As many provinces begin to drop a number of COVID-19 protocols, many Canadians are breathing a sigh of relief.
But are there silver linings to these COVID-19 protocols? Are there any measures that should remain in Canadian society? For example, movie theatres and grocery store lines are more accessible and efficient because of social distancing.
What do you think? Anthony Furey discusses in his latest video.
The international community needs to pay greater attention to the threat China poses to Taiwan, according to Japan’s defence minister.
Nobuo Kishi told the Financial Times that international pressure was needed to prevent a military confrontation between China and Taiwan.
“Rather than a direct military collision between China and Taiwan, international society needs to pay greater attention to the survival of Taiwan,” Kishi said.
“A lot of countries have shown their sympathy with our idea of a free and open Indo-Pacific…We can together send a strong message on regional peace and stability.”
The Japanese minister warned that the Chinese regime has been making various military moves “that work to envelop Taiwan.”
China has increased efforts to assert its claim of Taiwan in recent months. Chinese military aircraft have regularly entered the Taiwan air defence zone and Chinese naval vessels have been spotted in waters off of Taiwan’s eastern coast.
While Japan does not intend to form a direct military relationship with Taiwan, the Japanese government recently broke with years of precedent and directly linked Taiwan’s security with its own. In a recent defence white paper, Japan stressed the need for a greater “sense of crisis.”
Japan’s Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso went even further and said a crisis in the Taiwan Strait would present an existential threat to Japan.
During a ceremony commemorating the 100th birthday of the Chinese Communist Party in July, Chinese President Xi Jinping vowed to “smash” any attempts by Taiwan at formal independence and pledged to complete “reunification” with the democratic country.
Critics of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau have called on the Canadian government to do more to support Taiwan.
A Politico report earlier this year suggested that the Liberals attempted to prevent an international award from being awarded to Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen.
Following the report’s publication, the government reversed course and Taiwan was awarded the Halifax International Security Forum’s John McCain Prize for Leadership in Public Service.
A Christian man and his 7-year-old son were beheaded by Islamists as they were returning from choir practice.
According to the International Christian Concern (ICC), Thomas Wollo, 46, and his 7-year-old son Nggwe Thomas were beheaded by Fulani radicals close to their home in Tafigana village in Plateau state’s Bassa Local Government Area on Sunday.
The perpetrators of the attack were said to have disappeared afterwards and have not been found. Locals reported that later in the day, the extremists also destroyed farmland in a nearby village.
This latest gruesome attack on Christians isn’t new in the African country, as 2021 has been a deadly year for Christians in Nigeria.
According to the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety), over 3,400 Christians have been killed since January, while at least 3,000 Christians have been abducted.
The number of Christians killed in Nigeria so far in 2021 is just 68 deaths less than the total deaths for all of last year, which Open Doors reported as 3,530.
The rise of Islamist groups, including Boko Haram and Fulani radicals, has led to an increase in violence in the African country. The ICC lists Fulani radicals as the fourth-deadliest terror group in the world and poses the greatest threat to Nigerian Christians.
A number of human rights activists are sounding the alarm on the persecution of Christians in Nigeria by Islamists extremists.
Open Doors listed Nigeria in the top ten of the World Watch List, a list of countries where Christians face the most extreme persecution, for the first time this year.
Earlier this week, the Alberta government announced that they would be dropping a number of public health measures, including forcing individuals who test positive for COVID-19 to isolate for two weeks.
Unsurprisingly, the COVID busybodies and pro-lockdown activists are losing their minds about Alberta’s decision. But is it really reasonable to continue locking individuals up in their homes? Shouldn’t these protocols only be temporary?
Anthony Furey discusses in his latest video.
In sharp contrast to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Conservative leader Erin O’Toole says if he becomes Prime Minister, he would leave it up to the New Brunswick government to decide how to fund abortion services.
Earlier this week, Trudeau said his government will be withholding healthcare transfers to New Brunswick because he claims the province is limiting access to abortion.
The provincial government subsidizes abortions at two hospitals in Moncton and one in Bathurst, but says it will not cover the cost of the procedure at the privately-owned Clinic 554 in Fredericton.
While in Fredericton on Friday, O’Toole said Trudeau’s decision to withhold healthcare transfers to the province is for “political gain and to divide Canadians.”
“How the provinces run their health care systems is not what the federal government should be interfering with,” O’Toole said.
According to Trudeau, the New Brunswick government has not lived up to its obligations under the Canada Health Act because it continues to make it difficult for women to access abortions.
“Making sure that every woman across this country has access to reliable reproductive services is extremely important to us, and that’s why we’ve continued … to impress strongly upon the government of New Brunswick how it needs to keep up its obligations under the Canada Health Act,” Trudeau told reporters in Moncton on Tuesday.
Pro-life advocacy group RightNow co-founder Alissa Golob sharply criticized Trudeau’s decision to withhold healthcare transfers to New Brunswick.
“Justin Trudeau is such an extremist on the abortion issue, he would rather withhold taxpayer dollars (without taxpayer consent) during a pandemic, than follow the Canada Health Act and let provinces decide funding decisions themselves,” Golob told True North.
“In Trudeau’s twisted mind, killing children supersedes life-threatening medical conditions. Let that sink in.”
Despite O’Toole’s pro-choice stance, the Conservative leader has allowed his MPs to vote on abortion-related bills according to their conscience.
2021 has been a deadly year for Christians in Nigeria.
The Anambra-based International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety) estimates that over 3,400 Christians have been killed since January, while at least 3,000 Christians have been abducted. Their report indicates that 300 Churches and 10 priests have been attacked.
The number of Christians killed in Nigeria so far in 2021 is just 68 deaths less than the total deaths for all of last year, which Open Doors reported as 3,530.
To compile its statistical data, Intersociety relied on credible local and foreign media reports, government accounts, reports from international rights groups and eyewitness accounts.
According to the Christian Post, due to the lack of adequate government record-keeping, death tolls reported by media outlets or the government are estimates and often are skewed.
A number of human rights activists are sounding the alarm on the persecution of Christians in Nigeria by Islamists extremists.
Open Doors listed Nigeria in the top ten of the World Watch List, a list of countries where Christians face the most extreme persecution, for the first time this year.
The rise of Islamist groups, including Boko Haram and Fulani militants, has led to an increase in violence in the African country.
“The Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen are responsible for majority of the killings with at least 1,909 Christian deaths in 200 days, followed by Boko Haram, ISWAP and Muslim Fulani Bandits who jointly killed 1,063 Christians, while Nigerian Army, joined by the Nigeria Police Force and other branches of the Armed Forces accounted for 490 Christian deaths,” the report reads.
In its report, Intersociety accused the Nigerian government of failing to protect its citizens.
“The Nigerian Government has continued to face sharp criticisms and strong accusations of culpability and complicity in the killings and supervision of same,” the report reads.
A small group of Albertans want more government in their life and are demanding the Kenney government enforce stricter COVID-19 protocols.
A handful of individuals who were masked and socially distanced outside participated in protests at McDougall Centre in Calgary and the Alberta legislature in Edmonton on Friday and Saturday. The protesters were upset with the Alberta government’s decision to loosen public health measures.
Earlier this week, citing high vaccination rates, the government announced that they would be dropping a number of public health measures, including contact tracers, mandatory isolation and the province-wide mask mandate.
The pro-lockdown protests were organized by Dr. Joe Vipond and Albert Nobbs.
Vipond is an outspoken critic of the Kenney government and has been in favour of lockdowns since the start of the pandemic. Nobbs is one of the founders of the Alberta Activist Collective – an advocacy group determined to defeat the United Conservative Party in the next election.
“Everything that I hear now coming out of [Chief Medical Officer of Health of Alberta Dr. Deena] Hinshaw’s mouth is gaslighting and outright lies. How can I trust my government?” said Vipond at the protest.
During the protest, Vipond also demanded the resignation of Premier Kenney, Health Minister Tyler Shandro and Dr. Hinshaw.
“We want resignations from Dr. Hinshaw, Premier Kenney, Minister Shandro and we want to negotiate a return to sane public health policy.”
He went on to add that Dr. Hinshaw has lost the “moral authority to be our public health leader.”
The protests were also attended by labour union groups, teachers union members and New Democrat MLAs, who all seized on the opportunity to criticize the Kenney government.
On Wednesday, Premier Kenney said that Albertans will need to learn to live with COVID-19 and accused the legacy media and activists of promoting fear.
“COVID continues to exist. As I’ve said before, the virus will continue to circulate. Numbers will go up and they’ll go down, but what matters most is that the widespread protective effect of vaccines is real,” Kenney said.
“We should stop listening to people who deny the powerful protective effect of vaccines.”
According to the latest government statistics, there are currently 1,655 active cases of COVID-19 in Alberta. Among eligible Albertans age 12 or older, 75.8% have now received a single dose of a COVID-19 vaccine while 65% have now had two doses.
The Trudeau government is proposing the creation of a Digital Safety Commission that will have the power to regulate “harmful online content.” The government is targeting online platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Pornhub.
In the Liberals’ world, expressing a politically incorrect opinion is as much a crime as exploiting a child or publishing nonconsensual intimate images.
True North fellow Lindsay Shepherd breaks down the Trudeau government’s proposed Digital Safety Commission of Canada.
There appears to be no end in sight for the Trudeau government’s pandemic spending spree.
In the first two months of its fiscal year, the federal government ran a deficit of $23.8 billion, according to the Finance Department’s regular fiscal monitor.
While the government points out that the $23.8 billion budgetary deficit is a significant drop from the $86.8 billion recorded over the same months in 2020 – when the pandemic first began and the government started implementing various COVID-19 support programs – critics are wondering when the government will reduce spending.
“Of course it’s good to see a smaller budget gap but this is still a massive deficit so the feds shouldn’t be patting themselves on the back,” said the Federal Director with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation Franco Terrazzano.
“We need to make sure all the temporary and costly COVID spending remains temporary because taxpayers can’t afford a repeat of 2020.”
Canada’s federal debt surpassed $1 trillion dollars this year following a frenzy of pandemic spending by the ruling Liberal government. Further, in its latest budget, the government revealed a whopping deficit of $354 billion with no plan to pay down the debt and balance the books.
“Unfortunately, the Trudeau government doesn’t seem to be taking the $1-trillion debt problem seriously because we continue to see massive spending announcement after massive spending announcement,” said Terrazzano.
In its most recent Fiscal Sustainability Report, the Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO) warned that the federal government will not return to a balanced budget until 2070 if politicians do not curb spending.
In its estimate, the PBO says the government is projected to tack on an additional $2.7 trillion in debt before balancing the budget in 2070. Interest charged will cost Canadians approximately $3.8 trillion by 2070.
The use of fentanyl, cannabis and methamphetamines spiked across Canada during the early stages of the pandemic, according to a government report.
Statistics Canada’s Canadian Wastewater Survey found that the increase in drug use is a contributor to the spike in overdose deaths last year.
In its report, government researchers analyzed the chemicals in wastewater in Halifax, Montreal, Toronto, Edmonton and Vancouver.
The report found that Vancouver had a per-capita load of fentanyl four times higher than any other city in the report. Edmonton saw the highest per-capita loads of Methamphetamines. Detectable cannabis was the highest in Halifax.
Increased isolation, poverty and a lack of social services caused by lockdowns led to a sharp increase in overdoses. Multiple provinces reported an alarming number of overdose-related deaths in 2020.
In Alberta, a record number of 95 young people under the age of 25 died from accidental opioid overdoses in 2020.
In Ontario, deadly opioid overdoses were up 75% following the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 when compared to deaths the year prior. 2,050 people died of opioid overdoses between March and December 2020.
In the six months after the pandemic began, British Columbia recorded more overdose deaths than deaths from homicide, car accidents, suicide or the coronavirus combined.
Canadians have been victims of some of the strictest public health orders in the world, rivalling communist countries like China and Cuba. A number of government reports have led Canadians to question how effective lockdowns are.
A Statistics Canada report revealed that more Canadians under the age of 65 died from the “indirect consequences” of the pandemic than the COVID-19 virus itself.
Statistics Canada also reported that most of the people who died from COVID-19 in Canada were over the age of 85 and had dementia, Alzheimer’s, chronic heart disease or other pre-existing “cardiovascular and respiratory conditions.”