SLOBODIAN: The end of Trudeau, but not necessarily the Trudeau era

“We got you.” So said a teary-eyed Justin Trudeau on March 6 in his final speech as prime minister. Canadians wept too — jubilant tears over his departure.

The deservedly loathed one, who belittled, betrayed and weakened Canada, moulding it into a socialist shell of its former proud democratic self, offered a wild fairytale account of his decade as PM.

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Think USAID was bad? You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

Have you heard of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS)? If not, that’s unsurprising. It is a 230-employee agency that supposedly mediates disputes between unions and businesses, but that mediation is “voluntary.” Its headquarters is a nine-story building on K Street in DC, which houses—wait for it—60 employees. Where are the other 270? It’s yet another agency that thought it was independent. It wasn’t. Most FMCS employees “worked” from home. I put “worked” in quotes because if you thought the USAID or other federal agencies thus far exposed by DOGE were corrupt, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

Wow.

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How scientists misled the world about Covid’s origins

Five years ago today, based on a highly misleading ‘model’ forecast from one academic, Neil Ferguson, the British government ditched its pandemic plan and locked the entire country down. This decision had disastrous and – as Sweden proves – unnecessary consequences.

It was the first of many dreadful mistakes made by the government during the Covid pandemic: shutting schools at the behest of unions, assuming the virus was not airborne, vaccinating children, overclaiming for vaccines and masks. The government thought it knew best and it let us down.

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JFK files expose family secrets: Their relatives were CIA assets

Growing up, John Smith knew his grandfather as a serious academic — a bespectacled professor at the University of Maryland who wrote books on pre-Civil War presidents. He also knew E.B. Smith had traveled the world in his younger years.

What he didn’t know until this week is that his grandfather had once been a U.S. government asset, feeding Soviet-era intelligence to the CIA.

The Trump administration’s release of more than 77,000 pages related to the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy has thus far shed little new light on the killing. But the unmasking of many previously redacted names has revealed the identities of people who worked with the clandestine services, roles that in many cases were hidden for decades even from close family members.

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Tommy Robinson in jail: 1,250 phone calls and daily doctor visits

The jailed far-right activist Tommy Robinson has been allowed more than 1,250 social phone calls and 80 prison visitors during his time at HMP Woodhill, a court has heard.

Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, is serving an 18-month prison sentence for contempt of court after breaching an injunction. He is currently seeking to launch a legal challenge against the Ministry of Justice over his segregation from other prisoners at HMP Woodhill in Milton Keynes.

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Charity watchdog’s ‘Islamophobia’ fear gives misogyny a free pass

Is there any public benefit to the “advancement of religion”? Under the Charities Act 2011, places of worship can achieve charitable status if they demonstrate that their activities are for the public benefit. But what if the views espoused in such settings cause harm to wider society?

This is an urgent question, because yet another mosque has fallen foul of the rules. This time it’s the An-Noor Masjid and Community Centre, a registered charity in Birmingham which posted a video of a preacher who effectively condoned domestic violence and marital rape. Mahamed AbdurRazaq was advising a congregation on what a husband could do if his wife refused to have sex with him.

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Replacing Cash With a Digital Dollar Would Pose a Grave Threat to Our Rights and Freedoms

The Bank of Canada has made no secret of its efforts to explore a Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), a “digital dollar” issued and controlled by the central bank. The Bank of Canada is not alone. To date, 134 countries and currency unions have explored a CBDC, and 66 countries are already in advanced stages of implementation.

In 2023, cash accounted for a mere 11 percent of total payments made by Canadians. Consumers increasingly tap their credit and debit cards at checkouts, send e-transfers, or use online banking to pay bills, make investments, and donate to charities. For many Canadians, metal coins function less like a currency and more like a locker or shopping cart token; paper bills are for birthday cards, not for “serious” transactions. New legislation in Quebec empowers law enforcement to presume that cash sums of $2,000 or more are the proceeds of unlawful activity.

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Nolte: ‘Snow White’ Bombs — Breaks Record for Lowest Live-Action Remake Opening

With its dreadful $43 million opening, Snow White now holds the record for the lowest debut weekend of any of Disney’s live-action remakes.

The previous record-holder was 2019’s Dumbo, which opened to $46 million.

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GOLDSTEIN: Spare us the hollow ‘patriotism’ of the federal Liberals

For the Liberals to portray themselves as “Team Canada” in this federal election displays a level of shameless hypocrisy, given how they sneered at Canadians during their decade in power.

Led by a self-righteous and hypocritical Justin Trudeau — who took every opportunity to bash Canada, Canadians, our institutions and history — they are in no position now to don the mantle of ginned up patriots because they have a new leader in Mark Carney and an election ad with Mike Myers touting their mutual love for Canada.

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Amid Canadian political-poll mayhem, meet the man worth listening to

After a long stretch of dominance in the polls, the Conservative Party of Canada now finds itself the potential underdog. Mark Carney, Canada’s newly appointed (but not yet elected) prime minister is kiting his international credentials, shaking hands with the king and a Europe keen on stability.

This dramatic shift in voter sentiment sparks lively banter among political pollsters. Nik Nanos predicts the upcoming federal election in Canada between the Liberals and the Conservatives will be akin to a “knife fight in a telephone booth.” Others speculate on the duration of leadership honeymoons; they don’t last forever but sometimes they last long enough.

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Donald Trump upends notions of stability and change as Mark Carney and Pierre Poilievre square off

In a little more than five weeks, either Mark Carney or Pierre Poilievre will be the prime minister of Canada.

But it is abundantly clear that this election campaign is more than a faceoff between the Liberal and Conservative leaders.

It’s also going to be a tug of war between change and stability — and which one of those forces is ultimately most important to Canadians at this tumultuous time for the country.

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Kelly McParland: Sorry folks, but Poilievre’s fate rests with Ontario

Let’s say, if just for the sake of argument, that the outcome of the federal election depends on how the vote goes in Ontario.

Because that’s the way it usually goes, and nothing in the dynamics of this campaign suggests there’s a compelling reason to expect it to be different. Conservative Leder Pierre Poilievre can sweep all of Alberta and the best he’ll pick up is two Liberal seats. Ontario has 74 Liberals, more than three times the total for all of western Canada. That being the case, Poilievre has considerable work to do to if he wants the province to help make him prime minister.

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