News roundup, 16 Sept 2024

- Another person apparently tried to kill Donald Trump yesterday, but was chased off before he could get a shot off at the former president. The suspect has been captured alive; the impact on public opinion remains to be seen. It doesn't speak well for the political culture in that country, in any case.

- Several schools as well as state and municipal offices in Springfield, Ohio were closed on Thursday over a bomb threat. The threat was reportedly related to Trump's rather strange claims about the dietary practices of Haitian immigrants.

- The byelections in Elmwood-Transcona and LaSalle-Emard-Verdun happen today. The latter one has a ballot with no less than 91 candidates thanks to an organization called the Longest Ballot Committee, who say they recruited numerous candidates as a protest measure against the first-past-the-post electoral system. While the system is very much worth protesting, I'm not sure if this is the most effective way to do so. And you can be sure that if the Liberals hold onto that riding, but the results are delayed as a result of the committee's stunt, people will use this to claim that the election was rigged.

- Pierre Poilievre still refuses to go through the necessary procedures to get a security clearance that would allow him to read the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP) report on foreign interference in Canadian politics, despite the fact that 60% of his own party's supporters would like him to do so. He says this is because he would be unable to publicly discuss details of the report. Of course he can't publicly discuss those things anyway, and some in this Reddit thread suspect ulterior motives.

- Two new candidates have expressed an intent to compete with former Winnipeg Blue Bomber and current Fort Whyte MLA Obby Khan for the leadership of the Manitoba Progressive Conservative Party. Trevor Sprague, a tax consultant and onetime Canadian Alliance candidate, announced last week that he is considering a run, and hotel operator and onetime federal Conservative candidate Wally Daudrich made a similar announcement shortly after.

- A woman in Norfolk County, Ontario was charged with assault after what she says was an inadvertent squirting of her neighbour with a water pistol while playing with her child. Folks on Reddit are insinuating that the neighbour in question has a long history with his neighbours of calling the authorities over trivial and petty matters; in this thread as well as this one it is further alleged that the woman's ex-husband is an OPP officer.

- An eastbound Ford F-150 left the road just inside the Perimeter and annihilated a bus shelter and the person inside it as well as a utility pole and another vehicle before running into a gas station. Three other people were injured.

News roundup, 6 June 2024

- UN secretary general Antonio Guterres is urging countries around the world to ban fossil fuel advertising, drawing analogies with the bans on tobacco advertising in many countries.

A report from Canada's National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP) on foreign interference in Canadian politics alleges that several MPs, not named in the report, were "semi-witting or witting" participants in said interference. The chance of their identities becoming known does not appear to be high. Andrew Coyne suspects that both Liberal and opposition MPs are involved, pointing out that the Tories waited until it was clear the MPs would not be named before making an empty demand in Parliament for their names to be released.

- The cost of the proposed widening of the residential part of Kenaston Boulevard in Winnipeg has been estimated at $586 million at a minimum. A substantial part of the cost would be in the expropriation of a number of properties. One can't help but wonder if there isn't a better use for that money.

- The controlled entrances at Manitoba's Liquor Marts have, not surprisingly, been extremely effective at curbing thefts. Other retailers, however, are reluctant to follow suit, for fear of losing market share to competitors who don't.

- The superintendent of Mountain View School Division in western Manitoba was fired in a special board meeting on Friday. In response, three long-serving trustees resigned in protest. The chair of the board says this was because the superintendent had proposed a change to his salary and that his contract was expiring in June, however the Manitoba Metis Federation believe that the real reason was that he had permitted Dauphin's Pride Parade to use a school as a starting point; the board chair denies this.

- Siemens Mobility has developed a dual mode electric locomotive, capable of running either on battery power or from overhead wires. This makes the elimination of diesel trains a realistic possibility in many places.

- The popularity of diamonds has declined markedly in recent years. Competition from synthetic diamonds (which, as a bonus, can be counted on not to be "blood diamonds"), as well as shifting consumer preferences and declining marriage rates, are cited as factors.