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Sue a business into Profitability

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  When a business starts losing money, it is sending a signal. In Hamilton, Ottawa’s instinct is to shoot the messenger. I n 2024, Ohio-based Cleveland-Cliffs bought Stelco for $3.4 billion. To win approval under the Investment Canada Act, it signed binding undertakings to maintain employment for five years: the same number of unionized workers and the vast majority of non-unionized staff. The commitment was sold as a shield for the national interest and for the workforce. L ess than two years later, the shield is being tested. Squeezed by U.S. tariffs and a shrinking market for certain steel products, Stelco says it will idle finishing operations in Hamilton, putting up to 500 jobs at risk. The company calls this survival. Ottawa calls it a breach. Industry Minister Mélanie Joly has given Cleveland-Cliffs five business days to produce a plan to keep the jobs or face court action. The federal government has also put money on the table to keep the lines running, an offer the com...
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Quebec’s Sovereignty Votes Were Democracy. Alberta’s Is Suddenly Fascism

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  Consulting citizens about their province’s place in Confederation does not become authoritarian simply because the province is Alberta. When Quebec asked its people twice whether they wanted out of Canada, the country treated it as high-stakes democracy, but when Alberta puts a softer version of the same question on the ballot this month, large parts of the 'commentariat' reach for words like “fascist,” “illiberal,” and “psychological warfare.” The double standard is glaring, and it reveals more about elite preferences than about democratic principle. Quebec’s 1980 and 1995 referendums were initiated by elected Parti Québécois governments with explicit separatist platforms. The questions were imperfect, especially the 1995 wording that carefully avoided the word “country”, yet the exercises were accepted as legitimate expressions of popular will. Federalists campaigned hard against them. Capital took flight. The country held its breath. After the narrow 1995 defea...
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Before We Privatize Canada's Airports, Ask Who Will Pay

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  Prime Minister Mark Carney's government wants to bring private capital into the operation of Canada's four largest airports — Toronto Pearson, Montréal-Trudeau, Vancouver International and Calgary International. Ottawa frames this as a way to unlock billions in investment without selling the airports outright: the federal government would keep ownership of the land and assets while granting private investors long-term operating concessions. That distinction matters to policymakers, but for the passenger at the check-in counter, a different question matters more: who eventually pays the investor? Private capital is not charity. Pension funds and infrastructure investors who commit billions to Canadian airports will expect a return, and that money has to come from somewhere. Canada's aviation system already runs largely on the user-pay principle — the Competition Bureau reports that passenger fees alone accounted for 33 to 47 percent of revenue at the country's eigh...
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RIVAL FANS AREN’T LAUGHING ANYMORE

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                                                       How Arteta Has Turned Arsenal from a Punchline into a Problem A subtle shift is taking place around Arsenal. The banter from rival supporters is becoming quieter, replaced by a growing recognition that Mikel Arteta has built a team that is increasingly difficult to solve. Chelsea Met a Different Arsenal Xabi Alonso arrived at Chelsea with serious credentials after winning the German league unbeaten. Chelsea’s early performances under him showed attacking promise, that so many expected them to provide Arsenal with a major test. Instead, after scoring early, Chelsea created very little of consequence. Arsenal remained composed, controlled the match and dealt with the challenge methodically rather than emotionally. A Team That Knows How to Win For years, Arsenal could play ...
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More Government Less Personal Responsibility

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  There is a contradiction at the heart of modern politics. We complain that life is too expensive, that taxes are too high, that businesses charge too much — and yet the moment something goes wrong, the instinct is the same: the government should do something. Regulate it, license it, inspect it, subsidize it, create an agency for it. Then we wonder why everything costs more. Consider the difference between a few families buying a cow together, having it butchered, and dividing the meat, versus buying meat through the commercial food system. The first is a simple chain: farmer, cow, butcher, families. The second passes through layers of licensing, inspection, labelling, and record-keeping — all of it staffed by people who must be paid, either through taxes or through the prices businesses pass on to customers. Either way, we pay. What About Health and Safety? Regulation clearly has benefits, and nobody serious wants contaminated food or unsafe slaughterhouses. But the re...
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Money Is the New Brawn. Guile Never Went Away

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For centuries, men and women built different survival strategies because they lived under different realities. A man's greatest asset was often his physical strength — he fought wars, hunted, defended, built, and performed the labour civilization ran on. Brawn wasn't just admired; it was economically valuable. The strongest men generally had the greatest capacity to provide and protect. Then society changed. Machines replaced muscle. Knowledge replaced manual labour. Capital replaced physical power. Today a man's biceps matter far less than his bank account — his ability to earn, build wealth, invest, and create economic value has become the modern equivalent of physical strength. Money is the new brawn. And you want to sit at home and not work as a man? Your woman will get uncomfortable ooo. Women experienced a different evolution. Historically, where physical dominance wasn't their comparative advantage, women leaned more heavily on persuasion, emotional intelligence,...
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Double Standards, Racism, and the Uncomfortable Question

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  Two things can be true at once. A Black academic accused of plagiarism deserves a fair investigation. And the coverage of that accusation can still be excessive, racially loaded, or out of step with how comparable white academics are treated. We should be able to hold both thoughts without collapsing into one. The recent conversation around Professor Jason Arday raised, once again, the question of racism, accountability, and double standards in Western institutions. It is understandable that Black people look at cases like this and ask whether a white academic facing the same allegations would face the same scrutiny. That is a legitimate question. But there is a second one we owe ourselves: what are we going to do about it? Naming a double standard is only the opening move. Plagiarism Is Not a Black Word Plagiarism existed long before Jason Arday became a professor. White academics have been accused of it, investigated, and in some cases forced out; others have weathered the cont...
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