COUNTERWEIGHTS EDITORS. GANATSEKWYAGON, ON. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 28, 2024. Susan B. Glasser in The New Yorker nicely summarized one key but strange political event of 2024 in the USA :

“The Weird New Normal of Donald Trump in 2024 … Radical revisionism is a strong contender for the theme of this disruptive year, in which some unique property of political alchemy managed to transform a defeated and disgraced ex-President into a perfectly electable Republican candidate.”

For our part here we are just providing links to our top 10 counterweights stories from the year now ending, in chronological order. And we are relying on the titles of our top 10 pieces to suggest what they were (and still are) all about :

(1) Is the “free and democratic society” riding on the outcome of more than 60 elections around the global village in 2024? … Jan 5th, 2024.

(2) Who is supposed to be running the Government of Canada — the federal government elected by the Canadian people or 10 provincial premiers ?? … Mar 14th, 2024

(3) MPs killing bill that would make oath to Charles III optional just marks the start of real debate on future of monarchy in Canadian House of Commons … Apr 12th, 2024

(4) 2024 Indian election : Modi wins third straight government but BJP’s Hindu nationalist brand has stumbled … Jun 12th, 2024

(5) What do Canadian advocates of proportional representation think about the July 4, 2024 election in the UK? … Jul 10th, 2024

(6) “History has many cunning passages” : Can Kamala Harris’s Democrats win the new 100 Days War in one of them?? … Jul 29th, 2024

(7) PM Trudeau has no reason to call early election — and it will take new alliance of Conservatives, New Democrats, and Bloquistes to give him one ../. Sep 5th, 2024

(8) Will three of the four provincial governments in Western Canada soon be in the hands of New Democrats ?? Certainly not, it turns out !! … Oct 29th, 2024

(9) Will Trump’s 2024 electoral triumph in US finally become like 2016 triumph of Brexit in UK *— falling down to support from less than a third of UK voters today? … Nov 9th, 2024

(10) Will Justin Trudeau resign? Will Canada’s Conservatives take over sooner than later? Or will Chrystia Freeland lead Liberals to yet another victory in 2025? … Dec 17th, 2024

Canadian politics should actually be somewhat more interesting than US politics in the federal election year of 2025

We don’t really think that Chrystia Freeland will lead the Liberals to yet another victory. Unless the polls for the past two years have been dramatically wrong, Pierre Poilievre’s ”Trump Lite” (according to UK journalists) will be winning a vast majority of seats in the House in Ottawa (with not much more than 40% of the popular vote) — and probably sooner rather than later in the new year?

So … happy holidays 2024 and Happy New Year 2025 — from a United Nations member state that, the less than popular Kevin O’Leary notwithstanding, will as Bob Rae has pointed out, not adjust to any “51st state idea” which is “nonsense from the get go. Canada is a federal country, with 10 provinces and 3 territories. Not sure adding 26 Senators is in the game plot.” (And then there’s the problem that just one 51 st state in all of Canada would have more geographic territory than all the other 50 states combined!)