Readable, teachable news.
Tuesday, March 19, 2024
Canadian astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield will soon be simply, “Mr. Hadfield.”
That’s because he has announced that he is resigning.
In this case, “resigning” means stopping his job as an astronaut.
Hadfield has been an astronaut for 35 years.
Recently, he gained wide popularity after sending photos and videos to Earth from the International Space Station.
Many people around the world enjoyed his tweets and Facebook posts from space.
Justin Trudeau is the new leader of the Liberal Party of Canada.
Justin Trudeau is the son of Pierre Trudeau, who was the charismatic Prime Minister of Canada for more than 15 years in the 1960s, 70s and 80s.
A new kind of Trudeaumania swept the Liberal Party on Sunday, where Justin Trudeau won the leadership of the party by a landslide.
He took more than 80 per cent of the vote, winning handily on the first ballot.
Trudeau has a big challenge—to get the Liberal party focused again, and eventually to get it back in power.
He wants to be Canada’s next prime minister.
Two giant pandas arrived in Toronto on March 25 to begin a 10-year visit to Canada.
The pandas will spend five years at the Toronto Zoo, and then move to the Calgary Zoo for another five years. They are on loan to Canada from the Chinese government.
The pandas travelled by plane from their native China, along with several kilograms of bamboo shoots, boxes of apples and their favourite toys. The trip took 15 hours.
The pandas were greeted at the airport by a large crowd, including Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Zhang Junsai, the Chinese ambassador to Canada. A high school band played “O Canada” as the pandas’ crates were unloaded.
The top high school basketball player in the United States is a Canadian.
This week Andrew Wiggins was awarded the Naismith Trophy and named the Boys’ High School Player of the Year.
Wiggins was born in Vaughan, Ont. and is playing for Huntington Prep School in West Virginia.
Wiggins is 18 years old. His average per game is 23.6 points and 11.7 rebounds.
He hasn’t yet decided where he will go to university; many schools are competing for him.
The Naismith award winner is chosen by basketball journalists in the U.S.
Want to know what Canada’s prime minister did yesterday?
Just read his Twitter feed.
Harper tweeted a picture of his cat, Stanley, sitting on a chair beside him while the prime minister ate his breakfast.
He tweeted a time-lapsed video of his drive to work; viewers could see the Canadian flag flying on the hood of his car and watch the PM leave his limo with a briefcase full of work.
For nearly a month Theresa Spence, Chief of the community of Attawapiskat, has been protesting the way First Nations people are treated in northern Ontario.
Spence has not eaten any solid food for about 30 days. This type of protest is called a “hunger strike.”
During a hunger strike, people stop eating in order to make a peaceful protest about something they believe in. Spence is consuming only liquids, like water and broth.
Spence said she will not end her hunger strike until Prime Minister Stephen Harper meets with her to discuss First Nations rights.
Last week, Harper said he will meet with First Nations leaders on Jan. 11.
There has been a significant change in government in the province of Quebec.
On Sept. 4, the PQ party won the provincial election.
They will take over from the Liberals, who have been in power there for nine years.
The PQ leader is Pauline Marois. She will become Quebec’s first female premier.
The PQ or Parti Quebecois advocates “sovereignty” for Quebec. That means they believe Quebec should be a separate country from the rest of Canada because it is unique in terms of culture and language. Most people in Quebec speak French.
The government of Canada had a sleepover, and all of the MPs were invited.
In fact, attendance was mandatory.
What’s really happened is that the Members of Parliament stayed up all night working.
They were voting on a bill, but the way they did it was very unusual—and very interesting.
It all started when Stephen Harper’s Conservative government introduced Bill C-38.
Bill C-38 is an enormous 425-page bill covering all kinds of things including budget items.
The opposition party (the NDP) wanted to protest the fact that the government bundled all of those extra items into the bill.
They say that when too many items are bundled that way, none of the items can be looked over and properly discussed.
Queen Elizabeth II is the queen of 54 Commonwealth countries. 16 of these countries are called Commonwealth Realm countries and Canada is one of them.
When Elizabeth steps down or dies, her son, Prince Charles will become King. If he steps down or dies, his first-born son, Prince William will become King–even though Princess Anne is the Queen’s only daughter and is next in age to Prince Charles.
In other words, because she is female, the crown wouldn’t go to Princess Anne.
Since the beginning of the British monarchy, men have been chosen first to become the next ruler.
A woman can only be chosen when there are no men in the monarch’s direct line, (like a brother or a brother’s sons).
That is how Elizabeth became queen. Her father, King George VI, had two daughters and no sons.
The robo-call scandal is not going away. In fact, it’s getting bigger.
During the last federal election, many Canadian voters said they received automatic voice-mail messages (robo-calls) directing them to the wrong polling station.
CBC News is reporting that they have found voters across Canada who say they got misleading robo-call messages because they were not voting for the Conservative Party.
In other words, according to CBC News, people who weren’t voting Conservative were called and directed to the wrong polling station. (If people can’t find their polling station – the place where they vote – then they may not be able to vote, or they may decide it’s too much of a hassle to find the right polling station.)
This points the finger for the robo-calls at the Conservative Party and Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
