UPDATED JULY 21 [see below]. My first reaction to the evolving long-form census issue in Canadian federal politics was stark disbelief. Noting how it has progressed hand in hand with the rising heat in this apparently hotter-than-ever-before summer, however, I have come to see it as a rational phenomenon among people suffering from increasing degrees […]

[UPDATED JULY 10, 13]. It is a sign of the strange waters Canadian federal politics are in these days that the Harper minority government’s current omnibus budget bill may be stuck in the still unreformed Senate of Canada. The Canadian Press reports: “The Tories are threatening a fall election after opposition senators stripped contentious provisions […]

TORONTO. JUNE 30, 2010. 10:30 PM ET. Everything is clearer in retrospect. And only a few days after the latest G20 congregation has left this blandly civilized city with the secret heart of a loan shark, various fresh possibilities for judging the event a failure are blowing in the summer breeze. Two possibilities deserve particular […]

TORONTO. SUNDAY, JUNE 27, 2010. 11:15 PM ET. Customary Sunday dinner guests begged off this evening. They live just outside the G20 security zone downtown, and have to dig their car out of an alleyway. They did not want to confront the too many police on the streets near their house, who often seemed to […]

TORONTO. SUNDAY, JUNE 27, 2010. 12:30 AM ET. Now that darkness has descended on the city, the mood about the G20 protest that suddenly turned violent yesterday afternoon has shifted somewhat. My own feelings, to some degree at least, have shifted somewhat too. A Canadian Press report captures key features of what I saw on […]

TORONTO. SATURDAY JUNE 26, 2010. 5 PM ET. There is so much local reporting on the G8/G20 meetings in this region of the world right now. The online edition of the Toronto Star, eg, has been running a good live blog on the hardworking journalists’ view from the streets, as it were – first in […]

[UPDATED JANUARY 31, 2011, JULY 24, 2012]. I have been asked by the editors to jot down a few quick words of au revoir to the Canadian House of Commons, which is  “preparing to rise today for its summer break”: (1) THE LATEST EKOS POLL also unveiled today shows, for cross-Canada popular vote (rounded to […]

Personally, I have always liked Michael Byers’s Liberal-NDP cease-fire proposal. But politics is the art of the possible. In Canada today the Liberals and the New Democrats are just not ready for even this limited form of vague alignment – and certainly not before the next federal election takes place, whenever that may be. In […]

I am not sure just what to think about Victoria Day – or May Two-Four or the May-long, etc  – in the year 2010. It does remain officially, I suppose, a celebration of the birthday of the so-called Queen of Canada (at least outside predominantly French-speaking Quebec). And in this respect it still reminds me […]

British election: I can’t remember a British election that has won so much attention this side of the Atlantic, in both Canada and the United States. The national results show Conservatives with 36.1% of the popular vote and 306 seats, Labour with 29.0% and 258 seats, Liberal Democrats 23.0% and only 57 seats, and Others […]