It’s a 7-per-cent tax, unseen and insidious. Do business across a provincial boundary and that’s what the federal government estimates you’ll face in extra costs due to the myriad of conflicting regulations, standards, registrations and restrictions. Canada’s Agreement on Internal Trade, a deal struck in the early days of Jean Chrétien’s Liberal government to reduce trade barriers between provinces, will be 20 years old in 2014.

National efforts to put a price on carbon in the United States largely petered out years ago, but the climate policy is gaining traction in a handful of states out west. The governors of California, Washington, and Oregon, along with the premier of British Columbia in Canada, signed an agreement Monday to coordinate efforts to reduce carbon emissions in the region. Washington and Oregon will aim to implement their own pricing structures to mimic those already in place in California and British Columbia.

Ottawa has dismantled a key task force aimed at supporting the peace process in Sudan at a time of renewed fighting in Darfur, raising questions about Canada’s commitment to aid and diplomacy in the conflict-torn region.

Glenn Rogers lives in Brooklyn. He’s from Australia. Most importantly, he has no affiliation with Rogers Communications. Yet none of those easily obtainable facts were enough to save the entrepreneur from being on the receiving end of a torrent of angry messages unleashed by Rogers customers in the throws of a collective Twitter fit Wednesday night.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper arrived in Bali for an Asia-Pacific leaders’ summit Sunday bearing what could be called a $36-billion vote of confidence from Malaysia’s state-owned oil and gas company. Malaysian Prime Minister Mohd Najib sprung the “gargantuan” investment figure during a joint availability with Harper in Putrajaya, saying Malaysia’s state-owned oil and gas company Petronas has committed to construction of a liquid natural gas plant in British Columbia and the pipeline to feed it.

Jonathan Kay presents an excellent introduction to why most Canadians would reject the Canada/U.S. merger proposed by Diane Francis. Ms. Francis suggests a possible American merger incentive payment to Canada of $17-trillion (coincidentally currently equal to the total U.S. debt), payable over 20 years. But there is a big problem for Canadians with that. As a percentage of GDP, the U.S. government now projects its revenue to remain constant, and its debt interest and entitlement costs to continue rising linearly and match revenue by 2025.

Canadians John Greyson and Tarek Loubani, jailed in Egypt since their Aug. 16 arrest, have had their imprisonment extended for another 45 days, according to a friend who spoke with the pair's lawyers in Egypt. The two men are on the 13th day of a hunger strike in Tora prison, south of Cairo.

Former Parti Québécois leader André Boisclair has been relieved of his functions as Quebec’s official representative in New York City at his own request so he can fight allegations involving his past cocaine use.