America still doesn't understand how deep the rift goes
I’m not alarmist, and I don’t want to sound alarmist, but imagine my thinking the other day when this happened.
I was in the field that separates my Scottish second home from the crushing waters of the North Sea. It's a gorgeous spot, and our overseas home (which replaced our Georgian Bay cottage in Ontario) is comprised of two old sheep barns converted into a small steading where I work on my books, my speeches, my podcasts, and catch up on my reading of history. We spend a few months a year where the sheep used to roam, enjoying the remoteness, the quiet, and yes, the golf.
While we are used to seeing the fighter jets from nearby RAF Lossiemouth manoeuvring the skies five to ten thousand feet above us, training in the same area as RAF pilots have done for decades, back through the years to the Second World War, when pilots like a young Guy Gibson (later of Dambusters fame) built up his hours getting ready for future combat in fighters and bombers.
But recent manoeuvring by the Russian Navy in the waters around the North Sea has brought new activity, at least to the skies above our place. I was actually practising my golf swing (it's been brutal of late) when suddenly a huge two-engined aircraft, that looked a little like a 737, came right over the house, pretty low, maybe 2500 or 3000 feet. I’d never seen anything like that before in the area. I grabbed my phone, went to my flight tracking apps, and found it.
An RAF Poseidon, an anti-submarine aircraft heading out over the North Sea, I guess looking for Russian subs. Or not. Maybe just training for looking for Russian subs. Keep in mind this country is trying to get on a war footing; that’s what the government has been saying for the past 18 months, and they’ve been trying to put serious money behind the tough talk. I chose to believe what was roaring over our place the other day was part of all that.
Whatever it was all about, it has had me searching out different sources for analysis of the world situation. Found this recently; it's free, like The Buzz is free, which means you have to sign up, but it costs you nothing. You might find it interesting:
How close are we to World War Three?
For years, many of us have made the case for the Port of Churchill.
If we want to open up the north in a major way, Canada will have to put major money behind the northern Manitoba port. That’s never been closer to happening than it is now. It’s not there yet, but it could be coming. Wesley Wark put the case under the microscope in his Substack earlier in the week:
Churchill returns?
I guess it had to happen at some point.
Mark Carney has been getting such good international reviews, heralded as a major leader in the new world order. So, should we be surprised that some are pushing Carney as a candidate for serious recognition?
Mark Carney's stand against Trump leads to Nobel Peace Prize and Time Person of the Year buzz
The upcoming Monday Quebec election was the featured topic on yesterday’s Good Talk podcast with Chantal Hebert and Bruce Anderson. You can find it here.
Earlier in the week, a really good Moore-Butts conversation on the BC election and what the political set really thinks of the media. It's available here.
A year ago, our regular Monday podcast contributor, Dr Janice Stein, wrote a paper from her university perch in downtown Toronto.
Her research had indicated that Benjamin Netanyahu had ignored warnings in the late summer of 2023 that Hamas was planning a major operation in Israel. He denied such research, as he again did this week… but this time it's become a major campaign issue as Israelis go to the polls. Check this out in the Washington Post:
🔒 Reports that Netanyahu ignored Oct. 7 warnings dominate Israeli election
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This just smells so bad.
But what doesn’t smell bad about some of the money shuffling, backroom deal-making, and bent-knee company executives going in and out of the White House these days? But this one could take the cake:
Trump’s handling of Venezuela’s oil money threatens a constitutional crisis
A good friend of ours surprised me the other day by saying she had let her car drive her from their cottage to their home in the city.
Now I know that’s becoming more commonplace for a lot of drivers who believe in their high-tech vehicles, but I was still caught off guard.
I’m not trapped in another era. I mean, I flew back and forth across the Atlantic this week knowing full well that up in the cockpit they were relaxed with everything on autopilot. If they’re comfortable navigating the skies for eight hours over the waters where the Titanic, under human control, crashed into an iceberg, who am I to say people shouldn’t let a computer make the decisions at 37 thousand feet? But in a car on the 401? I’m still nervous about it. And after reading this, I’m even a little more nervous:
We Are Alarmed to Learn That People Are Installing DIY Self-Driving “Mods” on Their Cars
If you’ve noticed you're seeing more of the night sky than you used to, you’re not seeing things.
Depending on where you live, even in the heart of bright cities, things are changing, and the benefit means better views. The Guardian had this in the past week:
The night sky is getting 10% brighter every year. We’re forgetting what darkness feels like
For the past half dozen years, Gavin Newsom has teased those who follow such things that he could be a strong candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Didn’t work out in 2024, but he’s at it again, making no secret that he would like to be considered in 2028. He sure didn’t hold back his desire in this feature piece in the current Vanity Fair:
