Open Sources Guelph - January 21, 2016

If last week's show was a major bummer, we try to lighten things up on this week's Open Sources Guelph with some news that's a little more hopeful, or at the very least head-scratchingly unbelievable. We look ahead to the coming week as Parliament gets back down to business, and we look at the Official Opposition's upcoming leadership race and the surprising entry into that race. In other news, relations with an old enemy have thawed a little further, while another damp chill falls over the Canadian media landscape. We said we'd try!

This Thursday, January 21, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz  and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss:

1) Done Deal! After years of negotiating, the deal between Iran and a group of western nations working towards their nuclear disarmament went into effect his weekend with the loosening of economic restrictions and unfreezing Iranian assets in foreign banks. At the same time, Iran freed four Americans it was holding, including Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian, in a prisoner swap negotiated by Switzerland. Has diplomacy won over force? Has Iran shown it can be a trusted, and will critical American politicians accept that?

2) House Rules. After a month-and-a-half break, the House of Commons will be getting back to business. What will be on the docket? There's still no clear strategy for Canada's involvement in the war on ISIS and our fighter jets are still in the field. The economy is struggling as the dollar and oil both sink in value, and the government is now forced to confront bigger deficits than they once promised. Doctor assisted death, electoral reform, and the ongoing refugee resettlement are all issues on the frontburner, so what can we expect when Parliamentarians gets back together next week?

3) We Need to Talk About Kevin. What started as one of the stupidest dares in history, a $1 million investment in Alberata's oil patch in exchange for Rachel Notley's resignation as Premier of the Wildrose province, became a full blown political insurgency when Kevin O'Leary began pondering a run for the leadership of the Conservatives. With his business background and reality TV bonafides, people began making the comparisons to a certain conservative politician currently leading the national polls in the United States, but can O'Leary really make himself Canada's Trump? Is Canada's right willing to gamble on that?

4) Paper Cuts. Postmedia cut 90 jobs this week, including nearly the whole editorial staff of the Edmonton Journal. On top of it all, newsrooms in Ottawa, Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver, where Postmedia owns two daily newspapers, will see their staff slashed and newsrooms merged as CEO Paul Godfry desperately tries to stem the tide of red ink from the company that owns the vast majority of Canada's English newspapers. Wasn't all this inevitable? Do Postmedia's cuts represent a danger to the quantity and quality of journalistic expression in Canada?

Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.