May 28, 2023

Hit and Miss #299: Issues elsewhere, issues here

Hello!

I spent the morning as a biking kit man to T and T’s mom, who ran the Ottawa marathon today. CONGRATS BOTH!! It was so awesome to see their accomplishment, gruelling as it was at times, and to share it with S and V at some key points along the route. We’re all thoroughly zonked, so I’ll just leave some links and head off to rest.

• This entertaining annotation of some legal back and forth over an inquiry requesting access to Boris Johnston’s journals taught me that there’s a full-on, proper inquiry “to examine the UK’s response to and impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, and learn lessons for the future”. Talk of an inquiry is all the rage in Canada at the moment—and with good reason!—but not with how we responded to the pandemic as its object. As I’ve written about previously (“Learning in crisis”, August 2022; “Broken social scene—wait, I mean, contract”, July 2022), this is the kind of serious endeavour I desperately wish this country would take on.
• Huge congrats to all in Nova Scotia’s new Department of Cyber Security and Digital Solutions, including Nova Scotia Digital Service friends. Matt Jukes recently reflected on his ten years in digital government, to which Matt Edgar recently responded—movement in Nova Scotia is a bright spot in the Canadian landscape, one I’m glad to see.
• “Why do [US] prison emails cost so much?” Concise, impactful depiction of prison as an industry. Canada has its own issues here, too, lest you thought this was a distinctly American thing.
• “Make all cars electric” is not the panacea some think it is, as heavy batteries will probably make those cars much more dangerous for those sharing the road. Not to mention the immense difficulty—primarily in water volumes, but not exclusively—of putting out an electric vehicle that’s caught fire. So, public transit anyone?

All the best for the week ahead!

Lucas