Happy Saint Patrick's Day

 

My name is Patrick. I am a sinner, a simple country person, and the least of all believers. I am looked down upon by many. My father was Calpornius. He was a deacon; his father was Potitus, a priest, who lived at Bannavem Taburniae. His home was near there, and that is where I was taken prisoner. I was about sixteen at the time. At that time, I did not know the true God. I was taken into captivity in Ireland, along with thousands of others. We deserved this, because we had gone away from God, and did not keep his commandments. We would not listen to our priests, who advised us about how we could be saved. The Lord brought his strong anger upon us, and scattered us among many nations even to the ends of the earth. It was among foreigners that it was seen how little I was.

 

It was there that the Lord opened up my awareness of my lack of faith. Even though it came about late, I recognised my failings. So I turned with all my heart to the Lord my God, and he looked down on my lowliness and had mercy on my youthful ignorance. He guarded me before I knew him, and before I came to wisdom and could distinguish between good and evil. He protected me and consoled me as a father does for his son.

 

That is why I cannot be silent – nor would it be good to do so – about such great blessings and such a gift that the Lord so kindly bestowed in the land of my captivity. This is how we can repay such blessings, when our lives change and we come to know God, to praise and bear witness to his great wonders before every nation under heaven.

 

This is because there is no other God, nor will there ever be, nor was there ever, except God the Father. He is the one who was not begotten, the one without a beginning, the one from whom all beginnings come, the one who holds all things in being – this is our teaching. And his son, Jesus Christ, whom we testify has always been, since before the beginning of this age, with the father in a spiritual way. He was begotten in an indescribable way before every beginning. Everything we can see, and everything beyond our sight, was made through him. He became a human being; and, having overcome death, was welcomed to the heavens to the Father. The Father gave him all power over every being, both heavenly and earthly and beneath the earth. Let every tongue confess that Jesus Christ, in whom we believe and whom we await to come back to us in the near future, is Lord and God. He is judge of the living and of the dead; he rewards every person according to their deeds. He has generously poured on us the Holy Spirit, the gift and promise of immortality, who makes believers and those who listen to be children of God and co-heirs with Christ. This is the one we acknowledge and adore – one God in a trinity of the sacred name.

(Saint Patrick, Confessio)

Only Little People Demand Answers

It's not like they are entitled to them:

The Opposition Conservatives are demanding to know why the public was kept in the dark for nearly two weeks after an Iranian missile slammed into a Canadian airbase in Kuwait on March 1.

Conservative defence critic James Bezan said on Thursday that it was a “failure” of government communications and transparency for this information to be withheld for more than 11 days, pointing the finger directly at Prime Minister Mark Carney.

“Prime Minister Carney has had multiple occasions and press availability to disclose this fact,” said Bezan.

The newspaper La Presse reported earlier in the day that the Canadian section of the Ali Al-salem Air Base in Kuwait, nicknamed “Camp Canada,” appeared to be damaged by an Iranian missile, based on overhead satellite images of the area. The retaliatory strike was launched shortly after the U.S. and Israel launched a coordinated bombing campaign targeting the Iranian regime’s leadership in Tehran.

The story reported that no Canadian personnel were harmed in the attack, a detail that was confirmed on Thursday afternoon by Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand.

(Sidebar: were they to have been killed, would you silence their families?) 

Anand told reporters in Ottawa that Defence Minister David McGuinty affirmed to her Thursday morning that “all (Canadian) lives are accounted for.”

Carney demurred when asked directly, at a press conference in Yellowknife, N.W.T., why he didn’t inform Canadians about the Kuwait attack when it happened.

“I’m not the only spokesperson for the government, but I’ll just confirm that members of the Canadian Forces are all safe and sound,” said Carney.

(Sidebar: whatever you do, Carney, don't take this seriously or anything.) 

Carney reiterated that Canada was “not engaged” in the Israel and U.S.-led attacks on Iran.

**

Iran fired missiles at a military base housing members of the Canadian Armed Forces and the Carney government said nothing for almost two weeks.

When they finally did say something it was only because Montreal newspaper La Presse had reported on the matter.

There was significant damage to the Ali Al Salem air base in Kuwait, which houses Canadian, Italian and other NATO troops. No personnel were injured, thankfully, but the government should have informed the Canadian public.

Instead there was silence– followed by flippant remarks when Mark Carney was asked about this by reporters on Thursday.

“Well, I mean, I’m not the only spokesperson for the government,” the Prime Minister said.

He went on with his boilerplate remarks about all military members being safe and that Canada isn’t involved “in these actions” as he calls the military strikes against Iran.

Well, maybe we aren’t engaged in striking Iran, but they are engaged in striking out against us – and Carney decided to hide it.

That decision and his dismissive comment, once again aimed at a female reporter, show that he doesn’t feel he needs to be open and honest with Canadians – he can’t be bothered to level with us peasants.

Leave it to him, he’s in charge.

The Italians told their citizens about the attack the day it happened, as per a report from Agence France Presse.

“There was significant damage to the runway but no Italian personnel were injured,” Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani was quoted as saying.

“The Italian air force members at the Kuwait base that was attacked with missiles from Iran are all safe. They were in the bunker.”

Canadian Press reported that they first asked the Department of National Defence about the strike on March 6 and it took a week to get a response.

“We are aware of reports of strikes in the vicinity of Ali Al-Salem Air Base. For operational security reasons, we do not discuss assessments of damage or impacts to military facilities,” DND spokesperson Lt. Pamela Hogan told CP on Thursday after La Presse broke the story.

“Based on events since Feb. 27, efforts have focused on the force protection of Canadian Armed Forces members, including relocating some within the region, staying in their location if force protection is appropriate and where applicable, redeploying some back to Canada.”

This is completely unacceptable.

A hostile foreign government fired upon Canadian military personnel with ballistic missiles. The Canadian public should have been told about this and told promptly.

 It’s clear though the Prime Minister is struggling with how he should respond to this war given that many in his caucus oppose it.

His initial instincts were correct. He spoke out in favour of the strikes using clear and moral language.

“Canada supports the United States acting to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and to prevent its regime from further threatening international peace and security,” he said on Feb. 28.

Since then, he has said he only supports these strikes with regret, that Canada could get involved, that Canada definitely won’t get involved, he has called for a ceasefire and given Canadians a muddled view of the thinking driving his government’s policies.

The regime in Iran was the one who killed 55 Canadian citizens, 30 permanent residents and 53 others with connections to Canada when they downed Flight PS 752 in January 2020. They are the same regime that tortured and killed Canadian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi in 2003.

It’s the same regime that was kicked out of Canada for spying on our country and harassing our citizens. They have oppressed, tortured and murdered their own citizen by the thousands of late.

Now, they have shot at Canadians and our NATO allies and Mark Carney wants to stay silent about it.

This is not leadership. It’s cowardice.

Indeed, Canada has made its typical sanctimonious refusal to take part in a forty-seven year old conflict for pragmatic reasons.

(Sidebar: read cannot because it has no military capabilities, and it will be deep in the cold, cold ground before it uses the current crisis to mop up by selling some much-needed oil.)

But that has not stopped the Liberal government from allowing in the Iranian ruling class, the one that benefitted from leaving the average Iranian poor and oppressed:

Reports were emerging in January that even while Iranian citizens fed an uprising that led to the murder of roughly 40,000 of them at the hands of the Iranian regime, members of the regime have been quietly relocating to Canada. 

A news site called Justice In Conflict reported in January that “in 2021, a Tehran police chief was spotted at a Toronto-area gym. In 2024, it was reported that 700 Iranian nationals linked to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) resided in Canada – the same group that has been designated as a terrorist entity by the Canadian government. That same year, five Iranian regime figures faced deportation back to Iran.”  ...

Lantsman got into greater detail in an op-ed she penned for a Canadian news site called Todayville, where she said that hundreds of IRGC agents may be in Canada. 

While she acknowledged that Mark Carney, Canada’s prime minister, called that number inaccurate, he won’t confirm any number. 

“This week we learned from the Minister’s own agency that at least 239 people linked to the Iranian regime are living here in Canada and have had their visas revoked,” Lantsman wrote. “Yet of the 239 whose visas have been revoked, only one single person has actually been deported.” 

Lantsman’s numbers are based on news media reports, which she says suggests that 700 IRGC agents may be in Canada. 

When discussing the Canadian government’s seeming paralysis on the issue and the notion of deporting potential hostile residents from Iran, Lantsman said “senior bureaucrats blamed a lack of flights to Iran for the government’s inaction, as if the regime was not already a listed sponsor of terrorism long before the current hostilities.” 

She added that the government “went on about protecting ‘privacy,’ and suggested that some of these individuals might even be able to claim asylum. This is very much another self-own from Canada’s broken and abused refugee system, which is supposed to protect those fleeing violence, not protect those importing it.” 

**

🚨 She should be terrified! ☠️

GPS—there are hundreds, and growing, IRGC operatives, supporters, or assets of influence who almost certainly reside and operate in Canada, because institutional weakness and political timidity created the ideal sanctuary.

Canada has become a soft… https://t.co/NAv882dUyz

— Tony Seruga (@TonySeruga) March 14, 2026

** 

Ontario is set to make Premier Doug Ford and cabinet members' records secret as it "modernizes" freedom-of-information laws, a change the province's privacy watchdog warns will eviscerate public accountability.

Public and Business Service Delivery and Procurement Minister Stephen Crawford, however, said his government is still "one of the most transparent governments in the history of Ontario," citing an open data catalogue, an audit of a regulator and a move eight years ago to publish financial information from the former Liberal government.

"We're very focused on transparency," he said Friday at a press conference.

Bull. Sh--.

Your Wasteful, Greedy and Unaccountable Government and You

We are compelled to pay taxes.

We have no choice.

And, for some reason, the government is not compelled to give account for all of the money it wastes:

Prime Minister Mark Carney has pledged to “spend less on government operations and reduce waste.” But newly released federal records show that he is also on track to spend more on the Privy Council Office (PCO) than his predecessor.

According to the Privy Council Office’s 2026-2027 Departmental plan : “For 2026-27, PCO’s total planned spending is $252,265,293, with 1,246 planned full-time equivalent staff.”

This eclipses the figure of $251,744,189 that was spent during Trudeau’s final full year in office, to the tune of more than half a million dollars.

Staffing in the PCO was on the rise for several years, from 1,180 full-time equivalent staff in 2020 to 1,333 in 2024. It fell in 2025 to an estimated 1,249. The newest report says the plan is to lower those numbers further, to 1,145 by 2028.

**

I took 2015-2025 CDN financial data, made individual files for all payments by year, purpose, Ministry, recipient, then merged them into one file, and merged them into single sums

From 2015 to 2025 Brookfield companies received $900 million from Canadian taxpayers https://t.co/xuyA4JPz0K pic.twitter.com/m15eIF0WBY

— The Reclamare (@TheReclamare) December 29, 2025

**

I can explain it.

It's called wasting money:

The federal government says it cannot provide a breakdown of $78,273 in travel and living expenses tied to Canada’s foreign interference inquiry commissioner, according to a newly released response to Parliament.

The spending relates to the Public Inquiry into Foreign Interference in Federal Electoral Processes and Democratic Institutions, led by Commissioner Marie‑Josée Hogue.

In an order paper question, Conservative MP Kelly McCauley asked the government to provide a detailed breakdown of $78,273 in travel and living costs listed in the 2025 Public Accounts for the inquiry.

The question requested specifics including transportation costs, accommodation, meals, per diems, security-related travel costs, the dates the expenses were incurred, and the purpose of each trip.

But in its response, the Privy Council Office said it does not have that information.

“The Privy Council Office does not have a detailed breakdown of travel and living costs,” the reply states.

According to the government, travel expenses for Hogue were processed through the Office of the Commissioner for Federal Judicial Affairs Canada, which verifies judges’ eligible expenses and then requests reimbursement from the Privy Council Office.

Because the costs were processed through that system, the government said it cannot provide the detailed accounting requested by MPs.

 

There Would Be No Need to Hide a Blacklist If the CBC Ceased to Exist

As it ought to be removed from the country:

The CBC yesterday would not release an internal guide detailing which public figures are banned from interviews by the news department. Travis Dhanraj, a former CBC-TV host, told the Commons heritage committee he had seen the guide and a companion blacklist of 45 names: “Do not go near these people.”

Not Everyone Sees It That Way

To wit:

Canadians are owed “solid proof” of unmarked graves at Indian Residential Schools, Alberta Senator Scott Tannas said yesterday. “How do we address deniers when we don’t have any kind of solid proof?” Tannas asked the Senate committee on Indigenous peoples: “How do you see this ending?”

 The proles are owned an explanation, are they?

Why Does This Sound Familiar?

This:

The committee will deliberate expanding MAID to the mentally ill ahead of the conclusion of a temporary federal ban on assisted suicides for individuals whose sole underlying medical condition is a mental illness, which is set to expire on March 17, 2027.

Oh, yes!:

Children’s euthanasia was a prologue to the more ambitious and destructive campaign to kill mentally ill adults. Sometime in July 1939, Hitler commissioned his escort physician, Karl Brandt, and the head of the Führer’s Chancellery, Philip Bouhler, to organize adult “euthanasia.” In collaboration with Herbert Linden of the Reich Ministry of the Interior’s Department IV (a co-developer of the children’s program), they assembled a circle of ideologically reliable doctors around them to assist with planning and executing the program. The circle included the chaired professor of neurology and Psychiatry, Max de Crinis; the director of the Clinic for Psychiatry and Neurology of Heidelberg University, Carl Schneider; Professor Berthold Kihn of Jena; and Werner Heyde, Professor of Psychiatry and Neurology at the University of Würzburg. The circle of initiates also included Ernst Wentzler, Helmut Unger, Hans Heinze, Hermann Pfannmüller, Dr. Bender of the mental hospital at Berlin-Buch, and Professor Paul Nitsche of the asylum at Sonnenstein near Pirna. In late July and August 1939, a series of meetings occurred between these hand-selected individuals in Berlin. Bouhler explained to the participants that “euthanizing” mental patients in German asylums and nursing homes would create necessary hospital space for the impending war, freeing up medical staff to care for the wounded. Bouhler further indicated that Hitler had refrained from publishing a euthanasia law for foreign policy reasons. He went on to reassure everyone present that they would be immune from criminal prosecution for their actions in connection with the killing program, inviting dissenters to withdraw from involvement if they so desired.

 

No Country For Anyone

Presented with no comment:

So two-and-a-half years after Hamas’s slaughter in southern Israel, what do we have in the way of concrete action? Carney mentioned new legislation, presumably referring to Bill C-9 on hate speech, but that’s hardly a game changer, even as it activates freedom-of-speech concerns. Critics, including the Conservatives, argue compellingly that it adds little of value to the Criminal Code that isn’t already in there just waiting, in theory, to be enforced.

What most still seem to be missing is that even when laws are enforced, it often goes nowhere. Pick a well-publicized incident of anti-Israel attacks since Oct. 7, 2023 where charges have been laid, and chances are very good those charges have been dropped.

There was the “Indigo 11,” the gang of weekend revolutionaries who vandalized a location of Heather Reisman’s bookstore chain in November 2023, accusing her of “funding genocide.” Two of those charged pleaded guilty to mischief and received absolute discharges — i.e., they won’t have a criminal record. All the rest of the charges were dropped.

That same month, Calgary police tried charging a protestor for chanting “from the river to the sea,” as a public-disturbance charge, with a “hate motivation” attached. The Crown declined to proceed.

In September 2024, three anti-Israel activists were arrested and charged for harassing then immigration minister Marc Miller’s office in Montreal. The Crown dropped the charges.

In November 2024, anti-Israel protesters refused Ottawa police instructions to stay on the sidewalk near the Human Rights Monument, as opposed to blocking Elgin Street. Five people were charged with mischief, obstructing police and participating in an unlawful protest. All those charges were dropped.

Remember the folks who disrupted the Giller Prize book awards ceremony that same month, claiming title sponsor Scotiabank “funds genocide”? Three people were charged with “obstruct(ing), interrupt(ing) or interfer(ing) with the lawful use, enjoyment or operation of property,” as well as “use of a forged document.” The Crown then withdrew all charges.

Readers may recall an ugly scene a few weeks later at Toronto’s Eaton Centre outside a Zara store, where various goons harassed staff and appeared to scuffle physically with police. A 34-year-old man was charged with unlawful assembly, interfering with property and assaulting a peace officer. That case was dropped.

In October 2025, a protest on behalf of the Gaza-supporting “freedom flotilla” blocked a major downtown Toronto intersection for hours, resulting in nine arrests for unlawful assembly, obstructing a peace officer and common nuisance. Six weeks later, the Crown dropped the charges “for lack of public interest based on the need to be judicious with respect to the use of court resources.”

(As always, the definition of “public interest” in a Canadian courtroom is entirely up to the lawyers in attendance.)

Anti-Israel protesters will surely have noticed these outcomes, and could only have been emboldened.

The Legal Support Committee, which aids protesters arrested under the Palestinian flag in Toronto, recently offered left-wing online news outlet The Grind some remarkable statistics: Of 154 people criminally charged between October 2023 and January this year in Toronto, 96 cases have been resolved. In 94 cases the charges were dropped or stayed, or the accused received absolute discharges. (That’s similar to a count provided by Toronto Police: 165 arrests representing 309 charges, though it doesn’t maintain a tally of case outcomes.)

The Alliance of Canadians Combatting Antisemitism (ALCCA) has been keeping track of such cases as well. The only convictions it notes that are relevant to this discussion are those of Omar Elkhodary, who assaulted a woman putting up posters of child hostages taken by Hamas, and received a five-month conditional sentence followed by a year of probation; and Razaali Bahadur, who got a year in jail for inciting hatred against Jews, to wit, bellowing at children through a megaphone that their parents had “raped and murdered (Palestinian) children.”

A Toronto Police spokesperson underscored for The Grind that just because the Crown doesn’t proceed with charges does not mean there weren’t grounds for arrest. But when the prosecution rate is this low, surely it’s stretching that point nearly to breaking: If the Crown’s not willing to proceed with protest-related charges, are those things really illegal? Should people be arrested for them in the first place? Arresting someone isn’t just supposed to be a way to defuse a tense situation at a protest.

And of course, some of the most disturbing incidents since October 7 haven’t led to any charges at all. Marching through a Jewish neighbourhood in protest over Israel’s assault on Gaza, for example, is about as nakedly antisemitic as you can get — an unambiguous statement that Canadian Jews are responsible for Israel’s actions purely by dint of being Jewish. Not only do Toronto Police not think it’s their job to stop that from happening; they escort those marches through the Jewish neighbourhoods.

On Wednesday, the federal government committed $10 million “to help Jewish institutions strengthen security at gathering spaces such as schools, daycares, camps and places of worship.” That’s better than nothing. -

(Sidebar: it IS nothing and you know it.) 

 But it’s profoundly disturbing, and a national scandal, that playing defence — bollards outside schools, bulletproof windows and doors, even more security — is the only plausible idea anyone in charge seems to have.

 

Mid-Week Post

Your middle-of-the-week vantage point ...

Carney announcing he's going to visit another country that just signed a multi-billion deal with Brookfield. China, UAE, Quatar, India and now Norway.

March 6 2026: Brookfield signs a $2.6B deal with Norway.

March 9 2026: Carney announces he's going to Norway. @dsimieritsch pic.twitter.com/tKsDQxOgon

— G.M. Forbes (@gmforbes35) March 10, 2026

Give the government installed to fail another try:

As the prime minister continues his latest circumnavigation of the globe in pursuit of trade opportunities, his government’s memorandums of understanding are piling up like St. John’s snowdrifts in March.

This year alone, the prime minister’s website lists fresh agreements with China, Qatar, Luxembourg, India and Australia.

The latest list of putative deals from India suggests the government has now signed $85 billion worth of global investment agreements in the past 10 months. This would be big, if true, since foreign direct investment in Canada reached a 20-year high of $96.8 billion last year.

But the applause should be held until we see the evidence.

Adam Chambers, the Conservative critic on international trade, said the prime minister has no problems setting expectations very high on the world stage.

“However, the risk he faces is one of results.  These memorandums of understanding and agreements to agree generally do not guarantee actions or results.  The prime minister’s time spent as a central bank governor and as lead finance official for international engagements would often see heavily negotiated communiques tossed aside when the respective parties returned to their home countries.  Success should be measured by results achieved — not on promises to deliver something in the future,” he said.

**

According to Statistics Canada’s January numbers , Canada employs 4.6 million people in government, representing 21.8 per cent of all workers. That’s over one in five working Canadians drawing a paycheque from a state-supported institution. We’re approaching the share seen in the early 1990s, just before federal and provincial governments undertook major fiscal reforms.

Even more striking: public sector workers now represent 11 per cent of Canada’s entire population, the highest share on record.

Public sector employees include all workers employed by federal, provincial and local governments, government agencies, Crown corporations, and publicly funded establishments like schools, universities, and hospitals. It’s a broader measure than just bureaucratic administration.

The pandemic sparked the surge, but the expansion continued well past emergency measures. Between the fourth quarter of 2019 and the fourth quarter of 2025, Canada added approximately 822,000 public sector employees, a 21.9 per cent increase. Over the same period, Canada’s population grew by 3.7 million , or 9.9 per cent. Government hiring outpaced population growth by more than two to one.

Throughout this period, the federal government and many provinces ran budget deficits, meaning this workforce expansion is largely debt-financed. Canadians aren’t just covering the salaries; they’re paying interest on the borrowed money to fund them.

Every dollar of government spending must eventually be funded by current or future taxation. When businesses anticipate higher future tax burdens to service today’s deficits, they think twice about investing and expanding. When talented workers are drawn into stable government jobs, they are redirected away from the riskier businesses, startups and innovations that drive productivity growth.

**

Complaints of misleading “Made in Canada” labeling increased tenfold since tariff troubles erupted with the U.S., says the Food Inspection Agency. Inspectors attributed it to “an increase in awareness.”

**

Defence Minister David McGuinty fell billions short of promised spending on military preparedness equivalent to 2 percent of GDP in 2025, new figures confirm. Cabinet has promised to try again this year: ‘We are making reliable contributions to our allies.’

**

Defence Minister David McGuinty included costs of tree-planting in attempting to meet a minimum 2 percent NATO target on military spending, Access To Information records show. The defence department still fell billions short: ‘It’s for the ongoing planting of approximately 14,450 trees at strategic locations.’

 

The Trudeau dynasty must be expunged from memory:

The 1968 federal election was the first for the new Progressive Conservative leader, Robert Stanfield. Like other leaders before him, Stanfield had a Quebec lieutenant, in this case, Marcel Faribault. Westerners were suspicious of Faribault.

At a candidate forum in the rural Alberta riding of Crowfoot, arch-conservative MP Jack Horner was asked about Faribault. Himself a bit skeptical of the fellow, Horner replied, “I don’t know much about Faribault, but at least I could say this: that he’d fought for our country in the last war. Need I say more?” The audience went quiet.

It was sufficient that Faribault had served in World War Two to get the respect of Albertans. Why? Because the new Liberal leader and prime minister, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, had refused to serve. When war broke out in 1939, Trudeau was of military age, fit, and healthy. But he did not want to fight for Canada. He thought it was someone else’s war.

Even some of Trudeau’s admirers seem ashamed of his actions and statements about the war. A few years ago, John English, a former history professor at the University of Waterloo and also a former Liberal MP, wrote a favourable two-volume biography of Pierre Trudeau. In the first volume, Citizen of the World, Trudeau’s attitude and response to the war are explained.

When war broke out, English writes curtly, “Pierre could have enlisted, but he did not.”

It wasn’t just that he didn’t enlist. He openly opposed Canada’s participation. Indeed, English notes, “Trudeau’s virulent opposition to the war was publicly expressed.”

In November 1942, during a federal by-election in Montreal, Trudeau actively campaigned for an anti-conscription, Quebec nationalist candidate. At a major campaign event, Trudeau gave a fiery speech that was subsequently published in the newspaper, Le Devoir. According to English, in this speech, Trudeau “minimized the Nazi threat” and stated that “the government had irresponsibly declared war even though North America faced no direct threat of an invasion.”

Of course, the Second World War led to hardships for millions of Canadians. Coming from a wealthy background, however, Pierre Trudeau lived a life of ease. “Throughout this period, Trudeau lived at the family home, with its chauffeur and servants, while denouncing the bourgeois life.”

Perceptively, English adds, “It was easier to be anti-bourgeois when your circumstances were thoroughly bourgeois.”

The basic point is this. While Canadian soldiers were fighting and dying overseas, “Trudeau and his associates stood on separate ground, avoiding the battles in Europe while furiously debating what their future as francophone professionals would be in a modern North America.”

Useless sack of crap.

 

It wasn’t only the government buoyed by replacement immigration.

Others were in on the scam, too:

However, the government does not bear the full blame for the sharp increase. Between 2020 and 2022, numerous business, educational and non-governmental organizations supported raising permanent and temporary immigration levels and easing restrictions on temporary workers.

The provinces, with the exception of Quebec , also generally went along with the federal immigration strategy, backing large numbers of international students, whose higher tuition helped fund post-secondary schools.

Ontario, which is dead last in government funding for post-secondary education, was particularly egregious in its use of international students to maintain the financial stability of its universities and colleges. This strategy aimed to compensate for its freezing of provincial funding since 2019, a policy that was only recently reversed .

The education sector overall was similarly bullish on international students, driven by limited provincial funding and the lucrative gains from higher enrolments. Universities Canada urged the federal government to “invest in diverse talent, both undergraduate and graduate, domestic and international. ”

Colleges and Institutes Canada argued that, “International talent will play a critical role in tackling skills gaps in may sectors and meeting the labour needs of Canadian employers.” Neither seem to have considered the broader, longer-term impacts. Some academics noted the growing “education-immigration nexus ” and institutional implications, but did not question the societal effects of high immigration.

Many academics and numerous conferences, including Metropolis and Pathways to Prosperity , supported higher levels of immigration. The Canadian Council for Refugees predictably argued for increased numbers of refugees after the pandemic.

The business community prioritized immigration as a cheaper means to meet labour-market needs than raising wages and investing in technology.

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business , which represents small and medium-sized enterprises, argued that the federal government should make it easier for businesses to bring in foreign workers, including those categorized as lower-skilled.

The Business Council of Canada surveyed companies and found that half thought Canada should increase the number of permanent residents, with the majority supporting the levels outlined in the government’s 2022–24 immigration plan.

The Conference Board of Canada and the Century Initiative similarly argued that, “Increasing Canada’s immigration levels remains the most effective lever to grow our economy and address persistent labour-market needs,” with the latter recognizing the need for “ growing well ,” rather than just higher numbers.

However, some demographers, geographers and labour-market economists offered a more balanced view of higher permanent and temporary immigration.

David Ley , a geography professor at the University of British Columbia, for example, highlighted immigration’s impact on housing costs. Economists Fabian Lange, Mikal Skuterud and Christopher Worswick noted that, “Increasing low-skilled immigration to increase the overall size of the economy risks driving down average living standards in Canada.”

Post-pandemic recovery and stakeholder pressure do not excuse the previous federal government’s ill-advised expansionist policies, even though those pressures are real, and hard for politicians and policymakers to ignore.

The recent decline in public support for immigration has not prompted serious self-reflection on the impacts to housing, health care, social services and infrastructure. In terms of the five stages of grief , most stakeholders have not progressed beyond the early states of denial, anger and bargaining.

Returning to measured, human-capital-based immigration policies depends on the grieving parties reaching the acceptance stage. They need to learn to live with the new reality, rather than trying to roll the stone back up the mountainside.

 

Also:

Anyone in the world who shows up in Canada and makes an asylum claim is entitled to free subsidized daycare if citizens get it too, said all but one judge of the Supreme Court on Friday. They framed their decision as a matter of social justice — seemingly ignorant that their words degraded the value of Canadian citizenship by extending our social safety net, which we pay for, to unvetted foreigners.

 

We don’t have to trade with China:

The big trouble is that when dealing with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), a little “stabilizing” can slide into “normalizing” relations with a state that’s anything but normal or trustworthy. And when the costs of dependence and arbitrary political decisions are calculated, far fewer economic agreements look worthwhile. All four countries have been down that rough road before: Canada (and I) had the ordeal of the Meng-Michaels affair; India got a border war that killed 20 of its soldiers; Australia spent years in the Party’s doghouse losing billions of dollars in trade; and Japan is currently suffering its economic and diplomatic wrath after Takaichi stated publicly what has been longstanding policy on Taiwan. The uncomfortable reality is that accommodating Beijing’s demands at best yields temporary relief, and at worst incentivizes further bullying.

All four Indo-Pacific prime ministers can see how the CCP is increasingly contesting the balance of power in their region. China seeks not only to supplant the United States, but also to divide, co-opt and weaken any other countries it fears might band together to constrain its ambitions. To that end, and to prop up its own unbalanced economic growth, for the past decade Beijing has been rolling out the biggest industrial policies in history. It wants to seize the commanding heights of advanced technology and manufacturing, make other countries more dependent on China, and reduce China’s reliance on others. Chinese officials insist they support the WTO and free trade and oppose tariffs, but their policies put the lie to this propaganda. Their aggressive mercantilism, which last year generated an unprecedented US $1.2 trillion trade surplus, has played a key role in provoking Trump’s tariffs and now is subjecting the world economy to a Second China Shock.

**

China scholar and former Canadian diplomat Charles Burton says Beijing expects that its strategic partnership with Ottawa means Canada will refrain from disrupting its espionage and foreign interference operations.

The partnership suggests Canada “won’t disrupt China’s operations in Canada, and espionage and influence operations, so that they can continue to expand their influence in Canada for the future when, from their point of view, China becomes the dominant power on the planet,” Burton said.

Burton’s comments come after Prime Minister Mark Carney said during a visit to China in January that Ottawa’s relations with Beijing had entered “a new era” and the two countries were in a “strategic partnership.”

**

On the surface, these are noble goals. But the MPS is not a standard police force; it is the primary arm of the Chinese Communist Party’s internal security apparatus — the same body responsible for "Operation Fox Hunt" (whose purported aim is to capture or harass political dissenters), as well as the establishment of illegal overseas police stations on Canadian soil.

Why the great wall of secrecy? Why the silence?

Despite repeated calls from opposition MPs Michael Chong and Frank Caputo, this Liberal government has officially deemed the MOU "confidential." Unlike trade deals, which at least offer high-level summaries, the operational protocols of this police pact remain locked in a vault. If you are not deeply disturbed by this, you should be.

The government’s excuse is predictable: "operational security" and the "sensitivity of diplomatic relations." However, this lack of disclosure masks a deeper failure. By refusing to publish the full text, the government has failed to provide any public evidence of safeguards that prevent the RCMP from inadvertently sharing data on Canadian dissidents under the guise of "criminal investigations."

Or oversight mechanisms. For example, we do not know who, if anyone, monitors the "bilateral working groups" to ensure they don't become pipelines for Chinese intelligence.

Or any indication of jurisdictional boundaries. It remains unclear whether this MOU grants Chinese "liaison officers" increased access to Canadian information, territory, or security and intelligence databases.

The backlash has been swift and severe. The critics of this MOU have spoken out, and we really need to pay attention. Diaspora groups, particularly the Hong Kong Watch and various Uyghur advocacy organizations, have expressed "profound alarm." For those who fled Communist China’s reach in Asia, seeing the RCMP shake hands with their former oppressors is nothing short of a betrayal.

Former RCMP senior officer Garry Clement and other security experts warn that the MPS uses "cooperation" as a cover for transnational repression. Without a public list of "no-go" zones, critics fear the RCMP could be tricked into assisting in the "return" of political targets labelled as "financial criminals" by Beijing.

The mere existence of a secret police pact creates a "trust crisis." If a Hong Kong-Canadian activist believes the RCMP is sharing information with Beijing, they stop reporting threats. They stop speaking to the media. They disappear from the democratic process. In effect, the Carney government is outsourcing the silencing of its own citizens.

The timing of this is particularly galling. Justice Hogue’s inquiry into foreign interference recently concluded that China’s activities in Canada are "real and persistent." To sign a secret police pact with the very entity accused of that interference is, as one critic put it, "inviting the fox to help guard the hen house.”

 

But you can't let the US invade Canada.

That would be weird somehow.

B!#ch, please – we’re poised to kill more people than the Second World War did:

Trade with the United States is compromising Canada’s “moral compass,” a Commons committee chair said yesterday. Liberal MP Salma Zahid (Scarborough Centre-Don Valley East, Ont.) said internal American immigration enforcement raised “serious human rights questions.”

Someone owes Sarah Palin an apology.

She’s waiting.

 

A country that has allowed Nazis into its borders, allows Jews to be terrorised, films a man as he is being murdered, dissolves traditional marriage for votes, wallows in its political corruption, appeals to the basest jingoism while forgetting the country’s original underpinnings is not a country that is serious.

It is a country incapable of self-reflection but indulges in self-congratulation and hypocrisy.

To wit:

A survey of 25 countries by the Washington, D.C.-based Pew Research Center has found that Americans are most likely to rate others living in their country as morally or ethically bad. In fact, it was the only country where more people defined others as bad than good.

At the other end of the scale was Canada.

Participants in the survey were asked: “Generally, how would you rate the morality of (survey country nationality) – are their morals very good, somewhat good, somewhat bad or very bad?”

In America, four per cent of respondents chose “very good,” while 43 per cent said “somewhat good,” for a total of 47 per cent on the good side. Meanwhile, 11 per cent thought other Americans were “very bad,” and another 42 per cent went with “somewhat bad,” putting 53 per cent on the bad side.

Several other countries — Turkey, Brazil, Greece and France — had a near 50-50 split on the good and bad responses, but the United States was the only one where the bad outweighed the good.

Canadians, however, were the most likely to view their fellow citizens as morally and ethically good. To the same question, more than a third of Canadians said others in this country were very good (38 per cent) and more than half chose somewhat good (54 per cent). A mere five per cent said they thought Canadians were somewhat bad, and just two per cent chose very bad. (One per cent did not know or refused to answer.)

 

It’s about time someone mentioned this:

Autism should not be considered a “spectrum”, according to one of the architects of the theory.

Dame Uta Frith, a pioneer of research that underpins our understanding of autism, said the spectrum was now so “accommodating” it was “completely meaningless”.

The 84-year-old said while the factual definition of autism remained, the interpretation of the condition had changed over time, becoming “more inclusive”.

“The basic definition of autism that I’ve given you – that it’s lifelong and neurodevelopmental, and that there are communication difficulties and restricted behaviour – has remained the same,” Dame Uta told the Tes magazine.

“It is generally accepted. But the interpretation of that definition is a different matter, because we have made it more inclusive.”

Dame Uta, an emeritus professor in cognitive development at the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London, said the “spectrum” concept came about because “nothing is a neat category, and we wanted to include the not-so-typical cases”, and so widened the criteria.

“But that’s very difficult, because what’s notable about being part of a huge spectrum that we all belong to? We’re all neurodiverse; we can accept this because all our brains are different. But it makes a medical diagnosis completely meaningless,” she said.

Dame Uta said they had adopted a spectrum approach because the “categorical approach” had meant lots of people did not fit within the precise definition. She warned, however, that “because of various cultural factors, the spectrum has gone on being more and more accommodating, and I think now it has come to its collapse”.

“This is something that I don’t think has been quite recognised, because people still hang on to the idea that there is something that unites all the people who are diagnosed as autistic. I don’t believe that any more,” she said.

Dame Uta added that it seemed now that there were “two big subgroups” which included those diagnosed early in childhood, typically under five, and those diagnosed later in life, who she suggested could be called “hypersensitive”.

The latter, she said, was “made up of a lot of adolescents, and among them, a lot of young women” who are “without intellectual impairment, who are perfectly able to communicate verbally and non-verbally, but who might feel highly anxious in social situations”.

This group of primarily young women and teenagers, Dame Uta said, was growing at a “frightening rate”, but that the first group was “only moderately increasing”.

“In autistic children with intellectual disability, there has not been any real increase; that group seems quite stable,” she said.

“I think the people in the second group really do have problems. I would definitely not say they are ‘making it up’. But I would say that these are problems that can perhaps be treated much better than under the label of ‘autism’. I would fight for that label to be limited to the first group,” she added.

Dame Uta also said the condition “existed from birth” and would still call it a “disorder” despite some objecting to this.

The professor said many people were “self-diagnosing” and putting pressure on doctors to diagnose them, while also criticising the current testing methods, which rely on a patient’s “subjective experience, rather than on objective clinical observation”.

It’s some sort of fashion to pretend at being “neurodiverse”, as if the social currency of simply being awkward, as opposed to being trapped in one’s own mind and body, was not at all pretentious and utterly insulting.

It is.

 

Also – this is fiction, too:

A Canadian journal has issued corrections on 138 case reports it published over the last 25 years to add a disclaimer: The cases described are fictional.

Paediatrics & Child Health, the journal of the Canadian Paediatric Society, has published the cases since 2000 in articles for a series for its Canadian Paediatric Surveillance Program. The articles usually start with a case description followed by “learning points” that include statistics, clinical observations and data from CPSP. The peer-reviewed articles don’t state anywhere the cases described are fictional.

Some People Are "Special"

But don't take my word for it:

Homeowners in the Vancouver area should know that the title to their land hasn’t been taken away from them by the Mark Carney government. That said, an expert in constitutional law and Indigenous rights said he understands why people are anxious when they hear about the recently signed agreement between Ottawa and the Musqueam Indian Band in the Vancouver area. …

On Feb. 20, during a Friday afternoon when most people had checked out for the weekend, the Carney government announced what it called “Historic Agreements Recognizing Rights, Stewardship and Fisheries.” The part that had people wondering about their home, land or business ownership was where the federal government signed an agreement giving right and title to the Musqueam Indian Band to pretty much all of the land in Vancouver, West Vancouver, Burnaby and Richmond and much of Delta.

“The purposes of this agreement are to: (a) recognize Musqueam’s Rights and Title within Musqueam Territory; (b) demonstrate progress in incrementally implementing Musqueam’s Rights and Title,” the document says.

That part of the agreement and many others have left Vancouver-area residents unsure about the future. The phrase “rights and title” has a very specific meaning that denotes ownership, which understandably has many people wondering about the repercussions.

“These agreements do not impact private property,” Crown Indigenous Relations Minister Rebecca Alty said in a post on X last week.

That’s nice and so too is a statement from Musqueam Chief Wayne Sparrow saying they aren’t coming for anyone’s private property. The problem is that words in legal documents have meaning and a court could easily see the words in this document meaning something different down the road.

“There’s this cloud of uncertainty,” Newman said.

So many questions, so few answers

All of this is taking place against the backdrop of the Cowichan Tribes v. Canada court decision last year that granted the Cowichan Tribes rights and title over more than 7.5 sq. km, more than 1,800 acres, of land in Richmond, B.C. That land is now land that the Musqueam has been given rights and title to in their agreement with the Carney government.

The Musqueam are appealing the Cowichan court decision, saying it infringes on their land. Meanwhile, the Squamish Nation is challenging the Musqueam agreement saying that it infringes on their traditional territory.

In the background, homeowners and businesses throughout the Vancouver area wonder what any of this means for them and the land that they think they own.

After the Cowichan decision, there were also claims that nothing would impact private property owners. Yet, the British Columbia government ended up putting forward a $150-million fund to assist landowners after banks and other lenders said mortgages in the area were in question.

Newman said that in the Cowichan case, Justice Barbara M. Young made the argument that Aboriginal title and private property ownership, called fee simple title, can coexist.

 “She says at one point that the two can coexist, which doesn’t make sense, because each is an exclusive ownership of the land and two people can’t both exclusively own the exact same thing,” Newman said.

Newman points out that the New Brunswick Court of Appeal shut down an attempt by the Wolastoqey Nation to try to claim Aboriginal title over private land rather than Crown land. That is the opposite of what was decided in B.C. in the Cowichan decision and Newman believes this will end up at the Supreme Court.

“We might see the Supreme Court of Canada engage with this question sooner than later if they decide to hear an appeal,” he said.

Newman admitted that there is a lot of complication and uncertainty and that is unlikely to change for the foreseeable future as these cases work their way through the system.

Bottom line: You haven’t lost the title to your home, but that doesn’t mean you won’t.

**

People living in a trailer park in the Comox Valley say they’re being evicted unfairly by the K’omoks First Nation.

The First Nation has given notice that residents at the Queneesh Mobile Home park have less than two years to move off the property.

Many considered them their forever homes.

With the high cost of moving a trailer and extremely limited places to legally move them, the residents say they deserve better.

“There’s no place to move our trailers to on the Island. We are stuck. We have put our life savings into this trailer, and now we have to leave with nothing. That is ludicrous,” said Kathy Jenkins, a park resident of 34 years.

**

After 11 years of reconciliation fewer than half of employees in one major federal department say they have a clear understanding of what it means or how it applies to their work. It follows a 2024 Privy Council survey of Indigenous people that found reconciliation had not resulted in “any tangible improvements in the qualify of life for Indigenous people.”