interference shouting from almost every Postmedia owned newspaper while their "reporters" go about doing the exact same thing they accuse the Chinese of. Except there is SILENCE from the CPC on that interference. I think this has become a case of "we know we can't win, so we'll break it".
Bad and sloppy reporting along with conservative "guilt by association" political tactics has pretty well destroyed the We Charity. No one seems to recognize that non-profits need the support of quite the same sort of people as those who might run for office one day or devote themselves to other forms of public service.
Note, the Rouleau Commission reported Feb 17. Fife's diabolical deflection from the Convoy decision was a valuable political contribution/consideration to Poilievre, Ford and the Cons. The Globe is in the gutter.
Yes, it was diabolical. Conservatives should have stayed on the Rouleau Report for a few more weeks, explaining in detail what an idiotic, inconsistent travesty it truly was. Nobody with any sense puts any stock in that partisan hack report.
Good stuff. Also waiting for Fife or anyone else to verify this story, showing that the leak(s) is/are real and not just someone with a personal beef, or the CPC looking for ANYthing they can fling.
What an excellent and thoughtful column -- great summary of the chaos that Bob Fife and the boys are doing in their pellmell rush to get Trudeau to resign.
It’s not free first charity the CPC has gone after, and likely not the last. Crippling charities for progressive causes will continue to be under fire from the right.
Reminds me of when Harper rather cruelly, viciously, and deliberately targeted Katimavik for defunding, a cause near and dear to then-MP Trudeau's heart. He sure showed Harper when he won that boxing fight with the Katimavik logo painted on his arm opposite the eagle tattoo, then restored the funding as PM. There was no rhyme or reason for putting this organization in the crosshairs other than a mean and sadistic hate campaign against all things Trudeau.
The CPC and juvenile punditocracy's hatred for this family, and the philanthropic causes or cultural patronages they undertake, is personal and visceral to the point of psychosis. Jen Gerson had nothing but mean-girl bile to spew over the now-defunct WE Charity mental health podcast that Sophie and Margaret Trudeau were producing. Andrew Coyne's own awkward family connections are well known and clearly appear to have coloured his ability to be objective in his commentary about this PM. But even worse are Jeff Ballingall's bloodthirsty bunchanumbers orcs swarming the PM and Liberal ministers/MPs'/staffers' Twitter feeds, calling on their pigeon messiah to go after the Canadian Avalanche Foundation and investigate the PM's surviving brother because he wrote a travel memoir about China.
Why the avalanche foundation of all things? So they can defile poor Michel Trudeau's corpse, remind the PM of a painful trauma and nothing more. I seem to have lost the bookmark but I recall an article from, I believe it was the Hill Times, where Scheer's advisors and strategists were encouraging him to "push Trudeau's emotional buttons." In other words trigger his PTSD as a campaign strategy. They are horrid creatures who would make Attila the Hun blush.
There is something feral and savage about conservatism in North America. The British Tories have long had a reputation as the "nasty party," but the Canadian Reform-a-Cons seem hell-bent on punching above their weight when it comes to competing with the QAnon GOP.
Hey Jackie, I had forgotten all about some of these things. It will make any charity reluctant to have anything to do with politicians of any stripe, won't it, and then we will all be the poorer for it.
I just don't understand it. Harper disrespected and ignored the media and they were so intimidated by him that they never stood up to him, while Trudeau is happy to talk to them (though they seem to have trouble understanding what he says.) So they despise him for it. It baffles me.
Harper allowing right wing American interests to buy a lot of our media wasn't an accident. Harper stacked the deck in the rights favour and the only thing not letting then run things so far has been Trudeau's popularity. That's why they are so angry. They did all they could to game the system and they are still losing.
This whole China political interference thing blew up in alberta about 10 years ago. Frankly, I’m surprised at all the surprise. We have strong Chinese interference in our cities, our policing, in our universities because the Chinese can and do buy a great deal of good will. In the city of Edmonton, the Chinese diaspora is lobbying against drug harm reduction sites and more punitive policing instead.
Spying is generally not talked about in the media, because then you give all your spies access to the information you have on them. So this whole not talking about spies that the opposition is so concerned with, frankly puzzles me. I think instead, we should simply ask all former citizens of other countries to put Canadian interests first when they become Canadian citizens, making it clear that to do otherwise is treasonous. Apparently this hasn’t been explicitly expressed to our new citizens.
One further point that most people do not understand. As someone who is part of a family that set up a foundation in our name, there is no way that any member of our family has now or will ever have access to money that is currently invested in the foundation. There were three primary reasons for setting up the foundation in the first place. The first was taxes. After we sold a family business, part of the proceeds from that sale went into the foundation, to minimize the tax implications. The second, was to have funds available to my husband and I, and eventually the extended family to donate to charities we support. And finally the third, was to ensure that these funds could not be used for anything other than doing good in the world. In other words. No member of the family has access to these funds. This whole China/Trudeau Foundation connection is all smoke and mirrors.
We hear Chinese influence and election interference shouting from almost every Postmedia owned newspaper while their "reporters" go about doing the exact same thing they accuse the Chinese of. Except there is SILENCE from the CPC on that interference. I think this has become a case of "we know we can't win, so we'll break it".
Bad and sloppy reporting along with conservative "guilt by association" political tactics has pretty well destroyed the We Charity. No one seems to recognize that non-profits need the support of quite the same sort of people as those who might run for office one day or devote themselves to other forms of public service.
Note, the Rouleau Commission reported Feb 17. Fife's diabolical deflection from the Convoy decision was a valuable political contribution/consideration to Poilievre, Ford and the Cons. The Globe is in the gutter.
Yes, it was diabolical. Conservatives should have stayed on the Rouleau Report for a few more weeks, explaining in detail what an idiotic, inconsistent travesty it truly was. Nobody with any sense puts any stock in that partisan hack report.
Good stuff. Also waiting for Fife or anyone else to verify this story, showing that the leak(s) is/are real and not just someone with a personal beef, or the CPC looking for ANYthing they can fling.
What an excellent and thoughtful column -- great summary of the chaos that Bob Fife and the boys are doing in their pellmell rush to get Trudeau to resign.
It’s not free first charity the CPC has gone after, and likely not the last. Crippling charities for progressive causes will continue to be under fire from the right.
Reminds me of when Harper rather cruelly, viciously, and deliberately targeted Katimavik for defunding, a cause near and dear to then-MP Trudeau's heart. He sure showed Harper when he won that boxing fight with the Katimavik logo painted on his arm opposite the eagle tattoo, then restored the funding as PM. There was no rhyme or reason for putting this organization in the crosshairs other than a mean and sadistic hate campaign against all things Trudeau.
The CPC and juvenile punditocracy's hatred for this family, and the philanthropic causes or cultural patronages they undertake, is personal and visceral to the point of psychosis. Jen Gerson had nothing but mean-girl bile to spew over the now-defunct WE Charity mental health podcast that Sophie and Margaret Trudeau were producing. Andrew Coyne's own awkward family connections are well known and clearly appear to have coloured his ability to be objective in his commentary about this PM. But even worse are Jeff Ballingall's bloodthirsty bunchanumbers orcs swarming the PM and Liberal ministers/MPs'/staffers' Twitter feeds, calling on their pigeon messiah to go after the Canadian Avalanche Foundation and investigate the PM's surviving brother because he wrote a travel memoir about China.
Why the avalanche foundation of all things? So they can defile poor Michel Trudeau's corpse, remind the PM of a painful trauma and nothing more. I seem to have lost the bookmark but I recall an article from, I believe it was the Hill Times, where Scheer's advisors and strategists were encouraging him to "push Trudeau's emotional buttons." In other words trigger his PTSD as a campaign strategy. They are horrid creatures who would make Attila the Hun blush.
There is something feral and savage about conservatism in North America. The British Tories have long had a reputation as the "nasty party," but the Canadian Reform-a-Cons seem hell-bent on punching above their weight when it comes to competing with the QAnon GOP.
Hey Jackie, I had forgotten all about some of these things. It will make any charity reluctant to have anything to do with politicians of any stripe, won't it, and then we will all be the poorer for it.
I just don't understand it. Harper disrespected and ignored the media and they were so intimidated by him that they never stood up to him, while Trudeau is happy to talk to them (though they seem to have trouble understanding what he says.) So they despise him for it. It baffles me.
Harper allowing right wing American interests to buy a lot of our media wasn't an accident. Harper stacked the deck in the rights favour and the only thing not letting then run things so far has been Trudeau's popularity. That's why they are so angry. They did all they could to game the system and they are still losing.
This whole China political interference thing blew up in alberta about 10 years ago. Frankly, I’m surprised at all the surprise. We have strong Chinese interference in our cities, our policing, in our universities because the Chinese can and do buy a great deal of good will. In the city of Edmonton, the Chinese diaspora is lobbying against drug harm reduction sites and more punitive policing instead.
Spying is generally not talked about in the media, because then you give all your spies access to the information you have on them. So this whole not talking about spies that the opposition is so concerned with, frankly puzzles me. I think instead, we should simply ask all former citizens of other countries to put Canadian interests first when they become Canadian citizens, making it clear that to do otherwise is treasonous. Apparently this hasn’t been explicitly expressed to our new citizens.
ain’t read it yet.. but know it gonna be scrumptious !
These dread dayz we desperately need fearless voices
unafraid to confront ‘opinionation’ pretending as ‘journalism’
I jumped all over Ms Delacourt the other day
yet today lauded her on how she redeemed herself
with a Great informative Perspective Re Mr David Johnson ..
Well said m’man.. & super timely - props to you !
One point though.. presuming ‘China doesn’t understand something’ ?
Are you willing to bet they don’t know who Pierre Poutine is ? I’m not
I bet they know EVERYTHING.. about the Live & RoboCall 2011 Fraud
.. just imagine what they could do with that !
.. & what could they do with their knowledge of The Plymouth Brethren !