CanCon

It's been too long, but this week the whole crew comes together to be called out (or praised!) by our listeners.

Will Canada's privatized airports become another example of enshittification? Was $100 million worth it to put down the Alberta separatists? How many referendums are enough, exactly? This week it's all about your feedback, our responses, and Jordan's apparently wrong opinions!

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].

Unlike their Western brethren, Quebec separatists are good at this. They've been at it a long time. They are organized, patient and understand how to get elected. And they just did.

With the Parti Quebecois winning a minority government, another referendum is at the very least back on the table, even if it isn't likely anytime soon. But there's a lot more going on in the province than a potential vote years down the line. Politics in Quebec is largely ignored by English Canada unless separation is a possibility. It shouldn't be.

With the help of independent journalist Nora Loreto, of Sandy and Nora Talk Politics, we're here to help with that today.

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].

There's no way to sugarcoat the story of Ryan Wedding. Once an aspiring snowboarder from Thunder Bay, Ontario, Wedding qualified for the 2002 Olympics as a member of the Canadian team. He didn't medal. Two decades later, he was on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list, being compared to the likes of El Chapo and Pablo Escobar by American officials.

After years on the run, Wedding was apprehended in January of this year in Mexico City, and he'll soon head to trial facing up to 19 felonies for his role in allegedly importing nearly 60 tons of cocaine into the US and Canada, working with the Mexican Sinaloa cartel.

How did Wedding end up here? Perhaps, as a famous writer once put it, "gradually, then suddenly". But he's well on his way to becoming one of Canada's most infamous criminals, and a new podcast series explores how an athlete from Northern Ontario found himself among the most wanted fugitives in the world.

Michelle Shephard, Canadian journalist, documentarian and the host of the CBC/Toronto Star podcast, The Most Wanted Olympian, alongside Toronto Star journalist Calvi Leon, walks us through what we know about Wedding's journey and what we're still waiting to find out...

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].

You've been warned about them, undoubtedly. You've probably passed on that warning to your elderly loved ones, or anyone you see as a little digitally naive. But how much do you really know about how so-called 'Grandparent Scams' operate in Canada—from the scale of them to their ever-increasing sophistication to the damage they leave behind in their wake?

This week, Rachel Brown walks us through her detailed reporting for The Walrus to give you a detailed look inside what's becoming a huge criminal industry, one that shows no signs of slowing down... 

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].

Many of us have been lucky enough to experience the ongoing trade war with the United States as a small part of everyday life. We may pay slightly higher prices, or choose not to buy American products. We may read headlines about job losses or plant closures and feel sympathy, but we don't know what it's like to grapple with the ever-changing tariffs playing havoc with our bottom line.

But small Canadian businesses have been living this hell for a year and a half now, and we wanted to give you a firsthand look at what that's like—from small annoyances to macro business pressures that force drastic changes. Today on Cancon, Dave Misener, co-founder of OMS Canada, an audio equipment retailer that imports from around the world, including the United States, takes us inside his world...

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].

Mark Carney's government will open up three major Canadian airports to private investment, raising billions of dollars and fundamentally changing how these facilities are run. It's a strategy used in many countries around the world, but it's a new one for Canadian travellers. So, what's about to happen?

John Gradek, Professor Emeritus at McGill University and one of the country's leading aviation experts, walks us through what could be a massive improvement to the Canadian airport experience. And while many Canadians would welcome the upgrades other massive international airports have seen, it remains to be seen what that investment will actually mean to those of us trying to schlepp bags through security and hopefully depart on time...

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].

If you're reading this in a big city, congratulations! You have reliable local news options! If you're living somewhere smaller... well, it's a bit of a dice roll, really.

While most communities still have at least one options for reporting on their every day lives — everything from city council to education, local hospitals and sports and events — but news deserts are spreading with every closure of small town newspaper or radio station, and while independent publications and podcasts are working hard to replace them, that business mode is difficult to make work in smaller places.

Today, we sit down with April Lindgren, professor emeritus at Toronto Metropolitan University and co-founder and director at the Local News Research Project, to discuss what happening to newsrooms across the country and what comes next.

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].

Most Albertans don't want to leave Canada. Most Canadians don't want to see them go. The data is clear, the separatist wing is a small percentage of the population, and is likely buoyed by foreign influence campaigns. 

To many Canadians, it seems clear there's no need for a referendum at all—that it only raises a question that millions of people already answer every day; that it's a bad faith attempt to steer the political conversation further right. So, why have it?

Because we live in a democracy. A democracy that, like most in the West, is under threat. And you don't solve a democratic credibility problem by holding fewer votes.

Today, Concordia University political science professor Donal Gill explains why this fall's vote in Alberta, as messy as it might get, is a healthy sign for Canadian democracy.

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].

New tariffs have hit us. Our government will respond in kind next week. A trade war has begun in earnest. And there's no doubt Canadian businesses will suffer and jobs will be lost. 

And yet. After more than a year and a half of economic turmoil, the numbers tell a story of resiliency. Of an economy that did not, in fact, enter a technical recession. An economy that, in the last quarter, actually posted a very impressive number.

Is this our economic diversification at work? Is it the calm before the storm? What do good numbers in the middle of uncertainty really mean for the months to come? And how will your wallet experience the new phase of the trade war?

Economist and director of the Centre for Future Work Jim Stanford joins Jordan to explain the recent economic reports, and look ahead to what happens now.

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].

Canada's going to become one of three "framework nations" taking the lead on Arctic defence. The government is moving to purchase military equipment outside the United States or even (gasp!) build it here at home. Is all that talk about taking national defence seriously starting to show up in action?

Alistair Edgar, Associate Dean at the School of International Policy and Governance at Wilfred Laurier University, joins us to analyze the Carney government's recent defence decisions.

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: [email protected].