News roundup, 14 Oct 2025

- The price of gold has topped $US4,000/oz t last week for the first time in history, as investors price in uncertainties about the US economy. Actual inflation hasn't been all that high, but the Federal Reserve has signalled that interest rates will likely decrease again later this year. Not mentioned in the article are concerns about the future independence of the Federal Reserve itself; presumably CBS' new owners don't want us thinking about that.

- A Bell 222SP helicopter went out of control and crashed while participating in a "Cars 'N' Copters" event in Huntington Beach, California on Saturday. The aircraft is shown from multiple video angles going into a spin, and the entire tail rotor gearbox was ejected from the tail before impact. The two people on board survived but with significant injuries; three people on the ground were injured as well. Juan Browne (blancolirio) has some preliminary analysis here.

- The Carney government has announced that they will be moving forward with plans for income taxes for some lower income Canadians to be filed automatically starting in 2027 and expanding over the next couple of years. This sort of thing has been the norm in many countries for a long time; no doubt the tax software companies are vehemently opposed, though. Politically, it's a smart move because when people have to do their own taxes they're reminded of the fact that they're paying taxes, making it easier to whip up populist anger about them. The government is also expanding a national school meals program.

- China is now outright offering to remove the punishing tariffs on Canadian canola if Canada is willing to remove the equally punishing tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles. Prairie premiers, including both Wab Kinew and Scott Moe, have been calling for this for some time, while Doug Ford is vehemently opposed. If this does happen I will be pleasantly surprised; while the Canadian auto sector is probably doomed anyway, I doubt that Carney will be willing to be seen to be admitting that, since the ridings with a lot of auto plants are mostly competitive, while the rural folks in the prairies who would benefit from opening up the canola market aren't going to vote Liberal no matter what (because Jesus, Trudeau, and freedumb).

- The Canadian Union of Postal Workers is backing away from their across-the-board strike, moving to rotating strikes instead. I guess that the union's leadership knows deep down that regardless of the merits of their position they're not going to win in the court of public opinion if people can't get their Amazon orders.

- BC Conservatives leader John Rusdad has ordered the cellphones of all his MLAs to be searched after it was leaked to the media that there had been a push for his leadership to be reviewed. Rustad denies being paranoid and claims that it was actually caucus members who pushed for this. Notably, the search extended not only to phones issued by the legislature but MLAs' private phones as well (at least the ones Rustad knows about). 

- The head of Oregon's National Guard told a Senate subcommittee that if his troops are deployed, they will consider protecting the public from ICE to be part of their mandate. Of course, this just means that the regime will use NG troops from a more pliant state, but it will be interesting if this protection extends to the actions of out-of-state troops. Things could get very interesting if, say, the governor decides to deploy the Oregon NG to protect the state's people from them (or from out-of-state NG troops). It's worth noting that ICE has already accidentally teargassed cops in Chicago.

News roundup, 8 Sept 2025

- The agriculture sector in both Canada and the US is taking a beating due to the ongoing trade dispute with China. In the US, corn and soybean prices have collapsed; in Canada there's a similar situation with canola. In both countries, governments are trying to pick up the slack by incentivizing more biofuel production. Saskatchewan premier Scott Moe is calling for the removal of tariffs on Chinese EVs as these tariffs are widely seen as being part of the reason China has sanctioned our canola in the first place. I hate to agree with Moe on anything, but he's right about this. Unfortunately there's no way in hell that the federal government will throw auto workers under the bus.

- Suicide is now the number one cause of death in the EU for people between the ages of 15 and 29, accounting for nearly 19% of all deaths in that age group. This represents a reversal of a previous downward trend for suicide.

- Air Canada's flight attendants have rejected the latest wage offer from their employer. The union argues that even with the increase offered, flight attendants would still effectively be making less than the minimum wage for federally regulated industries.

- A consumer advocacy group in Australia has found that 16 out of 20 brands of sunscreen don't provide the level of protection claimed on the label. This in the country with the highest incidence of skin cancer in the world.

- Former Winnipeg Blue Bombers running back Willard Reaves is running for the leadership of the Manitoba Liberal Party. I guess he figures that if Obby Khan can lead a party, so can he.

- In France, the government led by prime minister François Bayrou is expected to lose a non-confidence vote. Bayrou had called the vote himself, hoping to "shock" politicians into getting their act together, but it doesn't seem to be working. Meanwhile the bleating masses are lining up behind Jordan Bardella, leader of the far-right National Rally, because he seems like "someone you could get a drink with". You'd hope that a democracy could choose its leaders based on something more substantial than that, but I guess not.

- Erin Patterson, who poisoned several of her husband's relatives with death cap mushrooms, killing three, has been sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 33 years.

News roundup, 13 Aug 2025

- Canary Mission is a pro-Israel website that purports to document antisemitism and identify guilty parties. The problem, of course, is that their idea of what constitutes "antisemitism" seems to come straight from the Israeli authorities (for instance, support of the BDS movement or using the "from the river to the sea..." slogan is deemed "evidence" of antisemitism, judging from their entries), and their "identification" of said parties has been denounced as "doxxing" by many critics. And now it seems they've been handing information about these people directly to ICE in the hope of getting them deported from the US. Their site can be found here if you're curious.

- National Guard troops have hit the streets in DC. This is not expected to go well for the homeless population, among others.

- China has imposed a 75.8% "anti-dumping" duty on Canadian canola, effectively shutting Canadian farmers out of their market. 

- A man who openly violated Nova Scotia's backcountry travel ban, which was imposed due to wildfires, has been fined more than $25,000. He is planning to challenge the ban in court. He was a candidate for the People's Party in April's election, and he's getting legal assistance from the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms, who were also involved in many legal challenges against pandemic restrictions.

- Researchers have confirmed that a storm in northwestern Ontario in late July spawned a tornado that touched down near the hamlet of  Mine Centre. Not the usual sort of place you expect a tornado, but apparently seven of the eight tornadoes recorded in the province last year were in the northwest.

- Doug Ford may be angry with Trump over tariffs, but he sounds mighty Trump-like in his attacks on the judiciary and the principle of judicial independence.

- Air Canada's flight attendants are preparing to walk off the job this weekend after a breakdown in negotiations. 

- The patio on the Bill and Helen Norrie Library in Winnipeg's Grant Park neighbourhood, which only opened in 2021, is already closed for repairs. The library itself remains open, but the work by three contractors on the project is now the subject of a lawsuit by the city.

- The Winnipeg Parking Authority says that allowing the collection agency they contract with to send text messages to people with outstanding tickets has been quite effective in getting people to pay up. I guess if it works for scammers it will work for them, and any concerns about empowering actual scammers by normalizing this practice are an externality that they don't need to worry about.

- Anna Sorokin, who's trying her hand at being an influencer after her fraud convictions for scamming money out of people while claiming to be an heiress named Anna Delvey, did an Instagram photoshoot with three domestic rabbits - which were later found abandoned. Not surprisingly, she's receiving death threats; for her part she blames someone else involved in the photoshoot for their abandonment (to be fair he has apparently admitted blame).

- Researchers have found a way to make humanoid robots more relatable for humans - make them neurotic.