A Poilievre Comeback, Alberta’s False Promises, Is Marriage Bad?

Monday, June 16, 2025

This week from The Walrus:

News from The Walrus

Congratulations to the winners at the National Magazine Awards. The Walrus won Gold in the Issue Grand Prix category for “If He Wins: How Poilievre Will Change Canada” and Silver in the Columns & Essays category for “The Collapse of Self‐Worth in the Digital Age.”

More congratulations are in order for writer Michelle Cyca and editor Harley Rustad, who won third place in the 2025 Indigenous Media Awards Best Longform/Magazine Story category for the story “How Workplace Diversity Fails Indigenous Employees.”

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Pierre Poilievre Is Not Backing Down

The Conservative leader is plotting a comeback. But first he’ll need to prove he’s more than an opposition brawler

BY MARK BOURRIE

Image of Pierre Poilievre in a blue suit standing against a greyscale background.

So far, the Tories have been led by a skilled opposition leader, but their challenge is his plausibility as prime minister. People didn’t buy the angry young man offered to them in 2025. Can Poilievre mature? Can he do the self‐evaluation needed to understand why so many people were turned off by his personality? Can he level with people instead of torquing real and imagined national and regional problems? Can he just tone it down?

Not to sound like a Leafs fan, but the next election is there for the taking.

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Doug Ford Is Now the Most Popular Conservative in Canada

As Poilievre slips in the polls, could Ontario’s premier be the right’s backup plan?

BY PHILIPPE J. FOURNIER

Prime Minister Mark Carney stands in the centre as he is flanked by Minister of National Defence David McGuinty (right) and Chief of the Defence Staff General Jennie Carignan against the backdrop of the Canadian flag.

Why Mark Carney Is Talking like It’s 1939

The prime minister just gave the most hawkish speech in a generation

BY WESLEY WARK

A photo illustration showing nurses going through a revolving door.

Alberta Is Struggling to Keep Its Nurses and Teachers

Internal documents show the province tried to make workers “feel good about their service.” They don’t

BY KENA SHAH

Canada Goose Built a Luxury Empire by Betting Big on China

The parka maker dodged geopolitics, the pandemic, and local pushback

BY YVONNE LAU

Portrait of Karen Solie against a green background.

She Writes about Tractors and Oil Drilling. She’s Also Changing Canadian Poetry

At fifty‐eight, Karen Solie is one of our major poets. You might find her on her family farm in Saskatchewan

BY NICHOLAS BRADLEY

A herd of caribou walks over the frozen waters of Lac du Sauvage, Northwest Territories.

What Photography Teaches Me about Surviving the News Cycle

It is humbling to pause and take note of what we can easily lose

WORDS AND PHOTOS BY PAT KANE

Are Women Allowed to Be Happy in Their Marriages?

Literature often describes matrimony as banal or repressive. That’s a shame

BY TAJJA ISEN

Image of fireflies and a road through a forest.

A Son, a Scientist, and the Secret of Bioluminescence

My father spent a career decoding how fireflies make light. Now, as dementia sets in, he isn’t ready for life’s final mystery

BY ARNO KOPECKY

A black and white photo illustration shows the blurry image of a woman and a hand holding a shining pill with a bunch of leaves coming out of it.

When Therapy Didn’t Work, I Turned to an Illegal Drug

MDMA helped me come to terms with years of trauma

BY REBECCA HUNTLEY

Today’s Quiz Question

The Walrus contributing writer Tajja Isen has noticed that books about marriage and divorce often fail to escape society’s narrow ideas of matrimony. What does Isen identify as a common habit authors rely on in the growing divorce memoir genre?

Yes, I know the answer

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) has become a highly contentious issue, facing significant challenges and rollbacks in both private and public sectors. With US president Donald Trump issuing executive orders to dismantle DEI programs, and corporations responding by scaling back or rebranding their initiatives, DEI has become a flashpoint in broader cultural debates.

Join us online tomorrow at The Walrus Talks at Home: DEI as we explore pressing questions about this topic and examine how Canadians can hold the line on inclusion and equity work and go beyond to make the promise of DEI a lived reality.

Join us

The Human Journey Through Media and Technology

Digital platforms and generative AI are reshaping how journalism is produced, shared, and understood. But who controls these tools—and how does that shape public discourse?

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Mike Ananny. His research explores the relationship between media technologies and the public good—from algorithmic accountability to AI’s role in community connection.

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This week on What Happened Next, host Nathan Whitlock is joined by author and artist Teresa Wong. Her most recent book is the graphic novel All Our Ordinary Stories, published in 2024 by Arsenal Pulp Press. It was also longlisted for Canada Reads and won two Alberta Literary Awards. (NB: as you’ll hear, this episode was recorded a few days before the book won.) Teresa and Nathan talk about the potential meditative benefits of learning to swim as an adult, which she is currently doing, about worrying she was done making books entirely after All Our Ordinary Stories was published, and about her complicated thoughts on the whole concept of literary awards.

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