How Canadian wildfire smoke is jeopardizing health across North America
Canadian provinces have evacuated towns and struggled to contain the second-worst wildfire season in 30 years, while residents of some U.S. cities have endured unhealthy air as smoke from the blazes wafts across the border.
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Canada News.Net
24 minutes ago
- Canada News.Net
Why Trump wants Putin in Alaska and not anywhere else
The choice of Americas northern frontier is as much about politics as it is about geography The choice of Alaska as the venue for the August 15, 2025, bilateral summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin carries a rare blend of symbolism. It reaches deep into the past, reflects the current geopolitical balance, and hints at the contours of future US-Russia relations. From the standpoint of historical memory, there is hardly another place in the United States that so clearly embodies the spirit of neighborliness and mutually beneficial cooperation lost during the Cold War. From 1737 until 1867, this vast, sparsely populated land was known as Russian America - a semi-exclave of the Russian Empire, separated from its Eurasian heartland yet sharing a border with another state. Tsar Alexander II's decision to sell Alaska to the United States for $7.2 million was one of the most debated diplomatic transactions of the 19th century. In St. Petersburg, it was clear: if left unattended, Alaska would likely fall into the hands of Russia's main rival at the time - the British Empire. Handing it over to Washington was not an act of weakness, but a calculated investment in future relations with a nation whose Pacific ambitions did not yet collide with Russia's. In the 20th century, this symbolic connection gained new meaning. During World War II, the city of Fairbanks - with a population of just thirty thousand - became a major hub in the Lend-Lease program, a massive US military aid effort that supplied the Soviet Union with aircraft, equipment, and materials. Alaska's airfields served as a key route for delivering American planes to the Eastern Front. Even today, Alaska remains the "most Russian" of US states: home to Old Believers - descendants of 19th-century settlers seeking religious freedom - with functioning Orthodox churches and place names like Nikolaevsk, Voznesensk, and Upper and Lower Russian Lakes, linked by the Russian River. But the choice of Alaska is more than a nod to history; it is also a political calculation. Trump clearly has no intention of sharing the spotlight with intermediaries such as Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the president of Türkiye, or Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the president of the United Arab Emirates and one of the most influential figures in Middle Eastern politics. Both men have played high-profile roles as international brokers, but their involvement would inevitably shift the tone and priorities of the summit. Trump has chosen the most geographically remote state in the union - thousands of miles from any Euro-Atlantic capital - to underline his distance both from his Democratic opponents at home and from NATO allies who, acting in Kiev's interests, will seek to undermine any potential breakthroughs. There is also a practical side: Alaska's low population density makes it easier for security services to minimize the risk of terrorist attacks or staged provocations, while sidestepping the legal complications posed by the International Criminal Court's arrest warrant. In 2002, the United States withdrew its signature from the Rome Statute and it does not recognize the ICC's jurisdiction on its soil. There is another crucial dimension: Alaska is America's only truly Arctic region. In a world where the Trump administration has been exerting pressure on Canada and Greenland to bring them under firmer US influence, the high north is becoming a strategic theater. Russia and the United States have overlapping interests here - from developing the Northern Sea Route, which partly runs through the Bering Strait, to tapping offshore oil and gas reserves. The Lomonosov Ridge, an underwater formation in the Arctic Ocean claimed by Russia as a natural extension of its continental shelf, is a case in point. Joint Arctic projects could turn the region into one of the most prosperous in the world, but under a different scenario it could just as easily become a stage for nuclear weapons tests and air defense drills. Ukraine will loom large over the summit agenda. Western media outlets have already floated the possibility of territorial swaps - for example, the withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from Donetsk People's Republic in exchange for Russian concessions in the Sumy, Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, and Nikolaev regions. Even Western analysts have called such a deal a diplomatic victory for Moscow, noting that the unoccupied territory Russia would gain would be four times the size of the areas it might cede. Alaska is a fitting place for such discussions: its own history is a vivid reminder that territorial ownership is not an immutable historical-geographic constant, but a political and diplomatic variable shaped by the agreements of great powers in specific historical moments. The summit in Alaska is more than just a meeting between two leaders. It is a return to the logic of direct dialogue without intermediaries, a reminder of historic ties, and a test of whether Moscow and Washington are willing to work together where their interests not only intersect, but could align. Alaska's story began as Russian, continued as American - and now has the chance to become a shared chapter, if both sides choose to see it as an opportunity rather than a threat.
Edmonton Journal
38 minutes ago
- Edmonton Journal
Rick Bell: Alberta, the rest of us wait for Carney to do something
Article content And Elbows Up is now a punchline to a joke. It hasn't aged well. Article content At best, it is an oddity like one of those teen dances from decades ago. Let's all do the Hand Jive! Article content Carney is a politician not a messiah or a comic book superhero. If and when Canada gets a deal with Trump it won't be because Canada yelled the loudest or threatened the most or declared war on the U.S. Article content A deal will come because Carney is not doing what the mob wanted. Article content In Alberta, our fate awaits. When will Carney take the handcuffs off the oilpatch and strengthen Canada's economy in these trying times with the U.S.? Article content Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre was in Calgary. He tries to explain Carney. Article content 'For the last ten years Mark Carney was a net-zero, keep it in the ground green fanatic. He said he wanted to keep at least half our oil in the ground. He's testified against the Northern Gateway pipeline. He supported all the carbon taxes. He's publicly spoken in favour of the electric vehicle mandate,' says Poilievre. Article content Article content Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, flanked by members of parliament, speaks in front of workers and a fracking pump at EnQuest Energy Solutions in Calgary on Thursday, Aug. 7, 2025. Article content 'He's tried to present himself as some big change because he looks and sounds different than Justin Trudeau but he has supported all of the same policies.' 'What he's doing right now is ragging the puck and trying to drag people along into believing he will one day do something. But he hasn't done anything other than hold a lot of meetings and make a lot of bold statements.' Article content For the guy who says he wants to build baby build we wait for action from Carney. Article content Alberta is losing patience. Rebecca Schulz, the environment minister in Premier Danielle Smith's government, echoed that sentiment in a recent interview with your scribbler. Article content When is Carney announcing he will dump the nasty laws holding back the Canadian economy, a move Premier Smith has been pushing hard, as has Poilievre? Article content Article content At the risk of Carney plagiarizing Poilievre, why does the prime minister not just repeat the following. Article content 'We can't wait until everybody is onside.' Article content 'There are some people out there who don't believe Elvis is dead. You can't get everybody to agree on any basic fact, even the basic fact we need a pipeline.'
Edmonton Journal
an hour ago
- Edmonton Journal
Cam Tait: Alberta's official disability advocates dropped the ball on CDB clawback
Article content The story goes that, back in 1955, an Edmonton newspaper columnist, listening to Bryan Hall on CKUA and aware of a sports announcer vacancy at 630 CHED, tapped out a piece saying Hall should apply. Article content Article content Article content Let's dig a little deeper. Article content Minorities, it can be said, have their own struggles — a subset of generational challenges. Article content I live with disability. Article content The generation of people living with disability before mine fought to have handicapped — the buzzword of the day — people living in the community rather than hospitals. Article content When I rolled on to the scene in the early 1970s as a young man old enough to accept the obligation of tugging on the communal rope to further the inclusion of people with disability, there were new things to advocate for. Article content Article content Curb cuts. Accessible transportation services. Innovative housing programs. Adequate income programs. Education support systems. Article content Article content And more. Article content While most of those boxes are checked off, there is always the need to do more: to reflect the increasing population of Albertans with disability, and the changing ways of society itself. Article content That brings us to today. Article content In Alberta, the big battle — and it is beyond big — is the provincial government maliciously clawing back the $200 federal supplement, the Canadian Disability Benefit, from people on the Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped — the only province to show its graceless greed by taking it back. Article content The $200 a month, plus the province's $1,9021, would mean people receiving AISH would get $2,102 a month, or $25,224 per year. Article content More importantly, it would bring people receiving AISH closer to the Canadian poverty line — $24,252 per month.
