Most weeks in the history of white supremacy are not good weeks, but this is a particularly bad week. Some lowlights: In my hometown of Minneapolis, a white police officer lynches George Floyd while three other officers look on. The incident is caught on video, which is important because the initial police report does not […]
Category Archives: Politics
COVID-19: This Time It’s Personal
As regions and municipalities start to relax their lockdowns, advice is starting to pop up about risk and decision making. It is almost entirely addressed to readers in the second-person singular. For instance, Madison physician James Stein outlined different levels of personal risk and says “I can’t make decisions for you”; The New York Times […]
Some extremely obvious reflections on the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz
It’s all connected. Yesterday was the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. I don’t believe I had any relatives at Auschwitz, but members of my extended family did die in the Holocaust. They also died because of anti-semitic conscription during World War I in the Austro-Hungarian empire (in fact, this is the reason my mother’s […]
Here are some hot Canadian election takes for you
As always, remember that an election is just an election. It has real implications, but party politics is the tip of the iceberg. If you want real change, there is a lot of organizing and work to be done outside the party politics system. I am relieved the conservatives didn’t win. It is impressive that […]
An Open Letter in Support of Divest McGill
As I’ve mentioned before, McGill students have been organizing a campaign to get McGill to divest from fossil fuels. This seems eminently sensible to me. This past week, the Committee to Advise on Matters of Social Responsibility released a report to the Board of Governors recommending AGAINST divestment because (among other things) oil companies have […]
Paris Report
Greetings from Paris. Here is your fucked up Paris update for a fucked up world (pardon my French). My experience of Paris at this point has completely diverged from my social media feed. For those of you not here, here is what I have experienced. In my social media feed, and reading the news, France […]
Canada: Where the 4th Best Election Outcome is Kind of OK
Possible 2015 Canadian Election Results, Ranked NDP Majority NDP Minority, propped up by liberals Liberal Minority, propped up by NDP Liberal Majority Liberal Minority, propped up by conservatives. Conservative minority, propped up by liberals. Conservative Majority. By my count, a liberal majority was the fourth best outcome I could have hoped for from last night’s election. […]