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, 18 Nov 2025

- Mark Carney's first budget passed by a margin of 170 to 168, averting an election, after two NDP MPs and two Conservatives abstained.

- The UN Security Council has approved the Trump regime's plan for an international "stabilization force" for Gaza; Russia and China abstained. A lot of the details still have to be worked out, of course, but it almost certainly won't do the Palestinians any good in the long run (it wouldn't have passed otherwise).

- The Palestinian flag was raised at the Manitoba legislature for the first time in history, on the anniversary of Palestine's declaration of independence in 1988. This is consistent with flag-raisings held on national days of more established countries, but of course the rabidly pro-Israel B'nai Brith was not pleased.

- Several former officers in the Canadian air force are urging the government to go ahead with F-35 purchases and not get sidetracked by Sweden's Gripen. I can't help wonder, though, if they're stuck in a past when the US was thought of as a reliable ally. They do argue that the F-35 has better technology, but one has to ask, better for what? Its much-touted stealth capabilities are more important for attack than for defense, for instance; meanwhile its limited range and single engine make it less suited for Arctic operations. Even its communications are ill-suited to the task. Perhaps it's better at attacking people in their own countries than the Gripen, but should that be what we want in a fighter? I guess that has to be weighed against American threats about what will happen if we don't buy it though.

- The Manitoba Municipal Board has given the Granite Curling Club everything they wanted in terms of stopping an affordable housing project if it's going to cost the club even a single parking space. The fact that the club operates out of a building on city-owned land, and that the parking spaces they'd lose are also on city-owned land, seems not to matter. Premier Kinew says he's "open to looking at" the ruling, but is also a bit leery about interfering in a heavy-handed way. 

- Prosecutors in Milan are investigating reports that wealthy Italians paid large amounts of money (around £70,000 each) to participate in "human safaris" run by the Bosnian Serbs in which they would get to shoot at Bosnian civilians from rooftops during the siege of Sarajevo. Not surprisingly, many of these tourists had ties to the far right.

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.