Trump’s lumber tariffs make home ownership too expensive for more than a million Americans
One of Donald Trump’s protectionist “America first” policies is partly to blame for making home ownership too costly for more than one million Americans. According to the U.S.-based National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), American tariffs on Canadian softwood lumber have caused housing prices in the United States to jump by an average of $9,000 […]
PM Pays $100 Ethics Penalty
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been fined $100 for another breach of Parliament’s ethics code, this time involving a gift from the Premier of Prince Edward Island. Neither the breach nor fine were disclosed until Parliament prepared to adjourn for summer recess.
Quebec Charter of Values a factor in radicalizing foreign fighters: study
Five months after Shayma Senouci left Quebec to join Islamic State fighters (ISIS) in Syria, she wrote a long email to her friends back home. She told them that she felt she didn’t belong in the West and that she had an obligation to emigrate to a Muslim country. “I left because I felt imprisoned […]
News broke late Thursday that the government was renewing the federal equalization program — with no changes. But Alberta’s United Conservative Party was ready for it. UCP leader Jason Kenney planted himself in front of some rail tanker cars and took advantage of Alberta’s mid-June bounty of sunlight — more than 17 hours — to […]
Read MoreOntario Premier-designate Doug Ford has tapped a senior staffer from Stephen Harper’s government to be one of his top advisors, say sources closely linked to the Progressive Conservatives. Jenni Byrne will be Ford’s principal secretary, according to four sources who spoke with iPolitics on condition of anonymity. Byrne did not reply to a request for […]
Read MoreThe U.S.-owned company behind a Windsor-Detroit bridge crossing is stepping up its fight to prevent a Canadian-funded second span from being built. And they’re doing it by appealing to U.S. President Donald Trump with a TV commercial. The owners of the Ambassador Bridge — the Detroit International Bridge Company (DIBC) — say the construction of […]
Read MoreThe polls were right. Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford won a majority on June 7, NDP Leader Andrea Horwath secured official opposition status for her party, Premier Kathleen Wynne’s Liberals were decimated, and the Greens finally got a seat.
Read MoreThe Supreme Court’s chief justice says the over-representation of Indigenous people in prison is unacceptable and reveals a serious problem. Richard Wagner tells a news conference today he’ll leave the politics to others, but the court will make its voice heard on issues of Indigenous justice. He points to a decision this month in which […]
Read MoreChinese telecom giant Huawei, which has put down strong roots in Canada, is now encountering more trouble in other G7 countries, with a German lawsuit this week alleging that the Shenzhen company has stolen state-of-the-art technology, and Congressional pressure on Google to cut ties with the firm. This week, Israel’s SolarEdge Technologies filed a patent-infringement […]
Read MoreFeatured Ink
How Chrystia Freeland became the (unofficial) deputy prime minister
A cabinet shuffle may well be coming in the next couple of months in Ottawa, but Prime Minister Justin Trudeau seems to have already jumped the gun and created a new job for one of his ministers. Chrystia Freeland, already Canada’s foreign affairs minister, is increasingly looking like the unofficial deputy prime minister to Trudeau.
Trump’s America an embarrassment to this dual citizen
I’ve always been proud of being born in the U.S.A., even after five decades as a Canadian citizen. Having access to dual citizenship in a country that gave so much to the world economically, militarily and democratically was a bonus branch from our family tree. Not any more.
Trump gives Trudeau a golden ticket, but can he cash in?
For Justin Trudeau, spotty record and all, Donald Trump could be the improbable ticket to re-election. The question is, does Trudeau understand why the Trump card is so important? The domestic political situation facing Trudeau and his Liberal government is increasingly gloomy. Whether he knows it or not, the disappointment amongst the coalition that gave […]
The dazzling deceit of big marijuana
Alex MacDonald is a grizzled old pothead. He has a cough from 50 years of smoking dope. He used to be a dealer, too, though he hasn’t done that for years. Today he remains a faithful consumer and a close student of the industry. He thinks a lot of the hype around legalization is ridiculous.
How Canada’s G7 summit fell short for women
Canada is being praised in some quarters for taking a strong stance on supporting women’s empowerment as host of the G7 leaders’ summit earlier this month, but the praise is somewhat misplaced. There was a $400 million investment in women and girls’ education; a commitment to raise $3 billion to support women’s economic participation in […]
Without the Safe Third Country Agreement, we’d soon see how liberal on refugees we really are
You must understand, there is never going to be a turning point. People keep expecting, even predicting one: the dramatic “have you no decency, sir” moment when Donald Trump at long last goes too far, even for his supporters, and begins his inevitable decline and fall. But life is not a movie, and resists our […]
The passage of the Cannabis Act is crucial for Trudeau’s credibility
Promise made, promise kept — which is not something this government has been able to say very often. The passage of the pot-legalization bill before the summer recess was crucial for Justin Trudeau, who during his 959 days in power has garnered a reputation as a promise-breaker. After reneging on the pledge to usher in […]
Are issues getting too complex for real debate?
Yesterday in this space, I called for an election on how Canada should respond to Trump. In a note, public affairs expert Andrew Beattie neatly laid out what I believe is a widely shared fear about such a debate: the issues are too complex, and it would quickly degenerate into bombast and sloganeering. I see […]
War Under the Peace Tower
In the parliamentary calendar, it is inevitable that the subject of Question Period’s dysfunction will emerge, often with a twinge of anger. It’s happening again in these last few days, led by the Toronto Star researching into the veracity and truthfulness of that one time in the House where the government must account for its […]
Reforming Parliament: Time to hear from all the players
Is representative democracy in Canada in trouble? The Samara Centre for Democracy, a Canadian charity working to improve politics thinks so. Their recently released report, Flip the Script, paints a grim picture of Canada’s system of elected representation. Based on interviews with 54 Members of Parliament exiting after the 2105 federal election, it portrays a hyper-partisan House […]
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau needs a better summer in 2018 than he had in 2017 — and the Chicoutimi-Le Fjord byelection was not exactly the most auspicious start. Publicly, Liberals are casting the Conservative victory as not a big deal — the byelection, they’re saying, was always going to be an uphill struggle against local […]
Read MoreToday, on World Refugee Day, Canadians might see yet another news story about the traumas of young Central American girls and boys being separated from their asylum-seeking parents by US immigration officials. As the American Civil Liberties Union recently reported, children who flee to the US unaccompanied are also being brutally mistreated: child immigrants in […]
Read MoreWe keep looking for a politician who’ll stand up and admit failure. Suddenly here was one. There’s a kind of nobility in taking your licking, I guess. “We’re disappointed” in Monday’s by-election results in the Quebec heartland riding of Chicoutimi-Le Fjord, Jagmeet Singh told a knot of reporters outside the House of Commons before Question […]
Read MoreRelief is here, premier-designate Doug Ford told his raucous new caucus at Queen’s Park on Tuesday morning as they prepare to take over the provincial government next week. Ford gave a quickie version of his stump speech from the Progressive Conservatives’ successful campaign before closing the meeting of six dozen Tory MPPs, most of them […]
Read MoreAndrew Scheer’s Conservatives are not going to allow Justin Trudeau to rebuild a Liberal fortress in Quebec without a fight: that’s just one of the messages from Monday’s Chicoutimi-Le Fjord’s byelection upset. And some of the other messages — in particular for the New Democrats — are more alarming than others. But first some essential […]
Read MoreThe results of the Chicoutimi-Le Fjord byelection suggest the Bloc Québecois chapter in Quebec electoral history is over — and that the NDP’s is closing. The convincing Conservative victory on Monday night may not offer great insights into how the general election will play out next year, particularly given the low voter turnout of just […]
Read MoreJustin Trudeau rose in the Commons this week to accuse New Democrats of playing politics with Donald Trump’s inhumane treatment of children warehoused in cages. Some 99 times out of 100, the prime minister would have been correct. One needs not search very hard before tripping over an outbreak of politics in the nation’s capital.
Read MoreYesterday’s byelection in Chicoutimi-Le Fjord was bad news for the Liberals. That’s aluminum country and Liberals were surely hoping the tariffs would translate into a Trump-bump. They didn’t. Does that kill any chance of a national election? No. There is a serious argument to be made for an election, but it turns on Canadians’ national interest, […]
Read MoreYes, the Conservatives had a popular hockey coach as candidate, but their thumping of the Liberals in Chicoutimi-Le Ford, Monday night, should worry the Grits. Canadian voters are not rallying to the Liberals in solidarity as Justin Trudeau confronts Donald Trump over tariffs and trade. If that confrontation damages the economy, watch out. Next year […]
Read MoreFor twelve exciting hours last week, Parliamentary business was held up by a Conservative procedural tactic forcing a vote on every one of 200 items in the Main Estimates. The marathon voting session was in protest at the Liberal government’s failure to release detailed projections of the cost to Canadian households of pricing emissions of […]
Read MoreEntertainment Plus
Here’s What’s Playing On Netflix Canada In July 2018
Netflix Canada welcomes July 2018 with a wide range of new and original titles, including the much anticipated return of Orange Is The New Black Season 6 on July 27.
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