Posts Tagged ‘travel’

Greenland Is Not Some Distant Place

Posted: December 23, 2025 in Uncategorized
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There’s something I say a lot when I’m trying to get people to understand the North and particularly how vast this country actually is. I usually turn it into a question. “If you were to leave Toronto and travel in a straight line north to Alert, Nunavut, how far do you think you’d be going?” People will throw out numbers. They’ll guess. And then I ask the second part. “If you went that exact same distance south, where do you think you’d end up?”

Almost no one ever gets this right. Most people say somewhere in the United States. Maybe the middle of it. Sometimes Mexico.

The actual answer is Bogotá, Colombia. In fact, just a few kilometres south of Bogotá. Every single time I say that, people stop.

Because once you hold that in your head, you can’t pretend the North is abstract anymore. It is a massive part of our country. That distance tells you something about scale, and scale tells you something about vulnerability.

That’s why, when I hear people talk casually about Greenland, I pay attention. With the renewed conversation this week about the United States assigning a new envoy to Greenland, I once again felt very concerned. This isn’t a response to an invitation. It isn’t a request for partnership. It’s the familiar posture of I’m doing this because I want to.

Greenland is not an idea. It is not a strategic blank space. And it is not a prize waiting for a powerful country to notice it. Greenland is primarily Indigenous, specifically Inuit. It is already someone’s home. And for my fellow Canadians it is not very far away. At Canada’s northernmost point, the distance from our coast to Greenland is 26 kilometres, (16 miles) miles. That’s not an ocean separating us. That’s proximity you can almost see across.

Only about 2% of Canadians have ever been north of the 60th parallel, even though nearly half of our landmass lies above it. And even then, most trips north are to places like Whitehorse or Yellowknife, northern cities, yes, but still sub Arctic, still below the tree line.

The Arctic is different. Being above Hudson Bay, above the ice, above the assumptions we carry from the south, that changes how you understand distance, exposure, and survival. It also changes how seriously you take casual talk about “acquiring” places that are already inhabited, already governed, already culturally whole. Those of us who have spent time in the North understand this instinctively.

Remote Indigenous communities are not empty space. They are resilient, deeply rooted, and far too often spoken about as if they exist only in relation to what outsiders want from them. Greenland is no different.

Which brings me to Denmark. I have always had a particular affinity for Denmark, my sister married into a Danish family, and growing up, Denmark was simply part of our world. My brother in laws mother was our Nana Cail. Familiar. Human. Not abstract. So when people talk about Greenland as if it is a loose possession, barely tethered to anything meaningful, it tells me they do not understand the depth of relationships or the weight of history that comes with it. Greenland’s relationship with Denmark is complicated. All colonial histories are. But complexity does not equal vacancy. And it certainly does not create an invitation for others to test boundaries simply because they can. Especially when Denmark is a NATO ally.

At some point, this conversation cannot just come from Denmark or Greenland. It has to come from NATO itself, reminding the United States that when it talks about Greenland, it is talking about a NATO-affiliated territory. This is not a sandbox. These alliances exist precisely to prevent powerful countries from testing limits simply because they feel entitled to do so.

Every time I name Donald Trump in my writings I want to be precise. I am not talking about one man acting alone. I am talking about an administration, a set of enablers, billionaires and a political culture that rewards impulse, spectacle, and domination especially when geography looks exploitable.

As the ice melts and Arctic routes become viable, conversations that once sounded absurd suddenly become operational. The Northwest Passage is no longer something unknown and vague. The United States has never fully accepted Canadian sovereignty over it.

So this is where people misunderstand the danger. Greenland is not asking for partners nor protection. And it is certainly not asking to be spoken about as if it is available.

And Indigenous homelands do not become negotiable because someone powerful has grown bored. If we keep treating places like Greenland as ideas instead of homes, as strategy instead of community, we shouldn’t be surprised when others decide consent is optional.

And history is very clear about what happens when powerful countries confuse proximity with entitlement. If Greenland can be spoken about as available, Canadians would be foolish to think we’re too far away to be next.

Immigration and The Road Ahead

Posted: December 20, 2025 in Uncategorized
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A country this big doesn’t change direction suddenly. It travels there, one decision at a time.

I started my morning with population numbers for Canada in the New York Times. For the first time since 1946 our population is down. Changes that look small enough to dismiss. Is it just a fractional dip, or a a quarterly adjustment? It would be easy to scroll past. But these numbers are flagging something important.

I am fortunate to know many new Canadians. I personally know international students who came to Canada with a plan. It was not through a loophole, nor a fantasy, but with an actual plan. To study, to work and to stay and build their life here. I know people on work visas who did exactly what we told them to do, only to realize the door they were walking toward is now quietly narrowing. They come from all over the world. This isn’t about one country or one culture. It’s about what happens when policy pivots faster than lives can.

I’m not speculating here. Professionally, I know how much anxiety is sitting inside certain industries right now. Real anxiety. Not because executives are worried about optics, but because the labour math no longer works the way it used to. We can scoff at low wage jobs, but the truth is blunt. There are jobs in this country that are not being filled. Not because Canadians are lazy, but because those jobs may be unstable, seasonal, or incompatible with raising a family. Pretending otherwise doesn’t make us principled. It makes us unserious. Often those from other countries are willing to take these jobs with a goal to ultimately better theirs and their families lives.

At the same time, because reality refuses to behave, I also know domestic students who couldn’t find work. So yes, the system was strained. Yes, some promises were oversold. Two things can be true, even if our politics can’t handle that sentence.

What’s still barely being discussed is post-secondary education itself. Most Canadians don’t realize how much our colleges and universities have been financially buffered by international student tuition. Not necessarily out of greed but rather out of survival. Those large international student fees helped keep programs running, facilities open, and tuition for domestic students from climbing even faster. When that revenue drops, and it is dropping, something gives. Programs shrink, staff disappear and costs shift. That’s basic mathematics. And then there’s the demographic fantasy we seem keenly aware of. Canada is not repopulating itself through birthrates. Nothing more complicated than that. We are a vast country with an aging population, and no amount of lecturing about “family values” is going to change that. And let’s stop pretending otherwise. When some people say “we should just have more babies,” they’re usually picturing a very specific kind of Canadian family. I had two children. That replaces exactly two people. I do not expect my sons’ partners to reproduce on command to soothe someone else’s demographic anxiety.

Now I want to talk specifically about National defence. We have said, repeatedly, that Canada needs to grow its military. Global threats are increasing, not receding, and much of the current instability has been accelerated by the man south of the border. For the first time in generations, both our southern and northern borders are strategically fragile. You don’t protect a country with slogans. You protect it with skilled, trained people and in numbers that work.

As you know an industry important to me is aviation. We already face a pilot shortage both civil and military. Airlines are competing with the air force for talent, and the pipeline is thin. And aviation has always understood something politics and people sometimes forgets. An airplane has never cared about the colour or ethnicity of the pilot flying it. It only cares whether the person in the seat is trained, competent, and ready. Physics is brutally fair that way.

If we continue drawing potential military pilots into civil aviation or fail to build the pipeline at all, that’s not a cultural debate but rather a capability gap. And you don’t fill cockpits, secure borders, or respond to crises with wishful thinking.

This is why it’s so frustrating when immigration gets reduced to irritation. The Facebook drama when someone didn’t quite catch your order at a Tim Hortons drive-thru. Yes, communication matters. Yes, standards matter. But confusing momentary annoyance with national strategy is like judging an airline’s safety record based on whether you liked the coffee on your flight.

And this is where I suspect our Prime Minister’s thinking actually is. Not in slogans nor in extremes. But in the uncomfortable middle, where immigration, defence, education, labour, and global instability all collide. The real work isn’t choosing “more” or “less.” It’s designing a system that actually supplies the people we know we need, in the places we know we’re vulnerable.

This isn’t an argument for open borders. It’s an argument for adult policy.

Because Canada does need more people. But like any long journey, growth without direction is just motion. You need a route. You need capacity. And you need to know why you’re heading where you’re headed, before you find yourself miles down the road wondering how you got there.

An Xray Was Always The Point

Posted: December 18, 2025 in Uncategorized
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I’ve spent a lot of time lately writing about things that are heavy, personal, and deeply consequential, and while that’s not going to change, every now and then I need a different kind of mental exercise. Something a little lighter and a little more entertaining. Something that reminds me why I enjoy paying attention in the first place. This Vanity Fair photo series does exactly that, because underneath the outrage and the hot takes, there’s something genuinely interesting going on here about strategy, image, and what happens when political presentation is stripped down to its bones.

None of this was accidental. The photographer, Christopher Anderson, wasn’t sprung on the White House without warning. His work was pre-approved. His bio was known. His style was known. He has made a career out of shooting very close images. Close enough to remove the usual polish, and Vanity Fair’s editor described the work as an attempt to cut through what Anderson himself has called the “theater of politics.” So the shock some people are expressing now feels, at best, selective.

Listening to pundits dissect the images, what struck me wasn’t the outrage so much as the misreading. These weren’t meant to flatter, and they weren’t meant to humiliate either. They function more like scans. Almost like x-rays. Not images designed to reassure, but images designed to show what’s there once distance, lighting, and control are no longer doing the work for you.

I’ll admit something here. On a purely emotional level, this delights me. There’s something deeply satisfying about watching people who spend their lives managing image and narrative suddenly confronted with a lens that refuses to play along. Not cruelly nor theatrically but rather precisely. Anderson’s brilliance isn’t just technical; it’s strategic. He shows them not as caricatures, but as they are when the scaffolding is removed. And for someone who pays close attention to power, messaging, and performance, that kind of clarity is genuinely enjoyable to witness.

Take J.D. Vance, photographed against a wall that quietly provides visual reference points. It’s subtle, but it matters. A way of grounding scale and proportion for someone who has spent a great deal of time rhetorically inflating his own presence. The photograph doesn’t argue, doesn’t editorialize, and doesn’t correct him. It simply measures and lets the viewer connect the dots. With these references it is easy to measure his true height.

And then there’s Karoline Leavitt, which is where the conversation predictably veered off course. Yes, you can see evidence of cosmetic work. So what. That’s neither shocking nor particularly interesting. What is interesting is what Anderson didn’t do. He didn’t soften. He didn’t blur. He didn’t smooth away the human texture that appears on every face when a camera gets this close. Anyone who has ever been photographed at that distance knows that skin behaves like skin.

It’s worth noting here that the image you’re looking at has had an HDR filter applied, and you can feel the difference right away. That small change alone alters clarity and mood, which is worth keeping in mind when we talk about what a photograph is, and isn’t telling us. Even light intervention shifts how an image reads, which only underscores how deliberate Anderson’s original choices were.

The result, even so, is striking. She’s 28, but she reads older, not in years but in bearing. Almost matronly, in the sense of discipline rather than age. This isn’t a face inviting dialogue; it’s a face trained for delivery and repetition.

Which brings Donald Trump into the picture, even when he’s not in the frame. Because he has publicly praised Leavitt not just for her performance, but for her appearance, focusing obsessively on her lips and how they “move like a machine gun.” Placed next to this image, stripped of gloss and distance, that comment lands differently. Less like admiration and more like a functional assessment. Less about judgment or insight, more about output.

This isn’t a beauty image. It isn’t about youth or glamour. It’s about role. Should I bother to mention the slight orange tinge to her nose?

Politics usually depends on illusion. In photos using flattering angles, soft light and careful distance. These photographs decline to participate in that bargain. They don’t demean anyone, and they don’t exaggerate. They simply remove the padding and let the structure show. An x-ray doesn’t flatter you, and it doesn’t insult you either. It just tells you what’s going on under the surface.

And before anyone worries that I’ve gone soft or lost my edge, don’t. I’ll be back, as always, with plenty to say about politics provincially, nationally, and globally. This is simply a reminder that sometimes the most revealing political commentary doesn’t come from a speech or a press conference. Sometimes it comes from a camera, a small adjustment, and the uncomfortable realization that once you really look, you can’t unsee how the machine actually works.

Where Humanity Takes Flight

Posted: December 11, 2025 in Uncategorized
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So my conversation today isn’t supposed to be about politics. Well, yes it is, and no it isn’t. What it’s really about is humanity, compassion, decency, and the expectations we set for the people who lead us and for the people we choose to be.

Some of you know me through the stories I tell. I’m not a historian or a journalist, I speak from lived experience, from the people and places that shaped me. And today, even though I said I wasn’t going to talk about politics, how can I talk about how we treat other human beings without landing there?

With yesterday’s talk of requiring five years of social media history just to enter the United States, it became clear that many of us, myself included, won’t be visiting anytime soon. Honestly, I’m not sure I’ll miss it. I’ve been to Disney more times than I can count; I’ve walked New York; I can survive without Vegas.

What I can’t survive without is my sense of humanity, and today I was reminded of where it comes from.

I grew up in Moncton, a small city in New Brunswick. In the 60s and early 70s it looked overwealmingly white, like so many communities across Canada. The exception was the steady stream of students from around the world who came to learn to fly at my father’s flight school. That was my normal. As a teenager I was pumping avgas, dispatching flights, and working around those students. I grew up in a hangar full of languages, accents, hopes, and dreams. I didn’t understand then what a gift that was.

A few months after my father passed away in 2008, a letter arrived from one of those former students, Israel Ameh of Nigeria. I hadn’t known him at the time he trained in Moncton, I had already left Moncton, but his words captured exactly who my father was and what humanity can look like when lived fully and without prejudice.

Here is his letter, unchanged: “I came to Canada from Nigeria in 1982 to learn how to fly. Even before I got here I felt like I knew Mr. McClure as he tried to make my voyage to Canada as trouble-free as possible. When I arrived at the Moncton Train Station on August 2nd 1982, Don sent his Cool Station Wagon to pick me up. He made the MFC become like… a revolving family setting and as I needed to take different courses, I did not think twice about where to return for those courses. When I returned in 1988/89 and got my Flight Instructor rating, Don helped me get my First and second jobs. His recommendation also made securing a Work Visa easy. I ended up marrying from Buctouche making the Moncton area part home. In 2008, I found Don’s email address on the Internet and sent him a thank you letter which was unfortunately returned due to a bad email address. When I learnt of his passing, it was a sense of tremendous loss that I did not get to thank him for all he did in my life. Mr. McClure, I know you can still read this and I want to say THANK YOU for being such a wonderful person. You practised equality and globalisation with sterling vision before it became fashionable. To many of us, you were like a father. I still remember a talk you gave to me in 1985 about AIDS and why us young men had to be aware and cautious. Other students laughed at the time but it made me into a better man. From the provinces of Canada, Libya, Nigeria, UK, the Carribeans, Nepal, India, Pakistan and all other places that sent men and women to you to turn into Pilots, I think I speak for all of them when I say the world lost a Great Man. Rest in Peace Don, but I know that if they have airplanes in Heaven, you will be helping run an efficient operation and checking up on the airplanes and asking why they are not up flying just as you did to keep us on our toes; but most of all, thank you for changing the life of an 18 year old from an African village.”

That letter, especially that last line, tells you everything about my core. And it’s why, when I hear Donald Trump speak of Haiti or Africa or Afghanistan as though the people from those places are somehow lesser, it hits like a gut punch. It dishonours the young men and women I grew up around. It dishonours my father. And it dishonours that young man whose life changed because someone treated him with dignity.

Trump, born with every advantage, has no understanding of what it means to build your life by strength, opportunity, and gratitude. No understanding of being a guest in another country. No understanding of leadership grounded in humanity. This isn’t left or right. It’s about whether we widen the circle or shrink it until only people who look like us get to belong.

Most of you reading this already get that. But maybe someone, somewhere, will feel something crack open. Because there are cracks everywhere right now, cracks in the asphalt, cracks in the façade of cruelty-as-strength. But dear God, don’t let this be the world our children and grandchildren inherit. Not a world sliding backward into suspicion and hate toward anyone who doesn’t look like us.

If an 18-year-old from an African village could take flight because someone believed in him, then surely we can choose humanity.

Surely we can chart a better course, one where compassion, not fear, keeps us airborne.

December 7th: Echoes, Reverence, and the Weight of History

Posted: December 7, 2025 in Uncategorized
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Other than being a beautiful, almost-winter day here in my corner of rural Alberta, December 7th carries a weight that never leaves me. For Canadians, Americans and the rest of the world this date is part of our shared history, a reminder that the world doesn’t fracture in isolation and that we have always stood shoulder to shoulder with our allies when democracy is threatened. Today is the anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbour, December 7th, 1941, the moment the United States was pulled into the Second World War, and the moment the trajectory of the 20th century changed. I debated writing about it at all because I try, so often, to anchor things “at home.” But everything I write comes from my own lived place, memory, emotion, experience, and this date sits at the centre of all of that.

My father, as many who read me now know, shaped so much of how I see the world. Back in 1981, during the 40th anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbour, my parents wanted one final trip to Hawaii, my mother already many years into the paralysis of her stroke. I met them there because my father couldn’t manage the physical care on his own, and because time with them mattered. Two things were important to him on that trip: travelling to the remote resting place of Charles Lindbergh, and standing where the Second World War began for America.

Standing above the sunken USS Arizona with them is something I will never forget. Tourists moved around us, reading plaques or pointing at the quiet water. But for my father, it was not a tourist stop. It was a place of reverence. A place of loss. A place that demanded silence. He stood there as a Canadian who had done his part in those dark years, because it was right to stand with an ally, with democracy, with the world. And I felt that through him. I wasn’t alive in 1941, but I knew the significance of that place because he carried it in his bones.

That’s why it sits so heavily with me that, according to reporting years later, when Donald Trump toured the USS Arizona Memorial in 2020, he asked what it was and why it mattered. The president of the United States standing on the graves of 1,177 Americans and not understanding the meaning of where he was. People say, “Well, that’s just Trump.” But that is the point. When you cannot feel history, when you do not carry its weight, you cannot grasp consequences. You cannot lead through the echoes of the past when you don’t even hear the original sound.

And today, after the United States released its new National Security Strategy, framed against a backdrop of global instability, authoritarian drift, and democratic stress this anniversary lands with a different heaviness. Because Pearl Harbour wasn’t only an American call to arms. It was a turning point for Canada too. My father, like so many Canadians of his generation, believed that when democracy was threatened, you didn’t shrug and say, “That’s someone else’s problem.” You showed up. You stood with your allies. You defended something bigger than borders.

And now, as Americans face a crossroads inside their own country, the echoes of 1941 feel unbearably loud. Not because history is repeating itself, but because, as a historian recently said, it is not repeating. It is echoing, resonating and warning.

I think about my father’s reverence on that platform above the Arizona. The way he held the past with both gratitude and responsibility. And I contrast that with a man who once stood in the same place and asked, essentially, “What is this?”

So maybe it’s an emotional weekend. Maybe it’s Christmas coming. Maybe it’s age. Maybe it’s the weight of watching the world tilt again in ways too familiar for comfort. But as a Canadian who once stood above the USS Arizona carrying the reverence my father carried, I will say this plainly:
We understand, perhaps more than we say aloud, that America’s turning points have always shaped our own, economically, politically, militarily, and morally. Canada has never been a bystander in the currents of history.

The anniversary of Pearl Harbour matters, not just to Americans, but to all of us. Especially now, as we watch a man who has never understood the weight of history wield presidential power without any sense of consequence. The echoes are loud. Please hear them.

Alberta’s Road Ahead

Posted: November 30, 2025 in Uncategorized
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Today, I’m reaching out to a group that might not think of me as “their” voice, but I believe you are. I write from a progressive point of view, yes, but I am not far left and never have been. I am a centrist, maybe philosophically a little left, and most people who follow me are the same: grounded, pragmatic, and driven by fairness over ideology.

But this post isn’t for the usual audience. It is specifically for those Albertans who once proudly called themselves progressive conservatives or small-c conservatives, people who understood conservatism as careful stewardship, not chaos; community, not division; country, not grievance. I need you to hear this before Alberta follows the path unfolding south of us. And to my regular readers, who know I work hard to be fair and fact-driven: I’m asking you to put party labels aside. Think instead about your philosophy, your values, the things you believe when you think about your family, your neighbours, and the country we share. Because I need to say this plainly: the word “conservative” tastes bitter in my mouth these days. Not because of its history, that I respect, but because of what extremists have turned it into.

And I know many of you feel the same. You are not extremists. You are not separatists. You are not Christian nationalists. You are not part of this radical takeover. You represent the Alberta I know and love, and you deserve to hear the truth about what is happening inside the party you once believed in.

What happened at the UCP AGM in Edmonton this weekend was a defining moment. In truth the moment it became undeniable that the UCP is not simply “right-leaning.” It is controlled by an extreme-right faction whose language and goals mirror the dangerous movements tearing the United States apart. And they are not hiding it anymore. Their conversations about divisiveness and separation aren’t fringe now, they are escalating. And we need to be honest about why as even Danielle Smith has lost her audience. She will not be leading this party forward. She is now a liability to the very forces she once empowered. And that leaves Alberta staring down something far worse than “better the devil you know,” because what’s waiting in the wings is far more radical, far more determined, and far more dangerous.

That reality hit me hard during the recent discussions around the pipeline memorandum of understanding between Alberta and Canada. Let me be blunt: that pipeline, framed that way, is never going to happen. And the separatists know it. They are shifting, regrouping, and preparing their next move.

But here is where you need to stop, breathe, and listen. Those separatists do not define this province. Not now. Not ever.

And this circles us back to Forever Canadian. When Thomas A. Lukaszuk and team launched the Forever Canadian campaign, I knew we were responding to something real. But this weekend hit me like a freight train with the realization of just how vital that work was, and how vital it still is. We proved something timeless, something that matters more than ever and is especially true to the quote from Margaret Mead. “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”

Forever Canadian wasn’t loud. We didn’t have deep pockets. What we had were real Albertans who wanted this place to remain part of Canada. Our strength wasn’t in noise. It was in purpose, unity, and integrity.

So yes, right now it may look like the separatists have the upper hand. But loudness is not strength. Money is not legitimacy. Coordination is not public support. A fringe is still a fringe, even when it shouts.

As we wait for the constitutional ruling that will determine whether this extremist faction can legally push a separation agenda, I need to speak personally. This is not the Alberta I expected to live in during the later chapters of my life. And I refuse to watch it fall into the hands of people whose vision would tear this province apart. This weekend left me asking, over and over; what can I do? I can write which I do. I can speak,often boldly. And I will not sit still and watch this happen. I still have something to give. Maybe more than one thing and I am ready to take on whatever tasks are needed to keep this province whole, sane, democratic, and Canadian.

And I believe with absolute certainty that most conservatives do not want what is happening inside their party. So I am asking, genuinely and urgently, please speak out. If what you saw this weekend unsettled you or frightened you, you are not alone. And you do not have to stay silent. We have a decision to make about the future of our province and it has to be made now.

Forever Canadian was never a one-time campaign. It was the first line of defense. Now we must choose whether it was a moment or whether it becomes a movement. I know where I stand. And after this weekend, I know exactly why we must stand together again. This moment feels like a long Alberta prairie road, the storm rolling in on one side, sunlight fighting on the other. We can still choose which way we go. But we have to choose now.

August 3, 2025

Posted: August 10, 2025 in Uncategorized
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UPDATE: It is important to note that I wrote this to explain the structure of the process. There are many aspects of it that should be revisited and one that I often mention in more detailed conversations around the exclusion of Hydro power in the calculation. So take this as a very general explanation as it was intended.

Equalization payments 101. I’m beginning to believe a lot of citizens skipped grade six. Jason Stephan, MLA for Red Deer and member of Alberta’s Treasury Board, posted today about what he viewed is the money Alberta ‘sends’ to Quebec saying it’s “too bad Quebec didn’t separate.”

Let’s just pause on that for a second. A sitting MLA who is responsible for provincial finances is wishing a founding province had left Confederation. Because of taxes? That’s not just a cheap political shot. That’s a fundamental misunderstanding of how Canada works. And how the equalization system works.

And unfortunately, he’s not alone. So let’s try this one more time at a grade six civics level, since that seems to be where the understanding stopped. Equalization isn’t Alberta sending cheques to Quebec. It’s not a personal donation to daycare in the Maritimes.

Here’s the truth. Canada is a country, not a profit-sharing corporation. Let’s think of it like a big family. Alberta is the high-earning sibling who makes good money, works hard, maybe brags about it a bit too much at Thanksgiving. New Brunswick? That’s the older relative. Wise, tough, but not pulling in as much these days. Quebec? Well, Quebec is the family member who insists on doing everything their own way but still shows up for supper.

And like any decent family, we try to make sure everyone has what they need, even if we don’t all contribute the same amount.

That’s where equalization comes in. Here’s how it actually works. The federal government collects taxes from across the country (and yes, Alberta pays a big chunk because we earn more. Please know that’s not punishment, it’s math). Then, based on a formula, it gives equalization transfers to provinces that don’t have the same ability to raise their own revenue. That means more help for places like New Brunswick, PEI, and Manitoba so they can offer public services at reasonably similar levels and tax rates. Provinces like Newfoundland for example have been both the successful family member and the one that needed some help on occasion.

And just to be crystal clear Alberta does not send money directly to other provinces. No one’s mailing cheques from Edmonton to Quebec City. Equalization payments come from the federal government to each provinces.

And about that formula? It can be reviewed. And it has been including during the Harper years. So if Jason Stephan thinks it’s broken, maybe he should dig into those files before continuing the negative narrative. While he’s at it, maybe he can get a memo to Premier Danielle Smith because if there’s one thing this Premier loves more than chaos, it’s finding someone else to blame for it.

Canada is not a zero-sum game. Every province brings something to the table. Not all bring cash and thank God, because if money were the only measure of worth, we’d be a pretty soulless country.

Right now, we’re dealing with global instability, trade tensions, economic insecurity, war, and climate pressure on everything from food to fuel. The job right now is to take care of our own. That means defending each other, not dividing each other.

If we need to revisit how the family handles its finances, then fine we will. But not in the current situation our country (family) is in. And not because one provincial politician needs a distraction from his own lack of solutions.

Maybe Quebec is the kid who’s still living at home, expects dinner on the table at six, and reminds you regularly they might move out if the menu ever changes. Alberta is the sibling who just landed a big promotion and can’t stop telling everyone else how to run their lives. Annoying? Absolutely. But guess what? They’re both still family.

Because in the end these provinces are all part of this amazing country and in my view we are family. And like any real family, we all have a seat at this table. No one gets to kick anyone else out.

We argue. We pass the potatoes. We fight over who has to do the dishes. But we also make sure everyone’s plate has something on it. That’s not weakness. It’s the strength of the system.

So if the way we split the bill needs a second look, we’ll do that. Together. Like grown-ups. But let’s not confuse family finances with family values. Because from this citizens point of view we make sure everyone gets dinner on their plate. We argue, we grumble, and sometimes we roll our eyes at each other. But we don’t cut anyone out just because it’s politically convenient.
We show up. We share. We do the work. That’s what being Canadian actually means.