2020-28

Tuesday September 1, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday September 1, 2020

With a New Leader, Conservatives Look to Unseat Justin Trudeau

In keeping with the general upheaval that has marked this year, the Conservative Party of Canada announced its new leader at an unusual time: in the middle of the United States’ presidential nominating conventions.

August 25, 2020

Mr. O’Toole, who is from Ontario, offered shout-outs to Indigenous Canadians, people who are “Black, white, brown or from any race or creed,” union members, L.G.B.T.Q. Canadians and people who “joined the Canadian family five weeks ago or five generations ago.”

During his leadership campaign, he pitched himself as a “true blue,” or hard-right-leaning, Conservative, without being too specific about policies. But his record in politics shows that he’s from the moderate side of his party.

During his debut news conference as leader, Mr. Toole moved to distance himself from the party’s social conservatives on issues like abortion.

January 23, 2020

That tack, Professor Marland said, may prove critical to expanding the party’s support in Eastern Canada and among women.

“I’m absolutely convinced that the Conservative leader is going to have to tackle social issues in a much stronger way than has been the case in the past,” he said. “Historically, this has been a problem for parties of the right.”

The contest to elect a new Conservative leader brought with it speculation that Mr. Trudeau’s government might fall shortly after it starts a new session of Parliament on Sept. 23 with a throne speech.

Regardless, a longer lead time to a vote may benefit Mr. O’Toole and his effort to expand the Conservatives beyond their base. (NYT) 

 

Saturday August 29, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday August 29, 2020

Fear around hugging, touching could be long-term consequence of COVID-19 pandemic, psychologists say

Janna Wiebe woke with a start recently, after dreaming her young son was surrounded by school friends who weren’t observing physical distancing.

July 25, 2020

She calls it a nightmare.

Wiebe’s family in Gretna — a southern Manitoba town about 100 kilometres from Winnipeg — have been practising the recommended distancing from others for the last month. They’ve gotten used to only being close to each other.

She thinks the public health directives and orders have gotten into her head.

“All I have wanted since this pandemic has started is for my son to be able to go back to kindergarten — to go back to school and finish his first year of school properly,” she said.

April 30, 2020

“Now I’m having a nightmare that he is going to school, and that’s obviously something deep down in my subconscious that finds that thought nerve-racking.”

Even Wiebe’s partner had a bad dream about a person being hugged by someone they didn’t know.

The Wiebes aren’t the only ones who are wary of touching others or getting too close. Psychology experts say the lingering effects of public health orders could have an impact on mental health long after those orders are lifted, and could increase phobias and obsessive reactions in those who already have anxiety problems.

Life in a Pandemic

That’s because fear-related learning is persistent, he says. For example, if a person has a bad experience getting stuck in an elevator, that might trigger a lifelong fear of elevators — a fear that’s maintained by avoiding them altogether.

The same could be true of the pandemic, says Bolster.

“This pandemic will end, and the threat of contracting this disease from casual social contact will diminish drastically,” he said.

“But to the extent that people avoid social contact that’s now not only benign, but necessary to feel emotionally and personally connected with others, they will likely pay a price in emotional health and social adjustment.” (CBC) 

 

Friday August 28, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday August 28, 2020

As Young Black Athletes Call for Racial Awakening, Some N.F.L. Retirees Declare Fealty to ‘Winner’ Trump

On one of the most consequential nights in recent sports history — when a player-led boycott forced the N.B.A. to postpone playoff games — the Republican National Convention offered pro-Trump testimonials from a retired Notre Dame coach and a former N.F.L. player facing insider-trading charges.

Sketches from the 2020 RNC

“It is a pleasure, a blessing, and an honor for me to explain why I believe that President Trump is a consistent winner,” said Lou Holtz, 83, who coached college and pro teams during a successful four-decade career.

“I am here as a servant to god, a servant to the people of our nation, and a servant to our president,” said the former Minnesota Vikings safety Jack Brewer, 41.

Mr. Trump has plenty of support among athletes, especially white ones, across a range of sports. And he has hobnobbed with many Black sports figures, most from previous generations, like Mike Tyson, Herschel Walker and Jim Brown. Some, like Mr. Walker, have appeared at the Republican National Convention, and delivered a message that the party wants to project — that the president is not racist.

June 3, 2020

But members of the current generation of Black athletes in the N.B.A. and in other sports leagues have not personalized their protest in the same way — their movement is a broader call for social justice — and they certainly do not view themselves as Mr. Trump’s “servant.”

And the shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black father who was partially paralyzed after a white officer fired seven shots into his back on Sunday in Kenosha, Wis., has revived the sense of urgency stirred by the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor by the police.

Many see the Trump era less as an exceptional moment in American history than as the resurgence of chronic patterns of oppression, discrimination and racial violence.

But the president’s gleeful culture-war attack on the former N.F.L. quarterback Colin Kaepernick — who took a knee during the national anthem four years ago Wednesday to protest racism and police shootings — and his response to the current uprising over systemic racism seems to have steeled the determination of Black athletes across many sports.

June 15, 2019

By late Wednesday, the N.B.A. stoppage had spread to the W.N.B.A., Major League Soccer and Major League Baseball. Games between the Cincinnati Reds and Milwaukee Brewers, the Seattle Mariners and San Diego Padres, and the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Francisco Giants were called off just before they were scheduled to start.

“For me, I think no matter what, I wasn’t going to play tonight,” said Mookie Betts, the star Dodgers outfielder, who is Black.

The N.B.A. players are withholding their labor, it is not clear for how long, to promote an as-yet undefined campaign for systemic change that includes, but also transcends, ousting the current president.

“BOYCOTTED, NOT *POSTPONED,” the Lakers star LeBron James, who supports Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic nominee, wrote on his Instagram feed late Wednesday.

Even before the Milwaukee Bucks players announced their boycott of Wednesday’s playoff game, Black athletes and their coaches had been offering yearning expressions of anguish as resonant as anything uttered at either political convention. (New York Times) 

 

Thursday August 27, 2020

August 27, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday August 27, 2020

Doug Ford praises appointment of ‘amazing’ Chrystia Freeland as federal finance minister

“Amazing.”

“Incredible.”

November 21, 2019

Those were just two of the adjectives the Progressive Conservative premier of Ontario used to hail the new federal Liberal finance minister.

“I absolutely love Chrystia Freeland. She’s amazing. I’ll have her back, I’ll help her any way we can,” an elated Premier Doug Ford said Tuesday.

As first revealed by the Star’s Susan Delacourt in April, the COVID-19 pandemic has forged a close friendship between Ford and the deputy prime minister.

The premier was visibly delighted that Freeland, who represents University-Rosedale in the House of Commons, is succeeding departing Toronto Centre MP Bill Morneau as federal treasurer.

December 11, 2019

“I want to congratulate my good friend Chrystia Freeland. An amazing person. I actually texted her this morning to say congratulations. I don’t know how she’s going to do it. She’s working around the clock now,” Ford told CityNews’s Jamie Tumelty in Scarborough.

“There’s no one that would be better in that role than Chrystia Freeland,” he said, pointedly declining to comment on the WE Charity scandal that triggered Morneau’s resignation.

“I’m not going to get into that federal politics. That’s up to the prime minister to deal with. We’ve been working very collaboratively together.”

The premier predicted Freeland would be a good partner for Queen’s Park, which is seeking additional federal funding for infrastructure projects.

“If there was one person, I have confidence in, it is Chrystia Freeland. She’s going to do an incredible job,” said Ford. (Toronto Star) 

March 27, 2020

Now this just in: With less than two weeks to go before most schools are set to welcome back students for the fall term, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau today announced more than $2 billion in funding to help provinces and territories re-open their schools and economies safely.

The announcement comes as some provinces are reporting increases in the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases.

The funding is meant to allow provinces and territories to work with local school boards to implement measures to protect students and staff from COVID-19. The money can be used to help adapt learning spaces, improve air ventilation, increase hand sanitation and hygiene and buy extra personal protective equipment (PPE) and cleaning supplies. (CBC) 

Wednesday August 26, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday August 26, 2020

The coronavirus took a back seat to culture wars during the RNC’s first night

Despite the ubiquity of the coronavirus in American life in 2020, the pandemic was not a top tier issue during the first night of the Republican National Convention on Monday.

GOP elephants

Rather than placing the pandemic as a central theme to kick off the convention — in the way 9/11 did for both parties in 2004 — the leadoff speech Monday night from 26-year-old Charlie Kirk framed Trump as “the bodyguard of western civilization.”

Segments on violent crime and cultural issues like “cancel culture” far outweighed anything on the virus.

In one clear COVID-19 focused bit, Trump did a stand around interview with frontline workers.

July 10, 2020

In a mix of asking them how they were doing and soliciting flattery, Trump once again made avoidable missteps that have come to characterize his response to the pandemic.

“Your blood is very valuable, you know that, right?” the president told a COVID-19 survivor.

“OK, and I won’t even ask you about the hydroxychloroquine,” Trump quipped at another point, referring to the unproven therapeutic normally reserved for malaria treatment. There was also a speech from a West Virginia nurse that praised Trump’s pandemic response. 

May 5, 2020

“As a health care professional, I can tell you without hesitation Donald Trump’s quick action and leadership save thousands of lives during COVID-19, and the benefits of that response extend far beyond coronavirus,” Amy Ford, a registered nurse from Williamson, W.Va. said. 

The only other focused messaging on the virus came in repeated lines about Trump banning travel from China on Jan. 31, which was part of what Ford was alluding to when she claimed Trump saved “thousands of lives.”

July 22, 2016

Fact checkers have found there is little to back up that claim on the ban — which wasn’t a complete ban — and public health experts have noted it did little to mitigate transmission once the virus began coming to the US from Europe.

Subsequent nights of the convention might feature more on the pandemic, but months of communications issues and a consistent reluctance to back a national response instead of delegating it to the states have shown Trump has little appetite to make the virus a major campaign issue. (Business Insider)