What's the Opposite of Being on a Roll?

Immigration Minister Jason Kenney keeps popping up in the op-ed pages for all the wrong reasons.

Last week Immigration Minister Jason Kenney publicly berated Federal Court justices for holding up refugee cases, and then posted a Globe and Mail story about his speech to his website. Only the version on his site omitted criticisms of Kenney that appeared in the copy of the story in the Globe, leading readers to claim that Kenney had edited the piece to make himself look better. In fact, as this Globe piece points out, he didn’t edit it, but posted an earlier version of the story to which the writer hadn’t added critical comments to yet. So Kenney’s off the hook, except he reposted the Globe story without buying the rights to it, violating the paper’s copyright. Oops.

Also in the Globe, Audrey Macklin and Lorne Waldman slam Kenney’s attack on judges, calling it “an inappropriate exploitation of political office.” It’s in everybody’s interest that judges operate independently from the political process, they write, and Kenney’s public statements could be read as an attempt to influence future decisions. This is irresponsible, Macklin and Waldman say, and The Newsroom would have to agree, especially because Kenny made spurious charges like judges are deciding cases “seemingly on a whim.”

Many writers have pointed out the flaws in the bill Kenney supports that would ban Canadian Muslim women from voting while wearing a veil, but this analysis from National Post pundit Chris Selley is exceptionally scathing. The bill is utterly useless, he argues, because it does nothing to address the fact that voters are currently allowed to identify themselves with non-photo ID. “To state the obvious,” writes Selley, “if someone is ‘proving’ her identity with a hydro bill and a bank statement, it makes no difference whether you can see her face or not. It would make as much sense to demand she show you her feet.” Personally, we like Canada’s loose voting rules because they encourage people, especially young Canadians, to vote, but we have to concur with Selley that it's unbelievable supposedly intelligent MPs have drafted such a stunningly ineffective bill.