Month: August 2017

Saturday August 12, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday August 12, 2017

Trump warns North Korea’s Kim he will ‘truly regret’ further threats to US and allies

Donald Trump on Friday went further to turn the crisis over North Korea into a personal battle of wills between him and Kim Jong-un, warning the North Korean leader he would “truly regret” hostile acts against US territory or US allies.

The warning came a few hours after an early-morning tweet from the president that claimed US military options were “locked and loaded” for use if Pyongyang “acted unwisely”.

The tweet triggered worldwide alarm and a rebuke from German chancellor Angela Merkel, who said: “I consider an escalation of rhetoric the wrong answer.”

But Trump stood by his words when asked about them at his golf resort in New Jersey.

“I hope they are going to fully understand the gravity of what I said, and what I said is what I mean,” Trump said. “Those words are very, very easy to understand.”

He then issued an ultimatum to Kim Jong-un himself. “This man will not get away with what he’s doing,” he said. “If he utters one threat in form of overt threat – which, by the way, he’s been uttering for years – or if he does anything in respect to Guam or anyplace else that’s an American territory or an American ally, he will truly regret it.”

The North Korean leadership has warned it will launch four missiles at the waters around US Pacific territory of Guam as a warning to the US if it persisted with its practice sorties by long-range bombers based on the island.

Despite gung-ho language from the US president, there was no change in US deployments in the region or a change in the alert status of US forces. And it was reported on Friday that the Trump administration had reopened a channel of communication between US and North Korean diplomats at the U.N. (Source: The Guardian) 

 

 

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Friday August 11, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday August 11, 2017

Canada’s Army Builds Tent Camp For Haitian Asylum-Seekers Arriving From U.S.

Featuring a Fire and Fury gallery of Donald Trump cartoons

The Canadian military is building a temporary shelter near the border with the United States, to accommodate hundreds of asylum-seekers crossing illegally from the U.S. into Quebec.

June 2, 2017

Most of those arrivals are Haitians who were admitted to the U.S. after the earthquake in 2010, and whose future legal status in America is unclear.

Dan Karpenchuk, reporting for NPR, says the Canadian service members are only building the camp, not remaining afterward to staff it.

“The camp will hold as many as 500 seekers, about the number of asylum-seekers waiting to be processed,” Karpenchuk reports. “The soldiers will also set up lighting [and] heating, and install flooring. They will not have security roles.”

May 11, 2017

The CBC reports that currently, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police have a tent set up at the border to handle processing — but there are no beds. People spend two to three days waiting on benches and chairs.

The soldiers, at the request of Public Safety Canada, are assembling a camp at a nearby “converted private campsite,” the CBC reports.

“Setting up tents, this is something obviously we’re quite familiar with, we’re pretty good at doing this,” Maj. Yves Desbiens, the spokesperson on the ground for the Canadian Armed Forces, told the Canadian broadcaster. “But in terms of these capacities, this is not something we do often.”

February 10, 2017

The tent camp on the border is just the first stop for asylum-seekers.

“After they’re processed, the asylum-seekers will be bused to Montreal, where they will be put up in other temporary accommodation, including the Olympic Stadium, a former convent and now a facility at one of the city’s hospitals,” Karpenchuk says.

As we reported last week, Montreal’s Olympic Stadium has just recently been pressed into service to house asylum-seekers, after normal facilities were overwhelmed. But it’s only a temporary option, since the stadium won’t be available during upcoming events.

June 29, 2016

The surge has, by all accounts, been dramatic. Last week, a spokesperson for the provincial government organization that helps asylum-seekers told the CBC that the group helped about 180 people last July — and that more than 1,000 people crossed the border this July.

Immigration Canada told the CBC on Wednesday that crossings at one point along the border have quadrupled in just the past two weeks. (Source: NPR) 

 

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Thursday August 10, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday August 10, 2017

Trump’s Threat to North Korea Was Improvised

President Trump delivered his “fire and fury” threat to North Korea on Tuesday with arms folded, jaw set and eyes flitting on what appeared to be a single page of talking points set before him on the conference table at his New Jersey golf resort.

April 15, 2013

The piece of paper, as it turned out, was a fact sheet on the opioid crisis he had come to talk about, and his ominous warning to Pyongyang was entirely improvised, according to several people with direct knowledge of what unfolded. In discussions with advisers beforehand, he had not run the specific language by them, though he had talked over possible responses in a general way.

The inflammatory words quickly escalated the confrontation with North Korea to a new, alarming level and were followed shortly by a new threat from North Korea to obliterate an American air base on Guam. In the hours since, the president’s advisers have sought to calm the situation, with Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson assuring Americans that they “should sleep at night” without worrying about an imminent war.

June 21, 2006

But the president’s ad-libbed threat reflected an evolving and still unsettled approach to one of the most dangerous hot spots in the world as Mr. Trump and his team debate diplomatic, economic and military options.

The president’s aides are divided on North Korea, as on other issues, with national security veterans like Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, the national security adviser, on one side and Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s chief strategist, and his allies on the other. 

The president had been told about a Washington Post story on North Korea’s progress in miniaturizing nuclear warheads so that they could fit on top of a ballistic missile, and was in a bellicose mood, according to a person who spoke with him before he made the statement. His team assumed that he would be asked about North Korea during a scheduled media appearance tied to his opioid meeting, but Mr. Trump had not mentioned his comment during a conference call beforehand that focused on North Korea.

“North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States,” Mr. Trump told reporters in remarks aired on television and broadcast around the globe. “They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen.”(Source: New York Times) 

 

Wednesday August 9, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday August 9, 2017

Authorities seek ways of deterring hikers from Mount Albion Falls

The “meat-loving” marine creature that ate at the legs of a Melbourne Australia teenager has been identified as a flesh-eating sea flea, known as a lysianassid amphipod.

July 14, 2017

Marine biologist Dr Genefor Walker-Smith said the creatures, which left 16-year-old Sam Kanizay with significant bleeding from his legs, were a small, scavenging crustacean that usually fed on dead fish or sea birds.

Amphipods are related to shrimp and prawns but are smaller in size, ranging from 6-13mm. They are not venomous and their bites do not cause any lasting damage.

They are commonly known as sea fleas or sea lice, although Walker-Smith noted that sea lice was more commonly used to refer to isopods, a different type of crustacean.

Kanizay said on Monday he was soaking his legs at Brighton beach when he felt the creatures attack, causing wounds that would not stop bleeding.

September 17, 2016

“By the time walked across the sand about 20 metres … I looked down and noticed that I had blood all over my ankles and feet,” he said. (Source: The Guardian) 

Meanwhile, Hamilton fire prevention officer Steve McArthur said a total of 10 hikers needed assistance getting out of Albion Falls after an “excessive amount of water” came Monday afternoon. No one was injured, he said.

Albion Falls has been at the centre of the public and political backlash lately over people ignoring safety warnings and trespassing.

This has led the city to bolster safety features, including adding $75,000 worth of fencing and increasing ticketing enforcement of trespassers. (Source: Hamilton Spectator) 

 

 

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Saturday August 5, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday August 5, 2017

This health-care crisis is growing

Hospitals — running over budget, operating beds they don’t have funding for. Emergency rooms — patients stacked up in hallways. Acute care beds — too many blocked, occupied by people waiting to leave hospital but with no place to go. Ambulances — stretched to the limit, often not available at all.

December 21, 2016

It’s an old story. One we would rather not argue about again. But here’s the problem. Things are not getting better, they’re getting worse. And so this old story appears here yet again in hopes it will take on a new sense of urgency.

Hamilton Health Sciences needs to cut $20 million from its budget, St. Joseph’s Healthcare $7 million. In both cases, staffing will be affected, stretching already thin human resources even thinner. Executive staff are being cut as well as front line. In the case of HHS, three senior executives are leaving. And that’s at a hospital system that already spends below the provincial average on administration, according to the Canadian Institute for Health Information. HHS spends 4.9 per cent on administration, higher than the national average of 4.3 per cent but well below the provincial average of 5.6 per cent. Keep that in mind next time someone declares hospitals would be fine if only they cut senior management costs. 

May 10, 2016

Hospitals have seen provincial funding cut repeatedly. The province provided some relief this year with a two per cent increase. That doesn’t even cover inflation.

That’s why it’s so frustrating when Health Minister Eric Hoskins says he doesn’t expect funding to impact patient care. What world do Hoskins and other politicians live in? It’s already affecting patient care. In Ontario, you’re not supposed to spend 48 hours on a bed in a hallway awaiting admission. You shouldn’t expect to wait double-digit hours in the ER. You shouldn’t expect to be told there’s no acute care bed for a sick relative. You shouldn’t expect years-long waiting lists for aging relatives waiting for long-term care. All these are happening and getting more common. (Source: Hamilton Spectator Editorial)