And the Rest of It

Yep:

Australia's ambassador to China was denied entry to a heavily guarded Beijing court on Thursday that is hearing an espionage case against Australian blogger Yang Hengjun, at a time of worsening ties between the two nations.

China said the case involved state secrets and so could not be heard in open court. Yang, an Australian citizen born in China, wrote about Chinese and U.S. politics online as a high-profile blogger and also penned a series of spy novels before his detention two years ago.

 

Of course! That's why China is clamping down on everyone! 

Why? Because. That's why:

Conservative MPs Shannon Stubbs and Marty Morantz pressed Liberal Minister for Foreign Affairs Marc Garneau on the matter Tuesday, to which Garneau admitted that "Iran had failed to be open and accountable for the actions they committed against flight PS752," once again falling short of condemning the IRGC.

 

There. Are. Rules.

But they only apply to a few:

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh is apologizing after a video obtained by Global News shows him breaking COVID-19 restrictions and spending unmasked time in close quarters with an individual who is not from his household.

**

It’s anything but quiet on the set these days in Canada. Diligent (and expensive) adherence to health and safety protocol has film and television production surging during the virus’s persistent third wave, and with low reports of COVID-19 incidents.

Since it reopened last summer, the industry has operated full tilt. “I can tell you we’ve rebounded since we reopened last summer and we are hitting historic highs in terms of productions,” said John Lewis, international vice-president and director of Canadian affairs with International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE).

The numbers back up Lewis’s declaration. Gross wages for film technicians in British Columbia, for example, have jumped nearly $4-million during the first quarter of 2021, compared with the corresponding prepandemic figure from 2019.

In Ontario, according to the Directors Guild of Canada, there are 87 major productions happening in the province at the moment – a big number that doesn’t take into account documentaries, unscripted series and commercials.

And in Toronto? Film star Jason Momoa has been a one-man industry.

The reason for Momoa’s heavy workload is that he’s cast in the Netflix fantasy-adventure feature Slumberland and the Apple TV series See, both filmed in Toronto. The explanation as to why filming in Canada is booming and allowed to flourish by governments while other sectors of the economy are locked down and desperately struggling is more complicated.

 

There i$ nothing complicated about the$e double $tandard$. 

Could it be that locking people down for a Chinese-spread virus with an over ninety percent survivability rate is a bad idea?:

The measles virus can rip through a population much faster than COVID-19, and experience shows that 95 per cent of the population needs to be vaccinated to protect everyone.

At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic early last year, the thinking among scientists was that herd immunity could come if 60 per cent of the population achieved immunity through infection or vaccination. That number is gradually creeping up, with 75 per cent to 85 per cent now being touted as the required level.

 

It's not about health and it never was. 

As long as one can morally posture, slavery doesn't matter:

The lawsuit says, "There is no question that defendants have specific knowledge that the cobalt mined in DRC they use in their various products includes cobalt that was produced by children working under extremely hazardous conditions, that serious mining accidents are common due to the primitive conditions and complete lack of safety precautions in the mines, and that hundreds, if not thousands, of children have been maimed or killed to produce the cobalt needed for the world's modern tech gadgets produced by defendants and other companies."