RANDALL WHITE, CANADIAN REPUBLIC NOTEBOOK. TORONTO. FRIDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2026. In my wider universe focused on the northwest shore of Lake Ontario, in the Great Lakes region of North America, three particular public events have marked the first full week of October 2026 — (1) Youth (and other) protests in France, Brazil, and beyond ; (2) 2026 Nobel Prize in Literature awarded to Canadian/Icelandic writer Anne Carson ; and (3) “Injunction filed to force incoming PQ government [in Quebec] to take oath to King.”

(1) Youth (and other) protests in France, Brazil, and beyond

Even in the 2020s the France that gave the wider world the French revolution in the late 18th century, and then the 1848 springtime of the peoples and the 1871 Paris Commune, can suddenly reappear, alive again.

See, eg : “URGENT: Police are clashing with protesters in Place de la Bastille in Paris” ; “IT’S TOTAL WAR AT BASTILLE! VERY HEAVY POLICE CHARGE AFTER NUMEROUS PROJECTILE THROWS” ; and “FRENCH STUDENT: ‘More resources for education. Our demand is institutional … A breakaway left. We want to change the system.’”

As has often happened in the past again, the French example has inspired or at least parallelled similar mass protests elsewhere. In the early autumn of 2026 see eg : “Hundreds of students, inspired in part by student unrest in neighboring France, took to the streets of the eastern Belgian city of Liège … Belgian students clash with police over tuition hikes” ; and “LONDON | Solidarity with the high school student movement … Rally at the French embassy … ”

And then there’s : “From Athens, Greek students and pupils send their support to the mobilization of youth in France! Same fight, same demand: a public education, free and accessible to all” ; and “HISTORIC MOBILIZATION IN RÍO DE JANEIRO: THOUSANDS OF STUDENTS FLOOD THE STREETS IN SUPPORT OF LULA … Thousands of students marched with chants in defense of public education and democracy.”

(2) 2026 Nobel Prize in Literature awarded to Canadian/Icelandic writer Anne Carson

As also noted recently, the “Canadian poet, essayist, translator, and professor of Classics” Anne Carson was first noticed on this website in L. Frank Bunting’s “Taking time out from current madness to consider one woman’s brilliant writing more than 2500 years ago.” (From back in March 2019, during Donald Trump’s first wild and crazy term as US president.)

Now, among others no doubt, I was impressed that Ms Carson has just this past week won the 2026 Nobel Prize in Literature. See eg : “Canadian Anne Carson awarded Nobel Prize in Literature … Carson, 76, has previously won several prestigious literary prizes” ; and “Anne Carson wins Nobel Prize in Literature … Carson is a celebrated poet and essayist who earned three degrees at the University of Toronto.”

For some quick first impression of Anne Carson’s writing the New Yorker magazine has posted a short Carson poem on Twitter/X and no doubt elsewhere as well. It begins with “It’s good to be neuter,/I want to have meaningless legs.” At the same time, as a mark of the complexity of Ms Carson’s thought, the second-last line is “Drink all the sex there is.”

A final somewhat intriguing ingredient in the current Anne Carson story is that while (as Bunting has explained) she was born in Toronto and “grew up in various parts of Ontario. (Her father worked for a bank, and was frequently transferred.),” Ms Carson currently lives in Iceland. And both Canada and Iceland have claimed the new Nobel Prize winner as their own! On the other hand, Canadian foreign minister Anita Anand has also just noted that “Canada is home to the largest Icelandic community outside Iceland, reflecting generations of friendship between our peoples.”

(3) “Injunction filed to force incoming PQ government [in Quebec] to take oath to King”

As already noted elsewhere on this site, I personally like and applaud the new Parti Québécois minority government in Quebec’s enthusiasm for abolishing the old colonial monarchy in Quebec (and in my own case in the rest of Canada too).

See eg “Newly-elected premier takes first shot at abolishing the monarchy in Quebec” and “Injunction filed to force incoming PQ government to take oath to King.”

As already noted as well, I do think Paul St-Pierre Plamondon’s keeness to do away with the current office of lieutenant governor in Quebec is misplaced.

He would be better served by adopting the now vanquished CAQ government’s draft legislation on renaming the office ‘Officer of Quebec’.

As other parliamentary democratic republics elsewhere have shown (such as Iceland eg), our kind of democracy works best with some form of separate ceremonial head of state.

Meanwhile, I do not think it would be wise for Canadian courts to simply grant an injunction to (try to?) force the incoming PQ government to take the constitutional oath to the King, that does quite foolishly still exist in Canadian law.

Opinion polls do show that nothing remotely close to a majority of the Canadian people who vote in elections, coast to coast to coast, seriously believe in and support the monarchy in Canada today.

And aggressively enforcing this particular branch of the current technically correct but largely obsolete rule of Canadian symbolic law will not seriously help build a strong Canada for the future.

RANDALL WHITE. HOME AND NATIVE LAND. FERNWOOD PARK, TORONTO. FRIDAY, OCTOBER 2, 2026. [UPDATED OCTOBER 6, 2026.} This coming Monday, October 5 la belle province will hold a general election to choose members of its 44th National Assembly (Assemblée nationale du Québec, finally following the nomenclature of the Assemblée nationale in France).

[Scroll below for October 6 update on election results.]

(1) Can Quebec Liberals finally nudge out Parti Québécois in 2026 … probably not ??

I have just noticed two in some ways quite different polls on the coming Quebec provincial election. The first (Pollara, somewhat older) suggests PQ (Parti Québécois) 29% ; PLQ (Liberals) 22% ; CAQ (Coalition Avenir Québec, the present government) 21% ; PCQ (Conservatives) 17% ; QS (Québec solidaire — as seen from the Ontario wilderness a party for hardcore left-wing francophone nationalists) 10% .

The second poll (Sondage Pallas Data, somewhat more recently) suggests a quite different ultimate victor : PLQ 32% ; PQ 29%, ; CAQ 14% ; PCQ 14% ; QS 11%.

Despite the Liberals’ first-place finish here, however, most even recent polls I’ve seen have the Parti Québécois standing first — and even possibly with a majority of seats in the Assembly (and thus a majority government), won with less than a third of the province-wide popular vote. (Thanks to five at least strong enough parties competing in a “first-past-the-post” election.)

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RANDALL WHITE, NORTH AMERICAN NOTEBOOK, TORONTO. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 2026. Two recent Twitter/X postings by two eminent US commentators suggest some deeper rumblings in Donald Trump’s America in the early autumn of 2026.

The first comes from William “ Bill” Kristol. He currently describes himself as “Editor at large, The Bulwark ; Director, Defending Democracy Together ; Host, Conversations with Bill Kristol ; Never Trump.” He has only a few months ago been described by C. Douglas Golden in The Western Journal as a “neocon, publisher, and one-time Republican operative extraordinaire” who has now declared “today I’m a Democrat.”

I was first struck by a Kristol post from a few days ago : “I found watching Trump’s UN speech today deeply depressing. It is a matter of national shame and humiliation that he is our president. Every country in the world, friend and foe alike, sees we are governed by a vainglorious fool.”

From here I was intrigued to come across Bill Kristol’s eight-point policy for Democrats in the US midterm elections this November 3 — “1. Stop the data centers ; 2. Make AI safe ; 3. Protect your health care ; 4. Fix the rotten Supreme Court ; 5. Get us out of the Middle East ; 6. Renew our friendship with Canada ; 7. Hold the oligarchs accountable ; 8. Release the Epstein files.”

Sitting here in front of my still newish Dell PC, only a hundred yards or so from the northwest shore of Lake Ontario, I was particularly impressed by “6. Renew our friendship with Canada.” In contemplating the likelihhood of any such thing in any near future I was further impressed by a still more recent post from the more traditional left-wing, long-term Democrat (and former Bill Clinton labor secretary), Robert Reich.

Reich wrote : “I spent much of this week talking with foreign officials who are in the U.S. for United Nations meetings … Here’s what I learned:

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RANDALL WHITE. HOME AND NATIVE LAND. FERNWOOD PARK, TORONTO. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2026. As long ago as 1930 Harold Innis, author of The Fur Trade in Canada : An Introduction to Canadian Economic History (still the most interesting and single best — if not exactly easiest to read — book on any kind of Canadian history) began the conclusion of his local classic with :

“Fundamentally the civilization of North America is the civilization of Europe.” And the main broad “interest” of Innis’s pioneering Canadian fur-trade study of 1930 was “primarily in the effects of a vast new land area on European civilization.”

You might almost guess that somewhere along the line both PM Carney and some among his own updated new/old Ottawa officialdom have lately been reading the conclusion to Harold Innis’s first big book on the “northern North American” resource economy themselves.

And it seems reasonable enough that in the third decade of the 21st century a country of this sort would be graced by an offer to become the first “associate member” of the European Union.

(1) “Carney says Parliament will vote on EU partnership”

The exact nature of this “associate member”status (proposed by Ursula von der Leyen, “President of the European Commission”) inevitably remains for the moment not entirely clear.

Yet it seems likely that a Canada which became the first of the new breed (Australia and New Zealand, other EU figures have suggested, would soon follow) could help define any such status practically.

In any case we happily need not worry about such details for the moment : “Carney says Parliament will vote on EU partnership” in the soon enough fullness of time.

Meanwhile, who can deny the symbolic power already in the transatlantic air; eg, “Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez posted an image of the EU flag with a red maple leaf beside it Thursday morning.”)

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RANDALL WHITE. HOME AND NATIVE LAND. FERNWOOD PARK, TORONTO. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2026. Like many others no doubt, I have a few personal memories of the disastrous events of September 11, 2001 in New York City.

One is a phone call from the only friend from my Toronto high-school days I am still in touch with. It happened shortly after I first saw the morning TV reports on how “hijackers seized US passenger jets and crashed them into two New York skyscrapers, killing thousands of people.”

Another is an email from my younger son, then working in San Francisco, reporting the “somber mood” on the other side of the USA, more than 4500 kilometers (2900 miles) west of New York City.

Yet another is the late great Ontario politics guru Graham Murray’s somewhat later remark on how “devastatingly effective” 9/11 was, from the standpoint of the Middle East suicide bombers who did the appalling selfless work. (Possibly in an issue of his original Inside Queen’s Park or possibly some related communication that I can’t for the moment track down!)

As it happens today, the 25th birthday of 9/11 is unhappily mixed up with Donald Trump’s not surprising compulsive lies about how two New York firemen dragged his very big and somewhat unwilling body from one of the the sites of the New York City branch of the disaster (and attack), back when it happened.

And Donald Trump has by now threatened the sheer existence of the great majority of Canadians, to the point where Canada cannot avoid deep questions about the USA USA next door.

Note eg the recent Nanos finding that when its sample Canadians were asked “Do you support or oppose Canada rejecting the trade deal with the US despite the potential economic risk to Canadians?”, 85% answered “Support”: and only 12% said “Oppose”. Or the paralell Angus Reid result that “Canadians by a five-to-one ratio say it was the right move to walk away.”

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RANDALL WHITE. FERNWOOD PARK, TORONTO. Friday, September 4, 2026. The print copy of the 13 August 2026 issue of the London Review of Books has finally arrived at my front door. And I have finally had a chance to read its lead article — Emily Wilson’s controversial review of the new movie on Homer’s ancient Odyssey, directed by Christopher Nolan.

I should preface my short report here by noting two earlier appearances of the brilliant University of Pennsylvania Classical Studies professor Emily Wilson on counterweights.ca.

Back in the middle of March 2019 (somewhat more than seven years ago, during the first Trump administration), my colleague and friend L.Frank Bunting posted “Taking time out from current madness to consider one woman’s brilliant writing more than 2500 years ago.”

This covered Emily Wilson’s admiring review of Anne Carson’s translation of the limited surviving work of the great ancient Greek lyric poet, If Not, Winter – Fragments of Sappho.

Then, somewhat more than three years later, in late August 2022 during what now seems the interim sanity (relatively speaking) of the Biden administration, the collective wisdom of the Counterweights Editors posted “As summer winds down there’s a Quebec election in the air (and Emily Wilson’s translation of The Odyssey on YouTube!).”

Emily Wilson — more respectful and supportive of Christopher Nolan?

There is another Quebec election in the air in the late summer of 2026. And Emily Wilson’s 2017 English translation of Homer’s original Odyssey in ancient Greek is also referred to in Ms. Wilson’s 2026 LRB review of Christopher Nolan’s new Odyssey movie:

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RANDALL WHITE. HOME AND NATIVE LAND. FERNWOOD PARK, TORONTO. FRIDAY, AUGUST 28, 2026. Here on the northwest shore of Lake Ontario (where the Indigenous Wendat “name Lacus Ontario was first recorded in 1660 by Francis Creuxius”), not far from a 17th century Seneca village, it is impossible to resist the thought that the USA USA in 2026 is in the presidential hands of a maniac, plain and simple.

And yet happily enough, in our ongoing In Search of Canadian Liberalism we the Canadian people have now fortunately landed on Prime Minister Mark Carney — former Governor of the Bank of Canada and then the Bank of England, and yet another Canadian “first among equals” with a relevant PhD. (Even if almost a quarter of us still do not believe in the good fortune.)

These also plain and simple preceding 120 words at least summarize my own feelings about and even analysis of the current moment in the politics of the Canada-US trade war, started by the second Trump administration for its own twisted reasons.

And these reasons have nothing at all obvious to do with the long-standing friendships and even (as I can personally testify) family ties between The United States and Canada (also the title of a Canadian political science textbook, first published in 2019 during the first Trump administration).

Strangely enough as well, I do continue to think that, whatever the ultimate world-history judgments about winners and losers, the Canadian future will be in one way or another enhanced by the Carney government in Ottawa’s current standing-up to the clear madness south of the border — clearly enough supported by a clear and even strong majority of the Canadian people.

At a time when no less a political pundit than Robert Reich, Bill Clinton’s labor secretary, is reprinting poems by W.B. Yeats and W.H. Auden as guides to the present, I can only return to one of my favourite lines from T.S. Eliot (from his “Gerontion” first published in 1920) : “After such knowledge, what forgiveness? Think now/History has many cunning passages, contrived corridors/And issues, deceives with whispering ambitions,/Guides us by vanities.”

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RANDALL WHITE. HOME AND NATIVE LAND. FERNWOOD PARK, TORONTO. MONDAY, AUGUST 24, 2026. My immediate reaction to how the Government of Canada has just stood up for the home team in the ongoing trade war unleashed on the true north strong and free by the increasingly wild and crazy Trump administration next door is four cheers (or more) for PM Mark Carney.

By way of quick prelude, note that Mr. Carney has also just won applause from as unlikely a pair of US observers as Anthony Scaramucci (“Carney now leads the West”) and Mia Farrow (“Mark Carney and Canada are now the ‘leaders of the ‘Free World’”).

For the moment I just want to offer some quick numbers that set in some wider perspective the no doubt big enough challenge to Canada in the madman Trump’s new 50 per cent tariffs on Canadian goods.

These numbers suggest that the Trump administration’s own claims about the impact on Canada in the latest lunacy from south of the once undefended border are at best wildly exaggerated.

According to CTV News : “Roughly 87,000 Canadian jobs could be at risk because of the United States’ new 50 per cent tariffs on Canadian goods, according to an analysis conducted by University of Calgary economics professor Trevor Tombe … The hardest-hit provinces for job losses are Ontario (36,100), Quebec (18,300) and B.C. (11,200).”

If you are or fear you might be one of the 87,000 Canadians who just might lose their their jobs in this context these numbers are no doubt seriously fearsome. And public policy must do something to soften the blow — as PM Carney and provincial premiers have acknowledged.

At the same time, according to Statistics Canada’s latest Labour Force survey there were some 21,215,000 jobs in Canada as of the end of this past July 2026. And Professor Tombe’s 87,000 jobs at risk amount to a mere 0.4% of this number.

Moreover, Ontario, Quebec, and BC are the most populous provinces in the Canadian confederation today. To say that they are also the provinces where the most jobs could be be lost (or are “at risk”) is just to say that the most jobs lost because of the United States’ new 50 per cent tariffs on Canadian goods will be in the most populous provinces. Which is hardly surprising.

Moreover, while 36,000 jobs could be at risk in Ontario eg, according to the July 2026 Labour Force survey Ontario gained some 52,000 jobs last month — even with all the earlier Trumpian measures meant to harm and humiliate the sovereign (and bilingual) Canadian confederation (whose modern history goes back some 400 years).

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RANDALL WHITE. HOME AND NATIVE LAND. FERNWOOD PARK, TORONTO. FRIDAY, AUGUST 21, 2026. Through no fault of my own or that of anyone at all close, I live in one of the three Canadian federal electoral districts (or ridings in the old school lexicon) where a byelection is taking place this coming Monday, August 31 — only 10 days away.

Judging by traditional election signage in front of houses and apartment buildings and so forth, you might be hard-pressed to know that a local federal election is just 10 days away. At the same time, from those who run sign campaigns I have learned that a lot of signs finally just means a strong well-organized sign campaign in some technical sense. — and not too much more.

(I should also confess that we have a small sign in front of our house. This is entirely the result of my TV-watching-partner’s down-on-the-ground action — with my prior agreement. In the interests of objective reporting, I will not reveal who our sign is supporting!)

Today’s Rabble Review is headlined “NDP feels momentum growing in run up to Beaches-East York by-election.” But M. Fournier at 338Canada would not be impressed His Beaches—East York numbers for August 16, 2026 put Liberals at 62% , NDP 18%, and Conservatives 15%. It will take A LOT of momentum over the next 10 days to carry the New Democrats into anything close to Liberal territory, if M. Fournier is anywhere close to the real world.

I have seen public polling numbers as well that suggest Mark Carney’s Liberals have at least some prospects of winning all three August 31 byelections. Least likely may be Chicoutimi-Le Fjord in Quebec. Here an August 15, 2026 post from Polling Canada put the Liberals at 35%, Bloc Québécois 31%, and Conservatives 26%. An August 9, 2026 Polling Canada post for the bylection in North Vancouver-Capilano put the Liberals at 54%, Conservatives 31%, NDP 10% — not quite as Liberal-likely as Beaches-East York in Toronto, but close. (And the east-end Toronto Beaches are sometimes locally critiqued as a den of “Vancouver wannabees.”)

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RANDALL WHITE, CANADIAN REPUBLIC NOTEBOOK. TORONTO. FRIDAY, AUGUST 14, 2026. Toronto’s annual “Canadian National Exhibition” (CNE) starts just a week ahead — August 21, ending Labour Day, September 7. And this is just one day before the start of Vancouver’s 2026 “Pacific National Exhibition” (PNE) — August 22–September 7.

These seasonal fairs in the air mean it’s also time to at least start waving goodbye to “August for the people and their favourite islands.” One approach currently in the news focuses on an issue of serious if still too much un-debated importance to the Canadian people, who form the real sovereign power in Canada’s “Westminster” parliamentary democracy of the 21st century.

Two recent posts on the CBC News site illustrate the current state of this particular art : First, “Supreme Court of Canada to hear case on constitutionality of requiring oath to the Crown … Decision comes after Alberta’s top court decided requiring oath for lawyers violates Constitution.” Second, “Quebec law ending mandatory oath to King faces constitutional challenge … Lawyer takes aim at 2022 law scrapping requirement for Quebec legislators.”

The general form of the Canadian “oath of allegiance” involved here“derives from that which was, and still is, taken by parliamentarians in the United Kingdom.”

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