News roundup, 24 July 2026

- Tens of thousands of people are being evacuated from several communities in southwestern France due to wildfires. The situation is not being helped by the weather, with temperatures as high as 37°C and winds of up to 50 km/h. Spain has also seen significant evacuations due to fires in the last few days. More disturbingly, several wildfires in southern Italy are being attributed to arson, sometimes committed by tying rags soaked with accelerants to the tails of cats and lighting them on fire. It's suspected that mobsters are hoping to buy land cheaply after fires go through.

- Mark Carney says that retaliatory measures are being considered if Trump's planned 50% tariffs on pretty much every Canadian export that the US can get elsewhere come into effect later in August. Predictably, Danielle Smith says she's opposed to using tariffs for this purpose. Carney isn't saying yet what measures are being considered.

- A high school student in Marin County, California was given an assignment for his journalism class, namely to tell a news story in the form of an Instagram slideshow. Living in an extremely wealthy area, he figured he'd search the Epstein files for references to his county and see what came up. He ended up making a lot of people very angry, much like the protagonist of the German film The Nasty Girl whose high school project shines unwanted light on her town's Nazi past. A modelling agent named Gisele Attias Bonnouvrier threatened to sue the school district for defamation after being named as having supplied models to Epstein; she didn't go ahead with her lawsuit, presumably because she actually was named in the files for this. Perhaps she'd never heard of the Streisand effect.

- A bar in Toronto just got caught buying stolen booze at a homeless encampment. The owner claimed that he was doing this to "keep the peace" because people from the encampment retaliated against his earlier refusals; a provincial tribunal didn't buy his explanation, though, and the bar's license has been revoked. None of this would have happened in Manitoba thanks to the MLCC's security measures; interestingly, the Ford government shot down a plan by the LCBO to introduce similar measures a couple of years ago. As I said at the time, the most likely reason for this is because Ford wants to sell more alcohol in convenience stores, who would probably not be able to compete with the LCBO on security and many would thus decide that selling it wasn't worth the risk.

- Orcas have been observed ganging up on ocean sunfish and ramming them so hard that they explode. Scientists are divided on the reason; some think it's simply practical to break them up into smaller pieces to be easier to eat, but others say it shows signs of being a sort of social game; orcas are among the few animals (alongside humans and cats) that will kill for fun.

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, 25 Feb 2026

- The Starmer government in the UK is refusing to allow the US to make use of bases at Fairford, Gloucestershire as well as at Diego Garcia in the British Indian Ocean Territory in any impending attack on Iran. In response, Donald Trump is withdrawing his support for a prospective handover of the BIOT to Mauritius, not that it's supposed to be up to him of course. This could actually lead to something resembling justice for the Chagos Islanders, though only for a few decades at best because the islands only rise a few metres above sea level.

- The US Department of Justice removed several documents from the Epstein files that draw connections between Epstein and their Fuhrer. Others, some of which suggest that Trump may have abused a child, were withheld entirely despite legal direction from Congress, but NPR got their hands on them anyway. Not that Trump loyalists will listen to NPR anyway...

- A man has been charged with assault following a confrontation with striking municipal employees in the Rural Municipality of Tache, Manitoba. The man allegedly aggressively drove through a picket line at the municipal office, then shoved a union leader and took his phone after the union leader took video of his actions. The suspect is a 68 year old man from the neighbouring RM of Ste Anne.

- Conservationists as well as hunters are concerned about a federal proposal to amend migratory bird regulations to allow the hunting of Tundra Swans and Mourning Doves in the Canadian prairie provinces. In the case of the swans, there are fears that misidentified Trumpeter Swans, which are not allowed to be hunted anywhere in North America. In the case of the doves, there are concerns about the impact on the public perception of hunters, as they're the sort of birds that join songbirds at feeders.

- US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is threatening to blacklist Anthropic AI from working with the Pentagon because the company has ethical standards such as not allowing their products to be used to control weapons or for mass surveillance.

News roundup, 24 Feb 2026

- Most folks associated with the Republicans will vehemently deny any Nazi sympathies. Maybe some of them are even telling the truth and are just extremely ignorant, but it's getting harder and harder to give them the benefit of the doubt. The Trump regime seems to be very clearly copying Nazi aesthetics and phrasing, for instance. It's getting to the point where thoughtful, reasonable conservatives like the author of this article - of whom there seem to be fewer and fewer these days - are leaving the Republican Party in disgust.

- The Conservatives have introduced several proposed amendments to the Carney government's budget implementation bill, which would impose limits on the government's proposed power to exempt corporations from some regulations. Perhaps the only thing more surprising than the Conservatives proposing something half-decent is the fact that the Liberals have accepted the amendments. Maybe politics in this country isn't quite as far gone as it is in the US.

- The would-be assassin who was killed by security at the Mar-a-Lago compound appears to have come from a family of Trump supporters in North Carolina, but left behind a bunch of writings expressing rage over the Epstein files. 

- The Macron government issued a summons to US ambassador Charlie Kushner (father of Jared) following comments regarding the killing of far-right activist Quentin Deranque in Lyon. Kushner, however, refused to attend and has had his access to French officials blocked in response.

- An 11 year old boy in Perry County, Pennsylvania apparently was displeased when his parents took away his Nintendo Switch. Police believe he was so displeased, in fact, that he shot his father to death. Interestingly, in Pennsylvania minors charged with murder are tried as an adult by default, though the case can be moved to juvenile court under some circumstances. In Canada he couldn't even be charged criminally, though one would hope other measures would be taken.

News roundup, 20 Feb 2026

- The Andrew formerly known as Prince was arrested Thursday on suspicion of misconduct in public office. He was released from custody and has not been formally charged but remains under investigation as police continue to search the Royal Lodge in Windsor. Unsurprisingly, this is related to his connection to Jeffrey Epstein, but surprisingly it's not related (directly at least) to sexual abuse allegations but rather to reports that he shared confidential material with Epstein while serving as the UK's trade envoy. Of course, assuming the allegations are true he was probably compensated for the material in some way, probably in a way that one doesn't want to think about.

- China has reportedly transformed its largest desert into a carbon sink by planting trees and shrubs in a belt along the desert's edges. They've been working on this "Great Green Wall" since 1978; its primary purpose was to keep the desert from expanding into farmland, but new research out of the US indicates that it is having a beneficial impact on the carbon cycle. Stuff like this isn't enough, of course (emissions cuts are still essential), but it's a big step in the right direction. Of course, the fact that this is in Xinjiang puts a bit of a pall on it; I suspect the consultations on this matter wouldn't meet with democratic standards.

- Brazil is having some success in protecting the Amazon rainforest. Satellite evidence shows that the deforestation rate is the lowest since 2014.

- The City of Winnipeg has released a development plan for Point Douglas that calls for more low- and mid-rise residential properties, with mixed use development along the planned route of a future rapid transit corridor. The plan also restricts heavy industrial development in the area. This is welcome news, though it will require some significant infrastructure upgrades (especially replacement of combined sewers with separated sanitary and storm sewers). Of course such upgrades would be welcome anyway.

- Manitoba Public Insurance is suing Ford to recover the costs of payouts for fires caused by faulty block heaters, most recently one in Pilot Mound that destroyed two vehicles insured by the corporation. These heaters are now the subject of a recall issued by Transport Canada earlier this year.

- Alberta will be putting several referendum questions on the ballot this coming fall; these questions relate to immigration as well as to constitutional matters. One of the questions would be to "require proof of citizenship" in order to cast a ballot; this would seem to be pointless given that under current rules any non-citizen who manages to vote should be identifiable and could be prosecuted easily. It also will likely not affect all citizens equally; the more affluent will be more likely to have passports and thus be easily able to prove their citizenship than the poor. I guess the real purpose of this question is to serve as a dog whistle for the folks outside Calgary and Edmonton (and a substantial minority of those in those cities as well). 

News roundup, 13 Feb 2026

- While the American labour movement had what was considered a breakthrough year in 2024, with over 1,600 workplaces holding unionization votes, this is far short of the movement's successes even two decades previously, much less the mid 20th century. Worse, overall union density in the private sector remains at an abysmal 5.9% of the workforce, compared to around a third in the 1950s. There are fears that this could lead to a "death spiral" where weakening unions are less able to score wins, making them less relevant to the needs of workers, and so forth. Unless a great deal changes the left in the US - and perhaps a lot of other countries - is going to face the unthinkable prospect of having to move ahead without the labour movement.

- Gallup will no longer track the approval ratings of the president, something they've tracked for nearly a century. When asked if pressure from the White House had anything to do with it, a company representative simply said "this is a strategic shift solely based on Gallup’s research goals and priorities". Of course, this is probably not false; their research goals and priorities probably include still being allowed to conduct research, albeit maybe not on the president's popularity.

- To the surprise of few, there has been a torrent of disinformation about trans people following the Tumbler Ridge massacre. Far-right pundits, and even supposed news outlets, have been claiming that there's an "epidemic" of violence by trans folks - and once those stories are out there, debunking them can be hard. In the words of Jonathan Swift, "falsehood flies, and the truth comes limping after it".

- A proposed bylaw in Winnipeg would prohibit protests within 100 metres of schools, hospitals, and cultural centres in the city. There would be an exemption for "legal labour activities related to a dispute or collective bargaining", however activists are naturally wary. Councillor Evan Duncan, who introduced the proposal, says it's to protect "potentially vulnerable populations" served by those locations; it's widely suspected that this comes in response to pro-Palestinian protests that were held near synagogues. On the one hand, conflating Jewish worship with the policies of Israel is problematic; on the other hand, I've seen allegations that at least one such protest was in response to a synagogue hosting someone who was promoting the sale of seized Palestinian land in the West Bank, which if true sounds like fair game for protesters (I'd like to see confirmation of that claim, though, since while it sounds believable it could also be disinformation).

- Jeffrey Epstein apparently purchased 330 gallons of sulfuric acid in 2018, about a year before his last arrest. 

News roundup, 4 Feb 2026

- Bill Blair has resigned his seat as the MP for Scarborough Southwest in order to take up a new position as Canada's high commissioner to the UK. Doly Begum, who has represented the seat for the NDP at the provincial level since 2018, has announced that she will be running for the Liberals to replace Blair, sparking condemnation from the federal party.

- The seven states that depend on the Colorado River basin are at an impasse about how to manage the long-term drought the area is experiencing. The upstream states - Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming - are refusing to cut their own consumption, saying that the problem lies with the other three states in the basin (Nevada, California, and Arizona), which consume far more water but which, on the other hand, have taken some measures to cut their consumption. The New York Times article on the matter takes the position that this is entirely the fault of the upper basin states. I'm not so sure; while those states should doubtless be making cuts, one has to question whether growing alfalfa in a desert for the Saudis is a wise or sustainable industry.

- Colorado is challenging the Trump regime's order to keep an aging coal-fired power plant open. Even the state's power utilities want to close the plant, but Trump can't tolerate any kind of move away from coal, so...

- Thousands of Epstein-related documents have been removed from the Department of Justice website after some of his victims said that they were identified in the documents.

- At least 17 Palestinians have been killed in an Israeli airstrike in response to an Israeli soldier being wounded by gunfire. Israel seems to take "one of ours, all of yours" seriously.

- The federal government is considering amending the Canadian Migratory Birds Regulations to allow the hunting of Tundra Swans in the prairie provinces. This has raised concerns among some that this will lead to collateral damage to the more vulnerable Trumpeter Swan, which looks very similar and could easily be mistaken for the more common species.

News roundup, 27 Jan 2026

- Border patrol commander Gregory Bovino has been stripped of his duties in Minnesota and reassigned to the US-Mexico border. Tim Walz says that the feds are showing some willingness to deescalate; perhaps Trump's fears of losing control of the narrative have something to do with it.

- St Boniface Hospital is set to become the third hospital in Manitoba to be "grey-listed" by the Manitoba Nurses union (after HSC and Thompson General), designating it as an unsafe workplace.

- The sale of TikTok to a consortium of mostly US investors was followed very soon after by reports by users of being unable to use the word "Epstein" in direct messages to other users. On the positive side, I guess you can talk about Winnie The Pooh on the platform now.

- Five people have been charged with extortion following a series of arson attacks on Winnipeg businesses; two of them have been charged with some of the actual arsons as well.

- The Huron Perth Health Care Alliance paid $241.42 to put a homeless man from Blyth, Ontario on a taxi to London to get them out of their hair.

News roundup, 22 Dec 2025

- Less than a day after a large dump of Epstein-related documents on the US Justice Department's website, several of the files were suddenly removed, including a photo of Trump with Epstein. Other information seems to have not been posted in the first place, given how few of the photos and documents refer to Trump. Naturally the DoJ has not held back on stuff connecting Epstein to other people, such as Bill Clinton. Information from court documents and other sources reportedly suggests that Trump tried to have his name removed from the files entirely (not that we didn't all already suspect that). Two co-sponsors of the House resolution that ordered the release of the files are now calling for Attorney General Pam Bondi to be held in contempt of Congress.

- The largest isolated power grid in the world, the South West Interconnected System which serves Western Australia, is scheduled to close all of their coal plants by 2029. Interestingly, while a spike in natural gas usage is expected at that time, the spike is not expected to last long as battery storage will enable renewables to pick up much of the slack.

- Manitoba premier Wab Kinew has announced that a public inquiry will be held as early as next year into the outgoing Conservative government's attempts to approve the Sio Silica project in Springfield.

- The company that makes Jim Beam bourbon will be suspending production at its main location in Kentucky for all of 2026, ostensibly to upgrade the facility. Distillers in that state have lost some $75 million this year due to the Trump regime's trade policies and the resulting boycotts.

- Russian Lt Gen Fanil Sarvarov, who headed the military's operational training department, was killed by a car bomb in Moscow this morning. Russian authorities suspect Ukrainian intelligence services were involved in the bombing. This may very well be true; on the other hand, it's also possible that this was "defenestration by other means".

- Bari Weiss, the news editor for CBS, spiked a story on the mistreatment of detainees who had been sent to El Salvador by the Trump regime. The piece had been scheduled to run on yesterday's edition of 60 Minutes, but Weiss ordered the story pulled because it did not include an on-the-record comment from an official of the regime.

- A fire at a PG&E substation in San Francisco cut power to 130,000 residents for several hours. Notably, it also revealed an interesting problem with Waymo robotaxis - they don't know what to do at an intersection if the traffic signals aren't working.

- An EasyJet A319 preparing to take off from Malaga, Spain on a flight to to London, England was delayed for 12 hours after flight attendants discovered that one of the passengers was dead. The deceased, an 89 year old British woman, had been wheeled onto the plane by relatives, who said that she had fallen asleep after feeling unwell at the airport, but further investigation showed that she was not, in fact, just resting. Many passengers suspected that she may have already been dead by the time she was wheeled on; perhaps her family didn't realize, or maybe they hoped to avoid the inconvenience of having to report a death in a foreign country.

News roundup, 24 Nov 2025

- Marjorie Taylor Greene has announced that she is resigning from Congress in January, saying that she wants to spare her district from a "hurtful and hateful" primary that would result if she tried to stay on. Greene was a staunch Trump ally until the president began stalling on the release of the Epstein files, but her stance on that issue has drawn the president's wrath.

- Four more measles cases have been reported in Manitoba, bringing the province's total number of cases this year to 253. Sixteen people have been hospitalized; nobody has died from the disease in the province so far, though two premature babies have died in other provinces. The emergency department at the Boundary Trails Health Centre outside Winkler is listed as a potential exposure site.

- US Senator Angus King, an independent who represents Maine, fears that Trump's behaviour towards Canada is causing a "cultural break" between the two countries that never was a issue with previous trade disputes. Threatening to annex a country has a way of doing that, though.

- Approximately 25% of all doctors in the US are immigrants. In rural communities, the proportion of immigrants in the profession is even higher; this leads to questions about what will happen to healthcare in the country if prospective immigrants no longer want to go there. 

- A home care worker is being investigated for multiple thefts from residents at an assisted living facility in Selkirk, Manitoba. At least eight residents and their families reported missing money and valuables as well as having seen the man in their units during odd hours. Charges have yet to be laid.

- The vice-president of research at Brandon University is under investigation for changing a student's failing grade to an A+ during her time as the university's dean of science. The student in question is related to someone known to her from outside campus.

News roundup, 20 Nov 2025

- Trump has signed the bill authorizing the release of the Epstein files. The bill contains provisions that parts may still be withheld if they are related to an active investigation... or if they are deemed to "invade personal privacy". So in all likelyhood, just about anything in the files could be withheld if Trump so desires.

- Ukraine is accusing Russia of recruiting Ukrainian teens for sabotage jobs. Some of those recruited are said to have been as young as 11. The BBC managed to contact one of the recruiters posing as an interested party; they were offered $1,500 for setting fire to a post office or $3,000 for a bank.

- The federal government plans to move ahead with plans for high speed rail between Toronto and Quebec City. The travel time between Toronto and Montreal would be about 3 hours. Of course a flight is only about 90 minutes, but once you factor in getting to the airport an hour early and checking in, it's pretty much a wash.

- An ICE employee was among 16 men arrested in a sex trafficking investigation in Minnesota, allegedly for attempting to purchase sex from an underage girl. He tried to dissuade the arresting officers by telling them who he worked for, but they weren't swayed.

- Winnipeg police have made an arrest in a string of arsons around the city, including the constituency offices of cabinet ministers Bernadette Smith and Nahanni Fontaine as well as multiple businesses. Interestingly, the police claim that he acted alone and that this is not related to recent reports of extortion by many business owners.

- The Manitoba Nurses Union has voted to "grey-list" Thompson General Hospital, warning that it is not a safe place to work. The last straw was the stabbing of a patient in September. The union had previously given this dubious designation to Health Sciences Centre in Winnipeg.

- Sioux Valley Dakota Nation in western Manitoba has called in the RCMP to investigate threats made during their band election last week. Among other things, vote counting had to be paused after someone tried to storm the hall where the count was occurring; the incumbent chief, who is facing sexual assault charges, was defeated in the election but is trying to have the results thrown out. Whether the threats are connected with this has not been stated by the authorities.

- A Christian organization calling itself the Burn 24/7 Canada Worship Ministries Society is suing Quebec City for cancelling a concert by American far-right musician Sean Feucht at a city-owned venue. They have retained the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms for legal assistance.

News roundup, 19 Nov 2025

- Both houses of Congress have now passed a bill forcing the release of the Epstein files; every member of the House except one voted in favour. However, there's a catch - the bill as passed allows the DOJ to withhold or redact any records that "would jeopardize an active federal investigation or ongoing prosecution". This is relevant because Donald Trump has ordered Attorney General Pam Bondi to open an investigation into three prominent Democrats, including former president Bill Clinton, and their connections to Epstein. This just might provide the pretext Trump needs to keep the files out of public view.

- A new poll gives the Democrats a significant advantage in next year's midterms. That's assuming, of course, that the midterms are free and fair, which may be doubtful.

- Denmark held municipal elections across the country yesterday. The governing Social Democrats have lost control of Copenhagen's council; fortunately the beneficiaries there were other leftwing parties rather than the far right.

- Germany's government, a coalition between the centre-right Christian Democrats and the centre-left Social Democrats, is deeply divided over the future of pensions in the country. The coalition agreement calls for pensions to be propped up at least until 2031; the Social Democrats are trying to extend it further. The Christian Democrats' youth wing is not keen on the additional expenditures that the Social Democrats are calling for, though, and the pension legislation is not guaranteed to pass.

- The Manitoba government has presented its throne speech for the new legislative session. Highlights include the opening of a supervised consumption site as well as an overpass for the intersection near Carberry where 17 seniors died in a bus crash and a new emergency room at Victoria General Hospital. More problematically it calls for the construction of a new natural gas power plant for Manitoba Hydro; it is hoped that it will eventually run on renewable fuels but there's no plans for that in the near future.

- The City of Winnipeg has cleared two homeless encampments on Monday, the first day when new restrictions were in effect. The restrictions prohibit encampments within 50 metres of schools, playgrounds, daycares and skating rinks, and within 30 metres of transit shelters, bridges, docks and similar public facilities.

- The cycling magazine Momentum has published its annual list of the 30 most bike-friendly cities around the world. 24 of the 30 cities listed are in the European Union; the only other countries with cities on the list are Canada (represented by Montreal, Quebec City, and Vancouver), Switzerland (Zurich and Bern), and Norway (Oslo).

- The Brazilian government is proposing that brazilwood, an endangered tree, be given the highest level of protection by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). This is a source of alarm to many musicians, due to the wood's widespread use in bows for stringed instruments - it would force musicians to register their bows in order to travel internationally.

News roundup, 17 Nov 2025

- Mark Carney's budget is expected to pass today, as while none of the opposition parties are expected to vote in favour of the budget, none of them are election-ready either, so enough abstentions are expected for the budget to pass.

- Donald Trump is now saying House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files. Presumably he's hoping that it will be blocked in the Senate and wants to repair divisions in the Republican Party over the issue (including a high-profile spat with Georgia representative Marjorie Taylor Greene). Whether this will get people to move on from the issue is a fair question, but one should never discount the stubbornness and pig-headedness of the MAGA crowd.

- Chile held the first round of their presidential election yesterday. With nobody winning a majority, it will come down to a runoff between the far left and the far right as Jeannette Jara, a Communist Party member who served as labour minister in a centre-left coalition under the incumbent president, faces off against José Antonio Kast, a rabid opponent of abortion and same-sex marriage. The second round will be held on 14 Dec. Unfortunately Kast is thought to have the edge there as he is expected to win support from several other rightwing candidates who got around 30% of the vote.

- Former Bangladeshi prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who is currently living in exile in India, has been sentenced to death in absentia for crimes against humanity related to a crackdown on anti-government protesters last year.

- A Polish rail line which is used to transport military supplies to Ukraine was damaged by an explosion on the weekend; Polish authorities suspect sabotage.

- Liberal-minded folks, people of colour, and LGBT* people in the US have been buying guns in record numbers as the political climate in the country grows more hostile towards them. The Liberal Gun Club says that requests for firearms training have quintupled since Trump's reelection last year.

- A Winnipeg couple have pleaded guilty to numerous counts of animal cruelty after torturing and killing over 90 animals and selling footage on the dark web. Their victims included 67 cats as well as seven birds, six rabbits, six hamsters, three goldfish, a frog, and an axolotl; they were apparently paid a total of around $2,800 via PayPal for the videos. Their pleas mean that several other charges, including accessing child pornography and some bestiality-related offenses, will not go ahead. This is significant because the maximum penalty for animal cruelty in Canada is 5 years in prison.

News roundup, 14 Nov 2025

- A full vote in the House of Representatives on the full release of the Epstein files appears imminent after Donald Trump failed to convince Republican representatives Nancy Mace and Lauren Boebert to remove their names from the discharge petition. Of course, a yes vote in the House won't force the release; it would still have to be voted on in the Senate, where it is expected to be blocked, but some in the Trump camp fear that this could open divisions in the Republican Party that might get out of control. In other Epstein-related news, Steve Bannon reportedly sought advice on political messaging from him during a pro-Trump media campaign in 2018.

- Lawyers for New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI director James Comey are arguing for the dismissal of charges against their clients on the grounds that prosecutor Lindsey Halligan's appointment was illegitimate. Halligan was installed on an interim basis without Senate approval after her predecessor, Erik Siebert, resigned after refusing to proceed with the prosecutions.

- Saab CEO Micael Johansson has confirmed that his company is in talks with the Canadian government as well as with Bombardier for a licensing deal to build the Gripen fighter in Canada. There are suggestions that this could not only provide fighters for Canada, but also for Ukraine, who have announced the intention to buy at least 100 of the aircraft.

- Winnipeg's 2026 budget is expected to include a 3.5% increase in property taxes. The city has a lot of catching up to do, given that taxes were frozen for many years while expenses kept creeping up, and time is running out for upgrades to the North End Water Pollution Control Centre, among other things.

- Toronto's city council has voted to relax zoning restrictions that prevented new retail stores and cafes from opening on residential streets, despite the best efforts of NIMBYs like these people. There will still be restrictions; for instance, they can only open on corner lots, or lots next to parks or locations that are already zoned commercial. Food services will be limited; while cafes and the like are OK, large commercial kitchens will not be allowed. And councillors will have a veto on new facilities in their wards.

- The Silicon Valley crowd is apparently looking for ways to get around legislation prohibiting genetic engineering of human embryos. I guess we can add Gattaca to the list of science fiction dystopias that the techbros see as utopias.

- Sonder, a chain of boutique hotels, suddenly went bankrupt on Monday after defaulting on payments and losing their licensing deal with Marriott, stranding thousands of guests in over 40 cities around the world.

- After an intoxicated woman fell while disembarking from a carnival ride in Port Hardy, BC, sustaining significant injuries, investigators learned that the ride attendant had left his nine year old child in charge of operations while he went to "wash up". The company involved is no stranger to such investigations; earlier this year one of their employees was killed when he was hit by the same ride involved in the most recent incident.

News roundup, 13 Nov 2025

- The US House of Representatives has passed the budget bill, bringing an end to the government shutdown after a record 43 days. Unfortunately the Democrats have precious little to show for the shutdown; the eight Democratic senators who broke ranks got nothing but a promise of a vote in the Senate on Obamacare subsidies at some unspecified point in the future. The party's more left-leaning members are furious; even a relative moderate like Gavin Newsom called the deal "pathetic" and a "surrender". One of the less obvious consequences of the shutdown is that economic data was not gathered, complicating policy decisions.

- In other House news, Democratic representative Adelita Grijalva has finally been sworn in, nearly two months after her byelection win, becoming the critical 218th signature on a petition that will eventually force a vote by the House on the release of the Epstein files. 

- Despite concerns about a mismatch between available vaccines and the flu strains in the wild, public health experts are still advising people to get the shot, saying that it still has some protective value even if it's not as effective as hoped.

- Keir Starmer has announced that Rolls-Royce will be building small modular reactors in Wales. The US ambassador, Warren Stephens, says that his country is "disappointed" by the decision, apparently because it won't be an American company doing the work. The labour union Unite is also disappointed, but for different reasons - they would prefer one large reactor to be built, which would be more labour intenstive than several small ones.

- Some attacks on Palestinian villages by West Bank settlers have been so egregious that even Israel's figurehead president thinks that it's going too far.

- A Hamilton man boarded an articulated bus while the driver left for a short break and took it on a joyride with passengers still on board. Nobody was injured, nor was the bus or anything else damaged; in fact the police as well as the passengers were quite impressed with his driving skills. Passengers didn't even realize that he wasn't supposed to be driving until he made a wrong turn somewhere. He was eventually arrested without incident.

- Passengers on a ferry between Dieppe, France and Newhaven, England were treated to an unusual show when the TV in the lounge, which was tuned to a Formula 1 race, went on to show a porno movie after the race ended. The crew quickly changed the channel when they realized what had happened; the ferry company has apologized and says that the channel has been removed from the list of available stations.

News roundup, 12 Nov 2025

- There are signs that the record-setting government shutdown in the US may be moving towards resolution. Eight centrist Democrats in the Senate voted with the Republicans in return for a vote on enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies at some unspecified time in the future, with no guarantees of Republican support for the subsidies. The House of Representatives is expected to approve this today. This does not sit well with the more left-leaning Democrats, though, who see it as a capitulation. Probably the fact that over 10,000 flights have been cancelled in the country due to the shortage of air traffic controllers is a factor; the US Thanksgiving holiday is just around the corner, and presumably nobody wants to be the one blamed for ruining that.

- The European Union has proposed legislation that would, among other things, require satellite operators to address the space junk problem. The Americans are foaming at the mouth about this, saying that it would place "unacceptable regulatory burdens" on US companies and could threaten threaten technological advancement in space. Even if that last point is true, though, the threat to technological advancement from this is trivial compared to that posed by "Kessler syndrome"; hopefully the Europeans will stand their ground.

- Canada's top public servant, the Clerk of the Privy Council, met with the CEO of Saab recently. Now, a delegation including Sweden's king and numerous members of the country's business community are scheduled to visit next week, including a tour of aerospace plants. This is leading to speculation that the government may be considering a purchase of Gripen fighters. That would be a very interesting development; stay tuned.

- Canada has lost its status as a country free of measles transmission following over 5,000 recent cases. Of course the decline in vaccination is the reason. Meanwhile there are fears of a mismatch between the current flu vaccine and the strains spreading across the country, which could make for a very bad flu season this year.

- An event held at UC Berkeley by Turning Point USA, the organization founded by the late Charlie Kirk, was met with over 100 protesters, and there was at least one violent altercation between protesters and supporters. The US Department of Justice is investigating the university's preparations for the event.

- The US Travel Association is forecasting a 3.2% decline in tourism for this year, driven mostly by a decline in visits by Canadians. This is expected to cost the travel sector some $5.7 billion.

- Arizona representative-elect Adelita Grijalva is finally expected to be sworn in, potentially tipping the balance towards forcing a vote on the release of the Epstein files. 

News roundup, 3 Nov 2025

- The noted American lawyer and rabid Israel supporter Alan Dershowitz is calling for Trump to impose additional tariffs on Canada as punishment for recognizing a Palestinian state, and potentially other sanctions as well. Dershowitz became particularly incensed when Mark Carney, in an interview with British podcaster Mishal Husain, said that Canada would honour the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu and arrest him if he set foot in the country.

- Judges in Massachusetts and Rhode Island have ordered the Trump regime to use emergency funds to get SNAP benefits flowing again. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent says that the program could be back up and running by Wednesday. Meanwhile, one dollar store in Columbus, Ohio had boarded up their front windows in anticipation of looting due to the interruption of the benefits.

- Police are investigating an apparent bombing at Harvard Medical School on Saturday morning. No injuries have been reported.

-  Adelita Grijalva has still not been sworn in by the US House of Representatives, more than a month after being elected. This is now the longest wait for a seat in the history of the House; speaker Mike Johnson continues to refuse to swear her in, presumably because she would provide the necessary vote to force a general House vote on the release of the Epstein files.

- A resident of the Rural Municipality of Tache set up a display with effigies of several municipal officials hanging from a gallows. The resident was apparently angry at receiving a bill from the municipality's volunteer fire department for extinguishing a fire on his property; police are investigating. In one encounter with police he described himself as a "peaceful sovereign", which suggests a possible connection with the so-called "sovereign citizen" movement. Given that movement's history of violence, one hopes that the police keep him on a watchlist even if the display doesn't meet the criteria for criminal harassment. One person in the related Reddit thread who is a volunteer firefighter says that it's uncommon for property owners to be billed under such circumstances, and that if this guy was presented with a bill there's probably "a reason worth knowing".

- The NDP is not ruling out abstentions by some or all of its caucus on the federal budget vote. Presumably this is because the party is in no shape to fight a new election campaign right now.

- Strike 3 Holdings, the owner of a number of pornography studios, is accusing Meta of pirating their intellectual property in order to train AI. Meta denies this, saying that the 2,400 movies were downloaded by their employees for personal use.

News roundup, 31 Oct 2025

- Kat Abughazaleh, a journalist turned podcaster who is seeking the Democratic nomination for Illinois' 9th congressional district, has been indicted on charges of conspiring to impede a federal officer following a protest in September in which Abughazaleh and others allegedly slowed the progress of an ICE vehicle towards a facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview.

- Some National Guard members in the US are vowing to defy illegal orders from the Trump regime if ordered to deploy in Chicago. Two of them say they have already received written warnings about this; one, who is also running for the Democrats in Illinois' 13th district, has had his security clearance suspended and an investigation opened against him. The deployment is currently on hold pending a Supreme Court decision, but given Trump's stacking of the court that may not last much longer. Even if the court rules against the regime, they might simply invoke the Insurrection Act in order to get around the ruling.

- Airports in Winnipeg and Kelowna are so short of air traffic controllers that they had to briefly close their control towers on occasion. Perhaps NAV Canada should be trying to poach controllers from the US, where they are currently not being paid as a result of the government shutdown.

- The Times of London has removed an interview in which former New York mayor Bill de Blasio was quoted as criticizing current mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani. De Blasio is actually a supporter of Mamdani and says that the quotes were fabricated. The Times was once a highly respected if somewhat conservative paper, but under Rupert Murdoch's ownership it has fallen a long way. For their part, they claim that their reporter was "misled" by someone "falsely claiming" to be the former mayor.

- King Charles is stripping Prince Andrew of all his royal titles and kicking him out of his official residence following revelations linking him to Jeffrey Epstein. The evidence against Andrew must be pretty damning for it to go this far.

- For a long time it has been accepted wisdom that a plot of happiness against age produces a U-shaped curve, with happiness being high in teens and young adults, declining through middle age, and then gradually increasing again in old age. This has been found in numerous cultures, not only of humans but even other great apes - but a recent study now suggests that this once ironclad rule is breaking down. This is not because middle-aged people are getting happier, but because young people are miserable. And this seems to be the case in more than 80 countries, including some of the poorest countries as well as some of the richest. This trend apparently started around 2014; a definitive reason for this dramatic shift has not been found, but one of the researchers mentions the rise of smartphones as a possible cause.

- The City of Winnipeg has released details of a plan to deal with homelessness. Encampments will be sorted into three categories, with the highest priority being encampments that are in "sensitive" locations (defined based on proximity to everything from schools and playgrounds to bus stops, as well as those with active safety hazards such as fires); these will trigger an "urgent" and "coordinated" response. At the other end of the spectrum are small sites in low-risk areas; these will be monitored rather than actively cleared. A major caveat is the fact that the plan does not include any new staff or funding. One encampment resident suggests that the city should provide a designated location for encampments as some other cities have. Meanwhile, south of the border, Utah is building a large internment camp for the homeless, complete with forced labour, in response to federal threats to withhold funding for states and municipalities that fail to crack down on people camping in public places.

News roundup, 22 Oct 2025

- Arizona's attorney general is suing to try to force House Speaker Mike Johnson to swear in Adelita Grijalva, who was elected in a special election last month. Of course, the fact that Grijalva would be the key vote needed to force a full House vote on releasing the Epstein files is widely assumed to be the reason for not seating her. Johnson says he will not swear her in while the House is adjourned; the adjournment, of course, was also his choice. The lack of a codified deadline by which a member-elect has to be sworn in is an unfortunate oversight in the system; it's almost as if the system were designed by someone who thought of political disputes as simply disagreements among people of good will, and who couldn't imagine any true American wanting to undermine democracy. Reality seems to be running up against this model, though.

- A poll indicates that more Americans blame the Republicans than the Democrats for the ongoing government shutdown. Paradoxically, though, Donald Trump's personal approval rating is increasing at the same time. Of course, the poll question specifies Democrats or Republicans in Congress, and members of Congress tend not to get the same level of adulation from their supporters as an actual president. Additionally, the question could be skipped, so some people who skipped it may have been among those who said they approve of Trump. This does lend support to the idea that much of MAGA's success comes from Trump's own personality and that the movement might falter if they lost him somehow; on the other hand, by the time he's out of the picture American democracy might be so damaged that charisma is no longer needed to retain power and even the likes of JD Vance could hold office with no effective opposition.

- Part of the East Wing of the White House, which was added in 1902, is being demolished to make way for a huge ballroom that Trump wants to construct. Given what we know about the president's sense of style, the ballroom will probably have a very high cost to aesthetics ratio. The work being done is visible from the offices of the US Treasury, whose employees have been told not to share photos of the work, ostensibly for security reasons.

- The federal Liberals' house leader, Steve MacKinnon, is expressing concerns about the prospects of getting the upcoming budget through the House of Commons. The Liberals only have 169 seats in the House, with 172 constituting a majority; neither the NDP nor the Bloc have shown enough willingness to suport the budget for MacKinnon's comfort. My guess is that enough NDP MPs will be come down with "diplomatic flu" and be absent from the House on the day of the vote for the budget to pass; I don't see them wanting to hold an election right now given that they only have an interim leader right now.

- Daniel Naroditsky, an American grandmaster and chess streamer, has died suddenly at the age of 29. A cause of death has not been disclosed but Redditors are reading between the lines, citing in particular the unfounded accusations of cheating against Naroditsky by Russian grandmaster (and former world champion) Vladimir Kramnik.

- Marvin Winans, pastor of the Perfecting Church in Detroit, has gone viral in a way he probably didn't want after criticizing a parishioner for tithing "only" $1,235 instead of the $2,000 he had asked for. Unfortunately for him, the service was livestreamed, and the clip was copied to various video sharing sites.

News roundup, 8 Oct 2025

- The growth in renewable energy has been so strong that despite growing demand for electricity, all of the additional demand has been met by renewables based on global averages. This has not been spread evenly, however; in the US and even the EU renewables haven't been enough and those countries have increased their fossil fuel consumption. Meanwhile China, despite building some new coal plants, has reduced its overall emissions from electricity production by 2% even as demand for electricity has skyrocketed. Simon Stiell, the executive secretary of the UN framework convention on climate change, sees some reason for optimism, although emissions are still increasing from other sources. One thing remains clear, though; change isn't going to come soon enough for hundreds of millions if not billions of people. There's going to be a lot more migration in the near future, even if many of the affected people will probably die in place.

- Adelita Grijalva, elected in September to serve as the representative in Congress for Arizona's 7th congressional district, has still not been sworn in. She is hinting at what many others have also suggested - that Speaker Mike Johnson is trying to delay her taking office until the couple of Republican holdouts on the Epstein files can be browbeaten into changing their minds. If nothing changes, once she takes her seat she will be the crucial 218th signature needed to force a vote in the House to release the files. It has also emerged that Johnson's recent adjournment of the House (roughly equivalent to a prorogation in Westminster systems) came mere hours after the House received Epstein-related financial records from the US Treasury. The adjournment, combined with the government shutdown, also has the convenient effect of preventing the Treasury from delivering any more records.

- Former Manitoba premier Heather Stefanson has been fined $18,000 for violation of the province's conflict of interest law. This follows Stefanson's use of the "caretaker period" between the Tories' electoral defeat and the new government being sworn in to make efforts to get a mining project approved. The fine had to be voted on by the legislature, and it's telling that even the Tories voted with the government to impose the fine. I do have to question the propriety of having to decide something like this by a vote in the House rather than by a court, though in this case the penalty seems more than warranted.

- Doug Ford's plan to ban Ontario municipalities from using speed cameras looks kinda fishy in light of the fact that several of his ministers have gotten tickets recently, and that one of the Tories' political staffers got nailed for using a government vehicle to drive at speeds up to 162 km/h in a 100 km/h zone. The staffer has apparently been allowed to keep their job after promising not to do it again (at least until the speed camera ban is in place, presumably). To be fair, at least Ford doesn't want the cameras going to waste - he's musing about repurposing them for crime surveillance.

- Clownvoy leaders Tamara Lich and Chris Barber were both given conditional sentences on top of time served following their convictions for public mischief and counselling others to disobey a court order. The prosecution had called for severe sentences (8 years for Barber and 7 years for Lich) while the defense had called for an absolute discharge.

- Ted Cruz is demanding that the Wikimedia Foundation, which runs Wikipedia, provide documentation to show how they assess the merit of sources. Cruz considers Wikipedia to have a leftwing bias, citing that the site's "reliable sources" list which describes CNN and MSNBC as "generally reliable" sources for science and politics while deprecating Fox News.