- French President Emmanuel Macron has appointed a new government from the fragmented parliament elected in a snap election earlier this year. The new government is a coalition between his own Renaissance party and the conservative Republicans; however the two parties combined do not have a majority and they will need the support of other parties to pass legislation - possibly including Marine Le Pen's National Rally.
- The author of a recent article in the Manitoba Law Journal on the question of whether it's OK for a backbench MLA such as Mark Wasyliw to be practicing criminal law at the same time thinks there are real issues with the matter, with potentials for conflict of interest as well as the more basic question of whether it's advisable to be trying to do two fairly demanding jobs at the same time. He is, however, critical of the focus on the connection with Peter Nygard. Meanwhile NDP caucus chair Mike Moyes has stated that Wasyliw was a difficult person to deal with; that he may well have been, but I guess that doesn't resonate with the public the way the Nygard thing does. In any case, the matter does not seem to have impacted Wab Kinew's popularity; he still has the highest approval rating of any premier in the country.
- In Ontario, the Ford government is planning to override municipal powers again, this time to restrict municipalities' ability to build bike lanes. The proposed legislation is called the "Reducing Gridlock and Saving You Time Act". In actual fact, fewer bike lanes likely means more motor vehicles on the road and hence more gridlock, but the suburbanites Ford is trying to court seem incapable of understanding that. Or else they don't care because they're stuck driving anyway thanks to their questionable lifestyle choices, so they want to make sure inner city residents don't have it any better.
- Solar energy continues to surge worldwide, and some are predicting that this could finally be the tipping point that starts to cause a reduction in global carbon emissions. Some environmentalists are concerned about the impact of some solar installations, fearing that this will alter some pristine habitats, but the truth is that no habitat is likely to escape dramatic change in the next few decades, so maybe the best approach is to focus on keeping as many habitats viable as possible, rather than pristine. Meanwhile in Norway, electric cars now outnumber gas-powered ones.
- Speaking of keeping habitats viable, as opposed to pristine, researchers in the US, Mexico, and the Caribbean have had some success in breeding heat-resistant corals. Stuff like this is necessary, though it will probably also make some uncomfortable because it's pretty much an admission that wilderness, as we understand it, is essentially a thing of the past. In a similar vein, I think it would make a lot of sense to replant the burned areas of Jasper National Park, say, with broad-leaved trees that are better suited to a warmer climate (and less prone to severe wildfires), but that might be unpopular since it would greatly change the nature of the park. Like it or not, though, engineered ecosystems are going to have to be a much bigger part of our world in the future.
- A large housing and commercial project planned for the French city of Caen has been scrapped following a study that concluded that the sea level rise that's already locked in from climate change will render the site where it was planned uninhabitable in a matter of decades.
- While Kamala Harris stands a good chance of winning in the fall, the possibility that a state with enough electors to decide the outcome could end up in the Supreme Court is worrisome.
- Bruce Zuchowski, the sheriff of Portage County, Ohio, suggested that residents of his county keep lists of addresses with Democratic election signs. One resident who called the sheriff's office and left a message critical of this says that they started getting calls from blocked numbers, and when they finally answered the caller simply read out their name and address. Not particularly subtle of them, that's for sure.
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