Poet Shai Ben-Shalom writes: "George W. Bush presents a collection of portraits: heads of state met in person. the sharp eye of the former president captures revealing views..." READ MORE
Review: A Trip To The Twilight Zone
Few authors possess the skill to take an everyday image and turn it just slightly, in Twilight Zone fashion, to reveal a startling and intriguing truth. Professor Joan Sangster of Trent University does just that in The Iconic North. To read Sangster’s account is to question every common media depiction of the Arctic. “The North has been rendered exotic, romantic, terrifying, sublime, enigmatic, otherworldly and intrinsically Canadian, and some of these adjectives are equated not just with the landscape but with the original inhabitants of the North,” Sangster writes. This is not ancient history. Parks Canada spent more than $21.5 million looking for an English shipwreck, "a salient reminder that we need an ongoing critical analysis of a romanticized North ‘discovered’ by white explorers,” says Sangster. The Franklin Expedition was a famous failure of no scientific or exploratory value whatsoever. Media’s fascination with the sailors' deaths is striking. READ MORE
Post Office Paid Bonus: CEO
Canada Post paid bonuses last year while losing a record $1.57 billion, CEO Doug Ettinger yesterday disclosed. Payments were made even as cabinet told the post office to “cut the fat.” READ MORE
MPs Want To See Secret Plan
MPs yesterday demanded Public Works Minister Joel Lightbound release a confidential report on postal service cuts. Cabinet has withheld the 2025 document for months: "Parliamentarians, municipalities, workers, citizens still do not have a detailed plan of what is going to happen." READ MORE
Chinese Autos Face Scrutiny
The Canada Border Services Agency yesterday said it will likely investigate whether imported China-made battery electric cars are assembled with slave-made parts. Conservative MP Michael Kram (Regina-Wascana) questioned why cabinet didn’t first check before approving the import of more than a quarter million Chinese vehicles: "Would you say it’s more than a little bit irresponsible?" READ MORE
No Crypto Campaign Donors
The Senate yesterday by a 58 to 4 vote passed into law a cryptocurrency ban in election financing. The bill is the first of its kind that prohibits use of bitcoin in ordinary transactions where traceable money is accepted: "Changes to prevent anonymous and hard-to-trace funding channels are welcome." READ MORE
“May” Ask To Blacklist Coal
Environmental groups opposed to coal mining may petition cabinet to blacklist the rock as toxic, the Department of Health said yesterday. The remarks came in response to a Commons petition sponsored by the Green Party: "Regulate the mining, use, export and import of thermal coal in Canada." READ MORE
Guest Commentary
Canadians would first treat me as a kind of fanatic, as though I ate babies for breakfast, but then acknowledge I was always respectful of the Canadian people. I never denounced Canada, I was for Québec. Canada is a great country, but it is not my country. I respect Canadians, and sense we share more similarities than differences. We will make good neighbours one day, and would like to know you as friends. In a democracy you face realities. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Nobody is happy in defeat, but we always respect the verdict of the people. I remain convinced I will see a sovereign Québec in my lifetime.
