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"Zap you're frozen".
Some of us are old enough to remember that Trudeau line. Trudeau the Elder loved using it in the 1974 election campaign making fun of Robert Stanfield’s plan to introduce wage and price controls and promising he’d never go there. It worked and Trudeau won a majority.
A year later and guess what? Trudeau went there and outlined wage and price controls himself. The flip flop of flip flops.
If you go through the list of Trudeau the Younger’s promises when he won a majority in 2015, right up near the top was his plan for election reform.
As we all know, and as reformists really know, it never happened. Promise broken. Just couldn’t do it, he said.
I get mail every week from different parts of the country banging the election reform drum and swearing they’ll never vote for Trudeau again. They didn’t in 2019, 2021, and promise they won’t whenever the next election comes, whether it be next year or 2025.
Do you think Justin Trudeau regrets his flip flop?
This week Phil Tank of the Saskatoon StarPhoenix made the case that maybe, just maybe, he now does. Here’s Tank’s mini thesis:
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Phil Tank: Trudeau may now regret his broken electoral reform promise
Charles Adler has never been a shy guy.
He’s the outspoken broadcaster and opinion columnist with the Winnipeg Free Press, and this weekend he’s got some pretty pointed advice for Pierre Poilievre:
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Appeasement has dire consequences
Want more on this subject? Check out this week’s YouTube version of Good Talk available all weekend.
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Modernizing Canada’s Broadcasting Framework
The CRTC is preparing to modernize Canada’s broadcasting system. Canadians’ views on public policy priorities have changed with the times. The Motion Picture Association – Canada commissioned a national study and found people see and value what global studios and streaming services contribute to Canada’s creative economy, including a new world of opportunity for Canadian creative workers.
It’s that time of year, so brace yourself: Here come the year enders.
Interviews with the leaders. Plus, endless panels picking the winners and losers of the year gone by.
Zzzzzzzzzzzz.
I know because I’ve done them. Lots of them. Take those leader interviews, for example. Tell me the last time one really made news. I mean real news. I think you have to go back to the early eighties when CTV’s distinguished Ottawa Bureau Chief, the late Bruce Phillips, got Pierre Trudeau to cough up some questionable thoughts on the future of capitalism. In those days the PM of the day only did one interview at year end. By nature, it was special. The Phillips interviews were always special. Nowadays every news organization seems to do one. It becomes a blur. Again, I know. I’ve been a part of the blur in the past.
And those panels. We tried to spice them up one year by throwing up a picture of an obscure MP and challenging the panelists to name the person. Coyne would look puzzled. Anderson would try to hide. But that damn Hebert would somehow always have the answer. No wonder I still get mail from Chantal Nation.
Okay, here’s one of this year’s first, published, year ender interviews with the PM. It’s from Canadian Press:
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Trudeau says unfinished business, threat to progressive agenda drive him to run again
And now a shameless plug for my year ender this coming week on The Bridge. It will be different, I promise.
Okay poll junkies, here is the piece for you.
If you like numbers and a deep dive into those numbers, get ready for some eye openers. Enough with the pretend pollsters (yes, I’m looking in a mirror here), who tell you what they think everything means. These facts and figures from Angus Reid will give you a whole new perspective on polls, what they really mean, and how significant they may be. This is one of those classics you can pin to the fridge and refer to whenever a new poll comes out. It really does earn that label, “deep dive”. Enjoy:![](https://assets-nnw.nationalnewswatch.com/the-buzz/_natural/240014/NNW-thebuzz-article4_2024-01-05-172927_nzvj.webp)
The Swing Factors: Understanding the campaign promises that could grow, or shrink, the CPC’s blue tent
I guess I got out of the TV anchoring business just in time.
In other words, before AI. This has always been the fear since AI became a thing – that it would replace you no matter what you do.
So, check this article out from Loz Blain at News Atlas:
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AI-generated news anchors show off superhuman abilities
Did you catch a glimpse of the meteor shower on Wednesday night?
For those who could see it, it was pretty impressive. But scary? No, we were warned what was going to happen and had lots of time and ways to prepare.
But dial back to 1833 when science didn’t have quite that predictive ability and it was chaos. The world was going to end, some thought. I love this piece by Dave Kindy in The Washington Post:
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The massive meteor shower that convinced people the world was ending
We may never know just how much Donald Trump is worth.
Quite frankly, who cares? But I will give him this, he knows how to hustle for bucks. Trump Steaks, Trump University, Trump Deodorant, Trump Water, Trump Vodka to name just a few. Most went under but not before Trump hustled cash from a lot of naïve investors. Now he’s on to another one.
Remember that mug shot? Remember the suit he was wearing? Now you can own your own piece of it. Timothy Sigsworth of The Telegraph has all the exciting details:
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Donald Trump sells cut-up pieces of suit he wore in mugshot – for $5,000
Thanks for being here again this weekend.
The Buzz will be back a week from now… meanwhile enjoy this weekend, and remember, if you are stuck for a gift giving idea, head to your local bookstore for a copy of How Canada Works, my latest book with co-author Mark Bulgutch. #4 on the bestseller list if you are wondering!
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.