TIME TO WEAR YOUR BIG-BOY PANTS JUSTIN

   In a letter Friday, Scheer pressed Trudeau to take a harder line with Canada’s second-biggest trading partner at a time when the countries are locked in a diplomatic dispute that has dragged on for more than seven months.
   “There is no other way to put this: Canada is being bullied by the Chinese government and you have done nothing to stand up for Canada in response,” Scheer wrote to Trudeau in the letter, which his office released publicly.

   The Canadian Food Inspection Agency, however, has no intention of increasing inspections on Chinese imports, a spokeswoman for Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau said later Friday.

CANADA GEESE DESTINED FOR DINNER PLATES

  As Canadians were celebrating Canada Day, Denver’s parks and recreation department (DPR) decided it had had enough of our unofficial bird.
  Federal crews corralled hundreds of Canada geese into a fenced area at City Park where they would soon — to put it lightly — be no more.
  The city estimates 5,000 geese take up residence in Denver every year, producing up to 5,000 pounds of feces each day and polluting the city’s waterways, Scott Gilmore, the city’s parks manager, told the Denverite. On top of that, populations have become aggressive to residents and have taken over parks.

LIBERAL STANDARDS OF OPENNESS & TRANSPARENCY

Bonokowski:  Back in May 2016, for example, and with the lid on as tight as tight could be, Trudeau had a private fundraiser at the Toronto home of a Chinese-Canadian billionaire with impressive ties to Beijing.
  The ticket for those with dual Canadian-Chinese citizenship was $1,500, but the Chinese-only guests, because of federal restriction against donating, were nonetheless allowed to mingle and press flesh.
  One attendee, it later came out, was Canadian financier Shenglin Xian, who was awaiting final say from feds to approve his plan to build a bank in Canada.
   Two months after that meeting with Trudeau, Shenglin had his bank.

CONSERVATIVE MPP LISA MACLEOD: A REAL CHARMER

The owner of the Ottawa Senators says he was subject to a profane tirade from MPP Lisa MacLeod at last weekend’s Rolling Stones concert near Barrie.

“So I’m just there, we’ve got families and friends in a small group and I’m surrounded by people from Ottawa — and I see from the corner of my eye somebody trying to bust through,” Melnyk said in a phone interview Thursday.

“I’m thinking, ‘OK, might be a crazed fan and that’s fine. I’ve gotten used to it. And all of a sudden it’s this woman and she yells at me, ‘Do you know who I am?’

“I can’t place her so I said, ‘I’m sorry. No.’ And she yells, ‘I am your minister and you’re a f—ing piece of s–t and you’re a f—ing loser’.”

BOMBARDIER: A PROFITABLE INVESTMENT FOR CANADA

Opinion

Marcil: By contributing to Bombardier’s development efforts through loans and equity investments, Canadians are not only getting their money back in full, but also creating value. Facts are stubborn things: supporting Bombardier and the aerospace industry is a profitable investment for Canada.

Olivier Marcil is the Vice President of External Relations of Bombardier Inc.

AB INQUIRY INTO FOREIGN OIL AND GAS FOES

The Alberta government will hold a public inquiry into environmental groups that it says have been bankrolled by foreign benefactors hell-bent on keeping Canada's oil and gas from reaching new markets while letting oil production grow unabated in the Middle East and the United States.

Kenney said deep-pocketed U.S. charities have been deliberately trying to landlock Alberta resources for years by funnelling money to an array of Canadian groups. Many of his assertions are based on the writings of Vancouver researcher Vivian Krause.

He blames those groups for the demise of several coast-bound pipelines that would have helped oilsands crude get to markets besides the U.S., as well as delays in building the Trans Mountain expansion to the west coast.

TRUDEAU DEFENDS NB JUDICIAL APPOINTMENTS

An advocacy group has filed a complaint with the federal conflict of interest and ethics commissioner calling for an independent investigation into Dominic LeBlanc and the connections he has with recent judicial appointments in New Brunswick.

Democracy Watch is also calling on the federal government to suspend all judicial and watchdog appointments until “the appointment process is changed to be actually independent and merit-based.”

"We are fully confident that the process, the transparent, merit-based process that we've put in place is the right one and we stand by it," Trudeau said Thursday.