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'That's how I register despair' Profile picture
'That's how I register despair'
@GenevaTradeLaw
Lawyer and law prof, former Canadian diplomat, aspiring scénariste and playwright, eternal optimist. I have no views about things I know nothing about.
Mar 19 • 17 tweets • 4 min read
The United States is set, on April 2, to turn the world trading system on its head. Treaties that have provided a large measure of stability for international trade, and considerable prosperity for US workers and consumers, are to be trampled and discarded.

Two 🧵👇🏽 1/ Tariffs, I have taught consistently for 30 years, are an industrial policy tax instrument like any other. Sometimes they are needed. Like any targetted tax, they give rise to policy, political, institutional, and economic problems. Proceed with caution. 2/
Mar 15 • 11 tweets • 4 min read
He didn't say it was bad policy. It was not. He said it was divisive. It was. Not because of the policy, but because of the scorched-earth politics of the Axe the Tax Party.

80% of Canadians will be poorer; Canada's climate policy will be less logical.

Having succeeded, 1/ Image
Image instead of taking a victory lap and tacking, the moderates are complaining about "a year ago Trudeau said something different" and the lunatics are stoking paranoia. This, to be sure, is the level of seriousness to be expected of a Noun the Verb Party addicted to ragefarming. 2/
Feb 19 • 12 tweets • 4 min read
I'll bite.

Trade lawyer and trade law prof here. I've been doing this stuff for 32 years. Mr. Leslie really should not use his platform to mouth banalities about things he knows - based on this Xit - exactly zero about.

For the Nth time, here is an explainer. 1/ Let me first address the two standard talking points. For that, let's take the latest two global tariff measures announced by the US President.

"Global? I thought they were aimed at fentanyl and our defence spending?"

Yes global. And they're not. 2/

blg.com/en/insights/pe…Image
Feb 16 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
I'll bite.

Trade lawyer and former Canadian trade commissioner here.

Every Canadian government since at least 1959 has tried to expand and diversify trade outside of the US. This is why we are active in multilateral institutions like the WTO. And we we've been negotiating 1/ free trade agreements all around the world - some taking decades to continue.

In trade, as in life, location counts for a lot. So does a common language (largely). So do harmonized regulations (see location, above). So does a rich market with an insatiable appetite. (Ibid.) 2/
Feb 2 • 13 tweets • 5 min read
I'll bite. And this time I'll avoid spicy language.

"Canadians" already know the truth. The tariffs are an unprovoked act of economic war.

This question - and the last sentence - is in extreme, unmitigated, undiluted bad faith.

1. Our entire trade establishment has been 1/ quietly talking to their US counterparts, Senators, Reps, and governors since the Trump announcement. Ministers have been in DC. (And, attempting public diplomacy, Premiers have been on American news channels.)

This is all standard in bilateral relations. And you'd know it 2/
Jan 31 • 9 tweets • 3 min read
Trade lawyer and former Canadian trade diplomat here.

No one - not one person - in the federal government has the slightest interest in a trade war.

This is a calumny of the highest order, uttered by a nepo-baby with scant knowledge of recent history or politics. 1/ In 2018, President Trump threatened to destroy Canada's economy because he wanted to renegotiate NAFTA, the deal Mr. Mulroney's father arranged with the US and Mexico.

He imposed illegal tariffs on Canadian imports. We hit back. No one wanted a trade war back then. 2/ Image
Jan 27 • 19 tweets • 5 min read
I'll bite.

My first case as a junior trade lawyer at Canada's trade ministry was the "Supply Management" case under the NAFTA. Perhaps more than most trade lawyers in Canada, I'm aware of our "protectionist policies."

I then spent four years litigating the Softwood cases. 1/ You want to talk about "complaints"? Look up "Byrd Amendment" in the Softwood context. Or COOL, in agricultural trade matters. Perhaps the US's sugar tariffs (ask Mexico about them).

Point is, we have trade agreements - multilateral or bilateral - and institutions and dispute 2/
Jun 20, 2024 • 42 tweets • 12 min read
Hear ye, hear ye!

The Ontario Superior Court is in session. We have a decision in Dong v. Global.

It's not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning in a deeply disturbing and shameful episode of Canadian journalism. 1/ This is not a ruling on the underlying allegation that Global defamed Dong. Rather, it's a threshold ruling; but an important one.

In Ontario, you can't sue to shut people up on matters of public importance. This is a critical principle, essential for the free flow of debate. 2/ Image
May 1, 2024 • 12 tweets • 3 min read
When I first saw this quote I thought it was fake.

This, of course, is dangerous populist rhetoric. Next step from this is government by plebiscite, the favourite of tinpot petty dictators the world over.

This, by the way, is not about the Notwithstanding clause. Not just. 1/
Image The Notwithstanding clause is part of a complex set of compromises that made the Charter possible. It is a safety valve, permitting Parliament and the courts to have a time-limited dialogue in respect of a limited number of constitutionally-guaranteed rights.

Like the EA, 2/
Jan 3, 2024 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
This is an excellent thread.

As General Counsel @FinancesCanada during the Financial Crisis, I was responsible for legal advice on all non-tax business lines of the Department. This list is missing trade, money laundering, and international financial institutions. 1/
Image The Globe is, of course, doing the Globe-par-excellence thing of knowing the price of everything and the value of nothing. It aspires to be the Economist - a foolhardy venture at the best of times - and ends up being a only marginally higher-brow National Post. 2/
Dec 23, 2023 • 40 tweets • 12 min read
Retweeting the CPC is further evidence that the punditocracy does not want the Truth about election interference, but a full-on Gomery circus.

Government lawyers do not represent Liberal Party interests. This is a depraved attack on the professionalism of the civil service. 1/
Image I was a "government lawyer" for almost twenty years, under both Liberal and Conservative governments. In all that time, except in one glaring instance, ministers were diligent in keeping party and political matters out of policy briefings and instructions.

To be sure, 2/
Oct 11, 2023 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
I don't know if @MichaelChongMP ever served in government, or whether @acoyne (who regularly retweets the MP) remembers the Lebanon evacuation. And, especially, what an evacuation in a war zone entails. I defer to my former colleagues, @SabineNolke and @PafsoPresApase.

A 🧵. 1/ 1. We do not have enough diplomats in each potential trouble spot to help everyone who needs help. This is normal: you staff to what is needed for routine operations, and staff up if something comes up.
2. An evacuation is a "whole of diplomatic service" enterprise. 2/
May 25, 2023 • 11 tweets • 3 min read
I like priors to be challenged, which is why I read Andrew's opinion pieces.

He'd "boil down" the Old Testament to: "Guy found in a floating basket goes up a mountain, talks to a burning bush, and comes back with sixteen rules he counts as ten, half of which are about him." 1/ The key question is not, of course, whether or not a public inquiry. The punditocracy knows well that the documents that have not been aired will still not be aired. And that they will also not be shown to people who don't have clearance. (Hint hint) But, the people who do, 2/
Mar 6, 2023 • 6 tweets • 3 min read
Via @Scribulatora

This is a valid point - up to a point.
1. Not ever allegation is worthy of reporting, and just calling it an "allegation" does not make it reportable.
2. Not every unnamed source should be believed or reported. We know this from Arar, but also 1/ the experience of the Trump years, where "unnamed sources" was just a byword for "I have access pay attention to what I report but not to what I hold back for my book", as well as police misconduct reportage.
3. We also know that "allegations" in the news pages 2/
Mar 5, 2023 • 18 tweets • 9 min read
An ex parte application to the Ontario Superior Court of Justice reminded me of this note about investigations. It also has other interesting points on precedents - well, interesting for me and other law geeks, and potentially of interest to WTO nerds as well.

Ex parte? 1/ It means going to court asking for something without the other side present. For example, in the middle of a criminal investigation.

In this instance, the Court issued a sealing order for all relevant materials. And that the motion at issue could proceed without notice. 2/ ImageImage
Mar 4, 2023 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
Mr. Coyne is going down some deep - and dark - rabbit holes going back to ... 1997.

I'm guessing Chretien, Martin, and Harper were also enablers of Chinese influence peddling, theft of high-tech secrets, and money laundering?

Let me tell you about "controversial" reports. 1/ ImageImage Caveat: I have not seen the reports and so cannot judge what the reporter means by "watered down" and "sanitized".

I did serve as manager and senior executive in the government of Canada, and as lawyer at PCO, and I can tell you what *I* would have found "controversial". 2/
Mar 4, 2023 • 19 tweets • 5 min read
🧵

The most interesting thing about the China scandal that has Canadian media in a feeding frenzy is that we know exactly nothing about it. It's a scandal because they say it is, not because anything scandalous has been revealed.

My $0.02 about the media-driven "scandal". 1/ Image 1. What do we know?

A. There are intelligence reports that China, Russia, and Iran sought to interfere and influence Canadian elections.

B. The intelligence is not concrete enough for an RCMP criminal investigation or for Elections Canada to act.

C. Two reviews determined 2/
Mar 3, 2023 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
I'll not link to this.

You don't have to be a particularly astute or seasoned media critic in Canada to see where this is all heading.

1. Leak and "report" without context
2. Senior officials give testimony that the "intelligence" is not reliable, smear them 1/ with "their officials"
3. Create a crisis
4. Demand transparency to bolster the confidence they themselves have eroded
5. Claim that whatever is reported is not enough/redacted
6. Officials say "nothing of note happened", demand a public inquiry to find out who was complicit 2/
Mar 3, 2023 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
And in his At Issue comments @acoyne suggested that officials are risking imprisonment, which means they must be really concerned about the government's handling of the issue.

Poppycock and balderdash.

1. The RCMP said, at the same table, "ain't got nothing". 1/ 2. The Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, sitting right there, said, "what we got is not a lot."
3. All of which should tell you - actually, nothing. This is all irrelevant.

Let me spell it out: it is not up to individual spies to like or dislike government policy. 2/
Mar 2, 2023 • 23 tweets • 9 min read
Two names are in the news these days: Robert Fife and Sy Hersh.

That they continue to get paid to write is a subversion of economics. That anyone takes them seriously is a puzzle of both journalism and logic.

Especially Robert Fife. Of the CSIS/China fame.

Why? Two words: 1/ Maher Arar.

(See the factual background in the Commission report.)

Leaks. Senior Canadian intelligence officials. See a pattern here?

Harper apologized for Arar. Did Fife? 2/

ccrjustice.org/sites/default/…
Mar 2, 2023 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
If I were to ever give advice to a well-respected journalist - and one I've known personally since I was in undergrad - it would be this: don't go full Conrad.

Never go full Conrad. 1/ It's not necessary to be a complotist to question the timing of the latest leaks and the orchestrated media circus on this. 2/