Today's News: International Women's Day, some good Canadian stuff, latest on the US/Israel War, and Paralympics Catch-up

Sunday was International Women's Day - enjoy these:

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Sunday Funday: Paralympics are underway! Plus this week's funny posts and stories, Carney Hat Trick, Moar Epstein Files, TrumpWatch, Animal Crackers

Paralympics are underway!

The Paralympics have begun and Canada has 50 athletes attending. Above is a photo of Canada's team.

Alpine skier Kalle Eriksson and guide Sierra Smith take silver


Natalie Wilkie takes silver in biathlon


Kurt Oatway wins bronze in downhill sit-skiing

Canadians to Carney "Hell No, We Won't Go"

So the US and Israel have been at war with Iran for a week now. How's it going?

Well, first of all, they say history doesn't repeat itself but sometimes it rhymes. I'm hearing a rhyming now -- "hell no, we won't go" was what the young men of America told Johnson and Nixon about Vietnam.

Now Carney has found himself having to say again himself, repeatedly, Hell No We Won't Go - and Canadians have been saying that repeatedly to him, too:

CARNEY: "We have not received any request for such assistance [from Gulf states] ... We're not engaged in the conflict. We do not intend to engage. What we are doing is dealing with the consequences of the conflict … I don't necessarily anticipate those requests."

- Scott Robertson

Read on Substack

Will we stay or will we go? A roundup of comments about whether Canada has a role in the US/Israel war against Iran

So yesterday in Australia, Carney seemed to say that he wasn't ruling out Canada military in the US/Israel war with Iran. 

Everyone yesterday thought that was just a mistaken phrasing. Today I'm not so sure.

Here's what he said:

Speaking in Australia, Carney said he would “never categorically rule out” Canadian military involvement in defending allies from Iran, but added it’s distinct from offensive actions being taken by the US/Israel. “We will always stand by and defend our allies when called upon”

— Brian Platt (@brianplatt.bsky.social) March 4, 2026 at 7:35 PM

“There’s a distinction between the offensive actions that were taken, and are being taken, by the United States and Israel…We’re not party to those actions. But we will always defend Canadians. We will always stand by and defend our allies when called upon.” www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

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— Brian Platt (@brianplatt.bsky.social) March 4, 2026 at 9:28 PM

Today's News: Carney talks to Australia, and Canadians are listening

With Carney traveling make friends and influence more trade agreements, I have seen several good comments and interviews that I want to share.

And yes, there was an f-bomb too.

 First, in the Toronto Star, columnist Steve Paikin interviews David Frum for this article: David Frum on Trump’s Iran attack and why Carney’s Canada must be more ‘cold-blooded’ than ever before (gift link). Here is the section of the interview on Frum's observations about Carney (emphasis mine):

...Prime Minister Mark Carney, very quickly out of the gate, endorsed this military action. Should he have?
This is a complicated question. I don’t say this as a value judgment, just as an empirical matter, but with the radicalism of the change in foreign policy that Carney has brought, Carney is the least Pearsonian prime minister in Canadian history.
The Carney view is, while Canada spent much of its existence as a nation under the protection of the superpower of the day — first Great Britain, then the United States — under that protection, Canadians never had to worry much about their own security. That was somebody else’s job. So Canadian foreign policy could focus on values.
Carney is now saying, Canada has lost its superpower protector, for the first time since 1867. And in that world, Canada must act in a much more cold-blooded and amoral way. And that’s why it must forgive India for committing assassinations on Canadian soil. It must forgive China for interfering in Canadian elections and brutalizing Chinese Canadians on Canadian soil. And it must accept the American intervention in Iran, because those are all things that are important to those much greater powers, and Canada needs to navigate between India, China, and the United States in a world in which Canadian security is much less secure than it ever has been before, and there’s no room in this complicated equation for Pearsonian talk. Canada is out of that business forever.
That seems to be what he’s saying, and it’s very radical.
Let’s pivot to what you see happening on Canadian-American relations. A lot of our politicians are trying very hard to influence this administration, everything from Premier Doug Ford’s commercials featuring former president Ronald Reagan, to Conservative MP Jamil Jivani visiting his old friend the vice-president JD Vance. Is there any evidence that any of that is working?
Well, the fact that it doesn’t work doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it.
Canadians are not wrong to use the tried-and-true methods first. Politics is extremely hard, and the fact that things don’t work doesn’t mean you are foolish to try them. It’s worth the effort.
And it was also worth taking the measure of how much of Trump’s hostility to Canada was just bluster, and how much of it was settled implacable malice. I think it’s the latter.
And it has taken time for Canadians to accept that that could be true, because it’s so different. It’s so shocking. Canada has a whole history that goes back to the meeting between Franklin Roosevelt and Mackenzie King at Ogdensburg (New York) in the ‘30s, where Roosevelt said an attack on Canadian territory will be (considered) an attack on the United States. It’s America’s first permanent security guarantee to any country. And now that logic has changed, and it’s hard to adjust.
Many people up here wonder whether we should be expending so much effort on a renewed trade agreement with the U.S., because they fear even if he signs it, Trump won’t adhere to it anyway. What’s your view?
As scary and threatening as Trump is, he has one thing in common with every other previous president, which is, he starts with a bucket of minutes, and every day he spends the minutes, and they never return. And as you spend the minutes, the president almost always gets weaker.
So, the longer Canada postpones agreements with Trump, the better Canada will do.

Now Carney is in Australia - here are some of the best interviews and speeches.
First, that f-bomb -- which in the clips now is barely heard. Darn it!:

In which Mark Carney drops the F bomb while talking about having drank too much wine 😅 (they muted it out for youtube of course *eye roll* it was more of that whispered fuck as opposed to loud dropping it) www.youtube.com/shorts/Z6vWP...

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— Krista D. Ball: Canada's Mean Potato (@kristadb1.bsky.social) March 4, 2026 at 2:07 PM

Today's News: Carney walks it back, while Poilievre talks about Robin Hood

Carney walked it back today:

- #Francesk🇨🇦

Read on Substack

I like this statement considerably better than his first https://www.pm.gc.ca/en/news/statements/2026/03/03/statement-prime-minister-carney-evolving-situation-middle-east

- Black Cloud Six

Read on Substack

Today's News: So Far, So Good? I don't think so.

Now its Monday night, two days into the US/Israel War with Iran, and its quite clear that the United States doesn't know what it is doing, why it is doing it, or when it can ever stop.

Sunday and today, we saw absolute clown shows across the US government:

So far we’ve heard 12 different primary reasons for the war, 7 different main objectives, and 5 different exit strategies.

— Ron Filipkowski (@ronfilipkowski.bsky.social) March 2, 2026 at 3:12 PM

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— George Conway ⚖️🇺🇸 (@gtconway.bsky.social) March 2, 2026 at 7:37 AM

The glibness. The indifference. The carelessness. The utter lack of planning for a war against a country of 90M. The sickness of a man who acts on whim that will kill thousands not hundreds. The horror of a regime that enables this sickness. The broken body politic that votes in such malignancy.

— Steven Beschloss (@stevenbeschloss.bsky.social) March 2, 2026 at 7:39 PM

Monday Funday: a day late and a dollar short this week

Just the usual batch of funny stuff for this week - enjoy!

In happy political news, the Green Party unexpectedly but decisively won a byelection in northern England:

For Europeans looking in: - The Greens are the only party in England advocating a new EU referendum. - Pro brexit Labour lost. - Pro brexit, anti ECHR and right wing Reform party lost. This might be a big moment in Britain - turning away from the far right.

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— GylesNaMopaleen (@gylesnamopaleen.bsky.social) February 27, 2026 at 12:14 AM

Now there is hope! It's no longer a choice between grim and grimmer. We can vote for who we want and win. Anywhere. It's just one constituency, but the Green victory in Gorton and Denton is an electric shock to our political system.

— George Monbiot (@georgemonbiot.bsky.social) February 27, 2026 at 1:33 AM

Today's News: America and Israel start a war with Iran "I expect this war will turn out to be just as inept, corrupt and half-assed as everything else Trump does"

James Lucas 

Look at this fascinating map, showing the great variety and complexity of regional rug patterns in Iran -- how many centuries of organized culture does it take for a people to develop such a sophisticated, distinctive and unique art? Iran has been an organized country for 3,000 years, with a population of 93 million. 

I think Trump and Hegseth and Vance and Rubio and Gabbard thought America could quickly bomb Iran into cowering submission. Because wasn't it easy to send a troop of soldiers into Venezuela to pick up Maduro and to order a few Navy ships to blockade Cuba.

But Iran has a military that can fight back.

So I expect this war will turn out to be just as inept, corrupt and half-assed as everything else Trump does.

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The Ones Who Walk Away

illustration from Sam Woolfe

So tonight I was reading some Rodger Sherman posts about sports - one of the American journalists I follow because of his wide sports knowledge - and his last Olympic newsletter was mentioned. People liked this part especially:

But you know, I just couldn't accept this statement.

Here we go again -- another Poilievre re-set

Here we go again. Another Poilievre "re-set" is underway.

This time, he's Serious!!! Calm!!! Statesman-like!!! Thoughtful!!!
The occasion was a speech in Toronto to the Economic Club of Canada on Thursday. 

The At Issue panel starts talking about it at the 8:20 mark:

TLDW -
Raj: "good speech, good politics...need to focus on the relationship but this too shall pass. We need to use our leverage... Mark Carney has failed to live up to his promises..."
Hebert: "a lot of Canadians have made up their minds about Poilievre... but its good news about not giving away the country. He's playing the long game, that I'm a serious person, going on trips outside the country..."
Coyne: "it depends on the follow-up...it was a change in tone, it was statesman-like after a week of demagoguery on the refugee file...more emphasis on getting successful trade negotiations...he's overestimating our trade advantages..."

Today's News: SOTU follow-ups, #ETTD, Epstein Scalp-watch, and the war in Ukraine plus other wars

State of the Union Follow-ups

I found some good posts today about that SOTU:

PM Carney about the State of Union address: “I didn’t watch it.” 😂🤣😅 I love this guy 😅🤣

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— 🍁🇨🇦Team Canada Forever🇨🇦🍁 (@teamcanadaforever.bsky.social) February 25, 2026 at 6:50 PM

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Definitely the first State of the Union where the president talked about the military killing unarmed fishermen as a laugh line

— Tom Scocca (@tomscocca.bsky.social) February 24, 2026 at 9:44 PM

"Holy shit, did WE ever make the right decision" - The US Women's Hockey Team

— The Daily Show (@thedailyshow.com) February 24, 2026 at 10:01 PM

Today's News: Playing politics against refugees in Canada, the State of the Union and the state of the NHL

Poilievre and the Conservatives have apparently decided their fortunes could improve if they can convince Canadians to play politics against refugees:

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We’re back to the racist and MAGA scapegoating of immigrants and asylum seekers for the failing healthcare systems. #QP

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) February 24, 2026 at 1:34 PM

Today's News: Some interesting stuff that isn't politics, plus Olympic Wrap-up

The State of the Union is tomorrow and we do NOT plan to watch even a single moment.
In fact, I am mostly "politicked-out" for now. So I thought tonight it would be interesting to sample a wider range of interesting stuff.

Just as Cory Doctorow invented "enshittification" to describe the inevitable decline of social media, so Ryan Broderick has invented "pre-deplatformed" to describe the new generation's intention to reject social media restrictions of artistic guerilla creativity.
At Garbage Day, Broderick writes The only taboo left is copyright infringement The Future Of Media Is Pre-Deplatformed

....if everything is just attention now, and attention is completely commodified by algorithmic tech platforms, how can you push back against that? Well, I am slowly coming around to a theory on the new cool: You have to essentially pre-deplatform yourself.
Culture right now is determined not by human teams of editors and producers picking and choosing what youth culture gets the spotlight, but, instead, by the unthinking algorithms that power YouTube and TikTok. Which means the only things that have the level of scarcity and danger required to be seen as cool by young people will, slowly, but surely, be whatever is unacceptable on those platforms.
... But politics, left or right, is actually not actually the most subversive thing you can do right now. It’s copyright infringement.
In 2022, filmmaker Vera Drew created a movie called The People’s Joker, which turned the story of The Joker from Batman into a trans allegory. Drew received a cease and desist from Warner Bros. and held guerilla screenings of the film until the rights were worked out. And this trend, of filmmakers using the corpse of the theater system to bypass the world of algorithms, has only continued. The 2022 film Hundreds Of Beavers had a similar renegade quality to how it was screened. Hell, even Taylor Swift was savvy enough to screen the Eras Tour concert in theaters directly through AMC. And you could argue that’s what YouTuber Mark “Markiplier” Fischbach just did with Iron Lung, which bypassed the studio system entirely and caused such a stir in Hollywood its massive ticket sales were removed from box office charts.
In fact, just this week, filmmaker Matt Johnson released Nirvanna The Band The Show The Movie. It had the biggest opening ever for a live-action Canadian film and not only is the film itself a massive copyright rats nest, but the web series it’s based on is completely illegal to watch on streaming platforms currently. Johnson, at a screening I attended last week, said he was excited to find out if they were going to get sued once the film debuted this week. (They haven’t yet, it seems.)
... The culture that feels the most dangerous, and, thus, exciting to young people, will be what you can’t see online. And the most dangerous thing for platforms is not racist garbage. It’s unmonetizeable content. The “metric” that will matter most going forward will not be the numbers at the bottom of a post or video, but the human beings in a room that left their house to experience something. Which, of course, will be filmed and put back online. You can’t escape the matrix entirely.

Broderick follows up with a related piece this week An endless feed of celebrities eating chicken wings.
Both articles are worth reading.

Sunday Funday: Olympics Catch-Up, this week's funny posts, plus Carney Hat-trick, Epstein Scalp-watch, TrumpWatch, Animal Crackers

Olympic Catch-up
Hey everyone, if you google "olympics" you can watch Nazgul run across the bottom of your screen!

The Olympics are almost over -- Canada's Day 15 results here. For what is coming up on Day 16, click here.

Canada now has 19 medals at the Olympics after this Ivanie Blondin silver. And with guaranteed medals in curling and hockey, Canada will surpass 20 medals at the Winter Olympics once again. It’s a streak that started 20 years ago in Italy. And continues.

— Devin Heroux (@devinheroux.bsky.social) February 21, 2026 at 10:43 AM