In the classic comedy Animal House, the authorities deal the protagonists a crushing blow – for their many misbehaviours, our heroes’ fraternity is dissolved and they are expelled from university. As they sit forlornly bemoaning their fate, one of the groups rallies...
Canada has punched above its weight in military matters. Our contributions to both WW1 and WW2 were out of all proportion to our small population at those times. The sacrifices made are commemorated in statues and war museums throughout the country. Canada sent its...
Against the frenzy of inaccurate and manipulative information consistently roaring through our social media sites, the companies that manage these sites, like Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter, have been trying to wage a war against misinformation. However, they always...
There was “nothing new under the sun” last week when Canada’s premiers turned their annual discussion to healthcare. The premiers made the standard pledge to ensure “their residents have access to timely, quality services consistent with Canada’s universal healthcare...
A litany of disastrous decisions have sometimes cost lives and definitely many billions of dollars. Effectively cancelling the Global Public Health Intelligence Network; the failure to implement the pandemic preparedness protocols developed by Ottawa’s public health...
Foreign influence or interference has become a mediatic topic. The fear and suspicion of interference in the elections and democratic process have been in news headlines. For the western countries, the suspicion bears on Russia and China. Revisionist powers have a...
The Indigenous policy, being advanced by the Canadian government in a suite of legislation in the fall of 2018, is supposed to mark at new turn in the relationship between the Crown and Indigenous people. It appears, however, that the new policy is merely a tweaking...
One of Canada’s best known historic heroes has taken quite a shellacking lately. John A. Macdonald’s statue was removed from a place of prominence in Victoria by order of its city council, and there have been calls elsewhere for buildings that honour his memory to be...
Galileo once wrote, “In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual.” The problem is the ideas and clout of that one thousand make that single individual a rare and unappreciated gem. Copernicus defied...
The Province of Ontario has put indigenous municipal councillors into a special category. Because they are Indigenous, they are no longer required to swear or affirm allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II before taking office. This exception arose as...
More people are finally beginning to realize that supplying the world with sufficient, stable energy solely from sun and wind power will be impossible. Germany took on that challenge, to show the world how to build a society based entirely on “green, renewable”...
Hydro-Québec, (HQ), is the electric power utility for Quebec, Canada’s largest province by area, and is owned entirely by the provincial government. It could theoretically be worth as much as $162B were it divested; or, far less if investors believe that its...
Many luminaries have urged us to believe whatever a woman says about her experience in sexual encounters. This view is widely held by feminists, the #metoo advocates, the Obama Department of Education, and many university administrators and bureaucrats, especially...
"One day, I was approached and asked by a fellow called Jean Allard, a prominent member of the Indigenous community.” He felt that certain treaty rights were not being respected “and he was passionate about this. He felt that there was something very wrong happening...
It isn’t easy to grasp just how vast and complex Canada’s federal Indigenous affairs portfolio has become over the past fifty years. In part, that’s because Indigenous Affairs (now divided into Indigenous Services and Crown-Indigenous Relations) is unlike any other...