NAFTA, the NDP and a new tag line: 3 ways federal politics touched us this week
OTTAWA — Parliament Hill was absorbed by the scandal that was Anthony Scaramucci this week, with even the most focused of policy-makers wondering how their best-laid plans on NAFTA could possibly deliver, given the constant chaos engulfing the White House.
Even with the resignations of three key political figures over the past few days — Newfoundland’s finance minister Cathy Bennett, Ontario environment minister Glen Murray and former B.C. premier Christy Clark — Canadian politics looked placid in comparison.
Scaramucci — fired Monday as Donald Trump’s communications director just 10 days after he took the job — was let go by the president’s new chief of staff John Kelly, whose visit to Canada last winter when he was secretary of homeland security was so enthrallingly normal that political insiders in Ottawa took some heart.
Beyond the Scaramucci gossip and some outrage over sweltering Air Transat passengers stuck on a plane on a runway for six hours, federal politics brought changes on NAFTA, the NDP and government’s approach to economics.