Politics Is Broken

Is Canada trying to protect kids online... or just trying to regulate the internet after it has already escaped the barn, stolen the tractor, and opened a TikTok account? This week, Stewart and Lisa talk Bill C-34, the proposed under-16 social media ban, age verification, Ai safeguards, deepfakes, online harms, and why protecting kids online will take more than just telling Big Tech to behave. The...

U.S. Ambassador to Canada Peter Hoekstra is back in the headlines after reposting Donald Trump’s “51st state” comments... because apparently diplomacy now comes with a retweet button and no adult supervision. This week on Politics Is Broken , Brittlestar and Lisa B talk about Hoekstra’s latest Canada-sized diplomatic faceplant, Trump’s ongoing 51st state nonsense, and why Canadians are getting tir...

Is politics getting nastier... or just more honest? This week on Politics Is Broken , Brittlestar and Lisa talk about the collapse of political decorum, the rise of insult politics, and whether it’s sometimes okay to meet bad-faith nonsense with a little verbal fire. From Alberta separatism and anti-separation rallies to Pierre Poilievre’s media scrums, Mark Carney, Stephen Miller, Gavin Newsom’s...

This week on Politics Is Broken , Brittlestar and Lisa take on Alberta separatism... the political idea that sounds simple until someone asks, “Okay, but who’s paying for the borders?” With a referendum question now in play, Stewart and Lisa break down the facts, myths, and very expensive realities behind the idea of Alberta leaving Canada. They look at the big claims around Ottawa, oil, transfer...

Should we take Alberta separation seriously? On one hand, most Albertans still don’t appear to want it. On the other hand, separatists reportedly submitted nearly 302,000 signatures, there’s a voter data scandal, U.S. meetings, First Nations treaty challenges, foreign disinformation concerns, and a premier trying to balance “Sovereign Alberta” with “please don’t actually break the country.” This w...

Is Mark Carney opening the door for the NDP? This week, Brittlestar and Lisa B talk about Carney’s economic update, the concerns raised in Althia Raj’s Toronto Star opinion piece, and whether cuts or stalled funding to pharmacare, child care, and health transfers could push progressive voters away from the Liberals. They also get into Stewart’s trip to Politics and the Pen, a surprisingly funny Me...

There’s a lot of “slop” online right now… and some of it is starting to shape real-world conversations. In this episode, Brittlestar and Lisa unpack the rise of AI-generated content pushing Alberta separation and 51st state narratives — much of it coming from inauthentic sources designed to generate clicks, not clarity. They explore how these videos work, why they spread so quickly, and how algori...

When political branding stops matching reality… what happens next? In this episode of Politics Is Broken , Brittlestar and Lisa explore what they call a potential “Conservative Death Spiral” — a moment where long-standing messaging around fiscal responsibility and “common sense” begins to clash with real-world decisions and outcomes. From Doug Ford’s controversial government jet purchase to Pierre...

Canada’s political landscape just took a strange turn. In this episode of Politics Is Broken , we break down the wave of floor crossings that has pushed the Liberals to within one seat of a majority government — without an election . Are MPs switching sides out of principle… or pure political survival? We dig into: The recent Conservative → Liberal defections Why Marilyn Gladu’s move is causing ba...

What happens when the headlines are too chaotic to ignore… but too exhausting to fully process? You react. This week on Politics Is Broken , Brittlestar and Lisa react to the biggest, strangest, and most concerning headlines from around the world—because picking just one story feels impossible right now. From war-driven oil spikes to political chaos in the U.S.… to Canada’s policy curveballs… to a...

What happens when you stop watching politics… and actually go see it? This week on Politics Is Broken , Brittlestar heads to Ottawa to speak at Carleton University’s Kesterton Lecture… and ends up going behind the scenes of Canadian politics. From touring Parliament Hill and sitting in on Question Period… to meeting politicians in the hallway and eating in what may or may not be called “the cafete...

Ontario’s government says it wants to modernize transparency laws . Critics say it looks more like hiding the paperwork. This week on Politics Is Broken , Brittlestar and Lisa break down the Ford government’s proposed changes to Freedom of Information rules — which could exempt the premier’s office and cabinet ministers from requests while extending response times. The timing is raising eyebrows....

Brittlestar and Lisa tackle a week that somehow managed to get worse. From Mark Carney's principled Davos speech to his awkward endorsement of the US-Israeli strikes on Iran, Canada finds itself diplomatically sandwiched between its values and its geography. The hosts dig into why the timing of Operation Epic Fury feels suspiciously convenient — and what the avalanche of newly released Epstein doc...

Science says we’re getting dimmer…and politics is sprinting to the cognitive bottom. In this episode of Politics Is Broken , Stewart (Brittlestar) and Lisa unpack the Reverse Flynn Effect (yes, it’s a real thing) and why critical thinking has been quietly leaving the group chat since the mid-’90s. We dig into “cognitive offloading” (Google, GPS, AI doing our thinking for us), the flood-the-zone st...

The "Conservative Party of Canada" is leaking. In this episode of Politics Is Broken , Stewart (Brittlestar) and Lisa dive into the shocking news of Edmonton MP Matt Jeneroux crossing the aisle to join the Liberals. Is this a "dirty backroom deal" as Pierre Poilievre claims, or a sign of a deeper rot within the CPC leadership? The truth may surprise you (if you were just born today).

A heavy week in Canada sparks a tough (and surprisingly data-filled) question: is Canada actually better than the U.S.? In this episode of Politics is Broken , Stewart (Brittlestar) and Lisa start by acknowledging a heartbreaking tragedy in Tumbler Ridge, B.C., and the wave of grief, misinformation, and opportunistic culture-war blame that followed. From there, they zoom out and do what Canadians...

What’s really happening in the United States…and how did American democracy get to this point? On this episode of Politics is Broken , Stewart and Lisa are joined by U.S. political analyst, bestselling author, and former congressional staffer Eric Ham for a revealing conversation about Donald Trump, American politics, and the structural failures that paved the way for the current crisis. Eric offe...

The Conservative Party just held a leadership convention in Calgary and—surprise— Pierre Poilievre walked away with a huge vote of confidence. But was it unity…or just muscle memory? In this episode of Politics is Broken , Stewart and Lisa watch the convention so you don’t have to, unpacking Poilievre’s 87% approval, the party’s fixation on the “good old days,” and the increasingly polished attemp...

"Nostalgia is not a strategy." This week on Politics Is Broken , Stewart (Brittlestar) and Lisa dive into the fallout from Davos 2026, where Prime Minister Mark Carney finally took the gloves off. From rallying middle powers to reminding the world that Canada doesn't just "live because of the U.S.," Carney is drawing a line in the snow—and the "Board of Peace" is not happy about it.

Brittlestar and Lisa wade bravely into the comment section (together… for safety) to do a little “Reply in the Comments” palate-cleanse… because the world is a dumpster fire and sometimes it’s healthier to fixate on people’s gripes instead. Along the way: suburban snow rituals, the “grandma shuffle,” superbox mailbox rage, why Chinese EVs are both tempting and complicated, and the terrifying absur...

Happy New Year… and welcome to 2026, the future nobody ordered. Stewart and Lisa ask the big question: is Canada prepared for a world where the U.S. goes full rogue-state vibes ... ignoring rule of law, weaponizing trade, and exporting chaos. They talk worst-case vs best-case, what Canada can actually do, and then end with a “Wrong Answers Only” Trump-quote game because of course they do.

It’s the year-end wrap for Politics is Broken … and it’s festive in the way a tire fire is festive when someone tosses a candy cane into it. In “The 12 Months of Crisismas” , Brittlestar and Lisa rip through 2025 month-by-month… Trudeau stepping aside, Doug Ford’s third majority, Carney’s technocratic pivot, election anxiety, internal trade “why didn’t we do this 100 years ago,” Poilievre’s by-ele...

This week on Politics Is Broken , Danielle Smith becomes the first Alberta premier in nearly 90 years to face a citizen-led recall petition... and the UCP’s own recall law starts doing exactly what everyone warned it would do (just not to the people who wrote it). Then we pivot south, where the U.S. releases a new “National Security Strategy” that reads less like policy and more like a world domin...

Canada’s back in the global spotlight… and this time it’s not for policy, it’s for pop. In this episode, Brittlestar and Lisa start with the truly urgent question of our time: is Justin Trudeau actually soft-launching a relationship with Katy Perry, complete with a former Japanese prime minister accidentally hard-launching it to the world? From there, they dig into FIFA’s World Cup draw, the eye-r...

In this week’s Politics Is Broken : The death of “statesmanlike” behaviour Trump’s “quiet, quiet, piggy” moment and Ford’s “get a job” clapback How recall actually works in Alberta (and why there are so many petitions) What other countries do with recall… and why it’s so rare Whether recall is a dangerous precedent or a much-needed pressure valve And why this all “smells a little like hope” in a g...