Public broadcasters exist in many democracies. Britain has the BBC. The United States has PBS and NPR. Canada has the CBC. The idea behind these institutions is simple: provide journalism that is independent of corporate interests and serves the public good. But there’s an unavoidable tension built into that model.

Fahrenheit 11/9, Michael Moore’s controversial political documentary, is a striking reminder of how public perception can be shaped, manipulated, and ultimately overturned.

Prime Minister Mark Carney's plan allows for the import of up to 49,000 Chinese electric vehicles (EVs) into Canada at a reduced tariff rate of 6.1%, down from 100%. This agreement allegedly is aimed at making EVs cheaper to buy and maybe foster China to manufacture some cars locally.

When people read the news online or in their morning paper, they often don’t realize how much of that information comes from a single source: The Canadian Press (CP). It’s one of the country’s most important news agencies, but it’s also a privately held corporation. So the natural question is: who does it really serve—its owners or the Canadian public?

I’ve been thinking a lot about what Canadians should want in a Prime Minister, and I keep coming back to one simple quality that often gets overlooked: the ability to speak plainly.

Not “plain” as in unsophisticated, but plain as in clear. Direct. Understandable. A leader should be able to explain what they believe, what they intend to do, and how it will affect everyday people. If someone is asking for your vote, you shouldn’t need to interpret, decode, or guess what they meant.

Here are, thanks to the Whitehouse, 57 examples of madness in the minds of Americans who call themselves progressives. President Donald Trump promised he would deal with the problems created by the ridiculous open border policy implemented by his predecessor, Joe Biden. He is succeeding in spite of these morons fighting him at every turn with irrational words and thoughts.

The once great State of Minnesota is now a model that Democrats, at least those who accept socialist and woke ideology, would like to use for the entire United States of America.

Minnesota, like the canary in the coal mine, is an early warning for the majority of Americans who love the country.

The idea that life changing pronouncements could be made, about a topic as complex as Earth’s climate, because a small group of people agreed that “the science” was settled. This was the excuse for spending trillions, passing intrusive laws and regulations and stifling any alternative scientific evidence.

Pinocchio’s nose would be a nice lie detector. No, detecting lies is complicated. Liars’ give themselves away by gestures, phrases, small shifts in behaviour, language, and emotion that don’t quite line up. Liars offer answers that are strangely vague or overly detailed. Their stories change slightly when retold. They may dodge direct questions. Saying “to be honest” or “as far as I know” signal distancing, especially when they appear suddenly. Long pauses before simple answers hint at obfuscation rather than truth.

Actors apologize for being racists because they laughed at an inappropriate joke about a black person or didn’t do anything when someone said something insulting about a black person.

These are personal situations we have all faced and we deal with them in our own way.

Geoffrey Hinton, the "Godfather of AI," explores the fascinating parallels between artificial and biological intelligence. This lecture delves into neural networks, comparing their learning processes to biological brains. Hinton examines how AI learns from biological intelligence and its potential to surpass human capabilities.

According to the Canadian Election Study, men were more inclined to vote Conservative, while women leaned towards the Liberals and NDP.

President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963. I was 13 at the time. My family had just moved to a new city, and I had just started high school.

Everything in my world felt new and unsettled — new streets, new faces, new routines, and that strange feeling you get when you’re trying to find your place in a place that doesn’t yet feel like yours.

Then history shattered all of it.

The Internet Archive crawls the public internet to collect and archive web pages. Over the years it has created a permanent digital library. Anyone with internet access can perform a search of its content. When you enter a website URL, IA returns what it has found for that site.

Philip Morris International (PMI) has launched a global campaign promising “a future without cigarettes.” At first glance, it sounds like a radical transformation — a tobacco company vowing to end cigarette sales. But does the evidence match the promise? Apparently the company promises a cigarette free world by 2030. Wouldn’t the billions of people addicted to nicotine rejoice. Surely this is too good to be true.

An Angus Reid poll on PM Mark Carney’s first five “national interest” projects saw media headlines frame the public reaction as “mixed reviews.” The phrase sounds neutral, almost reassuring — as if Canadians are cautiously on board.

But a deeper reading of both the poll and the article itself tells a very different story. What’s presented as balance is, in reality, public ambivalence, regional division, and dissatisfaction on the government’s most pressing files.

CBC is a Crown Corporation and Canada’s national public broadcaster. It has a huge budget largely paid for by taxpayers. Most people who watch CBC News believe it is accurate and objective. Let’s see if this is true. According to CBC’s page devoted to corrections.

 CBC News is committed to transparency and accountability to our audience whenever we need to correct or clarify our journalism.

Corrections and clarifications are noted directly on all digital posts.

Updates that significantly change the audience's understanding of a report on any platform are logged on this page.

Government-wide financial statements receive clean audit opinions. Yet the federal public service has systemic weaknesses in financial management and control. Could that be true? You better believe it’s true. Let’s take a look at some examples of mismanagement.

In Canada, individual Elected Members (MPs) and appointed Senators have responsibility for legislating in the national interest, upholding democratic values, and protecting the rights and freedoms of all citizens.

Is that the case?

Canadians vote for local Members of Parliament. That’s Parliamentary Democracy. Yet once Parliament is formed, real power quickly concentrates in the hands of the Prime Minister and his Cabinet.

This creates a paradox. On paper, Parliament is supreme. In practice, the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) sets the agenda, appoints key officials, and directs the Cabinet. Strong party discipline means government MPs almost always vote with their leader, reinforcing the centralization of power.

According to the Icelandic Met Office:

While few impacts have been reported, numerous studies demonstrate that unusually high temperatures early in the year can have significant impacts on local ecosystems. These ecosystems, adapted to very cold climates, are sensitive to temperature shifts, and disruptions to their delicate balance can lead to consequences not only for the ecosystems themselves, but also for the communities that depend on them.

Pierre Poilievre’s Canada First Economic Action Plan will supercharge the Canadian economy. His goal is to get major projects built, unlock our resources, and start selling Canadian energy to the world again, bringing home good jobs and billions of dollars in lost investment, and putting Canada First–For a Change.

The Associated Press claims it is: independent, factual, most trusted source of fast, accurate, unbiased news, the essential provider to the news business.

The headline from a March 21, 2025 article by Rob Gillies in the Associated Press reads: Canada’s new prime minister is triggering an election campaign this weekend. Here’s what to know.

In 57 BCE, the Roman Acta Diurna was a type of daily gazette, with official business and matters of public interest. It was written on stone and metal and posted in public places. In a sense, the Acta Diurna was the prototype of the modern newspaper. Centuries later, News was written by hand on paper. Eventually Johannes Gutenberg’s printing press led to production of newspapers for mass distribution.

When a government uses information as a tool to instil fear—limiting free speech, restricting free association, and suppressing independent thought—it’s dangerously close to totalitarianism. In a healthy democracy, governments should empower their citizens with accurate, unbiased, and truthful information. Transparency fosters trust, allowing citizens to make informed decisions about their lives and their country. However, when fear replaces truth, it is the responsibility of citizens to take action.

Back in the day, I accepted whatever I heard from the TV, newspapers, school, and government without a second thought. But things have changed drastically since then. I trusted these institutions implicitly, believing they were looking out for the best interests of society and delivering unbiased information. Doveryai, No Proveryai, or as President Ronald Reagan said during his disarmament talks with Russia, TRUST, BUT VERIFY.

I’m Canadian, but Italian by birth. My whole working life has been spent as an employee of a government agency, first as a project engineer and finally as a policy analyst. I’m now retired and living in rural Ontario with my wife of fifty years. In 1949 George Orwell published his final novel, 1984, about a dystopian world where the government told people that war was peace, freedom was slavery, love was hate, and ignorance was strength.

This Blog is my effort to look at what’s happening in the world for signs that we are heading towards a world resembling 1984.