In the latest episode of The Line Podcast, recorded on July 17th, 2026, Matt Gurney and Jen Gerson keep things refreshingly brief as both are juggling family matters. They begin with Jen's unsuccessful attempt to achieve cottage zen, as she unloads on the latest complaints from American politicians about wildfire smoke drifting south from Canada. Both hosts independently arrive at the same tongue-in-cheek solution: if the Americans don't stop griping, Canada should simply schedule its forest fires for days when the wind is blowing south. (They're kidding. Mostly.) They also discuss Donald Trump's latest bizarre speech and the increasingly revealing comments from senior U.S. officials, who seem unable to hide just how much Prime Minister Mark Carney has gotten under their skin.

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Your hosts then turn to the slow-burning civil war within Canadian conservatism. Jen, still falling well short of cottage zen, has a few things to say. Matt observes that while Carney may be a practicing Catholic, he also seems to have accumulated an extraordinary amount of good karma in previous lives — politically speaking, he's facing remarkably little effective opposition from either the left or the right. Matt also warns the Conservatives that, whether they realize it or not, they're in danger of getting "Jagmeet Singhed." And it's not subtle.

This episode is also brought to you by BioCanRx, a federally-funded Canadian not-for-profit research network focused on cutting-edge cancer immunotherapy research that they’re helping Canadian researchers bring from labs to patients in clinical trials –– all in Canada.

A new treatment for your cancer has been approved. Can you get it? Maybe, maybe not. Canada isn’t just one health jurisdiction. At the federal level, Health Canada assesses the safety and efficacy of all drugs and therapies in the country, and in a year — sometimes less — they can approve one for sale in Canada. Once approved, — or sometimes while the assessment is happening— the drug’s cost effectiveness is evaluated by Canada’s Drug Agency.

Then the ball goes to the provinces. They work together to negotiate prices with the drug maker, to confirm that it doesn’t duplicate something they’re already stocking, and that its potential value justifies its cost. Only after that can it be provided by each province’s ministry of health. This process can take years. It’s one reason that Canadian innovations leave the country to be developed elsewhere, and why drug companies don’t always choose Canada to initially to launch their products. In the U.S., they get FDA approval, set a price, and wait for the market to decide if the price is right. In Canada, Heath Canada approves and lengthy negotiations start, with no revenue or guarantee of future approval.

Organizations like BioCanRx are willing to wait out the dry years because they’re not-for-profit, but companies with shareholders might skip the Canadian market until they’re making big money elsewhere. This means Canadians have to wait on the system for drugs that could save them, and are saving people in other countries. We’ll talk more about these problems in the weeks to come. Stay tuned for more.

The hosts wrap up by discussing Naheed Nenshi's apology for speaking with an Israeli, which Matt suggests has elevated the Alberta NDP leader to full windbag status. Matt reminds Jen that he used to complain Nenshi needed to get himself into the public eye more often. After this week, he'd like to politely withdraw that recommendation. Jen wonders if maybe this is why he's been invisible — he might just actually be awful at this. Anyway, congrats to Danielle Smith. At this rate, she'll be premier for life.

All that and more in the latest episode of The Line Podcast. Check out our main page at ReadTheLine.ca, and keep your kindling and torches ready. Wait for the code word.

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