Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - January 25, 2025, Winnipeg, Manitoba THINK TANK COMMENT EDITOR: RUSSELL WANGERSKY 204-697-7269 ● RUSSELL.WANGERSKY@WINNIPEGFREEPRESS.COM A9 SATURDAY JANUARY 25, 2025 Ideas, Issues, Insights Trudeau meets the political cycle I F making sense of politics today seems like Greek to you, luckily there’s a Greek who can help explain it. His name is Polybius. Unlike his better-known forebear, Plato (who plumbed for government ruled by a philoso- pher-king), Polybius was a believer in mixed forms of government. He gave rise to what we now call the “separation of powers” to avoid concentration of authority in one or a few sets of hands. Smart thinking. Captivated by the dynamic Roman empire of his time (literally, since he was a hostage there for almost two decades), Polybius developed the the- ory of anacyclosis, the cycle of political evolution. This cycle is characterized by three characteris- tics. First, that regime decline is natural and inev- itable; second, this is because of how successive leaders act; and third, regimes are determined by what precedes them. What’s this got to do with our current, increas- ingly unlamented prime minister? It helps answer the question as to how and why Canada is where it is today and what’s coming next. And it answers whether Justin Trudeau’s political demise is a victim of either inevitable political circumstances or a victim of his own actions. Polybius would say both. Today, we simply offer the all-encompassing dictum that “governments defeat themselves.” Conveniently, this pins the blame on some unspecified elixir of unpopular leadership, controversial policy decisions and poor political performance. It covers every- thing yet reveals nothing about what’s lying underneath. What’s underneath are the cultural tremors that inevitably give rise to earthquakes of political change. Understanding politics today means under- standing that it is more about culture — what voters feel is important — than ideas to fix what’s important. Culture is dominant because it is where and how people live. Its immediacy for people transcends any future, rational consider- ation of reasonable facts or futures. It shapes the language politicians use to be relatable and, more importantly, the priorities they pursue. “Alterna- tive facts,” anyone? Pierre Trudeau (remember him?) famously preached “reason over passion” when it came to politics. His son, not so much. In the current cycle of culture politics now pre-eminent, both are the dismissed men of history. But for opposite reasons. The first because he sought to suppress the passion that goes with culture in politics; the second because he sought to magnify the passion of culture in politics. Pierre Trudeau would be a historical relic in politics today. Justin Trudeau is about to become a contemporary one. “Because it’s 2015!” is how the newly minted prime minister explained his historic decision to make his cabinet gender even. Once political zeit- geist, 10 years later the moment reeks of artificial symbolism given the resignations of ministers Chrystia Freeland, Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott. Justin Trudeau’s self-description of being a feminist fails to compensate. From Indigenous reconciliation to diversity, eq- uity and inclusion policies, Trudeau sought to surf the cultural waves of the past decade. Some of these were imported from America. Think “Black Lives Matter” and “Me Too.” Canada required its reckoning and Justin Trudeau was to be its instrument. Or so he thought. Today, he is out-of-date and out-of-time. His was the equivalent of taking a knife to a cultural gun fight. The battleground shifted beneath him. Broke by “woke,” Trudeau failed — wittingly or not — to see the frontiers of this cultural war. In- stead of cementing tangible legacies for his coun- try that constitute progress, he embraced full-on progressivism — domestically and internationally — as the animating current to run through every- thing his government did, whether the country wanted it or not. It did until it didn’t. His overreach underlined three essential truths in any political culture war. First, by overreaching in rhetoric, style and substance, a political counter-current will be generated that will seek to unravel what came before it the first chance it gets. Building on what previous governments and leaders did is a quaint notion of yesteryear. Through executive order fiat, Donald Trump is proving exactly that in the United States. DEI is DOA. Second, every populist culture runs up against popular political limits in a democracy. Push too far, too fast or too soon, and the ballot box bounce that favoured you in the last election will smack you in the face at the next. Third, culture wars require armies of privates to follow, not just generals to direct. Magnified by social media, these followers must be contin- uously fed a diet of facts, truths and victories — real or imagined — to remain engaged. Trump’s pardoning of some 1,500 convicted Jan. 6 rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol Building in 2021 to stop Joe Biden’s presidential certification is the most egregious example. We will soon see the Canadian version of this play out once Trudeau leaves the stage. The cycle will be complete. Until, as Polybius points out, another cycle begins. David McLaughlin is a former clerk of the executive council and cabinet secretary in the Manitoba government. He was campaign manager for the Manitoba PC Party in 2016 and 2019. He was a chief of staff to the prime minister and federal finance minister. Protecting the integrity of Manitoba elections MANITOBA Premier Wab Kinew says work is underway on a bill aimed at protecting provin- cial elections from foreign interference, dis- and misinformation campaigns and other interven- tions which could undermine the fairness and integrity of the election process. That bill could be introduced as early as the spring session of the legislature. Some of the potential changes will flow from recommendations contained in the 2023 annual report from Shipra Verma, CEO of Elections Manitoba. That report focused in large part on the 2022 amendments to the Elections Act, which were intended to improve the accessibility, effi- ciency, security and voter satisfaction with the election process. Following the October 2023 election, Elections Manitoba conducted an in-depth analysis of how the modernized voting system had operated. Unfortunately, a major storm, a power outage, technical problems with the electronic vote tab- ulators and human errors in the entry of voting data all contributed to delays in the collection and reporting of results. This led to criticism — not all of it fair — that Elections Manitoba had not “road-tested” the technology sufficiently or trained its approxi- mately 5,000 (mostly temporary) employees ade- quately. The CEO presented extensive evidence in her annual report to rebut these criticisms. Operational efficiencies in the delivery of voting services are important and technological tools can support improvements. For example, artificial intelligence algorithms can be used to determine optimal polling station locations and facial recognition can be used for voter authenti- cation purposes. However, AI tools can also be used to interfere in the election process by spreading disinfor- mation, creating false images, videos, texts and audio targeted messages intended to mislead low-information voters or to erode confidence in the election process and its outcomes. The CEO of Elections Manitoba recognized these threats and acknowledged the limits of her existing authority. The Elections Act prohibits the transmission of false or misleading information about candidates and impersonation of election officials. Strengthening these provisions, the CEO wrote, is essential to safeguard democratic processes against the threat of false information. She called for amendments prohibiting communi- cation of false information about voter eligibility, voting locations, the technology used in elections and the actions of election officials. The B.C. legislature has recently amended its election law in this way. Last October in Ontario, the CEO recommend- ed an even broader approach that would require that all AI generated content be identified as such in any communications, that he should have the authority to order digital media companies to remove false information and that penalties be imposed for failures to comply. Legislation is just one component of a more comprehensive, integrated approach to the pro- tection of election integrity, which must involve political institutions and actors, as well as media companies and civil society. As part of election competition, political parties will increasingly be tempted to use AI to generate images and videos (deepfakes) to make emotional connections, raise fears and/or confuse voters. In Manitoba, a voluntary code of conduct (2000), which relies on self regulation by political parties, calls for the avoidance of misleading and defamatory messages about other parties and candidates. However, there is no explicit ban on the use of deep fakes. This leads to two questions: should such a ban be added and should enforce- ment be transferred to Elections Manitoba? In national politics, party nominations and lead- ership contests have been identified as vulnerable to potential foreign interference by state and non-state actors. The extent to which a relatively small province like Manitoba is a target for such interference is hard to know. Party nomination processes are mostly wide- open affairs. Potential foreign influence is some- what limited by a ban on contribution to parties and candidates from anyone living outside of the province. As for leadership contests, contri- butions from Manitoba residents are limited to $3,000 and contributions over $250 are reported publicly. More oversight of these processes by Elections Manitoba is required. Cyberattacks from state and non-state actors on different aspects of the election process are pos- sible. The exposure of Manitoba to such threats is difficult to discern. Clearly Elections Manitoba takes the threat seriously. It works with Commu- nications Security Establishment Canada and the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security, uses firewall systems, encryption and audits, all activities meant to protect the election infrastructure and sensitive voter information. Third parties, (such as political action com- mittees or associations of various kinds) can be a source of disruption of the election process. In Manitoba there are some statutory restrictions on activities by such entities. For example, third-par- ty advertising which promotes or opposes a party or candidate is considered to be election com- munications and is subject to spending limits of $100,000 in the pre-election period and $25,000 in the election period. Citizens can play a role in protecting the integ- rity of elections by being shrewd consumers of political messaging. Elections Manitoba conducts educational outreach about the election process. Elections BC goes further with a webpage encour- aging citizens to identify fraudulent websites/ social media accounts and false information, and reporting concerns to media companies. Developing approaches to protect the integrity of the elections should involve a broad range of stakeholders, not just the registered party repre- sentatives who serve on advisory committees to Elections Manitoba. Rather than going directly to legislation, it would have been preferable to widen the dialogue by issuing a discussion paper outlining possible actions to ensure fair, free and transparent elections in a rapidly changing digital environment. Paul G. Thomas is professor emeritus of political studies at the Univer- sity of Manitoba. From 2014-2019, he was on the advisory board to Elections Canada. Who owns outer space? I HAD been thinking about this already. Then, a few weeks ago, there was an item on the TV news about a SpaceX rocket that had exploded shortly after launch, near the Turks and Caicos Islands, showing a huge amount of fiery debris falling into the Atlan- tic Ocean. We’re asked to recycle our newspapers and milk cartons to help save the environ- ment, yet SpaceX owner Elon Musk can launch a rocket full of contaminant material which then explodes and crashes into the ocean and nobody blinks an eye. Who owns outer space? It should belong to everyone on Earth. No one business or billionaire should have the freedom to explore outer space without regulations about what those activities can do to our environment. Why should they even be allowed to go there? We should all be concerned with what’s going on. Turns out I’m not alone. In January 2022, the Outer Space Institute surveyed a random sample of American adults about their opin- ions on space. Of the 1,520 respondents, 81 per cent agreed with the statement “Outer space should belong to everyone.” In a book written by Michael Byers and Aaron Boley titled Who Owns Outer Space, the authors (Canada Research Chairs at the University of British Columbia) brilliant- ly put forth the challenges that underlie humanity’s expansionist cravings to explore outer space. In the early days, only highly trained astronauts with scientific missions were launched into space. Now, private companies like Musk’s SpaceX have introduced space tourism for those who can afford US$20 mil- lion a trip. The emergence of space tourism, the authors say, raises a host of difficult issues. One is the impact of launches on the Earth’s environment. Next is the accumulation of space debris (junk) in the low Earth orbit. It’s getting crowded up there. SpaceX, having launched more than 3,000 satellites since 2019, now controls large swaths of the Earth’s lower space orbit. And finally what would be the expec- tations of government agencies (such as NASA) to try and rescue tourists in distress? This is an issue currently confronting the International Space Station (ISS). In June last year, two American astronauts were propelled into space to the ISS, for an eight- day visit. They have now aged almost a year. The private company rocket for the return trip malfunctioned, leaving the astronauts stuck there for the past seven months. SpaceX may be ready to launch a rescue operation in March, maybe April. The players involved in space-related activities include six governing countries — the U.S., Russia, China, India, Australia, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency. So far, the three companies that have space programs are Musk’s SpaceX, Virgin Galactic and Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin. Elon Musk’s SpaceX only exists because of NASA contracts provided to it when it was a fragile start-up. It still relies on U.S. Space Force contracts which are allowing the company to become ever more powerful and Musk to become ever more wealthy. A core principle set out in the 1967 Outer Space Treaty states that the exploration and use of space is “the province of all human- kind.” And in 2020, the Artemis Accord established rulings on space mining. It may be too little too late, and the wrong timing politically, to expect tighter regula- tions. For Musk, space exploration is a rich man’s hobby. He even has aspirations to es- tablish a one-million-person colony on Mars, in the event that global warming destroys Earth’s atmosphere and we have to go some- where else. It’s apparent that it helps to become a multi-billionaire on Earth, before you can try and become an owner of outer space. But when it comes right down to it, he’s trespassing in our space. Terry Aseltine was a student in Professor Lockhart’s Astronomy class at the University of Manitoba in 1970. TERRY ASELTINE DAVID MCLAUGHLIN We’re asked to recycle our newspapers and milk cartons to help save the environment, yet SpaceX owner Elon Musk can launch a rocket full of contaminant material which then explodes and crashes into the ocean and nobody blinks an eye. PAUL G. THOMAS THE CANADIAN PRESS FILES Prime Minister Justin Trudeau leaves a news conference after announcing his resignation as Liberal leader Jan. 6. ;