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The RCMP talked about the federal government using the Emergencies Act just one week into the protests that gridlocked Ottawa, the inquiry looking into the use of the act was told Thursday.
The revelation came on a day when the Public Order Emergency Commission heard eight hours of testimony from OPP Commissioner Thomas Carrique, who said the national-security threat of the protests never rose to the level defined by CSIS, the threshold contained in the Emergencies Act.
Text messages between the Commissioner and his RCMP counterpart, Brenda Lucki, also revealed they discussed the possibility of bringing in the military as special constables, with Commissioner Lucki suggesting having military members wear RCMP uniforms.
Ontario Provincial Police Commissioner Thomas Carrique appears at the Public Order Emergency Commission in Ottawa on Oct. 27, 2022.Justin Tang/The Canadian Press
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Judges can give tougher sentences than what Crown seeks, Supreme Court rules
Judges can deliver much tougher sentences than what prosecutors ask for, even when an offender pleads guilty, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled on Thursday.
For the first time, Canada’s top court was asked to decide whether sentences should be effectively capped at the upper end of what prosecutors are seeking, in cases where an offender spares victims from testifying by pleading guilty.
Meet the Canadians who are cultivating an audience with America’s far right
Voters in the U.S. are preparing for midterm elections on Nov. 8 – a critical vote that will govern the future legislative ability of Joe Biden’s administration and measure the support Donald Trump continues to attract through candidates he endorses.
Those casting ballots for candidates aligned with Trump form a critical audience for the far-right Canadians who have built a following in the U.S., partly by rejecting the progressive politics in their own country.
The modern wave of influential right-wing Canadians owes credit in large measure to Rebel News, the online media organization co-founded by Ezra Levant. “Rebel was the incubator for North American far-right talent,” said Daniel Lombroso, who directed White Noise, a documentary about white nationalism.
Read more: Trump supporters in Michigan are mobilizing to give themselves authority over election results
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Also on our radar
Musk completes Twitter takeover: Elon Musk fired top executives he accused of misleading him in one of his first moves as the social media giant’s new owner.
Fewer than one in five Canadians have received a COVID-19 booster shot: With most Canadians behind on their COVID-19 vaccination, many are at greater risk of infection and severe outcomes as cases trend upward and new variants spread. Some experts say weak public messaging about the importance of staying up to date with boosters is partly to blame.
- COVID-19 measures brought the flu to standstill. Why experts say the coming season is unpredictable
Mediation talks fail, telecoms say: After meditation talks failed to resolve the Competition Bureau’s objections to the proposed $26-billion merger between Rogers and Shaw, the case is headed for a lengthy tribunal hearing.
Canada mum on leading multinational security force in Haiti: The federal government also won’t say whether it would join the force, but has sent an assessment team to the beleaguered country to determine what Haitians want help with before making decisions.
Federal deficit hits $90.2-billion for 2021-22 fiscal year: The figure was much smaller than the government’s April projection as revenues were buoyed by higher inflation and an economy that outperformed earlier expectations. It marks a sharp drop from the $327.7-billion deficit posted the prior fiscal year, which covered the height of the pandemic.
Morning markets
Tech weakness weighs: World share markets were down for a second day running on Friday as a rout in top tech stocks outweighed hopes of a slowdown in Fed and ECB rate increases. Just after 5:30 a.m. ET, Britain’s FTSE 100 was down 0.53 per cent. Germany’s DAX and France’s CAC 40 lost 0.82 per cent and 0.53 per cent, respectively. In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei closed down 0.88 per cent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng sank 3.66 per cent. New York futures were in the red. The Canadian dollar was lower at 73.42 US cents.
What everyone’s talking about
The Trudeau government wants to regulate like it’s 1968
“No longer confined to a home market dominated by bland foreign fare, Canadian music and video creators can reach a global audience at the touch of a digital button. Yet rather than adapt the regulation of broadcasting to this new and exciting reality – and by adapt I mostly mean eliminate – the ‘modernizing’ Trudeauite approach is to regulate the internet as if it were television in the 1960s. And by regulate the internet I mean regulate the internet – all of it, or very nearly so.” - Andrew Coyne
California’s homelessness disaster is a cautionary tale for us all
“They want the homeless cleared from their areas! They want to feel safe walking their streets again! Not exactly outlandish requests but sadly what they really want is a return to a world that existed 20 or 30 years ago. The great irony, of course, is one of the biggest reasons housing for the homeless stalls is because of resident resistance: no one wants an apartment building for the homeless in their neighbourhood. This resistance is killing proposed projects all the time. (In Canada too.) So is political infighting and warring factions of government.” - Gary Mason
Today’s editorial cartoon
Brian/The Globe and Mail
Living better
Five things to stream this Halloween weekend: The best horror movies of 2022
From Saloum, an unpredictable, high-energy concoction that tosses The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Assault on Precinct 13, Beasts of No Nation and From Dusk Till Dawn into a blender and hits “pulse,” to Prey, which brings the fist-pumping theatrics of the original film, here are the best horror films of the year, ready to get you screaming.
Moment in time: Oct. 28, 1955
Bill Gates is born
Bill Gates launched Microsoft in 1975 with his childhood friend, Paul Allen, transforming the world of consumer electronics, software and computers.Louie Palu/The Globe and Mail
Not very long ago, computers were devices too complicated to use for the average person. Now, we carry them around in our pockets and call them cellphones like it’s no big deal. In many ways, we have Bill Gates to thank for that, who was born on this day in Seattle, exactly 67 years ago. Two decades later, in 1975, when Gates launched Microsoft with his childhood friend, Paul Allen, he transformed the world of consumer electronics, software and computers. Windows, Microsoft’s proprietary operating system, started that revolution. It made computers personal. Suddenly, everyone could multitask, use web browsers and find an accessible start menu on their computers – luxuries introduced in the 1990s that we take for granted today. But Gates didn’t stop there. After building out computer apps such as Microsoft Office and introducing other web services, which became industry mainstays, Gates slowly transitioned out of his leadership roles at Microsoft in the early 2000s. Since then, he’s been focused on philanthropic efforts, particularly toward health care and climate change. Over the years, there has been a slew of controversies around Gates, but for better or for worse, Gates has helped forever change all our lives. Temur Durrani
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