Harper, Mulcair, and Trudeau Debated Foreign Policy Last Night. We Still Have Questions

Canada's three main political idols took to the stage last night to prognosticate platitudes into a reverb-heavy sound system in an effort to make themselves look like the statesman that Canada wants, even if they're not the one we really need. Everyone knows who the clear winner of last night's sparring match was (you know who we're talking about), but we wandered out of the media room in the sub-basement of Toronto's Roy Thomson Hall after the event with a few questions.

So we'll just leave them here, and if the party leaders wouldn't mind calling us to go through detailed, substantive answers, that would be just great.

Why won't Stephen Harper scrum?

Yes, I am a broken record.

But last night's debate contained a particularly weird moment. After Justin Trudeau and Thomas Mulcair scrummed with reporters, we began to pack up. It's become a running joke. Sometimes I'll call out to the press guys, "Hey, do you know when Stephen Harper is scrumming?" And we laugh. And we laugh. And then we sigh.

So last night, a whisper went through the puddle of journalists: Kory Teneycke.

He's scrumming? He's scrumming. He's scrumming!

Then, with no warning, Teneycke—all seven-foot-eight of him—was standing slightly off-stage, waiting for reporters to come ask him questions. Quickly, a few cameras trained themselves on his face. And then there was silence. So I piped up. What follows is the transcript.

Me: Where is the prime minister?
Teneycke: He's not doing a post-debate scrum.
Me: Why is he not doing a post-debate scrum?
Teneycke: Because he's chosen not to.
Me: Then why are you here in his place?
Teneycke: I'm not here in his place. I'm here to answer any questions that you might have.
Me: Why isn't he answering our questions?
Teneycke: That's like four questions in a row. Is there anyone else who has a question?

Me and Kory Teneycke: best frenemies.

Video courtesy Daily VICE

If the NDP won't bomb the Islamic State, who will they bomb?

One of the more confounding parts of last night's debate is the moment when Thomas Mulcair tried to explain why he wouldn't bomb the Islamic State—and to get into who he would, as prime minister, blow to kingdom come.

Trudeau, of course, wasn't much better—going on at some length about why our contribution is useless, and how we need to train ground forces (which we're doing) and lavish humanitarian aid (which we're doing.)

Mulcair seemed intent, though, to brandish some apparent international law chops.

"Well, it's important to remember that this is not a NATO mission. This is not a United Nations mission," he said, adding: "There will be times when we have to, either under the NATO Charter or under our international obligations with the UN, to use force, and we won't shy away from that."

The moderator jumps in a minute later: "What are the criteria that you're looking for?"

Mulcair says he was supportive of sending strategic airlifts to Mali, and to bombing Libya. Then he went on to say that we need to cut off funding for the Islamic State (which we're doing) and to sign the UN Arms Trade Treaty in order to stop the flow of weapons (this treaty has been in force for more than a year and it's completely unclear what impact Canada's ratification would have, if any).

So I asked Mulcair at the debate—don't you believe in the Responsibility to Protect, that doctrine that says that states are obligated to act in cases of mass violence and genocide?

"It's theoretical," Mulcair said. "But what you have seen us do, is support a UN mandate—under the responsibility to protect of the UN—and that was in the case of the Libyan mission. So we've shown, in the case, that we were willing to go that route."

So, yeah, not really an answer, especially when you consider that what Mulcair is in essence saying is that Russia and China, through the UN Security Council, should have some level of veto power over whether we get involved in foreign conflicts is sort of troubling.

Is Justin Trudeau going to arm-wrestle Vladimir Putin, or take him out for dinner?

To give you some insight into how low the expectations were for Trudeau last night, check out this exchange, per the official Munk Debates transcript:

• Rudyard Griffith [Moderator]: Mr. Trudeau, if you become Prime Minister how will you deal with Vladimir Putin?
• (Laughter.)

And, to a degree, that level of contempt from the audience was warranted. In the first three sentences of his answer, Trudeau uttered the following string of words: "[Putin] is pushing in blocking the achievement of ceasefires and stabilizing and stopping the bombings and war in Syria."

Read that a few times. Putin is pushing in blocking the achievement of ceasefires. Putin is stabilizing and stopping the bombings and war in Syria. Putin is stop go stovepot fireplace and the train in Constantinople.

But leaders regularly flub lines during debates like this. What matters is his overall point.

"Now Mr. Harper has made a big deal out of talking loudly and strongly at Mr. Putin, but the reality is Canada has such a diminished voice on the world stage that Mr. Harper hasn't noticed that Vladimir Putin didn't listen to him when he told him to get out of Ukraine," Trudeau said.

The implication, there, is that if Putin liked Harper better, maybe he would have given a sincere apology and withdrew all of his troops. Which is dumb.

So I asked Trudeau about that, too: what do your platitudes actually mean?

"If Canada hadn't lost its seat on the United Nations Security Council, we would have a much stronger voice in talking across the table with Vladimir Putin. If we were still a country of respect at the UN, a country that actually works substantially and meaningfully with international partners at multilateral tables, we would have seen a much better capacity to be effective in sanctions, in holding strong as part of NATO. This country has chosen to use a megaphone instead of having countries actually listen to them," Trudeau said.

That kind of sounds nice, except it's generally misleading. It's true that a Canadian seat on the Security Council would be a help, so full marks there—though there's no real proof that Harper is anymore to blame for that loss than, say, Paul Martin or Jean Chretien.

That other thing about "holding strong as part of NATO" and having a "better capacity to be effective in sanctions" is nonsensical. We are currently a major player in a NATO training mission in Eastern Europe, and have one of the strongest sanction regimes in the world.

Nobody is sitting around complaining that Canada is too vocal about Russia. Except maybe Russia.

Is Rudyard Griffith the most pretentious name of all time?

OK, this is one we have a clear answer to. The answer is yes.

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