Good evening, let’s start with today’s top stories:
Aggressive protests ‘are not going to make us flinch,’ Liberal Leaders says
Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau said today he won’t change his campaign in the face of increasingly aggressive protests but said he will follow the advice of the RCMP when it comes to his tour’s security.
“A few misguided individuals who don’t believe in science, who just want to watch things burn, are not going to make us flinch,” Trudeau told reporters at a campaign stop in Montreal.
Yesterday, the anti-mask, anti-vaccine and anti-Liberal protests that have followed his campaign since the start turned violent. A protester threw a handful of gravel at Trudeau, his security detail, Liberal staff and journalists as they were leaving the event.
Also on the campaign trail today: Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole says he would appoint a health minister who is fully vaccinated against COVID-19 if his party forms government, despite not requiring his candidates to be vaccinated.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh is promising to double funding for public-transit projects to help municipalities make their fleets fully electric by 2030.
And the Green Party is pledging to boost greenhouse gas emission reduction targets and cancel all new pipelines and oil exploration as part of its newly released platform.
Opinions:
- Trudeau risks losing this election both to O’Toole and to Singh – John Ibbitson
- Between Liberal red and Conservative blue, there’s a green gap – Globe editorial
Explainers:
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The latest COVID-19 developments: Newfoundland announces vaccine passport, plus more
Newfoundland and Labrador has become the latest province to say it will introduce a COVID-19 vaccine passport system, joining British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec . Premier Andrew Furey says Newfoundland will use the Quebec model for the passport, which will use a QR code to show a person’s level of vaccination. Meanwhile, some Alberta businesses are increasingly frustrated with that provincial government’s reluctance to introduce a vaccine passport program.
By the numbers: Ontario is reporting 1,145 new cases of COVID-19 and five deaths over two days: 564 new infections today and 581 yesterday. Quebec, meanwhile, says it has recorded 515 new cases today and no additional deaths attributed to the virus.
Read more:
- Nursing schools can’t accommodate increase in demand at time when profession faces shortage
- Supply chains are still a mess – and the Delta variant is making things worse
- How Quebec’s response to COVID-19 left 4,000 dead in long-term care homes
Taliban name new caretaker cabinet as tensions rise across Afghanistan
The Taliban today announced a caretaker cabinet that gave top posts to those who dominated the 20-year battle against the U.S.-led coalition and its Afghan government allies.
There was no evidence of non-Taliban in the lineup, a major demand of the international community.
The cabinet appointments were announced by a Taliban spokesman hours after Taliban fired into the air to disperse protesters and arrested several journalists, the second time in less than a week the group used heavy-handed tactics to break up a demonstration in the Afghan capital of Kabul.
ALSO ON OUR RADAR
Canada aims to block Chelsea Manning from entering country: A decade after Chelsea Manning revealed U.S. state secrets about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, officials in Ottawa are seeking to permanently block her from entering Canada. A tribunal hearing to determine Manning’s legal ability to enter Canada is scheduled to for Oct. 7. Federal officials are preparing to argue that her past crimes render her too dangerous to be allowed entry into the country.
Activist investor battles for control of CN: TCI Fund Management has launched a battle for control of Canadian National Railway in the wake of the railway’s apparently failed bid to buy Kansas City Southern. The activist investor accuses CN of ‘incompetent’ and ‘weak’ leadership and said it will soon call a special shareholders’ meeting to oust CN’s chairman, CEO and other directors.
Fernandez advances at U.S. Open: Quebec’s Leylah Fernandez beat Elina Svitolina of Ukraine with a third-set tiebreaker this afternoon to reach her first Grand Slam semi-final. In quarter-finals action, Felix Auger Aliassime of Montreal will meet Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz Garfia tonight. Check back at GlobeSports.com later for scores and highlights. Meanwhile, in the early hours this morning, 2019 champion Bianca Andreescu of Mississauga suffered her first U.S. Open match loss in a marathon 3½-hour session with Maria Sakkari of Greece.
Bombardier to rejoin Canada’s main stock index: A familiar name is returning to the S&P/TSX Composite Index on Sept. 20: Bombardier, which had been cut in June, 2020, after its stock price struggled to remain above $1, is one of eight companies being added to the index.
On today’s episode of The Decibel podcast: Tracy Vaillancourt discusses the effects of pandemic-related school closings on children’s mental health, and what both governments and parents can do to help.
Cosby accuser finds ‘closure’ with memoir: After roughly 15 years of her speech being constrained for legal reasons related to her sexual assault claim against Bill Cosby, Andrea Constand is telling her story in a memoir released today, The Moment.
RIP Michael K. Williams: The actor who, as the rogue robber of drug dealers Omar Little on The Wire, created one of the most popular characters in television in recent decades, has died at 54. His death is being investigated as a possible drug overdose, police say.
MARKET WATCH
The TSX and S&P 500 closed lower today while the Nasdaq edged up to a record high, as investors balanced worries about the slowing pace of economic recovery with expectations that the U.S. Federal Reserve will maintain its accommodative monetary policy.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 269.09 points or 0.76 per cent to 35,100.00, the S&P 500 lost 15.10 points or 0.34 per cent to 4,520.03, and the Nasdaq Composite rose 10.81 points or 0.07 per cent to 15,374.33.
The Toronto Stock Exchange’s S&P/TSX composite index dropped 14.80 points or 0.07 per cent to 20,806.63.
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TALKING POINT
A war on women is just beginning with Texas’s abortion law
As this fight plays out among lawmakers and the courts, it’s easy to forget who is going to be most harmed by these restricted rights. It will be women – the sisters and daughters of people who are expected to snitch on the abortion providers helping them.” - Elizabeth Renzetti
LIVING BETTER
Five issues we should be talking about before the Sept. 20 vote: Join The Globe’s climate-change columnist Adam Radwanski and The Narwhal’s editor-in-chief Emma Gilchrist for a live conversation today at 6 p.m. EDT, 3 p.m. PDT on key environmental issues.
TODAY’S LONG READ
Canada bet big on real estate. Now, it’s an economic drag
Over decades, real estate has become an increasingly big slice of the economy, taking the mantle of Canada’s largest industry in the 2008-2009 recession as low rates fuelled a lengthy boom period. The pandemic put that trend on steroids.
Before the COVID-19 health crisis, residential investment routinely amounted to 7 per cent of nominal gross domestic product. More recently, that’s surged to more than 10 per cent – or roughly double the equivalent rate in the United States. Stuck at home in the pandemic, people spent big on new properties and renovations, with help from rock-bottom interest rates that were critical to the crisis response.
In a sense, the exuberance for real estate was a bright spot in the darkest days of the pandemic recession, a slight offset to devastation in other parts of the economy. Now, things are shifting. As housing activity cools, the industry has become a drag on an economy that increasingly relies on it. Read Matt Lundy’s full story here.
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