Western Context

The Canadian economy slumps due to coronavirus and protests, Alberta’s education plan cuts down on admin costs, and a blockade outside John Horgan’s home overshadows the BC budget. Also, we look at the foreign funded origins of the debilitating protests.

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Duration: 47:16
Hosts: Shane and Patrick

• Canada’s no good, very bad fourth quarter might be even worse than we expected
• Support us on Patreon
• Sweeping change aims to drive dollars to Alberta classrooms, while cutting administrative costs
• Canada’s latest blockade? It’s at the end of B.C. Premier John Horgan’s driveway
• Who are the protesters? ‘There’s a lot of people that aren’t from these communities, that aren’t Aboriginal’
• Word of the Week: Bottleneck

Trudeau shuffles his cabinet and creates a border security minister, many provinces now oppose Trudeau’s carbon tax, and Alberta’s NDP is equalizing and diversifying K-4 education. Also, Vancouver’s False Creek is teeming with raw sewage and E coli.

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Duration: 40:49
Hosts: Shane and Patrick

• Trudeau cabinet shuffle brings new faces, several changes for run-up to 2019 campaign
• Trudeau’s carbon tax looks pretty much dead now that most provinces are out
• Support us on Patreon
• In new social studies curriculum, there’s no such things as Albertans
• Call for clean swimming water in Vancouver’s False Creek falls flat
• Word of the Week: Sanitary

In Alberta clickbait dominates a headline about UCP education policy, the BC NDP flip-flop and conduct dozens of partisan appointments, the media questions the accuracy of polling, and an acquitted ISIS fan fights to stay in Canada. Should he be able to?

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Duration: 41:34
Hosts: Shane and Patrick

• Alberta Premier Rachel Notley says United Conservatives are determined to bring harm to gay children
• (BC) NDP government stacks jobs with partisan insiders
• ANALYSIS: Poll finds Scheer’s Tories ahead of Trudeau’s Liberals but can we believe it?
• Acquitted ISIS supporter fights to stay in Canada
• Word of the Week: Acquit

The long Conservative leadership race is finally over with a surprise victor: Andrew Scheer! Also, reforming the social studies curriculum in Alberta, continued uncertainty in BC, and foreign campaigning and financing in the 2015 federal election.

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Duration: 45:08
Hosts: Shane and Patrick

• Andrew Scheer wins Conservative Party of Canada Leadership race
• New Social Studies curriculum pushes social change, not history
• BC Liberals denied majority as final election count leaves government in danger
• Andrew Weaver sought a $30,000 big money donation from a member of a Vancouver development company
• New report alleges outside influence in Canada’s 2015 federal election
• Word of the Week: Unity

The BC NDP is promising to spend without first raising revenue. A Calgary public school confiscates banana bread? Disappointment regarding the Northern Gateway pipeline. And the refugee situation on our southern border has changed and not for the better!

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Duration: 37:45
Hosts: Shane and Patrick

• Horgan set to miraculously spend big — and balance the books
• Education minister weighs in after boy banished from CBE class over banana bread
• ‘We are very disappointed’: Loss of Northern Gateway devastating for many First Nations, chiefs say
• Border services officer assaulted by asylum seeker detained for criminal past: Nearly half of recent illegal border crossers have criminal records, CBSA union says
• Word of the Week: Border