Throwback Thursday 2011 is the year everything was normal right up until it wasn't. The Space Shuttle Atlantis glided home in July with no engines and one shot at the runway and human spaceflight went quiet. The Arab Spring started reshaping the world. Houses cost $250,000. Harry Potter was in theatres. Stephen Harper and Barack Obama talked about Canada and the United States in complete sentences without threatening each other once.

That last part is worth sitting with. The audio of those two leaders on the Canada-US relationship sounds like it needs subtitles today, not because the language is different but because the temperature is. Artemis splashdown is at 8:07 Eastern tomorrow. Someone on this show described the launch as humanity's next great voyage. That framing hasn't been available for a while. 2011 is where it stopped being available and this week is where it came back.

The Canucks lost game seven that year and the city rioted. Progress, maybe, that nobody bothers anymore. Or something else entirely.

Topics: throwback Thursday 2011, Obama Harper audio, Space Shuttle Atlantis, Artemis splashdown, Arab Spring

Originally aired on 2026-04-09

Marilyn Gladue floor crossing to the Liberals is the kind of news that made Rob Breakenridge wonder if he was thinking of the wrong person. Then wonder if it was a late April Fools joke. Then confirm it was real and sit with the fact that she had been denouncing other floor crossers just days before.

What do you actually get out of crossing the floor? Not a cabinet post. Rob Breakenridge is clear on that. Not necessarily more freedom in caucus. Not even a guaranteed seat, given how conservative her riding has been. Marilyn Gladue spent years as one of the most ardent social conservatives in the party, ran to lead it six years ago, and has a track record that makes the Liberal fit genuinely hard to explain. She could walk into a private sector job in petrochemicals that would pay more than an MP salary plus whatever anyone imagines they're being offered. The incentive is baffling and that's the part nobody can answer cleanly.

This is the fifth floor crosser. At some point the question stops being about Marilyn Gladue and starts being about what the Liberal Party actually stands for when everyone is welcome.

Topics: Marilyn Gladue floor crossing, Canadian by-election, Pierre Poilievre caucus, Liberal majority, floor crosser incentive

GUEST: Rob Breakenridge | robbreakrenridge.ca | @robbreakenridge

Originally aired on 2026-04-09

Artemis crew splashdown is at 8:07 Eastern tomorrow and before they come home there is one thing worth sitting with. The Earthrise photograph from Apollo 8 in 1968 is probably one of the most important images ever taken. The astronaut who took it was Bill Anders. He died in 2024. Most people still couldn't tell you his name.

That gap is the whole point. Right now Reed Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen have spent nine days taking photographs that may rival Earthrise. They fixed a broken toilet. Nutella floated through the capsule. Mark Carney called and talked to Jeremy Hansen about maple syrup. These are not abstract heroes. They are specific people doing something that has not been done since 1972, going around the moon and coming home. Bill Anders would have recognized exactly what they were doing.

Say their names. Reed Wiseman. Victor Glover. Christina Koch. Jeremy Hansen. Splashdown tomorrow at 8:07 Eastern.

Topics: Artemis crew splashdown, Bill Anders Earthrise, Jeremy Hansen Canadian astronaut, Apollo 8, Reed Wiseman Victor Glover Christina Koch

Originally aired on 2026-04-09