Who wants to drain the Ontario PC swamp? Vic Fedeli announced he’s here to “root out the rot” of the party he took over as interim leader, while confirming he won’t seek a permanent nomination. And now Barrie MP Alex Nuttall claims that Patrick Brown’s downfall was an elitist inside job. John Tory got in a good dig at Doug Ford, though, joking that his own campaign plans changed because his mother doesn’t have a basement. Still the subject of leadership speculation is Caroline Mulroney, whose lack of announcement added weight to her brother Ben’s wife's extremely scientific poll on Instagram:

“I’ve been very, very careful all my life to be thoughtful, to be respectful of people's space and people's headspace as well.” Justin Trudeau suggested to CBC Radio’s The House that for more than 25 years he’s done everything he can to avoid being the subject of sexual misconduct claims—although the article about the interview was edited to be less affirmative that it initially appeared. The case of ex-cabinet minister Kent Hehr, accused of calling an Alberta legislature staffer “yummy,” followed by an allegation of groping, is being considered as distinct as any other by the PM, even if a third-party report on Hehr is likely to remain under wraps.

The cracked new era of apologies from the TTC. A detailed list of explanations dispatched from @bradTTC could only do so much to simmer down Tuesday-morning commuters who were pushed to stand beyond the yellow line to the verge of evacuation at Bloor/Yonge. And with the dawn of a new day came a different reason for delays:

Norm Kelly’s crypto pitch is almost for real. The first city council meeting of 2018 will include presenting the recommendation by Kelly to look into whether taxes and utility bills can be paid by Bitcoin. The motion coincides with Kodak delaying its blockchain venture amidst questions over the legitimacy of claims by Cameron Chell, a motivational speaker once banned from the Alberta Stock Exchange. The abrupt halting is reminiscent of Alex Tapscott’s company NextBlock Global having its plans cancelled after apparently falsified endorsements were exposed—nonetheless, his father Don soldiered forth to Davos to call for “microsurgery on this new economy.”

Drake takes the cake by tripping the Billboard algorithm. "God's Plan" debuted at the top of the Hot 100 due to some clever gaming of an of an ever-changing system—whose methodology is different from when “Hotline Bling” got stuck in the pole position. As a result, Drake adds to his list of chart superlatives based on inconsistent measurements, even though his 159 appearances on the big singles chart have yet to catch the 207 forgotten downloaded hits from the soundtrack of Glee. The content of “God’s Plan” doesn’t sound like much (it even rehashes two Toronto street references) but there’s no denying that its streaming success won the pop music electoral college:

Jordan Peterson finds the least hostility in Hollywood. The author of Amazon’s officially certified chart-topper 12 Rules For Life made an appearance on Wendy Mesley’s The Weekly, primarily consisting of Mesley confronting him over Pepe the Frog-related associations—consistent with how the loudest Canadian academic types default to discrediting him. But a different story is found in his swing to Los Angeles: Joe Rogan scored the lengthiest of Peterson’s podcast appearances, culminating in the clinical psychologist explaining why he hasn’t been able to process this middle-age fame, while just beginning what’ll likely be a long footold on the self-help shelf:

The edible-eating cop story has built quite a buzz. Worldwide attention has come for the tale of two Toronto Police officers suspended for alleged marijuana tasting on the job—partly because one was a social media doofus, partly because of the detail that an officer who arrived for backup required medical attention for slipping on ice. But it’s also led the Ontario Safety League to reinforce its view that edibles should remain illegal. And questions about whether cannabis can cause the kind of hallucinations that can get you stuck in a tree.