News roundup, 16 Jan 2026

- Donald Trump is threatening to invoke the Insurrection Act in Minnesota, which would enable him to send regular military into the state to maintain order. This follows widespread protests against the killing of Renee Good and the wounding of another person. Some protesters (and/or agents provocateurs, and/or straight-up nihilists) apparently threw stones at law enforcement, and tear gas and flashbangs were used by police. Meanwhile governor Tim Walz is calling on citizens to film ICE agents operating in their communities, stating that this footage may be useful for future prosecutions. A bold move for sure; Walz had better stay well away from upstairs windows for the next while. And someone in this Reddit thread made this comment:

Firearms for liberals is like abortion for Republicans. We have them too, we just don't talk about it.

 All in all, things could get rather interesting down there.

- Mark Carney has made a major breakthrough on tariffs after meeting with Chinese president Xi Jinping. China will drop tariffs on canola and other products, and in return Canada will allow the import of 49,000 electric cars at a tariff rate of 6.1%. It's the right move I think, but a politically dangerous one given the importance of the auto industry.

- Winnipeg Centre MP Leah Gazan has endorsed Avi Lewis for the federal NDP leadership. She is the first sitting member to issue an endorsement for this race; former MP Charlie Angus has endorsed Alberta MP Heather McPherson. 

- A former Winnipegger who now heads the Anhart Community Housing Society, a BC-based housing nonprofit. is interested in redeveloping the site of the destroyed Manwin Hotel. They hope to work with the Main Street Project to build affordable housing on the site. The organization is also interested in redeveloping the site of the Sutherland Hotel which burned last year. A snag has arisen already, however - the cleanup of the Manwin site has been delayed due to concerns about asbestos.

- The Manitoba government will not be participating in the federal government's buyback program for firearms that were banned in legislation passed in 2020. Justice Minister Matt Wiebe has expressed concerns about the cost and effectiveness of the program, especially given that a pilot of the buyback in Cape Breton that was expected to collect some 200 firearms netted only 25.

- A construction crane fell onto a passenger train in Thailand, killing at least 32 people and putting another 64 in hospital, seven of them in serious condition. The accident is under investigation.

- UK Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch has removed MP Robert Jenrick from her shadow cabinet and suspended him from caucus after being presented with what she calls "irrefutable evidence" that he was planning to defect to another party, which other sources identified as the far-right Reform UK.

- As of the new year, all margarine and dairy milk sold in Canada is required to be fortified with vitamin D. This is a good idea, but it will be interesting to see how the antivax/anti-flouridation crowd will react. I suspect they won't like it; anything done by the government that improves people's health goes against their libertarian individualist spirit.

News roundup, 29 Jan 2025

- A total of 6 candidates have been approved to run for the Liberal Party leadership. A seventh, Nepean MP Chandra Arya, will not be permitted to run, for reasons that are not being made public; some on this Reddit thread are alleging that far-right influencers have been telling their followers to join the party ad vote for Arya, though, which just might have something to do with it. For her part, Chrystia Freeland says she's running against the "Ottawa establishment", which does sound a bit rich coming from someone who served as one of Trudeau's top cabinet ministers from the beginning of his prime ministership. Not to say that the only other candidate anyone's heard of, Mark Carney, isn't establishment; he's more "international establishment" than "Ottawa establishment", though. Not sure which is worse in the eyes of the kind of voter Poilievre is going after.

- The public inquiry into foreign interference in Canadian elections has found no evidence of "traitors" in Parliament; while there was some evidence of attempts by foreign interests to "curry favour" with MPs, no evidence was found of MPs helping. For his part, Charlie Angus is calling for Elections Canada to investigate possible interference by Elon Musk and X. Given that Musk seems to have no compunction about such interference, this is an eminently reasonable request.

- One of the few things Doug Ford has in common with David Eby, policy-wise, is a willingness to ban American alcohol from his province if Trump goes ahead with his threatened tariffs. And as in BC, some bars and restaurants are uneasy about this, complaining that some of their top-selling cocktails can't be made without bourbon. Nonetheless, I have to give credit where credit is due; Ford has done the right thing here, showing that he is at least no lower than the third worst premier in the country after Danielle Smith and Scott Moe. The impact may be noticeable - the LCBO is one of the biggest buyers of alcohol in the world (though not the undisputed #1 that it once was).

- School districts in the US are trying to figure out how to respond when immigration officers show up at their schools (possibly for kids born in the US but whose citizenship is no longer recognized by the current administration).

- Google has reclassified the US as a "sensitive country", meaning one that gets really worked up when you don't call things by the name they prefer (like how China gets when an airline lists "Taipei, Taiwan" instead of "Taipei, China" as a destination). Presumably this is why they've given in to pressure from the administration and accepted the renaming of the Gulf of Mexico.

- Gwynne Dyer would like to remind us that for the most part countries still take international law seriously, even if there are a few exceptions (Rwanda, Russia, US, etc.)

- Calgary is planning a new LRT line. Since that sort of thing does not sit well with the provincial government, due to running contrary to the interests of the only people the UCP cares about, the province imposed limits on the project that amount to a poison pill. City council, though, recognizing that the line is needed regardless, has voted to move ahead with the project anyway.

- When office space becomes vacant, it's not always feasible to convert it into apartments due to design constraints for residences. An alternative, though, is to use it for food production instead.

- The prospect of a casino opening in Tysons Corner, Virginia (a short drive from Washington) is causing unease in some former intelligence officers. They figure that, James Bond movies notwithstanding, having your spies, military, and defense contractors get the gambling bug is not a good thing from a security standpoint. It would be interesting to know who is bankrolling this casino and/or lobbying in its favour.

News roundup, 11 June 2024

- Climate scientist Susan Solomon is somewhat optimistic that the worst of climate change can be prevented, though she acknowledges that the situation is still scary. Gwynne Dyer also has some optimism based on the potential technological solutions.

- Student editors at the Columbia Law Review were apparently pressured to halt publication of an article written by a Palestinian human rights lawyer. When they refused, the publication's website abruptly went offline with a notice that it was down for "maintenance", although it came back online after an uproar about potential censorship.

- The Public Service Alliance of Canada held a seminar yesterday evening on antisemitism and Islamophobia. One of the panelists is Avi Lewis of Independent Jewish Voices, and some Jewish members of the union are incensed that the wrong kind of Jew was selected for the panel.

- Ontario is cancelling their wastewater surveillance program that had made the province a world leader in tracking of infectious diseases, including but not limited to COVID-19. The province says this is to "avoid duplication" because the federal government has a program in place, however the move will drastically reduce the number of sites being monitored. It's almost as if the government wanted to avoid knowing in advance about future infections that might compel them to take action that might be unpopular with the masses.

- Charges against a man accused of uttering death threats against NDP MP Charlie Angus and his staff have been stayed... because the police "lost" the evidence. Not sure if the police are actually that incompetent or if they are actually complicit, but either way it's not a good look. For his part Angus says that the threats were not the reason for his decision not to run again in the next election, but it probably made the decision easier. 

- In Alberta, documents have come out suggesting that Alberta police chiefs actively campaigned for the UCP. 

- A neo-Nazi organization, Blood Tribe, waved Nazi flags at a demonstration at the South Dakota legislature. Apparently that was too extreme even for Gov. Kristi Noem.

- Ian Walker has won a convincing victory in the byelection to replace trustee Francine Champagne, who resigned after being suspended three times for hateful behaviour. Walker received 1,554 votes; the second place contender, far-right candidate Sandra Saint-Cyr, received only 430. Definitely good news, but the turnout in a school board byelection is usually pretty low, and there's no question that the hillbillies will be back for another try at the first opportunity.

- A City of Winnipeg bylaw allows the city to seize derelict vacant buildings under some circumstances, but it hasn't been used since 2016 and only sporadically before that. When Winnipeg Free Press reporter Tom Brodbeck inquired about this, city officials responded with the bland and unsatisfactory statement that "the landscape of vacant building enforcement has changed over that time". If anything, though, there's a lot more need for enforcement now than there was eight years ago.

- Three food truck operators that had been booked for the Pembina Valley Pride event in Altona, Manitoba have pulled out, citing threats to vandalize their vehicles. Organizers cite the local MLA's refusal to support a bill recognizing Two-Spirit and Transgender Day of Visibility as encouraging others who might have kept quiet to become more aggressive.

- A post on the satirical Facebook group "The City of Winnipeg Complaints Department" claimed that AI-equipped cameras would be used to enforce seatbelt use and ensure people weren't using their phones while driving. The masses being what they are, though, a lot of them thought it was real.

News roundup, 17 May 2024

- Climate activists in Russia are taking the government to court for failing to adequately protect its citizens from climate change. I'm guessing most of those activists will, at the very least, end up on a "foreign agents" list. They'd better start carrying Geiger counters and avoiding windows as well.

- Four neighbourhoods in Fort McMurray that were destroyed in the 2016 fire have been evacuated again, though it is hoped that the measures brought in after that fire will protect the community better than last time.

- Charlie Angus has written an opinion piece for the Tyee about Pierre Poilievre and the Conservative Party's courting of rightwing extremists. In it he mentions that when he called out Poilievre in Parliament for the latter's refusal to disavow an endorsement from Alex Jones, Conservative supporters responded by posting photos of Angus' daughters, along with the locations of their workplaces, on social media, accompanied by thinly veiled threats. With stuff like that going on, it's no wonder Angus has decided not to run again.

- Slovakian prime minister Robert Fico is now in stable condition following yesterday's shooting. His own political career has evolved in an interesting way, to say the least - he started out as a Communist during the cold war, then continued with that party's democratic successor, the Party of the Democratic Left, after the end of the one-party state. Then in 1999 he and others left that party and founded a party called Direction - Social Democracy, which he considered a "third way" party, but as leader he has continued to take that party to the right, to the point where they're straight-up rightwing populists now. One can't help wonder if the general mood he's helped to cultivate might have helped motivate the shooter; perhaps the likes of Poilievre should take note.

- Until recently, support for Israel (at least at the official level) has been very widespread in the West. Maybe not quite so much anymore; they've alienated a lot of allies, though I suspect that when it comes down to the crunch the US and Germany, at least, will still grudgingly support them after a bit of public finger-wagging. Canada has sanctioned four individuals for their involvement in some of the more egregious acts of violence by West Bank settlers against Palestinians, though I wouldn't hold my breath for sanctions against the Israeli state.

- Despite suicide being one of the biggest causes of death among young adults, over 70% universities in Canada do not keep statistics on this rather important issue.

- Joe Biden has declared that the federal government will issue no new leases for coal mining on federal land in the country's biggest coal producing region. In contrast, Florida governor Ron DeSantis has signed into law a bill that removes virtually all references to climate change from state legislation. The same bill also bans offshore wind turbines, among other things.

- Ten states in the US have not yet signed onto the Medicaid expansion that's part of Obamacare. Polls indicate that expansion would have broad public support, but the Republicans are apparently counting on that support not to be strong enough to get very many people to vote for the Democrats. Sadly, their confidence is probably justified; too many people think they'll be cast into a lake of fire if they do that.

- A flight instructor with the US Air Force was killed after apparently activating the ejection seat of his aircraft while it was sitting on the tarmac.

News roundup, 8 April 2024

- Another veteran NDP MP, Charlie Angus, has announced that he will not be running again. Pierre Poilievre responded to the news in his typical mean-spirited fashion, though sadly I don't think he's necessarily factually wrong in saying Angus might have a hard time getting reelected. Because Poilievre has been very successful in convincing a lot of working class people that he's their guy. This is nonsense of course, but a few flashy ads and zippy slogans work on the common mind far better than many of us would like to admit.

- Also on the subject of MPs stepping down, Transcona councillor and all-round loose cannon Russ Wyatt is apparently considering a run for the seat vacated by Elmwood-Transcona MP Daniel Blaikie. He apparently hasn't decided which party he would run for; I guess he'll go for whoever will take him.

- In the US Congress, the House Freedom Caucus (comprised of the kind of people who give freedom a bad name) are threatening to withhold funding needed to rebuild the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge unless environmental and union wage regulations are waived for the project. One of their claimed reasons for this is to avoid delays, yet they are also demanding that the government seek compensation from the shipping companies responsible for the accident before funding is released, something that would itself cause delays. They further want the administration's pause on approvals of LNG export terminals to be lifted.

- Joe Biden wants companies that use American airspace to launch spacecraft to pay the same taxes that airlines do. The taxes in question help to cover the cost of the ATC system, and controllers do have to take space launches into account when directing aircraft, so it's an eminently reasonable proposal. No doubt Elon Musk and his followers (or as I call them, the Muskrats) will cry foul, though.

- A hydrogen plant has opened in Gladstone, Queensland. Unlike many such facilities, which produce hydrogen from natural gas and are thus not carbon-neutral, this uses electrolysis of water, and renewables can be used to produce the electricity for this. So a definite step in the right direction.

- The impact on the power grid from the disruption of solar power from the coming eclipse has yet to be determined as of this post.

- Tick season, as well as mosquito season, is expected to start early this year in Manitoba due to the warm weather.