Note: Transcripts may contain errors. If you wish to re-use all, or part of, a transcript, please contact CBC for permission. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. Copyright © CBC 2019

The Current Transcript for September 18, 2019

Host: Laura Lynch

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: I'm very pleased with Mr. Johnson's decision to invite me to the leaders debate. That was the right decision. Half of Canadians wanted to hear from us.

LAURA LYNCH: He's in. And Maxime Bernier, ex-Conservative, leader of the People's Party of Canada, apparently couldn't be happier to be invited to the leaders debates. We'll debate what that means for his rivals with our national affairs panel first up. After that.

VOICE: As an 11-year-old I, yeah of course I bought the propaganda. And one doesn't question that I think the real abuse that occurred was that so many of us, every white child in Rhodesia was raised white supremacist.

LL: Writer Alexandra Fuller has penned unvarnished memoirs about growing up in white minority ruled Rhodesia before. This time she take stock of her father's life and legacy, how he helped shape her into the woman she is, one who rejects any idea of racial superiority. Also, more on accused spy Cameron Ortis. And the chess diet, how to lose weight by exercising your mind. I'm Laura Lynch and this is The Current.

Back To Top »

Week two of campaign sees leaders offering up different solutions to Canadians’ financial needs

Guests: Chris Hall, Marie Vastel, Shachi Kurl

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: As Prime Minister I will increase the RESP grant from 20 percent to 30 percent for every dollar they put into their RESP up to a maximum grant of $750 a year.

VOICE 2: We are going to increase the Canada Child Benefit by 15 percent if you have kids under the age of 1.

VOICE 3: Instead of that $14 billion blank cheque that Mr. Trudeau wrote to the wealthiest corporations, we're saying we need to invest in housing. We believe our party should be investing in people, investing in housing and that's what we're going to do.

LL: Well it seems federal leaders are tripping over themselves to give you some money and help. You heard NDP leader Jagmeet Singh there. Before that, Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau and Conservative leader Andrew Scheer, all putting family,! Finances and affordable housing front and centre in the first week of the federal election campaign. Our national affairs panel is here to talk about how those pledges might play with voters. And of course we can't ignore the news that Maxime Bernier, head of the People's Party of Canada, will now be onstage for the official leaders debates. Chris Hall is the CBC's National Affairs Editor and host of The House on CBC Radio. Marie Vastel is the parliamentary correspondent for Le Devoir. They're both in our Ottawa studio. And Shachi Kurl is executive director of the Angus Reid Institute, a not-for-profit polling organization. She is in our Vancouver studio. Welcome to all of you.

CHRIS HALL: Good morning.

MARIE VASTEL: Good morning.

SHACHI KURL: Good morning.

LL: Everybody is bright and shiny. I can hear that. Okay Chris, why did David Johnson, who is the head of the Leaders Debate Commission change his mind and decide to allow Maxime Bernier to take part?

CHRIS HALL: Well the original criticism from Maxim Bernier of being excluded was it relied too much on polls had not enough on the political context as he put it. Rising support for populist parties like his own as a result they submitted a list of five ridings including Maxim Bernie's his own and in Boesch which is a kickback writing and the Commission did its own polling in the four others and it talked to people like Nick Nanos who about what it might take to be able to legitimately have a chance to win a riding and that was the real criteria Laura. And in the end they decided there was a legitimate chance in these four ridings that the PPC, they found at least 25 percent in one case, as many as 40 percent of the people there would consider voting for for the PPC and as a result they decided to reverse the decision. So a legitimate chance of winning four seats gets him in and now obviously adds legitimacy to the PPC as a national party.

LL: Right. Mary Vastel how surprised were you by the reversal?

MARIE VASTEL: I was actually quite surprised in my mind not much changed. As Chris said, Mr. Bernier argued he had chances in four ridings where he has star candidates. People like Renata Ford or ex-conservative minister Steven Fletcher in Manitoba and his own riding. And then essentially the commission ordered their own poll which asked people if they would maybe potentially probably consider voting for the party, which Shachi might disagree but is not the highest threshold for a poll it didn't it didn't ask about the particular candidate it just asked about the party. So in the end I mean this commission was supposed to make all this very objective but this third criteria that you had to meet which is the legitimate chance to to have to get candidates elected was always going to be subjective. And to me this this whole this whole episode kind of just proves that the politics is not necessarily out of this whole polling that the the ridings where Mr. Bernier says that he has a legitimate chance to win were won in 2015 by the Liberals or or the Conservatives depending on the seat with 50 to 60 percent. That's a big margin to you know overthrow for a new party that is barely one year old.

LL: And of course he's one of them being elected as a Conservative in Beauce. Do you think that the People's Party of Canada stands a chance of picking up seats in Quebec?

MARIE VASTEL: Well it's unclear if Mr. Bernier will keep his own seat in Beauce. The Conservatives are really campaigning hard to essentially get rid of him once and for all with their candidate, which used to be a mayor in the region. There's also a a rhinoceros party who is presenting a candidate named Maxime Bernier. Now I don't think that guy really has huge chance of being elected, but you know it's an added hurdle when you have two guys with the same name on the ballot. Other than his own seat he doesn't have any star candidates in the province. He was supposed to have won in the Quebec region, an ex-union guy who's very well known for denouncing corruption a few years ago. That guy backed out for personal reasons. So it looks unlikely so far that Mr. Bernier's big breakthrough would be through Quebec.

LL: Now Shachi Kurl I would expect that you may have some questions about the methodology that was used in this case, but the CBC Poll Tracker estimates that the People's Party of Canada's support nationally is about, well it's less than 3 percent. I'm wondering to what extent you think being included in the debates could boost that party's profile and potentially its support?

SHACHI KURL: So a few things for me. I was actually more surprised by the exclusion initially of the People's Party than the reversal and the inclusion. And as for seeking you know opinions about polling and where are they, I just have to say the commission never called us at the Institute. What we are seeing is the People's Party polling in about 4 percent, which is actually higher than what the Green party's actual percentage of popular vote was in 2015. So it's always mucky and murky. You're talking about so-called fringe parties or new parties into the into the mix I think and correct me if I'm wrong Elizabeth May was allowed to participate in one of the national debates possibly in 2008 or 2011 2008 2008 when she did not have an elected seat in the house so for me I was I suspected that this was going to go another way after the initial exclusion for a number of reasons and whatever the reasoning or the methodology or the or the arguments were for and then later against you know what's done is done. He's in. So what is the impact if there is a vulnerability if there is a potential loser from all of this. It is absolutely Andrew shear and the conservatives and that's because the Conservative Party is something of an uneasy alliance its base is an uneasy alliance of small government free enterprise enthusiasts but also the hardest core of the conservative movement are conservative thinkers in Canada. And when I talk about the hard core I mean this is Canada relative to the U.S. or Europe where it's not nearly as extreme but it's the hardest core of of conservatism plus social conservatives those who who come together based on socials that social values issues and Bernier actually taps into certainly the small government side of that party and then call it the hardcore conservative side. So whether he's talking about his opposition to to the public wearing of the niqab or the hijab which by the way across the country is something that resonates with a lot of people whether it's in Quebec or outside of Quebec or whether he's tapping into questions around how many immigrants at a time when Canadians are starting to push back. Possibly because the argument hasn't been properly made for immigration. But Canadians are starting to say no and then things like supply the supply management deregulation. All of those things combined to really give what we see in the polling. The People's Party is the second choice of about one in five Conservative voters. That's not good news for Andrew Scheer if Bernier does very well in these debates.

LL: Then Chris I want you to weigh in on this because there are a couple of other things that Shachi didn't mention about the People's Party and Mr Bernier's position. He opposes multiculturalism. He denies human activity plays a role in climate change. How should the other leaders react to him during the debate if he starts espousing those views?

CHRIS HALL: Well talking to the various parties, Justin Trudeau will obviously challenge him if he raises issues that are seen to be intolerant. If I can put it that way. The questions about multiculturalism, which after all was a policy introduced by his father Pierre Elliott Trudeau. Andrew Scheer clearly is a person I think who has the most to lose. I agree with Shachi. He will have opponents on both the left, which he was prepared for, but now also on the right, which he wasn't necessarily. And clearly if you look at Maxime Bernier's Twitter feed, his focus almost entirely is on basically Andrew Scheer being a a slightly bluer version of Justin Trudeau. So there will be a distinct tone change to this and ultimately not knowing the exact format yet Laura, it's clear that with another leader in there that means proportionately less time for all the others.

LL: Right. So what do you expect them to do then during the debate?

CHRIS HALL: Well I think they'll try to ignore him to the extent that they can and if they can't they will attack. Because really he doesn't represent, he represents ideas that none of the others, including Andrew Scheer really agree with on social side. On the fiscal side Scheer will have to say well we have a more responsible plan. If you look at what Maxime Bernier's saying, he would basically cut all subsidies for corporate corporations including the oil and gas sector. He'd get rid of the CBC. There's all sorts of things that he would do that probably don't sit as well with the other leaders.

LL: OK Marie Vastel, I'm wondering do you think that Mr. Bernier will try to present a more temperate version of himself than some of the statements that he's put out on Twitter?

MARIE VASTEL: Yeah absolutely. I agree with Chris that his Twitter feed is very targeted at Mr Scheer, but I also am doubtful that he actually feeds it. I don't think he writes most of those. The more you know I don't want to say radicals, it's not a great word to use, but the most maybe controversial tweets that come out from his account, from knowing him for 10 years on the Hill, I don't think that he is the one writing that. And you have to remember Mr. Bernier almost won the leadership against Mr. Scheer. He debated Mr. Scheer. I think how many debates was that? It was never ending. So he knows his principal opponent, Mr Scheer. The policies were very popular amongst the Conservative base as Shachi said and he is capable of being more composed. You know I think he's very aware that this is his only chance to make this party into more than a one hit wonder if I can say. And I would expect to see him more reasoned trying to make a rational argument. His objective here is to grow his base, not just to reinforce the fringe voters maybe that have already transitioned to his party. And so I think other leaders, Chris is right, will attack him on some of his views, but I don't think he's going to come out there trying to be controversial and make headlines for the wrong reason.

LL: OK we've got a couple of weeks as Chris said before the first of those debates takes place on October the 7th. In the meantime, the parties are busy rolling out their platforms. Shachi Kurl you heard that they're talking about pocketbook and affordability issues and that squares with what Canadians have been identifying as their priorities in the polling research you've done, correct?

SHACHI KURL: You've got to wonder why. You know so politicians don't actually start talking about something until they know for sure and they've message tested that it's already resonant with the people they're talking to. And absolutely among 30 something, young 40 something uncommitted voters, especially in those battlegrounds the GTA, Metro Vancouver, other major urban centres, affordability is the number one issue. So what happens? You look at the fact that for the Conservatives and for the Liberals who right now at this stage in the campaign are basically running neck and neck and if it continues this way it will really be a face off between these two leaders and these two parties for four voters their path to victory and two government runs through those urban battlegrounds. And it runs past those young educated professional families who despite the fact that you know Canada's economic indicators seem to be looking pretty good are not feeling that ease and are really feeling the pinch in terms of trying to get by. So within that Venn diagram you see the Conservatives trying to take an end and avail themselves of an opportunity they need to grow their base particularly in the centre and on the centre left. There aren't a lot of issues that they can credibly talk about in that space but affordability is one of them. So now you've got that the my plan is better Olympics with Justin Trudeau talking about the Canada Child Benefit and the other direct benefits that he is offering to young families and to others on the lower side of the income scale. You've got Andrew Scheer going back to to Harper era boutique tax cuts that were quite popular, but of course the criticism around those is that you know you've got to pull them off of your taxes, you need to be mindful of what you're eligible for. So everyone's now into this space saying I've got the better plan, but you know the question is who is actually going to remember who has the better plan, who's going to be able to keep them straight. Newsflash, not everybody is as wonkish as us, like keeping track of all of those products.

CHRIS HALL: Can I just jump in for one second.

SHACHI KURL: Go ahead.

CHRIS HALL: It's interesting to me, the Conservatives are and as Andrew Shearer always promised, not upset with the policies they brought forward in the Harper years. They're just going to try and be a more friendly government, a more friendly party with a leader who didn't have the same kind of sharp edge of Stephen Harper. So no surprise to see the reintroduction of child tax credits for sports and arts a universal tax cut to try to leave more money in lower middle class pockets, which is clearly an aim to try to undercut the liberals here. The distinction though is that the Liberals are often emotional promises are money upfront as opposed to using the tax cut later. So for example for childcare, you get the money upfront. While the NDP is not talking about leaving more money in your pocket, but is talking about making dental care more affordable. It's making housing stock, increasing the size of the housing stock. So all these things are actually in contrast with eachother. You don't have to be a wonk to understand that they're all trying to do something that will appeal and make you feel as though your life is better because certainly and Shachi would know this, the polls suggest that people aren't all that secure about their future, especially for the kids.

LL: Marie Vastel?

MARIE VASTEL: Yeah I agree this. This one upping by the Liberals yesterday was quite interesting to me that they essentially took Andrew Scheer's idea to give a tax credit on maternity and parental leave, but instead doing it right off the bat as Chris said and just taking away the taxes from the source. But again a lot of these promises yes do relate to affordability, but not for everybody. Not everybody gets maternal leave or paternal leave. And so I thought the kind of even went even further in trying to be progressive in helping everyone. Stats can Statistics Canada said that in 2017, almost 30 percent of moms didn't qualify for EI because you know they haven't worked enough in the past year or they didn't don't qualify todifferent criteria. And so the Liberals are even promising some sort of national maternity paternity leave guaranteed income. Those types of things I think the Liberals are trying to argue that they can have a more universal way of supporting families supporting young parents or new parents. On the other hand I find that the. Concerns have been pretty smart so far in terms of policy announcements because every day so far they have announced some sort of tax cut some are recycled. As Chris said tax credits for four sports for arts. Some of the things are for public transit some of those things are just brought back from the Harper years. But it does allow them to have the exact same message every day. We will put more money into your pockets and so far the Liberals had a big announcement yesterday but we haven't seen you know really huge policy announcements so far after one week of the campaign from the Liberals.

LL: Shachi we've talked about the Liberals, the Conservatives and the NDP. Green Party Leader Elizabeth May released her party's platform this week that was focussed on the environment, but it did include promises for Pharmacare and the elimination of post-secondary education tuition. How do you think voters, especially in B.C. where they're hoping to gain seats might respond?

SHACHI KURL: Well I think the tilt towards the Greens certainly can possibly be enhanced by some of these platform items that are being rolled out, but ultimately the Green vote in British Columbia and in other parts of the country is largely driven by two things. First of all the fact that climate change along with affordability is an absolute top issue identified Bob of concern by voters so they're they're very concerned about this they want to hear from leadership about this. And secondly it has to do with disaffected liberals who have migrated to the Greens because they've been unhappy about SNC level and they've been unhappy about broken promises over electoral reform and and Justin Trudeau generally. The question is do they stay with Elizabeth May and the Greens or do they drift back to Justin Trudeau the Liberals and either forgive him or hold their nose and vote anyway. So you know what's interesting about the Greens in this campaign is we saw a bit of a peak in the spring. We saw Elizabeth May starting to poll in the double digits we saw you know she has been perennially from a person now from a personal leadership perspective a popular leader unlike the rest of them everyone else has negative net momentum scores her scores have always been positive except for recently where she's now starting to lose some of that favorability. And I'm curious and wondering as we go through this campaign are people now just starting to turn off because of familiarity and proximity now she's a main player on the stage so she's not just not fun Elizabeth anymore or because because there has been that aspect to her personality or is is is her actually getting and the party getting more serious broadening the platform going to be something that resonates. I am not necessarily seeing a lot of momentum at this stage. Let's see what happens in the coming weeks.

LL: We have less than a minute left. I want to go around the table quickly. Chris Hall does it seem like any one leader has an edge at this point?

CHRIS HALL: No. Not an edge so much, but I think Jagmeet Singh has exceeded expectations so far, but it's a long campaign. And I think the other leaders including Elizabeth May have done what they need to do to. To Shachi's point, Elizabeth May is now being treated as a leader of a party that is interested in more policies and simply the climate change file, so we'll see how that plays out, but I think they're doing what they need to do.

LL: Marie and Shachi you've got 15 seconds each.

MARIE VASTEL: Yeah I don't see any leader really you know running out into and distancing himself from anyone else. I think the next few weeks will be really important to see who gets ahead for the first place and who gets ahead for the third place. I think Elizabeth May might have plateaued and her vote might actually go back to the Liberals and the NDP.

LL: Shachi ten seconds.

SHACHI KURL: Okay, I increasingly see this if the campaign continues as it has been as one that will be decided between the Conservatives and the Liberals and Justin Trudeau and Andrew Scheer.

LL: Thanks so much to all three of you. We'll talk soon.

CHRIS HALL: Thanks Laura.

SHACHI KURL: Thank you.

MARIE VASTEL: Thank you.

LL: Chris Hall is the CBC's National Affairs Editor and host of The House on CBC Radio One. Marie Vastel is the Parliamentary correspondent for Le Devoir. They were in our Ottawa studio. And Shachi Kurl is executive director of the Angus Reed Institute. She was in our Vancouver studio. Well the CBC News is next. Then.

SOUNDCLIP

Clip of chess commentary.

LL: It appears top chess players can burn thousands of calories a day. A chess grandmaster takes us through his physical workout in half an hour. I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

[Music: Theme]

Back To Top »

Author Alexandra Fuller reflects on Rhodesia, racism, family and the agony of losing a child

LL: Hello. I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

[Music: Theme]

LL: Still to come, broken trust. How the emerging spy scandal could affect Canada's reputation for intelligence gathering around the world. But first, growing up in a world surrounded by white supremacy.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: A little worried. I'm hopeful that this will sort of stop the war. If it stops of war then I'd live under any conditions. Quite honestly the war has been dreadful.

LL: It's 1980. Robert Mugabe has just been elected prime minister of Rhodesia, a country that would soon come to be known as Zimbabwe. It ended the rule of a white minority government and signalled the end of a bloody bush war that lasted 15 years and claimed at least 20,000 lives.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: I lost my husband. I had three children to support. I can't, I am worried because if he should nationalize, as has been said, I stand to lose everything.

VOICE 2: I am frightened because I feel we've lost the war. We've been fighting for it and all the things that everybody has fought for has gone. We've lost it.

VOICE 3: Haven't you got any brains in your head to know what you've done?

VOICE 4: How do you feel about Mr. Mugabe's victory?

VOICE 3: I think it stinks and the British stink with it because she'd just given a victory to bloody Russia, you idiot.

LL: Again those voices from 1980. Alexandra Fuller knows that anger well. She grew up in what was then called Rhodesia and her parents were involved in that war, something she's written about in a number of bestselling books about her upbringing. Her latest is called, Travel Light, Move Fast. Alexandra Fuller is with me in our Toronto studio. Hello.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Hi.

LL: What was that like listening to those voices from the past?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Do you know what's so interesting is that my I think the thing that I mean this sort of camouflage of propaganda that's sort of put over you as a child I would have heard those voices very differently as an 11-year-old as I do as a 50-year-old. And they have not the voice of my parents, that that's I think the thing that is so tricky about white supremacy that it comes in so many forms. It comes in that kind of virulent obvious form and it comes with a Southern accent or a South African accent or a white Zimbabwean accent accent. But it also comes in the accent that my parents had which was this quite genteel colonial accent from East Africa. And then my father was very English and so I think that is the way in which when I hear that I can feel the other ring of of what that accent on that time represents where it's helpful for me maybe to that because I think the thing that resonates most strongly in my work is how much that time in Rhodesia on the cusp of becoming Zimbabwe reminds me so much of the time that we're in now in the United States where we have an overtly racist government with overtly racist policies you know becoming. No more fearful about the border turning the country into more of a police state. And then that weird significant coincidence with wanting to control women's reproductivity and how women's role in the world. And you know all those echoes come through to me when I hear voices like that.

LL: What did 11-year-old Alexandra Fuller think was her parents role in the war?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: You know you as a child you're just doing it. You you believe in the rightness of your view and do you believe in the rightness of your parents. Why wouldn't you? And so it is interesting to me the blind spots I recently was home visiting my mother and she's watching something on television about the British the last days of the British in Aden and the television programs all about you know children forever getting shot and kidnapped and terrible things going on because it's a civil war. And my mother turned to me and she said who would take their children to the frontline of a civil war and you know stand then fight it. And I sort of looked at her and thought you know blind spots persist and we all have them. So I think you know as a as as an 11 year old I am of course I bought the propaganda didn't you. One doesn't question that I think the real abuse for me the real abuse of that occurred was that so many of us every white child in Rhodesia was raised white supremacist wasn't cold that it just was. I mean if you are at. You don't need to say it but that never got undone. It wasn't as if the war ended and those voices that you're hearing on on the radio that really I mean wasn't that anyone came in and re educated those people or were more critically perhaps their children it would have taken break breaking up families. I think we are aware of some in the states where you have a sort of political divide between generations. That's mild compared to what you've gone through in such a brutal civil war where people are traumatised. There's people with truly untreated mental problems from the violence that they both participated in and that you know has been inflicted on them the way in which a whole. The message that you're sending if you have a civil war the way that we did the Rhodesian government had all white people between all white men between the age of 18 and 60 fighting for up to six months of the year it turned the entire country into a battlefield. Now in the cities it was a little better protection from that. The men so had to go off and fight but there was more protection from the visual of that as there was in the rural areas. I think I feel an anger at the cover up the collusion, the white lies, unilateral white lies and the white noise, the dominant narrative that was created about the war which had very little ability to be based on fact because the Rhodesians did a very good job of burning all the incriminating evidence at the end of that war. They knew that they had committed crimes against humanity.

LL: Well you have written about your family and the civil war before. You've written other books that are pretty clear eyed about what was going on and what was happening within your family and yet in this book, it's clear to me that you idolized your father. What did he mean to you?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Well I think that for me he was the same journey that I think a lot of white people have to go on and particularly the daughter of white supremacists such as the deconstruction of everything you are. And he represented that. He dissolved in vats and vats and vats of suffering, but he emerged a very joyful life affirmed liberated person and a liberated person was interested in the liberation of all people. I mean he wasn't a social activist by any stretch of anyone's imagination, but he lived in a way that accidentally kind of you know creates that. It enabled a culture around him of you know egalitarianism that he certainly didn't start off with. And so this the book, Travel Light, Move Fast, the memoir that I wrote about him and his sort of death was really a book about a man who stopped taking his life personally. So he didn't have to take his death personally. And that was something that I think he learned from living among Southern African indigenous communities for 50 years.

LL: I want to talk more about that not taking it personally a little later on, but the book is about your father's death. He died, what starts the book in Budapest where he actually died. But it isn't just about him, you also write a lot about your mother. And you talked about her a little bit earlier, but tell me more about her.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: So she was raised in East Africa and was you know during I think the most entrenched part of colonialism which is always the end you know the end of any empire. The people in it who have benefited from that are going to be the most in denial and the angriest they're going to be in the beginning stages of grief denial and anger and bargaining. They may get there. And so my mother really grew up in that that era and huge amounts of entitlement. So in a way you know if that I think if I think of her much more so than my father the sense that she was entitled to a space and in southern Africa and that she would fight for land to the death to the death of her children. I think as is her most sort of standout quality but followed by that is also this. She a fire. I mean the woman has a towering intelligence scathing wit. She's the endless resilience. So she's a contradiction. The sort of on the one hand the weaponized fragility and neurosis of a chronic racist too you know hasn't done their work to deconstruct that and is a very painful condition for that. I mean the one afflicted with it as well as doing the afflicting I mean that's a horrible imbalance of power. And on the other hand this mass of intelligence there's great empathy. I mean I think that battle within her is what makes us from a literary point of view such an interesting character from the point of view of being a daughter such an impossible person so on mothering. But we don't have to be great mothers and she wasn't she was a dreadful mother but she was a kind of magnificent person and it has forced. Me to do what I think a lot of western ers take a lot of time to do particularly I'm thinking of America. Not U.S. citizens here really but my country full of teenagers. You just have never met. I mean look at our leader. So it is this way in which his refusal to grow up, I think very much is part of that white settler ethos it's fact that you can be a child forever and should be a child forever and not have to go through.

LL: And always have things stay the same.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Yeah. Yes. Yes and that fight, to fight to the death, to make sure things stay the same for you.

LL: Now you just called her a character and as I said, you've mined your family for a few books. Warts and all, do you actually think to yourself, wow I had a really ecentric family?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Yeah.

LL: Why does it behove you then to put it all out there for everyone to see? Why do you feel this need to write about it and let everyone see?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Because I think that there is a particularly in white settler community a conspiracy of silence behind how we got where we got that there is this collective way in which we've decided not we have all sorts of terms for it Don't air your dirty laundry or I mean just this question itself which is basically asking how dare you I mean in not so many different words. And my feeling is around this that you one, I write the books that I don't see on the shelf by white women out of eastern and southern Africa, did not address the bloodbath, the racism, the alcoholism, the abuse, the neglect of the children. I mean it didn't and it sort of didn't cover the complications of being in love with people like that. It glamorized it and all made it seem like a sort of innocent picnic. Didn't say the picnic on the backs of six million people, 40 million people or however many were being affected by colonialism.

LL: Well then but how did your mom and dad react to being unmasked if you were in that way and also your sister?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: This is what always sort of slightly baffles me. How can you be unmasked if you've chosen to fight on the side of white supremacy in Rhodesia? At what point is anything I'm writing going to further unmask you? But it is a stripping down, what it does which is most horrific it humanizes you know that behaviour. It shows that that behaviour doesn't live in isolation. I think that's sort of the image one gets of white supremacists that they're just some marginalised group. That's all you do is sit around being white supremacists and that's not true. You also sit around doing other things, consuming literature, consuming food, you know having relationships, loving dogs, riding horses, you know and you know occasionally remembering that you have children you might want to feed so they're still alive at supper. So there's I mean those sorts of things are still you know and I think that we really bully our children into a dominant narrative and it means that the narrative doesn't get shaken up. I think this narrative has to be shaken up from the inside. I felt for me it's a moral duty that you know people have often said to me well couldn't you wait till your mother died? First of all she's going to outlive all of us, but also what gives her some sort of special pass that 6 million people suffered and that my silence contributes to that. I mean the great frustration I think among black Zimbabwean writers who were not they looked to wasn't even allowed to show up until after independence. So I mean talk about censorship. Why then inflict self censorship which denies you know the truth of the other side of the story. If we just have white settler narratives that sort of skip over the attempted you know enslavement of an entire population I think that that's very unlikely to move us forward, you know as a sort of human family let alone as Zimbabweans and as I say I mean for me it just keeps being a reflection on where we are in the United States.

LL: And yet they call them those awful books.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: My family?

LL: Yes.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Yeah I would too.

LL: But did they understand your reasoning or did they just.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: I never asked. Right. I didn't no please. There was no please. There was just stop.

LL: Obviously it didn't work.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Right.

LL: I just want to talk about your dad because he almost wound up being a Quebecer. Tell me what happened.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Yeah. He was back in the day in the UK. He got out of agricultural college and he in those days given racism was global and more open it was in the 50s, he was given a passage to Canada and you know stipend go and quote unquote whiten the place up a bit. So he ended up back on a farm. You nearly froze to death. Is that it was the most dangerous moment of his life going duck hunting in Canada and it was dry. He said it shocked him that these people he was living with didn't drink alcohol.

LL: How long did he last before he realized this wasn't the place for him?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Not a full season.

LL: So he ends up in Zimbabwe. What did he do? Or in Rhodesia I should say. What did he do for living in Rhodesia?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Farming.

LL: What was he farming?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: I mean I just calculated those but by the time I left home at 18 and or by the time he arrived at his final farm, he had lived on 20 farms in 30 years. So he grew tobacco primarily, he ranched cattle, but he you know anything that would grow on any piece of soil that he landed on, he would take a look at the soil and see what might grow there. And he might be there for only a season or two. And tobacco was a 14 month season. So you're sort of stuck in there, you in a way it's a tyranny of time. And my father talked about that and actually the title of the memoir that was written for those leaving before the rains come is something that my father said that you've got to get out before the rains come once the rains come. Things are good again and you'll end up staying you'll get stuck. And I was really talking in reference to a marriage that there's moments in a marriage. It's very obvious you should be moving in from the start to feel okay and you settle back in. And yet the time to leave is just when things are feeling sort of stable because you know that is the time you will have the energy to move on. But also you never do it, you move from urgency.

LL: Right. And there's another one of those sayings as the title of this book: Travel Light, Move Fast.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Yes.

LL: 20 farms, that's obviously what he did. Why was he moving around so much?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: I think he moved from tragedy. He moved impulsively from you know they lost three children my parents, so they moved for that reason. They moved because he made terrible political decisions, you know deciding to own a farm on the front line of white minority run government and a continent that was definitely seeing a scene change in the opposite direction seems from any distance. Insanely short sighted. So I mean he he he put himself out there a lot and a life fully lived. I mean his idea of of a full life didn't include many protections and syringes and syringes. That's for sure. So I mean I think the movement was part of having a kind of uninsured life.

LL: We were talking earlier, you mentioned how your father didn't take death personally and that's why he was able to accept it. What did he tell you about dealing with pain and grief? Was it that, just it's not personal?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Well I mean I think for him it was don't be in the middle of it. Don't get in the middle of your own suffering. Don't believe your own drama.

LL: Is that what you do?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Yes.

LL: But you dwell on it in your books. You dwell on your own grief and pain, which I, which is understandable to me, but that doesn't sound like the way your father approached things.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Did you experience it as dwelling?

LL: My thoughts was that you were writing your way through it. You used your writing as a way to deal with your grief. What was it like for you?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: I don't think that that is how, I don't think that you can write as a way of dealing with your grief. I think that that would be unreadable because grief is such a dismantling and writing is a mantling. It's a deliberate putting together of words into literature. Grief is an utter dismantling of who you are. And so I would say that in fact I aim to do the opposite in my books, which is not to dwell on me. It's to take the me out of memoir and to leave what is private out and to put only what is personal since that's universal to write all the way through me to everyone else. This isn't dwelling on me. That would be I think, I mean I know those sorts of memoirs, but they tend to make you feel a bit carsick. And so these are really voyeuristic and this is really a way for me to comment on racism and migration and death and grief and what is it supposed to look like. What is grief supposed to look like? For me it's not a dwelling place.

LL: Okay. Because toward the end of the book you write about the heartbreak of your son's death. What happened to him?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: He died suddenly in his sleep 14 months ago.

LL: And I am so sorry, it broke my heart when I read about it. In that case how difficult was it for you to write about him?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: I mean very. It's a very short piece in the book and I think that's the thing is that I don't know when I will be understand the grief of his death. But not until I've done that will I write it.

LL: So in this case you just mentioned. You noted it.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Right. Yeah and then that I know enough about death to know that it's a beginning. But I don't think that I mean it certainly I have written about his grief, but I'm still in the place where that writing is private. It's still dwelling. I am still dwelling in my private grief of him ,but that is not yet something I would put on the page for universal consumption because it's not yet personal. It's still very private. It's still a terrible lonely existential ache. But what I do know about that is that you know all parents promise to love their children and to infinity. Should you have a child that tests you on that you will find that nothing is that you are. I mean you one has to I think melt through as a grieving parent everything that you are to get to your child and you will do it. So it is the one thing that I think dissolves the ego and that's working through grief. That's what I'm doing and that you know I'm sure I'll eventually end up being a memoir but it's not I mean as you suggest healing or sort of dwelling on the page. By then I want this thing to move quickly the opposite something that feels almost flammable to the touch. Because I want the reader to have the ability to dwell. It's my job to do the thinking it's my job to do the emotional lifting and that's my job as the writer to hold myself I think emotionally responsible. I don't and as an adult that's what we do. I mean I think that's what I'm trying to demonstrate in the book that this is what growing up looks like. That losing a parent is an opportunity to become an adult. Losing a child is an opportunity to become an elder.

LL: You quote your father saying, "it will be all right in the end." Do you believe that?

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Yes.

LL: Why? Because he said it? Well because they have a lot of faith in your work.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Well the full you know it will be all right in the end. And if it's not alright, it isn't the end. That seems to me about as true as it gets. And it has been true of my experience so far, but even the end I think has to be okay. I think when you lose a child you strive harder than you otherwise would to get a sense of what "the end" is. And you realize oh so in a material sense there's incessant endings. That's what we are conditioned to see as loss. So the end of youth, the end of money, the end of I don't know career, the end of motherhood, the end of whatever you want to say. But it's not. That what we forget is that you have to have an ending to have a beginning. You can't just have endless open doors. It's just not made that way. That's a playground. In real life there is this way in which I think endings are, they have to become alright the older you get.

LL: Alexandra Fuller, thank you.

ALEXANDRA FULLER: Thank you so much.

LL: Alexandra Fuller's new book is "Travel Light, Move Fast." She was in our Toronto studio. Coming up, step aside KETO or Weight Watchers. Turns out intense rounds of chess can burn thousands of calories a day. Chess as the latest fitness fad in a couple of minutes. I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

[Music]

Back To Top »

Forget the treadmill: An intense game of chess can burn hundreds of calories, research suggests

Guests: Maurice Ashley

LL: I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Wow that was electriying. So many tactics it's the end.

LL: Commentary from the World Chess Champion Magnus Carlson's win over Ding Liren of the Champions Showdown two years ago. Chess may be a workout for the mind, but as players gather this month in Russia for the International Chess Federation's 2019 World Cup, the best of them will also be training their bodies. That's because research shows that world class chess players burn an average of 600 calories during a two hour game. And some will burn 10 times that, 6000 calories over the course of a full day of tournament play. How you may ask is sitting and staring at a board for hours and hours burn that many calories? The answer is a testament to the voracious appetite of anxiety. Chess is a stressful game. Breathing rates triple during competition. Blood pressure skyrockets. Muscles constantly contract before, during and after major tournaments. It all adds up to serious stress on the body and in some cases, serious weight loss. Maurice Ashley is a chess grandmaster and commentator who says the best chess players train on treadmills and chess boards these days. Mr. Ashley is in Lauderdale, Florida. Hello.

MAURICE ASHLEY: Hello Laura. How are you?

LL: I'm fine thanks. Probably not as fit as you though. I mean what were your thoughts when you heard players can burn hundreds of calories just from two hours of playing chess?

MAURICE ASHLEY: I was stressed just listening to you describe it, but it's a reminder of what our sport is about at the highest levels, because it is intense, it is stressful. It's always razor's edge, every move could be a mistake and that kind of pressure does lead to a lot of stress and subsequently a lot of calories burned. Just all that intense effort.

LL: The physical strain apparently is so great that players often drop weight during tournaments. What was the most extreme case of that?

MAURICE ASHLEY: Well probably the worst case was Anatoly Karpov, when he played his world champion match against Garry Kasparov back in the mid-80s. They played a really long match — it was called the unlimited match because instead of having a set number of games, it was the first person to win six games. And they couldn't get to six wins, they were so tightly matched. And by the end Anatoly Karpov literally looked like death. I mean the guy's skin was just like hanging off his bones, it was so bad. They stopped the match and decided to play a new match that had a limited number of games. That kind of extreme example is bad because that match actually lasted months. But you could see quite a bit of that happening with players.

LL: And I was going to ask you, have there been other instances of severe weight loss?

MAURICE ASHLEY: Not clearly as certain as that one. I think today's players are much more cognizant of the fact that you have to stay in shape, you have to exercise, be ready for the rigours of that kind of tournament intensity. Today's players are much more keen on it. They'll focus on their diet, proper eating, proper exercise and I think that they're more steeled for competition than ever.

LL: It's interesting you know because I'm wondering if this might have led the way to another offshoot of chess that I've actually seen myself and that is chess boxing, which has become a bit of a popular sport over the last several years. I gather you've seen it or you've heard about it too, but that that requires training body and mind. Do you think that those two things actually go together?

MAURICE ASHLEY: Well I do, I have seen it and it is fun and the audience is crazy. They love it. They're watching people beat each other to death and then turn around three minutes later and start playing chess and try to crush you mentally as well. It's something that does go together My sister is a six time world champion boxer and you know we often talk about the parallels between chess and boxing my brother is also a kickboxing champion so that kind of mental effort goes into chess goes into boxing and strategy as well and vice versa. You've got to have a fit body to have a really honed mind.

LL: So how have chess regulations changed to address this fact of extreme weight loss?

MAURICE ASHLEY: It has not. I don't think that problem exists with players today. The players are just much fitter, they workout on treadmills before, sometimes after games. Often after games in fact, just to get rid of whatever pent-up stress they had coming from the game, and wind down. You you'll see that players are younger by and large the top players are invariably under 30 years old chess players just generally burn out in their mid 30s or so it's. The odd play like this one of an unknown who's able to laugh even into his 40s but you see like Magnus Carlson the world champion Fabiano Caruana who was challenger this year. They're both late 20s and in many of the top players are in that range because the physical toll and the strain takes a toll as you get older and at some point you just say I had enough of this.

LL: Now you're a grandmaster. Have you ever experienced that type of weight fluctuation?

MAURICE ASHLEY: No beneficially. I've always been pretty fit, pretty much aware of the kind of diet I eat and really focussing on being healthy that way. And I again I think the weight loss, you burn calories right, it's calories in, calories out. So you burn calories, but as long as you keep that voracious appetite up then you can always just get it back. So it's really about staying alert to the dangers, the possible dangers of all that stress and potential weight loss and then just managing it.

LL: But maybe you can give me a bit of insight here because when I see really good chess players playing, they look so stoic. And I would think that what they're really doing is just trying to slow things down, including their heart rate, to be able to focus on what's at hand. What's actually going on beneath the visage?

You know my friends would look at me and say, when we're watching you play, you look like, we don't know if you're winning, you're losing, it's equal. The situation, they never know, but that's because my face, it has that resting angry face, you know, like I'm just trying to kill the guy. But inside, the heart rate's up. You think you're doing well and all of a sudden you realize you made a small mistake, and it's like 'Oh man, this is gonna turn around,' and you're trying to, as you said, slow things down and manage the emotional boiling that's happening inside. And so yeah it's just that big challenge of trying to deal with that but you don't want to give it away on your face. You know you have to have that poker face so to speak, so that opposition of emotional, the interior emotional state versus your exterior is pretty intriguing.

LL: And I suppose that the physical fitness would help you not be drenched in sweat while you're facing the board?

MAURICE ASHLEY: You're going to sweat anyway — you're not going to be drenched in sweat though, but I mean it is that kind of thing. Imagine if you were to take a college finals. You know a lot of us who had to take those finals for college you study like crazy the night before. Then you go to the finals and you have to take that test. Imagine taking back-to-back finals on the same day, because chess games can last five, six hours. And imagine that the finals is actually fighting back! It's changing as you're trying to get the right answer. Well that's what you're doing when you're facing an opponent. Your best ideas you're putting down, and the opponent's like, nope, I've got a better idea and they're hitting back. And then imagine doing that nine days in a row. That is the kind of intensity that chess competition is about, and you have to be ready for those rigours.

LL: OK so I know that I still all these years after I finished university I still have those nightmares about facing that final exam and not having studied. Are there chess nightmares too?

MAURICE ASHLEY: Oh my gosh. Of course you dream about those darn chess pieces at night. In your mind what's going to happen the next day, a blunder you made that might have cost you the championship or that tournament, winning that event. Yeah it's it's take a lot of meditation and concentration and soul searching and all of it to really get that mental toughness that you need at the highest level.

LL: Now we heard a clip off the top from one of the world chess champion Magnus Carlson's matches. Do you know what his physical workout regimen is?

MAURICE ASHLEY: Magnus loves to play sports of all types. He's a soccer well, I've been in the gym with him on a treadmill. The guy likes the HIT, you know high intensity workouts where you run real fast and you slow down and you run real fast again. He's a big proponent of that, but he's also into soccer, he's into basketball as well. Anything that's competitive that keeps him fit he wants not only the exercise itself but the competition because he's a competition hog.

LL: Is he set apart from others in that sense or is he just like the others who are at the top of their game?

MAURICE ASHLEY: I think Magnus for me is probably the fittest of all the players I've seen but everybody's doing it. Everybody's exercising in some way shape or form. It's just so necessary at that level that you just it's a regular thing. I mean the gym membership is for all the top chess players.

LL: Now when you're doing commentary do you ever feel burnt out from watching it and doing commentary?

MAURICE ASHLEY: Every single day. Again for us, for them it's one game. They're just playing the one game. But we as commentators we're covering all the games from every tournament. So while we're trying to talk about this one game, another fight is breaking out another board. We've got to switch back and forth. By the end it's like you know six or seven games in your head that you're trying to keep track of. At the end of the night I feel totally wasted and yeah I'm in the gym every morning just trying to get that out of my head.

LL: Maurice why do you think people then see chess as being purely cerebral?

MAURICE ASHLEY: Because that's what they see. With the activity itself players are sitting there, they're playing the game. It looks like hours are passing, nobody's making a move. So yes it is a very intensely cerebral activity, no question about it, but your brain requires energy and it's not just going to get there for free. You're burning that energy as you think and especially if you think about a job normally our jobs we can take breaks we can relax we go get some coffee to chat with our fellow employees but there's not any of that when you're playing chess it's you with your opponent five or six hours of intensity one mistake spells your doom. And that kind of intense stress people are aware of because they can't sit in those shoes. I think it's sort of like airline traffic controllers. You don't want those folks breathing. Like focus on one thing and that's getting my plane down and that's the kind of intensity that chess is.

LL: I am going to be watching chess in a whole new way from now on. Thank you very much for your time.

MAURICE ASHLEY: My pleasure.

LL: Maurice Ashley is a chess grandmaster and commentator. He was in Lauderdale, Florida.

Back To Top »

Former CSIS analyst Jessica Davis says Canada will need to work very hard to repair trust within both the domestic and international intelligence agencies

Guests: Jessica Davis

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: We recognize that these allegations, if proven true, are extremely unsettling Canadians and our law enforcement partners can trust that our priority continues to be the integrity of our investigations and the safety and security of the public we serve.

LL: That's RCMP commissioner Brenda Lucki, speaking for the first time yesterday after the arrest of one of Canada's top intelligence officials. Late last week the director general of the RCMP's National Intelligence Coordination Centre, Cameron Ortis, was charged under the Security of Information Act. CBC News has learned that the investigation into Mr. Ortis began when his name surfaced during an FBI probe into a shadowy Vancouver based company that sold encrypted cell phones to criminal networks around the world. Watching all of this unfold has been Jessica Davis. She's the president and principal consultant at Insight Threat Intelligence and a former analyst with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. And she joins me from our Ottawa studio. Hello.

JESSICA DAVIS: Good morning.

LL: What were you hoping to hear from the RCMP commissioner Brenda Lucki yesterday?

JESSICA DAVIS: Well yesterday I actually had very low expectations for what we were going to hear because this is as the commissioner said a very sensitive investigation. But it's also before the courts so that necessarily restricts what the commissioner is going to disclose about the allegations that Mr. Ortis is facing. What I did hear that was interesting though was her reassurance that this seems to be a single individual involved in this activity while she wasn't willing to comment on most other aspects of the investigation. That was one place where she was much more categorical. And I think that that's very reassuring for everyone in the Canadian Security Intelligence world. Why. Because sometimes insiders can operate with multiple individuals so it is not common but it is possible for there to be multiple people involved in this kind of activity working together. That's always going to be a concern for anyone whenever there is an insider threat or allegations of an insider threat. And so for the Canadian Security Intelligence world to be able to essentially not necessarily close the door on this chapter but to move forward that's going to be reassuring instead of not having to conduct ongoing internal investigation to try to find potential other conspirators.

LL: Now CBC News has learned that the investigation into Mr. Ortis grew out of an FBI probe into a Canadian company called Phantom Secure Communications. Its CEO Vincent Ramos is currently serving nine years in a U.S. jail after pleading guilty to racketeering conspiracy in May. What was Ramos doing at Phantom Secure and who were his clients?

j: His clients were essentially criminals from what I can gather from the court proceedings against Mr. Ramos and they what he really was doing was providing a certain service to those criminals of secure communications. And this is really critical in an era of increasing encryption that's complicating investigations both from law enforcement and security officials. And so he was providing a very necessary service that was in effect preventing law enforcement from legally and effectively listening to their conversations in ways that would help bring charges against them.

LL: Well I guess at some point they figured it out because it's alleged now that Mr. Ortis emailed Ramos offering him and this a quote "valuable information." What intelligence would Mr. Ortis have had access to that would be valuable to someone like Ramos or his criminal clients?

JESSICA DAVIS: There's really no end to the kind of information that Mr. Ortis would have had access to and the value that it could have potentially had to have two criminal organizations. So it's you know in a lot of ways I sort of think of Mr. Ramos as being the conduit of the information the potential conduit of the information. So he may not have been the ultimate intended beneficiary of it but the individual who might've been able to put Mr. Ortis in contact with people who might have had found a lot of value from it. So the kind of information that he would have had access to includes operational RCMP information so that ongoing investigations. It could have also included intelligence from Canadian security and intelligence services. So of course theses and other organizations but also allied information. So the RCMP obviously works quite closely in terms of investigations with the FBI and other allied police services. So he would have had access potentially had access to some of that as well as allied very highly classified allied intelligence. All of that would have potentially been of interest and a value to criminal actors foreign states terrorist organizations all sorts of nefarious actors.

LL: The CBC also learned that Mr. Ortis was carrying more than $90,000 of debt. In your view how significant is that?

JESSICA DAVIS: The information about that debt does date back a little bit to I think or 2012 or 2013, so it does a bit of historical debt that we can and that we're seeing. The amount of it really depends on how it was structured. So if it was $90,000, $92,000 of mortgage debt. That's not really a big deal in today's interest rates if it was ninety thousand dollars of credit card debt. Those interest rates are a lot higher that can be a bit more of a burden on someone. And if it was less regulated debt like you know debt to an individual outside of the banking sector and who knows what interest rates I could have been at that might have been even more pressure so the financial motivation for any kind of insider threat is definitely something that needs to be taken into consideration. At this point with the allegations facing Mr. Ortis, we have no indication what his motivation was. It could have been ideological, it could have been grievance based, it could have been financial, it could have been a combination of all of those things or more. But the debt pieces is definitely interesting.

LL: OK let's go back to the news conference yesterday with RCMP commissioner Lucki. She said that public information about the case is speculative unhelpful and may be harmful to the investigation. How does the RCMP balance reassuring the public with assuring the viability of the prosecution of Mr. Ortis?

JESSICA DAVIS: I found that statement very interesting, particularly since the Commissioner Lucki didn't elaborate on what it was that was inaccurate or speculative. I think part of that piece of it was about clarifying the RCMP and FBI's role and in this investigation and I think that's part of the reassurance that she was trying to bring to Canadians. So initial reporting had said that it was an FBI tip off that had alerted that the RCMP to a potential leak in their midst or an insider. The commissioner really clarified that for us and characterized that much more as a joint investigation between the two law enforcement agencies which is a significant difference. There's a huge difference between Canadian authorities being tipped off by the FBI and having to then essentially figure out what's going on and then. And the RCMP and the FBI working together finding information together and then the RCMP conducting the investigation. So I think a piece of that was about Commissioner lucky reassuring Canadians that the RCMP was able to do its job that it wasn't just tipped off by the FBI. And frankly I did find that reassuring. It's very different than if the FBI had had to run the investigation and determine who it was that was leaking. The RCMP did that work themselves. They took that initial piece of intelligence or information that had that had surfaced and determined who had access to it and narrowed down their list of suspects from there and that's why Mr. Ortis is facing these allegations.

LL: So at pains to make sure that people understood that the relationship with American allies were strong. I'm wondering how you think Washington and our other allies in the Five Eyes alliance are processing this case?

JESSICA DAVIS: Well certainly they're not happy about it. Mr. Ortis had access to the most sensitive information within the Five Eyes or some of the most sensitive information within the Five Eyes. We don't know what he actually took and what was of interest. So that's of course a concern. I would say too that the allies. This is not the first time that they've had to deal with this type of situation. We've had a number of insiders and leaks particularly from the Americans in terms of Chelsea Manning Edward Snowden WikiLeaks. So the procedures for dealing with this type of thing and essentially mitigating the damage they can cause those procedures are well-established. You know Canada's going to have to be in a bit of a damage control mode with the Five Eyes to make sure that they understand that we're taking this seriously that we're. Putting things in place to make sure that this can't happen again. But fundamentally Canada's not going to get kicked out of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance over this you mentioned mitigation Commissioner Luckey talked about steps being taken to mitigate the impact what what might they be. Those steps can vary significantly so I think some of them will probably be technological so making sure that information technology is secure within the RCMP and within the rest of the Canadian Security Intelligence world. You know making sure that it's not possible to accelerate data in whatever way Mr. Artist did. We don't know. We don't have any details about how that happened. But there's also mitigation in terms of the damage within the Canadian Security Intelligence world. The community is really built on trust. It's imperative that you be able to trust partners from other departments and agencies and that the security clearance process is robust. So there's probably a lot of mitigation activity going on in terms of damage control even within Canada and making sure that the pieces are in place to catch anyone else who could potentially do this type of thing in the future.

LL: Still much left that is unknown. What are the main questions that you're left with today?

JESSICA DAVIS: The motivation piece is fundamental I think to understanding this. The motivation piece also speaks to mitigation in place. So depending on what motivated Mr. Ortis in terms of these allegations he's facing, that's critical. Understanding that is critical because if we understand what motivated him, there are ways to prevent or to catch that in potentially other insiders or even for our allies. The motivation piece remains key. Certainly how the data was extracted rom the RCMP, I think that's a that's a huge question for me and ultimately who he was intending to pass this information to.

LL: We will pay attention and probably be back to you on this. Jessica Davis, thank you for your time.

JESSICA DAVIS: Thank you.

LL: Jessica Davis is the president and principal consultant at Insight Threat Intelligence and the author of Women in Modern Terrorism: From Liberation Wars to Global Jihad and the Islamic State. She was in our Ottawa studio. That is our program for today. Stay tuned to Radio One for Q. Tom Powers is joined by Kurt Browning and Ron MacLean to talk about the fifth season of Battle of the Blades. It's returning after a six year hiatus. We end today though with a very unusual obituary.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Joe Heller made his last undignified and largely irreverent gesture on September 8th, 2019, signing off on a life in his words "generally well lived and with few regrets." When the doctors confronted his daughters with the news last week that your father is a very sick man, in unison they replied, "You have no idea."

LL: And thus began the tribute to Joe Heller. He died earlier this month at the age of 82. His family didn't want an ordinary obit because Joe was anything but ordinary. But when it was printed in a Connecticut newspaper it caught fire as they say and now it's been shared around the world. It might have even spawned a new style of obituaries called Joebituaries. Monique Heller is Joe's youngest daughter and she gets the last word today. I'm Laura Lynch. Thanks for listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: The Thursday before my father passed we were all in his hospital room and I thought it was appropriate at that time to bring up what my father's intentions were to the family and that he wanted a funny tribute as opposed to kind of a clinical one being born during the Depression shaped Joe's formative years and resulted in a lifetime of frugality hoarding and cheap mischief often at the expense of others. Being the eldest was a dad we started just telling stories over my dad's hospital bed and it actually wound up being just such a wonderful celebration of his life and the different ways that he touched us. Some irreverent and some very sarcastic and very funny. His mother was not immune to his pranks as he named his first dog fart so she would have to scream his name to come if he wandered off in the neighbourhood just started his long and I think from that point on. We as a family were really committed to honouring the person he was. There he met the love of his life Irene who was hoodwinked into thinking he was a charming individual with decorum. Boy was she ever wrong. Joe embarrassed her daily with his mouth and his choice of clothing. To this day for my wedding the one request that I did have was for my mother to please just control my father and make sure that he didn't wear anything but the tuxedo that I had picked out for him. And so I was you know pleasantly surprised when I came down the stairs of this mansion where we held the reception and he he was suited up in his tuxedo. About halfway through the reception I hear just up roars of laughter coming from the dance floor. Much to my chagrin he is down there with his tuxedo off the tuxedo shirt off. In one of his colourful shirts that had a Chihuahua on it. With. I want to say elephant Titus of the scrotum and it said Who are you calling Tiny. And so in front of you know all of my friends and the executives who I worked for you know my father got in his last laugh. Please dress comfortably. The family encourages you to don the most inappropriate T-shirt that you were comfortable being seen in public with as Joe often did. Everybody has a Joe story and we'd love to hear them all. Joe faced his death and his mortality as he did with his life face on, often telling us that when he dropped dead to dig a hole in the backyard and just roll him in. Much to his disappointment, he will be properly interred with full military honours. As people approached the casket they were surprised to see my father in a grumpy T-shirt and instead of his hands being folded neatly in a solemn repose, my father had requested that his right finger be in a one finger salute. So he was flipping the bird to people as they were coming up to pay their last respects to him. Sorry we set and I did the very best we could to take care of him and keep him out of your hair as long as we could. He's back in your court now.

[Music: Theme]

Back To Top »

Provide Transcript Feedback

CBC would like to acknowledge the support of the Broadcasting Accessibility Fund.

Sept. 18, 2019 episode transcript

More Stories Like This