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- After consultation with indigenous groups, Mississauga is removing all Indigenous symbols from sports teams and facilities. blogTO reports.
- This Huffington Post Québec article, in French, notes that Montréal can make a very good case for again supporting a major league baseball team. The Expos may return.
- VICE notes that the idea of legalizing marijuana sales in New York State, and of devoting the funds raised from marijuana taxation to rebuilding the New York City subway station, is becoming popular.
- The latest redrawing of provincial electoral boundaries in Manitoba leaves the growing metropolis of Winnipeg with one seat more and rural Manitoba with one seat less. Global News reports.
- Laura Agustín reports on the experiences of a volunteer lawyer working with the Central American migrant caravan in Tijuana, here.
- Toronto city council has boosted office budgets to try to compensate for the increased workloads that have come about as a result of the expanded wards. The Toronto Star reports.
- Many people in high-rise St. James Town are concerned by the possibility of a new high-rise condo tower, 50 stories high, in their neighbourhood. The Toronto Star reports.
- Jamie Bradburn takes a look at how, in the run-up to Christmas in 1887, the Toronto press was covering the holiday season.
- VICE sent one of its journalists out for an entire day to the Christmas Market in the Distillery District. What effect did it have on them?
- Inglewood Drive, in midtown Moore Park, has embarked again on its street-long Christmas decoration. blogTO reports.
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- Rabble noted late last week the death, at 95, of anti-poverty activist Harry Leslie Smith.
- Amanda Simard, the only Franco-Ontarian MPP in the Ford government and representing a Francophone-majority riding, left the Ford government over the issue of its cuts to Francophone services. The Globe and Mail reported.
- MacLean's looks at Georgina Jolibois, a MPP who represents a vast riding occupying most of northern Saskatchewan, and sees how she accomplishes this.
- The National Post considers if Maxime Bernier has any chance of making his People's Party of Canada a viable political movement.
- The Canadian reaction to Trump's decision to force Congress to choose between accepting the new NAFTA deal or else risk a collapse of the entire project as the old treaty expires is muted. CBC reports.
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[BLOG] Some Friday links
Nov. 30th, 2018 02:03 pm- Bad Astronomer Phil Plait looks at the black hole-powered "cooling flows" of galaxy cluster Abell 2597.
- D-Brief notes that astronomers have, at last, measured the total number of photos emitted by stars in the universe. (Roughly.)
- Dead Things notes the discovery of a tool and butchery site of ancient hominids in Algeria, at Ain Boucherit, dating back 2.4 million years.
- Far Outliers looks at a Japanese-American's interrogation of old Okinawan classmates.
- JSTOR Daily looks at 19th century woman astronomers like Elizabeth Campbell who played a critical role in supporting their husbands' astronomy but were overlooked.
- Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at the victims of voter fraud, the members of stigmatized minorities.
- Marginal Revolution takes a look at the doctrine of double effect as shown in the TV series Daredevil.
- The NYR Daily notes how the language of Trump reflects and fuels the fascist right.
- Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel states the obvious: Science is not fake news.
- Window on Eurasia notes five reasons why the Russian's military-industrial complex cannot easily catch up to the United States'.
- Arnold Zwicky takes a look at the history of Swiss Tasmania, a region in the center of the island including the Swiss-themed town of Grindelwald.
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[BLOG] Some Wednesday links
Nov. 28th, 2018 12:00 pm- Henry Farrell at Crooked Timber considers democracy as an information system.
- The Crux shares what we have learned from our studies of the tusks of the mammoths.
- D-Brief notes another landmark of the InSight mission: It brought two CubeSats with it to Mars.
- JSTOR Daily takes a look at the odaliques of Matisse, paintings of North African women in intimate positions, in the contexts of colonialism and #metoo. What untold stories are there with these images?
- Anakana Schofield writes at the LRB Blog about her problems finding CBD oil post-marijuana legalization in greater Vancouver.
- The Map Room Blog notes the support of Popular Mechanics for paper maps, even in the digital age.
- Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution praises Toby Green's new history of West Africa, A Fistful of Shells, a book that emphasizes the influence of West Africa in the Americas and the wider Atlantic world.
- The NYR Daily carries a Tim Parks essay questioning whether it is worthwhile for an author to consciously seek out literary glory.
- Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel reports on the possibility that rocky planets might get large moons only if they suffer large impacts.
- Window on Eurasia reports on the insulting remarks of Russian liberal Oleg Kashin towards Ukrainians, and Tatars too, suggesting even liberal Russians might well be inclined to be anti-Ukrainian.
- Arnold Zwicky notes a remarkable word error in noting the 40th anniversary of the deaths of George Moscone and Harvey Milk, changing "assassination" into "assignation".
Tags:
- art,
- astronomy,
- biology,
- blogs,
- british columbia,
- canada,
- democracy,
- elephants,
- english language,
- former soviet union,
- france,
- globalization,
- imperialism,
- links,
- mars,
- national identity,
- north africa,
- oddities,
- politics,
- popular literature,
- russia,
- science,
- social sciences,
- sociology,
- space science,
- space travel,
- tatarstan,
- technology,
- ukraine,
- vancouver,
- west africa,
- writing
[URBAN NOTE] Some Sunday links
Nov. 18th, 2018 12:02 pm- Broadside Blog's Caitlin Kelly looks at a new movie and book celebrating the life of brave journalist Marie Colvin.
- Centauri Dreams looks at how the Spitzer telescope was able to constrain the size of 'Oumuamua.
- Crooked Timber asks a question about referenda. What are they good for? How can they be made to work effectively? The Brexit precedent is uncheering.
- The Dragon's Tales notes the delivery, by Europe, of the first service module for the Orion spacecraft.
- The Island Review shares Sylvia Warren's account of her visit to the Frioul archipelago, off the coast of Provence.
- JSTOR Daily reports on the perhaps surprisingly thriving culture of fandom that prevailed in the 19th century, with fans around the world devoting their energies to stars.
- Lawyers, Guns and Money suggests that the Democratic Party is grooming Beto O'Rourke to be a presidential candidate in 2020. Why not?
- Marginal Revolution links to a report suggesting that the pace of scientific advancement is slowing down, with greater investments in scientific research producing increasingly fewer fundamental breakthroughs.
- Carole Cadwalladr argues at the NYR Daily that the United Kingdom needs its own Mueller to get to the bottom of the scandals and mysteries surrounding Brexit.
- Casey Dreier at the Planetary Society Blog notes how the support of Texan Republican Congressman John Culberson for the exploration of Europa was used by his opponents as part of a successful attack.
- Drew Rowsome loves the movie Who Will Save The Roses?, with its story about the love of two older gay men for each other in hard times.
- Ilya Somin at the Volokh Conspiracy argues that the Spiderman Rule--"With great power comes great responsibility"--should be remembered by practitioners of constitutional law.
- Window on Eurasia considers what a proposed Russian sale of some of the Kuril Islands to Japan might imply about official attitudes towards territorial claims.
- Starting from Calvin and Hobbes, Arnold Zwicky considers rattles, death rattles and otherwise.
Tags:
- astronomy,
- blogs,
- borders,
- democracy,
- english language,
- european union,
- france,
- futurology,
- glbt issues,
- globalization,
- in memoriam,
- islands,
- japan,
- journalism,
- kuril islands,
- language,
- links,
- mass media,
- politics,
- popular culture,
- russia,
- science,
- separatism,
- space science,
- space travel,
- travel,
- united kingdom,
- united states
- The Map Room Blog shares this fantastic 1950s-style travel map for the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area, created by Warren Davidson.
- blogTO notes the installation of some new mural panels at Sherbourne Station.
- Dylan Ward at Spacing Toronto considers how ward councils, elected or otherwise, might work in Toronto.
- Fatima Syed at the National Observer takes a look at the stunning new exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Anthropocene, and its import for the human relationship to the environment.
- This profile by Anna Silman at The Cut of Faith Goldy, her former schoolmate and friend, is compelling reading. What happened?
- This article at The Atlantic outlines new genetic research outlining the remarkably rapid colonization of the America by human beings.
- VICE notes the huge strides forward made by the majority Navajo in Utah's San Juan County towards fair political representation.
- CBC notes that it will now be possible for Indigenous people in Nova Scotia courts to make use of eagle feathers for legal affirmations including oath swearing.
- In this MacLean's interview, musician and artist Tanya Tagaq makes it clear that her goal is to help other Indigenous people struggling to recover from colonization.
- The Map Room Blog links to this map of Indigenous Canada, mapping native names and locations and population centres.
- Sean Marshall maps out the Toronto election, focusing on the concentrated regional support of Jennifer Keesmaat (in the west downtown) and Faith Goldy (in some suburbs).
- Toronto Life shares some photos from the new Museum of Illusions.
- CBC Toronto notes Mayor John Tory's interest in appointing a transit czar to try to push things through an increasingly complicated transit environment in Toronto.
- Ben Spurr at the Toronto Star reports on how the TTC is making use of "gap trains" to alleviate overcrowding.
- Urban Toronto takes a look at the new Art Shoppe condo towers at Yonge and Eglinton, rising more than two dozen stories over midtown.
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- That the owners of 650 Parliament Street are charging displaced tenants rent, while they are away from their homes, is unconscionable. The Toronto Star reports.
- This CBC Toronto story about light pollution leaking over from a commercial building in Leslieville to nearby condos highlights a new problem for mixed-use districts.
- Urban Toronto takes a look at the latest version of a proposal for a mixed-used property at Lake Shore and Bathurst.
- blogTO notes that at least some politicians want to extend the underused Sheppard line of the TTC east to Kennedy station.
- Aparita Bhandavi at The Discourse notes how the recent elections confirmed the underrepresentation of non-white males in politics in Scarborough.
[BLOG] Some Monday links
Nov. 2nd, 2018 12:10 pm- D-Brief notes that, with the Dawn probe unresponsive, its mission to Vesta and Ceres is now over.
- The Dragon's Tales reports that NASA is seeking commercial partners to deliver cargo to the proposed Gateway station.
- JSTOR Daily looks back to a time where chestnuts were a staple food in Appalachia.
- Language Log takes a look at prehistoric words in Eurasia for honey, in Indo-European and Old Sinitic.
- Joy Katz at the LRB Blog writes about her lived experience of the conventional Pittsburgh neighbourhood of Squirrel Hill, a perhaps unlikely scene of tragedy.
- The Map Room Blog links to an interactive map showing the Québec election results.
- Marginal Revolution links to that New York Magazine article about young people who do not vote to start a discussion.
- Roads and Kingdoms looks at the real dangers faced by Venezuelan refugees in the northern Brazilian state of Roraima, at the start of the era of Bolsonaro.
- Window on Eurasia argues that changes to the Russian census allowing people to identify with multiple ethnicities could lead to a sharp shrinking in the numbers of minority nationalities.
Tags:
- agriculture,
- asteroids,
- astronomy,
- blogs,
- borders,
- brazil,
- canada,
- census,
- ceres,
- democracy,
- demographics,
- elections,
- environment,
- history,
- language,
- latin america,
- links,
- migration,
- national identity,
- neighbourhoods,
- politics,
- québec,
- russia,
- south america,
- space science,
- space travel,
- united states,
- venezuela
[BLOG] Some Saturday links
Oct. 27th, 2018 01:23 pm- Centauri Dreams notes the hope of the controllers of Hayabusa2 to collect samples from asteroid Ryugu.
- D-Brief takes a look at how ecologists in Hawaii are using bird song to encourage invasive species of birds to eat local plants.
- Bruce Dorminey notes preliminary findings of astronomers suggesting that stars with relatively low amounts of metals might be more likely to produce potentially habitable Earth-size worlds.
- The Frailest Thing's L.M. Sacasas considers what, exactly, it means for a technology to be considered "neutral".
- At JSTOR Daily, Hope Reese interviews historian Jill Lepore about the crisis facing American institutions in the 21st century. Is there a way forward?
- Lawyers, Guns and Money considers the ongoing catastrophe in Yemen, aggravated terribly by Saudi intervention and supported by the West.
- Andrew Brownie at the LRB Blog notes how soccer in Brazil, producing stars against dictatorship like Sócrates in the early 1980s, now produces pro-Bolsonario figures.
- The NYR Daily notes the resistance of the Bedouin of al-Khan al-Ahmar to resist their displacement by Israeli bulldozers.
- Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel notes how, among other things, extreme temperature swings make the Moon an unsuitable host for most observatories apart from radio telescopes.
- Window on Eurasia notes the sheer scale of Russian immigration to Crimea after 2014, the number of migrants amounting to a fifth of the peninsula's population.
Tags:
- asteroids,
- astronomy,
- birds,
- blogs,
- borders,
- brazil,
- clash of ideologies,
- democracy,
- environment,
- extraterrestrial life,
- former soviet union,
- hawaii,
- islands,
- israel,
- latin america,
- links,
- middle east,
- migration,
- moon,
- palestinians,
- philosophy,
- politics,
- russia,
- saudi arabia,
- south america,
- space science,
- space travel,
- sports,
- technology,
- ukraine,
- united states,
- war,
- yemen
- Brian Budd at The Conversation argues that the strong showing of Faith Goldy shows not only her particular threat, but that her expertise in social media and mobilizing support is something other alt-right people can learn from.
- Michael Coren at NOW Toronto argues that the attempt of Conrad Black to soft-pedal the racism and fascism of Faith Goldy is part of a broader effort by some people on the right to make Goldy and her views more acceptable.
- Anastasia Pitcher at The Varsity takes a look at Faith Goldy from her perspective of a U of T student, someone sharing in the traditions that Goldy has taken for her own in her alt-right career.
- Rob Salerno at Daily Xtra suggests that the confusion about progressives in Toronto about the sort of city they want, about the material ways they would make the lives of Torotonians better, will contribute to their continued defeats.
- Could rookie members on Toronto City Council hold the balance of power? The Toronto Star reports.
[BLOG] Some Thursday links
Oct. 25th, 2018 09:57 am- Bad Astronomer Phil Plait takes a look at the unusual object BST1047+1156, possibly a gas cloud or a faint galaxy.
- Keith Kintigh at The Crux takes a look at the poor preservation of critical archeological data, the sort of basic information that would allow much to be reconstructed by future generations.
- D-Brief notes that, with global warming, tropical cyclones are moving poleward.
- Dead Things notes how the diversity of some styles of ancient tools found in Texas hint at possible pre-Clovis migrations to the Americas.
- JSTOR Daily makes the case for lowering the voting age in the United States to 16, on the grounds of the reality of the many 16- and 17-year-olds who prove they can engage with the political process.
- At Lawyers, Guns and Money, Erik Loomis takes a look at the importance of fire as an element of the environment in the western United States, something at once feared and appreciated.
- The Map Room Blog highlights Navigating New York, an exhibition of ephemera (maps, tools, and others) relating to the New York City transit system running at the excellent New York Transit Museum.
- Scientist Conor Nixon writes at the Planetary Society Blog about a recent expedition to the glaciers of Iceland, looking for environments analogous to Europa's.
- Drew Rowsome reviews, and praises, the new LGBTQ anthology, Dark Rainbow: Queer Erotic Horror.
- Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel considers the early universe, where supermassive stars led to the formation of supermassive black holes.
- Window on Eurasia shares an argument that, after about 2000, the lived experience of millions of Russians with life elsewhere in Europe made it impossible to continue to imagine "Europe" as separate from Russia, even contrasting with Russia.
- Nick Rowe at Worthwhile Canadian Initiative considers the extent to which a job seeming to be useful would have greater appeal than a less useful but higher-paying job.
- Arnold Zwicky considers the origins of the Turkish taffy of his youth.
Tags:
- archeology,
- astronomy,
- blogs,
- democracy,
- demographics,
- economics,
- elections,
- environment,
- europa,
- first nations,
- food,
- global warming,
- history,
- iceland,
- jupiter,
- links,
- mass transit,
- migration,
- museums,
- national identity,
- new york,
- new york city,
- physics,
- psychology,
- russia,
- social sciences,
- space science,
- turkey,
- united states,
- west norden
- Lauren Pelley at CBC Toronto notes how, despite trying hard, Jennifer Keesmaat was unable to displace John Tory as the clear front-runner.
- Mark Gollom at CBC notes that John Tory may be able to find ways to work with Doug Ford, though the province will remain the dominant partner in any relationship.
- Many of the tenants displaced from 650 Parliament Street were happy to return briefly to their old homes, to retrieve belongings. The Toronto Star reports.
- blogTO shares these vintage photos of St. Clair Avenue a century ago, to all appearances just another rural road.
- Urban Toronto shared a gorgeous aerial photo of Toronto, looking south from a point in the Don Valley towards the downtown.
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Not voting in this year's Toronto mayoral election was not an option for me. Never mind that I had abundant time to go given my schedule yesterday, but my assigned voting location--the gym of Dovercourt Public School--was just down the street from me. If my favoured mayoral candidate, Jennifer Keesmaat, did not win, it would not be because I did not bother to turn out.
This election was unusually badly organized. Lots of voters--most of the voters I saw when I came in at 7 o'clock were not on the list, and I was among their number despite living at the same address since 2007--and there were long line-ups as the inadequate number of election workers tried to process the growing lines. Responsibility for this, I think, can be fairly assigned to the provincial government of Doug Ford with its explicitly anti-democratic meddling in local politics.
Still, I voted. I hope you did too; civic engagement matters, now as always if perhaps more visibly now than in earlier quieter eras.
- This sad SCMP article takes a look at the struggles of North Korean defectors on arriving in South Korea, a competitive society with its own values alien to them.
- This Open Democracy book review asks what went wrong in eastern Europe, that illiberalism became so popular. (Of note, I think, is the suggestion that Western definitions have changed substantially since the 1990s.)
- The rise, in the person of Bolsonario, of fascism in Brazil is the subject of this stirring Open Democracy feature.
- This New York Times opinion piece by an Irish woman living in England touches upon the ways in which Brexiteers' blithe dismissal of Ireland and Irish needs are starting to make many 21st century Irish angry with their eastern neighbour, again.
- MacLean's notes how the legalization of marijuana in Canada came about as a consequence of the recognition by Justin Trudeau of the unfairness of the old regime.
- Chris Selley at the National Post writes about the transformation of Jennifer Keesmaat from city planner to politician. (Vote for her today!)
- blogTO notes that Toronto is now the most expensive city in Canada for renters.
- Liam Barrington-Bush at NOW Toronto notes how, in the absence of any effective city leadership, people in Parkdale are taking it upon themselves to keep their neighbourhood affordable despite gentrification pressures.
- Steve Munro explores the question of why TTC ridership has stagnated, if not fallen, in the past few years.
- Sarah Ratzlaff has posted a stirring manifesto at Spacing calling for more public art in the City of Toronto.
- Toronto Life shares some photos showing Toronto scenes from 10/17, the day of marijuana legalization.
- The Presto system continues to underperform, with among other things a high--even worsening!--failure rate. The Toronto Star reports.
- The Downtown Relief Line, arcing east and north from Osgoode station on the Yonge line to Pape on the Danforth, has finally gotten approval following the completon of an environmental assessment. CBC reports.
- In the aftermath of the Church and Wellesley serial killer scandal, Toronto Police has finally assembled a permanent Missing Persons Unit. CBC reports.
- Enzo DiMatteo at NOW Toronto interviews mayoral candidate Jennifer Keesmaat, letting her make the case that her vision makes her uniquely qualified to become the next mayor of Toronto.
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- For John Lorinc at Spacing, the vision of Jennifer Keesmaat makes her an excellent mayoral candidate for Toronto. Me too. The essay is here.
- A judge has ruled that Bell Media will not be forced to run television ads for the far-right activist and mayoral candidate Faith Goldy. The National Post reports.
- Anthony Oliveira at Daily Xtra is decidedly unimpressed by Toronto police's return to Pride, and--I think--rightly so.
- The City of Toronto is not quite sure how to regulate marijuana smoking, different city departments and agencies regulating different elements. CBC reports.
- Urban Toronto shares this fantastic photo of the Toronto skyline as seen from the Leslie Street Spit, < a href=http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2018/10/photo-day-city-natural-setting">here.
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