It's time for another dose of news, analysis and commentary with Jim Csek and NowMedia managing editor Iain Burns.

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It's time for another dose of news, analysis and commentary with Jim Csek and NowMedia managing editor Iain Burns.

Now streaming on Rumble, Spotify, Apple and more.

Support The Really Big Show. We’re building independent Canadian media into a powerful voice and we can’t do it without you

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Aaron Pete: The path to reconciliation

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Investigative journalist Sam Cooper joins The Really Big Show to expose the deep networks of foreign interference, transnational crime, and elite capture threatening national sovereignty.

From the critical gaps in federal oversight commissions to controversial trade deals and the mainstream media's failure to ask tough questions, Cooper lays out a sobering blueprint of how Western institutions are being gamed. Jim, Ian, and Sam also discuss the chilling effects of new digital regulations and why independent, adversarial journalism is more essential now than ever.

Canadians want cheaper gas, a government that tells the truth about the economy, and a future worth staying for. Ottawa is offering a digital safety commission with the power to censor political content, a central bank governor who prefers the word "weak" to "recession," and a high speed rail project with 13 vice presidents and no train.

The Bank of Canada held rates for a 5th consecutive meeting while its governor admitted the economy hasn't grown in a year, refused to call it a recession and acknowledged his forecasts have been wrong on inflation, on "transitory," and on the recession he said wouldn't happen. Bill C-34 would give a new federal commission the power to order platforms to block content deemed to undermine political, economic or social stability. And 50% of Canadians would now seriously consider joining the European Union. When half the country is looking for the exit, something has gone badly wrong.

Today on The Really Big Show:

►The Bank of Canada held its key interest rate at 2.25% for a 5th consecutive meeting, with Governor Tiff Macklem admitting the economy "hasn't grown really in the last year," refusing to call it a recession and preferring the word "weak," one day after Statistics Canada confirmed 2 consecutive quarters of contraction

►Macklem's credibility is under scrutiny after wrongly predicting in 2020 that inflation would stay below 2%, in 2021 that inflation was "transitory," and in April 2026 that there would be no recession, with his own response being "did we get everything right? No"

►Culture Minister Marc Miller has tabled Bill C-34, the Safe Social Media Act, banning Canadians under 16 from social media platforms including Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat and X, with platforms facing fines of 3% of global revenue or $10 million for non-compliance, while the bill gives a new federal Digital Safety Commission the power to order platforms to block content deemed to undermine "political, economic or social stability"

►Miller acknowledged the bill involves "trade-offs" on Charter rights, saying "we're failing our children, enough is enough," as critics warn the content removal powers extend well beyond child safety into political speech

►Pierre Poilievre reaffirms a future Conservative government will cancel the $90 billion Alto high speed rail project, calling it a "pie-in-the-sky Liberal boondoggle," as Alto has spent $265.9 million of its $4.3 billion budget, employed 13 vice presidents and paid $2.76 million in bonuses without breaking ground

►Poilievre is calling for zero federal tax on gas and diesel for the rest of 2026, eliminating the fuel excise tax, the Clean Fuel Standard and the GST on fuel to save Canadians approximately 25 cents per litre, or $1,218 annually for a family of four, at a cost of $5.25 billion to the federal treasury

►India's High Commissioner to Canada says global investors want Canadian oil but remain cautious about the country's regulatory process, as both India and Japan join a growing list of nations seeking to diversify energy supply away from the Middle East amid the Iran war

►Energy expert Heather Exner-Pirot warns that while Canadian heavy oil has hit a $35 per barrel breakeven, new greenfield developments require $55 to $65 per barrel to clear investment hurdle rates, a gap that regulatory uncertainty is making wider

►126,000 temporary foreign worker permits were issued for skilled trades in 2025 alone, nearly identical to the 127,000 skilled trades workers who were unemployed that same year, as the program cost taxpayers a net $509 million to administer over 5 years

►A new poll finds 50% of Canadians would seriously consider initiating a formal process to join the European Union, more than double the 20% who would consider becoming an American state

When a government's response to public discontent is a commission with the power to remove content that undermines political stability, is it solving the problem or protecting itself from it? 

Let us know what you think in the comments.

The Really Big Show: The thinking Canadian's daily briefing, independent and informed.

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Jasmin Laine: The Liberal war on truth

On this episode of The Really Big Show, Jim Csek and Iain Burns tear into the layers of institutional incompetence piling up across the country. We break down the absolute shocker out of the aviation sector, where an Air Canada pilot managed to fly commercial wide-body jets for nearly 17 years without a valid commercial license right under the nose of Transport Canada regulators.

We also dive into the "Alto Pig"—the $90 billion high-speed rail Crown corporation that has managed to hand out millions in executive bonuses while failing to lay a single mile of track—and look at the Liberal cabinet's quiet preparation for a third regulatory swing at controlling your internet access. Plus, we look across the Atlantic where the UK is facing a full-blown border crisis as Belfast burns under Keir Starmer's watch.

Today is Tax Freedom Day, arriving later than ever, as Canadians spend more of their income on taxes than on food, shelter and clothing combined. Canadian officials are privately telling Reuters that the only real card Canada holds in trade talks is tariff-free access to the American market through CUSMA, the same relationship Carney spent a year telling Canadians he was pivoting away from. 

The Financial Times reports Carney is now willing to accept tougher conditions to trade in North America after more than a year of giving Washington the cold shoulder. The pivot is not a strategy. It is a concession. Meanwhile the Deputy Defence Minister failed to disclose a conflict of interest until after a meeting took place, the Alto Crown corporation paid $2.76 million in bonuses to 100% of its staff for a train that has not broken ground, and the Carney government is introducing a social media ban for Canadians under 16 while 4.4 million affordable homes remain unbuilt and homelessness is up 22% since 2017. The priorities are not adding up.

Today on The Really Big Show:

►Today is Tax Freedom Day, arriving later than ever, as Canadians now spend more of their income on taxes than on food, shelter and clothing combined

►Reuters reports Canadian officials privately acknowledge the main appeal Canada offers prospective trading partners is not Canadian resources or markets but tariff-free access to the U.S. through CUSMA, directly undermining Carney's pitch of building an independent middle powers trading bloc

►The Financial Times reports Carney is now "willing to accept tougher conditions to trade in North America" after more than a year of giving the U.S. the cold shoulder, as Canada remains frozen out of CUSMA talks and Washington signals displeasure at Carney's deepening ties with Beijing

►A defence start-up whose chief lobbyist is the brother of Deputy Defence Minister Christiane Fox secured a private audience with Carney to pitch drone technology, with Fox only disclosing the conflict after the meeting took place, weeks after she was already cited by the Ethics Commissioner for using her office to hire her husband's cousin into an $80,000 federal management position

►The Carney government is set to table an Online Harms Act banning social media for Canadians under 16, including TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat and Facebook, as child safety advocates warn Canadian children remain among the least protected in the Western world

►Federal Housing Advocate Marie-Josée Houle warns it will take over 1,000 years to eliminate homelessness at current construction rates, with a deficit of 4.4 million affordable homes, chronic homelessness up 22% since 2017, and the average Canadian household spending 52% of income on housing

►Pierre Poilievre says Alberta separatists are "rational people with legitimate grievances" and warns critics that dismissing them "will only worsen the divide," while personally opposing independence and calling for different government policies in Ottawa rather than a different country

►The Gordie Howe International Bridge between Ontario and Michigan is set to open this week, paid for entirely by Canadian taxpayers, after Trump threatened in February to block it "until the United States is fully compensated for everything we have given them"

►Finance Minister Champagne announced $150 million loans per airline to offset Iran war fuel costs, but WestJet called it "market-distorting" and Air Canada said its balance sheet is strong enough to handle the crisis without government help, as WestJet noted Ottawa forgave roughly $380 million in COVID loans to Air Transat last year

►Liberal and Conservative MPs are heading to Taiwan this fall despite China's ambassador calling it "hurtful," with Liberal chair Judy Sgro saying she neither sought nor received Carney's permission

►Federal records show Canada pays $14.5 billion annually in Old Age Security to 1.7 million pensioners earning over $60,000, including 328,400 earning over $100,000, while the Canada Child Benefit is clawed back at $79,000 in household income despite young families having significantly higher poverty rates than seniors

►Conservative MP Dean Allison has launched a non-partisan parliamentary forum to hear live testimony from COVID-19 vaccine-injured Canadians, as Health Canada records show more than 58,000 adverse events reported, 11,000 classified as serious, and only 250 of 3,500 compensation claims paid out

Carney spent a year building a trade strategy around the idea that Canada did not need the United States. His own officials just told Reuters that U.S. market access is the only reason anyone wants to trade with Canada. 

Does Canada hold any cards in the CUSMA negotiations?

Let us know what you think in the comments.

The Really Big Show: The thinking Canadian's daily briefing, independent and informed.