Today's News: Poilievre Put-downs, Responding to Wexit, China gives Trump the finger, and a Hantavirus Cruise Ship Update

Poilievre Put-downs

I think I need to start a regular feature about the comments and cartoons I see on our opposition leader Pierre Poilievre. I must admit, I seldom actually follow much of what he talks about, so I rely on these social media zingers to keep up with what he is doing. Enjoy!

From MP Peter Schiefke:

@globalnews.ca

Liberal MP turns to poetry to poke at Pierre Poilievre in House of Commons

♬ original sound - Globalnews.ca

🔴 😂 😂 😂 😂 Could someone please tell this one that the next election is in 2029.

- Fun Tom

Read on Substack

Lego Poilievre. Take note, Liberal digital strategists.

- Scott Robertson

Read on Substack

He keeps showing up with awful people:

This is all #propaganda and #foreign #interference in our politics by #American #MAGA. And what #Canadians are #supporting these #farright #Trump #MAGATS #Poilievre #Smith open.substack.com/pub/charliea...

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— Nandana (@nandanainthegarden.bsky.social) May 7, 2026 at 9:22 PM

So many people and institutions are out to make Pierre Poilievre fail, I expect there's a searchlight shining over Ottawa tonight, with a truck instead of a bat symbol in it, calling for support. Pierre, please, we all know you won't change, you can't change. #CdnPoli 🇨🇦

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— Doug Johnson 🇨🇦 (@smikooman.bsky.social) May 7, 2026 at 6:47 PM

The disgusting thing about Poilievre isn't his stupidity, it's his belief that everyone else is stupid.

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— Emmett Macfarlane 🇨🇦 (@emmettmacfarlane.com) May 3, 2026 at 11:28 AM

Poilievre: “Some people accuse me of being a fighter…” And the crowd goes mild. His numbers are dropping, even inside his own party, yet his strategy is still: blame Trudeau, rage endlessly, and vote against grocery transparency while pretending to fight grocery prices. Photo credit: CBC

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— Save the CBC 🇨🇦✌️ (@savethecbc.bsky.social) May 7, 2026 at 5:49 PM

Trump militant Mike Pompeo is getting the red carpet treatment from Canada's right wing. Along with Pete Hoekstra. They will be joined by Poilievre and Danielle Smith at a conference in Ottawa. We need to pay attention to the MAGA attempt to undermine our country. youtu.be/7Ghl-XJBvvk?...

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— Charlie Angus (@charlieangus104.bsky.social) May 7, 2026 at 6:28 AM

We see photo after photo too:

Pierre Poilievre, working hard to expand the Conservative Party base at the Canada Strong and Free Network conference in Ottawa. Conference vision: "It is time to step into the arena with courage, big ideas for the future and an unshakeable commitment to our principles." #CdnPoli 🇨🇦

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— Doug Johnson 🇨🇦 (@smikooman.bsky.social) May 7, 2026 at 6:33 PM

And his greatest hit:

Here's some more news that we didn't need:

The Trump administration has seized $120M USD owned by the Canadian pension fund earmarked for a wind development — and demanding the pension-backed company invest in fossil fuels instead.

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— Canada's National Observer (@nationalobserver.com) May 7, 2026 at 11:56 AM

Can't wait to see how Poilievre tries to make this not really matter. 🤪

— BernardoVerda 🤔 (@bernardoverda.bsky.social) May 7, 2026 at 4:54 PM

Responding to Wexit 

Speaking of Alberta separatism - AKA #Wexit - this is a fascinating interview:

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In a substack post in early April, Arlene Dickenson describes what Alberta means to her. I think it gives us all something to use when we are replying to Wexit talk:

... Alberta isn't like the other provinces and I mean that as the highest compliment. I've had homes in four of our nation's provinces and offices in six of them, so I think I can compare. All of our provinces and territories are beautiful and unique. But there's a directness here, a refusal to apologize for ambition or effort and a faith in individual initiative that runs so deep it feels geological.
We sit on the energy that's kept this country warm and moving for a century. Our agriculture feeds people around the globe who’ll never know who we are. Our entrepreneurs have built industries from open fields and stubborn optimism. Our small towns have produced doctors, engineers, teachers, and people who went out and served and contributed to the world beyond our borders. This isn't a place that needs to be explained or justified. It's a place that simply produces.
That heritage has given us something rare which is a legitimate claim to be taken seriously by the rest of Canada. But that claim is only as strong as the integrity with which we make it. And right now, I worry that we're borrowing the wrong language from the wrong neighbours to make it. We've moved from feeling like victims of Ottawa to feeling a moral superiority over the rest of the country, as if we alone pay for everything Canada enjoys. Neither are right or who we are.
Something's been seeping across the border that isn't oil, grain or trade. It's a particular kind of politics that's loud, binary, contemptuous of nuance and it's been settling into our public conversation like smoke into curtains. You can smell it, and it's not pleasant.
The language of American grievance hasn't ever belonged to us....
When I hear Albertans use the phrases, the tones, the entire emotional register of the partisan politics imported from the south, I feel something I can only describe as grief. Because it doesn't fit and it's not us. And more importantly, it doesn't help us at all. The American experiment is struggling under the weight of that kind of politics right now. Why on earth would we import it?...

Tonight's At Issue panel touched on the separatism issue as well. Andrew Coyne was particularly vivid.
 

TL,DW (too long, didn't watch) They talk about possibilities for Alberta pipelines, and whether this could quell Wexit. Coyne makes a good point that holding separation referendums, whether in Quebec or in Alberta, are a "mug's game"-a pointless gamble- that is trying to hold the country by its throat. 

Then they chat about whether governments should subsidize industries like the Honda EV battery plant- as though there could ever be a Canadian government that wouldn't support our major industries. Finally, they talk about whether teenagers should be banned from social media. I believe this is another unworkable idea because younger teens from grade 7 up all have to use their phones today for everything from homework assignments to calling for Ubers from basketball practices.

The Alberta voter data leak story is getting bigger by the day. Former premier Jason Kenney has jumped into the story now:

Former Alberta premier Jason Kenney is not happy with the separatists.

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— FuzzyWuzzy in Toronto🇨🇦 (@fuzzywuzzyto.bsky.social) May 5, 2026 at 4:45 PM

Jason Kenney: "There's no doubt they chose my name very deliberately and to share my personal information with that particular crowd I think almost constitutes a kind of incitement."

- Scott Robertson

Read on Substack

Following up on Scrimshaw's point yesterday, it may be true that the Alberta separatists have shot themselves in the foot, not just by stealing the voter data, but also taking such a cavalier attitude toward the private data of the Albertans they are trying to recruit to their cause.

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In his Globe and Mail column, Andrew Coyne connects the dots: (gift link)

...The scandal – which long predates the present farce – is that we ever allowed the idea to take root that the fate of the entire country could be decided by the vote of half the population in one province – that a bunch of people could help themselves to the territory of Canada, merely by holding a vote on it. Or, even worse, could threaten to do so, not because that is what they sincerely desired, but as a means of blackmailing their fellow Canadians.
... because of this abject policy of national self-negation, this willingness to legitimize the illegitimate, to tolerate what is intolerable under the constitutions of virtually every other democratic country on Earth, we now face the prospect of secession referendums in not one but two provinces, Alberta and Quebec (for the third time!), more or less simultaneously.
.... to engage in all this self-destructive nonsense at the precise moment when the President of the United States is threatening to annex the country, backed by overtures to the separatists in at least one province as part of an explicit divide-and-conquer strategy – I don’t think scandal is even the word.

China gives Trump the finger

In his Rest Of The World Report on Thursday night, Rudy Martinez talks about what China is now doing to break US sanctions on Iranian Oil. He concludes:

...China has told its companies to ignore US sanctions. The legal instrument it used to do so allows Chinese firms to sue anyone who complies with American law. Trump arrives in Beijing in seven days needing a successful summit. China is negotiating from a position of strength on Iran, on trade, and now on the sanctions architecture that underpins US foreign policy globally. The war that began February 28 has not only disrupted global energy markets — it has given America’s principal strategic rival the opportunity, the justification, and the legal framework to openly defy American economic power. That is the story underneath the story.

Trump is supposed to go to China in just seven days. Personally, I think he's going to find an excuse to cancel his trip. Also because he doesn't have the stamina anymore to make that long a trip.

Why are both of Trump's hands covered in makeup? This new bruising comes as Trump made an unscheduled visit to the "dentist" last weekend, which fueled even more speculation and questions surrounding his health. @sarahmatthews1.bsky.social reacts.

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— The Bulwark (@thebulwark.com) May 6, 2026 at 5:45 PM

Hantavirus Cruise Ship Update

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And a WHO update thread from epidemiologist @titanjibk. Here are a few of her posts:

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