You might want to boycott Chevron

Most major oil companies are unwilling to touch Venezuelen oil with a proverbial bargepole. Not so Chevron.

America's second largest oil company has been in Venezuela since 1923, navigating or conveniently ignoring all of the many varieties of bad stuff that have happened there over the decades. Now, in response to Donald Trump's call for private development of the mess that is Venezuela's oil industry, Chevron is the only US oil company to step forward, not back.

The other companies, preferring not to be associated with Venezuela, are eschewing the country for sound financial reasons: most analysts think it will take many years of serious investment before Venezuelan oil will be profitable for them. Plus, the US government is insisting on taking a 20% cut (finders fee?)

But you have to think too that they are all too conscious of the reputational risk involved. After all, the US's involvement arose through an invasion. Trump would have us call it a "deal", because everything is a deal to him. But the reality is, America invaded Venezuela, kidnapped its elected leader (who is even now languishing in an American jail), and intimated and browbeat the interim government into granting the US de facto control over its huge oil reserves.

This, then, is blood money, spoils of war. Most sensible companies would want to distance themselves from that. But Chevron? They're all in. Now, you might want to boycott Chevron-owned gas stations: Chevron, Texaco, Caltex. I don't know whether that is already an ongoing campaign, but if it isn't, it should be. Me, I have an electric car, otherwise I would be there too.

UPDATE

Turns out, there are various other reasons to boycott Chevron notwithstanding its Venezuelan connections: its profiteering from the ongoing genocide in Palestine; its price-gouging activities; its dumping of toxic waste in developing countries; and of course its egregious carbon footprint and greenwashing strategies.

What if the Democrats won Congress?

I have been trying to figure out how, if at all, a Democrat clean sweep in November's mid-term elections would change anything. I think none answer may be: not much.

Under Donald Trump, US policy, both at home and abroad, has been concentrated to an unprecedented degree one one man ruling through presidential decree and executive order. The courts have managed to rein some of his excesses, although the largely Trump-appointed Supreme Court has mainly protected him, other than in a few high-profile cases. Congress, on the either hand, has had very little influence on things and, even were the Democrats to control it, I'm not sure that would make much difference.

There has been a swing in American opinion, and there is a good chance that Democrats could win a slim majority in the House of Representatives, and maybe in the Senate too. It's by no means a foregone conclusion, but the chance is there, should the American people choose to seize it. This is true notwithstanding the likely efforts of the Trump administration to interfere in the elections by intimidating voters, seizing ballots, or denying the outcome of inconvenient election results, and past drives to gerrymander electoral districts, ban postal votes, etc.

But, if Democrats controlled Congress, what would change? There would, of course, be a strong symbolic effect, as it would be seen as a widespread repudiation of Trump and his policy. There is some congressional legislation in process, and Democrats could block any ongoing Republican nonsense, and even introduce somenchanges of their own, so that's something. But Trump could easily veto such initiatives, and the chances of Democrats swinging two-thirds of the vote (to veto the veto) are slim to none. The setting of the federal budget and the regular raising of federal debt ceiling may be about all they can influence to any great degree. Trump has already pushed through most of what he wants to achieve congressionally (e.g. his Big Beautiful Bill) in the first half of his term.

Democratic control of Congress could also dictate the terms and the make-up of committees, but the practical impact of those are very limited. Another attempt to impeach Trump is pretty unlikely.

One element I had not thought about is that, if the Democrats were to win Congress on November 3rd, some of the older Republican Supreme Court judges would probably be "encouraged" to retire before the new Congress would be sworn in in mid-January, so that Trump could appoint some younger for right candidates to extend the conservative majority for many years to come.

All in all, not a very edifying prospect. Tariffs would continue (insofar as the courts allow them), ICE detentions and enforced immigrant deportations would continue. All of the innumerable Trump executive orders would remain in place. Foreign policy would remain one of thoughtless aggrandisement and spite.

In the American political system, the President has way too much power. Yes, technically the President is directly elected, but if they then strike out on a completely different radical (arguably insane) path, there is little the electorate or an elected Congress can do about it. They need to fix that.

Yes, the mid-terms are important, but don't expect them to change the chaos of the Trump administration in any material way. As independent observers like GIS note, "the outcome of 2026 national elections will likely not significantly shift national policies or the direction of American foreign policy". Ouch!

"Your entire nation has a lower GDP than Texas"

"Your entire nation has a lower GDP than Texas". Not Donald Trump this time, but US Representative Brandon Gill of, well, Texas.

And his point? Er, not sure.

Canada goose 1 : American Eagle 0

I should know better than to respond to Trump's nocturnal ramblings on social media. But worth mentioning that I already dealt with this one long before it even happened.

In this episode... Trump has cherry-picked part of a photo sequence by a Canadian photographer of an encounter in Burlington, Ontario between a bald eagle (symbol of America) and a Canada goose (kind of a symbol of Canada, for our sins).

The photo seems to show the eagle dominating and savaging the goose. The rest of the photo sequence, though, shows very different outcome: after a protracted scuffle, the goose survives, rallies and threatens back against the shocked eagle. As I posted many months earlier, a different cherry-picked photo from the same sequence shows the goose rampant and a rather sorry-looking eagle.

Be careful with your source material Mr. Trump (or Ms. Harp, or whoever comes up with this guff).

Meet the ultra-cute leaf sheep

Part 52 in my series of cute and improbable animals, meet the leaf sheep.

You probably guessed that it's not a sheep at all. In fact, it's a kind of tiny sea slug (about the size of a gain of rice), Latin name costasiella kurashimae. It lives in shallow tropical waters near Japan, Indonesia and the Philippines. 

Unusually, it absorbs chloroplasts from algae and uses sunlight to generate energy in a process similar to photosynthesis (actually called kleptoplasty). It is also a hermaphrodite, possessing both male and female reproductive organs, although it does need another leaf sheep in order to reproduce.

Most of all, though, it is impossibly cute, with those tiny cartoon eyes, little horns and succulent-luke leaves branching off its back.

Does Canada have any alternatives to retaliatory tariffs?

As Canada invokes dollar-for-dollar retaliatory tariffs on the USA, one can't help but lament how Canada is getting dragged into Trump's own silliness. On both sides of the border, prices will go up, plants will close, and jobs will be lost. As one journalist put it, this is "fighting stupid with stupid". Protesting that "we didn't start it" doesn't change that.

I mean, think about it: Canada now has tariffs on the same exports to the US as the US has tariffs on its exports to Canada. How daft is that? We may as well just keep those products and use them here in Canada, rather than making them more expensive, exporting them to the USA, and then importing the same products back again from the USA (after they have made them more expensive). Franz Kafka would have had a field day with this stuff.

There again, what choice do we have? Doing nothing would signal surrender, and give Trump carte blanche to extend or ramp up his tariffs. Hardly anyone is advocating that.

Some - including the Alberta Federation of Labour, much to many people's surprise - have suggested levying export taxes on our exports to the US. After all, that would put the financial burden on American importers, not Canadian exporters, right? The problem is, export  taxes raise the prices for importers, who would probably then look eslewhere for their imports. It would reduce the attractiveness of, and demand for, Canadian products, and probably result in scaled-back production and job layoffs. 

Predictably, others - the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, for one - have strongly counselled against such a move. Oh, and export taxes are also explicitly prohibited under the CUSMA/USCMA agreement with the US (although, arguably, Trump has flouted the spirit if not the letter of that agreement many times).

Which leaves us with retaliatory tariffs, or some other non-tariff option. BC Premier David Eby has called on Mr. Carney to consider other strategies, like reconsidering the plan to buy American F-35 fighter jets, and to levy export taxes on exports of coal to the US, but only in adddition to retaliatory tariffs, which he says he fully supports.

Canada nonplussed by Trump's threat to change Lake Ontario name

Family overseas are asking us how Canadians feel about Donald Trump threatening to rename Lake Ontario as Lake America. (Could he not think of anything more creative?) Well, the word that springs to mind is "nonplussed". Generally speaking, we have learned to ignore Trump's bloviations and his childish outbursts as much as possible.

Besides, he just can't do it. Even a US president can't unilaterally change the name of a bi-national lake. Any change he proposes (assuming he is serious, which is far from clear) would only apply to US federal government publications and maps. The current name is recognized internationally and appears in federal legislation on both sides of the border.

Lake Ontario - an Indigenous name that predates either country, incidentally - is governed jointly by Canada and the USA, through a whole series of treaties, commissions and bi-national agreements. To change the name, Trump would first need to go through the US Board on Geographical Names. Assuming he could cajole, browbeat and threaten them to go along with his childish prank, it would then need to be ratified by the Geographical Names Board of Canada and Ontario's Ministry of Natural Rreources and Forestry and Indigenous Communities, which is consulted on culturally significant names.

So, not going to happen. 

Mr. Trump may be able to force the US government to change the name on its own maps and reports. But then, US government maps will be wrong and everyone else's will be right. How does that constitute a win, even by Trump's warped standards? You can just imagine government functionaries rolling their eyes, as they consider the prospect of all that extra work just to accommodate another Trump hissy fit.

Doug Ford tries to out-Trump Trump

It's pretty instructive to see Ontario Premier Doug Ford's contribution to the ongoing debate on American tariffs and their perpetrator, Donald Trump.

Following up on "He can kiss my ass as far as I'm concerned", Ford called Trump a "loser", a "dictator", a "bully" and the "king of bankruptcies". Ouch! Then, "I have more courage, more brains in my baby toe than he has in his whole body". Kapow! 

Predictably, Trump fired back very much in the same vein, calling Ford "the less charismatic, intelligent and overall unimpressive brother of the late, great Rob Ford". Zhang! And, to cap it all, he says he is "giving serious consideration to changing the name of Lake Ontatio to Lake America in that we don't expect to doing much business with Ontario any longer". So there!

Ford: "You think an insult from him hurts me? Well, bring it on buddy, I am read ready. Bring it on!" Kraak!

The next day, in a CNN interview, Ford admitted that, "Things got a little heated, it got a little personal yesterday". Yuh think?

They're two of a kind, aren't they? Neither of them have any filters or any off switch. Neither considers consequences or engages brain before speaking. How either of them got to where they are today is a mystery. They are supposed to be leaders of large and important regions, and they continue to talk like naughty schoolkids. I'm embarrassed by the pair of them.

Also like Trump, though, the more daft things he says and does, the more Ford's support increases (although while that was true at one time, Trump has shown that there are limits to this kind of counter-intuitive popularity bump - his popularity is now at an all-time low).

Canada-US trade talks fall through

Well, the Canada-USA trade talks fell apart at the eleventh-plus hour.

Prime Minister Mark Carney blamed the Americans for "last-minute changes in US proposed terms [that] were unfair, uneconomic and called into question the reliability of any deal". That sounds about right from past experience.

US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, of course, blamed the Canadians for "new demands and walk-backs of other commitments by Canada [that] have upended the careful balance reached in the past days". That sounds less convincing.

So, the 50% Section 338 tariffs on about $28 billion of Canada's exports to the US (about 5% of total exports) are set to go ahead forthwith. That sounds pretty bad, but an RBC analysis estimates the fallout at just 0.4% of Canada's GDP, and a separate Capital Economics study puts it at 0.6% of GDP. So, not good, but not disastrous, in the scheme of things. The burden would not fall evenly on the economy, though, with apparel and electrical goods being most badly affected (20% of production and jobs in those sectors could be hurt).

Canada has vowed to retaliate "dollar for dollar", Trump has vowed to up the ante should Canada retaliate, and we now have an all-out open-ended trade war. And we haven't even started negotiation on the renewal or otherwise of the CUSMA/USMCA free trade agreement!

But, I'll tell you what, it actually pretty good to be standing up to the bully to our south. The only other country that has stood up for itself in this way is China. Although, granted we are much more in a David and Goliath situation.

Elbows up, anyone?

Solar energy bails out a baking Europe

It's common sense, but still worth remarking on: Europe only got through this summer's successive heat waves and droughts due to its investments in solar power.

Nuclear, g as and coal plants reduced their output as cooling water sources dried up. Wind turbines struggled to produce in the stagnant, airless conditions resulting from heatwaves. But solar farms and rooftop arrays yielded record amounts of power, which, when called with battery storage, helped electricity networks cope with the abnormal demand levels Europe experienced.

Of course, under different circumstances, solar would not be the saviour. In times of abnormal rainfall, hydroelectricity would come into its own while solar struggles to produce. During periods of high winds, solar panels may still produce good output, but wind farms will really shine. Which is why a judicious mix of renewables is needed backed up by sufficient battery storage capacity. So, that people like Donald Trump can't smugly say, "The wind doesn't always blow, you know?.The sun doesn't always shine." Duh!

Canada probably needs to retaliate against US tariffs, even if it's self-defeating

Just hours before the next batch of Trump tariffs almost certainly comes into force, affecting a long list of Canada-produced items, there is still talk of retaliatalory Canadian tariffs. The question is: why?

Despite what Donald Trump wants you to think, tariffs are a tax on the levying country. Everyone else underatamds that. So, why would we want to do that to our own hard-pressed consuners and businesses?

The answer apparently, has nothing to do with economics. Economically, it makes no sense for us to levy counter-tariffs, even targeted tariffs. But not to retaliate would send a bad political message, and open up the possibility of further tariffs down the road, imposed apparently with impunity.

I get it: doing nothing implies weakness, and Trump punishes weakness. But I'm not totally convinced that responding with force is necessarily going to deter future escalations.  Retaliation or no retaliation, further threats and bullying is always a possibility with Trump, who is never satisfied.

Perhaps even more pertinent, though, is the matter of optics for Mark Carney and his Liberal government. Carney was explicitly elected on a platform of standing up to Trump, of not rolling over, and the polls are clear in their portrayal of Canadians as expecting some show of strength, some "elbows up". Carney's responses to Trump so far have been distinctly mixed, and many Canadians think he has already gone too far down the road of appeasement. So, a strong response is particularly important this time. And, for most Canadians, that means retaliation, however ill-advised.

Even if USMCA falls through.completely, the Canadian sky will not fall

It's been a while since I posted about US tariffs and the USMCA negotiations. It doesn't seem much like news any more. But as the US and Canada ramp up negotiations ahead of the August 19th deadline (tomorrow!) for a new round of Trump tariffs, it's starting to become more real. 

It was timely, then, to read an article about how even the end of USMCA - often portrayed as an existential threat to Canada - actually night not be as impactful as most people assume. Yes, it would be bad, bad, not good for the economy, generally speaking, but terminal danger?  - probably not.

There have been several studies and modelling exercises over the past couple of years on the likely impact of Donald Trump tearing up the USMCA agreement he signed off on six years ago, almost all of which have concluded that, while unfortunate for both countries, it would not be catastrophic for Canada. 

The latest such comes from the Canadian American Business Council, and it concludes that "USMCA Breakdown" would probably reduce Canada's economic growth rate by just 1% in 2027, and the economy would be about 1.6% smaller in 2035 than if USMCA were renewed (and respected) and tariffs fell to near zero.

Furthermore, it would result in about 102,000 lost jobs. While this sounds pretty bad initially, bear in mind that Canada currently has 21.2 million citizens in paid employment. The 102,000 lost jobs would have the effect of increasing the unemployment rate from 6.4% to 6.9% (which is about where it was four months ago; indeed, it was at or above 6.9% for most of 2025).

So, not so bad, then. The country will not be bankrupt. Not so good for those 102,000 workers, of course, and bear in mind that the axe will not fall randomly - some sectors in particular will be disproportionately affected. But all this means that Prime Minister Mark Carney does not necessarily have to accept any old deal Trump throws at him; a bad deal could be worse than no deal

AI slop has broken the internet

"Slop" was Mirriam-Webster's Word of the Year last year. "Slop" or "AI slop" is defined as "digital content of low quality that is produced, usually in quantity, by means of artificial intelligence". You know the kind of thing: pictures of Shrimp Jesus, glue-topped pizza recipes, AI-generated songs, sham biographies, deep fake videos, talking cats, genuinely fake news, advertising that looks "not quite right". AI slop is everywhere, and it now, after just a few short years, makes up a good proportion of the entire Internet. 

And it is for this that we are investing billions of dollars, and straining our electricity and water systems to power endless miles of data centres?

I knew slop was a problem, but I hadn't appreciated just how much of a problem until I read an article in the Globe and Mail (originally from the New York Times) today. It seems that tech giants like Google, Meta and X are having to spend significant resources weeding out AI slop that was largely produced by their own platforms.

Spotify removed 75 million AI fake songs and duplicate uploads last year. Google wiped 130,000 YouTube channels of low quality content over the last six months. TikTok removed 377,000 videos in the first three months of the year for violating its AI policies. (TikTok USA is currently developing a feature that lets people dial up or down the amount of visible AI content.) 

But still the problem lingers and grows. Apple Music estimates that a third of what is uploaded to its site is now AI-generated. French streamer Deezer says it may be as much as half for them. More than 20% of short YouTube videos are AI-generated slop according to one (AI-powered) online video editor. Nearly half of the posts over 50 words on X are create by AI.

But the same tech giants that are trying to manage AI slop are continuing to make things worse. At the same tume as Meta showcased a detection, labelling and tagging system designed to make AI content more identifiable, it also rolled out an all-AI video stream widely considered to be the apotheosis of AI slop, and released an AI image-generator using its own public Instagram accounts as its references.

Part of the problem is that the less-discerning elements of the internet's clientele laps this stuff up, and AI content, however poor, can substantially inflate the viewership of many platforms. It can make big money for the creators and re-posters too. Unfortunately, it also makes it much harder for other users to find genuine, truthful and high quality search results.

As Substack's CEO put it, "it's getting harder to tell what's real on the internet", and "platforms that reward fakeness will create a race to the bottom". Quite. Substack recently announced its own AI detection tool for users, but the tool mistakenly identified some real, human posts as AI-generated.

This stuff is not easy. The point is, though, the onus should not be on users to figure out what's real and what's not. It seems trite to whine that "the internet is broken". But, really, the internet is broken.

Should Ontario Appeals Court ruling overrule the earlier Superior Court ruling?

If a higher court overrules a lower court ruling, is it always the case that the higher court is more correct?

The Ontario Court of Appeal recently ruled that Premier Doug Ford's government can in fact rip out the bike lanes along Bloor Street, Yonge Street and University Avenue that Ford has a particular personal dislike of. In 2025, the Ontario Superior Court ruled that their removal would be unconstitutional because it would put people at increased risk of harm or death.

The Appeals Court, however, argued that there is no constitutional obligation to regulate roads in any particular manner, and that the government can choose to regulate roads however they like, and are under no obligation to listen to expert advice.

Well, I'm no lawyer, but it seems to me that, whether or not you agree with that, the Appeals Court's ruling does not negate - does not even address - the Superior Court's previous decision. Surely, when the expert advice involves constitutional rights, they do need to be listened to.

So, who wins? Is this a partisan decision a la USA? Does it have to go all tbe way to the Ontario Supreme Court to decide? Maybe.

Hunger stones in Germany

As Europe deals with unprecedented heat and drought conditions, you've probably read about relics of bygone ages surfacing as the levels of major rivers continue to recede: shipwrecks, unexploded WWII bombs, mammoth remains, even, most recently, a Roman bridge.

The other thing that is starting to be revealed are so-called "hunger stones" ("Hungersteine" in German). These are messages carved onto stones on rivers' edges during past droughts that usually remain hidden from sight, but are now starting to show

This one in the River Elbe in Germany is particularly poignant: it reads "Wenn du mich siehst, dann weine", translated as "If you see me, weep".

Carney's climate change announcent a drop in the bucket

If you are non-plussed by the Carney "Liberal" government's apparent complete abandonment of concern over climate change, as I am, you could do worse than to read a good article that appeared in the Globe and Mail last week, entitled "Not addressing climate change costs the economy more. When will we finally get this?"

It's nothing new, but it's well-written, well-argued and convincing. Unfortunately, it will have absolutely no impact on Carney's policies because, for now at least, he is focussed on fighting fires from south of the border, and he is all about short-term gratification right now.

As an indication of where his head is at, one of the very few climate initiatives he has announced - positive ones that is; he has made many announcements killing or paring back existing climate initiatives - was the recent announcement of $34 million for various projects to make Canadian communities more resilient in the face of climate change.

$34 million used to be a lot of money once upon a time. But, as has been pointed out, it amounts to one-thousandth of the money the government invested in the Trans-Mountain oil pipeline, and a similar proportion of the proposed West Coast pipeline. That certainly puts it in perspective. 

And even this paltry amount is focussed on mitigation of damage rather than aimed at reducing the ongoing need for such mitigation.

Child who caused Porter flight to be cancelled maybe not at fault

You will by now have probably heard or read the story of the Porter flight out of Victoria, BC, which was cancelled late at night after staff and parent were not able to get a young child to sit in his seat and buckle up his seatbelt. The child and parent eventually had to leave the plane, by which time it was too late for the plane to take off, and all the other passengers also had to disembark.

There have been mixed reactions to the incident, some (most) severely critical of the child and parent, some more empathetic. This eye-witness report, for example, makes.it clear that the child was clearly terrified, not just a spoiled brat having a temper tantrum.

I actually tried to find some video footage of the incident - you'd think, in this day and age, that someone would have been assiduously filming the whole thing. But all I could find was a very short clip, showing staff calmly (and obviously unsuccessfully) reasomong with the child.

My first reaction on reading about it was along the outraged "spoiled brat" lines. But, on reflection, I think the staff and parent probably did what they could, and the traumatized child probably could not help himself.

Soccer closes ranks against Infantino's vision

Football (soccer) federations across the world are closing ranks in opposition to beleaguered FIFA boss Gianni Infantino. 

In an "open letter to the football family" yesterday, UEFA (representing Europe), CONCACAF (representing North and Central America and the Caribbean) and AFC (representing Asia) presented Infantino and FIFA with a joint declaration of solidarity and opposition to Infantino's money-grabbing vision of world football.

It took Infantino's latest faux pas - his plan to sell off a large share of FIFA to private investors - to bring these disparate federations together in joint outrage, reflecting the outrage expressed by most of the rest of the world at Infantino's excesses. His time at the helm of FIFA is surely limited.

All those e-scooters you see? They're illegal

If you are becoming increasingly exasperated by those annoying and apparently lawless electric scooters, you are not alone.

Stats on e-scooter crashes with pedestrians are hard to find, but accidents resulting in e-scooter rider visits to hospital, and even deaths, are increasing exponentially, especially among children. There have been at least two deaths of e-scooter riders in July alone.

How does it make you feel, then, to know that pretty much all of the e-scooters you see zooming around our streets, sidewalks and bike lanes are doing so illegally?

Having said that, it depends on where you live. You see, there are no national or even provincial rules or laws in place regulating e-scooters. What rules do exist are municipal. (And when was the last time you saw municipal laws being enforced?)

Thus, in Mississauga or Brampton or Ottawa, e-scooters my be legal due to a six-year old provincial pilot program they are part of. Even there, though, they are only legal if the scooters are unable to go faster than 24 kph (can YOU tell?) and if the driver is over the age of 15 (again, can YOU tell?) Also, you can't ride with a passenger, under-18s must wear a helmet, you can't ride them on the sidewalk, and if there is a bike lane available you have to use it. In Mississauga specifically, you can't ride them on a road with a speed limit of more than 50 kph.

So, it's complicated, and most people you see are probably breaking at least one of those rules.

In Toronto, on the other hand, it's not complicated at all. Toronto is not part of the pilot project, and you can't legally ride an e-scooter ANYWHERE in Toronto except on private property (so up and down your driveway, for example). You can buy them, but you can't use them. Once again, no-one is enforcing this ban - e-scooters are everywhere.

Outside of Ontario, it's just as confusing. In Vancouver, Halifax and Calgary, for instance, e-scooters are allowed, at least in bike lanes. In Calgary, though, e-scooters are only allowed if they are rented/shared, not if you own your own e-scooter. Plus, you can use your (shared) e-scooter on some sidewalks in Calgary but not others. Like I said, it's complicated (and unenforced).

Canadians are surprisingly cosmopolitan

Visual Capitalist does it again: produces a striking and unexpected graph, this time of the extent to which the inhabitants of different countries travel abroad.

Not unexpected: Sweden, Netherlands and Germany top the list, with 99/96% reporting having travelled abroad, with the UK not far behind at 94%. 

More unexpected: Canada comes next, with 92% reporting having travelled abroad (although most to the USA, I'm guessing). This is more than the French (90%), Australians (88%), Italians (86%), and Spaniards (84%), and significantly more than the Americans (76%) and the Japanese (65%). 

Ha! How cosmopolitan we are!

Clear up your mess, Elon

I hope Elon Musk is going to go up there and clear up the mess his SpaceX rocket made on the Moon.

Trump's hold over US Supreme Court is weakening

The US Supreme Court had a busy day yesterday, as it prepares to wind down for a long and leisurely summer break. Among its mixed bag of decisions was one particularly important one: a 6-3 decision to strike down Trump's attempts to end "birthright citizenship", the right of children physically born in the USA - even to undocumented immigrants, tourists, and people on short-term work or study visas - to have US citizenship.

This was a big deal for Trump. His executive order on this issue was one of the very first things he did on taking power. He even attended the Supreme Court's oral arguments in person, the first time a sitting president has ever done so, his intention presumably being to stare down the judges to make sure they voted with him. In the end, though, the court voted against him in one of the few checks to his many illegal attempts to re-write American law and way of life.

Perhaps the biggest surprise, though, considering how clear the wording of the American Constitution is on the matter, and the century-plus of corroborating case law and legal precedent, is that three of the Court's most conservative judges - let's name names: Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas - still managed to justify dissenting against the decision. A fourth, Brett Cavanaugh, decided to prevaricate and knit-pick, concluding that Trump's order was not unconstitutional but did still violate immigration law. The other two conservatives on the Court (John Roberts and Amy Coney Barrett), who have in the past been guilty of voting ideologically, voted according to the clear legal principles this time, siding with the three Democrats on the Court.

Legal scholars are at something of a loss to understand how, and on what legal grounds, the three conservatives could vote to allow Trump to force through this clearly unconstitutional measure. But it just shows the hold Trump still has over them, even if his hold over some of the others appears to be weakening.

The Washington DC Reflecting Pool Saga

The Washington DC Reflecting Pool Saga in three minutes flat. In case you care...

Does Canada really need high-speed rail?

Canada has been talking about a high-speed railway line for decades. You only have to visit Europe or Japan or China to experience the wonder of an ultra-high-speed train, but these things don't come cheap. And, in North America at least, they don't come quickly.

The current Alto plan for a high-speed rail link from Toronto to Ottawa to Montreal to Quebec City (possibly via Kingston) is about 1,000 kilometers in length, and is protected to cost between $60 and $90 billion. The fact that the estimated cost covers such a large range suggests that they actually have no clue how much it will cost. Alto, the Crown corporation tasked with developing the project, itself warns that these figures are "for planning purposes only and should not be considered as a project budget". As with every other large Canadian development project, cost overruns are all but guaranteed.

As for how long it will take to build, well, that's anyone's guess. Not much of any size gets built in Canada in less than 15 or 20 years. The experience of California's foray into high-speed rail is salient here: a line from Los Angeles to San Francisco (just over 600km) was proposed in 2008 but, eighteen years later, just a tiny stretch of track has been laid, with most of the rest still at the planning stage. Currently, projections are that a 260km stretch from Merced to Bakersfield is expected to be completed by 2032, but don't hold your breath.

The bottom line, though, is the bottom line: $90 billion (plus) is an awful lot of money for Canada. Think what just a part of that that kind of money could do for public transit in Toronto or Montreal. Think what it could do towards eliminating poverty or propping up ailing Trump-tariffed businesses. 

Many politicians, though, seem excited by such a large-scale "nation-building project". It's often pointed out that Canada is the only G7 country without high-speed trains (although, as mentioned, America's is marginal). But is this really the best use of taxpayers' money? Do we really want to spend $90 billion - and it would probably end up costing much more than that, it always does - to save a few wealthy businessmen an hour or two on their commute, or to cannibalize customers from domestic airlines. 

Because, make no mistake, the cost of a ticket will probably put it outside the budget of the average Canadian (or the average tourist, for that matter), so it could end up as the biggest white elephant in Canada, the ultimate vanity project of the kind that we regularly mock other countries for undertaking. Canada's population is much less concentrated than France's or Japan's, and the distances are greater - what works over there won't necessarily work over here. Maintenance in the Canadian Shield terrain, and through those long hard winters, is also a differentiating issue.

I don't buy the argument that it is somehow miraculously going to fix traffic congestion and reduce our carbon footprint. It will not suddenly become the no-brainer option for travelling from Toronto to Montreal or Ottawa to Quebec City - it will be too expensive for that, for one thing, and will probably only appeal to people who currently take the train anyway. Neither will it magically boost GDP and create national prosperity, let alone improve access to housing and jobs and - most improbably - advance reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, all of which Alto is promising.

Yes, high-speed rail is cool, and yes, it would be nice. But can we really justify jt? Call me small-minded and anti-development, but I think not. And, just think, $90 billion!

Predictable outrage over Palestianian wxhibit at CMHR

A planned exhibit at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) entitled Palestine Uprooted: Nakba Past and Present is having the expected controversy and protest.

It's only a small exhibit, 12 metres wide, tucked into a corner on the first floor, just a few panels with some photos, video clips and first-person accounts, and it comes at the request of many Palestinian-Canadians who want to see some exposure of the violent displacement of some 800,000 Palestinians from their lands by the nascent state of Israel in 1947.

Many influential Jewish people, including "honorary board member" Gail Asper (who, with her father, Israel Asper, was instrumental in fundraising and getting the museum up and running), are taking issue with it, complaining that it lacks historical context and might inflame antisemitism. Jewish museum trustee Mark Berlin, who describes himself as pro-Palestinian, also resigned his position over the exhibit.

They argue that the exhibit lacks "context" in that it does not also cover the history surrounding the establishment of Israel, or the displacement of Jews from Arab lands after 1948. But, hold on, does any discussion of Nazi Germany have to include a countervailing segment on the Huns' invasion of Germany in the 4th century or Napoleon's invasion in the early 19th century, "for context"? How much context is enough context?

The so-called "Jewish nakba", in the years following the establishment of the state of Israel, is its own story, and probably merits a separate exhibit, although it bears noting that some of the resettlement of Jews was voluntary, and at least they had a homeland to resettle to, rather than languishing in refugee camps for decades like the Palestinians. 

The museum's CEO Isha Khan (not Jewish!) has defended the planned Palestinian exhibit, saying that it is not anti-Zionist, and that it does not challenge the legitimacy of the state of Israel. It is merely a piece to highlight a little-known aspect of Middle Eastern history and its human rights connotations. Moreover, the museum has for years had an exhibit on the second floor that specifically highlights the mass displacement of Jews from Arab lands, not to mention extensive galleries about the Holocaust.

An indication of just how knee-jerk a reaction this is: most of the people complaining about the display have not actually seen it yet! It only opened this weekend. The curators beg people to come and see it for themselves before they criticize.

What would the objectors have the museum do? Gloss over these historically-validated events? Grow the exhibit by two or three times in order to encompass the Israeli "context" (and thereby dilute the poignancy of the Palestinian story)? This is not a Jewish museum. Israel and the Jewish people have been the perpetrators of some pretty bad stuff over the years, as well as being the victims. Those stories need to be told too. This does not detract from Israel's - or rather the Jewish people's - vicissitudes and victimhood.

It was so predictable that there would be outrage expressed whenever Israel is criticized in any way. It was equally predictable that the "antisemitism card" would get played at some point. It's all part and parcel of the usual Israeli tendency to shut down any and all forms of criticism. I find it hard to understand that some people identify so closely with a race or a religion or a nationality that it subsumes almost everything else. But I do understand, from having observed it, that that's how it is with some people.

Hungary still out of step with Europe

You have to wonder about Hungary. By which I mean the Hungarian people. I know they just recently voted out Victor Orbán for a much more moderate president, so that's something. But, from what I can glean from international polls, they do still seem pretty out to lunch on political matters.

For example, a recent poll of different countries' views of Trump, Macron, Zelensky, Xi, Putin and Netanyahu, shows Hungary very much out on a limb where no-one else wants to be. While Canada and most European countries have very little confidence that Trump would do the right thing for world affairs and peace (in the range of 10-20%), 44% of Hungarians still have faith in Trump. Ditto with Putin: Canada and most of Europe's confidence in Putin ranges from 4% to 20%, apart from Hungary (33%) and, equally inexplicably, Greece (35%). They also have a much more positive view of Netanyahu than other countries.

As for their views on whether Donald Trump is a reliable partner to their country, Hungary and Greece are the only countries where their percentage has actually INCREASED over the last few years. Hungary's approval of Trump as a partner (65%) is much higher than any of the other countries polled.

Likewise, views on whether the USA contributes to peace and stability around the world have seen substantial decreases in most countries in recent years. Except Hungary, where the positive views have in RISEN from 33% to 46%! Hard to believe I know.

So, yes, the good burghers of Hungary have swapped out Orbán for Magyar. But they still seem to be totally out of step with the rest of Europe. And they clearly still have a soft spot for a good strong dictator.

Charm pricing is starting to lose its charm

Ever wondered why we still see things priced at $1.99, or $9.99 or $59.99? I mean nobody really thinks they're getting a bargain, do they?

Well, according to this CBC Cost of Living episode (about 12½ minutes in), some companies, including Walmart and Loblaws, are finally starting to move away from so-called "charm pricing", and rounding up to the nearest whole dollar. It's something I've seen when visiting the UK for some years now; here in Canada, though, it's pretty new.

Charm pricing was brought in decades ago now, the theory being that, given that we read from left to right, we probably don't pay as much attention to the final digits as we do to the earlier ones. It was a way to pull the wool overt ht eyes of its customers.

But, even if that ever actually worked, people are really over it nowadays; they would much prefer to see some price transparency. A store charging $5 instead of $4.99 seems more trustworthy to many people today. It also makes it easier for people to add up their potential bill total in their heads, and, in these days of tight budgets and runaway inflation, that's important. Plus, stores get to keep that extra penny, and all those pennies add up. Win-win.

Any trend toward change is still in its early days, though. Charm pricing will doubtless continue for a good while longer, because, they say, "consumers are irrational". Do they mean "stupid"? "Easily-fooled"? Don't bet the farm on it.

Next up: standardized unit pricing. Now wouldn't THAT be nice.

Ford Fest denies editing photos

Ford Fest is now a longstanding back-slapping exercise by Ontario Premier Doug Ford. Billed as a thankyou to Ford's right-wing base, it's more of an expensive public relations event than anything else, not dissimilar to those interminable taxpayer-funded Ontario adverts on local TV.

This year was a bit different, though. This year, Ford Fest was infiltrated in a big way by disgruntled members of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU), wearing purple t-shirts emblazoned with the slogan "Worth Fighting For". The protesters drowned out Ford's speech and generally made a real nuisance of themselves. OPSEU is currently demanding increased finding for community, health and social services, an end to public service privatization, and a retroactive reversal of the Conservatives' controversial wage cap legislation.

When members of Ford's caucus shared photos from the event online, though, all of those protesting purple t-shirts were miraculously converted into conservative blue Team Ontario t-shirts. The posters denied all knowledge of subterfuge, and later, there was a rather terse message from the Premier's office explaining how the photo had had "default saturation applied to correct an orange hue", adding that "this type of colour correction is standard and routine practice". The fact that it converted angry purple t-shirts into friendly blue ones was purely coincidental. OK...

This seems like another example of Ford veering towards Trumpian tactics and artifice.

Why does pedestrianizing Church Street require extra police?

Plans to pedestrianize parts of Church Street in downtown Toronto have run into some unexpected (and largely unexplained) costs.

Pedestrianizing Church-Wellesley Village - usually referred to as Toronto's "gay village" - during the summer months was expected to cost the City in the region of $150,000. But Toronto Police Services are insisting that extra policing is needed, and have budgeted an additional $300,000 for policing and security.

In fact, TPS's original ask was $3 million(!), but they were persuaded to only police it at weekends, which are expected to be by far the busiest times.

What's not clear, though, is what the extra policing is actually for. As Councillor Josh Matlow notes, "There's no reason you'd need more police at a pedestrian street than any other street". In fact, he continues, "they's safer because there are fewer cars". He's got a point. What is it that TPS are expecting to go down during these pedestrianized times?

Part of the problem is that Canada, and Toronto in particular, is just not used to having pedestrianized streets. They are the norm in most European cities, and have even become more common in some of the more progressive American cities. 

In Canada, Montreal is at the forefront of pedestrianization, with seven streets now fully pedestrianized during the summer months. Approximately 7 km of pedestrianized streets are now part of Montreal's tourist attractions, and they are wildly popular with local residents. Some store owners report a drop in sales, while others, particularly restaurants and bars, see a large increase in sales. They do not seem to require any additional policing, apart from for specific festivals and public gathering that would need extra policing anyway.

Brexit caused this political instability? Surely not!

Hard to believe, but it's been ten years, almost to the day, since the fateful Brexit vote, and the start of Britain's "messy divorce" from Europe.

Whatever Reform UK might tell you, it hasn't gone well. Best estimates (by the independent US-based National Bureau of Economic Research) suggest that Brexit has reduced Britain's GDP by 6-8%, investment in the country has slipped by 12-18%, and employment and productivity have both fallen by 3-4%, all as a direct result of Brexit. Not pretty.

Then, yesterday, we hear that yet another Prime Minister has resigned, despite winning a landslide electoral victory just two years ago. That makes it the sixth prime ministerial resignation in ten years, and soon the UK will have its seventh Prime Minister in that relatively short but tumultuous time.

As my brother-in-law deadpanned, "I wonder what could have caused such instability?"

The most, and least, liked countries in the world

Liking is a very subjective thing, especially when it comes to something as amorphous as a country. But the Democracy Perception Index does its best to quantify it, and Visual Capitalist does its usual excellent job of displaying its results.

It's edifying to see that Canada and Switzerland are jointly at the top of this list, closely followed by Japan, Sweden, Italy and Norway.

The lowest perceptions? You guessed it: Israel, followed by North Korea, Afghanistan, Iran and then ... Land of the Free, Leader of the Free World, the good old US of A. The US is the only major Western democracy with a negative net perception score. Go figure!

Ten years later, MAID in Canada is still strongly supported

At the ten-year anniversary of Canada's Medical Assistance In Dying (MAID) law, there has been a flurry of articles about how successful the initiative has been. In particular, there have been two competing opinion articles in the Globe and Mail, exemplifying the different attitudes to the service.

MAID, or assisted suicide, has been legal in Canada since June 2016, originally just for cases where natural death was "reasonably foreseeable". In March 2021, after much consultation, this was extended to people suffering intolerable whose death was not necessarily reasonably foreseeable. These two types of cases are now known as Track 1 and Track 2, although strict safeguards are of course still maintained, particularly in Track 2 cases.

One of the articles, by the regular Globe health critic André Picard, puts forward what is probably the majority view, that MAID has been an unalloyed good. Over the last ten years, about 100,000 Canadians have been spared unnecessary suffering, 95% of them in cases where death was "reasonably foreseeable" in the language of the law. Picard argues, "Life has not been cheapened by MAID. Dignity, choice and bodily autonomy have all been bolstered". Furthermore  it has not led to the "slippery slope" nay-sayers warned against, and continue to warn against, despite the extension to cases where death is not necessarily reasonably foreseeable (which continue to make up just a small minority of MAID deaths). The law is deliberately couched in very conservative and cautious terms for that very reason.

The other article, by regular contributor Robyn Urback, is more of a nuanced critique, alleging that, while the program has been generally successful, there has still been anecdotal examples where a small minority of Track 2 MAID deaths (where natural death is not necessarily probable) may - or may not - have been botched or mishandled. Improbably, Ms. Urback sees these isolated incidents as evidence that "life has become cheap in Canada", and that the extension to Track 2 MAID in particular is "eating away at the country's soul", a radical conclusion that does not seem to follow from her detailed argument. A few poignant sob stories do not negate the general good the 

My point here is that the negative argument is on much more tenuous ground, and is anyway not completely negative, but rather a relatively minor quibble against an otherwise highly successful initiative. Certainly in terms of general satisfaction, the Canadian public is quite happy with what was initially such a contentious issue. A recent Environics poll shows that between 81% and 89% of seniors and caregivers support MAID. Another recent poll found that 89% of Canadians support in MAID in cases of terminal illnesses, while 84% support MAID for people who are suffering intolerably even if they are not near the end of their lives.

When we get into the area of extending MAID to people whose sole underlying condition is a mental illness, however, the picture muddies considerably. But that is not currently part of Canada's MAID program, and a parliamentary committee recently voted that those with mental illness should not have access to MAID, at least for the foreseeable future. Now, that one IS contentious.

Anti-immigrant sentiment does not extend to soccer

If the World Cup has done nothing else, it has drawn attention to immigration, and, for once, no-one seems keen on criticizing and protesting.

Nearly a quarter of the 1,248 players at this year's World Cup a representing a country other than the one they were born in, up from just 9% at the 2006 competition. You just have to look at the number of black faces on teams from Canada, USA, England, Netherlands, even notoriously immigration-unfriendly Switzerland, to get a very visual reminder that these countries are highly reliant on immigrant talent (although bear in mind that many of the white faces are also immigrants).

Tunisia, Algeria, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Qatar all have more than half of their squads born elsewhere. The Morocco team is 73% foreign-born, the Democratic Republic of the Congo's is 85%, and little Curaçao's squad is comprised of 97% immigrants. 

There are many compelling immigrant stories behind some of the competition's top players. Canada's star player Alphonso Davies was born in a refugee camp in Ghana to Liberian parents. Australia's Thomas Deng and Nestory Irankunda were both born in refugee camps, in Kenya and Tanzania respectively. Germany's Antonio Rudiger was born to immigrant parents fleeing Sierra Leone's civil war.

The US team in particular has received a lot of attention, given the Trump administration's outspoken views on immigration. Florian Balogun, who scored two of the US's four goals against Paraguay, was born to Nigerian parents temporarily living in New York, making him a 14th Amendment "birthright citizen", which Trump has actively tried to deny (although federal courts are currently blocking his executive order from taking effect). Tim Weah, Haji Wright, Ricardo Pepi, Sergiño Dest, even Christian Pulisic, are all immigrants or children of immigrants, and several others on the squad have immigration somewhere in their stories.

I just find it interesting how little push-back there is against this particular kind of immigration, even from countries like USA, Germany, Switzerland,.Sweden and England, where there is so often a strong and vocal anti-immigration sentiment.

Trump? Isolated? Say it ain't true!

Here's Mr. Trump at the G7 meeting. 

Everyone else seems vey animated and engaged. But does no-one want to speak to Trump? Say it ain't true!

This photo probably came soon after Trump, supposedly tongue-in-cheek, told the room, "I'm the boss". *sigh* 

What has America achieved in Iran?

It's taken four months, and not a "few days" as advertised, but Donald Trump finally has his Iran Deal (or, rather, a memorandum of understanding, not a full-blown peace agreement). Details are still scarce, but it should see the extension of the current shaky ceasefire, the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, and the lifting of the US and Iran blockades. Much can still go wrong between now and Friday, when the agreement is due to be officially signed, but assuming it does actually happen, where does that leave things?

Well, essentially it leaves things pretty much where they were before the war, but with America, Iran and most of the rest of the world worse off. It's being called Trump's worst foreign policy blunder so far - and there have been a few! - an ill-advised, botched affair that should never have happened.

It has soured America's relations with the Gulf states, and severely damaged those states' reputations (albeit through no fault of their own) as islands of stability in a turbulent Middle East. 

It has weakened the US militarily, as it has burned through much more of its expensive and hard-to-replace weapons stocks than expected. At the same time, it has provided an important free lesson to equally heavily-armed and belligerent China as it continues to consider military action against Taiwan. Russia too will have been watching closely.

The global economy has taken a huge and unnecessary economic hit, for which the USA will be eternally (and rightly) blamed, with some countries in Asia and Africa in particular bearing the brunt of the suffering as oil prices surged and the supply of oil, petrochemicals, fertilizer and other important resources were strangled for months on end. The war has set in motion economic changes that will be hard, if not impossible, to reverse.

In terms of actual cost to the USA, best estimates put this in the area of $40 billion so far (because this may not be over!), although that only accounts for direct costs like munitions, destroyed equipment, damage to bases, etc.  The total price, of course, may be much higher, depending on what you choose to include.

The future of Iran's nuclear program and the level of sanctions levied against it remain to be negotiated, essentially the same position as things were at on 27th February, just before the US-Israeli attacks (except, then at least, negotiations on these matters were already well advanced). Iran did not have nuclear weapons before the war and it does not now. Its pledge not to develop them has been in place since 2003, and was renewed under President Obama in 2015. While Trump used to make a big hooh-hah about Iran's "nuclear dust" (what does he mean by that? nobody says "nuclear dust"!), he now claims that "it's not very valuable stuff", and he's not really bothered about it, except for perhaps "psychologically". What?

Trump is trying to sell the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz as a win. But the Strait of Hormuz was open before the war that Trump started. How is a return to the status quo a win for anyone? There is also a distinct possibility that the Strait may reopen with new "maritime service fees" - i.e. a toll - that was not there before. Transit tolls are prohibited under international law, but Iran says it reserves the right to charge fees in exchange for navigational services and environmental protection(!) as part of its deal with Trump. Still calling it a win?

Through the Memorandum of Understanding, Washington has promised to unfreeze billions in Iranian assets, remove sanctions, allow Iran to trade its oil on more favourable terms, and commit $300 billion to reconstructing what it has destroyed in Iran. Does that sound like the actions of a victor?

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other members of his administration and military are now dead, but they have been succeeded by younger and equally radical replacements. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) still wields total control over the beleaguered Iranian people. The repressive theocratic regime remains intact, arguably even more entrenched, embittered and emboldened, and the Iranian people are no better off than they were. Remember Trump's exhortations to the people of Iran to rise up and that "help is on the way"? Poof! Just in case you were in any doubt, Trump confirmed in a recent interview, "I never cared about regime change", and the Iranians now in charge are "nice to deal with"!

America's relationship with Israel - or at least with Prime Minster Netanyahu - has also suffered, once it became clear that Israel's goals were quite different from those of the USA. (Surprise!) Israel looks on the US-Iran agreement with dismay, as they are still looking to make further incursions into Lebanon, and would like to see Iran totally destroyed, which, despite Trump's bluster, it evidently is not. Some top Americans have been criticizing Israel's reaction in ways that would have been inconceivable at the start of this war. Vice-President Vance described Trump as "the only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of Israel at this moment in time", and even that may be a stretch. He warns that Israel "needs to wake up and smell the reality of the situation that country is in".

The whole sorry affair, then, is petering out, more with a whimper than a bang. Any agreement that does come out of it is unlikely to be much different from what Barack Obama achieved all those years ago. And that will really rankle with Trump. Thousands of Iranians and other Middle Easterners have lost their lives, reputations across the board have been damaged, the world is poorer and more unstable, the global economy is screwed up, and tempers are further frayed.

Remember Trump's demands for Iran's "UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER"? Well, in some respects, Iran may come out of this in better shape than before, even if the rest of the world doesn't. Good job, Donny!

Trump outdoes himself in the vulgarity stakes

It's hard to keep up with candidates for peak idiocy in Trump World, but yesterday's mixed martial arts (MMA) extravaganza on the White House South Lawn has to rank up there.

The very churlishness of using a National Historic Landmark for this kind of spectacle in the first place is unfathomable. But to feature a circus of violence in a monstrous 80 foot tall cage amid a welter of tasteless self-serving advertising (mainly for Trump products and companies) is surely beyond the pale. Just 16% in a Reuters/Ipsos poll thought that the event was appropriate. Even ex-Trump booster and influential blogger Joe Rogan seemed lost for words.

The UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) itself footed the reported $60 million dollar bill for the event, which was nominally in celebration of the USA's upcoming 250th anniversary, but was really for Trump's own 80th birthday. Trump is a big fan of the brutal UFC sport (famously branded by John McCain as "human cockfighting"), and UFC President Dana White is a big fan of Donald Trump. She gave an impassioned speech about how Trump had saved the UFC, notable for its falsification and mendacity (Trump's connection with the organization actually only began in 2016, when he saw it as just another plank of his election strategy).but 

The Event was invitation-only, but there are reports of sponsorship packages (including ring-side seats) selling for $1 million and up. And all this for a piece of vulgar narcissism by a fading president. Oh, yes, and a celebration of America's 250th anniversary.

Kash Patel is the archetypical chud

My new favourite word is "chud", although I confess I have never used it IRL (in real life).

The word "chud" supposedly originates from a cult 1980s sci-fi horror movie C.H.U.D., which in that context stands for Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers, a group of radioactive post-apocalyptic drop-outs. It gradually became used online to describe basement-dwelling internet trolls, gradually broadening its application to any online nerd, creep or jerk.

It's only recently that it had become even more broadly used to describe any unpleasant, boorish or socially inept (almost always male) person. It is particularly used by left wingers to describe those on the far right, particularly those of the MAGA persuasion. Embattled US FBI director Kash Patel recently sued a blogger for calling him a chud.

It should not be confused with the epithet "chad" (or "Chad"), which refers to an alpha male type, usually a strong, handsome and entitled man who effortlessly attracts women, and who is either admired or scorned for their brazen self-confidence.

Neither should it be confused with the Anglicism "chav", which is used for a binge-drinking, bling-wearing lout or boor, although that might work well for Kash Patel too.

I'm OK with Canada's modest AI ambitions

Call me a Luddite, but I can't help but be extremely suspicious of the whole world's reckless infatuation with Artificial Intelligence (AI). I'm not saying the whole world is wrong and I am right - well, actually, I kind of am ... - but I just have this feeling that the level of obsession most people are exhibiting over it can't be healthy, and that we are likely headed down a dark rabbit hole of our own construction.

I can't help but feel that, much like 5G communications, we are adopting a huge, expensive and world-changing technology, just because it's there - because we can - not because we need it. AI adoption, and the number of huge, power-hungry data centres under construction, is not equivalent to economic output, or even productivity, although you'd be forgiven for thinking so from the media attention. 

AI is currently keeping the world's stock exchanges at near record levels, in spite of all the other crap happening in the world, but not for any good logical reasons. Almost all of the big IPOs hitting the stock exchanges are tech related (mainly specifically AI-related). Call it a bubble or whatever other label you prefer. The markets have almost completely decoupled from the economy, and are largely running on the fumes of potential AI profitability. I've seen this movie before; it doesn't end well.

I read so many articles bemoaning Canada's sluggish uptake of AI (here's just one example) compared to our peers. Well, usually compared to the US. 30% of the US's real GDP growth now comes from private investment in IT equipment and software, compared to 5% in Canada, we are told. Data centre construction has increased by 180% in three years in the USA, while Canada doesn't even separate the category out from other spending on transportation, utilities and communications buildings. But is that such a bad thing. Who has it right?

Indeed, there is outright opposition to US-style unregulated expansion of AI data centres (except in US-style unregulated Alberta). Manitoba recently nixed a huge data centre development because, as Premier Wab Kinew explained, "there's a big threat to the environment and not much benefit to.the economy". Well, he's got a point. A similar process played out in Hamilton, Ontario, where the city council voted to pause all data centre development in the area, and most other municipalities in Canada are studying their decision with great interest. Even ultra-conservative Olds, Alberta, is up in arms against data centres, although they're more concerned about local property prices than the environment.

An Angus Reid study suggests that 68% of Canadian would oppose a data centre in theIr own backyard, and only 15% would support it. 

Their main concerns? That they strain local electricity grids and water resources, drive up electricity prices, increase greenhouse gas emissions, generate noise and air pollution, negative affect local property prices, and the more general anxiety about the concentration of wealth and power among tech billionaires and the perception of an AI industry spinning out of control. Valid concerns all.

(For what it's worth, even in the US-style US, the rollout of data centres is meeting with increasing grass-roots push--back, from an unlikely alliance of Democrats, Republicans, environmentalists and just concerned citizens.)

Canada does have many AI data centres, hundreds of them, particularly in Quebec, and many more are being built as we speak. It's not like we have our heads completely in the sand. Do we have enough? Well, how long is a piece of string?

The huge bet south of the border on AI, and the all those data centres it relies on, is just that: a bet. The future gains from AI we keep reading about may not actually unfold as predicted, which would leave states, local governments and electricity payers on the hook for many decades.

Canada, generally speaking, is much more environmentally conscious than the US (despite Mark Carney's efforts to change that), and the environmental footprint of AI data centres has come under increasing scrutiny of late. AI requites massive electricity consumption, high water usage for cooling data centres, and heavy raw material extraction for hardware. It's no surprise that some of the strongest opposition to AI and, on a more local level, data centres is from an environmental perspective.

Another element, though, is the increasing Canadian distrust of AI: trust in AI is significantly lower in Canada than the global average, particularly as regards potential job losses. Data centres are the physical embodiment of AI and its perceived threat to society. That distrust of AI extends to the business community in Canada to some extent, which is investing much less in AI than the US.

Once again, is this necessarily a bad thing (as it is usually portrayed)? Is the helter-skelter scramble in the USA actually the right call? The US may be much more conservative than Canada in most respects, but Canadian business tends to be quite circumspect and risk-averse, and that's not always a bad thing (look at how Canadian banks dealt with the 2008 financial crisis compared the Americans).

Here's another thing. An analysis by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis found that the computer equipment, batteries, switchgear, copper wiring, etc, needed for the US's AI rollout amounted to 23% of all US imports last year, increasing its trade deficit by roughly $200 billion. Canada's AI-related imports, on the other hand, remained pretty much consistent with previous years, and much more manageable.

So, who has it right? History will probably tell, but that doesn't much help today's planners. Mark Carney is making some moves to at least be seen to be doing something on AI, but even his strategy is pretty modest in the scheme of things. And, you know what? I'm OK with that. 

Canada's most important draw ever?

It's kind of pathetic, but kind of cute in a way. All of Canada is celebrating the one point it won agaist lowly Bosnia and Herzegovina in the 2026 World Cup, what is being referred to in some quarters (and only slightly tongue-in-cheek) as "the greatest draw in Canada's history".

In fact, they really should have won, if they had had just a few minutes longer, or if they had had a few more of their best players back from injury. But that's a lot of "ifs". They squandered several good chances, hit the bar, etc.

But the bottom line is, that single point for a 1-1 tie is more than Canada has ever won in its previous two World Cup appearances (1986 and 2022) put together, and the first time they have not actually lost. So, yes, a big deal, I guess, and arguably a boost towards potentially getting out of the group stages for the first time. (Switzerland would be an unlikely victory, but Qatar ought to be beatable.)

Canada as a footballing nation is still in its infancy. In 2023, soccer was still only the fifth most popular sport in Canada, after hockey, basketball, American/Canadian football and baseball. Compare that to most countries in Europe, South America, Africa, where soccer is almost the ONLY sport, and you get an idea of the kind of obstacle Canada is having to surmount.

That said, soccer has been the fastest-growing sport for several years now in Canada, and is now probably the most played team sport in terms of active participation, especially among youth. But this is still a very recent phenomenon, much of it driven by Canada's increasing immigration population.

Anyway, take it for what it is. At the moment, soccer is very much top of mind here in Canada and, in the popular imagination, the sky's the limit. So: Go Canada!

UPDATE

Just a week later, after Canada beat Qatar 6-0 in their second game of World Cup 2026, all the excitement over extracting a single point and scoring a single goal against Bosnia feels like the concerns of a different age. Canada is now confidently looking forward to the prospect of getting out of the group stage and into the knock-out competition proper.

How their aspirations have changed in a week! At this point, everything that happens is a first. The good news is, the pressure is off. Initial objectives of actually scoring a goal and not embarrassing ourselves have been met, and some. From here on, it's all gravy.

The sad natural history of Mauritius

It's weird to find out about it by reading Salman Rushdie's memoirs book Joseph Anton, but I only found out today that the now-extinct dodo was endemic only to the island of Mauritius. Furthermore, the island used to boast a whole slew of other, much less known, flightless or near-flightless birds, all now extinct also.

Mauritius is a speck in the Indian Ocean, about two thousand kilometres off the coast of Africa. The only other places even vaguely close are another speck called Réunion, and a the much larger island of Madagascar. It's the original island paradise - white sand beaches, turquoise lagoons, lush volcanic peaks - but man, is it isolated. 

The seafaring Dutch found it, though, at the end of the 16th century, at which time it was entirely uninhabited but chock-full of endemic birds and animals. By the time the Dutch left, just over a hundred years later, they (and their dogs and imported rats) had managed to kill off almost all of the native species, including the dodo. The French then moved in and established a sugar industry based on slave labour. A century after that, the British moved in to Mauritius and abolished slavery, but brought in hundreds of thousands of indentured workers from India (slavery lite), the descendents of whom still live there today.

So, a sorry history, to be sure. But it was all the extinct flightless birds that intrigued me. The dodo we know about, but Wikipedia has a whole page of links on the extinct animals of Mauritius, many of them flightless or at least flight-challenged birds, like the red rail, the Mauritius sheldgoose, the Mauritius ground thrush, the broad-billed parrot, the Mauritius blue pigeon, the Mauritius scops owl, the Mauritian turtle dove, the Mascarene coot, the Mascarene grey parakeet, etc. 

In addition to flightlessness, or at least poor flight ability, these birds, and many of the other Mauritian animals now extinct, these birds were terminally naive and trusting, having developed with no real predators, and certainly nothing like the rapacious humans now moving into the area.

Imagine being a Dutch explorer back in 1598, arriving on the pristine shores of Mauritius, full of curious ground-based animals and birds. What would you have done? Probably killed as many as possible. We were a pretty savage bunch back then.

Trump's attendance at Knicks game sheer selfishness

New York Knicks fans are saying that Donald Trump's presence at Game 3 of the NBA finals "killed the vibe", "messed up the flow" and generally "jinxed" the team, when he attended the last game against the San Antonio Spurs.

The Knicks were 2-0 up in the series and on a record-breaking 13-game play-off winning streak, when the Spurs beat them 115-111 in Game 3. Trump was heartily booed whenever his image appeared on the jumbotron, despite his own contention that "it was mostly cheers" (it was mostly cheers when he was NOT on the screen). This was New York, after all - not a big Trump town.

Fans were already up in arms after facing enhanced security screening at Madison square Gardens due to Trump's presence, causing waits of over two hours. Even getting to the venue was a nightmare, with many streets cordoned off and barred to vehicles while Trump arrived in his motorcade to boos and signs saying "Nobody wants you here", "Trump must go", and "Impeach. Convict. Remove." Local businesses, hoping to make a healthy profit from a home game, complained that the streets were deserted and takings were down.

And in the end, the Knicks lost, and a record-breaking run came to an end. Make of that what you will.

Trump may be a long-time Knicks fan, but he really didn't have to go to the game. It was sheer selfishness and narcissism. And it backfired, big-time, on any number of levels. 

UPDATE

A wild Game 4 went the Knicks' way too. Trump did not attend. Are you seeing a trend here?