Wednesday, March 30, 2022

Mid-Week Post


 

Your middle-of-the-week planting guide ...

 

If one finally realises that this is all about reducing people to an eighteenth century serf existence, then, yes, the math DOES add up:

In 2021, for example, it suddenly raised Canada’s emissions for the base year of 2005 to 739 million tonnes from the 730 million tonnes it reported in 2020, retroactively improving the government’s alleged performance on reducing emissions by 9 million tonnes.

The latest report from the federal Environment Ministry is also now including projected future emission cuts from land use and forestry practices, which it hasn’t done in the past, which isn’t part of its climate modelling, and which comes from a different government ministry — natural resources.

 

Carbon is not a pollutant, by the way. 

 


Justin is Kim Jong-Un and we all know it:

But unlike Mike Pearson, Mr. Trudeau fails to recognize that, if Ottawa is going to propose a new national policy, it must then equip the provinces to carry out that policy, preferably by ceding the necessary tax room, with expanded equalization for provinces that have weaker tax bases. Instead, he prefers the approach of direct federal transfers, with strict conditions attached.

This is both wasteful and hazardous. Wasteful, because provincial governments are the best judges of their priorities. They should not be dictated to by a federal government that – from Indigenous services to defence procurement – has proved itself incompetent in program delivery.

Mr. Trudeau’s heavy-handed approach will only increase resentments, both in Quebec and in the West. And those resentments will grow, when history repeats itself and the federal government reneges on its share of the funding responsibility.

This happened in the last century, when Ottawa cut provincial transfers in order to combat a dangerously high deficit. The deficit is dangerously high again.

 

Pearson got the ball rolling on Canadians' journey to dependence.  

He is why Canadians shiver at the idea of doing anything by themselves and why they abhor grassroots social action and think it foreign.

 

Also - Justin must know that people don't like him:

 

And - Justin openly admired the Chinese dictatorship that had people mowed down in Tienanmen Square and has since offered it interest-free loans, Francois Champagne not only had his mortgages in Chinese banks but refused to thank Taiwan for offering personal protective gear to replace the stuff Justin handed to China and find a Liberal who doesn't end up working for the Chinese in some way.

Now one sees why there will never be any investigation into Chinese ownership of Canadian resources or into slave labour goods:

Canada should launch a full security review for every investment by a state-owned company from an “authoritarian state,” a parliamentary committee says.

On Tuesday, the House of Commons industry committee released its report on the acquisition of Canadian-owned mining company Neo-Lithium by a Chinese enterprise. It said “all investments by state-owned enterprises from authoritarian states” meet the Investment Canada Act’s threshold of potentially being “injurious to national security.”

The committee recommended that the industry minister invoke Section 25.3 of the act — launching a formal national security review — in “all such cases.”

The choice of Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne not to do so over the sale of Neo-Lithium led to controversy in January. Neo-Lithium, which has a lithium mine in Argentina, announced it would be acquired by the Zijin Mining Group in October 2021 for $960 million. The deal closed on Jan. 26.

Lithium is classified as a critical mineral by the Canadian government. It’s significant because it’s used in batteries, which is increasingly important globally as industries such as automakers move toward electrification.

During its study of the acquisition, the Commons committee heard from experts that because the mine is in Argentina, there is no way to make sure the lithium actually ends up in Canada, and the sale might not raise national security concerns — but they also cautioned the acquisition of Neo-Lithium is part of an industrial strategy by China to become dominant in tech manufacturing.

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Federal agents have intercepted just one shipment of suspected slave goods from China since issuing an advisory against suspicious imports more than a year ago. MPs on the Commons foreign affairs committee yesterday expressed astonishment at the low rate of inspections: “I am a bit stunned by that response.”

 

 

Being a Liberal means never having to say one is sorry - ever:

Federal employees have filed more than 7,000 complaints of workplace violence and harassment since Parliament passed an anti-harassment bill, records show. Cabinet four years ago said the bill would curb inappropriate behaviour from sexual violence to Twitter gibes: “It’s going to apply to any activity linked to work.”

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No manager was fired or reassigned for crude bigotry at the Department of Immigration, MPs were told yesterday. Immigration Minister Sean Fraser called racism “a sickness” in his department, explaining Black employees may now attend trauma counselling: “We do know that within the public service and as well within our department these problems do exist.”

 

Because "transparency":

Proposed reforms drawn from We Charity investigations yesterday survived a vote in the Commons ethics committee. Liberal MPs lost a bid to bury a report recommending tougher conflict of interest laws: “Ensure Canadians have a chance to see this.”


 

No one wants to live or breed in Quebec.

As a Quebec native once said - "Let them die":

The federal government has tabled legislation to ensure Quebec does not lose a seat when Canada’s electoral map is redrawn.

It presented a bill Thursday to protect Quebec’s voice in Parliament after it faced losing a seat in an upcoming redistribution based on population.

The bill would prevent Quebec’s number of seats from dropping to 77 from its current tally of 78.

The legislation comes days after a commitment by the Liberal government to protect the number of Commons seats in Quebec in the text of a deal with the NDP.

If approved by Parliament, the bill amending the Constitution Act would make sure that the number of MPs from each province does not drop below the number they had before the last election.

 

It's cheating.

 

 

Because grandmothers need to be trampled by horses! That's why!:

Close to 40 days after the Coastal GasLink (CGL) attack near Houston, BC, resulting in millions of dollars in damage, RCMP has not provided an update on the investigation which it says is “ongoing.”

On February 17, CGL security workers on the Morice River Forest Service Road were rolled on by a masked group of people armed with weapons, including axes, who began setting fires and destroying property. The surveillance cameras had been successfully disabled, however some mobile phone footage was captured.

The incident unfolded just after midnight and RCMP says the group of attackers was roughly 20.

CGL confirms nine workers were attacked, all of whom fled for their lives. None suffered any injuries.

“This coordinated and criminal attack from multiple directions threatened the lives of several workers. In one of the most concerning acts, an attempt was made to set a vehicle on fire while workers were inside,” reads a statement from CGL.

When RCMP officers arrived, they discovered blockages on the road such as downed trees, tar-covered stumps, wire, and boards with spikes protruding. Fires had been lit throughout the debris.

Despite being close enough to officers to hurl smoke bombs and fire-lit sticks, the attackers successfully fled the remote work camp — the only trace of them being a series of makeshift traps, according to RCMP.

Mounties say one officer was injured, although the severity of the reported injury was not disclosed.

The incident dominated public discourse in BC for about a week before fading into the background, and nearly 40 days later RCMP has not said whether or not it has any leads, nor will it say how many officers are assigned to the investigation, however it does confirm “the investigation is active and ongoing.”

 

 

Is it time to ban Easter yet?:


 

MOAR money:

The chief of a First Nation that's searching for unmarked graves at a former residential school in British Columbia says they're looking for long-term funding as they prepare for a visit today by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Chief Willie Sellars from Williams Lake First Nation says his community along with others conducting similar investigations at former government-funded, church-run institutions across Canada need financial support for their work from start to finish.

He says reconciliation starts with a healthy community, and they also need long-term funding to support the mental health and well-being of residential school survivors, their families, and Indigenous communities.

 

When is that report coming out and where will it say how Justin's dad supported residential schools? 

 

 

To be filed under - NOTHING TO BE CONCERNED ABOUT:

A top U.S. diplomat will meet this week in China to discuss issues in Afghanistan with his Chinese, Russian and Pakistani counterparts, the Chinese foreign ministry and the State Department said on Tuesday.

The United States understands that China has invited Taliban representatives to the talks in Tunxi, a State Department spokesperson said.

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China’s oil refiners are discreetly purchasing cheap Russian crude as the nation’s supply continues to seep into the market.

Unlike India’s state-run oil refiners, which have issued a number of tenders seeking to buy Russia’s flagship Urals crude among other grades, traders say China’s state processors are negotiating privately under the radar with sellers. The nation’s independent refiners are also quietly buying, according to traders who asked not to be identified as the information is confidential.

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 The Solomon Islands has signed a policing deal with China and will send a proposal for a broader security agreement covering the military to its cabinet for consideration, an official of the Pacific island nation's government said on Thursday.

The arrangements are likely to concern the United States, which said in February it would open an embassy in the Solomon Islands after senior U.S. administration officials expressed concern China wanted to create military relationships in the Pacific islands.

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The Philippines has filed a diplomatic protest over a Chinese Coast Guard vessel engaging in "close distance maneuvering" that heightened a risk of collision in the disputed South China Sea, Manila's national security adviser said on Tuesday.

It is the latest of more than 200 diplomatic protests that the Southeast Asian country has filed against China, which claims large swathes of the South China Sea and continues to assert its presence in the strategic waterway.

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South Korea's military has said North Korea's largest missile test yet used an older, smaller intercontinental ballistic missile, and not the massive new Hwasong-17 ICBM, in part to try to head off negative domestic reaction to a failed launch.

South Korean and U.S. officials have concluded that the March 24 launch appears to have been a Hwasong-15 ICBM, a defence ministry official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

Washington has not yet publicly weighed in, with Pentagon spokesman John Kirby telling reporters on Tuesday that the test was still being analysed.

North Korea fist test-fired the Hwasong-15 in Nov. 2017, before imposing a moratorium on ICBM testing that ended with last week's launch.

Open-source analysts noted discrepancies in video and photos released by North Korean state media after that launch, saying shadows, weather, and other factors suggested it was from an earlier test, possibly a failed launch on March 16.

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Two Chinese state-owned mining companies plan to destroy an ancient Buddhist city in Afghanistan in order to get the copper underneath it, according to a new documentary

According to the film “Saving Mes Aynak,” Metallurgical Group Corp. (MCC) and Jiangxi Copper are in the initial stages of building an open-pit copper mine 25 miles southeast of Kabul. The location is home to a walled Buddhist city that dates back 5,000 years.

According to the Afghan Ministry of Mines and Petroleum, the site is also home to the world’s second-largest copper deposit. China is an importer of copper and a major global refiner of the industrial metal.

 

 Also:

India signed an agreement to set up hybrid power projects on northern Sri Lankan islands Tuesday in a deal seen as a strategic victory in its competition with China for influence in the Indian Ocean.

India’s External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, who was visiting Colombo, witnessed the signing along with Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Gamini Peiris, the Indian embassy said.

In December, China announced it was suspending its own plan to build power plants on three Sri Lankan islands due to security concerns.

An Indian official said Tuesday he couldn’t confirm if the plants in the new agreement are to be built on the same islands earmarked for the Chinese project. The power source and other details about the projects weren't available.

India considers Sri Lanka, just across the narrow Palk Strait off India's southeastern coast, to be within its sphere of influence. The island nation is in the middle of a key sea route connecting East and West and is important to China’s ambitious “One Belt One Road” global infrastructure initiative.

India and China are rivals for influence in the region and have border disputes that have flared in recent years.

“It is kind of a substantial victory for India,” said Lynn Ockersz a senior journalist and foreign relations analyst in Sri Lanka.

He said it would put India in a position to influence Sri Lanka regarding policy decisions that might affect it.

The cancelled Chinese power plant project would have been near India’s southern coast.

 

 

Be like Poland:

Poland announced steps Wednesday to end all Russian oil imports by year's end, while Germany issued a warning about natural gas levels and called on people to conserve, new signs of how Russia's war in Ukraine has escalated tensions about securing energy supplies to power Europe.

Poland, which has taken in millions of Ukrainian refugees, has taken the lead in the European Union on swiftly cutting off Russian fossil fuels. The 27-nation bloc has declined to sanction energy because it depends on Moscow for the fuel needed for cars, electricity, heating and industry, but it has announced proposals to wean itself off those supplies.

“We are presenting the most radical plan in Europe for departing from Russian oil by the end of this year,” Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said at a news conference.

It comes a day after Poland said it was banning Russian coal imports, expected by May. Morawiecki says Poland will take steps to become “independent” of Russian supplies and is calling on other European Union countries to “walk away” as well. He argues that money paid for Russia’s oil and gas is fueling its war machine.

 

 

Electoral fraud for this:

 

 

Tell me again that this isn't about grooming children:

 

Children don't wake up one day and realise that they are XYZ sexual flavour. Someone tells them that they are.

It's sick.

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Why hasn't this person been plowed with defenses of the Bard?:

Teacher Zahara Chowdhury suggested the Bard, the only compulsory writer on the secondary English curriculum, puts students off literature as they can find the language inaccessible.

Speaking on GB News, she said: “I don’t think Shakespeare should be cancelled, nor should his texts be banned, I don’t think students should hate Shakespeare either.

“...But the accessibility of Shakespeare’s language for a range of students is actually quite difficult and then can form a barrier to students' enjoyment of literature.”

 

First of all, she DOES want Shakespeare banned.

Secondly, all teachers have to do is, well, teach. Believe it or not but Shakespeare is modern English. It CAN be taught.

 

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Tuesday, March 29, 2022

That's Just Sad

A month has passed since blasts woke Ukrainians at 5:07 a.m. on Feb. 24. The sounds of explosions still scare but don’t surprise. Each day since has brought the wail of air-raid sirens, the screech of breaking glass and numbingly frequent moments of silence for the dead.

A month of war with Russia has forced every fourth Ukrainian out of their home. More than 3.6 million have left the country. The conflict has shown that Moscow’s forces fire indiscriminately on civilians in their apartments, businesses, hospitals and schools. It has exposed weaknesses in Vladimir Putin’s military, which seems stunned and disoriented by the month-long fight. And it has focused the world’s attention on the unexpected ferocity and power of ordinary people uniting to defend their homes and nation.

 

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Never Under-Estimate the Power of Spite

These things ... : 

Demonstrators came out again in the nation’s capital on March 26 as a convoy of vehicles from Quebec protesting against COVID-19 mandates drove through downtown Ottawa.

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Among its new insights is that on Jan. 30, the National Capital Region Command Centre (NCRCC) — which pooled municipal, provincial and federal information sharing efforts — expected protesters would leave the city "no later than" Feb. 2.

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Freedom Convoy truckers posed a threat to “social cohesion,” a Department of Public Safety manager testified at the Commons transport committee. Ryan Schwartz, acting director general in the department’s cybersecurity branch, said protesters’ use of the internet was disruptive: ‘It can cascade across social media platforms and be used to incite certain responses.’

 

(Sidebar: oh, that must be why the debutante thinks we are at war with Russia. Commence the deleting!)

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A parliamentary review of cabinet actions against the Freedom Convoy must not delve into cover-ups or concealment of evidence, legislators were told last night. New Democrat MP Matthew Green (Hamilton Centre, Ont.), who supported use of the Emergencies Act against protesters, said the review must be wide-ranging and above board: “The cynicism, the lack of trust, the erosion of faith in our democratic institutions is still very much a topic at hand.”

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Based on evidence given to The Post Millennial, it would appear as though Anglehart is a man with mental health challenges who has been used as a prop by the CBC.

The YouTuber concluded his video by slamming legacy media for their sloppy coverage. "To the CBC and CTV, please start doing some real journalism and some real research so us YouTubers don't need to do it for you."

In the phone interview with The Post Millennial, the YouTuber said Anglehart was kicked out of the protest because he was trying to collect people's personal data and presented his email to people as a way to financially support the convoy. The latter evidence has been reviewed by The Post Millennial.

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The CBC has retracted another false Freedom Convoy story that suggested foreigners played a large role in the protest. The claim was made on a radio broadcast of The World This Hour, self-described as “Canada’s most trusted audio newscast.”

“On February 10 in a report about the protest convoy CBC Radio’s The World This Hour incorrectly said GoFundMe ended a fundraiser for the protesters over questionable donations to the group,” the network said in a statement. No explanation was given.

CBC News at the time claimed to have completed an exclusive analysis of Freedom Convoy donations and found suspicious contributions from foreigners. “The donations identified by CBC News are likely only a fraction of all the donations made by people outside of Canada,” read a February 10 website story headlined “Convoy Protest Received Hundreds Of Donations That Appeared To Be From Abroad.”

“In recent days questions have emerged about how the protesters raised so much money so quickly and where it came from,” said the article. “Before GoFundMe shut down the protest convoy’s crowdfunding page and announced donors would be refunded it had attracted more than 120,000 donations amounting to more than $10 million.”

A second story that same day went further in questioning Freedom Convoy contributions. “An analysis of GoFundMe donations by CBC News has revealed at least one third of them had been made by donors who chose to remain anonymous or who listed names that were obviously fictitious or political commentary.”

Both stories were by Elizabeth Thompson, a CBC reporter who spoke negatively of protesting truckers at a public meeting of the Parliamentary Press Gallery on February 15. “Personally I felt a little uncomfortable because there were all these guys roaming around the street,” said Thompson.

GoFundMe executives in March 3 testimony at the Commons public safety committee confirmed foreigners comprised a small portion of convoy donors, that most contributions were small, and that a check of credit card records found no evidence of involvement by terrorist groups, neo-Nazis or other known criminals. “Our records show 88 percent of donated funds originated in Canada,” said Juan Benitez, president of GoFundMe.

Canada’s top anti-terror financing regulator also described convoy fundraising as harmless. “There were people around the world who were fed up with Covid and were upset and saw the demonstrations,” Barry McKillop, deputy director of the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre, testified February 24 at the Commons finance committee. “I believe they just wanted to support the cause.”

The CBC on February 3 corrected an earlier television story suggesting Russians were behind the Freedom Convoy. Television host Nil Koksal in a January 28 broadcast of Power And Politics claimed “there is concern that Russian actors could be continuing to fuel things as this protest grows or perhaps even instigating it from the outside.”

The claim was false. “A clarification note was added,” the CBC said in a statement.

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... are the reasons for these things:

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If millions of people have seen this on social media, it is no wonder that the petty, vindictive Justin wants to censor everything.


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It Was Never About A Virus

We know that by now:

Dr. Anthony Fauci flagged an article in an email to the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), highlighting portions that said the CDC’s guidance to impose 6-foot social distancing in schools was not based on science.

Fauci, the longtime director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, sent a STAT News op-ed to Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the CDC’s director, on Feb. 20, 2021.

“You probably have already seen this. But just in case, you should be aware of it,” Fauci wrote.

Fauci highlighted several paragraphs from the article, penned by Dr. Vinay Prasad and political science professor Vladimir Kogan, including a line that says the social distancing guidance was “not supported by science.”

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Heart abnormalities were detected in some adolescents months after COVID-19 vaccination, according to a study.

Researchers at Seattle Children’s Hospital reviewed cases of patients younger than 18 who went to the hospital with chest pain and elevated serum troponin levels, two key markers of heart inflammation, within a week of getting a second dose of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine.

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Vaccinated and unvaccinated children aged 5 to 11 years were about equally likely to test positive for COVID-19, according to the past several weeks of data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The rate of COVID-19 cases detected in children aged 5 to 11 was about 122 per 100,000 for the unvaccinated and over 131 per 100,000 for the vaccinated during the week that ended Feb. 19. In the prior week, the rate was 248 and 244 for the unvaccinated and vaccinated, respectively.

The month before, the rate was nearly 1,800 per 100,000 in the unvaccinated and over 1,340 per 100,000 among the vaccinated during the week ended Jan. 15.

While the CDC also tracks COVID-19 deaths among the vaccinated and unvaccinated, the agency omits data for ages 5 to 11 “due to low numbers.”

Young children are at the lowest risk of contracting COVID-19 or suffering severe outcomes. In the week that ended Feb. 19, however, 5- to 11-year-olds had the highest case rate among all the vaccinated age groups, the data shows. The lowest rate was among vaccinated 65- to 79-year-olds: about 86 cases per 100,000.

The CDC didn’t respond by press time to a request by The Epoch Times for an explanation of the case rate among 5- to 11-year-olds.

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A disciplinary hearing against a Calgary chiropractor who treated patients without wearing a mask has become a forum under oath to debate the efficacy of masking to reduce the spread of COVID-19.

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There is limited scientific justification for universal vaccine mandates, two medical experts yesterday told the Commons health committee. The Prime Minister’s dismissal of unvaccinated Canadians as a racist fringe group was uniquely unhelpful, said the president of one medical association: “It was politically driven. It did not help anyone in the health care industry.”

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Strong job growth driven by the so-called “core age” Canadians — those aged 25 to 54 — was dampened by a lagged return to the workforce among youth and older adults.

Comparing the latest StatCan figures to February 2020, unemployment last month was up 8.8 per cent in the 15-24 age group and 5.1 per cent higher for those aged 55 and older.

Economist Brittany Feor with the Labour Market Information Council (LMIC) says it’s too early to declare the pandemic job recovery complete when gaps remain across the board.

“It’s easy to forget that there’s a lot more going on,” she says.

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Informants flooded the Canada Revenue Agency with tips on suspected cheaters who falsely claimed pandemic relief cheques, records show. The volume of tips to the Agency doubled to more than 60,000 last year: “The leads program saw a significant increase.”

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China - the model of efficiency:

China locked down its financial hub of Shanghai on Monday, a city of 26 million people, in an extreme attempt to quell the transmission of COVID.

The snap lockdown, announced by local authorities late on Sunday, included dividing its most populous city in half, mass testing, closing businesses and confining millions of people to their homes.

The zero-tolerance measures are a response to what is largely asymptomatic cases of COVID. They also come at a time when most Western nations are exiting from COVID lockdowns and restrictions and attempting to co-exist with the virus.

Shanghai reported 3,500 cases on Monday, almost all with no or mild symptoms.

President Xi Jinping announced earlier this month that China would stick to its “dynamic zero-COVID strategy,” which aims to stamp out infections and prevent the virus from spreading through communities.

 

By welding people into their apartments.

 

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It's Just Everyday Life

People voted for all of this to happen.

Never forget that:

Over half of Canadians are now driving less as gas prices skyrocket across the country, a new survey says.

The Leger survey, conducted for BNN Bloomberg and insurance comparison company RATESDOTCA, found 54 percent out of roughly 1,500 Canadians surveyed say that are driving less due to mounting gas prices. Another 15 percent say they are planning to adjust their driving patterns.

The drivers’ responses to recent gas price hikes are largely similar across the country in terms of how people are changing their habits, according to John Shmuel, managing editor for RATESDOTCA.

“Clearly, this is having a big impact on the average Canadian,” he told CTV News on March 27.

In British Columbia, where gas prices are typically the highest in the country, drivers are not modifying their habits at a higher rate than in other provinces, though Shmuel noted roughly three-quarters of its residents have already cut back on driving, or are planning to do so.

Among those surveyed in Ontario, 55 percent say they are driving less, while in Alberta, 46 percent say so—the lowest in the country. In Atlantic Canada, up to 70 percent say they are now driving less.

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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told the Canadian oil industry Tuesday that it should use the massive bump in profits from the current surge in prices to fund a transition to cut their emissions.

The federal government unveiled its new emissions-reduction plan to reach its new greenhouse-gas targets by 2030. It projects the oil and gas industry needs to cut emissions 42 per cent from current levels if Canada is to meet its new goals. ...

The report forecasts that emissions from waste, including landfills, can be cut by 43 per cent by 2030, electricity by 77 per cent, heavy industry by 32 per cent, and emissions from buildings by 42 per cent.

 

Did everybody get that? 

And where will one get that lovely power to recharge their electric cars?

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People voted for Trudeau to sue veterans.

Never forget that:

Authorities must prioritize benefits claims by the neediest veterans, says Veterans Ombudsman Colonel (Ret’d) Nishika Jardine. Tens of thousands of former soldiers, sailors and air crew remain on waiting lists for disability benefits.

“Understand who is the person applying for this benefit,” said Jardine: “Does this person have a family doctor? Is this person in financial difficulty? Do they have access to the public service health care plan?”

The Department of Veterans Affairs in 2021 counted a backlog of 41,541 claims from veterans citing disability as a result of service. Wait times for the initial review of first-time applications averaged more than 300 days. Petitions for reassessments averaged another 140 days, with 340 days for further review.

“Which veterans need a decision faster than other veterans?” Ombudsman Jardine told the Commons veterans affairs committee. “A veteran who has a full pension, access to the public service health care plan and has secured a second job after they have left the Canadian Armed Forces may not need that decision as quickly as the veteran who does not have a pension, who cannot qualify for public service health care, doesn’t have access to rehabilitation programs but was broken by the Canadian Armed Forces and has walked out the door with their little baggie of three months’ worth of medications for a condition that is related to their service, and they have to wait.”

Jardine noted the department did prioritize veterans over 80 or those who “self-identify as having a life threatening condition” but made few other attempts to prioritize claims according to need. “It is the thing that disturbs me the most and it is the reason for my comments,” said Jardine. “We can get lost in the statistics and the numbers and how many weeks and how long.”

Veterans Affairs Minister Lawrence MacAulay on Friday told the Commons his department was doing its best. “We recognize more needs to be done,” said MacAulay, who earlier remarked that veterans’ paperwork was so onerous “I mightn’t be great at it myself.”

“You know this difficulty,” MacAulay testified at 2020 hearings of the veterans affairs committee. “You know about filling out forms. I mightn’t be great at it myself.”

“But the thing is you need the people that know how to fill out the forms,” said MacAulay. “The problem that you have with the forms is there’s something missing, something vitally important that could be missing, and you have to make sure that it is all there.”

Conservative MP Frank Caputo (Kamloops-Thompson, B.C.) told the committee Friday that claimants “are all veterans who have unique circumstances.” Proposals to ease the backlog date back five years.

“You can’t really tell a check box on a form that you are broken, and conversely a check box on a form can’t see that you’re broken,” said MP Caputo. “That’s one of the biggest problems I really see with this.”

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I'll believe it when I see it:

Conservative leadership candidate Pierre Poilievre promises to ban all overseas oil imports within five years of being elected prime minister while also removing government red tape he says hampers the construction of a west-to-east pipeline.

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Government Waste and You

Who would have thought that putting a snowboard instructor could wreck the economy?: 

The size of governments in Canada increased enormously during the COVID-19 pandemic, but even before that, the size of the federal government and almost all provincial governments had already grown beyond the optimal point to benefit citizens, a new study says.

“It’s important to understand just how much governments across Canada have grown in recent years, and what impact that might have on our economic recovery moving forward,” said study co-author Alex Whalen, a policy analyst at the Fraser Institute, in a March 17 release.

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That is a $1675 middle finger to Canadians.

Had this been any other country, a revolution would have broken out.

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Look what a war in Ukraine can do:

The Canadian government has chosen the F-35 as its preferred replacement for the air force's four-decade-old CF-18 fighters and will open negotiations with the stealth jet's manufacturer, Lockheed Martin.

It won't happen.

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Canada could face problems buying the specialized steel needed for its new $7-billion polar icebreakers, further driving up costs for taxpayers.

The polar-class icebreaker project was originally supposed to cost $1.3 billion for the construction of one vessel. Two icebreakers will now be built, but the cost has skyrocketed to an estimated $7.25 billion.

One of the top problems now facing shipbuilders is obtaining the special hardened steel needed for the icebreakers. In a response to questions from the House of Commons, the Canadian Coast Guard outlined the top 10 risks associated with the icebreaker project. Number one was listed as “Challenges sourcing specialized EH50 steel, which may impact cost, schedule and scope” of the project.

Other issues involved the type of helicopter that would operate from the vessels, the capacity of shipyards to do the work and potential design changes. All could contribute to boosting the project’s cost even further.

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Investment in oil projects peaked in 2014 and is now at only half that level despite the oil price having fully recovered since then. This investment-risk aversion, combined with the rise of environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) investing, numerous divestment initiatives, restrictive access to bank lending, and combative energy policy decisions, such as the passage of Bill C-69 in Canada and the ending of the Keystone XL pipeline in the U.S., have all served to perpetuate chronic underinvestment in new projects, resulting in structural barriers to oil production growth. 

Further, given still depressed trading multiples, with the average Canadian energy stock trading at only 2.6x its enterprise value to cash flow at US$100 WTI, a significant discount to historical averages of near 7x, as well as trading at a fraction of reserve values, global energy investors are insisting that excess free cash flow go towards share buybacks rather than growth.

Given all of this, it is easy to understand the hesitancy of companies to suddenly expand capital expenditures, especially given the request to do so is coming from the same people who only a few years ago tweeted that oil executives should be thrown in jail due to climate crimes or, more recently, have threatened industry with windfall profit taxes. 

 

(Sidebar: the Western provinces building nuclear reactors sounds quite reasonable right about now.)


Also - why, it's like there is a demand all of a sudden:

Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson says his government has assured European allies that Canadian energy producers will be able to boost crude oil exports by around five per cent this year to help ease tight oil markets rocked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — but the increase won’t come at the expense of Canada’s climate goals.

 

We wouldn't want that to happen, would we?

** 

The latest findings from the Parliamentary Budget Officer are fuelling arguments that the federal price on carbon is an economic burden for families — and could only increase in years to come.

According to a report released on Thursday, PBO Yves Giroux concluded that most households in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario will see a “net loss” resulting from federal carbon pricing in 2030. By then, the carbon levy will have increased to reach $170 a tonne.

“The moment you decide to decarbonize the economy in a relatively short period of time — and we’re talking here less than 10 years to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions — it’s clear that there is going to be a cost,” said Giroux in an interview with the National Post.

As the carbon pricing increases, lower income households should continue to receive rebates, but middle-class and upper-class households should be expecting to pay hundreds, if not thousands according to the PBO, depending on their carbon consumption.

In Alberta, the PBO expects that lowest-income households could expect to receive up to $246 back in their pockets this year, but highest-income households can expect to pay up to $1,925. In the end, Albertans will end up paying $507 per household on average.

In 2030, the PBO calculated that these same households in Alberta could be receiving $660 or paying up to $7,402. The net loss on average would be $2,282 per household.

** 

Parliament should raise taxes on real estate investors and use the money to subsidize affordable homes, the Commons finance committee was told yesterday. The submission by an ex-Toronto city planner follows disclosures CMHC identified the number of Canadians who own second properties: “We know Canada’s housing system is broken.”

**

Quarantine hotel rooms for cross-border travelers cost taxpayers up to $139 a night, according to records. The Public Health Agency as late as February was contracting for thousands of hotel rooms every month: “This is not a success story.”

**

The next time some dolt complains that the Americans are obscenely wealthy, remind them what sycophancy and idiocy get you in this country:

The Ontario sunshine list for 2021 has revealed that Sudbury’s chief medical officer of health made $800,726 last year – the ninth-highest public-sector salary in the province, and more than twice as much as any other city’s top doctor.

Dr. Penny Sutcliffe also collected $7,629 in taxable benefits, as shown by the annual list of all provincial employees earning more than $100k.

The 244,000 employees on the sunshine list represent nearly a 20% spike from the approximately 205,000 in 2020. According to the province, 95% of that growth is in the education sector, with teachers’ salaries accounting for almost all of it (92%).

Despite Sudbury being only the sixteenth-largest city in Ontario by population, Sutcliffe’s taxpayer-funded income dramatically outshone those of Ontario’s other top doctors, including provincial chief medical health officer, Dr. Kieran Moore.

Moore appeared twice on the list, making $235,314 for his work as Ontario’s top doctor as well as another $225,709 for serving Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox and Addington before June 2021. Combined, Moore’s take of $461,023 represented less than 60% of Sutcliffe’s $0.8 million.

** 

The number of Ontario teachers on the Sunshine List more than doubled last year.

Publicly-funded elementary and secondary school teachers earning $100,000 a year or more reached 65,581 in 2021, up by 35,606 from the previous year, according to an analysis obtained by the Toronto Sun.

Over 92% of the growth in the annual Sunshine List this year was attributed to teachers entering the six-figure club.

The highest paid teacher in the province worked for the Simcoe County District Board, pulling in $216,559 in 2021.

Two employees with the Toronto District School Board also made the top 10 list for teachers — elementary teachers who made $182,516 and $170,681.

Earnings are usually made up of salary and taxable benefits, although sometimes may include severance or similar settlements.

**

Wrong.

They were caused by bureaucracies:

Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos says the federal government will commit another $2 billion to help provincial health systems work through their surgical and diagnostic backlogs caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
**

Ontario is dedicating $800,000 to Indigenous health-care teams to help people experiencing trauma as a result of the residential school system.

The government says the money will go to eight Indigenous Primary Health Care Council member organizations to enhance the delivery of culture-based mental health and addictions care.

The funding could be used to hire mental-health specialists, such as psychiatrists, social workers and wellness workers, or for training and education, or to develop models of traditional healing such as sweat lodge ceremonies.

 


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But ... Doctors and Engineers

They brought their hands with them:

More than a third of government-assisted refugees remain on welfare a decade after landing in Canada, analysts with Statistics Canada said yesterday. Higher welfare rates followed landmark 2001 changes to immigration law: “It marked a major policy shift.”

 

Why stay?: 

Canadians are packing up and leaving at a fast rate, during a traditionally slow period. Statistics Canada (Stat Can) data shows emigration, the act of leaving permanently, jumped in 2021. The past year showed modest gains, rising to the highest level in half a decade. The fourth quarter is what sticks out though, showing a sudden acceleration. Canada saw the largest Q4 volumes of residents leaving since the 1970s.



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They Belong In a Museum

But why think rationally?:

Marie-Anne Day Walker-Pelletier sat down in a taxi as she left a private tour of the Vatican Museums and fell deep into thought.

“We are in 2022 and our history is being stored and shown in other countries where nobody understands,” the retired chief of Okanese First Nation in Saskatchewan pondered out loud Tuesday.

“Those items, those artifacts, those are ours. Those belong in our communities. They belong to people. They belong to generations.”

 

Which is why people have museums in the first place.

These items were donated to the Vatican Museum (which houses art and artifacts from several countries and civilisations). Where would they be housed and be of use and benefit if not in a museum?

But, please - take these items. ALL OF THEM. Let them be lost somewhere and let future generations never hear of the tribes now spelled with numerals. 

One cannot talk sense to the irrational.

 


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Never Under-estimate the Power of Spite

 It’s not enough to arrest the little people.

One must go full-Beria: 

Ontario MPP Randy Hillier has been released with conditions after being criminally charged in relation to his participation in the ‘Freedom Convoy’ occupation of downtown Ottawa.



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Stupid Debutante B!#ch

 

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Wednesday, March 23, 2022

Mid-Week Post


 

Your middle-of-the-week buoy in an ocean tossed ...

 

 

To wit:

Blah blah blah “strong middle class” blah blah blah “economic growth and climate action” blah blah blah “child care affordability, better health care and continued reconciliation with Indigenous peoples.” To hear it, you’d think Canadians gave his party a majority.

 

How much money do you have to print for this stuff?:

A promised federal dentacare program will cost about $4.6 billion a year by 2025, according to Parliamentary Budget Office figures. Introduction of free dentistry for 6.5 million people is among terms of a vote swap between Liberal and New Democrat MPs: “The New Democratic Party is basically the government.”
**

The prospects for a significant increase in Canadian defence spending in the coming federal budget looked a little less likely as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was set to head to Europe after announcing a stunning political deal with the New Democrats.

 

(Sidebar: the laughing-stock is currently stinking things up in Brussels.)

 

It's not like Justin et al were going to spend the money that they are supposed to on home defense or NATO.

Like the useless debutante (not Joly this time) who gets her wealthy boyfriend to pay for everything, she will sit pretty until her boyfriend (the US) realises that he can do better.


Also - it's just money:

The Canada Revenue Agency paid millions in wage subsidies to insolvent companies, data show. Revenue Minister Diane Lebouthillier in a report to Parliament would not disclose total costs of subsidies paid to failing firms: ‘It is due to confidentiality provisions of the Income Tax Act.’


Because "transparency".

**

The organization is apologizing for the problems uncovered by an independent third-party review, which found that Pride Toronto could not prove it completed several proposed projects after receiving $1.85 million in federal grants.

Pride Toronto, which organizes the city’s annual Pride Parade, says it hired KPMG in October 2021 to undertake a “grant compliance review” of three grants received in 2018 and 2019 following allegations that the use and reporting of those funds “negatively impacted” the Indigenous community.

It says it also asked the accounting firm to provide recommendations to ensure Pride Toronto’s processes “meet the highest standards” going forward.

 

To recap: an organisation that thinks sexual deviancy is an achievement wasted public money and did not give a kickback to Big Aboriginal but promises to keep this public spectacle alive by doing better.

What that means, I dare not guess.

 

 

If you have to pay people to like you, then they don't like you:

Federal departments and agencies last year spent more than $600,000 on payments to tweeters, bloggers and other social media influencers, records show. Local celebrities including a CBC-TV Dragons’ Den personality were hired to praise government’s work: “Communication is a fast-paced environment.”

 

Oh, that might be why no one outside of Canada likes Justin.

Or, IN Canada, for that matter. 



Okay, who did you vote for?:

Surging inflation has a growing number of Canadians concerned they won’t be able to stretch their dollars far enough to keep food on the table, according to the latest polling from Ipsos.

In a survey conducted exclusively for Global News from March 11-16, Ipsos found that six in 10 Canadians say they are concerned they might not have enough money to feed their families.

That figure is up 16 percentage points from a similar poll conducted in November, when the annual rate of inflation stood at 4.7 per cent.

**

 

The economy didn't fail because of truckers or because of Ukraine.

It failed because Canadians who traded away their freedoms for comfort voted in the worst sort of person for prime minister.

And time and time and time again their faith was rewarded with errors so colossal that one must conclude that Justin has brain damage.

This country is finished and Canadians helped finish it.

Bravo.



Never under-estimate the power of spite:

A Canadian pastor who was arrested and jailed for holding a prayer service for the trucker’s convoy that protested in Ottawa last month remains incarcerated.

Pastor Artur Pawlowski has been in jail since Feb. 9. He was denied bail on Feb. 19 and is currently being held in solitary confinement at the Calgary Remand Center, his son Nathan Pawlowski told The Epoch Times.

** 

The video shows numerous MPs including, notably, the leader of the New Democrat Party, Jagmeet Singh, who frequently touted both debunked points to justify his party's "reluctant" support of the Act's invoking.

Ottawa Police wrote in a news release on Monday that "There is no information indicating that" Connor Russell McDonald, 21, of Ottawa was involved "in any way with the Convoy protest which was going on when this arson took place."

McDonald has been charged with:

  • Arson Causing Property Damage
  • Mischief to Property Endangering Life
  • Mischief to Property
  • Possess Incendiary Material
  • Arson Disregard for Human Life



The institution too big to fail is seeing more burn-out from doctors it didn't fire:

Preliminary data from a national survey of doctors in Canada has revealed a concerning trend about the health of those who take care of Canadians.

A survey of 4,000 physicians and medical learners, also known as residents, done by the Canadian Medical Association in November 2021 showed 53 per cent have experienced “high levels” of burnout, compared to only 30 per cent four years before.

And nearly half — or 46 per cent — of doctors are considering reducing their work in clinics in the next two years.

 

 

They know that the Pope won't give them cash, right?

Pope Francis will meet representatives of Canada’s native peoples this month to listen to their concerns following the discovery of bodies of children buried in church-run schools in Canada, the Vatican said on Wednesday.

 

By the way, where is that report? 



The blackbox of the doomed China Eastern flight has been found:

Investigators sifting through the wreckage of the China Eastern Airlines Corp. jetliner that slammed into a hillside two days ago have located the cockpit recorder, one of two flight recorders on board.

The two separate devices, typically referred to as black boxes even though they’re painted distinctive orange to make them easier to see, can store audio recordings from the cockpit and data on hundreds of flight parameters — from speed and altitude to flap positioning and heading — that help investigators recreate the final fateful moments before a crash.

Analyzing the boxes is key to discovering why the Boeing Co. 737-800NG jet plunged out of the sky at close to the speed of sound before slamming into a hillside. The pilots didn’t respond to calls from air-traffic controllers after the plane tipped into its nosedive, authorities said.

While the aircraft’s particularly violent descent that resulted in total destruction of the jetliner and the presumed death of all 132 people on board, the devices — about the size of a large shoe box — are designed to withstand even the worst impacts. They can also function while submerged, emitting an ultrasonic pinging signal.

The cockpit voice recorder, or CVR, stores conversations between the pilots, their communications with ground-control personnel, and ambient sounds such as engine noise or cockpit sounds. The device typically stores only the last two hours of conversation, providing a narrower data set than the second box: the flight-data recorder, or FDR. This contains no sound recordings but stores the main parameters from at least 25 hours of flight time, allowing for a more technical readout of the aircraft’s performance.

 


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Tuesday, March 22, 2022

And the Rest of It

Shocking:

No survivors have been found as the search continued Tuesday of the scattered wreckage of a China Eastern plane carrying 132 people that crashed a day earlier in a forested mountainous area in China’s worst air disaster in a decade.

“Wreckage of the plane was found at the scene, but up until now, none of those aboard the plane with whom contact was lost have been found,” state broadcaster CCTV said Tuesday morning, more than 18 hours after the crash.

The Boeing 737-800 crashed near the city of Wuzhou in the Guangxi region while flying from Kunming in the southwestern province of Yunnan to the industrial center of Guangzhou along the east coast. It ignited a fire big enough to be seen on NASA satellite images.

China Eastern Flight 5735 was traveling 455 knots (523 mph, 842 kph) at around 29,000 feet when it entered a steep and fast dive around 2:20 p.m. local time, according to data from flight-tracking website FlightRadar24.com. The plane plunged to 7,400 feet before briefly regaining about 1,200 feel in altitude, then dove again. The plane stopped transmitting data 96 seconds after starting to fall.

 

 

To be fair, if I was being peppered with shrapnel, the last thing that I would want is a jab that could kill me:

Only about a third of Ukrainians have been vaccinated against Corona, in part with vaccines that are unapproved in the EU. The low vaccination rate could cause problems in the refugee centres. The city of Nürnberg, for example, has set up three gymnasiums to accommodate 600 people, where many must share a small space. …

Anyone who wants to can receive a vaccination a few hundred metres away ... free of charge for Ukrainian refugees.

“Unfortunately, we’re finding that the refugees aren’t exactly snatching the vaccines out of our hands,” says Nürnberg Mayor Marcus König.

“Many new arrivals are very worried about ‘forced vaccinations’,” adds Thomas Jung, Mayor of Fürth. He says you have to approach the topic with sensitivity. …

 

Also - who do you think you are? Trudeau?:

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky announced a measure that bans 11 opposition political parties, alleging they have ties to Russia, he announced in a Telegram video posted on March 20.

“Any activity of politicians aimed at splitting or collaborating will not succeed,” he said.

 

And - saucer of milk for the Kremlin:

In a blistering social media post, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, now a top Kremlin security adviser, lashed out at Poland for its support of Ukraine, reviving and escalating decades-long tensions between Moscow and Warsaw.

Poland’s surprisingly spirited defense of Ukraine would prove “expensive and pointless,” Medvedev predicted, ominously adding that he was confident that Warsaw would “make the right choice” and embrace Russia again.

 

 

Hidden from view:

The corpses of Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine are being moved from Belarus back to Russia by train and planes in the dead of night to avoid attracting attention, it has emerged.

Video posted by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty shows military ambulances driving through the Belarusian city of Homel in early March, with employees at the region’s clinical hospital claiming more than 2,500 bodies have already been shipped back to Russia as of March 13.

Ukraine’s military says that more than 14,000 Kremlin troops have been killed since the Russian invasion on February 24, while one US intelligence estimate has put the number at around 7,000. Moscow’s Defence Ministry says that less than 500 soldiers have been killed.

Now Belarusian medical staff in Homel, in southeastern Belarus, have described ‘overflowing’ morgues, with one resident of the city Mazyr claiming: ‘Passengers at the Mazyr train station were shocked by the number of corpses being loaded on the train. After people started shooting video, the military caught them and ordered them to remove it.’

A doctor at Mazyr’s main city hospital warned: ‘There are not enough surgeons. Earlier, the corpses were transported by ambulances and loaded on Russian trains. After someone made a video about it and it went on the Internet, the bodies were loaded at night so as not to attract attention.’

Officials at Hospital No4 in Homel are alleged to have begun discharging current patients on March 1 because of the sheer number of wounded Russian soldiers to treat.

One resident who was treated in the hospital said: ‘There are so many wounded Russians there – it’s just a horror. Terribly disfigured. It is impossible to listen to their moans throughout the whole hospital.’

 

 

Do live in fear with one's garment of social piety:

In medicine, and science more generally, the best evidence comes from experiment. In medicine, our experiments are called randomized control trials (RCTs.)

Of course, important information can sometimes be gleaned from statistical investigations of what has happened naturally, (we call these studies observational rather than experimental) but these are prone to bias and subsequent contradiction. Is it that flossing your teeth halves the risk of heart disease? Or is it that people who don’t floss have other habits that cause heart disease? For decades, the question was argued in medical journals and the popular news media. Experiments show no link, and so the skeptics are validated.

Conversely, it was first determined that cigarettes cause cancer by looking at rates of lung cancer in non-smokers versus smokers. A famous 1950 BMJ paper showed that doctors who smoke were ten to thirty times more likely to die of lung cancer than those who do not. However, it took subsequent animal experimentation to convince the public of the link. It would be unethical to experimentally subject humans to cigarette smoke, but we now have experiments of smoking cessation that show reduced lung cancer in humans. The link has been found to hold at every level of scientific evidence; there really is no room for skepticism.

Overwhelmingly, the skeptics who wait for randomized trials before believing in a medical intervention have been proven right more often. It is only in situations, as with cigarettes, where the correlation is very strong and very dire where I would be tempted to believe otherwise.

A massive RCT of masking called the DANMASK trial investigated the question of whether a person could prevent themselves from getting COVID by wearing a mask in public. It did not show an effect. The study was heavily criticized because it only looked at the personal health effects of personally masking. It did not look at the community-wide effects of asking a whole community to mask.

There have been many observational studies of community masking on COVID-19 transmission in humans. Sadly, after two years of pandemic, there has only been one RCT. The study was performed by researchers from Yale and Stanford in Bangladesh. Fortunately for us, it was monumental in scope, randomizing 300 villages to intensive community masking promotion and 300 villages to the status quo.

The rate of proper mask wearing more than tripled (from 13 to 42 per cent) in the villages randomly assigned to intensive promotion. A total of 340,000 people were studied. We need to take the results very seriously.

They found little to no effect on COVID-19 transmission from the use of cloth masks. They found a small benefit, 11 per cent decrease in transmission, from the use of surgical masks. Surgical masks prevented Covid cases in adults over 50 but showed little effect in adults under 50.

The authors do allow that with universal masking there could have been a greater reduction in transmission, but that doesn’t detract from the fact that cloth masks were of almost no benefit and that where surgical masks were used, age was the determining factor.

 

 

To be filed under- WHAT CAN POSSIBLY GO WRONG?:

Decriminalizing heroin and other street drugs is no answer to preventing deaths, Addictions Minister Dr. Carolyn Bennett said yesterday. Legalization of marijuana did not stop users from buying on the black market, said Bennett: “Decriminalization still means people go to the street to get their drugs.”

 

It is not about personal freedom but personal license.

This is what we pay for.

 

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