I Mother Earth reunites, in city Oct. 6

Health ministers meeting ends without long-term funding commitment from Ottawa

Canada’s health minister failed to deliver the promises of long-term funding increases that her provincial and territorial counterparts, who were gathered in Winnipeg this week, had been seeking.

Instead, Marjorie Michel reiterated the federal government’s commitment to working collaboratively towards renewing bilateral funding agreements and to meet again before the end of the year to discuss long-term funding.

“The decision we all agreed on is to have our public service… start the work on what will be the next step for the next negotiation on Canada Health Transfer and other agreements,” Michel said Friday at a news conference after meeting with the other health ministers.

When asked why the federal government couldn’t commit to maintaining funding levels geared, at a minimum, to the rate of inflation over the long term, Michel said that it’s time to update agreements signed a decade ago.

Letters, Oct. 16

A few days ago, U.S. President Donald Trump attended a rally in Arizona. At about the same time, Pete Hoekstra, the U.S. ambassador to Canada was interviewed on The Really Big Show.

Playoff hopes dwindle for Bombers after loss to Edmonton

EDMONTON — It’s a script the Winnipeg Blue Bombers should’ve shredded, burned, and buried.

Go to Edmonton, dominate the first half, crumble in the final two quarters and lose.

That’s what happened in Week 12, when the Bombers blew an early 16-point lead in a 22-19 loss. And in their return to Commonwealth Stadium on Friday night, the Bombers went down a nearly identical path in a 35-27 defeat to the Edmonton Elks.

In their latest disappearing act, the Blue and Gold led 21-10 with less than a minute remaining in the first half before seemingly vanishing into thin air.

Carney’s ‘counterweight’ summit strategy

Modern summit diplomacy had very inauspicious beginnings. Winston Churchill is widely credited with coining the phrase “summit” in 1950 to describe a conference of global leaders. But it was another British prime minister, Neville Chamberlain, who initiated the first actual summit meeting 12 years earlier — with Adolf Hitler, no less.

It didn’t go well.

Over a one-month period, the two leaders met three times over the fate of Czechoslovakia. Hitler threatened war. Chamberlain threatened appeasement. Guess who won?

Chamberlain was so desperate for a peace deal and so convinced he alone could convince Hitler, that he swallowed his inhibitions and flew in an airplane for the very first time in his life. “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again” he told reporters, explaining his tenacious summit activity. Skeptical of the spectacle, British Foreign Office wags quietly amended it to, “If at first you don’t concede, fly, fly again.”

The threat from outside Canada

The 10-question referendum being held in Alberta on Monday, Oct. 19, is not the first time the unity of Canada has been threatened by a vote within one province. It is, however, the first referendum of this type to take place in an age of unfettered social media misinformation and deliberate foreign interference.

From mischievous comments by U.S. President Donald Trump about making Canada the 51st state to technology trillionaire Elon Musk’s urgings to Quebec and Alberta to separate, there are clear signs foreign interests are trying to influence Monday’s vote. But there are also less-obvious efforts at work to influence the referendum and destabilize Canada.

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and independent think-tanks such as the Centre for Artificial Intelligence, Data and Conflict at the University of Regina have documented incidents involving Russian-linked automated content farms posting thousands of misleading articles about the referendum campaign on social media platforms. The content, CSIS has said, focuses on erroneous claims about the benefits of separation and the liabilities of remaining in Canada.

In the face of all that activity, Prime Minister Mark Carney has been alarmingly unconcerned. Campaigning in Alberta this week, Carney said Ottawa is closely monitoring disinformation campaigns. He added that, in his conversations with foreign governments, all have agreed to stand down from any activities that might be perceived as threats to democracy.

Today’s horoscope

MOON ALERT: Avoid shopping (except for food and gas and important decisions until after 8:30 a.m. After that, the moon moves from Sagittarius into Capricorn.

ARIES (March 21-April 19)

You couldn’t pick a better day for sports training or improving a skill in the arts, music, welding, sculpting, pottery making or doing anything that requires repetition to improve. That’s because you have the patience and the perseverance to keep trying.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20)