Well, well, well....Whadd'ya know:
So.
What does this mean in terms of the actual politics (as opposed to Cookie Dough Mike giving J. Byrne et al., double middle digits way, way, way up).
Well, if Mr de Jong significantly cuts into the Con vote and peels away a chunk of low info former BC Liberal types...
...Dr. Beer might be jumping' for joy as he hits the phones again.
...In its bankruptcy FAQ, the company said it hopes to "secure a partner who shares in its commitment to customer data privacy."...
...California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a consumer alert last week that residents should "consider invoking their rights and directing 23andMe to delete their data and destroy any samples of genetic material" the company has...
...According to Liberal sources who spoke to The Hill Times last week, if Clark decides to run as a federal Liberal, party officials are considering three potential B.C. ridings for her: Fleetwood-Port Kells, Vancouver Quadra, and Vancouver South. These seats have opened up following announcements from incumbents Ken Hardie, Joyce Murray, and Harjit Sajjan that they will not seek re-election.Senior Liberals are encouraging the former premier to run in Fleetwood-Port Kells, as the other two ridings are considered safe. The Liberals comfortably won the riding—which encompasses parts of Surrey and Greater Vancouver—in the last three elections. It was previously held by Conservative Nina Grewal from 2004 to 2015...
"...Pierre Poilievre is the name of the Canadian conservative party leader and he was miles ahead of, uhhhh, Justin Trudeau but because of the, ahhhhh, of what we see as unjust and unfair tariffs it's actually caused an increase in support for the liberals...And so that's what I fear is that the longer this dispute goes on politicians posture and it seems to be benefitting the liberals right now...So I would hope that we could put things on pause is what I have told (presumably Trump) Administration officials...Let's just put things on pause so we can get through an election...Let's have the best person at the table make the argument for how they would deal with (unintelligable)...And I think that's Pierre Polievre..."
“Don’t tell us what we’re going to feel,” he (Trump) said, raising his voice. “You’re not in a good position. You don’t have the cards right now.”“I’m not playing cards,” Mr. Zelensky replied. “I’m very serious, Mr. President. I’m the president in a war.”
"...Canada are tough traders and I want to tell you, they are tough traders (Trump said). They trade very top. You know, the expression I use is some people don’t have the cards. I use that expression of the week and a half ago, right? Somebody was negotiating the didn’t have the cards now I think is saying he wants to do it. I think we will have a big deal on that very special something and we have to do a deal on that..."
Ruth Ben-Ghiat is a professor of History and Italian Studies at New York University.
She knows a dictator when she sees one, and she explains what fascism is, with specific historical and contemporary examples, in the excellent question and answer video, above.
Ms. Ben-Ghiat also has a really good substack/blog.
Here is a bit from a recent post:
...Trump has worked hard for a decade now to encourage moral collapse among Americans. In 2016, two months after he boasted, "I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters, OK?" Trump raised the issue of changing collective behavior to favor violence and cruelty. "Part of the problem...is nobody wants to hurt each other anymore," he said when security guards treated protesters at a campaign rally too politely for his tastes.
The strongman’s goal is always to make his collaborators descend to his level, and Trump realized that “giving permission” to Republicans to be their worse selves was key to his domestication of the party. He made Republican elites complicit in his criminal efforts to overturn the 2020 election, and then shocked them into submission on Jan. 6 by targeting them for physical harm...
Her stuff is very well worth a follow and I will get it, and a number of other new blogs/sources up on the crawl soon - it's just a bit of a pain these days as I have to dig into the creaky old blogger code to do it.
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The United States has asked Denmark and other European nations if they can export eggs as Americans face surging egg prices, the Nordic country’s egg association said on Friday.
The request from the US Department of Agriculture coincides with a raft of new US tariffs on countries, including in Europe, and the threat of more.
Donald Trump has also threatened economic sanctions unless Denmark hands over control of Greenland to the US, and said this week that he thought the US would eventually annex it – despite its status as an autonomous territory of Denmark, a member of the European Union...
...The iZEV Program was scheduled to pause on March 31, 2025, or once all the available funding has been accessed by Canadians. Canadians will benefit from incentives until Program funds are exhausted...
...(A) single Tesla dealership in Quebec City claimed nearly $20 million in public subsidies by saying it sold more than 4,000 electric vehicles over a single weekend...
{snip}
...Four Tesla dealerships stand out for their timely salesmanship — two in Toronto, one in Vancouver and one in Quebec City. They went from selling several dozen cars per day to as many as 2,500 electric vehicles on the Saturday before the public funding ran dry, according to the data.
Together, the four Tesla dealerships declared sales of 8,600 EVs and were able to claim more than $43 million in rebates over the weekend of Jan. 10-12 — gobbling up more than half of the $71.8 million in program funding that had been remaining on Friday morning.
By Monday, the government informed all dealerships nationwide that its funds had been exhausted and the iZEV rebate program was over....
The State Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services received a letter from the United States Department of Agriculture earlier this month stating it will no longer receive funding for the Local Food Purchase Assistance Program. The nonprofit Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina is one of seven food banks that receives funding through federal programs like this one.
“Our portion of that would have been $2 million,” said Amy Beros, the nonprofit’s CEO. “But statewide, it's an $11 million impact for the food banks across North Carolina.
She said the $2 million in federal funds the nonprofit would have received would go directly to farmers for the purchase of fresh food that’s then distributed across the 34 counties they serve...
...The electric automaker earned $10.7 billion from selling credits created by government climate programs — a total that accounted for a third of Tesla’s profits over the last decade, according to an analysis of securities filings by POLITICO’s E&E News. In the first nine months of 2024, some 43 percent of its net income came from those credits, which Tesla sold to rival carmakers after exceeding climate mandates in California and elsewhere...
She's got an idea about how to move things forward and change the public's view of the toxic drug epidemic.
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"In a world of thieves, the only final sin is stupidity."
A radical makeover at the US department of justice has seen key drives to fight corruption hamstrung in ways that could benefit US businesses operating abroad and foreign kleptocrats, including some Russian oligarchs...
{snip}
...(New US'ian Attorney General Pam) Bondi moved fast on her first day to issue a directive ending “Task Force KleptoCapture”, which had targeted Russian oligarchs with Kremlin links since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, with some notable results.
Last year, the department announced the taskforce had charged more than 70 individuals for “violating international sanctions and export controls levied against Russia”, and some, such as Russian oil and metals multibillionaire Viktor Vekselberg, had their yachts seized...
Peter Stone, The Guardian, March 10, 2015
