• 2 Posts
  • 113 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 15th, 2023

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  • I think that the classic objection to rail transit is

    What about the last mile?!

    I think that that objection can be almost entirely adressed (on both ends of the ride) with close integration with [e-]bikes/scooters

    But it gets cold!

    So… pedal?

    But it rains and snows!

    Yes, and we’re Canadians with rain and snow gear.

    What about in a blizzard? Well, what do you do in a blizzard right now? Stay home, or risk getting stuck in the cold right?

    Range and charging!

    Right, but when the battery is flat, it’s still a bicycle…






  • I agree that the government should govern not politick, but isn’t it a bit naive to think you can make lasting change without politicking?

    I wonder if it’s useful to look at “governing”, and “politicking” as either end of a spectrum with “leading” as the sweet spot.

    Just my two cents though.



  • It’s really telling that Chinese EVs (like imported Teslas) were basically considered fine until the prospect of them being affordable to the middle class arose. That’s when we started hearing about labour abuses and fires that only happen with * cheap Chinese* batteries.

    It’s not like Tesla has a stellar reputation for quality and reliability. They started powerwall as a way to offload bad/ prematurely failing batteries. Don’t get me wrong, powerwall is a good idea. But pretending like BYD is going to have terrible batteries and that’s why we need tariffs is bad.

    China has labour and human rights abuses (eg genocide of Uyghers in Xinjiang [cultural genocide is still genocide]). Imo Canada is doing a better job of reconciling with its history/present of cultural genocide than China is. Canada’s TFW program probably results in lots of horrible abuses that we don’t hear about, but i think this program may be on its way out too. These issues don’t only apply to EVs though.

    The only things that’re EV specific are lithium batteries and automotive manufacturing.

    EV tariffs are protectionism: We want to protect domestic automotive (and para-automotive) manufacturing capabilities, and our investments in EVs/green tech.

    I don’t think 100% tariffs can be justified on EVs alone.











  • Idon’t think that’s a warship (although I do concede it’s gathering intel) and it’s a 1500km boat ride away from Canada’s territorial waters.

    1500km is about twice the length of Canada’s pacific coast (Southern tip of Vancouver Island, to Northern tip of Haida Gwaii)

    My view is that the condition of the arctic ice cap is of global interest, but China’s claim to be an arctic nation is total garbage.

    Canada probably should take steps to further assert sovereignty over its arctic archipelago (and the associated searoute), but I still feel that the comment I was responding to was spreading alarmist junk.



  • It seems that there is a lot of moving parts to this story and the article reports some eventsand quotes but doesn’t really string them together coherently. The Liberal MP that’s accused of trying to shift the discussion to abortion rights had some procedural complaints about the way the Conservative meeting chair set up the meeting, and argued that they were changing the topic away from abortion. Is there any merit to that complaint? It’s the sort of thing an article needs to address.