#Denis Bernier

[mariacallous]

This month, Andrew Bernier, a US Army Corps of Engineers researcher and a union leader, says that he has received a barrage of menacing messages from the same anonymous email account. Unfolding like short chapters in a dystopian novel, they have spoken of the genius of Elon Musk, referenced the power of the billionaire’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), and foretold the downfall of “corrupt” union bosses.

But the most eerie thing about the emails, which Bernier says began arriving after he filed an official charge accusing the Trump administration of violating his union’s collective bargaining agreement, is that they included personal details about his life—some of which he believes might have come from surveillance of his work laptop. The author referenced Bernier’s union activities, nickname, job, travel details, and even the green notebook he regularly uses. The most recent email implied that his computer was loaded with spyware. “Andy's crusade, like so many before it, had been doomed from the start,” one email stated. “The real tragedy wasn't his failure—it was his belief that the fight had ever been real.”

The unsettling messages, which were reviewed by WIRED, are an extreme example of the kinds of encounters that workers across the US government say they have had with technology since President Donald Trump took office. WIRED spoke to current employees at 13 federal agencies for this story who expressed fears about potentially being monitored by software programs, some of which they described as unfamiliar. Others said that routine software updates and notifications, perhaps once readily glossed over, have taken on ominous new meanings. Several reported feeling anxious and hyperaware of the devices and technology around them.

At the General Services Administration (GSA), one worker cited a Chrome browser extension called Dynatrace, an existing program for monitoring app performance. Inside the Social Security Administration (SSA), another employee pointed to Splunk, a longstanding tool that’s used to alert IT staff to security anomalies like when an unauthorized USB drive is plugged into a laptop. At the US Agency for International Development (USAID), one worker was caught off guard by Google’s Gemini AI chatbot, installations of which kicked off days before Trump took office.

“Everyone has been talking about whether our laptops are now able to listen to our conversations and track what we do,” says a current GSA employee, who like other workers in this story, was granted anonymity because they didn’t have authorization to speak and feared retaliation.

Dynatrace and Splunk did not respond to requests for comment from WIRED.

The workers’ accounts come as Musk’s DOGE organization is rapidly burrowing into various government agencies and departments, often gaining access to personnel records, logs of financial transactions, and other sensitive information in the process. The efforts are part of the Trump administration’s broader plan to terminate thousands of government employees and remake the face of federal agencies.

Like many private companies, US federal agencies disclose to staff that they have tools to monitor what workers do on their computers and networks. The US government’s capabilities in this area have also expanded over the past decade.

It couldn’t be learned whether the Trump administration has begun using existing tools to monitor employees in new ways; multiple agencies, including the Social Security Administration and the General Services Administration, denied that they have. The White House did not respond to requests for comment. Public evidence has not emerged of new government purchases of user-monitoring software, which is generally needed for detailed surveillance such as tracking which files a worker has copied onto a thumb drive. Some of the updates and changes that have been noticed by federal workers date back to software purchases and plans enacted long before Trump was in power, WIRED reporting shows.

“I will say my concerns are primarily based in general fear as opposed to specific knowledge,” says a worker at the Department of Homeland Security, who adds: “I’d love to be told I’m wrong.”

But activity that some workers perceive as signs of increased surveillance has prompted them to take precautions. Bernier, who works as a civil engineer for the Army Corps based in Hanover, New Hampshire, says the messages he received spooked him enough that he asked local police to keep an eye on his home, removed the battery from his work-issued laptop, and kept his work phone on airplane mode while traveling to a non-work conference last week. “There are things I don’t control but actions I can take to protect myself and my family,” he says.

Bernier’s anonymous emailer and the Army Corps did not respond to requests for comment.

A person inside the Environmental Protection Agency told WIRED last week that they’ve witnessed coworkers back out of Microsoft Teams meetings, which can be easily recorded and automatically transcribed, when they are related to topics they believe could get them fired. “Definite chilling effect,” the person says. The EPA did not respond to a request for comment.

An employee at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), whose work with international partners is being audited by DOGE operatives, says they and their colleagues began avoiding messaging one another and have “really cut down on putting things in writing” in recent weeks. They report that correspondence from their supervisors has also significantly dropped off. NOAA declined to comment.

At the Federal Bureau of Investigation, anxiety around officials possibly targeting officers and activities perceived as being disloyal to the president has cratered morale, a federal law enforcement source with knowledge of the agents' concerns tells WIRED. The FBI declined to comment.

Aryani Ong, a civil rights activist and cofounder of Asian American Federal Employees for Nondiscrimination, a group that advocates for government workers, says those she’s been in contact with are in a heightened state of alert. In response, some federal employees have turned to encrypted communications apps to connect with colleagues and taken steps to anonymize their social media accounts, Ong says. (Federal workers are granted an allowance to use non-official communication tools only “in exceptional circumstances.”)

Insider Threat

Long before Trump’s inauguration, user activity monitoring was already mandated for federal agencies and networks that handle classified information—the result of an executive order signed by then-president Barack Obama in the wake of a massive breach of classified diplomatic cables and information about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2010. The capability is part of government-wide insider threat (InTh) programs that greatly expanded after Edward Snowden’s leak of classified surveillance documents in 2013, and again after an Army specialist murdered four colleagues and injured 16 others at Fort Hood in 2014.

The US government’s current approach to digitally monitoring federal workers has largely been guided by a directive issued by the Committee on National Security Systems in 2014, which orders relevant agencies to tie user activity to “specific users.” The public portions of the document call for “every executive branch department and agency” handling classified information to have capabilities to take screenshots, capture keystrokes, and intercept chats and email on employee devices. They are also instructed to deploy “file shadowing,” meaning secretly producing facsimiles of every file a user edits or opens.

The insider threat programs at departments such as Health and Human Services, Transportation, and Veterans Affairs, also have policies that protect unclassified government information, which enable them to monitor employees’ clicks and communications, according to notices in the Federal Register, an official source of rulemaking documents. Policies for the Department of the Interior, the Internal Revenue Service, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporate (FDIC), also allow collecting and assessing employees’ social media content.

These internal agency programs, overseen by a national task force led by the attorney general and director of national intelligence, aim to identify behaviors that may indicate the heightened risk of not only leaks and workplace violence, but also the “loss” or "degradation" of a federal agency’s “resources or capabilities.” Over 60 percent of insider threat incidents in the federal sector involve fraud, such as stealing money or taking someone's personal information, and are non-espionage related, according to analysis by Carnegie Mellon researchers.

“Fraud,” “disgruntlement,” “ideological challenges,” “moral outrage,” or discussion of moral concerns deemed “unrelated to work duties” are some of the possible signs that a worker poses a threat, according to US government training literature.

Of the 15 Cabinet-level departments such as energy, labor, and veterans affairs, at least nine had contracts as of late last year with suppliers such as Everfox and Dtex Systems that allowed for digitally monitoring of a portion of employees, according to public spending data. Everfox declined to comment.

Dtex’s Intercept software, which is used by multiple federal agencies, is one example of a newer class of programs that generate individual risk scores by analyzing anonymized metadata, such as which URLs workers are visiting and which files they’re opening and printing out on their work devices, according to the company. When an agency wants to identify and further investigate someone with a high score, two people have to sign off in some versions of its tool, according to the company. Dtex’s software doesn’t have to log keystrokes or scan the content of emails, calls, chats, or social media posts.

But that isn't how things work broadly across the government, where employees are warned explicitly in a recurring message when they boot up their devices that they have "no reasonable expectation of privacy" in their communications or in any data stored or transmitted through government networks. The question remains if and to what extent DOGE’s operatives are relying on existing monitoring programs to carry out Trump’s mission to rapidly eliminate federal workers that his administration views as unaligned with the president’s agenda or disloyal.

Rajan Koo, the chief technology officer of Dtex tells WIRED that he hopes the Trump administration will adjust the government’s approach to monitoring. Events such as widespread layoffs coupled with a reliance on what Koo described as intrusive surveillance tools can stir up an environment in which workers feel disgruntled, he says. “You can create a culture of reciprocal loyalty,” says Koo, or “the perfect breeding ground for insider threats.”

Already Overwhelmed

Sources with knowledge of the US government’s insider threat programs describe them as largely inefficient and labor intensive, requiring overstretched teams of analysts to manually pore through daily barrages of alerts that include many false positives. Multiple sources said that the systems are currently “overwhelmed.” Any effort by the Trump administration to extend the reach of such tools or widen their parameters—to more closely surveil for perceived signs of insubordination or disloyalty to partisan fealties, for instance—likely would result in a significant spike in false positives that would take considerable time to comb through, according to the people familiar with the work.

In an email last month seeking federal employees’ voluntary resignations, the Trump administration wrote that it wanted a “reliable, loyal, trustworthy” workforce. Attempts to use insider threat programs to enforce that vision could be met by a number of legal challenges.

US intelligence community analysts are required by law and directive to provide unbiased and objective work. That means avoiding cherry-picking information to deliberately alter judgements or falling prey to outside pressure, including from personal or political biases. These standards, even when not officially codified, are core to the professional ethics of any intelligence practitioner or law enforcement analyst conducting assessments of insider threats.

A 2018 national insider threat task force framework notes that federal programs should comply with “all applicable legal, privacy and civil liberties rights, and whistleblower protections.” Bradley Moss, an attorney representing US intelligence and law enforcement personnel, says that "disloyalty" to the Trump administration is “too vague” an excuse to terminate employees with civil service protections, adding that if "they're going to go through the statutory process, they need to demonstrate actual cause for termination."

A federal law enforcement source warns that monitoring could theoretically be used to gather political intelligence on federal employees, while the administration looks for more palatable reasons to terminate them later; similar to how law enforcement may obtain evidence that's inadmissible in the course of a criminal investigation, but then search for another evidentiary basis to file charges.

Joe Spielberger, senior legal counsel at the Project On Government Oversight, a nonpartisan group fighting alleged corruption, says that if Musk were serious about cutting government waste, he would be strengthening protections for people who report corruption and mismanagement. Any warrantless or mass surveillance of federal workers without transparent guidelines, he says, would represent a major concern.

“When you create this culture of fear and intimidation and have that chilling effect of making people even more fearful about calling out wrongdoing, it ensures that corruption goes unnoticed and unaddressed,” Spielberger says.

[ama-ships]

I hate but love that my best friend knows me... They know I'd like that man and will fight vehemently to deny it... I hope he gets sucked into a black hole and NEVER knows of my existence... Stupid handsome bastard!!!!

I. HATE. EVERYTHING. ABOUT. YOU. SIR!

I am now leaving!

Regards; Amaryllis Bernier~`

[terriwriting]

The right-wing grift continues

The event got off on the wrong foot after Community Solidarity Ottawa issued a community alert about the event promoting panels featuring several far-right speakers linked to the 2022 Freedom Convoy, including Randy Hillier, Tom Quiggin, Maxime Bernier and True North’s Andrew Lawton.

Things went from bad to worse after PressProgress reported some organizations listed as event sponsors denied being sponsors, some people listed as festival employees didn’t exist, plus the man behind the whole event, Ray Samuels, was a far-right People’s Party activist and a prolific UFO conspiracy theorist.

Before the end of the first day, Tourism Ottawa, the Embassy of Mexico, an upstate New York PBS affiliate and former Much Music VJ Bill Welychka – who was the emcee of the event – had all publicly cut ties with the festival.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

This day in history

I’m coming to the HowTheLightGetsIn festival in HAY-ON-WYE with my novel Red Team Blues:

Tomorrow (May 28), 1130AM: The AI Enigma

Monday (May 29), 12PM: Danger and Desire at the Frontier

I’m at OXFORD’s Blackwell’s on Monday (May 29) at 7:30PM with Tim Harford.

Then it’s Nottingham, Manchester, London, Edinburgh, and Berlin!

#10yrsago Bank of Canada kills editorial cartoon, calls it “counterfeiting” https://www.timescolonist.com/local-news/jack-knox-the-90000-duffy-buck-stops-here-bank-of-canada-decides-4592661

#10yrsago Toronto mayoral car-crash: homicide detectives search mayor’s office after tip on crack-smoking video; top staffers quit https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/two-senior-members-of-toronto-mayor-rob-fords-staff-resign/article12168106/

#10yrsago UK Ministry of Justice denies that the court system is to be sold to hedge funds https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/may/28/moj-denies-privatisation-courts-service

#10yrsago Shambling Guide to New York City https://memex.craphound.com/2013/05/28/shambling-guide-to-new-york-city/

#10yrsago Canada’s business groups wants to hack your computer even more than the creeps at the Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property https://www.thestar.com/business/2013/02/08/business_thinks_antispam_law_should_protect_them_not_consumers_geist.html

#10yrsago Disaster porn and elite panic: the militarized lie of savage disaster aftermath https://web.archive.org/web/20130609055535/http://www.ochbergsociety.org/magazine/2013/05/in-haiti-and-beyond-learning-to-look-for-resilience/

#10yrsago Toronto cops hospitalize hotel guest who recorded them arresting another guest https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/05/26/exclusive_toronto_police_arrest_man_take_phone_after_attempt_to_film_takedown_at_sheraton.html

#5yrsago The first cyberattack took place nearly 200 years ago in France https://www.economist.com/1843/2017/10/05/the-crooked-timber-of-humanity

#5yrsago Germany’s scientific texts were made free during and after WWII; analyzing them today shows the negative effect of paywalls on science https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/effects-copyrights-science

#5yrsago 8 years of austerity have turned the UK into a bleak Victorian dystopia, where pensioners without electricity die from fires ignited by their candles https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/28/world/europe/uk-austerity-poverty.html

#5yrsago Canadian Conservative parliamentarian accuses black rival of “thinking the world revolves around her skin colour” https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/bernier-cesar-chavannes-tweet-1.4680467

#5yrsago RIP Gardner Dozois, pioneering, genre-defining science fiction editor who helped launch my career https://memex.craphound.com/2018/05/28/rip-gardner-dozois-pioneering-genre-defining-science-fiction-editor-who-helped-launch-my-career/

#5yrsago Futuristic designs for products the EU’s stupid new copyright law would kill https://web.archive.org/web/20180615000000*/https://futurenotmade.eu/

Catch me on tour with Red Team Blues in Hay-on-Wye, Oxford, Manchester, Nottingham, London, and Berlin!

[jenforyeshua]

Maxime Bernier says 'NO' to digital currencies, government 'control' over citizenry

[torontoarenas]

Leafs in the Playoffs! 9

Nobody ever interacts with my posts anymore, but that’s fine. I’ll keep chuggin’. If anybody’s still here, you know what the deal is with this. Let’s go.

Boston

Nick Foligno (2021) [LTIR]

Anton Strålman (2007 to 2009) [minors]

Carolina

Frederik Andersen (2016 to 2021)

Jake Gardiner (2011 to 2019) [LTIR]

Ondřej Kaše (2021 to 2022) [LTIR]

Stefan Noesen (2021)

Colorado

Alex Galchenyuk (2021)

Denis Malgin (2020; 2022)

Dallas

Mason Marchment (2020)

Matt Murray (2022 to present). Hang on. I’m just getting word that there’s actually two different NHL goaltenders named Matt Murray.

Edmonton

Jack Campbell (2020 to 2022)

Cody Ceci (2019 to 2020)

Seth Griffith (2016) [minors]

Zach Hyman (2016 to 2021)

Greg McKegg (2014 to 2015) [minors]

Calvin Pickard (2017) [minors]

Florida

[N/A]

Los Angeles

Trevor Moore (2018 to 2020)

Minnesota

Nic Petan (2019 to 2021)

New Jersey

Jonathan Bernier (2013 to 2016) [LTIR]

NY Islanders

Pierre Engvall (2019 to 2023)

Matt Martin (2016 to 2018)

Richard Pánik (2014 to 2015) [minors]

NY Rangers

Jimmy Vesey (2021)

Seattle

[N/A, but I’m still annoyed we let them take Jared McCann in the expansion draft]

Tampa Bay

Zach Bogosian (2021)

Toronto

Nick Abruzzese (2022 to present) [minors]

Noel Acciari (2023 to present)

Zach Aston-Reese (2022 to present)

Jordie Benn (2022 to present) [minors]

T. J. Brodie (2021 to present)

Michael Bunting (2021 to present)

Kyle Clifford (2020; 2021 to present) [minors]

Carl Dahlstrom (2022 to present) [minors]

Semyon Der-Arguchintsev (2022 to present) [minors]

Mark Giordano (2022 to present)

Erik Gustafsson (2023 to present)

Justin Holl (2018 to present)

Mac Hollowell (2022 to present) [minors]

Pontus Holmberg (2022 to present) [minors]

Calle Järnkrok (2022 to present)

Erik Kallgren (2022 to present) [minors]

David Kämpf (2021 to present)

Alexander Kerfoot (2019 to present)

Matthew Knies (2023 to present)

Filip Král (2022 to present) [minors]

Sam Lafferty (2023 to present)

Timothy Liljegren (2020 to present)

Mitch Marner (2016 to present)

Auston Matthews (2016 to present)

Jake McCabe (2023 to present)

Bobby McMann (2023 to present) [LTIR]

Victor Mete (2022 to present) [LTIR]

Matt Murray (2022 to present)

Jake Muzzin (2019 to present) [LTIR]

William Nylander (2016 to present)

Ryan O’Reilly (2023 to present)

Morgan Rielly (2013 to present)

Nick Robertson (2020 to present) [LTIR]

Ilya Samsonov (2022 to present)

Luke Schenn (2008 to 2012; 2023 to present)

Wayne Simmonds (2021 to present)

Alex Steeves (2021 to present) [minors]

John Tavares (2018 to present)

Connor Timmins (2022 to present)

Joseph Woll (2021 to present)

Radim Zohorna (2023 to present) [minors]

Vegas

Michael Amadio (2021)

Byron Froese (2015 to 2016) [minors]

Ben Hutton (2021)

Phil Kessel (2009 to 2015)

Winnipeg

David Rittich (2021)

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Elephant in the room: If we DID have proportional representation, the PPC would have 5.1% of 338 seats. They would have 17 seats. Before the PPC existed, there wasn’t a threat of a dangerously extremist party having more than 1% of the vote. The percentage of votes the PPC got will probably be used as an excuse to deny proportional representation from being implemented.

It will be but extremist parties under First Past the Post are worse.

Also Proportional voting system can have cutoffs, say 5-10%, meaning any party that gets less than 5-10%, can't get added proportionally (removing PPC). This is done to weed out fringe parties without broad support.

Additionally, people should be reminded, that Bernier lost control of the Conservative party by less than 1% of the vote. Under our system Bernier could have pushed PPC policies in the Conservative party and if elected, he could have gotten a majority government with no way for any other party to stop his agenda for 4 years.

Also under FPTP parties like the PPC can help radicalize bigger Conservative parties because they see them taking their votes away, so you could have in future elections O'Toole adopting some of the PPC's policies in order to have a better chance of forming a majority.

In a proportional system, we might have a few in Parliament, but they will have zero political power, because the majority won't support them.

Also for every PPC MP we’ll also gain leftist/communists. Greens, etc.

[cricketcat9]

Maxime Bernier is an idiot and a fucking disgrace

“ Canadian Maxime Bernier, the leader of the right-wing People's Party of Canada, is a popular man at the Ottawa protests. He's been here every weekend giving speeches to the crowd, and will host a "pancake breakfast" on Sunday. As we walk along one of the roads leading to the main protest site, he is stopped every few metres by someone wanting to shake his hand or even pass them his baby to hold. In the first week of the Freedom Convoy protests, Nazi flags were seen in the crowd - but Bernier denies the movement has become a rallying cry for far-right groups around the world. "No it is not. I was here that weekend and there was one guy in the crowd with a Confederate flag," he says. "This is not a far-right movement, it is people fighting to regain their freedom. That is it."

FYI, from Wikipedia: He was the only leader of a party represented in the House of Commons to reject the scientific consensus on climate change. He said he would do "nothing" to deal with climate change, and that Canada should withdraw from the Paris Agreement on carbon emissions. On September 2, 2019, Bernier posted a series of tweets in which he called Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg "mentally unstable". On September 4, after receiving widespread backlash, Bernier backpedalled.“

He is an antivaxxer, anti-immigration, anti- multiculturalism white supremacist, pro-healthcare privatization alt-right, and in general despicable person. 😡

[geezerwench]

Another conservative anti-vaccine radio talk show host succumbs to COVID, third in a month

30 August 2021

Marc “Mr. Anti-Vax” Bernier of WNDB in Florida, died Saturday, 08/28/2021.

He was preceded eight days earlier by Phil Valentine, a 61-year-old conservative talk radio host in Tennessee who mocked coronavirus vaccines but changed his tone after getting sick. He battled the disease for a month.

Also having a change of heart, before his stopped, was Dick Farrel, a former Newsmax commentator and all-around coronavirus-denying, vaccine-resistant right-wing radio talk show host. The South Florida radio host died of COVID-19 complications on Aug. 6, at age 65, after exhorting fans not to get the vaccine, calling the entire coronavirus crisis a “scam-demic.”

Both Farrel and Valentine urged friends and followers to get the vaccine as the disease closed in on them and said they regretted not doing it themselves.

________________________________________________

"Also having a change of heart, before his stopped, was Dick Farrel..."

It seems the coronavirus is especially deadly for conservative radio talk show hosts.

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from Treehugger:

Climate Arson was a term I first heard from Seattle architect Mike Eliason, who used it on twitter to describe people who go beyond simply denying the reality of climate change, but through their actions actually abet it. A climate arsonist knows that what he is saying isn't true, but willfully does it anyway for personal or political gain. But perhaps it is not the best term; others are making the same point with "climate nihilist." Bernier, and American politicians who put the fossil fuel industry ahead of climate, probably fit in this. Charlie Smith wrote in the Georgia Straight last year:

At the root of climate nihilism is the endless pursuit of fossil fuels to power the economy, regardless of the ecological consequences.... The nihilists are basically saying: "To hell with carbon budgets in the Paris climate agreement. To hell with scientists raising alarm bells about the melting of the polar caps and ice on Greenland. To hell with farmers who are not going to have water to irrigate crops. To hell with the billions of people who rely on rivers fed by glaciers for their drinking water. To hell with plant and animal species that are going extinct. To hell with those who have to endure more intense hurricanes. We simply don't care."

The NRDC notes that climate nihilism is prevalent in the American government too. Last year, when gutting the fuel efficiency standards, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said that the planet was warming, but that reducing carbon emissions from cars wouldn't make much of a difference, but would make cars cost more. So why bother? Jeff Turrentine writes about the difference between skepticism, denialism, and nihilism:

This is, to put it mildly, a twist on the usual rules of engagement between those who advocate for climate action and those who don’t. We’re used to fighting skepticism. But outright nihilism? That’s a new one. We’ve been rebutting climate change deniers—and their faulty data and conspiracy theories—for years, and as disturbing as it is to see their ilk installed in the executive branch, we at least have a template for fighting back: Lead confidently with the science, never let a bogus claim go unchallenged, and have faith that truth will ultimately win the day. But how are you supposed to respond when those who oppose climate action actually do accept the science behind global warming, and do understand that climate change poses an existential threat to humankind . . . but simply don’t care?

[pnwpol]

August 19, 2019 | Canada's election watchdog has warned environmentalists that saying climate change is real could break the law.

The issue arose because one party running in October's election denies climate change is a threat.

That has led Elections Canada to warn groups that running paid advertisements about climate change could be considered partisan activity.

Advocates called the guidance "ludicrous" and say it will dampen urgent climate discussions.

The UN has called for decisive political action by 2020 to put an end to climate change.

Why is climate change a partisan issue?

Keith Brooks, programme director for advocacy group Environmental Defence, says Elections Canada told him that because one candidate denies that climate change is an issue, any ad urging action on climate change, or calling climate change an emergency, could be considered partisan.

Maxime Bernier, the leader of the People's Party of Canada, has said numerous times that he does not believe climate change is a crisis.

"There is no climate change urgency in this country," Mr Bernier said in June.

Mr Bernier split from the Conservative Party of Canada last year to create the People's Party.

The party's platform states that "it is an undisputed fact that the world's climate has always changed and will continue to change".

Read More

[onpoli]

An Elections Canada official warned groups in a training session earlier this summer that because Maxime Bernier, the leader of the People’s Party of Canada, has expressed doubts about the legitimacy of climate change, any group that promotes it as real or an emergency could be considered partisan, said Tim Gray, executive director of the advocacy group Environmental Defence.

Any partisan activity — including advertising, surveys, or any kind of campaign costing at least $500 — would require a charity to register as a third party for the election, an onerous requirement that could jeopardize a group’s charitable tax status, Gray said.

It is “discouraging” that Environmental Defence and other charities may have to zip their lips about climate change being real during the campaign period “because one party has chosen to deny the existence of this basic fact,” he added.

[science-jules]

The immutable undeniability of climate denial 

In 2015, Senator James Inhofe, with the maniacal, blissful look of someone who knows they’re about to prove everyone wrong, brought a snowball into the US Senate. His rationale was glaringly simple, obvious even - how can the Earth be warming when it is so indisputably cold outside? 

In Canada, episodes of outright and blatant climate change denial like these seem to be few and far between, but not unheard of: in September, Maxime Bernier, the leader of the People’s Party of Canada, told the Toronto Sun that “while the climate may be changing, this is not due primarily to human activity”. The day after the 2019 Canadian election, the hashtag #wexit (for “Western exit”) blew up on social media, as an organization called WexitAlberta began to share separatist sentiments while disputing numerous climate-related issues, among them: halting the building of pipelines, and the carbon tax.  

All this begs the question: why are people in denial? What is fueling and intensifying this global spread of misinformation? This article explores the role of partisanship in the spread of misinformation focusing in particular on increased ideological polarization with respect to climate change. Their research has shown that this wide partisan divide on climate change can be reduced by drawing attention to the views of powerful politicians who explicitly acknowledge the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change. This research is significant because the climate change divide remains one of the only major partisan issues that involves a dispute over scientific fact - facts which, as this paper emphasizes, may be no match for partisan loyalty. One important finding stood out: the study participants’ attitudes towards climate change could be swayed and concern about climate change increased in cases where their own parties made corrective statements about climate change and accepted the scientific consensus, but not if the statements came from non-partisan scientists or the opposing political party. 

It’s important to note that while many climate change-denying statements made by politicians are obviously met with public incredulity by climate scientists, other politicians, and the general public, certain devastatingly misinformed opinions can still hold substantial and very real weight in some, particularly right-leaning, communities. The future of the climate crisis is uncertain, but this paper provides us with important research that has the potential to inform meaningful political discussion about how climate change is communicated, and how we can aim to unify an inexorably divided world against a very real, but not yet fully recognized, adversary.

[worklabournewsresearch]

How is Working From Home Working for Canadians?

“Given the COVID-19 pandemic, many employees and their employers are now adjusting to a ‘new normal’ of work-from-home (’WFH’) arrangements. This update sets out important legal and practical considerations for employers reviewing their WFH practices.”

Technology Policies

Accountability

Tracking Hours Worked

Monitoring, Encouraging and Addressing Productivity

Health, Safety, and Workers’ Compensation

Childcare and Family Status Accommodation

Human Rights Considerations

McCarthy-Tétrault, April 7, 2020: “COVID-19 Update: The “New Normal” – Facilitating Work-from-Home Arrangements,” by Justine Lindner, Simmy Sahdra, Caroline-Ariane Bernier, Laura DeVries. and Camille Bélanger

Statistics Canada: COVID-19 and working from home, 2020

“To get timely information about how Canadians are coping with COVID-19, Statistics Canada developed a new web panel survey. More than 4,600 people in the 10 provinces responded to this survey from March 29 to April 3. In addition to content on the concerns of Canadians and the precautions they took to reduce the risk of exposure to COVID-19, the survey includes questions on work location, perceptions of job security, and the impact of COVID-19 on financial security.”

Large increase in Canadians working from home: Approximately 4.7 million Canadians who do not usually work from home did so during the week of March 22 to 28.

Working from home more common for those with higher levels of education: Developing a full understanding of the number of Canadians working from home is essential for measuring Canada's capacity to support ongoing economic activity, while protecting the health and safety of both workers and the greater public.

Workers new to working from home just as likely to report having good to excellent mental health: Of those who reported that they did not normally work from home but did so during the week of March 22, about 4 in 10 (39.6%) live with a child under the age of 18, and likely experienced new challenges in balancing work and family life.

Statistics Canada, April 17, 2020: Canadian Perspectives Survey Series 1: COVID-19 and working from home, 2020 (4 pages, PDF)

CTV News, April 17, 2020: “Nearly 5 million more Canadians are working from home, and many like it: surveys,” by Jen St. Denis

How is the world’s mass homeworking experiment going?

“Amazon and Microsoft are already feeling the heat of quite so many users and enterprises trying to access their cloud infrastructure. Let’s hope we don’t all have to start turning off Netflix and HBO just so there’s enough bandwidth for the essential tasks. Everyone in IT across the planet is working weekends and nights to enable this massive shift to working at home. When the dust settles, we’ll all be in a very different world.”

CRN, April 2020: “Coronavirus Is Creating A Global ‘Work-At-Home’ Culture,” by Steven Burke

McKinsey Digital, March 2020: “A blueprint for remote working: Lessons from China,” by Raphael Bick, Michael Chang, Kevin Wei Wang, and Tianwen Yu

[allthecanadianpolitics]

“In the winner category, you can put a check mark next to NDP leader Jagmeet Singh's name... He's risen to the occasion many times over the course of this campaign and I think that he did so again tonight.” -- Vassy Kapelos, CBC News

“Jagmeet had some of the best lines of the night. He had the lines that are going to play with the average Canadians. They were short, they were snappy, they speak to Canadians.” -- Mercedes Stephenson, Global News

"The most interesting person tonight was Mr. Singh. Of the leaders tonight he was the most comfortable on stage. If Twitter traffic matters, he dominated the night. Both in volume and positive coverage it was about Jagmeet Singh.” -- Darrell Bricker, IPSOS

“Jagmeet Singh was pretty strong, hopeful, positive” -- Michel Boyer, CTV News

“Jagmeet Singh was the big winner, acting the most Prime Ministerial.” -- André Picard, Globe and Mail

“1st Quarter of this debate goes too.... Jagmeet Singh. He's comfortable, speaking naturally and eloquently. He's got nothing to lose and it shows. He's doing well.” -- Mark Towhey, Sun News

“Singh is strong tonight. He’s picking up steam on the hustings. Natural campaigner. Tonight’s zinger: Canadians don’t have to choose between Mr. Delay (Trudeau) and Me Deny (Scheer) on climate change action.” -- Mercedes Stephenson, Global News

“Singh lands a blow with the government's challenge to a compensation order for First Nations kids in care. He's heads and tails above the others on this file.” -- Robyn Urback, CBC News

“So far, Singh doing best tonight, I think. Exceeding expectations, seems at ease, repeatedly suggesting Trudeau too soft on rich and powerful.” -- Stephen Maher, Maclean’s

"Singh was really strong on this. Won that round, hands down.” -- Glen McGregor, CTV

“Jagmeet Singh sounds comfortable and conversational in debate section... Not really debating (which is good) speaking to the TV audience." -- Mark Towhey, Sun News

“And Singh, right off the bat, makes the best first impression. That’s my 2c.” -- David Akin, Global News

“Singh’s pretty darn good at this.” -- David Akin, Global News

“Jagmeet Singh is looking calm on this issue of Bill 21, and has moral authority. It’s likely a very strong moment for him in this debate.” -- Evan Solomon, CTV News

“This is my first extended exposure to Jagmeet Singh. He is the only one on this stage I can relate to at all. I’m impressed.” -- Damien Cox, Toronto Star

“I may disagree with most of what Jagmeet Singh has to say - but he’s coming out swinging and so far dominating this debate. -- Tasha Kheiriddin, Commentator

“This Q from Singh is tailor-made for one of the core NDP messages through the whole campaign: that Libs and Tories are two different shades of the same thing." -- Shannon Proudfoot, Maclean’s

“Singh talking about climate change goes right to forest fires and floods...done a decent job of talking to regular folks.” -- Josh Visser, VICE Canada

“Jagmeet Singh is crushing this debate.” -- Lauren O'Neil, BlogTO

“Singh got off a good line to Bernier: ‘You could have just said, hey man, I messed up.’ Point Singh.” -- Keith Baldrey, Global News

“Singh jumps in and points out that Trudeau and Scheer are fighting about ‘who is worse for Canada.’ Singh uses this to pivot to his platforms and how universal pharmacare and dental care will save families money.” -- Annie Bergeron Oliver, CTV News

“Singh takes the Q. He says divisions are growing because of ‘hateful discourse.’ He says people's worries are being exploited, and these worries are because of government neglect of housing, health care, jobs.” -- Alex Ballingall, Toronto Star

“Best line of the night so far goes to Jagmeet Singh: '(Trudeau and Scheer) are arguing over who's worse for Canada...we should be debating what's best for Canada.” -- James Cybulski, SN650 Vancouver

“Singh: "Mr. Scheer and Mr. Trudeau are arguing over who will be worse for Canada." Captures the feeling I had there pretty well.” -- Josh Tabish, CIRA News

“Singh says JT and AS are talking about who’d be worst for Canada. We ought to focus on who’s better. Singh is having a great night. Clear. Values talk. Broad at times, specific at others. A real human. Sweet suit. On message.” -- David Moscrop, Washington Post

"I want to get back to Jagmeet Singh for a moment. To me, he seemed to be the most in control of himself and what was going on.” -- Mirella Fernandez, CTV News

“Many agree that Jagmeet Singh performed very well in the face of the revelations of Justin Trudeau's blackface. He has been quite strong in the first debate for instance, and he has performed well.” -- Adrienne Batra, Toronto Sun

“I think that the people feeling the best tonight are the New Democrats. They feel that Jagmeet Singh has had his best week this week, since becoming leader.” -- David Cochrane, CBC News

“Singh is having a helluva night.” -- David Akin, Global News

Tagging: @ontarionewsnow @abpoli @politicsofcanada

[thepoolscene]

The Pool Scene - Alain Caya, Alain Martel, Alain Trahan, Anick Cadorette, Carol Audet, Christian Boisvert, Daniel Gagné, Daniel Sumun, Danny Hewitt, Dany Normandin, Darren Auclair Clément, Dave Simard, Denis Bernier, Dominic Byrne, Eric Cloutier, Éric Duchêneau, Éric Lepage, Gaston Soucy, Ghislain Champagne, Guillaume McNicoll, Harold Rousseau, Jean-François Dorais, Jeff Blais, Jérémie Boutet, Joey Cicero, Karl Tremblay, Louis-Martin Pratte, Luc Salvas, Marc Malette, Marco Caron, Marco Michel, Marie-France Blanchette, Mario Gamache, Mario Jacques, Markus Noe, Martin Daigle, Martin Sears, Medhi Bahloul, Michel Ferland, Michel Gagnon, Nick Jacques, Nicolas Charette, Pat Desbiens, Pierre Jubinville, Pierre Thériault, Réal Fontaine, Rémy Lefebvre, Sébastien Binette, Stéphane Fournier, Sylvain Béliveau, Sylvain Mercier, Tommy Cayer, Valerie Bedard, Yan Lalande, Yves Gaudreault - Quebec Billiards

New Post on https://goo.gl/n6rKQi

Daigle wins Falcon Tour in Drummondville

Here are the Falcon Cues Quebec tour results from march 03-04 from billard Hériot in Drummondville,Québec

1 Martin Daigle 1 200 $ 2 Dany Normandin 915 $ 3 Daniel Gagné 700 $ 4 Alain Martel 500 $ 5 Marco Caron 350 $ 6 Luc Salvas 350 $ 7 Danny Hewitt 225 $ 8 Yves Gaudreault 225 $ 9 Éric Cloutier 125 $ 10 Medhi Bahloul 125 $ 11 Éric Lepage 125 $ 12 Guillaume McNicoll 125 $ 13 – 16 Carol Audet 60 $ 13 – 16 Nick Jacques 60 $ 13 – 16 Stéphane Fournier 60 $ 13 – 16 Martin Sears 60 $ 17 – 24 Valérie Bédard 0 $ 17 – 24 Louis-Martin Pratte 0 $ 17 – 24 Pierre Thériault 0 $ 17 – 24 Dominic Byrne 0 $ 17 – 24 Sylvain Mercier 0 $ 17 – 24 Sébastien Binette 0 $ 17 – 24 Mario Jacques 0 $ 17 – 24 Rémy Lefebvre 0 $ 25 – 32 Harold Rousseau 0 $ 25 – 32 Karl Tremblay 0 $ 25 – 32 Markus Noé 0 $ 25 – 32 Denis Bernier 0 $ 25 – 32 Tommy Cayer 0 $ 25 – 32 Yan Lalande 0 $ 25 – 32 Pat Desbiens 0 $ 25 – 32 Ghislain Champagne 0 $ 33 – 48 Michel Gagnon 0 $ 33 – 48 Marc Malette 0 $ 33 – 48 Gaston Soucy 0 $ 33 – 48 Mario Gamache 0 $ 33 – 48 Dave Simard 0 $ 33 – 48 Sylvain Béliveau 0 $ 33 – 48 Joey Cicero 0 $ 33 – 48 Alain Trahan 0 $ 33 – 48 Pierre Jubinville 0 $ 33 – 48 Anick Cadorette 0 $ 33 – 48 Jean-François Dorais 0 $ 33 – 48 Jeff Blais 0 $ 33 – 48 Christian Boisvert 0 $ 33 – 48 Éric Duchêneau 0 $ 33 – 48 Darren Auclair Clément 0 $ 33 – 48 Alain Caya 0 $ 49 – 64 Réal Fontaine 0 $ 49 – 64 Daniel Sumun 0 $ 49 – 64 Marie-France  Blanchette 0 $ 49 – 64 Jérémie Boutet 0 $ 49 – 64 Marco Michel 0 $ 49 – 64 Michel Ferland 0 $ 49 – 64 Nicolas Charette 0 $