Some introspection can help break strife-sex cycle

Beijing behind the scenes: On women’s hockey’s biggest stage, it’s not just the players under pressure

Alex Clarke of Weyburn, Sask., is a Canadian linesperson who isn’t part of Team Canada at the Olympics.

Provincial intervention required at care homes

Back-to-back majority mandates confirm Premier Brian Pallister’s government has found favour with most Manitobans for an agenda that often champions privatization for its efficiency and cost control. There are exceptions, however, when even a free-market-minded conservative government must take control of for-profit businesses because public safety is on the line. Long-term care homes owned by Revera Inc. are such exceptions.

A pandemic precedent was set early in the COVID-19 epidemic when Ontario and Quebec faced the type of care-home crises now afflicting several Manitoba institutions. Those provinces intervened and took over the most afflicted of their care homes, employing strategies the Manitoba government would be well advised to follow.

About 20 long-term care facilities in Manitoba have been infiltrated by COVID-19, but the three where the virus has claimed the most victims — Parkview Place, Maples Long Term Care Home and Heritage Lodge — are managed by Revera.

There have already been calls for governments to step in. Revera is owned by PSP Investments, a federal Crown corporation that controls pensions for 160,000 federal employees; after care-home outbreaks in Ontario, PSP made a public call for the federal government to transition ownership of Revera facilities to the provinces in which they operate.

Pallister leaving future of bills to new premier

Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister says he is prepared to be replaced within a matter of weeks and is leaving the fate of major education reforms and other proposed legislation in the hands of his successor.

"I'm working on the assumption that the (Progressive Conservative) executive council will make a decision to have a leadership vote at some point in the next few weeks," Pallister said Monday in his first comments to the media since he announced Aug. 10 that he would not seek re-election.

The party executive was to meet Monday night to start laying out the rules and a date for a leadership convention.

The only declared candidate so far, former health minister Heather Stefanson, has said she wants to scrap an education bill that would eliminate elected English-language school boards. The proposed legislation, which would also centralize governance of schools, has been widely criticized in Winnipeg and rural areas.

Today’s horoscope

MOON ALERT: After 3:45 a.m. today there are no restrictions to shopping or important decisions. The moon is in Sagittarius.

ARIES (March 21-April 19)

You might be interested in unusual, powerful ideas. They might be mystical and idealistic. They might even be related to improving yourself somehow. Nevertheless, be aware this is also a mildly accident-prone day for you. Pay attention to everything you say and do.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20)

Despite midterm setback, Trump remains defiant

One might have thought Tuesday’s U.S. midterm elections, which saw the Democratic party regain majority control of the House of Representatives, would have sufficiently humbled President Donald Trump to prompt a prudently tactical muting of his usually raging rhetoric and perhaps even a more conciliatory approach to governing.

One could not possibly have been more completely, categorically and comprehensively incorrect.

Mr. Trump was in full battle mode on Wednesday, engaging in angry confrontations with media members during a briefing in the East Room of the White House and then later effectively firing Attorney General Jeff Sessions and installing as his interim replacement a loyal underling who, prior to joining the Trump administration, was an occasional news-network commentator who described in several television interviews the strategy he would use to shut down the Russian-collusion investigation of special counsel Robert Mueller.

The day started with the ever-combative Mr. Trump declaring Tuesday’s electoral result — in which Republicans slightly expanded their majority in the Senate — as “very close to ­complete victory.” After mocking several defeated Republicans whose losses he attributed to their failure to “embrace” him and his policies, Mr. Trump took questions from the media, and the event slid quickly into utter chaos.

Man pleads guilty to shotgun slaying

A WINNIPEG drug dealer has pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in a March 2025 killing that saw the body of a 30-year-old man dumped in a garbage bin and dragged to a West End alleyway.

Frederick Francis Mathias Baker, who was 28 upon his arrest early last year, shot Bronson Emery Dale Kequahtooway once in the thigh with a sawed-off shotgun and left him with a fatal wound, Crown prosecutor Matt Armstrong told Court of King’s Bench Justice Brian Bowman on Wednesday.

A split second after Baker shot Kequahtooway in the thigh, the victim was shot in the head with a sawed-off .22 rifle. The man accused of being armed with the rifle, Eric Matthew Morrissette, remains before the court on a second-degree murder charge.

“Either wound would have been fatal on its own,” said Armstrong.