Edmonton Journal -Thursday's letters:

 Smith oblivious to realities faced by minorities

Clearly, our new premier is out of touch with the current realities faced by Alberta’s minorities. Her naive, untrue and flippant comments on discrimination and anti-Canada comments are a frightening distraction. A pathetic attempt to curry favour from a small minority of equally selfish Albertans that refuse to vaccinate.


On Sunday May 8, 2022 the City of Edmonton officially proclaimed May 10, 2022 as the National Day of Action Against Anti-Asian Racism. A group walked from city hall to Pacific Rim Mall in Chinatown, where members of the community rallied to share experiences and impacts of racism, hate and discrimination.© Larry Wong

A simple Internet search tells us that many of those refusers led the charge in discriminating. In 2021, hate-motivated crimes targeting religion jumped 67 per cent, those targeting sexual orientation climbed 64 per cent and those targeting race or ethnicity rose six per cent. Facts and realities are lost on Smith.

Another quick search finds that Muslim women, Indigenous peoples, people of colour, GLBTQ community, the Jewish community continue to be the most discriminated against. Alberta’s population of about 4.5 million is less than 12 per cent of Canada’s population. The majority of our families have roots in other parts of the world, making the majority of Albertans a part of a minority group.

Smith’s silly ideas of leadership to focus on division and not on inflation, health care and education assure her place in history of the shortest term of any Alberta premier ever.

Murray Billett, Edmonton

Smith trying to scapegoat Hinshaw

I am absolutely disgusted at Danielle Smith’s decision to fire Deena Hinshaw, though not surprised. I was extremely worried she’d be the one the Conservatives would wind up placing as their leader as they have lost their way as the leading party for Albertans.

We now have this group of people who don’t believe in medical science, follow conspiracy theories, wish to disrupt rules of law, ignore provincial and federal regulations and acts to go their own way. Kenney was bad, but good Lord, she’s 10 times worse. Any body of people who decide that they know better than the medical profession when it comes to keeping people safe during a pandemic scares me. Trump did that to Dr. Fauci in the States and effectively muzzled him, leading to the deaths of countless more people who didn’t need to die.

Smith is trying to make Hinshaw our scapegoat here in Alberta. Shame, shame on her.

Sharon Flemming, Edmonton

Trump-ish talk will doom conservatism

Danielle Smith says unvaccinated people have suffered greater discrimination than those based on race, gender, sexuality and other. Really?

I wonder if Premier Smith has the intestinal fortitude to preach that rubbish to a Jew whose home was vandalized with anti-Semitic graffiti? What about a woman who earns far less than her male co-workers despite doing exactly the same job, a Black man who is routinely pulled over

several times a year while driving his car by police officers who racially profile, a Muslim who is pulled out of the line every time they go to the airport and harassed by Islamophobic customs agents, an Aboriginal survivor of residential schools, or a gay teenager who endures daily bullying at high school?

I predict that Smith and Pierre Poilievre will be the electoral ruin of Canadian conservatism with their right-wing, Donald Trump-style rhetoric.

Liam Duc Looi, Okotoks

Nelson: UCP Must Abandon COVID War To Retain Power

Opinion by Chris Nelson, For The Calgary Herald - 

It’s often said generals invariably fight the previous war. Politicians often make that same mistake, too.


It's time for some UCP members to move onwards from a focus on COVID, past pandemic restrictions and vaccinations, writes Chris Nelson.

© Provided by Calgary Herald

So, the question today is whether the fragility of our current provincial government can triumph if insisting upon making our recent collective pandemic response a major part of its upcoming election campaign.

Maybe it’s me, but when those dreary numbers of how many Albertans were dead, sick or infected finally stopped being announced every day, it was a blessed relief.

Confucius was right; living in interesting times is indeed a curse. And, let’s face it; our collective global fight against COVID 19 became a social, medical and political experiment involving a larger slice of humanity than any previous event in history. Yep, interesting barely covers it.

These days, statistics show we’re approaching 13 billion vaccinations administered, with more than two-thirds of the world’s population receiving at least one jab.

But, as we know too well, details of that mammoth logistical success barely scratch the surface of how this pandemic affected us. Yes, it’s still here, but if for no other reason than our mental health, discussing COVID in the past tense is hugely restorative.

Yet, it appears certain the current United Conservative Party, under Premier Danielle Smith, won’t let the issue slumber. There are too many party members who consider what was done in the name of COVID cause for an existential fight to ever allow retreat from this dreary battlefield.

The war — with its mask mandates, vaccine requirements and social gathering restrictions — will be refought, regurgitated and relived ad nauseam. It has become, to some, a reason to be.

Smith’s acceptance speech was, for the most part, an appeal to unity and a magnanimous reach-out to her Tory opponents and the rest of Canada — except when it came to the COVID call-to-arms.

“We will not be told what to put in our bodies in order to work or to travel,” she declared. It was but a single sentence yet raised the loudest cheer of the evening. The fight is far from over in a sizable section of the current UCP membership.

But 91 per cent of Albertans of voting age are vaccinated to some degree, while in the two major cities those numbers are even higher. In upper northeast Calgary those receiving at least one jab stands at an astonishing 100 per cent.

Probably many of those people still question some rules and strictures surrounding that whole COVID campaign, maybe even their own decision to get vaccinated, considering how goalposts constantly moved regarding effectiveness against ever-evolving viral strains.

Nevertheless, people indeed rolled up their sleeves — more than three and a half million Albertans made that choice — for what they considered both a personal and societal good. Therefore, to infer they were somehow dupes or simple-minded sheep by doing so would be a stunningly stupid strategy for any political party seeking office.

Nobody could be that daft, could they? Don’t rule it out.

This current kumbaya pause amongst the various Tory factions might only last until the party’s AGM, due in Edmonton next week.

Take Back Alberta, an influential group taking much credit for getting Smith elected, now wants to control the UCP board. The Edmonton gathering provides that opportunity.

The group’s founder, David Parker, said if the move was successful, then it would allow them to decide who runs as an MLA candidate and how party funds are spent. That’s real political power, for those keeping score.

Of course, its major goals include halting future vaccine mandates and stopping future lockdowns.

Inflation, pipeline access, educational shortcomings, exploding substance abuse and so forth don’t get a mention. The seemingly endless COVID campaign, marching in circles under that flowing banner of freedom, is all that matters.

Well, it will be a march ending in electoral oblivion. Danielle Smith knows this, but these are the folk that brought her to the dance. Will she jettison them now?

Hey, she abandoned her supporters before .

Chris Nelson is a regular columnist for the Calgary Herald.

Canadians condemn Alberta premier: ‘Has Danielle Smith ever met an Indigenous person, Black person, Brown person?’

Abhya Adlakha
·Editor, Yahoo News Canada
Wed, October 12, 2022 

Danielle Smith, sworn in Tuesday as Alberta's new premier, has drawn the ire of Canadian doctors and residents with her comments on unvaccinated Canadians. A day after being sworn in, Smith pledged to amend the Alberta Human Rights Act, said she will change the health system within three months and alter the provincial human rights law to protect those who choose not to get vaccinated.

"(The unvaccinated) have been the most discriminated-against group that I’ve ever witnessed in my lifetime,” Smith told reporters.

Smith says Alberta won't have any vaccine mandates, which will help attract more employees to the province.

Moreover, she has warned Albertans of upcoming rapid changes to the management health care team in the province. She has already decided to replace Alberta's chief medical officer of health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, and recruit a new team of advisors in public health.

I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a situation in my lifetime where a person was fired from their job or not allowed to watch their kids play hockey or not allowed to go visit a loved one in long-term care or hospital, not allowed to get on a plane to either go across the country to see family or even travel across the border. We are not going to create a segregated society on the basis of a medical choice. 

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith

Her statement on the ongoing discrimination being faced by several unvaccinated groups was received negatively by doctors, medical professionals, and several residents of Canada. After a massive backlash, the premier tracked back her comments in a statement.

Here is what people across the country are saying about

 Premier Smith's comments:

Keith Gerein: What can Alberta municipalities expect from Danielle Smith?

WHEN THE TERM LIBERTARIAN IS USED IT MEANS AYN RANDISM

Opinion by Keith Gerein - Tuesday

A decade ago, I was among the Postmedia reporters covering the 2012 provincial election.

UCP Leader and incoming premier Danielle Smith.© Provided by Edmonton Journal

My assignment was the Wildrose Party, which meant I spent most of the campaign within tape recorder distance of then-party leader Danielle Smith.

Many will recall that once promising campaign turned sour in the final days when Smith refused to take action against Wildrose candidates with unsavoury views. That stance drew the ire of Alberta’s two big city mayors, including Edmonton’s Stephen Mandel, who was already livid with Smith for what he saw as unsolicited, outsider criticism of city infrastructure choices.

Though unconfirmed, my sense at the time is that a lot of the big campaign decisions — including the fatal one to defend awful candidates — were controlled by party officials, even though Smith was the one who had to go out and sell them.

But as for Smith herself, I found the 2012 version of her to be articulate, determined and hard working, with an ability to instantly switch from graciousness and humour to gut-punching criticism.

And despite occasional obtusity in defending weird Wildrose positions, I found her to be generally on the right side of reasonable.

Alberta health workers call for stability after Smith's UCP victory

Smith seeking Brooks-Medicine Hat seat in byelection

The question now, for current municipal leaders who have to work with her, is whether the same can be said for the 2022 version of Smith. Based on some of the proposals she intends to implement , that characterization seems more tenuous than it did a decade ago.

Of particular interest to civic leaders is Smith’s stated desire to continue efforts to replace the RCMP with a new provincial police force — a major shakeup that so far has little public support, near universal opposition from municipalities, and minimal faith in Smith’s dubious suggestion the move would be cost neutral .

The UCP leader did offer a thin olive branch on this issue Saturday, telling media she knows there is a need to get more municipalities on board. That suggests at least a token aspiration to consult.

Still, it would be wise for Edmonton-area communities to quickly ramp up discussions with the city around establishing a regional police force .

Regardless, whatever differences may exist from 2012 Smith to 2022 Smith, one consistency over the last decade is a strong streak of libertarianism. Which is an interesting lens to consider how she might approach provincial-municipal relations, and where the limits of the libertarianism might lie.

“She did talk to municipalities a lot about funding and she does have some good ideas. So I think there is some hope,” said Cathy Heron, the mayor of St. Albert and president of Alberta Municipalities.

For one thing, Smith has said she is seriously considering a long-standing plea from municipalities to keep all of the property tax they collect rather than transferring a big chunk of it, known as education property tax, to the province.

In Edmonton, this could be worth about $500 million a year , and about $800 million in Calgary.

“I know that I complain a lot about how much extra money is taken out of Alberta that goes to Ottawa and that doesn’t come back, and quite frankly, we do the same thing to our municipalities,” Smith is quoted as saying in Livewire Calgary.

For civic leaders, this potential application of libertarianism has to be tantalizing, though it may not be the windfall some might hope. There is an open question as to whether a move like this would mean the end of existing provincial infrastructure grants and other funding. Likewise, it’s fair to wonder if it could mean more provincial downloading to municipalities.

One also has to be curious whether the new premier would really be able to resist the temptation to intervene if she doesn’t like specific spending decisions. Remember the Smith of 2012 was eager to blast Edmonton for choices to redevelop the City Centre Airport and prioritize the new Royal Alberta Museum.

This is what I mean when I wonder about the limits of her libertarianism, and whether municipalities would really have autonomy if their choices conflicted with Smith’s battle against Ottawa, her view of freedom, or her opposition to certain public health measures.

Would a municipality, for example, be allowed to implement its own mask mandate?

“We talk about getting out of the way of municipalities … but my experience with provincial governments is they say that until what the municipality is doing they disagree with,” Heron said. “So I think we need some bigger conversations about legislating that autonomy.”

In this vein, respect for the big cities is another important question for the Smith tenure. This is particularly so for Edmonton, which was more often treated as a punching bag than a partner by the Kenney government. But even in Calgary, doubts now have to be raised after Smith’s decision to hold a byelection for herself in the rural southeast, while refusing to hold one in the vacant constituency of Calgary-Elbow.

The new premier could help herself by keeping current Municipal Affairs Minister Ric McIver, who seems to have the respect of most civic leaders. As well, more balanced action to help cities with addiction, mental health and homelessness would go a long way.

“My approach to governing is always about relationships so it does scare me to hear her dislike for our prime minister … because that is not the way you get anything done in my opinion,” Heron said.

“She has talked a lot about that libertarian view but that is not the majority view in Alberta, so if she wants to be re-elected, she’s going to have to become more central, and appeal to the middle and hopefully keep the UCP together.”

kgerein@postmedia.com

Smith's discrimination remark making Alberta an international embarrassment: NDP

EDMONTON — Alberta’s Opposition NDP leader says Premier Danielle Smith has made the province an international embarrassment by proclaiming those who didn’t get vaccinated during COVID-19 endured the worst discrimination she's seen in her lifetime.


Smith's discrimination remark making Alberta an international embarrassment: NDP© Provided by The Canadian Press

Rachel Notley says the United Conservative Party premier needs towithdraw the comment, apologize and be clear where she stands on previous controversial statements, including that smoking isn't necessarily bad for your health and about patients having control over whether they get early-stage cancer.

“Over the last 48 hours, I’ve been overwhelmed by thousands and thousands of folks reaching out to me who feel deeply hurt and frankly a little fearful as a result of the comments coming from our new premier,” Notley said Thursday.

“We understand that hundreds of thousands of Albertans face discrimination each and every day because of characteristics over which they have no choice.


Notley said the story has made international headlines, including one published online earlier Thursday in the U.S.-based Forbes magazine, which is published in various editions around the world.

“This is a story about Alberta in one of the world’s most well-read economic publications,” said Notley.

“It is a story that hurts Alberta’s reputation, and we will now have to spend months undoing it.”

Smith, 51, made the discrimination comment at a news conference Tuesday, hours after she was sworn in as premier.

“(The unvaccinated) have been the most discriminated-against group that I've ever witnessed in my lifetime,” she said.

"I don't think I've ever experienced a situation in my lifetime where a person was fired from their job or not allowed to watch their kids play hockey or not allowed to go visit a loved one in long-term care or hospital, not allowed to get on a plane to either go across the country to see family or even travel across the border.”

Related video: Unvaccinated are Alberta's 'most discriminated' group, new premier says
Duration 2:33
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Minority groups, health professionals and some premiers across Canada condemned the remarks as ridiculous and insensitive, pointing out that in Smith’s lifetime there was still forced sterilization, residential schools and bans on gay marriage.

As furor escalated Wednesday, Smith’s office issued a statement clarifying that she did not seek to minimize the experiences of other discriminated groups. The statement did not withdraw her original comment or offer an apology.

Smith’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday.

Smith won the leadership of Alberta’s governing UCP last week to become the new premier on a promise of no more vaccine mandates or health restrictions that violate personal liberties.

A former journalist, Smith stated in early 2021: “My entire adult life and career has been spent questioning authority and institutions and conventional wisdom.”

In a May 2003 column for the Calgary Herald newspaper, she questioned whether smoking is harmful to one’s health. “The evidence shows moderate cigarette consumption can reduce traditional risks of disease by 75 per cent or more," she wrote.

In October 2012, as leader of the Opposition Wildrose Party, Smith said those in poverty should be fed beef tainted with E.coli, so the unsellable product didn't go to waste.

“We all know meat can be safely eaten if cooked properly,” Smith tweeted.

As a radio talk show host in 2020, she retweeted — and later apologized for doing so — a false claim that the drug hydroxychloroquine could defeat COVID-19. A year later, she backed ivermectin, a livestock anti-parasite medication, which was touted and later debunked as a possible COVID-19 cure.

This past July, during the UCP leadership campaign, Smith released a video of her interview with a naturopath in which Smith says responsibility for early-stage cancer is within a person's control. Patients and health professionals called the comment profoundly misinformed and cruel.

Smith's leadership opponents criticized her, including one who had lost his son to cancer, and she apologized for the hurt she had caused.

She said she had expressed herself "awkwardly'' and meant to say preventive health measures are just one more way to combat early-stage cancer.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 13, 2022.

Dean Bennett, The Canadian Press

OF COURSE SHE DID

Alberta's Smith says she didn't mean to trivialize with comment on unvaccinated

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith says she didn't mean to trivialize prejudice faced by minority communities when she suggested unvaccinated people have experienced the most discrimination she has ever seen in her lifetime.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Smith's comment on her first day as premier drew criticism from across Canada — including British Columbia Premier John Horgan, who called it "laughable," and at least one Jewish group that says it reached out to her office to express concern.

Smith said in a statement Wednesday that she intended to underline the mistreatment of individuals who chose not to be vaccinated.

"I want to be clear that I did not intend to trivialize in any way the discrimination faced by minority communities and other persecuted groups or create any false equivalencies to the terrible historical discrimination and persecution suffered by so many minority groups," said the statement.

Smith was sworn in Tuesday as Alberta's new premier after the United Conservative Party elected her in a leadership race to replace Jason Kenney as leader and premier.

Later in the day, at her first news conference as premier, Smith said she would shake up the top tier of the health system within three months and amend provincial human rights law to protect those who choose not to get vaccinated for diseases including COVID-19.

"(The unvaccinated) have been the most discriminated-against group that I’ve ever witnessed in my lifetime," said the 51-year-old.

"I don't think I've ever experienced a situation in my lifetime where a person was fired from their job or not allowed to watch their kids play hockey or not allowed to go visit a loved one in long-term care or hospital, not allowed to get on a plane to either go across the country to see family or even travel across the border."

Horgan, who is to step down as B.C.'s NDP premier later this year, responded to Smith's comment Wednesday in an interview with C-FAX Radio in Victoria.

"It's laughable, quite frankly," Horgan said when asked about the comment.

Horgan said the global community has gone through an unprecedented time with the COVID-19 pandemic — "nothing like this in over a hundred years going back to the Spanish influenza."

He said the country is also dealing with a toxic drug supply that's killing people and running out of people to provide health services.

"For the incoming premier to focus on a sliver of the population who chose not to get vaccinated when there are all these other challenges seems short-sighted to me. And I just disagree with her. I believe the vast majority of Canadians understood we had a collective responsibility."

Alberta Health data shows more than 82 per cent of the province's total population has received a first dose of COVID-19 vaccine and nearly 78 per cent of the population has two doses.

Duane Bratt, a political scientist at Mount Royal University in Calgary, said Smith's comment would be laughable if she wasn't the premier.

"This shows what drove her campaign and who her supporters are," he said.

Bratt said Smith's comment is offensive because there has been a lot of discrimination in the past 50-plus years.

"We still had forced sterilization. We had residential schools up until the 1990s," he said. "We didn't have gay marriage until (2005)."

Bratt said race, religion, sexual orientation and disabilities are not choices.

"Those are things that you have and that's why we don't allow discrimination based on that," he said. "Deciding not to be vaccinated is a choice."

Some Alberta groups, mayors and civic leaders also expressed concerns about Smith's comments.

"We … are keen on meeting with the premier to discuss antisemitism, discrimination in our community and others in Alberta, the need for mandatory Holocaust education, and the story of Alberta's Jewish community," wrote Jewish Edmonton.

Alex Montiel, the CEO of Diversecities, a community organization that works with marginalized groups in Calgary, said he hopes Smith reflects on what she said.

“We understand that being unable to retain or find a job, having restricted mobility across the country, or not being allowed to enter a public gathering based on a medical choice can be considered discrimination," Montiel said in a statement.

"However, this is incomparable to the uncountable cases of people who have been verbally and physically assaulted in the street while walking with their children, demanding them to return to where they belong because they are of Asian descent.”

Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek said on Twitter that there's a lot she could say.

"I choose to focus on demonstrating to this premier the work that our city continues to do around anti-racism, Indigenous relations, Holocaust remembrance, allyship with the LGBTQ2S+ community and equity-based awareness," she wrote. "In other words, work that matters."

Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe said he doesn't agree with Smith's comments.

He added it's not for him to judge who experiences discrimination.

"What we're here to do, and what I'm here to do … is any of those individuals or groups that do feel they've been discriminated (against) in some way, that we're here to support them."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 12, 2022.

— with files by Mickey Djuric in Regina.

Colette Derworiz, The Canadian Press

Note to readers: This is a corrected story; An earlier version had the incorrect spelling of Diversecities.

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith should apologize and retract unvaccinated comment: Notley
Kellen Taniguchi -

Opposition Leader Rachel Notley speaks about the UCP electing Danielle Smith as their new leader Danielle Smith during a news conference along the North Saskatchewan River on Oct. 7, 2022, in Edmonton.© Shaughn Butts


Rachel Notley is calling on Premier Danielle Smith to apologize and withdraw her comment calling unvaccinated people the most discriminated against group of her lifetime.

The Opposition NDP leader said the comment tarnishes the province’s reputation and has “deeply hurt” hundreds of thousands of Albertans. She said she understands the discrimination Albertans face each and every day due to characteristics they have no choice over.

“Given the amount of hurt and pain that has generally been expressed to us over the last two days, I call on Premier Danielle Smith to reconsider her decision to not apologize and, in fact, to offer an immediate and authentic apology to the hundreds of thousands of Albertans who’s experiences she has negated and who her remarks have hurt,” Notley told reporters Thursday.

Smith issued a statement on Wednesday explaining the “intention” of her comment, made on her first day in office.

“My intention was to underline the mistreatment of individuals who chose not to be vaccinated and were punished by not being able to work, travel, or in some cases, see loved ones,” Smith said during a Tuesday news conference.

“I want to be clear that I did not intend to trivialize in any way the discrimination faced by minority communities and other persecuted groups both here in Canada and around the world, or to create any false equivalencies to the terrible historical discrimination and persecution suffered by so many minority groups over the last decades and centuries.”

Notley said Smith’s statement isn’t acceptable and she needs to genuinely apologize to Albertans. She added Smith’s comment and statement shows Alberta has a leader who is “incapable” of demonstrating good judgment initially and is incapable of understanding when she’s made a mistake.

“She then has to go further and withdraw her previous comments and send a message to people outside of Alberta that she understands the damage that they did, that Alberta is actually an open and welcoming place for folks around the world,” she said.

Notley said the comment will have a negative impact on the ability to attract people to Alberta. She added Smith’s comment landed in a story in Forbes Magazine.

“This is a story about Alberta in one of the world’s most well-read economic publications,” said Notley.

“It is not a good story about Alberta, it is a story that hurts Alberta’s reputation and we will now have to spend months undoing it.”

‘She’s not going to apologize’

Duane Bratt, a political scientist at Mount Royal University in Calgary, said Thursday Smith’s comment on Tuesday was completely wrong and offensive.

“That’s why she tried to clarify, not apologize, but tried to clarify yesterday by saying, no, she wasn’t trying to rank different forms of discrimination.

Amid calls for the new premier to apologize for her comment, Bratt said he isn’t expecting Smith to do so.

“She’s not going to apologize. She doesn’t feel she said anything wrong,” said Bratt.

“This was not a slip of the tongue. This was consistent with her campaign. So, no she is not going to apologize and she’s already in trouble with some of her supporters with the waffling of the sovereignty act, she’s not going to waffle on COVID.”

Bratt added that Smith’s supporters don’t want her to apologize.

“The people who support her are not going to let her apologize. They want her to do this, they want payback,” he said.

Mekwun Moses, an Alberta Indigenous activist who has organized anti-racism rallies and rallies for residential school awareness, said Smith, who is 51 years old, was alive when residential schools closed in 1996 and that Smith’s comment offended her .

“For her to say within her lifetime puts more discrimination on First Nations people because she’s not recognizing that they didn’t have their freedom, that they didn’t get to choose a lot of things like being put on reserves,” said Moses.

Postmedia reached out to Smith’s press secretary for comment but did not hear back prior to deadline.

ktaniguchi@postmedia.com

twitter.com/kellentaniguchi

ONTARIO

Jellyfish found in Sudbury-area lake

Cottage Life - Yesterday 

This past summer, scuba divers in Sudbury discovered an unlikely form of aquatic life in the city’s Ramsey Lake. In late August, diving instructor Jason Fox captured a video of jellyfish, marking the first time the invasive species has been documented in Ontario outside of the Great Lakes. In a video, translucent, dime-sized craspedacusta sowerbii jellyfish pulsate with tentacles suspended in the water column.


Jellyfish found in Sudbury-area lake© Photo by Rostislav Stefanek/ Shutterstock

“It’s a crazy story and it’s received a lot of attention,” says John Gunn, Canada Research Chair in biology at Sudbury’s Laurentian University and the director of the Vale Living With Lakes Centre. “Jellyfish are usually thought of as marine species. People find it remarkable to learn that we have them here in freshwater.”

Fox told CBC that he “basically stopped counting” jellyfish after three weekend dives in Ramsey Lake, estimating to have seen 50 or more on September 11. His photos and video is the first evidence of jellyfish in Ramsey Lake, but Gunn suspects they’ve been around for perhaps a decade or more. Craspedacusta sowerbii, which is native to China’s Yangtze River, arrived in North America in the 1930s. “It likely came in ships’ ballast water or as part of the aquarium plants trade,” Gunn explains. “It is yet another example of the many species that have joined North American flora and fauna due to human movements.”

How to avoid spreading invasive species in lakes

The scientific literature suggests the freshwater jellyfish found in Ramsey Lake are innocuous. They eat microscopic phytoplankton in the water column, haven’t been linked to any adverse ecological effects, and swimmers don’t need to worry about the toxic stingers of some marine jellyfish. “They’re elegant and mesmerizing,” adds Gunn. “Divers and swimmers will really enjoy watching them in the water.”

Still, Gunn says the discovery is another cautionary tale of invasive species. “They aren’t like silver carp,” he notes, referencing the oversized exotic fish that have taken over waterways in the southern United States. Gunn hopes jellyfish in Ramsey Lake serve as a reminder of the ways humans have transported plants and animals all around the globe. “When you look at the lake,” he says, “realize that you’re glimpsing into a whole sea of biota that’s made its way here from elsewhere.

“We don’t have any specific concerns with jellyfish, but we do have to worry about others,” Gunn adds. “Stuff gets moved around in bait buckets and on motorboats. Humans are the vectors of countless nuisance species. We have to be extra cautious.”

There’s a Billion-Dollar Bidding War for EV Plants Across the US

Gabrielle Coppola
Thu, October 13, 2022 





(Bloomberg) -- Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer wasn’t happy. Ford Motor Co., a company whose very name is synonymous with Detroit, had just announced it had chosen two southern states, Tennessee and Kentucky, as sites for an $11 billion electric-vehicle project.

They had won Ford over by dangling huge incentives, and Whitmer knew Michigan needed to do more to compete. So she pleaded with lawmakers in a letter last October to put “more tools in our economic toolbox to attract private investment.” Two months later, they delivered, handing her a $1 billion fund for corporate subsidies. And a month after that, Whitmer dipped into the fund to net a giant deal from General Motors Co.: a $6.6 billion electric-truck factory and battery plant.

Michigan’s largesse -- and Tennessee’s and Kentucky’s -- was made possible in part by hundreds of billions in federal aid pumped into US states as part of President Joe Biden’s American Rescue Plan. The money was meant to soften the blow of a pandemic-induced fiscal apocalypse that never happened. Instead, it’s left states flush with cash, supercharging competition to win the automotive jobs of the future and cushioning the bottom lines of companies like Ford, GM, and Panasonic Holdings Corp., a battery supplier to Tesla Inc.

There’s a risk that all the money sloshing around amid the EV development frenzy will fund boondoggles, like Foxconn Technology Group’s heavily subsidized television factory in Wisconsin that never materialized.

To counter that risk, state and local officials helping to fund this EV boom say they built in protections to keep taxpayers from getting fleeced. But the stakes are getting bigger: The cost per permanent job for some projects is now eight times the average seen less than a decade ago.

Ford’s Tennessee hub will cost about $414,000 for each direct job, Michigan is contributing $450,000 per GM job, while Georgia committed to forgo revenue that amounts to $212,000 per job to win megaprojects from Rivian Automotive Inc. and Hyundai Motor Co. in the past two years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The average per-job cost of economic incentives in the US was about $52,000 in 2015, measured in today’s dollars, according to a study by Tim Bartik, an economist at the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

States have been competing to lure companies since at least the Great Depression. But the scale and the ferocity of it now -- for EV plants, semiconductor factories and other megaprojects -- are unprecedented.

“I have never seen the same kind of surge in subsidies all across the US all happening at the same time,” said Michael Farren, a senior researcher at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University and a critic of corporate incentives. “It’s pretty clear that there’s an external motivating factor, and that is the American Rescue Plan relief funds.”

Companies that receive incentives saved an average of 30% on state and local taxes as of 2015, a rate that had tripled since 1990, according to the study by Bartik. The same study found incentives don’t correlate strongly with states’ current or past unemployment levels, or future economic growth.

To skeptics, of whom there are many in academia and policy circles, these subsidies are a poor use of state resources that could otherwise be earmarked to hospitals or schools. The incentives create a race-to-the-bottom effect where local governments furiously try to one-up each other on handouts that deliver unproven payoffs. There’s also a question as to whether EV and battery plants will employ as many people or pay as well as combustion-engine cars.

“States have justified huge subsidy packages for assembly plants in part to capture the more numerous upstream jobs, but those jobs are clearly going to shrink a great deal,” said Greg Leroy, the executive director of Good Jobs First, which has written a report on the subject.

The $350 billion that Congress set aside for states and municipalities in May 2021 is coinciding with a once-in-a-century transformation of the auto industry, as carmakers prepare to retire the combustion engine in favor of battery power. While there are strict limits on how local governments can use the Covid relief money, the aid helped free up cash for corporate incentives.

Financial disclosures vary by state, and some withhold data at the behest of a company or to stay competitive against other states. This makes the full picture of corporate incentives incomplete.

What is known is that global carmakers and established battery manufacturers have announced plans to invest at least $50 billion into at least 10 states to build EV assembly and battery plants since the start of 2021, and states have made commitments totaling at least $10.8 billion to lure those investments, according to a tally of publicly disclosed incentives by Bloomberg and Good Jobs First. That figure almost certainly underestimates the actual number.

Blue Oval City

The electric-vehicle hub that Ford and battery partner SK Innovation Co. chose to locate in Tennessee is a good example of how the full cost of an incentive package typically isn’t made plain to the public.

Blue Oval City, a six-square-mile site an hour’s drive northeast of Memphis, will house an assembly plant making the new electric F-150 pickup and a battery plant that together promise to create 5,800 jobs. Construction will generate 33,000 temporary jobs; once completed, the twin plants and their suppliers will support 27,000 direct or indirect positions, and add $3.5 billion annually to Tennessee’s economy, state officials have said.

When the project was announced, state officials disclosed a $500 million cash grant to be approved by the legislature; local press reports later pegged the cost at $884 million.

In fact, contract documents obtained by Bloomberg show the value of the package is at least $2.4 billion, which includes tax breaks, donated land, infrastructure improvements and short-term wage subsidies from the federal government.

Even that figure is an undercount. It excludes an electricity subsidy provided by the Tennessee Valley Authority, the largest federal utility.

Tennessee officials said Bloomberg’s incentives calculation is “misleading” because some infrastructure investments were made years earlier, and some of the workforce training costs are estimates. They also argue that new property tax revenue, even at a reduced rate, is more than local governments would get without the project.

“Blue Oval City will be transformational for West Tennessee,” said Lindsey Tipton, a spokeswoman for the state’s economic development department. “For future projects, we will offer grant assistance, but at a much lower cost-per-job and more in line with a typical incentive package from our department.”

Ford said its decision was influenced by many factors beyond financial incentives.

“Public-private partnerships are essential for the United States to be a leader in the global transition to electric vehicles,” the company said in a statement.

Even states that have tried to move away from incentives have caved to the pressure to compete for jobs, said Dennis Cuneo, a former Toyota Motor Corp. executive and site consultant who has helped automakers pick locations.

“Incentives are like free agency in baseball -- nobody likes it, but you’ve got to do it if you want to win,” he said.

Georgia and Rivian

Georgia, which has emerged as a big winner in the current investment surge, landed two $5 billion EV deals from Rivian and Hyundai that promise to create more than 15,000 jobs. The state offered incentives worth $3.3 billion to win the projects.

State economic commissioner Pat Wilson said Georgia competes by helping companies move fast with shovel-ready sites and limited red tape, rather than putting the most cash on the table. He called Bloomberg’s per-job incentives calculation “terribly misleading” because it includes tax breaks written into state law that aren’t discretionary.

“I view the incentives that we put on the table really as Georgia being part-investor in these projects,” Wilson said in an interview. “We know the payroll for those jobs and the benefits they provide are going to trickle out and benefit the health of communities and families all across the state.”

Picasso's first lover more than a victim in Paris expo

Agence France-Presse
October 13, 2022

Pablo Picasso (AFP)

Fifty years on from Pablo Picasso's death -- and five years after the #MeToo movement started highlighting celebrities' abuse of women -- a new exhibition in Paris focuses on one of the early partners of the controversial artist.

If Picasso's reputation has taken a battering in the post-MeToo world, it is in part due to his treatment of Fernande Olivier, his first serious partner.

But for Cecile Debray, director of the Picasso Museum in Paris, we cannot just view the artist through the prism of modern-day sensibilities.

Possessive and jealous, Picasso would lock Olivier in their ramshackle Paris apartment when he went out and made sure she doted on him while he worked long into the night.


This should not however overshadow the story of their time together, say the organizers of a new exhibition at the Montmartre Museum, in the north of Paris.

The new show puts pages from her memoirs alongside dozens of paintings and sculptures by Picasso and others from that famous artists' circle.

"Picasso, due to a sort of morbid jealousy, kept me as a recluse," Olivier wrote in her diary. "But with tea, books, a divan and little cleaning to do, I was happy, very happy."

But her writings show she was more than a victim, said Debray.

'A strong woman'

Debray, who is overseeing the anniversary celebrations, has criticized recent "ahistorical" attacks on the artist for his treatment of women.

"It was a relationship almost of equals," she told AFP.

"Certainly, he was jealous, worked a lot... but he was also tender and loving, the only lover of that type that Fernande Olivier ever had."

He was more than just the "minotaur", the monster, that some recent accounts have portrayed, said Debray.

Their relationship ended after eight years in 1912, just as Picasso was gaining serious renown.

Twenty years later, Olivier published a book about the period, "Picasso and his Friends", which the artist tried to ban.

Her memoirs revealed a difficult life beyond their time together.

She was abandoned by her parents and raised by an unloving aunt, then forced into a marriage with a violently abusive husband before she fled and eventually met Picasso.

"They provide a look at the condition of women generally at the start of the century that is very raw and realistic, as well as of a hard worker who did many little jobs to stay independent beyond her marriage," said Debray.

"She was a strong woman, very intelligent in her writings and her vision of society and artists."

The Montmartre Museum exhibition is the first of several planned around Paris for the anniversary of Picasso's death on April 8.

© 2022 AFP

WAIT, WHAT?!

Right-wing host Dennis Prager: “There’s no secular argument against adult incest”

Prager University founder says the Bible is the only reason relatives should not have sex

By BRANDON GAGE

PUBLISHED OCTOBER 13, 2022 

Dennis Prager speaking at the Turning Point High School Leadership Summit in Washington, DC. (Michael Brochstein/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

This article originally appeared on AlterNet.

Right-wing radio host Dennis Prager declared on Tuesday's broadcast of The Dennis Prager Show on the Salem Radio Network that incest between immediate siblings that results in childbirth should not necessarily be avoided.

Birth defects due to inbreeding are well-documented and result from a lack of DNA diversity, increasing the chances that a baby will inherit and display recessive genetic traits. The risks grow if the illicit reproductive practice is continued by future generations.

But Prager's views are formulated from his fundamentalist interpretation of a verse from the biblical book of Deuteronomy.

"It's a big deal, and I try to explain everything. Just this one verse that men should not wear women's clothing or women men's clothing. So, let's go to my motto, preferring clarity to agreement. Either the Bible's right or the left is right. They can't both be right," Prager said in the latest edition of "The Ultimate Issues Hour."

First, he proclaimed that "you can't be a serious Jew or Christian and be a leftist. You can be a liberal, you can be a conservative, but you can't be a leftist. Just on this issue alone. You just would have to say the Bible's wrong and you're right. Mm, mm here. The public nudity calls are interesting. Anyway, none of you have a secular argument against it and I don't blame you for that because there isn't any."

Prager then pivoted to bolster his point.

"There's no secular argument against adult incest. Brother and sister want to make love, what's your argument? That they're going to produce mentally retarded offspring? That's nonsense. It takes many generations of inbreeding to do that. There is no secular argument against adult consensual incest. There is a religious argument – sex cannot enter family life. It's a big taboo," he said.

"See, people think we can live without the greatest source of wisdom and morality in the history of the world, the Bible," Prager added. "That's what they think. And some secular conservatives think that. They don't realize that they're living on the fumes of the Judeo-Christian value system. But if you ultimately extract those flowers from the soil that nurtured them, those flowers will wither and die. I don't want to see that happen."

Watch below via Media Matters for America or at this link:

RENT IS INFLATIONARY

Surging rents have Canadian condo owners rethinking their plans to sell, report finds
Shantaé Campbell - 

An apartment building in the Parkdale neighbourhood of Toronto.© Provided by Financial Post



Surging rents are draining inventory from Canada’s resale condominium markets as would-be sellers opt to lease out their units long-term instead, a new report suggests.

Condominium sales were down in the first eight months of 2022 in four key markets — Greater Vancouver/Fraser Valley, Greater Toronto Area, Ottawa and Nova Scotia — according RE/MAX Canada’s 2022 Canadian Condominium Report, which was released Oct. 12. Calgary and Edmonton bucked the trend, reporting double-digit sales gains.

Meanwhile, monthly rents have been surging. Average rent in the Greater Toronto Area, for example, rose 21 per cent on a year-over-year basis in August, a recent rent report by Rentals.ca and Bullpen Research & Consulting found.

“The affordability factor is the key issue in today’s housing market ,” said Christopher Alexander, president of RE/MAX Canada. “Rising interest rates have slowly eroded purchasing power and, despite lower housing values and cooling market conditions, buying a house is more challenging now than ever before.”

That means the cost of renting is now comparable to carrying a mortgage — and sellers are capitalizing on the trend by holding onto their properties and becoming landlords.

“They are getting great returns on their investment if they decide to rent their unit instead of selling. Rents have gone up 25 per cent, pretty much, across the board,” Alexander said. “So if you can cover all your expenses through rental income, and you can refinance to buy something else, you’re in really good shape.”

Jamie Johnson, a broker who owns RE/MAX Condos Plus, said he has encountered numerous would-be sellers who have pulled their listings and asked to advertise their condos as rentals instead.

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“For every condo listing for sale, we’re seeing about six listings for rent or lease,” he said.

Despite the rental effect, urban market condos increased their share of total sales as buyers opted for cheaper options and market activity slowed overall. In Toronto, for example, the bulk of condominium apartment sales now hover in the $500,000–$700,000 range, down from $600,000–$800,000 earlier in the year.

Compared to year-to-date levels one year ago, condominiums now represent more than 54 per cent of total residential sales in Greater Vancouver, 36.3 per cent in the Greater Toronto Area, 32 per cent in the Fraser Valley, just over 25 per cent in Edmonton and Ottawa, and almost 20 per cent in Calgary. Nova Scotia was the only market to register a decline in condominium market share.

“Buyers should be cautioned that the current slowdown in sales activity is likely not indicative of a crash,” says Elton Ash, executive vice- president, RE/MAX Canada. “Prices for condominium product have remained stable or risen in most major urban centres year-to-date. Conditions are balanced overall and, as such, buyers and sellers with realistic expectations should be able to achieve reasonable objectives.”

Average prices rose by up to 26 per cent year over year, the report found. In the GTA, prices jumped 15.7 per cent to $796,457 in 2022 from $688,137 in 2021.

• Email: shcampbell@postmedia.com