- The wildfires in BC and the Northwest Territories continue to wreak havoc. Meta's blocking of news continues to draw criticism for the delayed warning that has resulted; meanwhile the fires have economic and psychological impacts well beyond the areas actually burned.
- Speaking of wildfires, it seems that those in Maui have been greatly worsened by the drying up of the area by big corporations taking most of the water for golf courses and the like.
- The Manitoba NDP is promising rebates of up to $4,000 for purchasers of electric vehicles. A step in the right direction.
- Safe consumption sites for hard drugs unquestionably save lives, but some report collateral damage in the surrounding neighbourhoods. Those who want them to continue to save lives will need to do something about that if the sites are to continue to operate, for the simple reason that the people who benefit from them are less likely to vote than the people who live nearby.
- Some activists are challenging the constitutionality of the first-past-the-post electoral system. I wish them luck.
- The Globe is challenging the view that people who work from home are more productive than those who return to the office, citing a study that reports a modest decrease in productivity when working from home. Now I suppose it's possible that this is the case, but even if it is, there are potentially countervailing advantages, not to the businesses as such but to humanity as a whole - the biggest one being less pollution from transportation. In cases like this you have to ask whether productivity is the be all and end all. And a funny thing about the Globe article - the phrase "commercial real estate" doesn't appear once, even though many people (myself included) think that's the real reason for the push back to the office.
- Even as there's been a big victory for the climate in a Montana court, the feds are fighting tooth and nail against a similar case at the federal level. Biden may be worlds better than the Republicans, but he doesn't look too good when he says, and his administration does, stuff like this.
- A candidate for the Republican presidential nomination has just said the quiet part out loud, suggesting that the voting age should be raised to 25 to keep those damn lefty kids from having an influence on election outcomes. Of course he has little chance of winning, and even less chance of getting through the necessary constitutional amendments, but it shows where their heads are at.
- The livestock lobby is working furiously to maintain and enhance their preferential treatment by governments over greener and more humane means of producing protein. The cynic in me thinks that the best hope of overcoming this would be for some rogue geneticist to engineer a virus with a long incubation period, which kills cattle and turns other animals, including humans, into asymptomatic carriers. Just putting that out there for you CRISPR-savvy greenies out there.
- Hugh Segal has died. He was one of an almost extinct breed of Conservative - one that you could respectfully disagree with, and often agree with (such as his championing of a basic income). Unfortunately there are few today like that.
- Israeli police are being accused of branding the Star of David on the cheek of a Palestinian prisoner. Now I'm no expert, but I don't think this meets internationally accepted standards of human rights.
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