A recently renovated church in the Italian capital, Rome, has stirred controversy as many noticed that one of the restored angels bore a striking resemblance to the country’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
Italy’s press has posed the question of whether Meloni, of the radical right-wing Brothers of Italy Party, inspired the restorer, Bruno Valentinetti, who reportedly has had ties to the Italian right-wing politics.
OTTAWA — As Pierre Poilievre departed his party’s convention armed with the backing of delegates to lead the federal Conservatives into the next election, senior party figures say getting ready for that contest will be the next challenge.
Poilievre secured 87.4 per cent of support from the more than 2,500 delegates who descended on Calgary for the party’s three-day convention, with his leadership review on Friday night as the main focus of the gathering.
Scientists expected the opposite, but polar bears in the Norwegian Arctic archipelago of Svalbard have become fatter and healthier since the early 1990s, all while sea ice has steadily declined due to climate change.
Polar bears rely on sea ice as a platform from which to hunt the seals that they rely on for blubber-rich meals. The bears’ fat reserves provide energy and insulation and allow mothers to produce rich milk for cubs.
Is Canada really warming at double the global average rate, as the Canadian government says it is? A new report says no, because the data Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) uses are apparently corrupted by fundamental mistakes, mistakes so severe that when corrected, all the supposed warming of the past six or seven decades vanishes.
Given that Canada represents a large fraction of global land surface area, one naturally wonders if the world is warming at anything like we are told it is.
Donald Trump has said Iran is “talking to” the US and hinted at a deal to avoid the use of military strikes.
“[Iran is] talking to us, and we’ll see if we can do something, otherwise we’ll see what happens … We have a big fleet heading out there,” he told Fox News. “They are negotiating.”
Trump added that US allies in the region were not being told of plans for possible strikes due to security reasons. He has threatened to intervene in Iran in the wake of a deadly crackdown on anti-government protests.
A jewellery robbery in Richmond London this morning
( ahcomeridewithme ) pic.twitter.com/d0jmgyQUGq
— London & UK Street News (@CrimeLdn) January 31, 2026
Since my reference to it last week, Prime Minister Mark Carney’s address in Davos seems to have been both intended and received as a policy manifesto for Canada and also for other countries that feel short-shrifted by what have traditionally been known as the “great powers.” The prime minister quoted the Czech president and former dissident Václav Havel that the communist system sustained itself by adopting the habit initiated by a greengrocer, of placing in his window the Marxist tocsin “Workers of the world, unite!” (The 300 divisions of Stalin’s Red Army had more to do with it.) This gesture to the regime was widely taken up in the Soviet bloc, in what Havel described as “living within a lie.” Carney considers this analogous to the adherence of Canada and other countries to “what we called the rules-based international order” (a clangorous platitude that reminds me of my bossy Grade 1 public school teacher).
Cats being dramatic compilation 😹😻😹😹😹😹 pic.twitter.com/UJyBx49ka9
— Stu thats all you get🇺🇸🏴 (@Boldyboy1975) August 18, 2025
Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor will be failing victims if he continues to refuse to testify about his relationship with the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, Sir Keir Starmer has said.
The prime minister urged the former prince to give evidence before a US congressional committee that first requested his testimony in November. “Epstein’s victims have to be the first priority,” he said.
He may yet end the monarchy.
The AP is concerned that there are too few Somalis snowboarding for the Swedish Olympic team. Every time you think the media has evolved to be more sophisticated and serious since the 2012-2020 era, you get an item like this. https://t.co/CNGKrcfik6
— Under Secretary of State Sarah B. Rogers (@UnderSecPD) January 31, 2026
Party adopting a ‘stand your ground’-style policy, demands crackdown on criminal immigrants
Delegates at the Conservative Party’s national convention in Calgary voted overwhelmingly Saturday to enact a “stand your ground”-style law to allow someone to protect themselves with lethal force against an intruder in their home.
This was one of dozens of policies debated and adopted by delegates at this biannual gathering, many of which focused on crime, immigration and social policy.
After handing Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre a strong endorsement, party members renewed their policy playbook ahead of the next possible federal election.
“Demands crackdown on criminal migrants” as if that were a bad thing.
A London councillor has continued to earn £20,000 from the taxpayer despite campaigning for political office in Bangladesh.
Sabina Khan is seeking to represent the Bangladesh National Party in the Golapganj-Beanibazar constituency in national assembly elections in February.
Yet she continues to serve Tower Hamlets in east London as a councillor, earning £20,600 a year.
AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! 😆@fancypants_s https://t.co/K7xrdQvb3N
— Auntie Polly (@auntie_polly) January 31, 2026
h/t Auntie Polly
Stephen Harper’s ten years as prime minister began on Feb. 6, 2006. Twenty years later is a good time to assess his achievements in office and the legacy he left behind. I worked closely with Harper when he was leader of the Opposition, but not when he was in government, so this is a view from the outside.
The first thing to remember is the constraints under which he laboured. He led a minority government until he finally won a majority in 2011. Even then, he was still hemmed in by a Liberal Senate, a left-leaning judiciary, and a federal civil service that tends to tilt Liberal or NDP. Thus, it is not surprising that his greatest accomplishments were in areas where he could exercise his executive authority without impediment.
