Front Burner

On his first night back in the Oval Office, US President Donald Trump signed a series of sweeping executive orders that effectively dismantle federal diversity, equity and inclusion programs, and revoke a landmark Civil Rights-era anti-discrimination rule. This comes as major American companies, from McDonald’s to Walmart to Meta, have been rolling back their own diversity policies, which have recently faced growing legal and cultural backlash.Does this spell the end of DEI? And what could that mean, in the US and beyond?Today Washington Post business reporter Julian Mark joins us to break it all down.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Liberal leadership candidate Karina Gould was elected as the member of Parliament for Burlington in 2015 at the age of 28, but it didn't take long before she ended up in cabinet. In fact she was the youngest ever woman named to cabinet and the first ever active minister to take maternity leave.Gould has played a number of roles for the Liberal's during their decade in government… including Minister of Democratic Institutions, Minister for International Development, followed by Minister of Families, Children and Social Development, all before becoming the Government House leader.Today, Gould makes her case why should lead the Liberal party, and if she wins, fight the next election.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

The Liberal leadership race really got underway this week. Mark Carney wracked up endorsements from current cabinet ministers, while Chrystia Freeland pitched herself as running against the "Ottawa establishment".Meanwhile, Ontario Premier Doug Ford is calling an early election on Wednesday in hopes of shoring up another strong mandate, and capitalize on his visibility during the tariff fight.Vandana Kattar is a former advisor to Justin Trudeau, and a political strategist. Dennis Matthews is the President of the a national advertising agency Creative Currency, a conservative strategist and former advertising director for Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Mélanie Richer is Principal at Earnscliffe Strategies and former Director of Communications for the NDP and Jagmeet Singh. They join host Jayme Poisson to talk about it all.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Kaitlyn Braun, a pregnant young woman in crisis, takes dozens of birth workers through an escalating series of disasters – rape, baby loss, and even a coma. One by one, the doulas struggle to support her and grieve with her, and even save her life as they’re led down a distressing path. And then the truth comes out.In this six-part true crime series, Sarah Treleaven untangles a complex web of lies and deception to ask who Kaitlyn really is and why she did the things that she did. Cases like these puzzle legal experts and raise intricate moral and ethical questions. This is not your average con. Kaitlyn is not your usual scammer.Kaitlyn's Baby is Season 2 of The Con — a podcast exposing the art of deception — from CBC and the BBC World Service. Season 1 - the critically acclaimed catfishing quest, Love, Janessa, launched in January 2023.Content warning: The latest season of The Con contains references to medical emergencies, including baby loss. We also deal with sexual assault and there is some strong language.More episodes are available at: https://link.mgln.ai/UrgPYM

On Monday night, tech billionaire Elon Musk spoke at President Trump's inauguration rally in Washington. In the middle of that speech, he slammed his right hand onto the left side of his chest and thrust it out into the air in a straight line. Then he turned around, and made the gesture again.The backlash was immediate, with many people accusing Musk of making a Nazi salute. But the Anti-Defamation League, an organization founded to combat anti-semitism disagreed, and came to Musk's defence, calling it "an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute" on X. Its defence of Musk would have been nearly unthinkable even a year and a half ago, when Musk threatened to sue the group for defamation. Mari Cohen has been covering this evolving relationship between Musk and the ADL for Jewish Currents. She spoke to host Jayme Poisson about that, and how it fits into ongoing criticisms the organization is facing.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

There’s been a ton of buzz around Mark Carney throwing his hat into the Liberal leadership race. Many Liberals see Carney — the former head of the Bank of Canada and Bank of England, and a former advisor to the Trudeau government — as the best hope of reversing their party’s dire fortunes. This is Carney’s first foray into party politics. So what do we know about his track record and his beliefs? Is he really, as he claims, an “outsider?” And, in a time of rising populism on the right and left — when many believe big, global financial institutions have made their lives worse — can a man like Carney meet the moment?Today, a documentary looking at Carney’s life, work, and views.

Speaking from a cabinet retreat Tuesday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made the case for why the Trump administration should divert from the trade war collision course they’re currently on. His comments come just a day after Donald Trump was inaugurated as US president and mused about slapping 25 per cent tariffs on Canadian imports starting Feb. 1st.The Prime Minister went on to say that while the country will continue to negotiate - there are also preparations to fight back including considering dollar for dollar tariffs on American products coming into Canada.Today we are talking to Canadian economist Jim Stanford about the carrot and stick arguments Canadian officials are making to Americans. Stanford is director of the Centre for Future Work and recently published a report asking the question “Who’s Subsidizing Whom?” when it comes to the Canada-U.S. trade relationship.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Yesterday, Donald Trump was sworn in for the second time as President of the United States.In his inaugural address and as he signed executive orders throughout the day, Trump made his priorities for his first days in office clear. He declared an emergency at the southern border, made it the official policy of the United States that "there are only two genders", said America was "taking back" the Panama Canal and much, much more.Many of these moves are things that Trump has promised or threatened to do on "day one". Which is why on the eve of inauguration day we spoke to Tolu Olorunnipa, the Washington Bureau Chief with the Washington Post and co-author of the Pulitzer Prize winning book 'His Name is George Floyd' about what to expect in the coming days of the second Trump Presidency.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

For weeks, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has been talking about making Canada the 51st state. He’s even said that he’d look to use economic force to ‘get rid’ of the border between the two countries.Canadian businessman Kevin O’Leary has been pushing the potential benefits of an ‘economic union’ with the U.S. He explained his case in a feature interview with host Jayme Poisson on Sunday.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

On Drugs looks through the lenses of history, pop culture and personal experience to understand how drugs have shaped our world. Because even if it’s just caffeine or ibuprofen, there’s a good chance you’re on drugs right now. More episodes of On Drugs are available at: https://link.mgln.ai/aRCxzV

It was another really busy week in Canadian politics.It began with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s trip to Mar-a-Lago to talk tariffs and Canadian oil with Trump and his team, and it rolled into a meeting between Canada’s premiers and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, where Smith did not get onside with her colleagues.The Liberal leadership race narrowed further, and on Thursday, former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney threw his hat into the ring.Catherine Cullen is the host of CBC's The House. Jason Markusoff is a producer and writer with CBC Calgary. They join host Jayme Poisson to talk about it all.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Israel and Hamas signed a deal for a ceasefire set to begin Sunday January 19th that will see the exchange of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners in Israel and the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza. The news was met with celebrations in Gaza where Palestinians have been suffering under a brutal Israel offensive since the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023. Tens of thousands are dead, more than a million displaced and much of the strip is destroyed. Ceasefire negotiations have dragged on in Qatar between Israel, Hamas, the U.S. and other countries for months. So why has an agreement finally been reached now? Chaim Levinson, senior diplomatic correspondent at Ha’aretz, joins us to parse through the details of the deal, how it was reached and what could happen next.

Fires continue to burn in Los Angeles as millions of people remain under an extreme fire weather alert. The Palisades Fire and the Eaton Fire have already flattened entire neighbourhoods in Los Angeles, leaving nothing but outlines and ash where homes once stood. It is expected that this will all amount to the worst natural disaster in American history in terms of cost and scale.These fires raise major questions about the future of Los Angeles, who is to blame, insurance and just how prepared we are for worsening fires and other climate change fueled disasters.To discuss the size and scope of these fires, and what can be learned from them, we’re joined by David Wallace-Wells, New York Times writer and columnist and author of The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming. For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Donald Trump is building the wealthiest cabinet in American history with 13 billionaires set to be part of his administration. That of course includes his vocal backer and X CEO, Elon Musk. But it’s not just the ones joining him in office. A parade of CEOs and business giants have met with him over the past month in Mar-A-Lago including Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Tim Cook and Canada’s Kevin O’Leary.Even in a country where the super rich have always had an outsized role in American life, this moment stands out. But does it compare to the past and other administrations and why are they aligning themselves with Trump so publicly now?To explore this shift we’re joined by Quinn Slobodian, professor of international history at Boston University and the author of Crack-Up Capitalism: Market Radicals and the Dream of a World Without Democracy. For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

A week after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s resignation, a much clearer picture of the Liberal leadership race has emerged.Whoever the candidate ends up being will have the challenge of running both a leadership and a general election campaign at essentially the same time.According to some recent polling by Abacus Data, that won’t be the only challenge.David Coletto is the founder and CEO of the polling firm. He’ll talk about that, how Canadians are responding to Trudeau’s resignation, and what that means for the Liberal party.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Joe Biden will end his reign as President as not only the oldest holder of the executive office, but one of the longest tenured lawmakers in American history. As he enters his twilight in public life, we look at the President’s final few weeks in office and ask: how is Joe Biden likely to be remembered? President Biden’s final weeks in office include the controversial decision to pardon his son, Hunter, and the passage of the largest single-day grant of clemency in modern American history. But many believe he should use his final days to pass meaningful legislation on issues ranging from racial justice to the environment, national parks, abortion and Gaza. Our guest is Alex Shephard is a Senior Editor at The New Republic and has been writing about Biden through his Presidency, and beyond.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

With just under two weeks until he re-takes the Oval Office, U.S. president-elect Donald Trump has outlined a mind-map of sorts to, as he says, “make Canada the 51st American state.”He has referred to the border separating Canada and the U.S. as an “artificial line,” called Justin Trudeau Canada’s “Governor” and said Canada would “dissolve” without U.S. assistance.At the same time, he’s not ruling out forcibly incorporating the territory of Greenland into the U.S. and seizing control of the Panama Canal, a crucial shipping route.Threat, negotiation tactic, or meaningless bluster? CBC Washington correspondent Katie Simpson unpacks where it’s all coming from.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts 

Nearly a decade ago Justin Trudeau rode a wave of hope and optimism — his so-called "sunny ways" — to the prime minister's office, leading a once-flailing Liberal party out of the wilderness.A lot has changed since that time. Not only for Trudeau and his party's fortunes, but for the world — and how many people feel about the kind of hopeful vision that once helped propel people like Trudeau into power.Today we're going to grapple with Trudeau's legacy, and how he may be remembered: the accomplishments, the failures, the scandals — and whether, as the world transformed around him, Trudeau was able to adapt with it.Our guests are Aaron Wherry, CBC senior writer and the author of Promise and Peril: Justin Trudeau in Power, and Stephen Maher, author of The Prince: The Turbulent Reign of Justin Trudeau.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

After months of non-confidence votes and growing pressure, Justin Trudeau has stepped down as the leader of the Liberal Party. He’s still the Prime Minister, for now, after proroguing Parliament until March 24th so that the Liberals can hold a leadership race and find his successor. Wayne Long, a backbencher from New Brunswick, was among the first voices from within Trudeau’s own party to call for him to step down. Now that it’s finally happened, he talks to us about what the “internal battles” in the party actually looked like and what he thinks needs to happen next for the Liberals to have a fighting chance in the next election.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

For the last couple weeks, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has apparently been thinking about his future. At the same time, he faced new calls to resign: from his colleagues, the country and political rivals.Will he make it through the day, the week or the election?Tim Powers shares his thoughts on Trudeau’s political future. He’s the chair of Summa Strategies, managing director of Abacus Data, a former Conservative adviser and a regular columnist at the Hill Times.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

What is the point of Hollywood? There are two obvious answers, right? To make good stuff that entertains people. And to make money for the big studios and the people who work for them.Those two things don’t have to be mutually exclusive. But writer Daniel Bessner believes increasingly they have been.Bessner spent a year working on a deep dive into how Hollywood has evolved for Harper’s Magazine, called “The Life and Death of Hollywood”. Bessner is also a historian and host of the podcast “American Prestige”. He spoke to host Jayme Poisson last April.

For some time now, there’s been a growing trend on TikTok and Instagram of young women sharing about their daily lives as “trad wives.” “Traditional wives” forego the workplace, extol the virtues of homemaking, and often talk about the ways they “submit” to their husbands. So why do these women say they’ve chosen a life at home? How does their messaging cross into religion and politics? And is this “movement” a reaction to the burdens on modern women, or a threat to feminism’s progress?We revisit a conversation with journalist Sophie Elmhirst from last April, who wrote a piece in the New Yorker called “The Rise and Fall of the Trad Wife”.

Céline Dion is having a moment. It’s not her first. And millions of fans are hoping it won’t be her last. While Céline’s international stardom seems obvious now, it was all so unlikely. This is the final episode of the four-part series from Understood, the anthology podcast that takes you out of the daily news cycle and inside the events, people, and cultural moments you want to know more about. Hosted by Thomas Leblanc. More episodes of Understood are available at: https://link.mgln.ai/n5NBQC

Murray Sinclair — an Anishinaabe lawyer, judge, senator, and, most consequentially, the chair of the Truth and Reconciliation commission — died in November at the age of 73. Sinclair helped bring to light the stories of thousands of Indigenous residential school survivors and advocated for justice for them. He's been recognized by many as someone who fundamentally changed the country and what Canadians know about ourselves and our history.Today we have a documentary featuring the voices of three people who knew Murray Sinclair well, about the personal lessons he taught them and how he transformed Canada.We'll hear from journalist and filmmaker Tanya Talaga; Phil Fontaine, the former national chief of the Assembly of First Nations; and Kim Murray, the Special Interlocutor for Missing Children and Unmarked Graves and Burial Sites associated with Indian Residential Schools.A national Indian Residential School Crisis Line is available to provide support for survivors and those affected. People can access emotional and crisis referral services by calling the 24-hour service at 1-866-925-4419.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcriptsThis episode originally aired on November 11, 2025.

In the next two years, Canadian millennials will stand to inherit as much as one trillion dollars from their boomer parents. Today, we take a look at what this consolidation of family wealth could mean for Canada’s economy, and Canadian society writ large with Katrina Onsted, freelance reporter and producer for the Globe and Mail’s tech business podcast, Lately.

The Apprentice is a Donald Trump biopic that premiered at the Cannes Film Festival this year and got an extended standing ovation. But it quickly came under fire from its subject. Today, we bring you an encore of host Jayme Poisson’s interview with Dan Beckerman, one of the producers behind the film. He’ll walk us through the film’s complicated journey to theatres, and the challenges of making art about powerful people.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Céline Dion is having a moment. It’s not her first. And millions of fans are hoping it won’t be her last. While Céline’s international stardom seems obvious now, it was all so unlikely. This is the third episode of the four-part series from Understood, the anthology podcast that takes you out of the daily news cycle and inside the events, people, and cultural moments you want to know more about. Hosted by Thomas Leblanc. More episodes of Understood are available at: https://link.mgln.ai/yrMjPh 

Céline Dion is having a moment. It’s not her first. And millions of fans are hoping it won’t be her last. While Céline’s international stardom seems obvious now, it was all so unlikely. This is the second episode of the four-part series from Understood, the anthology podcast that takes you out of the daily news cycle and inside the events, people, and cultural moments you want to know more about. Hosted by Thomas Leblanc. More episodes of Understood are available at: https://link.mgln.ai/EnVXBB

Got some money burning a hole in your pocket? You could go online and place a bet about whether or not Canada will become the U.S.’s 51st state before July, whether or not there will be an election before the New Year, or whether the U.S. will ban TikTok before May 2025. And you could do it all on a website called Polymarket.Polymarket is a “prediction market”  that allows users to spend crypto to place bets on the likelihood of life events. The site is not without controversy. Polymarket is illegal to use in the US, researchers say there’s rampant “wash trading” taking place on the platform, and in November the FBI raided Polymarket CEO, Shayne Coplan’s New York apartment.Today we speak with New York Times reporter David Yaffe-Bellany about whether Polymarket is a new more accurate way of polling, or just another gambling site.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

People talk about Donald Trump as a singular figure. A one-of-a-kind politician who's made conservative history in the U.S. But where exactly does Trump fit in conservative history? In what eras does he stand on common ground? What are the big differences? Is he a revolutionary figure or a natural evolution of the movement?To work though that, we've got Sam Adler-Bell and Matt Sitman. They are the hosts of the Know Your Enemy podcast, which explores the underpinnings of contemporary conservatism.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

After Donald Trump was elected president in 2016, historian and professor Timothy Snyder wrote a long post on Facebook. Here's how it started: "Americans are no wiser than the Europeans who saw democracy yield to fascism, Nazism, or communism. Our one advantage is that we might learn from their experience."Snyder went on to share twenty lessons about authoritarianism from the 20th century. They would lay the groundwork for his 2017 book On Tyranny. Fast forward to 2024, and Snyder's warnings about authoritarianism are being amplified once again. He joins the show to look ahead to the next four years of the Trump presidency, through the lens of his latest books: the just-released On Freedom and On Tyranny.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

The fallout from Chrystia Freeland’s resignation is far from over. As more people demand Justin Trudeau’s resignation he appears to be in no hurry to heed the calls.Meanwhile, U.S. president-elect Donald Trump pokes fun at Canada’s ongoing chaos, reprising his jokes about the country becoming the 51st state. What does the drama in Ottawa mean for Canada’s position as it prepares for a potential trade war with Washington?We're joined by J.P. Tasker from CBC's parliamentary bureau and Alex Panetta, a Washington-based CBC News correspondent.  For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

The charge of ethnic cleansing is not, on its own, considered a crime under international law. Experts consider it to be part of the overall charge of genocide. In this episode we take listeners to northern Gaza and examine the words and actions of politicians, academics and settlements organizations in order to better understand whether Israel is perpetrating a campaign of ethnic cleansing in Gaza. Our guest is Meron Rapoport, a 30-year veteran of the Israeli news industry who formerly worked as the head of news at Israel's Ha’aretz newspaper. Today he’s an editor at the Israeli publication Local Call. He joins the show to discuss whether Israel is guilty of committing a program of ethnic cleansing, and the prospect of a ‘Second Nakba’ in Gaza. For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Chrystia Freeland's bombshell resignation as finance minister has thrown Justin Trudeau's fragile government into chaos. The decisions that led to this are raising questions about the Prime Minister's judgment, loyalties, leadership and ability to stay in power.Paul Wells and Stephen Maher are our guests. Paul has a substack under his own name and has written about Canadian politics for decades. Stephen is a longtime federal politics reporter and author of The Prince: The Turbulent Reign of Justin Trudeau.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Late last week, federal labour minister Steven MacKinnon recommended that Canada Post workers, who have been on strike for more than four weeks, be ordered back to work until May 22, 2025. In the meantime, an inquiry would look into the roadblocks preventing the two parties from getting to an agreement.This labour dispute has led to a lot of debate and discussion about the future of Canada Post.Ian Lee is an associate professor at the Sprott School of Business at Carleton University and has studied Canada Post for many years. He walks us through the crown corporation’s grim financial situation, how its business could adapt, and its uncertain future.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

The Bank of Canada cut interest rates again this week. Economists say wages are up, inflation is on target and the stock market is in the green.But most everyday Canadians are living a very different story. One of insanely high grocery prices, impossible housing costs and a suffocating economic squeeze.Recently, Canadian finance minister Chrystia Freeland announced a temporary GST holiday on a bunch of stuff to give relief to people feeling the pinch.But she went on to muse that the economic pain people were feeling might be the result of a "vibecession". Think recession – but you know – only in your head.Today, so are we in a 'vibecession'? Economist Armine Yalnizyan is our guest.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Once crypto-skeptic, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, has had a change of heart over the past year. Especially, after millions of dollars from the cryptocurrency industry poured into his campaign. Now, as he embraces the online currency, even appointing a crypto czar, the price of Bitcoin and other popular tokens reach new heights. Even memecoins are seeing a boost.But what happens if the volatile crypto market sees another crash like it did in 2022? Jacob Silverman, tech journalist and host of CBC’s The Naked Emperor, joins us to talk about why there’s so much crypto hype right now and what’s at stake if the boom goes bust.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Since the U.S. election last month, Bluesky – which describes itself as ‘social media as it should be’ – has gained a lot of traction. They now have more than 24 million users, and traffic on the site is up 500% in the United States in the last month.Many users have fled there from X (formerly Twitter) which has seen a sharp decline since Elon Musk bought the platform in 2022. The frequency of bots, partisan advertisements and harassment are often cited as reasons for leaving the social media platform.Ed Zitron is a tech journalist who hosts the podcast Better Offline, and writes the newsletter Where's Your Ed At.He talks to host Jayme Poisson about the rise of Bluesky, what differentiates it from X, and what this all means for the future of social media.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

 On Sunday, Syrian president Bashar al-Assad fled to Russia, where he’s been granted political asylum. This comes after rebels seized Damascus, Syria’s capital city, on that same day.Assad’s fall from power marks the end of 50 years of brutal rule by his family. His father, Hafez al-Assad, a longtime military officer, was known for his iron fist.Joshua Landis is the head of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, and a leading expert on Syria.He explains the significance of Bashar al-Assad’s fall, and looks back on the Assad family’s half a century in power.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot dead in New York City last week. In some communities online, like reddit and tik tok, Thompson’s killing has been met with encouragement and his killer has been lauded as a vigilante, a kind of folk hero. Part of the reason for that, is the deep dissatisfaction and anger with the state of healthcare in America. The murder has exposed a raw nerve and put renewed focus on troubling practices within the trillion dollar health insurance industry.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Kendrick Lamar’s hit diss track ‘Not Like Us’ accused Drake of being a ‘colonizer’ and a ‘pedophile.’ Now, seven months after the song’s release, Drake has filed a legal petition against Universal Music Group (UMG) for orchestrating a plot to artificially boost the popularity of the song via algorithm manipulation, online bots, and payola, in a bid to undermine him.Is Drake taking on the music business, in the tradition of Prince and Michael Jackson, or is he a sore loser, seeking litigious retribution for the fact that he lost the most high profile rap beef of all time? Brian Zisook is a co-founder of the music streaming platform Audiomack, and long time writer and executive in the hip hop world. He joins the show to discuss the facts of Drake’s case, the tradition of hip hop lawsuits that have come before, and the industry practices that created the conditions for this moment. For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

CBC chief political correspondent Rosemary Barton is back to talk about Prime Minister Trudeau’s trip to Mar-a-Lago for a dinner meeting with U.S. president-elect Trump. She’ll touch on how far it’ll go to quell tensions over Trump’s tariff threat, and whether Canada can present a united front against it.Plus, the politics behind the upcoming two month GST holiday, and whether we’re getting any closer to a federal election call.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

In a sudden offensive, Turkish-backed rebel forces in Syria have managed to take several villages and towns, including the second largest city in the country, Aleppo, all with minimal resistance from government forces. Now as they continue to push further south, Syrian president Bashar Al-Assad is left with a diminished army and his main allies are embroiled in conflicts of their own. Kareem Shaheen is the Middle East editor at New Lines Magazine. He spoke to host Jayme Poisson about what the fall of Aleppo and renewed fighting in Syria means for the Syrian people and the region.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

At the beginning of this year, immigration minister Marc Miller said the government was looking to rein in the number of international study permits it would be granting, in a bid to take pressure off the strained housing market. But that's been bad news for the post-secondary institutions for which a significant part of their operating budgets come from tuition fees from international students. Colleges in southern Ontario have been particularly hard hit, with many announcing cuts and consolidations — and there could be more to come.But it's only part of the problem. Alex Usher, the president of Higher Education Strategy Associates, explains the crisis Canadian universities and colleges are now dealing with: the result of years of cuts and a refusal to spend more on our post-secondary institutions.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

More than 10,000 arrests, a mountain of drugs stopped at the border, and more than a hundred assassination attempts thwarted. Those are just some of the results of a massive police data hacking operation in Europe to disrupt organized crime. And at the center of it all – Vancouver tech company Sky Global – that promised communication couldn’t be hacked by their encrypted phones.Frédéric Zalac, and Radio-Canada’s investigative program Enquête teamed up with journalists from a dozen European media organizations for the year-long investigation.The documentary aired on The Fifth Estate as “Cracked: Crimes Behind Encryption.” You can watch it on YouTube.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

People don’t think Graham Isador is losing his sight. They think he’s an asshole.Short Sighted is an attempt to explain what vision loss feels like by exploring how it sounds.Written and hosted by master storyteller Graham Isador, the show’s mini episodes are an intimate and irreverent look at accessibility and its personal impacts.Get lost in someone else’s life. From a mysterious childhood spent on the run, to a courageous escape from domestic violence, each season of Personally invites you to explore the human experience in all its complexity, one story — or season — at a time. This is what it sounds like to be human.More episodes of Personally are available at: lnk.to/pJDdjXaz

In 1996, after two hung jury trials, brothers Lyle and Eric Menendez were convicted of killing their parents in one of the most high profile trials in American history. The brothers argued they had killed their parents following years of sexual, psychological and physical abuse at the hands of their father, but it was ultimately decided that they had killed their parents in a premeditated fashion, in pursuit of their parents' million dollar estate. They were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.The case was a phenomenon, and one of the first to be broadcast on television via wall-to-wall coverage inside the courtroom. 35 years later, following a Netflix series and a pair of documentaries dedicated to the Menendez brothers' story, and the entry of new evidence, the brothers have put in a new bid for freedom.Robert Rand has been covering the Menendez brothers since the day after the murders, and has published reporting, books and documentaries dedicated to the story. He joins the show to discuss whether the brothers may soon be free men, how their story went on to help create the "True Crime" genre, and why had the murders taken place today things may have happened differently. For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

It's time for Canada to pay "a very big price." That was the message from president-elect Donald Trump this week when he announced a 25 percent tariff on literally everything coming into the U.S. from Canada and Mexico. The tariffs will come into effect January 20th, Trump said, and stay in effect until "Drugs, in particular Fentanyl, and all Illegal Aliens stop this Invasion of our Country! "This isn't the first time Trump has threatened to impose major tariffs or followed through on his threats. And while previous levies didn't last - but they were around long enough to be a thorn in the side of Canadian negotiators reworking The North American Free Trade Agreement.So, is this most recent threat a negotiation ploy, political bluster or the first salvo in a trade war that could end in economic ruin?For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

The second of two major antitrust cases against Google wrapped up this week. Earlier this year, a judge found the company holds an illegal monopoly over the internet search market. Now the U.S. Department of Justice is arguing the same thing about its grip on online advertising. This is all part of a major push of antitrust litigation against tech companies by the U.S. government — Apple, Amazon and Meta are all facing similar cases.What's behind this push to crack down on these companies now? Would proposed remedies like breaking them up actually make a difference? And will the momentum survive the transition to a second Trump presidency? Paris Marx — author of the tech newsletter Disconnect and host of the podcast Tech Won't Save Us — breaks it all down.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Argentina’s chainsaw-wielding, “anarcho-capitalist” president, Javier Milei, and El Salvador’s Nayib Bukele, who has called himself the “world’s coolest dictator,” have often taken cues from Donald Trump. But now, could he be taking cues from them?Today we speak to Tracy Wilkinson, a longtime writer with the LA Times, and Natalie Alcoba, a journalist based in Argentina, about the “right-wing strongman feedback loop” happening between these three leaders — and what it could mean for the U.S. and the world.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts