For my Canadian friends
- Thread starter Shiftless2
- Start date
Shiftless2
Well-known member
Canada CUTS the Cord from the USA as Mark Carney SEALS Ecuador FTA while American farmers are losing $41B. Canada just signed a Free Trade Agreement with Ecuador and Trump didn't even notice. He should have. That signing was the final piece of a 24-month strategic architecture Ottawa quietly assembled while the U.S. economy was busy unraveling itself.
The Ecuador trade deal immediately eliminates tariffs on 99.6% of Ecuador's exportable goods — opening 600 distinct product lines to Canadian consumers with zero duty friction. Bananas, cocoa, fresh-cut flowers, high-grade shrimp, petroleum oils, and precious metals now flow directly into Canadian deep-water ports, bypassing the contaminated and politically volatile U.S. transit grid entirely. Canada now holds active free trade agreements with every single country along the South American Pacific coast. Ottawa has finished constructing the Pacific Wall — a tariff-free maritime shipping lane stretching from the
Arctic Circle straight down the entire western spine of South America.
While the U.S. food system collapses into a $41 billion economic crater projected for 2027 — with $31 billion in agricultural losses, Canada engineered a clean, secured supply chain alternative that Washington cannot buy back into, cannot tariff, and cannot stop.
Shiftless2
Well-known member
Residents of a small Alberta community say they were "shell-shocked" to learn that one of Canada's most prominent white supremacist groups had quietly held a large national training event at their local volunteer-run community hall.
As CBC Investigates reports, Second Sons Canada, a group founded by Jeremy MacKenzie, gathered more than 60 masked members for military-style drills, marches, combat training and organizational exercises near Millarville, Alberta. CBC's visual investigations team identified the location using publicly available clues from the group's own social media posts.
According to the report, Second Sons leaders have welcomed neo-Nazis into their ranks, called for the mass deportation of non-white Canadians "at gunpoint," and said Canadian politicians should be executed as traitors.
The community hall's volunteer board says the group never identified itself when booking the facility. Had volunteers known who was behind the event, they say it would never have been approved.
This is not an isolated incident. CBC notes that Second Sons has repeatedly booked community spaces across Canada under false pretences, including a similar gathering in Ontario last year. Experts say this tactic is common among white nationalist organizations because most communities would refuse to host them if they disclosed their true identity.
The RCMP says it is aware of Second Sons Canada and is monitoring the rise of hate-motivated crimes and incidents across the country, while emphasizing that investigations focus on criminal activity rather than ideology alone.
This investigation is another reminder of why investigative journalism matters. CBC didn't simply repeat a press release. Its reporters and visual investigations team pieced together publicly available evidence, identified the location, spoke with local residents, the community association, experts and police, and brought important information into the public interest.
How should communities protect themselves from extremist groups booking public spaces under false pretences while respecting civil liberties? Where should that balance be drawn?
SOURCE with comments
Canada can deal.
In the U.S. we have The Bill of Rights which includes our First Amendment right to free speech. BUT !
Popular speech, "I love you Mommy!" doesn't need much protection.
It's unpopular speech which our First Amendment most prominently protects.
Our Skokie precedent provides insight into this. https://www.aclu.org/news/free-spee...-to-represent-the-free-speech-rights-of-nazis
Inciting to riot may be speech, but it is not protected by 1A. Neither is betraying State secrets, or libel, or perjury, or ...
Shiftless2
Well-known member
On Thursday, Doug Ford stood behind a podium reading “PROTECT ONTARIO” as he unveiled his government’s new framework for approving data centres. But with communities already calling for a pause, Ontarians might reasonably ask: who and what are we protecting?
CBC News reports the province says new data centres will pay the full cost of their electricity, receive no cash incentives and that projects using closed-loop cooling systems will be prioritized. Ford says the expansion will help keep Canadian data in Canada, while the province projects its AI strategy could generate $122 billion in economic growth by 2035 and 17,000 jobs annually.
But there are serious environmental and infrastructure questions that haven't gone away. Data centres can consume enormous amounts of electricity, require significant land and, depending on their cooling systems, put additional pressure on water resources. There are also broader questions about how rapidly expanding electricity demand will affect Ontario's grid and the province's climate commitments.
And some communities would rather understand those consequences before the building boom begins.
Oakville voted this week for a one-year moratorium. Mississauga is considering one. More than 5,000 Toronto residents have signed petitions raising concerns, while Ontario Green Leader Mike Schreiner is calling for a provincewide pause until stronger protections are established.
Schreiner also points to an important distinction in Ford's announcement: the government says it will prioritize closed-loop cooling systems rather than require them.
Ford dismissed some municipal resistance, saying it “doesn't add up” to oppose data centres when communities rely on computers, social media and AI.
But using technology doesn't mean communities have to accept every proposed data centre without first understanding its environmental footprint.
A moratorium could give Ontario time to independently assess the cumulative impacts on water, energy, land and emissions, and establish enforceable standards before approving more projects. That's not inherently anti-technology. It's asking government to know what we're getting into before committing communities to it.
So seeing “PROTECT ONTARIO” on Ford's podium raises a fair question about what that slogan means in practice.
If protecting Ontario's communities and environment ever conflicts with billions of dollars in investment, do Ontarians trust Doug Ford's government to put the public interest first? (Shift's comment - no!)
Or is “Protect Ontario” ultimately more about the money?
CBC's reporting gives Ontarians the information to start asking those questions before these decisions become irreversible.
What do you think? Should Ontario pause new data-centre approvals while their environmental and community impacts are independently assessed?
SOURCE with comments
?
Don't they anyway?
They may pay for both electric, & perhaps water too.
The problem is their disproportionate consumption drives the cost up for the others drawing from the same source.