Podcast
The Big Story
Episodes — page 42
- These days, something's always burning: A fire season preview
With the recent devastation in Jasper, Alberta, we wanted to revisit this episode we recorded back in April with author, John Vaillant, where he explains why wildfires have become…
- Welcome to Paris! Here's a Canadian Olympic cheating scandal!
The Paris games kicks off with the Opening Ceremonies today, but the Canadian women's soccer team has already given the thousands of media covering the event something to talk abou…
- How the script flipped in the US presidential election
A month ago President Joe Biden was about to debate former President Donald Trump. Everything since then has been a series of shocks that dramatically upset a race that had been st…
- What happens when 8.5 million computers crash at once?
Last Friday, a bad update from a cybersecurity company managed to give an estimated 1 percent of the world's computers the blue screen of death. Not only that, but the initial fix…
- Inside the rapidly shifting Canadian dental plan
Canada's dental plan, the first national model in the country's history, opened earlier this year. And it's already quite different than it was at launch. For starters, it's expand…
- Tick talk: What to keep in mind before venturing outdoors
If you get outside to enjoy Canadian nature, you've probably been warned about ticks and their potential to spread Lyme disease. But you may not have been warned about the other il…
- Crypto. AI. Sex dolls. Robotics. And a Canadian business plan.
No we haven't been hacked—today's story has all of these things and more. It's a tale about what happens when a Canadian crypto company wants to add to its portfolio, an American s…
- Rats! How Ontario failed where Alberta succeeded
Five years ago, the City of Toronto sounded a warning about an explosive growth in its rat population. The city planned to ... study it. Now, both Toronto and Ottawa are desperate…
- When a home purchase leaves the owner homeless...
If you own a property, you're not allowed to kick tenants out just to raise the rent. You are, however, allowed to evict them if you've purchased the property and plan to live in t…
- Inside WestJet's summer strike meltdown
Its mechanics were officially off the job only 29 hours. But more than a week after they returned to work, WestJet was still struggling with cancelled flights and stranded passenge…
- The rise, fall and (maybe) rise again of the Newfoundland cod fisheries
For 32 years a moratorium on cod fishing was in place in Newfoundland. When it hit, it cost tens of thousands of jobs, decimated the economy and changed the identity of the provinc…
- What do we lose when our malls disappear?
It's summer, and parents across Canada are desperately looking for things to occupy their children. So why not take a trip to your local mall? That is, while you still can. In this…
- Will Justin Trudeau take his own 'walk in the snow'?
A winter hike was the way his father, then prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, decided he was through with politics and would not run again. Inflation was high, Canadians were strugglin…
- Is America on the brink of political collapse? Should Biden bow out?
Political collapse is an order of magnitude different than, say, "a trouble democracy" or even "a hard right government". It means the end of democracy, a massive reordering of wha…
- Alice Munro's tarnished legacy and the evolution of MeToo
Learning that legendary Canadian writer Alice Munro was complicit in ignoring the sexual abuse of her daughter by her husband has shocked the country and forced us all to grapple w…
- An LCBO strike, and Ontario's long, strange history of booze policy
Ontario's liquor distribution workers are on strike for the first time in their history. The reason? The government's plan to open up places like corner stores for beer, wine and m…
- How Canada's asylum system completely collapsed
Eight years ago, the Prime Minister was welcoming Syrian refugees to Canada at the airport, to international acclaim. Canada was viewed as one of the world leaders in accepting asy…
- Is screen time still bad for kids?
On Sundays, we revisit some of our favourite episodes. If you're new to the show, we hope you enjoy hearing these for the first time, and if you've been with us a while, enjoy this…
- Inside the fight to save the Ontario Science Centre
First the Ontario Science Centre was to be moved in a year or two, and that was enough to spark a protest movement to keep the iconic building designed by a renowned architect righ…
- Will the UK turn left while France swerves hard to the right?
By the end of this weekend, two of Canada's G7 allies could each have new governments, on opposite sides of the political spectrum. While the Labour party is expected to end 14 yea…
