Blizzard conditions in B.C.'s Fraser Valley early in the week forced closure of parts of the TransCanada highway. (CBC)

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Old man winter arrived with a one-two punch pretty much right across the country this week. In Western Canada, it was frigid weather that had everyone talking about the Big Chill. The Prairies were averaging -30 degree weather early in the week with the wind chill factored in. There was a brief thaw mid-week, then the region was plunged back into the deep freeze. Even balmy Victoria suffered through a snow dump and -8 degree temperature, well below its seasonal average.

Windsor gets a wallop on Friday. (CBC)

In Central Canada, meanwhile, it was a huge two-stage snowstorm that wreaked havoc with transit, Christmas shopping and, in some places, power supplies. A massive storm that began in the U.S. Southwest (it even dumped a record almost nine centimetres on Las Vegas) shut down large swaths of Wisconsin, Indiana and Illinois before moving on to Ontario and Quebec at week's end.

Both provinces were bracing for a second bout on Sunday while the first storm moves on to the Maritimes and possibly Newfoundland.

• Deep freeze
• Environment Canada: 'snow-mageddeon' weather warnings

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The shoe heard round the world. (Associated Press)

Shoe hurling

Showing an agility few thought he possessed, U.S. President George W. Bush stood his ground at a press conference in Baghdad last Sunday and calmly ducked two shoes that were thrown his way by an overwrought Iraqi journalist. Afterward, Bush downplayed the flying footwear, saying it was just another case of someone flipping him the finger. But in Iraq, where shoes are considered a weapon of insult, the incident provoked deep divisions: thousands of Iraqis took to the streets and websites to champion the shoe hurler and denounce Bush, while the Iraqi government was deeply embarrassed by the breach in protocol and the shoddy welcome to a foreign leader.

By week's end, the 28-year-old TV journalist who tossed his shoes was reportedly asking to be pardoned and expressing regret for his "ugly act," according to a spokesman for Iraq Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Reporter Muntather al-Zaidi faces two years in jail for insulting a foreign leader. But the judge who saw him in court noted that al-Zaidi showed signs of having been beaten while in police custody.

• Nahlah Ayed: footnote to a presidency

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Bailout bingo

With the U.S. Senate having turned down a multi-billion dollar bailout package for the Big Three automakers, George W. Bush was forced to take matters into his own hands. Faced with the loss of tens of thousands of jobs even under the prospect of a so-called orderly bankruptcy, the U.S. president announced $17.4-billion in loans and investment guarantees for GM, Chysler and Ford, taking the money from funds that had previously been authorized for the financial sector.

In Canada, the federal and Ontario governments are expected to follow suit with equivalent guarantees in the $3.5 billion range, a reflection of Canada's 20 per cent share in the North American auto industry.

In addition, after first downplaying a need for significant economic stimulus, the Conservative government is now promising to extend bailout protection to the mining and forestry sector, while Prime Minister Stephen Harper is talking about injecting as much as $30 billion worth of new government spending into the economy in the near term.

• Limit deficit to $22 billion, TD says
• Flaherty unveils advisory council

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Zero down

In what may be the fiscal policy equivalent of firing your last shot, U.S. Federal Reserve Board chairman Ben Bernanke vowed Tuesday to reduce America's central-bank lending rate Tuesday to .25 per cent and zero if necessary, and keep it there for as long as it takes to turn the recessionary economy around. Cheap credit on this scale has been tried once before, by Japan in the late 1990s, with mixed results.

But Bernanke is also promising a range of other measures, from buying up dodgy mortgages and long-term debt instruments, to try to boost investor confidence. Initial results were promising: stock markets rose Tuesday and parts of Wednesday on the news, though the U.S. dollar slumped. By Thursday, however, Wall Street was back in the red as powerhouse General Electric was downgraded by the ratings agencies and oil prices continued to slump, to below $36 US a barrel at one point.

In its own bit of desperation, the oil-producing cartel OPEC is now pledged to cut production by a record 2.2 million barrels a day, beginning in January, to try to get prices back up again.

• Economy: The Bottom Line

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UBC prof. Tooryalai Wesa, Kandahar's new governor. (CBC)

Afghan governor

A Canadian academic and childhood friend of Afghan President Hamid Karzai is to be the next governor of volatile Kandahar province, where most of Canada's 2,700 soliders in that country are stationed. Tooryalai Wesa, 58, an agriculture expert at the University of British Columbia, grew up near Kandahar City and is returning to take on one of the more difficult jobs in the country. He will be the third governor in just over eight months.

He is also taking up the post at a time when the Taliban is on the ascendency in the region. Three more Canadian soldiers were killed by an explosive device earlier in the week, and the Taliban is said to now control the main supply road into southern Kandahar, a region where Canada is about to cede command to the U.S., which is moving more troops into place there.

• Afghan-Canadian named new Kandahar governor
• Afghan violence to worsen: Canadian General

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Canadian diplomat Robert Fowler. (CBC)

Missing in Niger

He was one of Canada's top senior civil servants, a foreign policy adviser to at least three former prime ministers and, at one point, Canada's envoy to the UN. But for almost a week now, Robert Fowler, 64, has been missing in action, somewhere in the West African country of Niger where he was on a special UN mission to talk with both sides in a protracted civil war that picked up steam late last year.

The UN said no ransom demands or claims of any kind have been made in the disappearance of Fowler, his assistant Louis Guay (another Canadian), and their driver. A rebel group claimed responsibility on a website, but the leader of that group said the report was not true. T

Fowler's empty car, with cellphone and camera, was discovered Dec. 14, not long after he and his aide had stopped at a mining company office for lunch. One of the issues he is investigating is the state of Niger's uranium mines,

• Rebel group claims responsibility

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Province power

Upset that giant forestry company AbitibiBowater is planning to shut its Grand Falls-Windsor mill by the end of March, putting at least 700 out of work, Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams is revoking the company's long-held timber and hydro rights in the province.

Caught offguard by the move, the U.S.-based AbitibiBowater threatened to launch a court challenge to the expropriation and may even take it up before a NAFTA free trade panel. Williams is offering the company some compensation for the timber and power rights, to be determined at a later date. Canadian governments rarely use their powers of expropriation, because of the message it sends other companies who wish to invest in their jurisdictions.

• Abitibi says it was blindsided by NL move

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