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Good Saturday morning and welcome to the latest edition of The Buzz. It’s Remembrance Day and here’s what I’m remembering:
A couple of years ago I was driving with my wife and son along what in Scotland is called the NC 500, the North Coast 500, a scenic route around the northern coast of the country. We’d stopped near the community of Invergordon as we passed a cemetery that had a small plaque posted on the outer fence stating there were “Commonwealth War Graves” included on the grounds.
Having toured battlefield cemeteries across Europe over the years, I’ve found them to be learning moments and rarely pass them by. So, in we went. It was a classic, traditional graveyard one finds in the United Kingdom, with weather beaten markers spanning more than a few centuries. At first, I couldn’t see any distinctive war graves. But then as I rounded the end of one row, I was suddenly confronted with thirteen stone markers clearly set aside as war graves. And in front of eleven of those graves were small Canadian flags planted in the Scottish soil.
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The engravings on the stones told part of the story. All had died on the same night - August 15th, 1944. The eleven Canadians were all members of the RCAF, mostly young men in their twenties. It must have been a horrific wartime plane crash. Beyond their names and ranks, the cemetery didn’t offer any more facts about the crew or the incident. Had they been shot down? Had they crashed on landing? Just what had happened? Once I got to my computer, I went to work on finding out more. The Canadian military, through the Defence Department, offers up an online service that was able to answer some of the questions, and search engines supplied the rest.
The men had all been on one aircraft, a Short 25 Sunderland flying boat. “Short”, named after the manufacturer, actually left the wrong impression because the Sunderland was anything but small. It was in fact quite large, carrying a regular crew of at least ten. It was a marvel of war machinery, loaded with machine guns to fend off German fighters. Nazi pilots nicknamed it the “Porcupine” for all those gun barrels sticking out. But it was also loaded with naval mines, depth charges and conventional “drop bombs” for its primary target -- German U-Boats. U-Boats by that time in the war had proven quite vulnerable from attack from the air and were suffering heavy losses.
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On that August night in 1944, the Sunderland was combining training exercises, with the extra crew on board, and keeping an eye out for U-Boats in the North Sea off the east coast of Scotland. But the weather turned bad, the haar rolled in and the decision was made to fly back to base. They never made it, slamming into the Scottish Highlands near Helmsdale about half way between Inverness and John O’Groats at the northern tip of Scotland. By the middle of the night when the first rescuers arrived at the remote crash location, there was no one to rescue. They were all dead.
Another tragic war story. But this one told something else – it was something about Canada. When those Canadians climbed on board the Sunderland that night, I wonder if they were aware of what a “national” story they were. There were only nine provinces making up Canada in 1944, and seven of them were called home by members of the crew. Just one province in the West and one in the Maritimes weren’t represented on the plane that night. All volunteers. All from big cities or small rural communities from one end of the country to the other.
I try to imagine in my mind the moment they got on the plane that what in fact was happening, was “Canada” got on the plane.
Lest we forget.
Here’s your question for the weekend: how many Crown corporations do you think Canada has?
Keep your fingers off Google. Just take a guess. Here’s a hint …the answer is somewhere between zero and fifty.
Why are there any? The federal government creates Crown corporations in areas of business where it feels the private sector isn’t interested – while it’s seen as a need, it’s often also a losing proposition for a private company. Okay, this is not me trying to get into a discussion about arguably the most famous crown corporation, the CBC.
It’s another of the forty-seven (that’s your answer) existing Crown corporations, one called the Canada Lands Company. Never heard of it? Don’t feel alone, neither had I until this week. Basically, it vacuums up unused or underused government properties and then works with communities to find the best way to use them for everyone’s benefit. Like housing. Ottawa says there’s a rather immediate need for three and a half million new homes in Canada. The CLC has been around for more than twenty-five years, so it’s no surprise the Trudeau government is now turning to the Crown corporation as the answer for… wait for it… just under thirty thousand new homes before 2030. Well, it’s a start:
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Feds promise to build more homes on public land as fall mini-budget looms
If you were a twice impeached, four times indicted, and found liable for sexual assault in an incident a judge actually described as rape, you’d think you might be extremely well behaved the next time you appeared in court.
But then you wouldn’t be Donald Trump, who has proven over the years that you can be brash, loud mouthed, as well as a serial liar, and still get away with it.
If you stayed away from the breathless news coverage all week of the new reality TV show, “The Trump Family in Court,” but you’d like a quick recap of what happened, then The Buzz is here for you:
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Highlights of Donald Trump’s hours on the witness stand at his New York civil fraud trial
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November is Financial Literacy Month
Financial literacy is an essential life skill and an important part of overall financial well-being. Canada’s banks support several programs to help Canadians strengthen their financial knowledge, skills and confidence, including the Canadian Bankers Association's free seminar programs, Your Money Seniors and Your Money Students.
It’s been two weeks now since the Buffy Sainte-Marie story came out.
How do you feel about it? Did you watch it? Do you agree it was a story? Do you agree with the way it was done? Since the CBC’s flagship investigative broadcast, The Fifth Estate, aired its segment I’ve heard a lot of different opinions. This one got me thinking and maybe it will for you too. Robert Jago is a freelance journalist, a member of the Kwantlen First Nation and the Nooksack Indian Tribe. He wrote this for the Toronto Star:
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The Buffy Sainte-Marie bombshell has been devastating. I fear some of this may be my fault
What do you know about Qatar?
You probably know that it’s gas rich, that it’s located in the Persian Gulf, that it may have the most futuristic skyline anywhere, but you probably aren’t quite sure how to pronounce it. Is it CAT-are, Cutt-are, or Cutter? I say ‘Cutter’ because of advice from friends who live there, but I’m constantly told by others that I have it wrong.
Well, enough about the pronunciation of the country’s name, how about its role in trying to negotiate an end to the Israel-Hamas crisis?
Qatar is increasingly not only a player in the Middle East, but the player. In the last few days, the heads of Israel’s Mossad and the American CIA have been in the Doha meeting with their Qatari counterparts. There are Hamas leaders in Doha too, some who actually live there.
There have been talks, how extensive and who’s at the table at any one time are unclear, but they are producing results. The online journal The Qonversation has this take on Qatar from writer Paolo Natale:
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Qatar’s mediation for hostage release deemed “crucial”
Now to close the loop on a story we told you about on The Buzz last week:
That sheep stranded on a cliffside in Scotland for two years. Rest easy, all’s well now – here’s a report from ITV News in Britain:![](https://assets-nnw.nationalnewswatch.com/the-buzz/_natural/51998/NNW-thebuzz-nov1123-article5.webp)
'Britain's loneliest sheep' rescued after being stranded on cliff for two years
That’s it for The Buzz this week.
Check out the latest episode of my podcast The Bridge, available wherever you get your podcasts and on YouTube – you can find the link on NationalNewswatch. Chantal Hebert and Bruce Anderson join me for a little Good Talk discussion on whether the NDP-Liberal deal is in jeopardy, and Mark Carney - why hasn’t the PM asked him to run in a byelection and join Cabinet?
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Have a great weekend and this morning, if you have a chance, pause to remember.
The Buzz is a weekly publication from National Newswatch that shares insights and commentary on the week’s developments in politics, news and current affairs.