Over the weekend, the judicial recount of the Quebec riding of Terrebonne complete, and the riding flipped back to the Liberals based with a one vote lead. One single vote. (Yes, your vote counts, you guys). What this means is that the Liberals are now at 170 seats, assuming they hold in the other recounts ongoing right how, and of course, because we live in a bad timeline, you have conservative online influencers claiming that there recounts are somehow operating in an underhanded manner so that the Liberals can get their majority, even though the math doesn’t appear to work in in their favour in most of these recounts, and the fact that these are now judicial recounts, so the conspiracy theories start getting pretty dark at this point.

That also means that we’re going to be treated to a whole new round of floor-crossing speculation, because they’re just two seats shy of the majority (three, really), and that’s getting another round of talks about Elizabeth May as Speaker (never going to happen), or someone from the NDP running to be Speaker, which is also not going to happen because they’re already trying to justify getting official party status with seven MPs, and if you reduce it to six, there’s no way even that many can try and argue for committee spots or more time in Question Period. It’s not plausible with seven, and even less plausible with six.

Meanwhile, the Star got a bit of a look behind the scenes amongst the Liberals as they prepare for this week’s Cabinet shuffle, with a bit of a “hunger games” mentality involved for staffers trying to get assigned to offices when there has been a reduction in the size of Cabinet, and so on. I’m sure the leaks will start tonight about who is in and who is out, but in the meantime, there are a lot of anxious people about what their jobs will be in the short term.

Ukraine Dispatch

Over the weekend, Putin proposed peace talks in Istanbul (without Türkiye agreeing) and said there were “no preconditions,” but then made a list of demands Ukraine could never agree to, but president Zelenskyy is calling his bluff and saying he’ll meet Putin there in person. So, we’ll see where this theatre goes.

Good reads:

• Dominic LeBlanc says the Americans haven’t said they’re looking to re-open NAFTA renegotiations early (not that we can trust their negotiations in any case).
• The federal government is looking to offload four mobile hospitals they acquired during COVID, because they are costly to store and maintain.
• CBC talks to a number of MPs who are packing up their offices in Ottawa after losing their seats in the election.
• Former MPs discuss the emotional toll that losing your seat can take.
• More Conservatives are trying to convince themselves that Poilievre’s only problem was that people couldn’t see his “softer side.”
• There are some sore bros over in the alt-right/far-right media space who also didn’t get interviews with Poilievre during the election.
• Kevin Carmichael makes the case for Carney to do big things in the face of major economic threats, because the private sector will retrench and not lead.
• Colby Cosh nails the fundamental cultural reason why any Alberta separatist movement will ultimately fail.
• Matt Gurney and Susan Delacourt debate whether the Conservatives need to overhaul their strategy of seething rage if this election was really just a fluke.
• My weekend column warns of the dangers of Danielle Smith flirting with separatism, building on Jason Kenney’s legacy of trying to keep Alberta a one-party state.

Odds and ends:

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