What are you doing New Year's Eve?
No, really?
Probably not travelling anywhere:
Quebec Liberal member Pierre Arcand is vacationing with his wife in the Caribbean despite warnings from the federal and provincial governments to stay home during the pandemic.
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Toronto Mayor John Tory came to the defence of Ontario Finance Minister Rod Phillips, who was found to be vacationing in the Caribbean while the rest of the province remained in lockdown.
News broke of Phillips' vacation on Monday, resulting in Premier Doug Ford asking Phillips to return to Canada immediately. Phillips also issued an apology saying he "deeply regrets" travelling "over the holidays."
(Sidebar: @$$holes of a feather ...)
Some people are "special".
Also:
Today, Dec. 30, 2020, is the one-year anniversary of the first major official communication by Chinese officials. Doctors had begun receiving patients sick with something new and aggressive at the start of the month, and one year ago today was the day that the local public health officials in Wuhan sent a memo to everyone in their unit, warning them to be alert and report additional cases of an aggressive pneumonia with an unknown cause. Symptoms were described. Links among patients to the Wuhan seafood market are noted.
This China and this virus:
Deep in the lush mountain valleys of southern China lies the entrance to a mine shaft that once harbored bats with the closest known relative of the COVID-19 virus.
The area is of intense scientific interest because it may hold clues to the origins of the coronavirus that has killed more than 1.7 million people worldwide. Yet for scientists and journalists, it has become a black hole of no information because of political sensitivity and secrecy.
A bat research team visiting recently managed to take samples but had them confiscated, two people familiar with the matter said. Specialists in coronaviruses have been ordered not to speak to the press. And a team of Associated Press journalists was tailed by plainclothes police in multiple cars who blocked access to roads and sites in late November.
More than a year since the first known person was infected with the coronavirus, an AP investigation shows the Chinese government is strictly controlling all research into its origins, clamping down on some while actively promoting fringe theories that it could have come from outside China.
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On December 21, Dr. Hinshaw tweeted that "there are currently 760 people in hospital with 149 people in ICU" but she omits the highly relevant facts that Alberta has over 8,300 hospital beds, and that Alberta's total ICU capacity is more than 1,000. Failing to include these relevant facts in her tweets is misleading.
More significantly, Dr. Hinshaw's tweets suggest that it's unusual for hospitals to be overrun by patients, when in fact "hallway medicine" has been a sad-but-common feature of Canadian health care for many years. Politicians have refused for decades to address the gross mismanagement of health care dollars by an unresponsive and utterly unaccountable government monopoly. Pretending that hospital over-crowding is a new phenomenon caused by COVID-19 is misleading.
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There is no way this could have been done this past February because reasons:
The federal government says it plans to require air travellers to test negative for COVID-19 before landing in Canada.
I'll believe it when I see it.
Happy New Year, Canada. Enjoy the decline:
Come Jan. 1, Canada Pension Plan contributions are going up again, although higher than originally planned. The reason is largely because of the pandemic’s effect on the labour market, which has some groups noting the impact will be felt by some workers more than others.
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The Trudeau government has been unacceptably opaque in its handling of the national purse, several former senior Finance officials say, a concern that reflects deeper disagreements in Ottawa between the public service and the Liberal government’s lofty spending plans.
People knew what Harper and his government were going to do.
And he certainly didn't dish out money to his family and friends like some families named Trudeau that one could mention.
Canadian Immigration Minister Marco Mendicino this month exempted five of those asylum seekers from the border restrictions, according to Kate Webster, their Toronto-based lawyer. Another application is pending. That means they will be allowed to enter Canada, if the United States releases them.
Someone has to replace all of those old people the government is letting die of the coronavirus.
This must be embarrassing:
Donald Trump has ended Barack Obama’s 12-year run as most admired man in Gallup’s annual poll, having tied with the former president in 2019.
Did Americans like being unemployed under Obama?
Curiouser and curiouser, as was said:
Sixteen months before Anthony Quinn Warner's RV exploded in downtown Nashville on Christmas morning, officers visited his Tennessee home after his girlfriend reported he was making bombs in the vehicle, according to documents obtained by The Tennessean, part of the USA TODAY Network.
Japan, why on Earth would you want to trade with a country that hates you? Why?:
Over 40% of Japanese companies the government recognizes as possessing sensitive technology linked to security are considering, or have already started, shifting their manufacturing bases and sources of parts supplies from China in a bid to diversify their supply chains, a Kyodo News survey found Tuesday.
The move to reduce their reliance on Beijing and mitigate security risks comes in response to rising U.S.-China competition over technological supremacy and concerns about potential concentration of medical production in China amid a shortage of medical supplies propelled by the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Forty-two companies, or 44%, of 96 respondents said they have diversified or are considering diversifying their supply chains by moving to India and Southeast Asian countries, according to the survey.
Kyodo recently surveyed some 150 major listed companies, of which 96 responded. The respondents include Canon Inc., Toyota Motor Corp., KDDI Corp., NEC Corp., Kobe Steel Ltd. and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd.
Only three respondents said they have or will downsize operations or withdraw from China, signaling the importance of the world’s second-largest economy to many Japanese companies.
Arm Nigerian Christians. What choice does anyone have?:
Bishop Chikwe, the auxiliary bishop of Owerri archdiocese, was kidnapped by unidentified gunmen on the evening of Sunday, Dec. 27, in Owerri, the capital of Imo State in southeastern Nigeria.
The website of the Nigerian newspaper The Sun reported that the bishop was kidnapped “alongside his driver in his official car” and that the vehicle “was later returned to Assumpta roundabout, while the occupants were believed to have been taken to an unknown destination.”
Archbishop Obinna told Vatican News Dec. 29 that the 53-year-old bishop was kidnapped as he was returning from a visit to his residence.
“Kidnapping has, of course, been going on in Nigeria, in different parts of Nigeria. That it has happened to my auxiliary bishop shows that the security situation in Nigeria is very bad,” he said.
At some point, countries will have to face others and justify their actions.
Some actions may be lamentable but necessary while some may be wholly benign. Others are unconscionable and ultimately disastrous.
This will be no different:
According to a November 2020 survey carried by independent pollster Giacobbe & Asociados, 60% of Argentinians opposed the law, while only 26.7% were in favor. But the law, one of the most permissive in the world and with no parallel in the region, was strongly supported by the media, TV personalities, and influencers.
“This law that has been voted will further deepen the divisions in our country”, said the Bishops‘ statement. “We deeply regret the remoteness of the leadership from the people’s feelings, which has been expressed in various ways in favor of life throughout our country.” Argentina saw indeed the largest pro-life peaceful marches in its history, but were mostly ignored by the local press.
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