7 ms·

Of note, Canada's deputy prime minister has a masters degree from Harvard in slavic studies and wrote a book about Russia. They knew what army the guy fought fo

Of note, Canada's deputy prime minister has a masters degree from Harvard in slavic studies and wrote a book about Russia. They knew what army the guy fought for, it's unlikely that she or anyone else who knew about history could really not have known if they'd thought about it at all.

1over137 3y ago
Who is the 'they' you refer to? You are incorrectly assuming that there is some big consultation about every guest invited into the House. There is not. Indeed Freeland would have noticed this if she was involved with the vetting, but she's the deputy PM, she's not doing minutia like checking guest backgrounds.
- cmrdporcupine 3y ago
  Probably true, but as deputy PM and as a person also intimately acquainted with this issue she should have been very involved. She is of Canadian-Ukrainian background, lived there for some years post-Soviet, fluent in both Russian and Ukrainian, and has extensive networks there. It's unclear to me in general why she hasn't been more prominent on this file in general (Ukrainian-Canadian relations during the war). Except that there have been controversies about some of her family's Ukrainian nationalist past, and maybe they're keeping her out of the limelight on this for that reason. Or Trudeau sees her as a threat, and is doing to her what Chretien did to Paul Martin (keep them close but under wraps), I dunno. In any case, she should have been involved, and would have known better. You hope. There was a time a couple years ago when she was the clear "natural" successor to Trudeau. Since then her star seems to have faded, and he doesn't seem to know when to get off the stage, either.
  - 1over137 3y ago
    >In any case, she should have been involved... The deputy prime minister should be involved in vetting other people's guests to the House of Commons? Personally? You don't think she has more important things to do? Vetting of guests should be done, and should be done much better than it was, but it's a job for (competent) staffers, not cabinet personally.
    - cmrdporcupine 3y ago
      She is an expert on Ukraine, and her skills are being misused if she is not involved.
      - throw0101a 3y ago
        > She is an expert on Ukraine, and her skills are being misused if she is not involved. She's also currently the Minister of Finance. I think her skills are focused on other things besides guest lists.
      - rsynnott 3y ago
        ... Wait, how do you think this works? "I'm going to bring in a visitor, can everyone in parliament please give them the thumbs-up"? I mean, arguably it _should_ work like that, because "parliamentarian shows off someone who turns out to be a milkshake duck" does seem to be a recurring thing, but it is very much not how it works.
        cmrdporcupine 3y ago
        "Ms Freeland, you are a lifelong expert in Ukrainian and Ukrainian-Canadian history and politics, I'd love it if you looked over this list." or "Mr Speaker, I hear you're putting together a set of speakers for Mr Zelensky's visit, it would be great if you would share that set with me, as I have a special focus on this area" I'm sorry, I don't see the confusion here. Unless you think that would be partisan interference with parliamentary procedure? Putting it another way, if she was my MP I'd be pissed. Because she's not "just" the deputy PM & finance minister, she's an MP in the Canadian parliament in the governing party, and this has been one of her lifelong areas of study, and I would expect her to be applying her expertise on the public's behalf, because that's how she got voted in.
        rsynnott 3y ago
        Yeah, it would have been good if the speaker had done that. However: > He identified Hunka as a "war hero" who fought for the First Ukrainian Division The speaker evidently did not think to so much as Google "First Ukrainian Division" (which would have made the nature of the situation clear) so it's... optimistic to assume that he'd think to check with an expert. > "Mr Speaker, I hear you're putting together a set of speakers for Mr Zelensky's visit, it would be great if you would share that set with me, as I have a special focus on this area" This probably wasn't even realistically on her radar; she's the _Minister for Finance_, which is, like, an actual job which requires a lot of work. Organising events like this is for backbenchers, and, apparently, speakers. Like, if she'd been chatting to the speaker at the coffee machine and he'd mentioned who he was inviting, I assume she'd have gone "wait, you're inviting a member of _what_?!", but it's not clear how you expect her to even have known about it otherwise.
AwaAwa 3y ago
The same Canadian deputy PM who's grandfather was at the very least an editor for a nazi newspaper?

1over137 3y ago

Who is the 'they' you refer to? You are incorrectly assuming that there is some big consultation about every guest invited into the House. There is not. Indeed Freeland would have noticed this if she was involved with the vetting, but she's the deputy PM, she's not doing minutia like checking guest backgrounds.

cmrdporcupine 3y ago
Probably true, but as deputy PM and as a person also intimately acquainted with this issue she should have been very involved. She is of Canadian-Ukrainian background, lived there for some years post-Soviet, fluent in both Russian and Ukrainian, and has extensive networks there. It's unclear to me in general why she hasn't been more prominent on this file in general (Ukrainian-Canadian relations during the war). Except that there have been controversies about some of her family's Ukrainian nationalist past, and maybe they're keeping her out of the limelight on this for that reason. Or Trudeau sees her as a threat, and is doing to her what Chretien did to Paul Martin (keep them close but under wraps), I dunno. In any case, she should have been involved, and would have known better. You hope. There was a time a couple years ago when she was the clear "natural" successor to Trudeau. Since then her star seems to have faded, and he doesn't seem to know when to get off the stage, either.
- 1over137 3y ago
  >In any case, she should have been involved... The deputy prime minister should be involved in vetting other people's guests to the House of Commons? Personally? You don't think she has more important things to do? Vetting of guests should be done, and should be done much better than it was, but it's a job for (competent) staffers, not cabinet personally.
  - cmrdporcupine 3y ago
    She is an expert on Ukraine, and her skills are being misused if she is not involved.
    - throw0101a 3y ago
      > She is an expert on Ukraine, and her skills are being misused if she is not involved. She's also currently the Minister of Finance. I think her skills are focused on other things besides guest lists.
    - rsynnott 3y ago
      ... Wait, how do you think this works? "I'm going to bring in a visitor, can everyone in parliament please give them the thumbs-up"? I mean, arguably it _should_ work like that, because "parliamentarian shows off someone who turns out to be a milkshake duck" does seem to be a recurring thing, but it is very much not how it works.
      - cmrdporcupine 3y ago
        "Ms Freeland, you are a lifelong expert in Ukrainian and Ukrainian-Canadian history and politics, I'd love it if you looked over this list." or "Mr Speaker, I hear you're putting together a set of speakers for Mr Zelensky's visit, it would be great if you would share that set with me, as I have a special focus on this area" I'm sorry, I don't see the confusion here. Unless you think that would be partisan interference with parliamentary procedure? Putting it another way, if she was my MP I'd be pissed. Because she's not "just" the deputy PM & finance minister, she's an MP in the Canadian parliament in the governing party, and this has been one of her lifelong areas of study, and I would expect her to be applying her expertise on the public's behalf, because that's how she got voted in.
        rsynnott 3y ago
        Yeah, it would have been good if the speaker had done that. However: > He identified Hunka as a "war hero" who fought for the First Ukrainian Division The speaker evidently did not think to so much as Google "First Ukrainian Division" (which would have made the nature of the situation clear) so it's... optimistic to assume that he'd think to check with an expert. > "Mr Speaker, I hear you're putting together a set of speakers for Mr Zelensky's visit, it would be great if you would share that set with me, as I have a special focus on this area" This probably wasn't even realistically on her radar; she's the _Minister for Finance_, which is, like, an actual job which requires a lot of work. Organising events like this is for backbenchers, and, apparently, speakers. Like, if she'd been chatting to the speaker at the coffee machine and he'd mentioned who he was inviting, I assume she'd have gone "wait, you're inviting a member of _what_?!", but it's not clear how you expect her to even have known about it otherwise.

AwaAwa 3y ago

The same Canadian deputy PM who's grandfather was at the very least an editor for a nazi newspaper?