The Big Story

You and a friend might be given two different prices by the same website for the same item. Heck, you might be given two different prices yourself depending on where you are when you're browsing the site. It's a phenomenon that began as dynamic pricing—a computer balancing supply and demand to ensure everything was sold at a price the market was prepared to pay—but it's now gone well beyond that.

As algorithms become smarter and more advanced, and as we voluntarily offer our devices and the companies we do business with more of our information, the prices you see may take into account things like where you are, what device you're on, your shopping history and... well, everything the machine knows about you. Is this the kind of shopping experience we want? If not, what do we do about it?

GUEST: Colin Horgan, writing in The Walrus

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Somehow, nobody involved in the now-infamous affair clued into the fact that a man who was fighting against the Russians in 1943 would have been fighting ... with the Nazis. That's at the core of last week's House of Commons' screwup that has made international waves, become a hyperpartisan blame game in Ottawa and has many people speedrunning the history of the Second World War.

But who's really to blame for this failure? Why will the blame land at the feet of the Liberals and Justin Trudeau regardless of the answer? And what do these frequent missteps signal about a government that seems to be getting tired, or at least giving observers that perception?

GUEST: David Moscrop, author, podcaster and political commentator

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Yup, the government body overseeing the economy has been hoping for a while now that some of the low unemployment rates that have been driving up salaries and opportunities for workers will vanish. It's a key pillar of their plan to steer the country away from a recession. That, and higher interest rates. All good, right?

Right now a surprising amount of our economic future is being determined because, according to contemporary economic thought, things were going too well. So now we're paying for it, and hoping we don't end up paying even more. Here's how we got here, what the BoC hopes will happen, and what we can expect those forces to do to, you know, us.

GUEST: Jim Stanford, economist, director of the Centre for Future Work

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Last week, Ontario premier Doug Ford caved, spectacularly. He apologized for breaking his promise, and vowed to reverse his decision to open up parts of the province's Greenbelt to development. The move came after months of scandal, investigations and public outcry—it's a rare example of a politician listening and admitting he screwed up, and got it wrong.

But the saga isn't over yet. There are developers who spent billions buying up land they assumed would be developed. They may sue. There are still ongoing investigations. And there is still an electorate that was showing clear signs of abandoning Ford over this move before his reversal. Will they reverse themselves, too?

GUEST: Emma McIntosh, Ontario reporter, The Narwhal

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The numbers have been climbing for years, and last year was a high not seen since the old days of manual hot-wiring. This year figures to be even worse, as a perfect storm of factors make modern cars vulnerable, movable and the target of highly organized thieves.

How does a modern car-theft work, anyway? Why do the thieves seem to be ahead of the automakers? What's the best way to stop this wave, on both an individual and regulatory level? OH—and just where do all those stolen cars wind up, anyway?

GUEST: Bryan Gast, vice president of investigative services at Equite Association 

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In many regions of Europe, wild boars roam the landscape. Also, they're radioactive. For a long time, it was assumed the Chernobyl disaster was the cause, and that's still partly true. But the real answer goes back even further, and offers us a glimpse of how the byproducts of nuclear technology can lay dormant for decades, only detected in the most visible part of a system we're still learning to understand.

This is the wild boar paradox, and this is what it can teach us about nuclear technologies past, present and future...

GUEST: Becky Ferreira, science writer, regular contributor at Motherboard

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You've probably got some in your medicine cabinet right now, and if you take them hoping for a relief from congestion, you're pretty much taking a placebo. A recent FDA review found that one of the most most popular active ingredients in these medications is basically useless.

So how has this drug been approved and available for decades when evidence shows it doesn't do what it's supposed to? Why did it take us so long to realize it? Which medications actually will relieve congestion? And what should you do when the first cold of the fall hits your household?

GUEST: Mina Tadrous, pharmacist and the host of the I'm Pharmacy podcast at the University of Toronto's Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy

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When Justin Trudeau told the country that his government has evidence implicating India in a June murder of a Sikh leader in BC, it shocked even seasoned intelligence experts. Foreign interference is by now a nationally known problem in this country, but extrajudicial killings are a large step beyond that.

What would India's role in the murder tell us about the state of Canada's national security? Will we ever find out what the government actually knows about the murder? Was there any way to stop the killing before it happened? And what must Canada do to be able to protect its citizens, even those wanted dead by their former countries?

GUEST: Jessica Davis, national security expert, president and principal consultant, Insight Threat Intelligence

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Last week, the president of Spanish soccer resigned amid a furor over a nonconsensual kiss given to one of  the Spanish women's team's players in the wake of their world cup triumph. Players around the world—not only women—had demanded this resignation and more, pushing for the total restructuring of Spanish soccer.

In Canada, last month's collapse at the world cup marked a long-running battle between our women's team and the federation that pays and oversees the national teams. Women's teams around the world have faced similar fights. Many of them are winning. Is this the seismic shift that soccer's sexist structure has long had coming?

GUEST: Shireen Ahmed, Sr. contributor, CBC sports; sports media instructor, Toronto Metropolitan University; Co-host, Burn It All Down

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This afternoon, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told the House of Commons, and all of Canada, that this country has credible evidence that India was behind the killing of a high profile Sikh leader in BC in June.
 

This evening we're re-sharing with you an episode we published in June, a few days after the murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a well-known community leader and pro-Khalistan activist who the Indian government had previously accused of terror offences. There were questions when it happened about if the Indian government could have been involved in his death. Canada now says it has answers. This episode explores his murder, his life, and his potential targeting by the Indian government.

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ORIGINAL SHOW NOTES:

Nine days ago, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, was killed in a targeted daylight shooting in a crowded area outside of a Sikh temple in Surrey, BC. Nijjar was a well-known community leader and pro-Khalistan activist who the Indian government has previously accused of terror offences— allegations he vehemently denied.

His activism and controversial past have spawned many theories about who may have done this and why, but more than a week after his death, the public has seen little evidence to substantiate those rumours. Meanwhile, a community is in mourning, and they took to the streets on Sunday to demand answers.

So what, if anything, can we say for certain at this point? And could this horrific crime spark further violence?

GUEST: Sonia Aslam, reporter, CityNews Vancouver

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