While National Newswatch does not keep an archive of external articles for longer than 6 months, we do keep all articles written by contributors who post directly to our site. Here you will find all of the contributed and linked external articles from Tasha Kheiriddin.
Is there hope for the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA)? For over a year, Canada-U.S. trade talks have been testy at best, in a deep freeze at worst. U.S. President Donald Trump mocked us as the “51st state,” put tariffs our steel, aluminum and autos, and claimed that America doesn’t need anything we’re selling. Prime Minister Mark Carney declared that Canada...
Mark Carney is usually good at speaking truth to power, but yesterday he failed. In an address to Jewish Canadians at Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto, he named the problem — rampant antisemitism — but failed to offer a solution. He failed to send a message to those causing the problem. And he failed to understand the nature of Canada itself.
Prime Minister John A. Macdonald famously described dealing with provincial leaders as “herding cats.” He was right on the money: like cats, premiers will purr loudly to get what they want but ignore you when it suits them. Or worse, lure you in and scratch you when you least expect it. But MacDonald knew how to cajole them, humour them...
This weekend, the U.S. paused its participation in an organization most Canadians have likely never heard of: the Permanent Joint Board on Defence. It was established in 1940, following U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s pledge that the U.S. would defend Canada if it were attacked, and Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King’s promise that “enemy forces should not be able...
Prime Minister Mark Carney is avidly wooing the west — but will his own caucus trip him up? Last Friday, Carney met with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith to reassure her that Ottawa’s got her back on a second bitumen pipeline from Alberta to Canada’s West Coast. After the tête-à-tête Smith said, “This morning I said ‘if’ a deal gets signed...
If it’s Tuesday, this must be Belgium . If you’re old enough to remember this 1969 film, where a busload of hapless tourists barrel across Europe on an 18-day tour of nine cities, you probably voted Liberal in the past election, like most of Canada’s baby boomers. And you’re probably happy with the way things are going so far. But...
Congratulations, Canada! On Monday, our nation joined an exclusive club: countries with sovereign wealth funds. Norway, Kuwait and other resource-rich nations have long tapped royalties and budget surpluses to fund investment vehicles: in this era of geopolitical uncertainty and an erratic neighbour, Prime Minister Mark Carney thinks it’s time Canada does the same.
Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Sunday video was a masterclass in crisis communications. He reminded Canadians of his credentials managing tough times. He described the urgent challenges Canada faces. He explained what he is doing to tackle them. He promised not to “sugarcoat” anything. He appealed to Canadians’ patriotism. And he promised to keep us posted: bookmark this YouTube channel for...
Tories worry that Carney has reshaped politics in Quebec
Prime Minister Mark Carney has secured the first Liberal government since 2019. That’s right — in case you hadn’t noticed, Canada has been operating under minority governments for seven years. Two were won by Justin Trudeau in 2019 and 2021, one by Carney in 2025. Trudeau’s minorities necessitated significant compromise with the NDP; from 2021 until the fall of 2024...
It’s back to the future for the NDP — and then some. Last weekend the party elected 58-year-old filmmaker Avi Lewis as party leader. During his campaign, Lewis pledged to impose a wealth tax, stop oil and gas exploration, implement national rent control, and set up public grocery stores. Ed Broadbent, the NDP leader who wanted to nationalize banks back...
Has the war in Iran torpedoed a federal election in Canada? Just two weeks ago, speculation abounded that Prime Minister Mark Carney might call a vote to capitalize on sky-high polling numbers and his desire for a majority mandate. But 10 days into Operation Epic Fury, the likelihood of Canadians going to the polls this spring has radically diminished. The...
Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was a monster. For close to thirty years, he presided over a police state that violated human rights at home and exported terror to the world. Now he is dead, crushed by the American assault on Iran that flattened his compound and sparked a regional war. From Tehran to Toronto, thousands of Iranians are celebrating...
RIP Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, we hardly knew you. As Prime Minister Mark Carney alights in Australia this week, fresh from a trade mission to India, the basic premise of the strategy — “to seize opportunities in the national interest of Canadians, while defending the values they hold dear” — has been junked in favour of realpolitik: doing business with countries...
This week, Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre released a video about the preferential treatment of asylum seekers in Canada. In it, he states that six million Canadians can’t get access to a family doctor and specialist wait times average 30 weeks. Then, he drops the kicker: rejected asylum claimants, who have never paid taxes, get free “deluxe supplementary heath care” such...
Canada’s defence industry got a $6.6 billion boost Tuesday, as Prime Minister Mark Carney formally unveiled Ottawa’s new Defence Industrial Strategy. The plan promises to create 125,000 new jobs over 10 years and award 70 per cent of defence contracts to Canadian companies, through a “Build-Partner-Buy” framework that prioritizes domestic industry. It is part of the government’s plan to increase...
The U.S. president is a preeminent concern for most Canadians. Pierre Poilievre did a lot right at the CPC convention last weekend. He got an 87.4 per cent approval rating, higher than most pundits predicted. He revealed a human side when he spoke about his autistic daughter and the family time he has sacrificed for politics. And he pledged to...
Prime Minister Mark Carney has had a busy week. A major international speech at Davos that garnered plaudits around the world. An address to the nation designed to rouse Canadian patriotism and rebut U.S. President Donald Trump. An announcement of GST relief to steal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s thunder on affordability, one week before Poilievre faces a leadership review vote...
If there was any doubt that U.S. President Donald Trump is operating outside all norms of law and common sense, he put it to rest this week with a letter to the prime minister of Norway. “Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation...
Quebec Premier François Legault announced Wednesday that he is resigning as leader of the Coalition Avenir Québec and as premier, to step aside once a successor is chosen. In a hastily-called press conference (his own caucus was only brought in the loop that morning), Legault said, “I can see that many Quebecers currently want change and a change of premier...
Twenty-five guns. That’s all the federal government collected in a recent pilot project in Nova Scotia for its new “buyback” (aka expropriation) program for prohibited firearms. “A total of 25 prohibited firearms, turned in by 16 participants, were destroyed,” spokesperson Noémie Allard said Friday. “The total compensation paid to pilot participants is $26,535.”
Happy New Year. Or not, depending on where you find yourself these days. If you’re deposed Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, that’s in a cell in Brooklyn, N.Y. If you’re U.S. President Donald Trump, that’s on the catbird seat in Washington, D.C. And if you’re Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, that’s on a tightrope in Ottawa, trying to strike the right...
If there was ever a year that proved that politics can still surprise, it was 2025. U.S. President Donald Trump started it by declaring Canada the 51st state and ended it by adding his name to the Kennedy Center. Our spring federal election morphed from Conservative cakewalk to Liberal renaissance, and the winter saw a flurry of floor crossing. Alberta...
Speculation abounds over who is waiting to take over the party.
The battle over Bill C-9, the federal government’s proposed anti-hate law, has blown up a cultural divide that not only pits Quebec against the rest of Canada, but seriously questions Ottawa’s willingness to tackle hate crimes. If Prime Minister Mark Carney gets the balance wrong, he risks both empowering hatemongers and fanning the flames of Quebec separatism — at a...
Is Canada going continental? This week, Prime Minister Mark Carney quietly signed Canada up for the Security Action for Europe (SAFE) initiative, part of the European Union’s plan to rebuild its military industrial base by 2030. Membership gives countries access to 150-billion euros (C$243 billion) in loans to back defence manufacturing. Canada is the first non-EU country to join. In...
Is the Liberal party’s foreign policy no longer feminist? People have been asking the question all week, ever since Prime Minister Mark Carney said on Sunday that, “We have that aspect to our foreign policy, but I wouldn’t describe our foreign policy as feminist foreign policy. Those are different points, but related.” He subsequently clarified that gender equality remains a...
Politics over principle is hardly a new story in Ottawa, but Tuesday’s budget vote provided a master class. For weeks the Conservatives huffed and puffed and threatened to blow the Liberals’ house down over their big spending ways. Conversely, the Bloc opposed the budget over its lack of spending on seniors. Green Leader Elizabeth May couldn’t support the budget’s boost...
Protectionists, start your engines. On Monday, Prime Minister Mark Carney unveiled a “Buy Canadian” procurement policy that prioritizes Canadian suppliers for all manner of federal spending, including a second set of national “major projects” he’s announcing on Thursday. “We will build Canadian, by becoming our own best customer,” Carney intoned. Ottawa will allocate nearly $186 million in new funding to...
Canada’s young people are falling behind. According to Statistics Canada, the unemployment rate for those aged 15 to 24 sits at 14.2 per cent, more than double the national average. The unemployment rate among youth attending school is 17.1 per cent, up 3.1 percentage points from last September. Among those youth who are working, many are under-employed, bouncing between short-term...
Prime Minister Mark Carney’s in a bind. On one side, there’s U.S. President Donald Trump, strangling our auto industry and cutting off trade talks, in the wake of Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s “Reagan was right, you are wrong” ad campaign. On the other, there’s Chinese leader Xi Jinping, offering to lift restrictions on agriculture and seafood imports in exchange for...
This week, over 100 homeowners in Richmond, B.C., got a notice no one wants to receive: Mayor Malcolm Brodie warned that due to a recent court decision, the title to their homes may be worthless.
It’s official: Canada is living next to an authoritarian regime. The question isn’t if the U.S. will slip into dictatorship, it’s when. When will the scales decisively tip? When enemies are jailed? When media outlets are shut down? When a golden statue of US President Donald Trump is installed at the Capitol Building? (You laugh, but plans for an “Arc...
Finance Minister François Philippe Champagne says moving the federal budget to the fall will “modernize” Ottawa’s fiscal cycle. Translation: starting this year, the main budget will land in November, with a shorter spring update replacing the former fall economic statement. Champagne claims this will increase budgeting predictability for the provinces, align with the construction season, and enable faster project starts...
Last week, Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand took the podium at the United Nations to deliver Ottawa’s vision of Canadian foreign policy. She evoked “three pillars”: defence and security, economic resilience, and core values, including gender equality and environmental protection — in that order. Some commentators have cast this as a break with former prime minister Justin Trudeau’s evangelical promotion...
On the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced Canada’s recognition of a Palestinian state. In just a few weeks, it will also be the second anniversary of the October 7 massacre perpetrated on Israel by Hamas terrorists, when 1200 people, mostly civilian, were slaughtered, and 250 taken hostage and dragged to Gaza. Forty-eight...
The condo market is crashing. It’s official: Prime Minister Mark Carney and the Liberal government are in the housing business. Last week, Carney unveiled Build Canada Homes, a $13 billion development scheme that will help fund the construction of 4,000 modular homes on six sites across the country starting next year, and “scale” up to 45,000. The agency will “fight...
Is Mark Carney the new Jean Chrétien? Last Wednesday, Carney used the “a word” — austerity — to describe the future of Canada’s finances in the era of Trump’s tariffs. Carney had already ordered a 15 per cent cut to Ottawa’s operational spending in July, implying a downsizing of the civil service and possibly program cuts. Then on Friday, he...
Mark Carney’s been busy these past few months, hosting the G7, pursuing foreign trade pacts, and talking with Trump on the telephone. But instead of a reset, he’s had a summer of discontent, putting us back at square one with the Americans and facing a host of challenges for the fall.
For months, Prime Minister Mark Carney has spoken about making Canada an energy superpower. He said it on the campaign trail, mentioned it again in an interview with CTV news in May, and dropped it again last weekend at the Calgary Stampede. While he usually inserts the qualifier of “both clean and conventional energy,” in an interview Saturday he stated...
For a while there, things were going so well. Prime Minister Mark Carney — aka “the Trump whisperer” — had morphed from critic to texting buddy of the U.S. President. Over the past three months, Carney had been chatting with Donald Trump, building backchannel goodwill. After the successful G7 summit in Kananaskis, Alta., hopes were high that Ottawa would strike...
It's time to confront the TDSB's mismanagement and the structural failings of our educational governance model
The PM has craftily captured the middle ground from the Tories. What a difference six months make. In December, Canada’s Conservatives were in the catbird seat with 48 per cent support, while the Liberals dropped to 19. Practically everyone pegged Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre as Canada’s next prime minister. Then Justin Trudeau stepped down, Donald Trump took office and Mark...
Well, at least he didn’t walk out. While U.S. President Donald Trump left the G7 meeting in Kananaskis Monday night, it wasn’t in the huff the world witnessed at Charlevoix in 2018. This time, after a day of huddles and the signing of a U.K.–U.S. mini-deal that slashed auto tariffs, Trump hurried back to the White House because of “what’s...
Damn the torpedoes! Canada’s Liberal government is taking aim at defence — and it’s about time. This week, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced that Canada will hit the NATO benchmark of 2 per cent of GDP on defence spending this year, instead of waiting for 2032, deploying an additional $9 billion in 2025-2026. Ever the banker, he’s also deploying some...
Will Prime Minister Mark Carney’s national infrastructure dreams be kiboshed by Canada’s First Nations? That’s the question hanging over Ottawa this week — and if Carney’s not careful, the answer could well be yes.
Canada, France, U.K. condemn Israel, but let terrorists who started the war off the hook
He's prioritizing economic development, but not in the West.
The Liberals will have drop climate obsessions to stave off a referendum in 2026.
As the dust settles on the 2025 federal election, many theories are emerging about why the Liberals won, and why the Conservatives lost. Fingers point at US President Donald Trump, and the impact of his threats to Canadian sovereignty. Pocketbook issues were also a major factor, particularly for younger and less affluent voters, who skewed Conservative, but not enough to...
All three potential allies of a minority Liberal government lean hard left, crushing the possibility of nation-building projects like pipelines
With just days to go before election day and millions of Canadians already having voted, both the Liberal and Conservative parties have finally dropped their full platforms. And the two are as different in substance, structure and style as the two campaigns — for better and worse. Substance-wise, the Liberals offer a slew of big-ticket items: a $5 billion Trade...
Wednesday night’s French-language leaders’ debate in Montreal didn’t produce any knockout punches — but if you were scoring on points, Liberal Leader Mark Carney came out on top. And he did it the old-fashioned way: by letting his opponents beat each other up. Carney’s performance was far from riveting, and he frequently fell into economist-speak, such as when he talked...
As Canadians tune in to the leaders’ debates this week — in French on Wednesday and English on Thursday — they’ll hear about affordability, tariffs, immigration and even an entire segment on climate, an issue that no longer cracks the top five. But one subject is conspicuously absent from both stages: national defence. It’s a baffling omission. While the French...
It’s been a strange Canadian election campaign, dominated by a politician who isn’t on the ballot, or even a citizen of our country: US President Donald Trump. While initially the Conservatives thought Trump’s win might help them – who would have better relations with Washington, ultra-progressive PM Justin Trudeau or Elon Musk-approved Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre? – that theory quickly...
Liberal Leader Mark Carney should feel right at home in Alberta: after all, he was raised there. But his trip there this week feels more like a political minefield than a homecoming. That’s largely due to his recent quip that while he’s happy to dispatch Ontario Premier Doug Ford to advocate for Canada in Washington, he wouldn’t send Alberta Premier...
“This is a uniquely important election … As the Prime Minister and Team Canada work to stand up to President Trump and protect our economy, I do not want there to be distractions … That’s why I’m standing aside as our 2025 candidate in our community of Markham—Unionville.”
The 45th Canadian federal election is the Liberals’ to lose. That’s not a line anyone would have written two months ago. But today, just three days into the campaign, opinion polls show the party ahead by up to seven points. All the gains the Conservatives made in the past two years have melted like the proverbial snow in springtime.