Don’t expect the foreign interference inquiry to do much to impede Beijing’s stunningly successful capture of Canada’s critical institutions, says Jonathan Manthorpe, author of Claws of the Panda. China’s most insidious infiltration isn’t happening at the ballot box but in our universities, corporations, the political class — and, perhaps most corrosively, our mindset. We been fooled into believing we need China: for trade, for friendship, for influence. But we don’t, and never have, says Manthorpe, who’s releasing an updated edition of his influential book in May. But, as he tells Brian, China does need Canada — to manipulate and exploit. And we’ve played right into its hands. (Recorded April 19, 2024)

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The recent budget’s tax hikes won’t be enough to get us out of the fiscal mess the Trudeau Liberals have made with unrestrained spending and endless deficits, as Robert Asselin tells Brian. Asselin once advised Liberal finance minister Bill Morneau and is now with the Business Council of Canada. He says that with deficits becoming structural and interest on the debt now eating up massive amounts of revenue, the imbalance between spending and revenues is so out of whack that economic growth alone can’t save us. The only way out of disaster will be doing what the Liberals have tried to avoid: Whacking middle-class workers with higher taxes. (Recorded April 17, 2024)

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The Canadian Victoria Cross has never been awarded in its 31 years of existence. Gen. Rick Hillier aims to change that, and he joins Brian to discuss the new “Heroes Among Us” project launching with Postmedia — and his worries about the general state of our military, and our nation, today. Hillier lays out in stark detail how Canada’s world stature has sunk from its former greatness, why we’re a “parasite on defence,” why the army is “essentially broken,” and why Ottawa’s new defence policy doesn’t reassure him in the least. He also talks about why he thinks Canada is being divided by leaders whose job it should be to unite us. (Recorded April 12, 2024)

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Islamist extremism is on the march, as Hamas, ISIS, Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Houthis and al Shabab unleash attacks against the West. Highly organized support for radicalized violence parades openly on our city streets. What connects them all is money, as Haras Rafiq tells Brian this week. And he says Canada has become a critical nexus of funding from Qatar, Iran and other sponsors connected to the Muslim Brotherhood. Rafiq is at the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy and served as anti-extremism adviser to top U.K. ministers. He explains how Islamists exploit Canada’s system to launder billions here and spread money globally to promote their ideology of destroying Israel and spreading shariah law worldwide. (Recorded March 27, 2024)

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All she did was tell the truth. Before she knew it, Selina Robinson was being hounded out of B.C.’s cabinet for saying the UN had allotted Jews a “crappy piece of land” in 1948, with anti-Israel activists accusing her of insulting Muslims. Robinson joins Brian this week to recount how she was first targeted weeks prior by a “vicious” mob who wanted revenge after the then post-secondary education minister criticized an overtly pro-terrorist college instructor. Robinson recounts how B.C. Premier David Eby and her former colleagues in the NDP turned betrayed her, and why she quit the party over its blindness to the antisemitism in its midst. (Recorded March 27, 2024)

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New Democrats and even other Liberals are now fighting Justin Trudeau’s carbon-tax scheme. This, as the prime minister’s abandonment of Israel has lost him a significant segment of long-time supporters. Postmedia’s Lorne Gunter joins Brian Lilley this week to unpack the chaos that appears to be consuming the Liberal party right now. They get into how the NDP threw the government into disarray with its Palestinian statehood motion, while the Conservatives seemingly have Liberals cornered on environmental policy. The upshot is that Trudeau’s one-time big tent party looks to be collapsing into a few rapidly shrinking slivers of special interests. (Recorded March 21, 2024)

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The Trudeau government didn’t just fight for years to hide the embarrassing truth about two scientists caught leaking secrets from Canada’s highest-risk pathology laboratory to China — including for bioweapons research. As former CSIS analyst Phil Gurski and Conservative MP Michael Chong discuss with Brian this week, the Liberals tried painting concerns about Beijing’s interference as bigoted, just as they have whenever warnings have been raised about Chinese infiltration. As Chong and Gurski discuss, it points to an alarmingly blithe attitude about national security, which has demoralized our intelligence agencies and unnerved our allies, who wonder whether Canada can still be trusted. (Recorded March 14, 2024) 

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Beware of governments making laws to “protect the children,” warns Ian Runkle, this week’s guest. The Liberals’ Bill C-63 rules to stop online child exploitation and revenge porn seem well-intentioned. But the Online Harms Act is so broad it could end up censoring popular streaming entertainment, says Runkle, a lawyer specializing in civil liberties and host of YouTube’s Runkle of the Bailey. More worryingly, as Runkle tells Brian, it’s all wrapped up with stiff new penalties and powers against supposedly harmful ideas that are so prone to abuse they can only encourage platforms to pre-emptively block Canadians’ speech — including yours. (Recorded March 6, 2024)

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We won’t need roads where we’re going. At least that’s how Liberal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault wants it. He wants to end funding for new roads in Canada and ban cars that use gas or diesel, while forcing our heating and energy to become all-electric. Meanwhile, as energy researcher and commentator Parker Gallant tells Brian this week, we’re throwing billions at battery plants that lack materials and even markets, as buyers shun EVs, as we push demand for power infrastructure we don’t have. As Gallant explains, all these “net-zero” plans being forced on us by Ottawa look like they could well be ruinously costly — while driving us in the wrong direction. (Recorded February 21, 2024)

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The tension between Ottawa and Alberta is rising. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has most recently attacked Premier Danielle Smith’s plans to restrict children from medically transitioning genders. This, after his environment minister demanded the province curb its oil industry and overhaul its gas-dependent power grid. Smith joins Brian Lilley this week, and says that while she would prefer to collaborate with Trudeau, she’ll fight if necessary. Smith also tells Brian why she thinks Trudeau has already begun campaigning for his next election by beating up on Alberta. In that case, she says to him, “let’s just do it”: call an election and let Canadians decide whether they prefer federal -provincial confrontation or co-operation. (Recorded February 22, 2024)

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