Latest / Kvetch & Release / David Moscrop answers what the hell is going on in Canadian politics

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David Moscrop answers what the hell is going on in Canadian politics · Kvetch & Release

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Hey, we're back, folks. Hope you are all doing well.
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  Speaker 1: Eleven thirty five John Leggy here on AM eight hundred.
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  Speaker 1: Cklw heck. You know, you look at the state of
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  Speaker 1: our politics, the state of our country, and heck, I
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  Speaker 1: don't know what's going on. It seems like we're well,
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: it doesn't seem like it. We are getting closer and
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  Speaker 1: closer to a federal election, and the heat of everything
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  Speaker 1: seems to keep being dialed up a notch. Whether it
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: be celsius or fahrenheit, things are getting hotter. One person
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  Speaker 1: who pays attention to this is one of our esteemed
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  Speaker 1: national columnists and commentators who discusses. David Moscrop joins me
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  Speaker 1: right now, Hey, David, how you doing good?
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  Speaker 2: Esteemed? It is such a kind synonym for aging.
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  Speaker 1: There you go. Well, listen, I'm not going to call
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  Speaker 1: you an old man.
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  Speaker 2: No, no, just oldish.
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  Speaker 1: I won't do it on air, at least, how about that. Hey,
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  Speaker 1: here's the thing, David, I look at the state of
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  Speaker 1: our politics and I go, what the hell is going on?
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  Speaker 2: Well, that's a great question, and I guess it's my
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  Speaker 2: job to answer that question day in and day out.
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  Speaker 2: And I was just thinking about this a little bit earlier, thinking.
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  Speaker 1: Well, we've had a vote.
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  Speaker 2: In well, presumably about a year and a bit October
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  Speaker 2: twenty twenty five, and I can't even imagine who I
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  Speaker 2: could bring myself to cast a ballot for. I'm going
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  Speaker 2: to bring some Frank's red hot sauce and just eat it.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, that's kind of the thing right now, is
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  Speaker 1: that I look at like I imagine if the NDP,
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  Speaker 1: like you write about this, Imagine if the NDP was
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  Speaker 1: actually the NDP and they actually espoused leftist visions, goals, ideals,
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  Speaker 1: but they're not. Imagine if the Liberals weren't trying to
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  Speaker 1: become the vision of the NDP that I just suggested,
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  Speaker 1: and they were the centrist ground that people could be
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  Speaker 1: comfortable with. Imagine if our conservatives weren't so mired in
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  Speaker 1: whatever the hell all is going on on that side
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: of things. I have never heard more people David say
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  Speaker 1: to me, I have nowhere left to go. I'm alone,
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  Speaker 1: I'm agnostic, I'm my party left me. Everyone is saying this.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, And here's the thing I was just writing about
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  Speaker 2: this today or yesterday. Everyone is chasing a very similar
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  Speaker 2: pool of voters, and we're in an era of a
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  Speaker 2: permanent campaign. So if you want to know when the
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  Speaker 2: election is, the answer is it's right now. It's always
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  Speaker 2: right now. And parties have then tried to focus on,
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  Speaker 2: you know, playing for these small narrow bands of voters
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  Speaker 2: and trying to one up each other, and it kind
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  Speaker 2: of what's become basically a race to the bottom on
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  Speaker 2: policy that's responding to the kind of interest and attentions
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  Speaker 2: or prejudices of the moment rather than long term planning
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  Speaker 2: and program building. And then they bash each other over
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  Speaker 2: the heads. They don't want to cooperate, and so parliament
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  Speaker 2: becomes dysfunctional. The committee's become functional, everyone goes online to
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  Speaker 2: dunk on one another. So we get really lazy, poorly
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  Speaker 2: constructed policy and parliamentarians who aren't cooperating, and parties who
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  Speaker 2: are thinking short term votes rather than long term nation
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  Speaker 2: building program building, and we end up with this and
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  Speaker 2: people are, rightfully, especially coming out of the pandemic and
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  Speaker 2: the portability crisis, really really sick of it.
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  Speaker 1: Well, rightfully, so they should be sick of it. I'm
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  Speaker 1: tired of the partisan sniping and I have no issue
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  Speaker 1: with partisanship, Don't get me wrong. We need partisanship. It's
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  Speaker 1: a healthy thing, but it doesn't feel like what the
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  Speaker 1: moment that we're living in is just traditional partisanship whatsoever.
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  Speaker 1: And I wonder if your perspective is that social media
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  Speaker 1: has just made things so much worse because of the
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  Speaker 1: immediate gratification, the dopamine hit, the likes, the loves, the shares,
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  Speaker 1: all of that stuff. Are we just living in a
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  Speaker 1: different political environment that we need to just accept? Does
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  Speaker 1: now the normal?
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  Speaker 2: Well, I do think we're stuck in us for the
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  Speaker 2: time being, for the foreseeable future, and I do think
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  Speaker 2: social media has made things a lot worse. And you know, so, wow,
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  Speaker 2: that's a little bit over simplistic. But the fact is,
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  Speaker 2: if you look back to the history of the advent
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  Speaker 2: of cable news and the twenty four hour news cycle
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  Speaker 2: that emerged in the eighties and nineties in the US,
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  Speaker 2: and the way that policy responded to that, and you know,
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  Speaker 2: getting over to the fairness doctrine in the regular era
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  Speaker 2: that broke American politics, that drove toxic political partisan polarization,
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  Speaker 2: and social media is just down on steroids and now
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  Speaker 2: we're getting it here. So social media is central to it,
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  Speaker 2: and not just the technology, but how we use and
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  Speaker 2: respond to the technology, and how policy responds to technology.
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  Speaker 2: Because we just can't wrap our heads around we don't
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  Speaker 2: do and every time we try to do something, we
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  Speaker 2: make a mess of it. Look at the Online News Act,
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  Speaker 2: which asked Google and the money to support media, and
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  Speaker 2: then medicine. Okay, we're not gonna host Nadian media anymore.
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  Speaker 2: And you know what happened with that. There was a
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  Speaker 2: report out Recently people started getting more nonsense, bogus news
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  Speaker 2: and disinformation instead of reliable news. And this is we're
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  Speaker 2: sort of circling the drain. And know what is perhaps
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  Speaker 2: the most dangerous part of this. Our politicians seem just
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  Speaker 2: utterly incapable of meeting the moment, all of them.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, you're absolutely right, they do seem incapable of meeting
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  Speaker 1: the moment. I will just say that when News was
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  Speaker 1: removed from Facebook, I'm getting a lot more Star Trek
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  Speaker 1: memes on my page, so that's pretty good. I'm very
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  Speaker 1: happy with that. But I do agree with you, it'd
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  Speaker 1: be great to have Mara informative sources. So listen, you're
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  Speaker 1: out there. You're a very snarky person online on Twitter,
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  Speaker 1: and you criticize you condemn, but you also praise. So
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  Speaker 1: when you look at the state of things right now
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  Speaker 1: in this country, are you inspired, are you optimistic about things?
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  Speaker 1: Or are you like me, a dark, jaded, cynical individual
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  Speaker 1: who goes, Oh, it's getting a lot worse.
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  Speaker 2: Oh, I mean, I think it's going to get worse.
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  Speaker 2: I don't think that's jaded or cynical.
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  Speaker 1: I think it's just objective fact.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. If you look outside and the storm clouds are
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  Speaker 2: gathering and the rain is starting to drop, and you
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  Speaker 2: see some light and you say, oh, I think we're
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  Speaker 2: gonna have the storm, that's not jaded or cynical. That's
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  Speaker 2: just looking at the window and seeing a storm coming,
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  Speaker 2: calling storm. I think that's just being clear eyed. There
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  Speaker 2: are little green shoots that give me hope. In the media.
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  Speaker 2: There's a bunch of organizations that are popping up that
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  Speaker 2: are doing good work. We're building some programs in this
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  Speaker 2: country that I think are going to do some good,
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  Speaker 2: as flawed as they are. You know, the pharmacare program,
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  Speaker 2: maybe the dental care program is already delivering some results
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  Speaker 2: for people, you know, cities and provinces, and the federal
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  Speaker 2: government is starting to think about the housing problem. In
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  Speaker 2: a more serious way, even though we're way far behind
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  Speaker 2: where we ought to be. Uh, these things kind of
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  Speaker 2: add up and matter, but it's not enough, right, and
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  Speaker 2: that's the problem. One thing I think presents a possible
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  Speaker 2: opportunity of allowances. All parties right now, including the Conservatives,
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  Speaker 2: perhaps cynically but nonetheless, are focusing more and more on
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  Speaker 2: worker issues. So there's a real chance right now to
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  Speaker 2: shift a national conversation towards Okay, how do we do
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  Speaker 2: better for working class people who are trying to get
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  Speaker 2: through the day. And everyone wants to talk about that.
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  Speaker 2: But that's an.
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  Speaker 1: Opportunity, can we Let's let's let's dive into that, because
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  Speaker 1: what I've I've found very interesting recently is that the
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  Speaker 1: NDP and the labor movement more broadly has decided to
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  Speaker 1: abandon labor issues. And you know, give me, give me
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  Speaker 1: a little bit of that benefit of out here, but
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  Speaker 1: like they're more focused on social justice issues I think
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  Speaker 1: right now, specifically to the Israel Hamas conflict that's going on,
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  Speaker 1: and you know, I don't hear them talking about we
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  Speaker 1: need to fight for workers' rights. And I wonder if
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  Speaker 1: that's created this opportunity that you just discussed about how
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  Speaker 1: the Conservatives have been actually not only just courting labor
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  Speaker 1: votes but also winning them in a lot of cases.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, they they're building their support with labor. And I
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  Speaker 2: think domestic and foreign issues, especially especially Israel Palestine Hamas
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  Speaker 2: are bound up with one another, so you can't entirely
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  Speaker 2: pull them up. But I do think what you're pointing
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  Speaker 2: at is a longer term issue, which is you know,
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  Speaker 2: labor has had some wins in the recent years in
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  Speaker 2: the United States and Canada, some organizing, some legislative wins.
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  Speaker 2: The anti scab law for federal workers of federal regulated
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  Speaker 2: industries under steam as O Wagan was a big win,
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  Speaker 2: but it has again hasn't been enough. People are are
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  Speaker 2: looking for a solution because they're living through an affordability crisis.
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  Speaker 2: They can't afford their homes, they can't afford the rent.
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  Speaker 2: They can't they're working two jobs governments. Look how many
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  Speaker 2: jobs we have in some of the gah ground working
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  Speaker 2: two of them, you know, to try to pay the rent.
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  Speaker 2: The cost of food is out of control, and there
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  Speaker 2: seems to be a structural problem here. Unionization rates in
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  Speaker 2: this country are still not great, especially in the private sector.
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  Speaker 2: You know, the rates are are buoyed by the public sector,
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  Speaker 2: but in the private sector they're pretty lousy, and so
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  Speaker 2: people are getting screwed and getting really angry about it.
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  Speaker 2: And on top of that, there's all the anxieties of
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  Speaker 2: the things we've talked about climate change, war in Ukraine,
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  Speaker 2: war in Israel,