News roundup, 28 Aug 2026

- Donald Trump has signed an executive order officially renaming Lake Ontario as "Lake America". Some folks on social media are suggesting that we should respond by closing the Welland Canal to American vessels, which would create a rather awkward situation for the US Midwest as they depend on the canal to ship their goods overseas. On a related note, Danielle Smith, predictably, continues to be vehemently opposed to using oil and gas exports as a bargaining chip with the US, and her fellow collaborator Scott Moe has similar opinions about potash.

- The investigation into the runway collision between an Air Canada jet and an airport fire truck at LaGuardia Airport in New York City, killing the pilots and injuring more than 40 other people, has found that two air traffic controllers had clocked out early, leaving the tower seriously understaffed. The FAA is looking to fire the controllers. Other factors in the accident, including the fact that the truck lacked a transponder, are still under investigation.

- Some Republican strategists are sufficiently concerned about Trump's collapsing approval ratings that they favour focusing on specific races. Trump's ego, of course, can't tolerate that, so his PAC, aptly known as MAGA Inc, is reportedly planning to bombard the country with ads making it all about himself.

- The spike in fuel prices resulting from Trump's war in Iran has led to a surge in the popularity of electric vehicles in pretty much every country except the US. This bodes poorly for the long term future of the American auto industry unless something changes soon.

- A civilian professor at the US Military Academy at West Point, NY has been fired for continuing to teach about human-caused climate change. Adam Kalkstein, who taught at the institution for 17 years, compares the prohibition to "trying to teach the law without being able to even mention the Constitution"; he is suing for reinstatement and requesting a jury trial.

- UK prime minister Andy Burnham is facing pressure from his MPs to move ahead with electoral reform. Burnham has advocated doing away with first-past-the-post for quite some time, and now nearly 100 of his MPs are calling on him to create a commission on the subject in his first 100 days in office. This is a refreshing stance for Labour; the party has long benefited from the status quo, but perhaps they're now realizing that this might be the best defense the country has against the rise of Reform UK.

- A car belonging to Salma Zahid, the Liberal MP for Scarborough Centre, was torched early Thursday morning by person or persons unknown; the fire spread to two other vehicles before being extinguished. Toronto police have not yet confirmed that Zahid was the target.

- A security guard at a Dollarama in suburban Winnipeg was stabbed after confronting a shoplifter. The suspect, who has a significant criminal record already, was captured quickly and charged with aggravated assault as well as robbery and failure to comply with a probation order.

News roundup, 27 Aug 2026

- Mark Carney's willingness to walk away from US trade talks is drawing praise from many former European leaders, many of whom see the EU's recent deal with the States as capitulation. Current leaders are being far more discreet, but observers say that they are quietly admiring Canada's resistance.

- The Pentagon apparently keeps a list of journalists whose questions it will not answer. Richard Allee, an official with US Central Command Public Affairs, reportedly threatened a reporter with being added to the list if they keep asking the wrong questions.

- BC premier David Eby is calling on the federal government to shut down US coal shipments through the Roberts Bank port in Delta. According to someone in this Reddit thread, the Americans depend on the port for access to Pacific markets, as Washington, Oregon, and California have blocked the development of infrastructure needed to export coal. If true this would make it an excellent and effectively targetted measure against the coal producing states, which lean Republican.

- BC MLAs Teresa Wat and Brennan Day have left the BC Conservative caucus, becoming the third and fourth MLAs the party has lost in a three day period. Both say that they have lost confidence in party leader Kerry-Lynne Findlay and can no longer serve under her. One observer says that Findlay has gone "out of her way" to alienate those she disagrees with.

- Alberta NDP leader Naheed Nenshi is calling on Danielle Smith to cancel, or at least postpone, a referendum question scheduled for October which asks voters whether they favour starting the legal process to hold a future binding vote on independence. Nenshi argues that Canada needs to show unity in the face of American aggression; Smith, not surprisingly, refuses to consider doing this.

- Former Conservative MP Inky Mark, already facing numerous firearms charges, has been re-arrested and hit with 26 new charges. These include weapons trafficking, three counts of knowingly possessing a prohibited weapon, nine counts of possessing a restricted/prohibited weapon with ammo without a licence or registration, nine counts of possessing a firearm knowing it is unauthorized, possessing a firearm with a tampered serial number, two counts of failing to report a lost firearm, and having more than six kilograms of explosives.

- There's a street in Ottawa named after Donald Trump. The street is in a neighbourhood with several New York-themed street names, but not surprisingly many want it renamed. An attempt to do so in 2021 failed, but the area's councillor believes that it's time to put an end to this "embarrassment".

News roundup, 26 Aug 2026

- California governor Gavin Newsom believes that Donald Trump will restart trade talks with Canada quite quickly, alleging that the Republicans are turning on Trump as the possible consequences of the trade war hit their constituents. Whether this is really the problem for Trump that Newsom claims is unclear, though; the assumption that it is hinges partly on this fall's midterm elections being free and fair, which is not safe to asume.

- An officer in the US Air Force is facing criminal charges after calling for the impeachment of Trump. Maj. Jason Watson had initially done an interview with a Substack blog called Defenders of Our Republic, then was arrested at a demonstration on the steps of the Capitol in July and again a week ago. After the most recent arrest he was placed into pretrial confinement, where he has been held without bail ever since. 

- A journalist who was found in contempt of court for refusing to disclose her confidential sources is appealing the finding to the US Supreme Court. Catherine Herridge had been found in contempt in 2024 over sourcing for her coverage of Chinese-American scientist Yanping Chen, who had been investigated for possible ties to China's military; Chen had sued the US government for allegedly illegally disclosing information to Herridge. Herridge was ordered to pay $800 for each day she refused to identify her sources, though the payments have been suspended pending the appeal.

- Loblaws, the parent company of Superstore and a number of other regional chains, is reversing its decision to remove country of origin labelling on produce displays. The company had removed the labelling in every province except Ontario and Quebec, both of which make this information mandatory. The company had removed the labelling in other provinces after getting caught mislabelling foreign products as Canadian.

- Six employees at Frankfurt Airport were recently infected with malaria, and one has died. The source of infection is believed to be mosquitoes that arrived by aircraft.

- A ramp agent at Montreal-Trudeau International Airport was killed on Monday when he was run over by a plane. To the shock of many passengers, the aircraft's external cameras captured the accident and showed it on screens in the cabin. The TSB as well as the federal labour department are investigating.

- Dolly Parton has died at the age of 80 from cancer.

News roundup, 25 Aug 2026

- Doug Ford declared on a Toronto radio station that Donald Trump "can kiss my ass" in response to the latest tariffs from the US. Wab Kinew, who doesn't agree with Ford on very much, doesn't fault him at all for his comments. For his part, the Mango Mussolini now says that he wants to rename Lake Ontario as "Lake America", saying "we don’t expect to doing much business with Ontario any longer".

- Jeff Leiper, an Ottawa city councillor turned mayoral candidate, is promising to end return-to-office mandates for municipal employees where possible, if elected. Incumbent mayor Mark Sutcliffe is crying foul - a statement from his campaign bleats that this matter is "the decision of the city manager"; another source cites him as calling the promise "counterproductive and performative". Despite this, though, the folks on Reddit say that Sutcliffe has been a vocal supporter of RTO at the federal level.

- The American aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln is heading home from a lengthy deployment in the Middle East due to the ongoing war in Iran, having been relieved by another carrier, the USS George Washington. The deployment has become notorious for the horrific living conditions on the vessel; many sailors apparently reported suicidal thoughts, with at least one having to be stopped from jumping overboard. Democratic senators are demanding that the Pentagon investigate; the Pentagon's response so far has been to fire the editor-in-chief, publisher, and a reporter from the military newspaper Stars and Stripes which reported on the conditions, allegedly for "insubordination".

- Two MLAs who left the BC Conservative caucus intend to form a new party. Kamloops-North Thompson MLA Peter Milobar, considered one of the party's moderates, left the party earlier this month in response to the hard-right shift under leader Kerry-Lynne Findlay. He was joined on Monday by Ian Paton, who represents Delta South and who, like Milobar, previously represented the centre-right BC United (the former BC Liberals). They acknowledge concerns about vote splitting but say they want to "give a home to those who feel politically homeless" in the province.

- There's an old joke about a guy who's coming out of anesthesia and the doctor says to him "Well, I have some good news and some bad news. What would you like to hear first?" The patient says "Give me the bad news first", so the doctor says "We amputated the wrong leg." He asks what the good news is, and the doctor says "Your other leg might not need to be amputated after all. Unfortunately, this scenario played out for real at a Winnipeg hospital, according to a lawsuit currently before the courts.

News roundup, 24 Aug 2026

- Trade talks between Canada and the US, which showed signs of going somewhere at one point, collapsed at the last minute, with the US slapping 50% tariffs on a wide range of products. Mark Carney says that he suspended talks after the Americans brought in new conditions that Canada considered unacceptable in the final hours before the deadline. Reportedly these conditions included relaxing the laws concerning French-language requirements for appliances and instruction manuals, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had expressed dissatisfaction with the proposed agreement, which may be a factor. Carney says that the tariffs will be matched dollar for dollar; his full speech following the collapse of negotiations may be found here. US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy responded to Carney's vow to match tariffs by saying that this was "foolish" because "Canada doesn't have a military".

- This year's El Niño appears set to be the strongest in living memory, and next year is likely to be the hottest in recorded history as a result. Panama is already limiting transits through the Panama Canal as the lakes that replenish the canal aren't getting enough rainfall.

- Russia is experiencing fuel shortages as a result of Ukraine's recent strikes on oil refineries. People are crossing the border into Kazakhstan to fill their tanks; Kazakhstan has prohibited exports of gasoline but their border guards have found hundreds of attempts to smuggle gasoline back into Russia in everything from jerry cans to tanker trucks. Kazakhstan is relatively fortunate in having their own oil reserves. Other central Asian states have a bigger problem - Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan have been heavily dependent on Russia for their fuel supply, and are now facing severe shortages.

- Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1505, which represents Winnipeg Transit drivers, is again calling for full shields after a someone threatened a driver with a hatchet for not going fast enough. The city has promised to install full shields, but has been slow to implement this; meanwhile 64 drivers are currently on stress leave, amounting to 225,000 hours of lost time.

- Research from China indicates that the batteries in electric vehicles last considerably longer if you drive reasonably than if you always accelerate aggressively. Worth noting that the kind of people who tend to hate EVs also tend to drive in the latter way.

News roundup, 21 Aug 2026

- Mark Carney is still urging the provinces to allow American alcohol back on the shelves. Wab Kinew says that Carney told the premiers that there "will be no trade deal" unless the provinces capitulate on this. Kinew has not made an absolute commitment on the matter yet. He says he's "reluctantly open" to the idea but urges Manitobans not to buy it even if it becomes available, and further says that given Trump's untrustworthiness "we reserve the right to take the US booze off the shelves again" if Trump reneges on the deal.

- The Manitoba government is looking into the possibilities of extending the shipping season from Churchill and reducing the need for expensive icebreakers as a result of declining sea ice.

- The Canadian Civil Liberties Association is filing a constitutional challenge over Manitoba's inadequate legal aid system. The organization says that the inadequate representation provided by legal aid violates the right to a fair trial and to the presumption of innocence.

- An American computer manufacturer reports that the Fedora Linux version of their laptop is outselling the Windows 11 version by ten to one. Some important context, though - Framework Computer is no ordinary computer manufacturer; founder Nirav Patel is a former Apple employee who is reacting against the industry's planned obsolescence model and has designed his products to be easy to disassemble, repair, and upgrade. So naturally the company is going to attract the kind of people who are more inclined to use Linux anyway.

- Swedish startup Heart Aerospace successfully conducted a test flight of the largest electric aircraft to date, flying for 27 minutes. The company plans to develop a 30 seat aircraft with a hybrid drivetrain, which it hopes to have in service within five years.

- Two members of Milligan University's cycling team were killed and seven injured when a car plowed into them. The suspect, a 69 year old North Carolina man, is in custody and facing multiple charges, including reckless vehicular homicide. His bail was initially set at $150,000 but was doubled at his arraignment; evidence was presented that he made no attempt to brake or take evasive action and that officers detected the smell of marijuana in his vehicle. So much for the idea that pot makes you peaceful...

News roundup, 20 Aug 2026

- Kyiv suffered heavy bombardment overnight, with apartment buildings among the targets. At least 13 people were killed and 40 injured; Ukraine says they are experiencing a shortage of air defense missiles, and were unable to intercept the missiles that hit the city. The country depended on the US to supply many of these, but they are now hard to come by thanks to the US attack on Iran which has depleted much of their supply of Patriot missiles.

- The US has sanctioned two more judges with the International Criminal Court, one from Senegal and one from Japan, due to their work on the case against Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister Yoav Gallant. They will be unable to obtain US visas, and furthermore will have any assets they own in the US frozen and will have their banking access restricted.

- Several former chairs of the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) fear that the Carney government's proposed amendments to Canada's Species at Risk Act will severely weaken the legislation. These changes include exempting projects deemed to be "in the national interest" from the "jeopardy test" required under the law, as well as allowing the federal government to establish "federal economic zones" where development could be pre-approved.

- The Ontario Court of Appeal has overturned a ruling from a lower court last year that stopped the province from forcing Toronto to remove bike lanes from three major Toronto streets. The lower court had ruled that the removal was unconstitutional because it would put people at increased risk of death and injury, and thus violated the right to security of the person, however the appeal court ruled that since cyclists could avoid injury by avoiding the routes, no rights were violated. That may be technically true, and I guess there's no basis for declaring a law unconstitutional simply on the basis of it being stupid (which this certainly is).

- A bagpiper busking in downtown Ottawa on the weekend was wounded and his bagpipe bag slashed in an unprovoked knife attack. The suspect, a 25 year old man, was quickly apprehended and faces numerous charges.

- A Belgian car salesman has been legally recognized as a prince after his royal ancestry was proven by a DNA test. Clément Vandenkerckhove was born as a result of an affair between Prince Laurent and Belgian pop singer Wendy Van Wanten. He will not be part of the line of succession, however, though that's probably academic as his father is only 15th in line for the throne anyway.