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Politics

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Updated 12/18/2019
News

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Updated 06/25/2019

21H AGO

Fighting with Trump is a Liberal strategy for a fresh election

The bromance between Donald Trump and Mark Carney is over. The president is back to jeering at the prime minister after Carney’s “hegemon” speech in Switzerland. And Liberals are back in their election comfort zone, acting as defenders of Canada against American hostility, as Brian discusses with Stuart Thomson and Tasha Kheiriddin, hosts of Postmedia’s Political Hack newsletter. It worked so well for Carney last election, they say this could be just the thing for Carney to call an election to try for a majority. But what about damage to Canada? They get into the advantages and risks, and the problem for Conservatives, who are still trying to regroup from the last time they got flattened by this drama. (Recorded January 23, 2025) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

21h ago

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55 min
JAN 19

The activist class is conspicuously quiet about Iran

Untold numbers of people demanding basic human rights have been killed by a corrupt, bigoted regime, but in the West there are no tent cities on campuses or raucous marches. As Iranian-Canadian human-rights lawyers Payam Akhavan and Kaveh Sharooz tell Brian, Western leaders, and even U.S. President Donald Trump, are proving largely ineffectual at helping the people of Iran. For now, the regime still seems to have the upper hand against a populace mostly abandoned by the international community. And while this is much wider and deeper than previous uprisings in Iran, it could end just as tragically — or worse. (Recorded January 15, 2025) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jan 19

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49 min
JAN 5

How the CBC lost its purpose

Canada once had a public broadcaster in the true sense of the word. Now we have a behemoth we pay nearly $1.5 billion a year for that almost nobody watches and doesn’t come close to serving its original purpose, as David Cayley tells Brian. Cayley, author of the new book, The CBC, was a producer there for decades. He says even the news division it prides itself on proved its inability to serve the public during the COVID pandemic, when it consciously chose to promote government narratives, blacklisted dissenting scientists and failed to ask basic questions. Amid stark audience polarization and an unprecedented media revolution, Cayley explains why the CBC needs a total rethink if it’s going to justify its continued existence. (Recorded November 27, 2025) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jan 5

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45 min
JAN 12

What Venezuelans say about Trump’s incursion isn’t what we’ve been told

Emilio Figueredo and Freddy Guevara understand better than any western analyst the Venezuelan reality, the regime of dictator Nicolas Maduro, and the aftermath of his capture by President Donald Trump. Figueredo, editor of independent Venezuelan news outlet Analitica, talks to Brian from Caracas and explains what it’s like there now, why Maduro was foiled by his reliance on Cuba, and why Trump needed to leave the Bolivarian regime in power — for now. Guevara, an exiled opposition politician once imprisoned by Maduro, tells Brian about support among Venezuelans for the military operation and why foreign complaints about Trump violating international law carry little weight there. Both describe Venezuelans’ hopes as higher than they’ve been in a long time, although freedom hasn’t come yet. (Recorded January 8, 2026) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jan 12

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59 min
07/19/2021

What a conspiracy theory cure looks like

When the pandemic first started back in early 2020, few people imagined we’d have an effective vaccine against the disease. Now we have several, and countries that are reaching high vaccination levels are seeing the disease decline. If only there was a similar treatment for COVID conspiracy theories, which continue to circulate even as the pandemic eases in some wealthy countries. Researchers say there are ways to neutralize conspiracy theories. But they’ll take time, and a lot of education. Today, in our final episode, Phil Tank of the Saskatoon Star Phoenix looks into a cure for conspiracy theories. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

07/19/2021

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23 min
12/23/2025

How some migrant farm workers wind up exploited under the Temporary Foreign Worker program

Canada’s agriculture industry employs tens of thousands of temporary foreign workers to help pick the produce that winds up on your plate. While many see this as a lifeline, a way to earn money to send to families back home, there are concerns the system is set up to exploit, and in some cases, abuse them. Robert Cribb, founder and director of the Investigative Journalism Bureau, joins host Dave Breakenridge to discuss the conditions under which these migrants work, and how the system designed to help bring them here for employment may actually be setting them up for harm. Further reading: 'This is the new slavery': Migrant farm workers underpaid, abused and injured Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

12/23/2025

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29 min
11/04/2025

Food safety fail: The hidden risks in Alberta restaurants

Do you really know how safe your restaurant meal is? MacEwan University Associate Professor Steve Lillebuen joins Dave Breakenridge to uncover what an investigation found in Edmonton kitchens and what needs to change in food safety. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

11/04/2025

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20 min
11/11/2019

Gangs of Montreal: Kings of coke

Montreal's underworld has gotten rich — very rich — from sneaking cocaine into the city by car, by air, by boat, and inside people, packages and shipping containers. In this episode we go back to the 1980s, when cocaine really took off in Montreal. Montreal's main criminal gangs — the Rizzuto-led Montreal Mafia, the Hells Angels biker gang and the West End gang — worked together to bring immense amounts of cocaine into the city. It's a partnership that lasted for years. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

11/11/2019

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22 min
11/04/2019

Gangs of Montreal: How it all began

It was pure coincidence but the Hells Angels opened their first Canadian chapter in Quebec just seven weeks before Nicolo Rizzuto took control of the Montreal Mafia. Those events in 1977-78 kickstarted a violent decades-long struggle to control the criminal underworld in Montreal. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

11/04/2019

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22 min
06/02/2025

Carney projects calm but he’s facing serious trouble

With the King opening Parliament, and a disciplined agenda, the prime minister modelled a poised and assured break from his unserious predecessor while sending a message to the world about Canadian sovereignty. That’s the verdict of Postmedia’s politics columnist John Ivison and parliamentary bureau chief Stuart Thomson, who join Brian to discuss the first week of Mark Carney’s re-elected government. Now, the easy part is over. Despite promises to cut spending, new estimates show bureaucracy out of control. President Trump has revived his “51st state” ultimatum, using missile defence as a cudgel. And provincial premiers are circling with demands in advance of a first ministers’ meeting. The panel runs through all the hard stuff for Carney that’s just getting started. (Recorded May 30, 2025) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

06/02/2025

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55 min

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