News roundup, 1 Sept 2026

- Three federal byelections were held yesterday, in the ridings of Vancouver-Capilano, Beaches-East York, and Chicoutimi-Le Fjord. All three were won by the Liberals. In the case of Chicoutimi-Le Fjord, the byelection was necessitated when the Conservative incumbent Richard Martel was "kicked upstairs" earlier this year, so this is a net gain for the Liberals.

- Kevin Klein, a former councillor and Tory MLA (and current CEO of the Winnipeg Sun's parent company) has entered the race for mayor of Winnipeg. Hopefully this means there will be a split in the rightwing vote between him and Mike Vogiatzakis (and maybe also Brad Gross) but this remains to be seen.

- Russia has responded to Ukraine's strikes on the warehouses of online retailers by hitting food distribution centres, leaving many grocery store shelves empty. 

- Another tornado has been reported in Manitoba. This one touched down near the community of Elkhorn in the RM of Wallace-Woodworth.

- A pedestrian was killed after walking in front of Waterloo's ION LRT over the weekend. The victim has not been identified and it is unclear if this was an accident or a suicide.

- Montreal's former anti-racism commissioner is suing the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) for defamation after the organization allegedly compared her to Hitler. Bochra Manaï says that the comparison was made in materials published by the organization; she is asking for $125,000 in damages.

- A 68 year old man has been charged with arson following a fire that destroyed a church in St. Simon, New Brunswick. Several social media posts subsequently made false allegations about the suspect, some saying that he was Israeli while others said he was Palestinian.

News roundup, 20 July 2026

- Dutch activists threw water balloons filled with vinegar, salt, hydrogen peroxide, and acrylic paint at the foundations of a data centre under construction in Amsterdam. The mixture is intended to degrade the concrete and speed up the corrosion of the rebar. How effective this will be remains to be seen. While the city has legislation to restrict "hyperscale" data centres, this one exploited a loophole in the legislation by building it as three smaller centres.

- The BC Conservative Party has hired a member of the separatist Republican Party of Alberta as their director of operations, as well as a writer who once worked for a website called Russia Insider as their caucus communications director. They aren't even trying to hide it, it seems; they're just counting on enough people to be sufficiently angry with the government that they don't pay attention who they vote for as long as they're voting against those in power.

- A 37 year old woman has been charged with assaulting another woman with her car in an Edmonton parking lot. The victim was wearing a hijab and the suspect allegedly subjected her to racist abuse before hitting her with the vehicle; fortunately it appears that the victim was not seriously injured.

- While homelessness is a crisis across North America (and probably in most places around the world), Denver has made some progress in threading the needle between helping people and satisfying other residents. The city has created around a thousand shelter spaces, which crucially provide support as well as housing. On the other hand, once an encampment is cleared from an area they take measures to ensure no new encampments set up in that location, which some activists aren't comfortable with. More substantively, there may be limits to the success of the program unless more permanent housing can be made available.

- L7 bassist Jennifer Finch has died at the age of 59. 

- A 72 year old Winnipeg man has been charged with theft and extortion after he allegedly stole his neighbour's cat and held it for ransom. The cat was recovered by police and returned safely.

- Country singer Charley Crockett had second thoughts about his choice of opening act for a couple of shows on his current tour. Twin Temple, described by Loudwire as an "openly satanic doo-wop revival act", were dropped from the tour, and Crockett has since deactivated most of his social media. It's not like Twin Temple are particularly subtle about the matter; anyone checking out their website or their songs should be able to tell. They don't seem to be suffering for it; in fact Jack White has just invited them to open for him in LA later this year. It's also something of a testament to the weirdness of our times that the phrase "openly satanic doo-wop revival act" actually refers to a real-world entity.

News roundup, 10 July 2026

- The ceasefire in the US-Iran war is in ruins after Donald Trump accused Iran of attacking ships in the Strait of Hormuz and launched airstrikes on the country, killing at least 14 people and destroying a bridge on a key trade route with Russia and China. Iran in turn launched strikes on Qatar, Kuwait, and Bahrain. Iran admits to firing on the ships, which it says ignored warnings about taking a non-approved route through the strait.

- Andy Burnham appears set to be the UK's next prime minister after winning the support of 322 out of 403 sitting Labour MPs. If nobody steps up to oppose him he will be declared party leader next week and take office later this month.

- The "Water Not Coal" campaign, an initiative by country singer Corb Lund which sought to ban coal mining on the eastern slopes of the Rockies in Alberta (or force a referendum if the government wanted to push ahead), was deemed by Elections Alberta to have not gotten the necessary 177,732 signatures in order to be deemed valid. Lund's campaign had submitted over 200,000, but staff at the agency attempted to contact a small sample of the signatories in order to determine how many could be deemed valid and deemed enough of them illegitimate to cancel the initiative. A statistician at the University of Toronto, however, believes that Elections Alberta's methodology was suspect and that the initiative likely had enough legitimate signatures to proceed.

- The BC government is suing OpenAI for its role in the Tumbler Ridge shooting that left nine people dead. The government believes that there were plenty of warning signs in the shooter's interaction with the platform that could have prevented the tragedy; OpenAI had banned her but had not notified the police.

- A Texas woman who was fired by her employer after video of her unhinged rant at two Muslim women went viral has raised over $100,000 in donations on GiveSendGo (which is, as I've called it before, the GoFundMe for deplorables). The women she harassed were doxed and have faced death threats.

- Two teenagers in Greensboro, NC were arrested after allegedly using a device described as a "homemade plasma cannon" to break into a school. The term may be technically accurate but makes it sound way more sci-fi than it actually is; it's not that dissimilar to the potato cannons that teens have been making for decades.

- A student pilot in Argentina was forced to land the aircraft by herself after her flight instructor suddenly opened a door and jumped to his death. While shaken, the student landed the Cessna 150 without further incident. I suppose if nothing else it was a good test of the student's ability to handle an emergency.

News roundup, 25 June 2026

- Oil prices have dropped back to the prewar baseline following the memorandum of understanding signed between the US and Iran that has led to a resumption in traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. Wholesale prices of fertilizer are coming down as well, though many farmers say they have yet to see any real relief at the retail level.

- At least 164 people were killed and 971 injured after two earthquakes struck within a minute of each other in the Venezuelan capital Caracas.

- The Red River Co-op has plans for a badly needed downtown grocery store at Portage Place. The 22,500 ft² facility is expected to open in 2029.

- Winnipeg city councillor Janice Lukes, who represents the suburban Waverley West ward, has announced that she is not running again in this fall's election. Folks on the r/Winnipeg subreddit are mostly rejoicing, though some warn that you should be careful what you wish for. As one person says, "I wasn't a fan, but progressives/urbanists may need to face up to the fact that she was possibly the best we were going to get out of Waverley West." River Heights-Fort Garry councillor John Orlikow isn't running again either; to date Transcona councillor Russ Wyatt has not ruled out running again despite facing sexual assault charges.

- Calgary's chamber of commerce has released a report concluding that secession could cost Alberta's economy $62 billion a year. They also surveyed their members; as this was a self-selecting survey it isn't definitive, but among those who responded more than 75% thought that the very discussion around separation was negatively affecting the province's economy.

- The heatwave in Europe continues, with temperatures hitting the low forties in parts of France yesterday. Even in the normally moderate UK, the town of Gosport recorded a temperature of 36.1°C, and it could get even hotter today.

- A mosque in Regina that got approval from the city to play their call to prayer from a speaker atop the building over the noon hour is getting threats from members of the public. I'd bet you donuts to dinars that the people doing this do not make similar threats to churches that ring bells.

News roundup, 19 May 2026

- Two armed teenagers attacked a mosque in San Diego on Monday, killing three people before turning their weapons on themselves. This is being investigated as a hate crime; the mother of one of the shooters found a note that he had left behind, though the content of the note has not been made public.

- Global Affairs Canada is warning Canadians to be wary about travelling overseas this summer, due to the possibility of flight cancellations as a result of skyrocketing prices of jet fuel due to the war in Iran. They also warn that fuel shortages could disrupt access to products and services at some popular destinations. 

- A Canadian who was a passenger on the plague ship MV Hondius has tested positive for hantavirus. Three others are in isolation after showing symptoms consistent with the virus.

-  An outbreak of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo has killed at least 131 people and may be spreading faster than originally thought.

- Manitoba is temporarily suspending the ban on sale of certain American alcoholic beverages, in order to sell off stock that expires in the fall.

- Keir Starmer is facing a direct challenge of his leadership of the Labour Party from Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester. Burnham is running in a byelection in the constituency of Makerfield, which was vacated by incumbent Josh Simons in order to make way for him.

- Thomas Massie, a Republican member of Congress from Kentucky, is facing a tough primary today as Donald Trump has aggressively endorsed his opponent. Massie drew the ire of Trump after pushing a bill to force the release of the Epstein files.

- A car crashed into a fireworks store in Toronto on Monday, starting what became a five-alarm fire. Nobody was in the vehicle by the time fire crews arrived.

News roundup, 8 Jan 2025

- A woman was shot and killed by ICE agents in a traffic stop in Minneapolis on Wednesday, apparently while serving as an observer keeping track of the agency's activities. The city's mayor, Jacob Frey, has condemned the killing and called for ICE to "get the fuck out of Minneapolis", but of course the Trump regime is spinning it as "domestic terrorism" on the part of the victim, claiming that she was trying to run down their officers with her vehicle (there's video here so you can judge for yourself). The Minnesota Department of Public Safety says that they will investigate the shooting "with federal authorities"; sadly that probably means that nothing will happen to the suspect, at least not through legal means. There are a couple of photos said to be of him here though. More information on the victim may be found here.

- Donald Trump mused about cancelling this year's midterm elections while speaking at a retreat for Republican members of the House. He quickly walked that back, but warned that he will be at risk of impeachment if the Republicans don't win the midterms.

- A professor at Austin Peay State University in Clarksville, Tennessee who was fired after posting a tweet with Charlie Kirk's famous quote on gun violence being a necessary evil shortly after Kirk himself fell victim to it has been reinstated and will be getting a $500,000 payout from the university.

- An antiwar protester in Grand Rapids, Michigan, was arrested immediately after being interviewed by a local TV station, as the cameras still rolled. 

- A newly enacted ministerial order by the Danielle Smith's education minister, Demetrios Nicolaides, requires schools to remove "sexually explicit" books from their libraries. School divisions are complying, but notably most of them, including those in the big cities, are not revealing what books are on the banned list. This is in stark contrast to the response to an earlier version of the order announced in July, which specifically included written descriptions as qualifying as "explicit". Back then, the Edmonton public school board publicly released a list of books that would have to be removed based on their interpretation of the order. Among the books listed were some of the usual suspects (The Handmaid's Tale, The Color Purple, A Game of Thrones, American Psycho) as well as some that you don't usually see on such lists (including The Godfather, Jaws, and, amusingly enough, two Ayn Rand novels (The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged). This put one of the activists who had been calling for the bans in the first place into a tizzy, accusing the school division of "malicious compliance" (and Smith later called it "vicious compliance").  It appears that the new version is more directed at comics/manga/graphic novels; perhaps the school divisions figure those aren't such a good hill to die on as stuff that older folks recognize as literature, so they're keeping their heads down for now.

- In the last couple of days Winnipeg has seen antisemitic graffiti at a school and Islamophobic graffiti at a mosque. While it's possible that one was done as a sort of collective revenge for the other, I think it's more likely that the people responsible don't come from either of those communities.

- Donna Cox, a councillor for a Manitoba municipality, was reinstated by a court after an attempt to remove her. The Rural Municipality of Thompson (a confusing name, since it's nowhere near the city of the same name) had rescheduled council meetings so they conflicted with her work, then removed her after she missed three consecutive meetings. The change in schedule happened shortly after Cox was elected; previously, council had alternated between morning and evening meetings, but then the entire council except Cox voted to hold all their meetings in the morning. I'd be very curious to know what kind of policy differences Cox has with her colleagues; this sounds malicious to me.

Another 9/11 anniversary...

... and the world is still reeling. Happily Terry Jones called off his stunt, but others are behaving in a similar fashion (h/t superfan1 at ontd_political). And that's not even considering the controversy over the "mosque" "at" Ground Zero. Happily not all Americans are like that:

Guess who has helped the Muslims organize their plans for this community center? The JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTER of Manhattan! Their rabbi has been advising them since the beginning. It's been a picture-perfect example of the kind of world we all want to live in. Peter Stuyvessant, New York's "founder," tried to expel the first Jews who arrived in Manhattan. Then the Dutch said, no, that's a bit much. So then Stuyvessant said ok, you can stay, but you cannot build a synagogue anywhere in Manhattan. Do your stupid Friday night thing at home. The first Jewish temple was not allowed to be built until 1730. Then there was a revolution, and the founding fathers said this country has to be secular -- no religious nuts or state religions. George Washington (inaugurated around the corner from Ground Zero) wanted to make a statement about this his very first year in office, and wrote this to American Jews:

"The citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy -- a policy worthy of imitation. ...

"It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for, happily, the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens ...

"May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants -- while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid."

Who else would dare point this out but Michael Moore (h/t omgangiepants at ontd_political)?

Jones calls off Quran burning

Of course this is an extremely good thing. However, let's have a closer look at this:

A Christian pastor in the US state of Florida has called off plans to burn copies of the Quran, in an event that had been roundly criticised and stoked fears of violence around the globe.

Reverend Terry Jones said on Thursday that he made the decision to cancel the event because the leader of a planned Islamic centre near the so-called Ground Zero site in New York had agreed to move its location.

However sources close to the imam of the planned Islamic centre told the Reuters news agency that he had not agreed to any such deal, and that the centre would not be moved.

"There has been no agreement. There have been no discussions with this pastor," one of the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said.

Source. I have a bad feeling that this "differing interpretation of the facts" is going to lead to nastiness in the coming days -- no doubt he'll accuse the Muslims of reneging on a deal. Of course, they made no such deal, but who are most Americans going to believe -- a pastor or an imam? I expect that the Quran burning will happen some time in the future, along with a bunch of inflammatory pronouncements about how those dirty Muslims can't be trusted on anything. This would not be a good thing in the long run.

Extremists don't want a good crisis to go to waste

They're organizing in the flood-ravaged areas of Pakistan:

NOWSHERA, Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa province - The coalition government of Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, the brainchild of the United States for an anti-Taliban political force that could effectively fight and support the American war in South Asia, has proved itself incompetent in the face of the country's unfolding flood disaster.

Devastating floods over the past month have affected more than 20 million people and laid waste a fifth of the country's land mass. The real fear now is that in the much-anticipated anarchy in the coming weeks, a fiercely anti-American Islamic revolution could break out if correct and timely steps are not taken as the waters recede and lay bare ruined lives.

From the Asia Times. No doubt the Taliban agitators are pointing out the fact that donations from the West are much less than for similar disasters (the Indian Ocean tsunami, the Haiti earthquake, etc), and insinuating that Islamophobia has something to do with it. Heck, Islamophobia probably does have something to do with it (though donor fatigue is probably a factor as well). And if extremists do take control of Pakistan, with its not insignificant nuclear arsenal, things could get very interesting indeed.