'The blob': Scientists confirm discovery of a completely new undersea species
Devika Desai 

Deep in the dark, murky waters of our oceans, a gelatinous blob, shaped like a dislodged human molar, floats along the seabed.

© Provided by National Post

 Meet Duobrachium sparksae – a strange, gelatinous species of ctenophore, encountered during a dive off the coast of Puerto Rico.

Thanks to its love for extreme depths and remote oceanic corners, no one had ever seen the blob, or even knew it existed, until a team of scientists accidentally discovered it during a deep-sea dive off the coast of Puerto Rico in 2015, with help from an underwater, remotely-operated vehicle called ‘Deep Discover.’

Five years on, in a paper published this month, scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have confirmed that the blob is an entirely new species of undersea creature, Duobrachium sparksae – a never-before-seen species of jelly-like ctenophore. It’s also the first time that researchers have discovered a species using high-definition video footage only.

“It’s unique because we were able to describe a new species based entirely on high-definition video,” explained NOAA marine biologist Allen Collins in a release.

“We don’t have the same microscopes as we would in a lab, but the video can give us enough information to understand the morphology in detail, such as the location of their reproductive parts and other aspects.”

Ctenophores, also known as comb jellies, have bulbous, balloon-like bodies, from which protrude two tentacle-like strings, known as cilia. There are between 100 and 150 species of comb jellies, according to the NOAA, and despite their name, they are not at all related to jellyfish. Ctenophores, the group explains, are carnivorous, and many are highly efficient predators that eat small arthropods and many kinds of larvae.

Three different specimens were filmed by the vehicle at depths around 3,900 metres, in an underwater area called the Arecibo Amphitheater, which lies within a trench known as the Guajataca Canyon, off Puerto Rico. One of the animals appeared to use its tentacles to touch the seabed, scientists said.

“It was a beautiful and unique organism,” oceanographer Mike Ford was quoted as saying in a release.

“It moved like a hot air balloon attached to the seafloor on two lines, maintaining a specific altitude above the seafloor. Whether it’s attached to the seabed, we’re not sure. We did not observe direct attachment during the dive, but it seems like the organism touches the seafloor.”

Identifying a new species solely via photographic and video evidence has often yielded contentious results, the scientists explained in their paper, as natural classification “relies heavily” on the physical specimen samples preserved in museums “to serve as references to which other material can be compared.”

“Indeed, the idea of using photographic evidence to establish new species has been highly contentious in recent decades.”

In this case, however, the team was able to avoid any pushback due to the high-definition quality of the footage they recorded of the three observed specimens. The team hopes to collect real-life specimens on future dives, but fears it may be decades before they run into the species again.

“Even if we had the equipment, there would have been very little time to process the animal because gelatinous animals don’t preserve very well,” Collins said.

“Ctenophores are even worse than jellyfish in this regard.”

Tory MPs keep talking on assisted dying bill as clock ticks down to Dec. 18 deadline

TORIES TELL CANADIANS THEY DON'T TRUST THEM TO BE ABLE TO KNOW WHEN TO END THEIR LIFE

OTTAWA — Conservative MPs are refusing to be rushed into a vote on assisted dying legislation, despite a looming court-imposed deadline.

© Provided by The Canadian Press 

COVIDIOT TORIES NOT WEARING MASKS

The Liberal minority government has until Dec. 18 to pass Bill C-7, legislation intended to comply with a Quebec Superior Court ruling that struck down a provision allowing only individuals who are already near death to receive medical help to end their suffering.

The government had hoped to wrap up debate on the bill in the House of Commons on Monday, paving the way for a final vote Tuesday and leaving just over two weeks for the Senate to deal with it before time runs out.

But Conservative MPs talked out the clock, with a number of them calling the deadline "artificial" and the urgency "manufactured."

The government is expected to rejig its agenda to resume debate on the bill on Wednesday and could yet try to impose time allocation to cut the debate off, a move that would require the support of at least one opposition party.

A spokeswoman for Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole was unable to say how many more Tory MPs still want to speak on the bill but, given that it literally involves a matter of life and death, she said anyone "who wants to speak to the bill is free to do so."

The bill would drop the proviso that only those whose natural death is reasonably foreseeable are entitled to seek medical assistance in dying (MAID). But it would retain the foreseeable death concept to set up two different eligibility tracks, one that makes it easier for those near death to receive MAID while those who are not near death would face more restrictive criteria.

Conservatives were the only MPs to give speeches during debate on the bill Monday and all but one of them — Toronto MP Peter Kent — were opposed to it. All of them, including Kent, slammed the government for rushing the bill through the Commons without adequate consultation.

They argued that the government should have appealed the Quebec court ruling to the Supreme Court and should not be making changes to Canada's MAID law until Parliament conducts the legally-mandated five-year review of the law.

That review was to have started in June but has been delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Conservative MPs noted that the government further delayed matters by proroguing Parliament in August for six weeks.

"Why rush to pass this flawed legislation when it truly is a matter of life and death?" asked Ontario Conservative MP Michael Barrett.

"We do many things in this place quickly but we can certainly agree that this step too far is not one that needs to be done in such a hasty way."

At one point, Liberal MP Kevin Lamoureux, parliamentary secretary to the government House leader, asked if it was the Conservatives' intention "to see us continuing to debate this indefinitely."

"It is very clear this legislation was rushed through to try to comply with an arbitrary date that was set by that lower court judge," retorted British Columbia Conservative MP Ed Fast.

"This deserves a full airing and review at the highest court of the land and, sadly, the current Liberal government refused to do that for Canadians."

Alberta Conservative MP Damien Kurek said he finds it "troubling that they seem to have manufactured a level of urgency."

Justice Minister David Lametti has said the court ruling striking down the foreseeable death requirement applies technically only in Quebec. Thus, if the government does not meet the deadline, which has already been extended twice, he has warned that intolerably suffering Quebecers who are not near death will have access to MAID while those in the rest of the country will not.

Among other things, Conservative MPs complained that Bill C-7 goes well beyond the court ruling, relaxing some of the rules for those near death to receive MAID. And, in expanding MAID to those who are not near death, they argued that the government is telling Canadians with disabilities that their lives are not worth living.

The Conservatives proposed a number of amendments when the bill was scrutinized by the Commons justice committee but they were all rejected.

They are reviving two of them for consideration by the House of Commons.

One would restore the required 10-day reflection period, which the bill proposes dropping for people who are near death. The other would increase the proposed 90-day period for assessing requests for MAID from individuals not near death to 120 days.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 1, 2020.

Joan Bryden, The Canadian Press

FCC Chief Who Ended Net Neutrality Says He’ll Quit Jan. 20
Todd Shields

(Bloomberg) -- U.S. Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai said he’ll leave the agency Jan. 20, eliminating the possibility of a holdover Republican majority at the agency that could have temporarily stymied changes sought by the incoming Biden administration.

© Bloomberg Under Ajit Pai the FCC in 2017 revoked so-called net neutrality rules put in place by the Obama administration that barred broadband service providers from interfering with web traffic.

Since being elevated to the chairmanship by President Donald Trump in 2017, Pai, a Republican, has led the commission in dismantling net neutrality regulations and pushed for fast wireless broadband service.

Pai’s term as a commissioner extends to July 2021 and he could have stayed on as a commissioner, without the chairman’s power to set the agency’s agenda, but has opted not to.

With another Republican leaving after his term expired, the FCC will have a 2-to-1 Democratic majority on Inauguration Day unless the Senate confirms Nathan Simington, a Republican whose nomination is to be considered Dec. 2 by the Commerce Committee.

Simington has backed Trump’s bid to rein in social media companies, and it’s not clear he has enough support among senators to succeed. If he is confirmed, Pai would have three Republican votes until he leaves. After that the agency would be left to operate under a Democratic chair, but at a 2-to-2 partisan deadlock, until a Biden nominee is confirmed.

Under Pai the FCC in 2017 revoked so-called net neutrality rules put in place by the Obama administration that barred broadband service providers from interfering with web traffic -- for instance by slowing competitors’ content.

Pai’s change gutted the FCC’s authority over internet service providers. It was welcomed by carriers such as AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc.

Since the vote, Pai has pointed to increased broadband availability as vindication. Critics have cited competing data and insisted rules are needed. The debate is likely to continue into the term of President-elect Joe Biden.

Pai pressed to assign more airwaves for high-speed mobile broadband. The FCC sold airwaves in an auction that attracted more than $4 billion in bidding that concluded in August, and has scheduled a sale for December.

Pai, 47, promised “light-touch” regulation, and he used his time in office to reduce FCC rules. He has been a member of the five-person commission since 2012.

DR.QUISLING
Public health must balance science and society: former top doctor

EDMONTON — A retired top doctor says public health orders have to balance science with society if they are to be effective.

©Provided by The Canadian Press

"(Measures) will only work if you have a majority of the population that supports it," said Andre Corriveau, who was Alberta's chief medical officer of health from 2009 to 2012.

"You can't pass measures that a majority of the public is not supportive of, because it's not enforceable."

 BULLSHIT PEOPLE OBEY THE LAW PERIOD ONLY A MINORITY DO NOT AND THATS WHY THEY GET FINED

Corriveau, speaking from Iqaluit, Nunavut, where he was advising that territory on how to deal with its COVID-19 cases, spoke after recordings were released that appeared to show Alberta's current chief medical officer of health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, expressing concern about politicians watering down her recommendations.

That just goes with the job, said Corriveau, who also served until last year as the top public health official in the Northwest Territories.

Experts such as himself or Hinshaw are responsible for winnowing through scientific evidence — often thin on the ground or hot off the research presses — to come up with the best advice they can. But, said Corriveau, judging what's acceptable or how something should be implemented is a political decision.

"There's a point beyond which you can't enforce any more," he said. "That's the role of the politician — to gauge that."

Nor is it appropriate for the chief health officer to advocate for measures not approved by the government, said Corriveau. The two sides have to trust each other and undercutting political decisions would damage that.

"There's always other people who can advocate," Corriveau said.

"Our effectiveness is built upon trust. If you turn around and you're doing public advocacy, then you've lost the trust and you're not effective any more."

Alberta has plenty of other voices for that, he said.

Doctors in the Edmonton zone recently formed a group to provide what they see as unbiased, arm's-length COVID-19 advice. Members of the Edmonton Zone Medical Staff Association felt people were losing trust in officials.

"There's many considerations when you make these decisions — health ones, economic ones, capacity of hospitals," said association president Dr. Ernst Schuster. "There was a feeling that the political considerations were stronger than some other considerations."

The committee is to hold its first meeting Tuesday.

The legal powers of a chief medical officer of health are delegated by the minister and may not be absolute, Corriveau said.

Hindsight is easy, he noted, and added that everyone involved in the fight against the pandemic is doing it for the first time.

Corriveau said he ran into situations where the final decision diverged from his advice, but he saw it as his job to make it work.  THE BANALITY OF EVIL HE WAS JUST FOLLOWING ORDERS

"It's a fine line to travel but I think it can be done.

"It's not necessarily ideal, but I understand the context and why at the political level they might have decided otherwise."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 1, 2020.

— Follow @row1960 on Twitter

Bob Weber, The Canadian Press

QUISLING a traitor who collaborates with an enemy force occupying their country.

How South Asian American socialists are helping lead the left


When Zohran Mamdani, a housing foreclosure counselor, became one of the first two South Asians elected to the New York state Assembly this month, he felt pride — but also anger.

© Provided by NBC News

Claire Wang 

“It’s both an extremely exciting feeling and an extremely infuriating one,” said Mamdani, an Indian Ugandan immigrant set to represent the Queens neighborhood of Astoria. Given that South Asians have lived in the city for more than a century, he said, the milestone is an “indictment of a political system that has not only ignored the South Asian community but actively worked to erase it.”

The 29-year-old decided to run for office to better serve the people who he said have been “left behind on the basis of their race and class.” This cohort includes many of his low-income South Asian and Indo-Carribean clients at Chhaya, a housing and social services organization.

“My job as a counselor was to put people’s lives back together after they’ve been broken into a million pieces by the multiple failures of capitalism,” he said. “Being a legislator comes with the opportunity to ensure people’s lives are not torn apart in the first place.”

In addition to public housing and single-payer health care, Mamdani said he’ll also advocate for causes specific to South Asian constituents, such as solving the taxi medallion loan crisis, expanding language access and advocating for making Diwali a school holiday.

Mamdani is one of three South Asian members of the Democratic Socialists of America who won historic down-ballot races earlier this month. In Pennsylvania, former magazine editor Nikil Saval became the first Asian American elected to the state Senate. And in Los Angeles, urban planner Nithya Raman will be the first Asian American women elected to city council. As first-time Democratic Socialists of America-endorsed candidates, they unseated Democratic incumbents while espousing progressive policies such as "Medicare for All," the Green New Deal and defunding the police.

Their wins point to the growing prominence of young South Asians on the left, many of whom, in the past half-decade, have transitioned from community activism to electoral politics.

“These candidates are successful not only because of the work they’ve done in South Asian communities,” Abdullah Younus, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America's national leadership body, said, “but also because the issues that they’re campaigning on — around housing, education and climate — cut across age divides and diaspora divides.”

Compared to East Asian and Latin American immigrants, the term “socialism” tends to hold less stigma among many South Asians, particularly those from India, since their home country has not had extended periods of communist or socialist rule, said Sangay Mishra, an assistant professor of political science at Drew University in New Jersey and the author of “Desis Divided: The Political Lives of South Asian Americans.”

While the explicit embrace of socialism is a more recent phenomenon, he said, South Asian Americans have long participated in progressive activism, working alongside Black civil rights leaders in the 1960s to desegregate schools and organizing taxi drivers in the 1990s against unfair regulations and rampant racism. (Shyamala Gopalan, the mother of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, was an active participant in the mid-century civil rights movement.)

The inflection point, though, was 9/11.

“In the last 20 years, we’ve seen more South Asian groups engaging with the targeting of Muslims,” he said, noting that pervasive racial profiling and bigotry propelled many young people to public service. “You came to terms with the fact that you’re likely to face hostility even if you live a comfortable life,” he said.

Saval, who’s set to represent a highly diverse district in south Philadelphia, said it was partly this shattering of the model minority myth that pushed him toward socialism.

“A notion that’s prevalent in the South Asian community is that if you work very hard, your talents will help guarantee you a place on the class ladder,” said Saval, 37, who secured the endorsement of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., before his primary contest.

He said he grew up with a deep faith in meritocracy only to learn through lived experiences that it offers little protection against exploitation, and no guarantee of social mobility. When he was working in the publishing industry in New York, he saw his employer doling out multimillion-dollar book contracts while paying him a salary that barely covered his rent.

This year wasn’t the first time South Asian socialists found success in local elections. In 2013, Kshama Sawant, an Indian immigrant and member of the Socialist Alternative party, became the first socialist in a century to win a citywide race in Seattle when she was elected to the city council.

Young South Asians have since risen to the forefront of the progressive and democratic socialist movements, not just as candidates but also as campaign strategists and thinkers.

Bhaskar Sunkara founded Jacobin Magazine, one of the country’s leading socialist publications. Saikat Chakrabarti co-founded Justice Democrats, a political action committee that recruits progressives, including some democratic socialists, to run for office; he later served as chief of staff for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., who is a member of Democratic Socialists of America. And Faiz Shakir served as campaign manager for the country’s best-known democratic socialist, Sanders, becoming the first Muslim and first Pakistani American to assume the role for a major party’s presidential primary candidate.

Progressive Congress members Ro Khanna, D-Calif., and Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., who won their seats in 2016, are also emblematic of a burgeoning South Asian presence in left-wing electoral politics. Though neither identifies as a democratic socialist, Khanna, the national co-chair of Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign, and Jayapal, the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, both have connections to the movement.

Some South Asian Democratic Socialists of America candidates pitched long-shot bids this year, and even in defeat, they’re laying the groundwork for the future.

Fatima Iqbal-Zubair, 38, a member of Democratic Socialists of America and a public school teacher, ran for a seat in the California State Assembly from a district in South Los Angeles. A win would have made the Sri Lankan immigrant the first Muslim and South Asian woman elected to the lower chamber.

With endorsements from the Democratic Socialists of America and Sanders, she campaigned on an ambitious climate platform, but lost in the general election to another Democrat. She's already gearing up for another run in 2022.

And in Georgia, Nabilah Islam ran for Congress, seeking to become the first nonwhite representative from a district that’s one of the most racially diverse county in the Southeast and has one of the fastest growing South Asian populations in the country. The 30-year old, who was backed by the Metro Atlanta chapter of Democratic Socialists of America, said her politics, such as support for single-payer health care, are heavily influenced by her upbringing as a daughter of working-class Bangladeshi immigrants.

Her mother broke her back from working grueling hours at the warehouse — an outcome that could have been prevented with stronger labor laws, she said. And like a quarter of the residents of Gwinnett County, where she lives, she was uninsured when she ran for office this year.

“I know what it’s like to watch your mom and dad struggle to pay the bills,” she said.

The novelty of her campaign, Islam said, was one reason she came up short in the primary, despite winning endorsements from Khanna, Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez.

“There’s a myth of electability,” she said. “When I launched my campaign, I was a 29-year-old, first-generation Bangladeshi immigrant. Even though I was born and raised here, it wasn’t enough for a lot of folks because they had never seen anyone like me succeed before.”

Artist or aliens? Mystery surrounds Utah monolith's appearance and disappearance

A quiet canyon in Utah's Red Rock country has sent the world's imagination into overdrive.

© Provided by NBC News

Members of the Utah Department of Public Safety's Aero Bureau were assisting Wildlife Resources in a routine count of bighorn sheep on Nov. 18 when they spotted the monolith — a tall, metallic reflective structure that clearly had been placed there.

But the question was: by whom?

The Public Safety Department admitted that it didn't know who — or what — installed the monolith, and it wouldn't even tell the public where, exactly, in the large and remote southeastern corner of the state the structure stood.

The public's first guess: aliens, of course. Theories and jokes abounded. Ones that only grew stronger after the federal Bureau of Land Management said Saturday that the monolith had suddenly disappeared. In its place was a pile of rocks, appearing to commemorate the vanished structure.

"#WhereDidItComeFrom #WhereDidItGo," the San Juan County Sheriff's Office wrote on Facebook.
Aliens?

Pilot Bret Hutchings said that when one of his officers spotted the monolith, it felt like a scene right out of the Stanley Kubrick classic "2001: A Space Odyssey."

"He was like, 'Whoa, whoa, whoa, turn around, turn around!' And I was like, 'What?' And he's like, 'There's this thing back there — we've got to go look at it!'" Hutchings told NBC affiliate KSL of Salt Lake City. "We just happened to fly directly over the top of it."

Immediately, people started making alien jokes, and when the monolith disappeared, the jokes didn't.

The alien gag become so popular that CNN even ran a headline saying, "The Utah monolith probably wasn't the work of aliens," implying a small chance that extraterrestrials had, indeed, placed it there.

And in its post about the disappearance, the sheriff's department poked fun at the alien theories, posting a collage of aliens from movies on Facebook and asking residents whether "you recognize anyone from the lineup provided as being in the area of the strange structure on the night of November 27th."

But while the monolith was still in the canyon, a more plausible theory was developing.
Art?

Hutchings, the pilot, acknowledged that the silver monolith appeared to be some sort of "new wave" art installation, and quickly, people began to wonder which one.

© Utah Department of Public Safety Image: Metal monolith in Utah

 (Utah Department of Public Safety)

One theory posited that the monolith was a work by Petecia Le Fawnhawk, a Southwestern artist who used to live and work in Utah. Le Fawnhawk has previously installed sculptures in the desert, but she told Artnet News that while she "did have the thought to plant secret monuments in the desert," she "cannot claim this one."

Others, including The Art Newspaper, said it immediately scanned the monolith as the work of the sculpture artist John McCracken, who died in 2011 and lived in New Mexico.

David Zwirner, whose gallery represented McCracken and showed his work, originally said he believed the structure to be McCracken's, but has since changed his mind.

“I love the idea of this being John’s work, but when you look closely at the photos of the Utah monolith, you will see rivets and screws that are not consistent with how John wanted his work to be constructed," Zwirner said in a statement. "He was a perfectionist. While I know that this is not John’s work, I also know that he would have enjoyed the Utah location and would have greatly appreciated the mystery surrounding this work. We all think it is a wonderful homage.”

A spokesperson for the state Public Safety Department said the monolith is clearly "somebody's art installation, or an attempt at that."

Ross Bernards, an adventure photographer, had another explanation for the missing monolith when he said he visited the installation on Friday.

In a photo series posted on Instagram on Monday, Bernards said four men, who appeared to come out of nowhere, disassembled the monolith and departed with its broken parts in a wheel barrow at about 9 p.m.

In one of the photos allegedly taken at the scene, three individuals with headlights can be seen with the monolith lying flat on the ground.

Bernards said he did not stop the group of men because he said he believed "they were right to take it out."

The last few words Bernards heard? "Leave no trace."

And yet, mystery also surrounds just how long the sculpture has been in the remote, rarely trafficked corner of Utah. The public safety spokesperson said it may have been there since the 1940s or the 1950s.

A user on Reddit, who goes by a name too profane to publish, claimed to have found the exact location of the sculpture through satellite images and terrain analysis. Based on the analysis, some believe it wasn't placed in the canyon until after McCracken died.

And just as interest in the monolith seemed to be plateauing, another — perhaps a copycat — was discovered in Romania — the second monolith of what could be many more to come.

© Provided by NBC News IMAGE: Metal monolith in Utah

 (Kelsea Dockham / Canyon State Overland)

Ethicists debate whether anti-mask protestors should forfeit COVID-19 medical care

THE MAJORITY ARE ANTI-VAXXERS

Sharon Kirkey POSTMEDIA DEC.1,20200

© Provided by National Post An anti-mask demonstration in Canmore, Alta., on Sunday, November 29, 2020. Ethicists disagree on whether people who flout public health measures should accept prompt care should they contract the virus. I WILL POINT OUT THEY ARE OUTSIDE IN THE FRESH AIR AND ARE SOCIALLY DISTANT, 

THEIR SIGNS ON THE OTHER HAND SHOW THEM AS TYPICAL COVIDIOTS

This past weekend, hundreds of Albertans rallied against masking orders, demonstrators gathered outside a house in Montreal’s posh Westmount neighbourhood they thought, mistakenly, belonged to Quebec’s premier, while in Ontario, police and bylaw officers saw to an illegal, 60-person party at a Mississauga Airbnb. Some guests fled as police arrived, 27 others were slapped with $880 fines, and the hosts issued summons carrying minimum $10,000 fines.

“These antics,” tweeted Peel deputy police chief Marc Andrews, “help no one.”

Given all that, some ethicists have argued that people who flout or publicly protest pandemic public health measures should willingly forfeit medical care in favour of those who play by the rules, should hospital resources become strained. An average of 2,111 people with COVID-19 were being treated in Canadian hospitals each day during the past week.

“We’re not saying don’t treat,” Arthur Caplan, founder of the division of medical ethics at NYU School of Medicine said Monday. “We’re saying, if you’re going to run around and claim exemption to endorsed and established behavioural policy, you should volunteer, if you get sick, to go to the end of the line.”

Others contend that a person’s political ideals should have no bearing on who should get care ahead of others.

In an opinion piece published earlier this year, an opinion he still holds, Caplan, along with his co-authors, argued that while most people are diligently and heroically adhering to public health asks, thousands of others haven’t fully grasped the gravity of the situation, or believe the economic consequences of stay-at-home orders disproportionately outweigh the health benefits.

'Thou shalt not kill:' Manitoba premier quotes Bible to anti-mask protesters

Addressing anti-mask protests poses a challenge for leaders, experts say

In Canada, demonstrators have argued that appeals and orders to mask or limit social gatherings violate their Charter rights, including freedom of peaceful assembly and freedom of association.

But Caplan said there are no free-for-alls in a “plague,” and that a threat to others justifies limitations on individual civil liberties. “Doctors have a long-standing obligation to treat everyone regardless of sin,” Caplan said. “We have an ethic of trying to treat all comers in medicine, and that’s good.” However, should people willfully engage in behaviours known to potentially harm others, “then if you get sick, I think you have an obligation to think about saying, ‘let others go before me, because I wasn’t responsible,” he said. “If you are a real believer in liberty, then you have to say, ‘I’ll pay the price.’”

Healthcare isn’t rationed for people who smoke cigarettes, but smoking is a self-harm behaviour, Caplan said. “It generally hurts you, but not others. If you’re obese, generally it’s harming yourself. If you are not controlling your blood pressure, same thing.” The scarcity of donor organs sometimes requires giving lower priority to people unable to control harm to themselves, he said.

“If you were just running around hugging yourself and you made yourself sick, OK. But if you run around not wearing a mask and hugging other people, or assaulting people by going mask-less and standing close, then you’re really harming others.”

At a minimum, protesters should sign a pledge stating that they are willing to forgo medical care should emergency rooms or intensive care units become saturated — in the name of their political beliefs, Caplan and his co-authors wrote. “Patrick Henry’s famous proclamation, carried by many protestors, is ‘give me liberty or give me death,’ not ‘give me liberty and if that doesn’t work out so well give me a scarce ventilator.'”

Vaccines are a different matter, Caplan said, “because if you get vaccinated, you may stop infecting other people.”

“I think the thing that motives people to not wear a mask, to go where they want to go, oddly enough that’s what a vaccine will let them do,” Caplan said. While some have mused that pandemic protesters might be more likely to reject vaccines, “I think it’s more consistent with what the anti-mask, anti-social distancing, anti-quarantine crowd wants,” Caplan said — “as soon as they understand they can get on a plane or go on a cruise if they get vaccinated, I think they’ll shift their attitudes.”

 

© Graham Hughes/The Canadian Press/File 

People protest against measures taken by public health authorities to curb the spread of COVID-19, in Montreal, Saturday, November 28, 2020.

While he has a great amount of respect for Caplan, McGill University’s Daniel Weinstock couldn’t disagree more with the assertion protesters should forfeit their right to care before others.

A basic principle in medical ethics, particularly in a country like Canada, is that “you get medical care, if and when you need it, and need is really the only criterion that we should use,” said Weinstock, a professor of law and the Katherine A. Pearson chair in civil society and public policy.

There absolutely should be sanctions visited upon people who break laws, Weinstock said, including criminal sanctions for criminal acts. A 30-year-old man was charged with assault last week after an employee at a Dawson Creek, B.C. Walmart was attacked and repeatedly punched after he requested that a shopper wear a mask. Masks are required by B.C. government order, and are mandatory in all Walmart stores across the country. “Certainly that assault on the Walmart employee would seem to qualify, but that doesn’t disqualify them from receiving care,” Weinstock said.

“I think everybody is kind of operating at a level of anxiety and fear that has polarized societies,” Weinstock said, but someone has to be the adult in the room. “Even though it might be tempting when seeing people flouting common sense public health directives to say, ‘you guys, back of the line’ … I think it really behooves the medical establishment to look beyond the crisis,” he said.

“We’re all going to have to live in society together and avoid any acts that may exacerbate polarizations or fractures in society.”

It’s also a principle of biomedical ethics that people have full information, but the pandemic has seen an unprecedented glut of misinformation and disinformation, “and I don’t think the consequences of that should be laid” at the feet of protestors, Weinstock said.

In exceptional times, people can become locked into messages thrown at them from all corners, but offer a way of rationalizing their denial, Weinstein said. “I don’t think we want to make matters worse by making them pay the price for what is a much broader set of problems.”

People also need to be sensitive to the frustrations, the COVID exhaustion and small businesses struggling with government-ordered closures, like a Toronto area barbeque house that last week brazenly beached lockdown rules to serve dine-in customers. “I can just imagine the level of despair people are feeling,” said Montreal critical care physician Dr. Peter Goldberg. “Absolute despair.”

“One of the great things about a vaccine is that at least people see there may be a end to this despair — ‘I can get hopefully through the next three months, or the next five months.’ We think there is actually a finite end.”

• Email: skirkey@postmedia.com | Twitter: sharon_kirkey

SCOTUS skeptical of plan to block undocumented immigrants from census count

Several Supreme Court justices on Monday questioned the legality of a last-ditch attempt by the outgoing Trump administration to exclude undocumented immigrants from the federal count used to award states seats in Congress and the Electoral College.

© Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg via Getty Images 

The conservative-leaning high court heard more than 80 minutes of oral arguments on the legal challenges against President Trump's effort to remove immigrants living in the U.S. without authorization from the decennial census count that dictates redistricting for the House of Representatives.

"A lot of the historical evidence and longstanding practice really cuts against your position," Justice Amy Coney Barrett, the newest addition to the bench, told the government attorney arguing the administration's case.

The U.S. government has always counted most of the country's residents, including non-citizens without legal status, for the purposes of allocating congressional seats. The 14th Amendment requires House seats to be awarded after the government counts "the whole number of persons in each State." The constitutionally mandated process occurs every 10 years following the census.

In July, arguing that "persons" was not strictly defined in the 14th Amendment, Mr. Trump said that it would be U.S. policy to exclude immigrants who lack "lawful immigration status" from calculations that determine how many House districts each state should have. His presidential directive instructed Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who administers the Census Bureau, to provide him information following the 2020 Census that would allow him to do this.

Justice Stephen Breyer, a liberal who was appointed by Democratic President Bill Clinton, on Monday called the legal argument that undocumented immigrants should be counted for congressional apportionment "fairly strong."

"They are persons, aren't they?" Breyer asked acting solicitor general Jeff Wall, the lawyer representing the Trump administration in the suit, known as Trump v. New York.

Barrett, who is Mr. Trump's third appointment to the high court, reminded Wall of the unprecedented nature of the change sought by the administration, and posed the example of an undocumented immigrant who has lived in the U.S. for 20 years. "Why would … such a person not have a settled residency here?" she asked Wall.

Wall responded by saying that the U.S. has previously excluded foreign diplomats living in the country on a long-term basis from the apportionment count. "I'm not disputing at all that illegal aliens form ties to the community in the sense you are talking about, but they're not the sort of ties that are sufficient to qualify you within the apportionment base," he said.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, appointed by President Barack Obama in 2009, said that immigrants detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — whom the Trump administration has said would likely be excluded from the apportionment count under its proposal — could be eligible to stay in the country through asylum or other forms of immigration relief.

"I'm not sure how you can identify any class of immigrant that isn't living here in its traditional sense," Sotomayor told Wall. "This is where they are."

Members of the high court's conservative majority and liberal wing pressed Wall on the practical feasibility of the Trump administration excluding the nation's estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants from the redistricting count. The Commerce Department has a December 31 deadline to provide the president a tabulation of each state's population. The president is then required by federal law to submit a statement to Congress that would be used to redraw House districts.

Census count puts Montana in a unique spot

Justice Samuel Alito, nominated to the bench by Republican President George W. Bush, called it a "monumental task."

Under questioning by Alito, Wall conceded that it was "very unlikely" that the Census Bureau would be able to identify and remove all unauthorized immigrants from the apportionment calculations.

Three federal courts have already ruled against Mr. Trump's planned changes to the census. In September, a three-member panel of federal judges in New York said the proposal violates federal laws that govern the redrawing of congressional seats and the census count, though they did not weigh in on its constitutionality.

Last week, however, another panel of federal judges in Washington, D.C. dismissed a fourth challenge against Mr. Trump's effort, saying the case was not yet "ripe for review" given the uncertainty surrounding which undocumented immigrants would be removed from the redistricting count.

Several conservative justices, including Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Mr. Trump's second appointment to the Supreme Court, on Monday weighed the possibility of the high court taking a similar approach and ruling after the administration decided which immigrants to exclude.

"The key point, I think, is that [Mr. Trump's] memorandum imposes no obligations on the plaintiffs to do anything at this point, unlike for example, a typical agency regulation," Kavanaugh said. "We call that a lack of ripeness."

If Mr. Trump's plan is enacted, California, Texas and Florida, states with large immigrant communities, could end up with one fewer House district than they would have been given under the current calculations, according to an analysis by the non-partisan Pew Research Center. Conversely, some states like Alabama and Ohio with less undocumented residents would gain a congressional seat that they would've otherwise not secured.

The Justice Department has argued that the impact of Mr. Trump's proposal on certain states potentially losing or gaining House seats is unclear, since he has yet to determine which classes of immigrants to exclude from the apportionment figures. The number of ICE detainees, the population Mr. Trump is most likely to exclude, stands at 16,075, according to government figures.

However, Justice Elena Kagan, an appointee of Mr. Obama, noted that the government also has records on hundreds of thousands of immigrants with final deportation orders or in removal proceedings, and of more than 640,000 recipients of the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. While DACA offers works permits and protection from deportation, it does not legalize the status of its recipients, who remain undocumented.

Chief Justice John Roberts, a Republican appointee, said in his opening questioning that if the court did not intervene now before the commerce department transmits state population information to the president, "I don't know when the court would be able to intervene."

Wall said that lawsuits could be brought after Mr. Trump determines who will be excluded from the redistricting numbers and sends his report to the House of Representatives.

"Isn't that going to be like having to unscramble the eggs?" Roberts asked.

BMO to Exit Oil And Gas Investment Banking in the U.S.

Kiel Porter, Rachel Adams-Heard and Kevin Orland
Tue, December 1, 2020


(Bloomberg) -- Bank of Montreal is winding down its U.S. oil and gas investment banking business and will focus on assets in Canada going forward, becoming the latest financial institution to cut ties with America’s beleaguered shale industry.

BMO said it has made “the financial decision for an orderly wind-down of our non-Canadian investment and corporate banking energy business.” Going forward, the company said by email, its capital markets energy business will be focused on Canada.

The company is eliminating about 50 positions in its investment banking group as part of the exit that was announced to staff on Monday, according to a person with direct knowledge of the situation who asked not to be identified because the information isn’t public. A handful of corporate bankers will manage BMO’s U.S. oil and gas loan book, the person said.


BMO is the latest bank to halt investment banking tied to U.S. oil and gas explorers, which even before the pandemic were facing pressure after years of generating meager returns. The move didn’t appear to be related to ESG concerns plaguing fossil fuel companies. America’s shale industry has been swept up in a wave of consolidation in recent months as the pandemic slashes oil demand, drags down prices and forces low-premium mergers. That follows years of lackadaisical M&A activity in the oil patch.

Read More: Bad Energy Loans Double Over Three Months, Canada Banks Say

BMO’s U.S. oil and gas loan book was about $5.4 billion (C$7 billion) as of July 31, making up half of its overall oil and gas loans, according to a company presentation.

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Enbridge Pipeline Linking Oil Sands to Midwest Wins Approval

Robert Tuttle Tue, December 1, 2020


(Bloomberg) -- An Enbridge Inc. pipeline that will help ship more Canadian crude to the U.S. Midwest received final approval, paving the way for construction to start soon on a third key export project for the oil sands after years of delays.

Minnesota approved the stormwater pollution plan for Enbridge’s Line 3 pipeline replacement and expansion, the project’s last pending permit, the company said on Monday. Construction is expected to take six-to-nine months on a line that will add 370,000 barrels a day of capacity.

Producers in Alberta, which holds the world’s third-largest crude reserves, have seen growth ground to a halt in recent years as a lack of enough export pipelines caused local crude prices to plummet in value. Now, three projects could allow them to ship an extra 1.8 million barrels a day when built.

Work is underway on TC Energy Corp.’s Keystone XL after a decade-long saga for approval, though it’s still unclear if U.S. President Elect Joe Biden will maintain an authorization from the Trump administration for the pipeline to cross the border. Meanwhile, the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion to the Vancouver coast is proceeding in Alberta and British Columbia.

“Line 3 is potentially unique among the three in that it has the potential to be the soonest online,” as early as late 2021, IHS Markit Ltd. Vice President Kevin Birn said by phone.

Line 3 could still encounter state and federal legal hurdles, as well as the prospect of protests that slow construction, delaying the start of service until 2022, Height Commentary said in a note last week. Trans Mountain faces fierce opposition in British Columbia, including from indigenous-led protesters.

Another of the company’s pipelines in the U.S., the Line 5 that crosses the Great Lakes into Michigan, was dealt a blow last month when the state’s government took legal action to shut it down. The pipeline supplies Central Canadian refineries with oil from Alberta.

“Until the barrels are freely flowing, we should take nothing for granted,” Tim McMillan, chief executive officer of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, said by phone.

Two years ago, Canadian export pipelines became so congested that heavy Western Canadian Select crude’s discount to benchmark U.S. prices widened to about $50 a barrel, prompting Alberta’s government to impose mandatory output limits. Those curbs were only lifted recently as the Covid-19 pandemic crippled demand for Canada’s oil, temporarily leaving extra space on some pipelines.

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.