If the People’s Republic of China is trying as hard as the Conservative Party of Canada insists it is to undermine Canadian democracy, it’s hard to understand why they’re bothering.
After all, if they’ll just leave us alone, we can probably take care of it ourselves!
I’d say the case is far from having been made persuasively that there was a massive and successful campaign to swing the 2019 election, as the Globe and Mail, the federal Conservatives, and the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service all appear to be working together to get us to believe.
The argument so far is loud, but it’s based on fairly a limited number of objective facts.
Still, as retired Canadian national security advisor Wesley Wark said yesterday on his Spionage Substack about the Globe’s allegations, which were based in turn on leaks from an anonymous CSIS source willing to break both his (or her) oath and Canada’s national security laws to own the Libs, there’s something there, even if it’s not as much as we’re being asked to believe.
As Dr. Wark put it: “The Globe’s news stories are not a ‘nothing burger.’ They are certainly not a full-course meal. Perhaps they are … a tasty morsel for a hungry public and hungry politicians who have little capacity, or even desire, to see a bigger picture of national security threats posed by interference yes, but by many, and arguably more concerning, threat vectors.”
Nor are any of the problems with this ongoing story fixed by Global News’s sensational claim yesterday that MP Han Dong advised a Chinese diplomat in 2021 that China should delay releasing Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor to increase pressure on the Trudeau Government to let Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou return to China from house arrest in Vancouver.
It does create an interesting new legal wrinkle, however. Mr. Dong has now quit the Liberal caucus and indicated he will defend himself against Global’s accusation, which may mean he intends to sue the broadcaster for defamation.
If he does, how will Global defend itself when the alleged facts on which the story is based are state secrets leaked by unknown and unidentified sources unlikely to volunteer to testify?
With the traditional defences of truth and fair comment thus off the table, what’s left? Even if Global tries the new defence of “responsible communication,” one would think they’d need to produce a document on which their supposedly responsible communication was based.
Regardless, as Dr. Wark suggests, it’s not a surprise if China’s leaders to hope for a government to be elected in Canada that is less bad from their perspective than the alternative.
However, whether that would be the Liberals led by Justin Trudeau or the Conservatives with Stephen Harper as their Cardinal Richelieu remains an open question. After all, Mr. Harper has a better track record for doing what the PRC wanted than Mr. Trudeau does – for example, his government permitted the Nexen takeover and signed the Canada-China Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement.
Still, from this perspective, China’s interference in Canadian democracy, such as it is, seems positively quaint!
They were simply doing what all foreign governments are expected to do: look out for their own interests.
Canada certainly can be accused of doing the same thing nowadays, and our big neighbour to the south is of course the all-time planetary champion for interfering in the affairs of other sovereign nations.
Moreover, despite having a nominally Communist government, China does not appear to be trying to change Canadian policies on ideological grounds in ways likely to do permanent damage to Canadian democratic institutions. This is different, then, from the routine conduct in Africa, Asia and South America of the United States, United Kingdom, France and sundry other Western powers – arousing little controversy in Canada.
Nor is China part of anything like the mainly American corporate-financed ideological effort to finance market-fundamentalist think tanks, bankroll right-wing political parties through donations from Canadian subsidiaries, lobby Canadian legislators, and influence Canadian legislation, or even write it, to subvert democracy and such principles as the idea polluters ought to pay to clean up their own messes.
Which brings us back to the parlous state of democracy here in Canada and Alberta.
Obviously we should be concerned by the fact that no one at CSIS appears to be remotely concerned about the efforts of one or more of its agents to violate national security law in an apparent effort to undermine a democratically elected government. The silence from CSIS suggests that this work with the media has the tacit support of the service’s leadership.
Meanwhile, here in Alberta, we’re making significant progress undermining democracy. All on our own.
Our premier, Ms. Smith, was selected in a members-only election by a party now controlled by an unelected MAGA organization called Take Back Alberta.
Lately, we’ve seen Ms. Smith – who not long ago was a professional lobbyist for a proposal to let big polluters off the hook for the cost of environmental cleanups they’d agreed to pay for – persuade her Legislative caucus to go along with the execrable scheme and finance it to the tune of $100 million in foregone royalties now, and possibly as much as $20 billion later.
In the last few days it’s also been revealed that her government has hijacked a whopping $9-million-plus in public funds to buy advertising for its re-election campaign.
That is to say, the money will be used for “supplementary government advertising” to run until April 30, a mere month before the scheduled May 29 provincial election.
So, yes, we certainly face foreign interference in Canadian democracy right now – from the U.S. Government, the American corporate sector, and the Neoliberal Internationale – that is, the so-called International Democrat Union headed by none other than former Canadian prime minister Harper, whose stated purpose is to interfere in other countries’ democracies to advance pernicious neoliberal economic nostrums.
Plus, of course, from some of our own political parties.
And, yes, from China too, apparently. Although maybe not so much.
I am of the belief that if there must be a public inquiry into who and what has tried to interfere politically in Canada, it should be a blanket inquiry with everything on the table. This should, of course, include the CPC and their benefactors, who will certainly be the O & G industry, US-based Evangelical Christian organizations, various right-wing dark-money political interests, including the likes of the NRA, the American Heritage Foundation, the Koch Bros. and many, many more. And there’s also Russia, of course.
We’ll see how interested Skippy Pollivere and his CPC are willing to have this inquiry if they are also under the microscope?
So when this whole China so called scandal started, the government, election officials and an outside party all concluded that whatever interference was attempted did not affect the election outcome. There seemed to be no RCMP investigation, no charges, just anonymous leaks which interestingly the government has clearly said contained inaccuracies. I think in the end this may turn out to be much ado about nothing or very little. However this sort of over reaction seems to be the temperment of the times.
For years the Federal Conservatives have tried again and again for big gotcha moments to try bring the Liberals down. I suspect they know Canadians are not buying what they are trying to sell, so the only hope they ever have of winning is to destroy the reputation of their opponents. They have swung hard several times and it has had some effect, but hasn’t worked so far. People may not be as enthusiastic about the Liberals as they once were, but they are no more enthusiastic about the Conservatives, perhaps even less with all their over the top antics. Bitcoin, donuts with the convoy protesters, accusations of treason do not make the opposition look more competent than the government they attack.
Well someone high up in CSIS sure seems to have it in for the Federal Liberals, who probably had a number of reasons for how they handled this issue. Preoccupation with COVID and concerns about the two Canadians held by the Chinese government are two factors that come to mind. Of course whoever it is can hide behind annonimity for now and selelectively leak secret tidbitd in drips and drabs to try damage or bring down the government. However, it is a dangerous game and if an intelligence agency gone rogue does not succeed, they will be reigned in. Ultimately unelected security officials do not dictate to our elected officials what to do.
So, Skippy is running for this for all it is worth, but in the end if this turns out not to be smoke from a fire, but from a smoke making machine, this could be very damaging for him. His party will have little tolerance for another leader who tried to bring down the Liberals and failed.
No doubt the Chinese are probably more than a bit puzzled by howvwhat they have always done, even under the previous Conservative government, has now turned into such a big crisis of the day. Of course they neither really understand or appreciate democracy, which is a major reason why their ham handed efforts failed and we do not too worry about them that much. But the hysteria of the moment is not about terrorists or Soviet Communists, it is about China and it will likely continue for a while until it shifts to something else.
Dave: I am of the view that there likely HAS been an RCMP investigation and the Mounties have concluded that charges are not warranted. Since police normally have a threshold for laying charges that is too low, I think we can probably trust the Mounties on this one. CSIS, for reasons of typical inter-agency rivalry, are put out about it and are fighting with the RCMP in public. There should be an investigation, and an excellent place for it to start would be, who is sharing top-secret documents with the Globe and Mail, and who else are they sharing them with? DJC
Another fine blog entry saying what so many are thinking but no actual mainstream press will say/print. Thanks DC
Excellent point David. One that should be made regularly and explicitly in response to the conservative misinformation campaigns.
We progressives and liberal thinkers go on all the time about the nasty and nefarious conservatives; and we should continue to do so. But it is all to easy to develop the idea that we are just 2 opponents competing for leadership of the democratic enterprise. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Conservatives, of whatever stripe, all kinds, all types are all about dismantling our democratic institutions and building up a kind of class structure of elites and the rest. This includes much of the corporate media, certainly Global and CTV and dangerously many in our police and spy agencies. Their end goal is somewhat hazy because those that have clear ideas want to keep it a secret while the majority don’t have the intellectual capacity to think that far ahead.
It behooves all of us to contemplate what the conservative agenda means and to broadcast the end results of any successes they might have. Because they certainly won’t!
The tRump show and Putin’s butchery, indeed, our own clown car of Dani and her incompetent disciples should be instructive and frighten any thinking or civilized person. These people are out to take everything we hold dear away. For themselves!
The whole things is starting to smack of the “Russia-gate” hoax a few years a few years back with leaked reports from anonymous sources from intel sources that nobody is allowed to question. China is cultivating ties with countries all over the world not just Canada. We’ve been hearing a lot about the “rise of China”, but in many ways we are returning to the world that existed before 1492 where China was the center of the civilized world and the feudal kingdoms of Europe were beating a path to its door along the ancient Silk Road.
Speaking of interference I wonder if Canadian mining companies had any part in the recent military coup in Peru which overthrew the democratically elected left-leaning government allegedly because it was developing too close ties with China.
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2023/02/shining-a-spotlight-on-canadas-much-ignored-role-in-perus-internal-conflict.html
China? Ok
Now do Russia’s interference, and infusion of cash to subvert our democracy using the trucker clownvoy in Ottawa, with the help of the Conservative Party.
Seems fair, if we are truly committed to the ideals of maintaining our democracy.
Athbascan: I remain committed to the idea that we’re probably going to be pretty good at dealing with foreign interference if we can ID it as such. It’s interesting that Russian interference seems to have been directed through social media while the Chinese tried theirs “on the ground,” as it were, with people they could identify as vulnerable. There’s an MA thesis for some bright spark on which worked better. Frankly, its the home-grown subversion of democracy – by political parties and by ideological zealots – that worries me. DJC
Polling so far suggests the UCP’s partisan advertising campaign using public dollars isn’t working. The latest Think HQ poll yesterday shows the NDP is up 3 points since their January poll. As Think HQ’s President Marc Henry commented:
“The results of this survey are a bit surprising, almost counter-intuitive. The Smith government has released a ‘chicken in every pot’ budget, are spending a lot on advertising the budget and their ‘inflation fighting’ measures, and the UCP have also been heavily advertising with partisan ads. Yet, they aren’t seeing a return on that investment in the polls; in fact, they’re down three points from January. Margin of error, but still.”
https://thinkhq.ca/ndp-ucp-remain-deadlocked-despite-provincial-budget/
Interesting poll results, John. Sadly, polls usually underestimate support for Con parties in the Kingdom of Oilberduh. I fear the 13% undecided, come the fateful day, will say, “I hate ‘em all. But I’m gonna vote for the pack of idiots, instead of the ones who scare me.”
Mike J Danysh: What if Danielle Smith puts her hoof in her mouth again? I’m sure that could change things.
Amen to that! You said the silent part out loud.
Something, something, Joe Biden wants to make Canada responsible for all of Haiti’s problems, because?
Abs: my questions as well, when I saw the headline , what? why? it makes no sense, military analyst said no way, I’m not sure who it was from the military that said it wasn’t feasible without a large loss of life without any guarantee of change. So who and why was this put out in the media…makes the hairs on the back of the neck stand up.
I hear rustling in the winrows! Stirring amongst the corn fed! What is foreign interference? Could it be that we’re not just a woman among nations, but rather a strappling to be interfered with by our betters at will! Time will tell! PS don’t trust the bumpkins! https://youtu.be/ZDcmo-5Qht4
The Conservatives are busy trying to spin the straw of foreign interference into electoral gold, notwithstanding the fact their own MPs and party leader supported and encouraged the occupation of our nation’s capital by people who wanted to replace our elected government with an unelected rabble. Foreign interference should be rooted out, absolutely, but I call “Rumpelstiltskin” on those who are using this to undermine confidence in our democracy and the legitimacy of the current government.
Rumpelstiltskin indeed Two Pennies. Foreign interference in Canada has been going on and accepted for a long time. The world leader in this is the USA as someone pointed out but the lobbyists here from around the world on behalf of foreign businesses and governments is legendary. Tolerance of it only depends on whether the interference is from “good” guys or “bad” guys…
“…the alleged facts on which the story is based are state secrets leaked by unknown and unidentified sources unlikely to volunteer to testify?”
This also applies to the alleged e-mails sent by Smith to the prosecutor’s office regarding the exculpation of COVID scofflaws. And, for that matter, to the original revelations of the Watergate case.
Except Smith told on herself. Then she told us all not to believe what she told us. Then she investigated herself and found no wrongdoing.
What was Stephen Harper doing down in the USA when he promised dink-dank market-fundamentalists that when he was done with Canada it wouldn’t be recognizable? What was the self-admitted advisory capacity of “retired” Canadian security personnel in the Jan6-inspired “Freedom Convoy” which the present leader of the official opposition participated in himself? And what was Andrew Scheer, PP’s predecessor-before-last, doing skulking around Number 10 Downing Street, UK? (This hapless leader of the CPC opposition can’t be really suspected of successfully inviting British interference in Canadian affairs—he was fitted in for tea and a digestive biscuit with PM Theresa May as charitably as any Dickensian street urchin might have been—but it was the thought that counted against him.) How many and how much foreign interference in Canadian domestic affairs have Conservative Party leaders invited?
Maybe the special “rapporteur” appointed to investigate such allegations as they pertain to Canadian elections in which voters decided the CPC should lose should include the broader scope that this question appears to warrant. Thanks for reminding us, PP!
However much I’d enjoy seeding CPC hypocrisy more fully exposed, this kind of exercise is too shit-for-shat, too close to arguing that ‘you-cheated-so-I-can-too’—you know: the way neo-right thinking works, always claiming victimhood to justify retaliation while reserving accusation, evidence, and judgement for itself. And righteousness, too, by gosh!
As long’s the presence and activity of partisan reaction within Canadian military, intelligence, and police services is acknowledged, and so long’s PP reads from the tRumpublican playbook (referring to the “Scorched Trust in Tactical Retreat” chapter) by positing with scant-to-zero evidence that elections have been rigged against the otherwise discredited neo-right, then claimed evidentiary “leaks” from any of these sources must be rejected out of hand. PP is plainly motivated by things ulterior to electoral veracity.
There is a serious principle at stake here: trust in our elections without which certain factions of society rationalize taking the law into their own hands and suspending or outright corrupting the rule of law and democracy itself. PP might think his masterbatory judgment can limit this slide down the slippery pole to no further than needing glasses, but is there any reason to trust that he could halt the slide before slipping into the hells of blind totalitarianism, Nazism, and fascism? It’s a shorter slide than he thinks it is. As minister responsible for the vote-suppressing “Fair Elections Act” whilst his governing party was repeatedly busted for electoral cheating (on a number of occasions the federal electoral office admonished, fined, and recommended criminal charges which landed one convicted HarperCon MP in jail), I’d say no, he can’t be trusted.
Is the sanctity of our psephological systems so fragile that a tainted, hyper-partisan twerp leading an increasingly extremist party in persistent decline can rock it with mere slanderous insinuation that looks a lot like Donald F tRump’s desperate insistence that he himself was cheated out of an election win? I would rather call it ‘delicate’ in the sense that sensibly ethical public servants understand why casting doubt on elections is such a serious charge that it should never be made without warrant—and especially not for partisan advantage.
In 2018 the BC NDP government made good its 2017 election promise to hold a referendum on electoral systems. However, among a number of questions about the process and design of the reference, the ballot offered an option to ‘test-drive’ a new electoral system for two terms, after which another referendum would solicit voters’ decision whether to keep the new system or return to the old one. This was dangerous because it would have had the potential to make not only the Referendum itself more of an inappropriately partisan exercise than it already was (propagation of the ‘yes’ and ‘no’ sides heavy biases was publicly-funded) , but potentially to make every election thereafter a partisan-political football wherein political parties could campaign on the promise of changing the electoral system: a challenger could blame the incumbents for implementing a system which favoured them and then promise to change it, presumably to one which would instead favour the challenger’s party. Taken farther than the already-too-far, every election would question the legitimacy of the previous one, and a party which implemented a system favourable to it would be harder to defeat at the polls. In short, the sacred trust in elections would have been seriously undermined, at least potentially. Like conflict-of-interest rules where even the perception of conflict is disallowed, electoral rules should not have any potential to undermine trust by introducing partisan calculus. It’s a matter of absolutes. (As it happened, BC voters rejected both this trial-period proposition and changing the status quo electoral system—the latter for the third time in a decade and a half.)
It’s easy to accuse anybody by innuendo. With respect elections, it’s heinous, but with PP it’s typical. He knows it’s wrong, and he knows why, but like Donald F tRump, he does it because gaining partisan advantage —what the Orangu-spray-tan One calls “leaverage” (which he justifies as ‘fair game’)—is more important than our nation’s democratic principles and the sacred rite of elections.
PS: I hope His Excellency David Johnson recommends taking a good, stiff broom to the military, intelligence, and policing services to sweep out agents of partisan reaction without which PP’s charges would be twice as lame as they already are.
Thanks for the article.
There isn’t any proof M.P. Dong has done what is being alleged. My concern is this alledged activity is being alleged based on alledgedly “borrowed” documents which employees or whomever were not to release because the material was “secret”. That isn’t how you run a democracy.
Didn’t notice much of a defence from the federal Liberal party but Cabinet Minister Ng stayed on in her position when there were allegations of conflict of interest. Makes you wonder what is really going on.
Not a Liberal but certainly am giving M.P. Dong the benefit of the doubt. There is no evidence, that I can see, that he did what is being alledged. M.P. Dong has taken the high road by resigning. Until evidence is provided he did what is alleged, I’m good with him in Parliament. He is a Canadian citizen and has taken the Oath of Allegience when he became an M.P. It is most unfortunate this has happened to him.
All of this carry on reminds me of the McCarthy era in the U.S.A. when it was “they’re a communist” and ruined careers.
All of this causes me to wonder: who is going to be next and will this simply be a way of targetting Canadians whose ancestors came from Asia.
EAF: “Intelligence” is rarely sufficient for conviction, or necessarily even suspicion. This is not to say such information is not legitimate, and can be acted upon in the sense of recommending caution in the sharing of information and so on. But it includes gut feelings, hearsay evidence, and spite, all of which we have striven for centuries to eliminate from findings of guilt or innocence. In this case, state security agencies seem to be pursing their own political agenda and fighting with one another (RCMP v. CSIS) about how to proceed. If charges are justified, then the RCMP should lay them. If they won’t, that should tell us something. The Conservatives, of course, would like nothing better than to pursue political prosecutions. DJC
Very interesting blog post DJC, so many points I’m not sure where to start but I’ll give e.a.f. the shoutout for mentioning the most interesting and maybe important angle of this whole affair. I see evidence alright but it’s that CSIS is trying to influence our democratic process. Collusion between the G&M, CSIS, the Cons, and maybe other behind-the-scene entities? Absolutely I say. As DJC points out the silence from official CSIS is confirmation in itself.
This not one “leak” from a disgruntled CSIS employee. It’s a list of numerous “releases” to not only the G&M but to Globe News and who knows who else, of Canada’s classified information over more than 6 months, including a strategy planning document from Global Affairs Canada and a confidential letter from the RCMP commissioner to a House committee. These were not just viewing appointments – the G&M admits to actually been given copies of the documents – we wouldn’t want them to get any of the important points wrong would we? This is not in question, these facts have been admitted and it certainly seems to be in violation of Canadian law – what’s being done about that?
This is the way CSIS and also the RCMP work, now in conjunction with the Conservatives. Targeting Canadian individuals or groups with unsubstantiated persecution is what they do and now it’s attacking politicians they don’t like. Who’s next indeed…
Mickey: This may well be the way both CSIC and the RCMP work, but I think in this case there’s a significant difference between what CSIS wants and what the RCMP thinks they can get. If CSIS was doing its job, the information it collected was passed to the RCMP and presumably the RCMP then for some reason passed on laying charges. Why would that be? – certainly not because the Mounties are infiltrated by Red Chinese spies! Rather, the most likely reason is that the RCMP looked at the “intelligence” produced by CSIS (I believe the technical term for this kind of information is “gossip”) and concluded “there’s no case here,” or at least no prosecutable case. Given the well-known proclivity of police to demand charges the Crown Prosecution Services knows are unlikely to result in conviction, this strongly suggests CSIS’s secret case is very weak indeed. Too weak, even, for a secret court like the one that convicted Jeffrey Delisle, late of the Royal Canadian Navy. DJC
Yes DJC, I agree with what you say, the RCMP have good reasons not to go with the CSIS “intelligence” and it strongly suggests that there is little or no case there and CSIS is trying to influence our politics or even threaten elected officials. That’s the big story here. I threw the RCMP in with CSIS because they have as much history & experience doing this BS as anyone, it’s just that CSIS does most of it now.
There’s no comment I can make that won’t be rejected for the use of expletives.
As long as the bad words are hurled at Mr. Peepers you are excused.
Coming from an expat of convenience, take this with a grain or two of schadenfreude! Your politics are being steered from down here as sure as my ass is behind me! I like the puppy though btw! https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a43402697/jack-daniels-parody-dog-toy/
Well the Harper is at it again. So just for him, I found a song that captures all he is, and nothing more. https://youtu.be/vfhJGNnCRYU
Politics is getting uglier all the time. It’s horrible.
Wild that this is so nearly timed with the Sabre rattling the Americans are doing towards China on the other side of our southern border. It’s not like our intelligence agencies have a noted partnership with theirs or anything like that right ?
Folks can toss and turn and worry about China all they want it’s the Americans that keep this bird from sleeping soundly
crazy thought?
this issue was manufactured to inoculate the Cons against any Russian interference, because the Ukrainian vote in AB and SK is a dangerous vulnerability on that score.