Wrapping up 2016 and looking forward to 2017, a word of thanks to all those who made our documentary work possible in the past year.

John Ivison has a good piece in today's National Post about the Liberals' hollow "consultation process" on abolishing the voting system we've used since the common people were first admitted to Parliament, in favour of one that will make them almost impossible to beat. And if you're worried about this change and the undemocratic, arguably unconstitutional way it's likely to happen, and live in the Ottawa area, you might want to attend the MY VOTE MATTERS Ottawa event this evening at the Ukrainian Community Centre (1000 Byron) from 6:00 to 7:30 and share your concerns.

In my latest National Post column I say the European Union ordering Ireland to make a tax lunge at Apple shows the wisdom of the Brexit... and maybe not just for the UK.

The Daily Telegraph reports a warning from Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Loefven that if Britain cuts corporate taxes it will make its discussions with the European Union over a Brexit "more difficult." He insists that his own country will keep taxing heavily and spending (no, sorry, "investing") because "Tax cuts are not the future." Dude, the whole point of the Brexit is that Britain won't have to keep implementing bad policy because European politicians condescendingly tell them to. It's even odd that Loefven believes the EU has leverage to dictate policy to a member whose citizens have voted to leave, let alone that threatening to will make them less determined to get away from such things.

Oh, and while I'm on the subject, the Telegraph also notes (you have to read down a bit in the story) that, as if deliberately seeking further to persuade Britons that the Brexit vote was a good idea, European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker wants all EU members to open their borders entirely in a gesture of solidarity with the refugees now causing EU members to tighten border controls. Juncker went so far as to say "Borders are the worst invention ever made by politicians" which is a mind-boggling fatuity given the horrors governments have inflicted on people from tax rates over 100% to concentration camps. I know, I know, you're not meant to end every discussion by invoking Hitler. But in this case Juncker's claim invites the retort from Bertrand de Jouvenel that, as Milton Friedman recounts it, "said he had always been an ardent advocate of world government until the day he crossed the border into Switzerland ahead of the pursuing Nazis."

Borders exist to protect people from the excesses of big government, from the petty to the ghastly. And Britain is correct to assert within its own the right to have tax policy that favours private initiative over a smothering state.

Hence the Brexit. Obviously.

Here is a teaser clip from our upcoming True, Strong and Free documentary. https://youtu.be/l4E0TBNJ-VQ

The Daily Telegraph reports that Britain is under American pressure to send an extra 100 troops to Afghanistan. How did it come to this? I'm not judging the merits of the Afghan mission at this point. I'm just noting that this is a protracted, difficult discussion between the two leading powers in the Western alliance about a company of soldiers. One hundred troops. One company.

The Telegraph says the deployment would make a difference to the American ability to deploy troops elsewhere in the country and bolster U.S. commanders' arguments with their own president about further reducing the American presence.

A hundred soldiers? I can see how the decision to send three regiments might signal serious allied commitment to a cause. But if it still matters, sending 100 soldiers should be a minor administrative decision not a major strategic issue.

Consider that in April 1940 in a failed attempt to rescue their Norwegian ally, the British put 3,500 men into a minor action at Namsos, despite having 200,000 in France and deployments worldwide, from the Caribbean to Burma and Hong Kong, in the midst of a major war. Yet such a deployment would strain the capacity of the far richer and more populous UK of 2016 in peacetime, with few other demands on its armed forces, and entirely exceed our own. How can we have let such a situation arise in a clearly turbulent world?

Look, the Afghan mission may have been misconceived from the beginning or badly executed. I don't think so, except in the unrealistic expectations for transforming the country through military action rather than just removing a regime dangerous to us. But it may be time to withdraw. It may be impossible to prevent a Taliban resurgence. The major terrorist threat may be elsewhere now. Or showing weakness once committed might be perilous. All these things can be debated.

What it seems to me cannot be debated is that when the two most powerful nations in the Western alliance are having protracted high-level discussions over 100 soldiers, both our military establishments and our will are dangerously weak.

In my latest column for the National Post I argue that Trudeau manhandling MPs was not just rudeness to colleagues. It was an assault by the executive branch on the legislature and, therefore, on Canadian citizens, who elect MPs to control the government on their behalf. One more reason we urgently need to fix our Constitution. Please back our documentary project and help us show the way.

There he goes again, you may be tempted to say. Our PM posed with the Canadian Invictus Games team and did their pushup-then-lock-one-arm-and-extend-other-hand gesture while issuing a thinly veiled challenge to Prince Harry and President Obama to do the same or something similar for the British and American teams for the upcoming games in Orlando. NBC headlined it "Watch Justin Trudeau's Macho Challenge to Obama, Prince Harry" and indeed my first thought was "Showing off again, huh?" But on reflection I'm going to praise him instead. First, the Invictus Games created by Prince Harry "for wounded, injured and sick Service personnel" are an excellent cause. Second, fitness is an excellent cause. Third, and crucially, the two leaders he implicitly challenges are both themselves healthy and physically active. It would be unfair and in bad taste to call out a political leader who through age or misfortune couldn't do such a thing. But in this case I appreciate his doing the... well, it sure is a clumsy thing to describe.

So I was thinking of dubbing it "the Trudeau" so we can do it at the dojo without spending five minutes naming it. But I decided "the Invictus" was a better name. Because this time I don't think he was calling attention to himself but to two worthy causes: rehabilitating wounded members of our Armed Forces and those of our allies, and staying fit.

Yes, it's a challenge, to other leaders and to the rest of us. But it's a worthy challenge because most of us should be able to do at least one "Invictus". If Trudeau happens to look good doing it, it's because he keeps himself in shape. And that's a good thing.