Good morning. Mark Carney’s speech at Davos in January was a bona fide hit, but middle powers are now wondering what they’re meant to do next – more on that below, along with AI real estate listings and World Cup hero Stephen Eustáquio. But first:

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Back in January, Prime Minister Mark Carney strode onto a Davos stage and delivered a eulogy for the old world order. Ravenous superpowers were hijacking global trade and territorial sovereignty, he declared, while mid-sized countries, caught between them, scrambled “to accommodate. To avoid trouble. To hope that compliance will buy safety. It won’t.” Instead, Carney urged middle powers to work together, because “if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.”

To say his rallying call was well-received would be a wild understatement. Bob Rae, Canada’s former ambassador to the United Nations, said he’d “never seen a global reaction to a speech” like the response to Carney’s. Politicians praised it as a “profound analysis” (Finnish President Alexander Stubb) that was “in tune with the current times” (Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum), and evidence that “Canada is back” as a world leader (NATO chief Mark Rutte). Nearly six months later, European and Asian diplomats are still quoting its choicest lines.

But as Campbell Clark, The Globe and Mail’s political columnist, points out, “the speech very much captured a moment – it did not provide a blueprint for a new diplomatic initiative.” In fact, the Prime Minister has said more about what this middle-power pact isn’t than what it ostensibly is. It’s not some sort of grand alliance. It’s not a modern-day twist on the Hanseatic League.

“If you look at the speech, I never advocated that all of sudden there was going to be a band of middle powers,” Carney insisted earlier this month, “you know, the M20, or something like that.”

That’s left a bunch of governments wondering what they’re supposed to do next. “Countries looked at that speech and went, huh, interesting diagnosis,” Clark told me. “But many people in Ottawa and foreign capitals are still asking: ‘So… what does it mean?’”

Carney would say it means “variable geometry,” which is different partnerships with different countries for different issues. He might point to Ottawa’s developing alliance with Australia on critical minerals, its deal to export liquified natural gas to Germany, or the recent series of tech agreements with Japan. Canada has joined a major European defence fund and even got let into the Eurovision singing contest last week. Carney also travelled this year to China, India, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates to shore up new trade deals. “Having a diversity of relationships is the first step if you’re concerned about dependence on the United States,” Clark said. “But it’s mostly still small steps.”

And that’s because Canada remains heavily reliant on the U.S.: It accounted for 71.7 per cent of exports last year, our largest market by far. In order to keep most of those exports crossing the border tariff-free, Carney badly needs to hold onto the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, so he’s calibrated both his policies and rhetoric accordingly recently.

The federal government introduced new legislation to stop imports of goods made with foreign labour, which had been a big cudgel in the Trump administration’s trade war. Ottawa also effectively killed a regulator’s decision forcing American streaming giants to pay more to fund Canadian content – even though the move could cost Carney his access to a coveted Heated Rivalry fleece. Last month, the Prime Minister struck a conspicuously conciliatory tone in a high-profile speech in New York, vowing that Canada would help make America great again. “He’s trying to smooth things over with the United States,” Clark said. “Carney has clearly made that more of a priority.”

Does that mean he no longer believes the rules-based order is dead? It very much does not. Carney has always been deft at picking his political moments, and he understands what this particular moment demands. “That Davos speech is not the one you’d expect him to give now,” Clark told me. “But it’s not necessarily far from the speech he might give in a year.”

Ventriloquist Sue Van Duynhoven is one of the longest-tenured volunteers at London Children’s Hospital in Ontario, where she delights young patients with the antics of her red-haired puppet, Petunia Ashley Ottersby, MD. Read more here about their efforts to spread joy.