News roundup, 15 Jan 2025

- Several NATO countries, including Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden, are sending troops to Greenland as a message to Donald Trump. Subsequently, France announced that they'll be sending troops as well. This follows an unsuccessful attempt by Danish diplomats to talk sense into the orange monster. There is talk of Canada sending troops as well, though Defense Minister David McGuinty says that no decision has been made on the matter.

- Unions and community organizations in Minnesota are calling for a general strike on the 23rd of January. Meanwhile, ICE is being accused of using private information, of the sort that's not supposed to be readily accessible to them, to intimidate people keeping an eye on them. Under Minnesota law, license plate readers and car registration data is only supposed to be accessible to law enforcement during a criminal investigation, but ICE seems to be getting around the safeguards. ICE has also shot another person, this one non-fatally.

- The FBI searched the home of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson on Wednesday and seized several devices, apparently in an attempt to find the source of a leak about a defense contractor that Natanson had covered in one of her articles.

- Trump is backing away from threats to strike Iran, saying that the government has reassured him that the killing has stopped. This is good news for international stability, unless of course it's happening because he thinks he needs to focus on Greenland. The least bad possibility (still very bad though) is that he wants his troops close at hand to use at home.

- Quebec premier François Legault has announced his resignation, just under nine months prior to the scheduled election. Legault's Coalition Avenir Québec is being clobbered in the polls; only 18% of eligible voters plan to support them. If an election were held today, the CAQ would come third in the popular vote, and fifth in seat count. Also resigning is Ontario Liberal leader Bonnie Crombie, who fared poorly in a post-election leadership review.

- Winnipeg's infamous Manwin Hotel, which had been vacant since last year when it was declared unfit for habitation, was destroyed by fire yesterday morning. The fire forced the evacuation of the Main Street Project next door, and it may be several days before the facility is able to reopen. Nobody died, which is more than can be said for rather a lot of days when the hotel was actually open. Housing advocate Marion Willis of St. Boniface Street Links calls the fire a "predictable outcome" of the city's lax approach towards vacant buildings. To their credit, the city seems to be moving towards potential seizure of such buildings; we'll have to wait and see how well they follow through with that.

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. 

News roundup, 26 Feb 2024

- A man burned himself to death in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington, apparently in protest of the war in Gaza.

- Russia managed to do in two years what the US couldn't do in 74 - get Sweden to join NATO.

- Donald Trump's base can't get enough of him, but while they love the craziness he spouts, it creates a problem for him if he wants to win the votes of the non-crazy. Meanwhile his legal troubles are creating financial problems for his campaign, and now the prosecutor in the Stormy Daniels case is asking the judge for a gag order to keep Trump from siccing his sheeple on jurors.

- Even in West Virginia, people in the know understand that the coal industry isn't going to recover to its earlier strength. It's been declining for decades, long before renewables entered the picture. Unfortunately while there are new jobs in the renewable energy sector, there are a lot fewer of them, and they aren't always in the same place (the best place to mine coal often isn't the best place to build a solar or wind farm).

- The federal NDP has managed to get the Liberals to move ahead with a national pharmacare program. The NDP had threatened to withdraw their support from the minority Liberal government unless an agreement was reached by the end of the month. Among things to be covered will be diabetes medications and contraceptives; for their part, the Alberta government has announced that they intend to opt out of the whole thing. Because freedumb, or something.

- Manitoba finance minister Adrien Sala accuses the previous government of presenting an "incomplete picture" of the province's finances following an external review ordered by the new government shortly after taking office. Among the things the Tories are accused of ignoring are the impact of last year's drought on Hydro revenues, as well as the impact of their own tax cuts on revenue.

- The former CAO of the Rural Municipality of North Cypress-Langford, Manitoba has been charged with theft after allegedly stealing around $30,000 from a curling club and then using municipal funds to repay it. No information about the motive, but if I were to guess I'd say gambling has something to do with it.

- Syphilis in the US is now at a 70 year high, and some doctors are rationing penicillin in order to keep it available to treat the disease.

- A number of "smart vending machines" at the University of Waterloo were discovered to be using facial recognition, for reasons that are not clear. This was discovered by accident when a software glitch led to a reference to facial recognition appearing on a screen on one of the machines. The university has announced that the machines will be removed.

- A branch of the Royal Canadian Legion in Vaughan, Ontario has had its charter revoked by the national body after allegedly being taken over by outlaw bikers.

Swedish city eliminates use of fossil fuels for heating

Kristianstad is almost as big as Brantford, and Sweden is not exactly a warm climate. If it's possible there, it should be possible almost anywhere:

When this city vowed a decade ago to wean itself from fossil fuels, it was a lofty aspiration, like zero deaths from traffic accidents or the elimination of childhood obesity.

But Kristianstad has already crossed a crucial threshold: the city and surrounding county, with a population of 80,000, essentially use no oil, natural gas or coal to heat homes and businesses, even during the long frigid winters. It is a complete reversal from 20 years ago, when all of their heat came from fossil fuels.

But this area in southern Sweden, best known as the home of Absolut vodka, has not generally substituted solar panels or wind turbines for the traditional fuels it has forsaken. Instead, as befits a region that is an epicenter of farming and food processing, it generates energy from a motley assortment of ingredients like potato peels, manure, used cooking oil, stale cookies and pig intestines.

A hulking 10-year-old plant on the outskirts of Kristianstad uses a biological process to transform the detritus into biogas, a form of methane. That gas is burned to create heat and electricity, or is refined as a fuel for cars.

From the New York Times.

Another twist in the Assange case

Sweden has reopened the rape investigation against him:

The case was dismissed last week by Eva Finne, chief prosecutor in Stockholm, who overruled a lower-ranked prosecutor and said there was no reason to suspect that Mr. Assange had raped a Swedish woman who had reported him to police.

The woman's lawyer appealed the decision and Director of Public Prosecution Marianne Ny on Wednesday decided to reopen the case.

From the Globe.

Assange vows to fight remaining charges

Although the rape charge against him was dropped, the WikiLeaks founder still faces charges of the lesser offense of molestation. Assange says he will fight those charges if Sweden decides to proceed (so far they seem not to have made a decision). Assange also makes an interesting allegation:

He said that he had been forewarned by Australian intelligence on August 11 to expect a campaign against him, though it was unclear who was behind it.

"It is clearly a smear campaign ... the only question is who was involved," Assange, who is an Australian national, said.

"We can have some suspicions about who would benefit, but without direct evidence I would not be willing to make a direct allegation."

From Al Jazeera. The prosecutor says that she'll be deciding what to do later this week; my money's on the remaining charges being dropped, but we'll have to see.

A curious twist in the WikiLeaks saga

As you've no doubt heard, the founder, Julian Assange, was charged with rape in Sweden, then the charge was withdrawn within hours:

The preliminary allegation, made on Friday night, and not further investigated at that stage, was apparently leaked by police to a tabloid in Stockholm, which published dramatic claims on Saturday morning that Assange was to be arrested.

The Swedish Prosecution Authority todaysaid an "on-call" prosecutor issued an arrest warrant for Assange late on Friday, only to see it revoked the next day by a higher-ranked prosecutor who found no grounds to suspect him of rape.

"The prosecutor who took over the case had more information, and that is why she made a different assessment than the on-call prosecutor," said Karin Rosander, a spokeswoman for the authority.

From the Guardian. The timing of this is rather peculiar, no? After all, remember how Blake's 7 opens?