The Big Story

For an election so hotly anticipated by angry partisans, Ontario's month-long campaign doesn't seem to have inspired much of a shift from pre-election polls. The province votes in two days, and a quick glance would seem to say that Doug Ford's Progressive Conservatives are headed for another majority. Beyond the top line, however, things are more murky.

Why have so many PC candidates dodged debates? Why have the Liberals and NDP spent so much time attacking one another, when their federal counterparts are openly working together? Why have highways taken debate time away from a climate crisis, even as a massive storm killed nine Ontarians and left thousands (still) without power? And if Ford does retain his majority, is it the end of the line for his opponents leading the NDP and Liberal parties?

GUEST: Richard Southern, Queen's Park Reporter, CityNews

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You see them in the headlines every week or so: Hundreds of thousands—more often, millions—of dollars in cryptocurrency or NFTs, stolen by hackers or scammers who lured their victims into providing access to their secure wallets, only to empty them out.

As more and more non-experts jump into the scene, encouraged by big stars in high-priced commercials and dreaming of riches, there's more money than ever out there for the taking. Is crypto safe? How can you spot a scam? Does it need regulation? Or does it just need to come with a disclaimer—the same way legal gambling does?

GUEST: Jacob Silverman, writing in The New Republic

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We've known for a long time that mining can come with harmful by-products, but Canada has often been slow to put this knowledge into action. And that's a big part of how a veritable mountain of arsenic — enough to kill everyone in this country — ended up entombed in the ground on the outskirts of Yellowknife, just across the bay from the Yellowknives Dene First Nation.

How did it get there? What are we doing about it? What happens as the frozen ground up there gets warmer in the years to come? These aren't pleasant questions, but sometime soon we're going to need some decent answers.

GUEST: Eva Holland, freelance journalist writing for The Walrus

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Pandemics end. It's in their nature. And in recent weeks there's a large amount of data pointing to declining deaths worldwide and the logical end of the one that's plagued us for two-plus years. Finally. But how will we know when it's really "over"? What's the criteria? What comes after the pandemic phase of Covid-19, and what does the future look like? (Oh, and how worried should you be about Monkeypox?)

GUEST: Dr. David Fisman, epidemiologist, Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto

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New numbers show Canada's rate of food inflation has hit a 40-year high, even passing the rate of the United States. Millions of Canadians are trying to balance their grocery bill with their budget and having to make difficult choices. So, where can you look for relief? What's less expensive even as other products are skyrocketing? How can you make sure you get the most for your money when there's little relief in sight?

And finally, much of the world is facing a compounding food crisis, how can we make sure Canadians continue to have store shelves full of goods, even if they do cost more than in the past?

GUEST: Sylvain Charlebois, Senior Director, Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University, co-host of The Food Professor podcast

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It begins on a dating app you use and trust, with a user located in your city. Not with emails out of nowhere or random DMs. Even the investment part makes you money at first, and you can withdraw and spend it, and check your portfolio any time you like. But then ... everything vanished, and you're left with a broken heart and an empty bank account.

Welcome to the latest, incredibly sophisticated dating scam. And what we can do to get it under control.

GUEST: Carlo Handy Charles, dual PhD Candidate, McMaster University and Université des Antilles; read his work here

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Fights over language have always been a part of Quebec politics, and of life in the province in general. For the most part, they tend to end in a begrudging compromise, with French protected and English available but not given equal billing. A new bill about to be passed by the province's majority Coalition Avenir Quebec government is threatening to change all that.

The government says it's necessary to protect the province's official language. Everyone who isn't a native French speaker, from Indigenous people to Anglophones to new immigrants hoping to make a home in Quebec, say that the bill is far too harsh and will make things like doctor-patient relationships, workplaces and institutional services far more difficult to navigate. So what's in the bill? What does it actually mean? And what happens next?

GUEST: Christopher Reynolds, Montreal-based reporter, The Canadian Press

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You see it most visibly when party leaders like Justin Trudeau and Jagmeet Singh are accosted outside of events. But ordinary MPs of all parties report increasing amounts of verbal abuse and threatening behaviour—both in Ottawa and their home ridings. And it's escalating.

Some veteran MPs have walked away from politics because of it. And it's quite likely this toxic climate is preventing plenty more would-be public servants from ever running for office. So how did it get this bad? And how do we fix it?

GUEST: Stephen Maher, writing in The Walrus

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The secret to Uber's success was always supposed to be scale. The company subsidized rides and drivers, operating at a loss on each ride, as it grew into what is now a global behemoth. At that point, with a huge chunk of the market secured, the profits would naturally follow.

Uber is now as dominant in its sector as any company could hope for. It has scale to rival the world's biggest companies and ... its posting losses. Big losses. What happened here? And what does it say about the future of the app?

GUEST: Alison Griswold, London-based journalist, author of Oversharing

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Mohamedou Ould Slahi is not a Canadian citizen. He's Mauritanian. But he did spend a few weeks in Canada, and during that time he was watched. It is that evidence gathered by Canadian authorities, he claims, that led to his eventual detention and torture, and 14 years in security facilities. Now he's suing the Canadian government for $30 million. How did a few weeks in Montreal change his life, and how much is our government to blame?

GUEST: Michelle Shephard, terrorism and human rights reporter, filmmaker and podcaster

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