Crowd-pleasing classic clodhoppers require no baking

Prairie opportunists are knocking and prime minister should answer the door

In preparation for Halloween, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney and Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe have spent an inordinate amount of time rattling their chains and howling like indignant spirits about the raw deal they are getting from the rest of the country.

In the wake of a federal election in which the governing Liberals failed to elect a MP in either province, Kenney and Moe are summoning apocalyptic visions of secession. We've heard a lot of that before but Western separatists, inspired by the Alberta and Saskatchewan first ministers, are warning everyone that this time it's serious.

Now, before anyone gets too spooked, it's important to remember that a good politician is — first and foremost — an opportunist. These are the folks with the pure political instinct to recognize a moment in which they can gain the upper hand and then seize on it like a ravenous dog on a bone. Imagine that, and you'll have a pretty clear picture of what Kenney and Moe are up to.

In short, the two premiers want two big-ticket items from Ottawa.

Canada's little-known wartime internment camps

MONTREAL - In 1940, a Jewish student in the United Kingdom named Edgar Lion was sent to Canada against his will on a ship that carried both German and Austrian Jews and Nazi prisoners of war.

And when he first arrived at an internment camp in Trois-Rivieres, Que., the Austrian-born Lion quickly realized the local citizens gathered near the camp entrance didn’t know the difference between the two groups.

“People were cursing us and throwing stones at us. We had to cross a gauntlet of citizens who knew some of us were prisoners of war, but (didn’t know) some of us were just ordinary prisoners," he said in a recent interview.

"We were in the wrong place. We weren’t supposed to be interned.”

Too close to call in Assiniboia

The Winnipeg constituency of Assiniboia was too close to call Tuesday, with the NDP candidate leading over the incumbent Tory minister of seniors and long-term care.

At 11:15 p.m., Elections Manitoba, reporting just seven of 18 polls, had the NDP’s Nellie Kennedy with a 562-vote lead over Progressive Conservative incumbent Scott Johnston in the swing riding on the western edge of the city.

Losing the seat would be a blow for the Tories, but it would be a moral, rather than a functional, one. A win for the PC incumbent would do little to dent the NDP’s majority victory. Liberal Charles Ward was running a distant third.

A NDP win would be a reversal. In the 2016 and 2019 elections, the party lost Assiniboia to the PCs by roughly 16- and nine-point margins, respectively. Johnston won with 44 per cent of the vote in 2019.

Tokyo Olympic film debuts in Japan; headed next to Cannes

Soaring gas prices, now topping $2 per litre across much of Canada, have emerged as a central topic on the Ontario election campaign trail, with the three main parties pledging different plans for relief.

North Kildonan home on spacious property has everything you need to relax and entertain

Every home has a story, almost without exception.

That’s certainly the case with a sprawling bungalow situated amid a huge, beautifully treed lot in North Kildonan, says Glen MacAngus of Royal LePage Top Producers.

“When this home was built in 1957, it was a pretty good size,” he says of the home, which sports an impressively wide footprint. “Today, it checks in at 3,390 sq. ft. due to a pair of remodels. The first was in the early 2000s, while the second was in 2018.”

Suffice it to say, the well-maintained home is anything but a throwback to its late-’50s origins.