News roundup, 30 Oct 2024

- The federal government reportedly plans to build a high speed rail link between Toronto and Quebec City, with stops in Peterborough, Ottawa, Montreal, Trois-Rivières, and Laval. Of course, they have little or no chance of being reelected next year, so they don't have to worry about being made to follow through on the plans; instead they presumably hope to blame the Conservatives when the latter inevitably cancel the project.

- Several Liberal MPs are trying to force a secret ballot vote by the entire party caucus on Justin Trudeau's leadership. Such a vote would be non-binding; whether it would have sufficient force to overcome Trudeau's ego is an open question.

- Donald Trump's campaign is disavowing a joke made by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe at Trump's rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday, but not the numerous other hateful remarks made by Hinchcliffe and others at the event. The rally is already drawing comparisons with another rally held at the same venue in 1939 by the German American Bund. Some Trump supporters seem to be worried about the optics of the whole thing.

- Japan's ruling party, the Liberal Democratic Party, has lost its parliamentary majority in a snap election on Monday. The opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, the only other party to have ever formed government since 1945, was the main beneficiary.

- Winnipeg police are investigating after numerous Stars of David were drawn on the sidewalk outside the Food Fare location on Portage Avenue. The store owner, who is Palestinian, commented that "If somebody went and drew a Palestinian flag in front of an Israeli or Jewish-owned store or business, I think it would be investigated as a hate crime. So in my eyes, this is definitely [one]".

- The University of Toronto's School of the Environment has announced that they will be refusing donations from fossil fuel companies; this is a positive development, but it's noteworthy that Princeton University, which made a similar move in 2022, reversed this decision earlier this year, saying that prohibiting individual faculty members from accepting such funding could be counterproductive (the U of T's policy does not constrain individual faculty members in the same way). And while Princeton says they will continue to divest from fossil fuel companies, they will no longer track their divestiture publicly.

- The city of Brampton, Ontario is trying to crack down on illegal rentals. Awkwardly, a city councillor is listed as co-owner of a house with a suite that was illegally rented out. When confronted about this, he initially denied ownership, then accused "City Hall insiders" of "leaking" the information.

Japan files WTO complaint against Ontario's green energy legislation

Apparently they have a problem with the local content requirements:

The Japanese government has filed a complaint against Canada with the World Trade Organization, saying that Ontario’s green energy plan unfairly pressures its producers of clean power to buy hardware from manufacturers in the province.

Ontario’s new alternative energy structure pays very high prices for wind and solar power, as long as producers source a significant proportion of their equipment in the province. The program has so far been very successful in drawing manufacturers to set up shop in Ontario.

But Japan says the local-content provisions breach portions of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and fall under the definition of a “prohibited subsidy.” It has asked for “consultations” with Canada under the WTO process, the first stage of a formal trade dispute.

From the Globe. This is unfortunate, because if this complaint is upheld it could gut the entire clean energy program:

Still, Mr. Atcheson said that if Japan eventually wins its claim, it could be a disaster for Ontario’s alternative energy plans. The prices the province pays for green energy – for certain types of solar power it is almost 20 times the rate customers pay – can only be justified if Ontario gets significant employment benefits from new development, he said. The province can’t afford to pay high prices for renewables “unless they are creating some jobs,” he said.

Yikes. Let's hope sense prevails.

How long can China's "economic miracle" last?

It's hard to avoid -- everywhere you look there's another story about China's tremendous economic growth. They're now the second biggest economy in the world, and seem unstoppable. But as Gwynne Dyer points out in the Georgia Straight, we've heard this story before:

Back in 1988, the last year of Japan’s 30-year boom, the land in the garden of the Imperial Palace in central Tokyo was allegedly worth more than the entire state of California, but that was just another way of saying “unsustainable property bubble”. The bubble duly burst, bringing down the entire Japanese economy with it—and it has stayed down for the past 22 years, achieving at best two-percent annual growth and usually much less.

The property bubble in China is reaching similar dimensions, with prices rising annually by 50 percent or more in dozens of cities. When property bubbles finally burst—and they always do—they tend to do a great deal of damage. (Nobody say subprime.)

As Dyer points out, China has a lot of parallels with Japan, though it would be premature to predict that they'll collapse as badly as Japan has. Still, the status quo can't go on forever.

Another country questioning its close ties to the US...

... and it's a biggie:

A split is emerging between the United States and Japan over the new Tokyo government's anti-globalisation rhetoric and its threats to end a refueling agreement for US ships in support of the war in Afghanistan.

Yukio Hatoyama, the leader of the Democratic Party of Japan, has caused alarm in Washington after publishing an article blaming the US for the ills of capitalism, the global economy and "the destruction of human dignity".

He also intends to examine an agreement that permits US warships to dock at Japanese ports, in violation of the nation's non-nuclear principles. Mr Hatoyama says he will also look again at the $6 billion cost faced by Japan to transfer thousands of US troops from their base in Okinawa to the Pacific island of Guam amid a wide-ranging review of the American military presence on Japanese soil.

His election campaign promised a more "independent" foreign policy from Washington and closer relations with Asian neighbours, including China. On Thursday, he repeated his intention to defy the US and end the Maritime Self-Defence Force's resupply mission in the Indian Ocean.

From here, via Mega in this iTulip thread. It'll be interesting to see how this goes; the Yanks probably won't let go of those docking privileges easily. Gwynne Dyer discusses the victory of Mr. Hatoyama and the DPJ in this article, and thinks they'll face an uphill battle bringing about permanent changes in the country. Time will tell.