Indeed

Christopher Landau is the US Deputy Secretary of State.

Related: The money sent to Russia is in blue; the money sent to Ukraine is in orange.

We Are All Treaty People

Reconcile this.

A B.C. property company says a lender has pulled out of financing a new building because of the recent Cowichan Tribes ruling that granted Aboriginal title to more than three square kilometres in Richmond.

Montrose Property Holdings, which develops industrial warehouses on land it owns, some of it in the Aboriginal claims area, said it had been in “advanced discussions” with the lender which it had successfully dealt with several times before, and a prospective tenant.

But talks ended because of “uncertainties and risk allocation issues” raised by the B.C. Supreme Court ruling in August, the company says in an application to reopen the court case that will be filed soon.

Montrose said it spent about $7.5 million advancing the project and expected to borrow another $35 million to complete construction.

The company said discussions have also ceased for the same reason with companies such as Fortis and Enbridge to develop a facility to capture landfill gas, rather than flare it. Those discussions had been underway for six years.

The 31-page application to reopen the case and a 1,200-page supporting affidavit, which have been sent to the parties involved in the case, were shared with Postmedia.
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The business effects Montrose says it is experiencing from the Cowichan decision are among the first specific examples to be aired publicly.

If you make major investments in a province that votes NDP, what follows is really your own damned fault.

Trump’s New National Security Strategy

Zerohedge;

The Trump administration’s just published new National Security Strategy has generated a lot of ‘shock’ and discussion since it appeared online early Friday. One of its more ‘controversial’ elements is the stark contrast in outlook on Europe in comparison with prior years’ national security strategy documents.

It warns that some of America’s oldest allies in Europe face “the real and more stark prospect of civilizational erasure” as a result of unchecked immigration, as well as the erosion of democratic principles. Alongside calling out irresponsible unchecked EU immigration policies, it further cites the curbing of free speech – also with the support for EU censorship excesses by transnational elite institutions, describing that “should present trends continue, the continent will be unrecognizable in 20 years or less.”

Matt Gurney and Jenn Gerson discuss implications for a similarly compromised northern free rider.

Some of what the document lays out is simply true, and Canadian and other allied politicians, especially on the left, have ignored those realities at their peril. Some of it is debatable, or at least worth taking seriously. And some of it is outright nuts, pulled straight from the conspiratorial anxieties of America’s far-right social media ecosystem. But whether reasonable, arguable, or deranged, it is now official White House policy — and the rest of us are going to have to learn to live with it.

From there, the conversation turns to how Canadians are, or aren’t, learning to live with it. There is still very little evidence that anyone here grasps the scale of the threat or the urgency involved. Jen introduces a new theory: Canada as a nation is increasingly resembling the federal New Democrats — and that’s not good news for anyone.

Then they get angry that the document treats us like a bitter underachiever, before going full CBC derangement.

Keir Starmer’s Britain

Where the foxes caper unmolested, the government packs your school lunch and the sun never sets on the Censorship Industrial-Complex Empire.

Very early into the COVID-19 pandemic, ZeroHedge suggested that a little-known Chinese lab in Wuhan might know something about the novel coronavirus sweeping the globe. As a result, and as you know, we were subject to an intense demonetization / deplatforming campaign that included getting kicked off of Twitter, PayPal, Facebook and other platforms, dropped by our advertisers, and targeted by MSM hit pieces which colluded with foreign ‘watchdogs’ to inflict maximum damage.

These same groups also targeted outlets including The Federalist and Breitbart over various reporting, which suffered similar fates.

Now, thanks to a new book by investigative journalist Paul Holden that builds on reporting by Matt Taibbi, Paul Thacker and others, we learn that the origin of these campaigns, launched years before the pandemic, was none other than UK Prime Minister Kier Starmer’s political machine, which began targeting left-wing outlets speaking critically of Starmer such as The Canary, and then went after conservative outlets in America – just in time for the 2020 US election.

Related.

Coulda Had a Tesla

If U.S. taxpayers are wondering where their hard earned money is going, they don’t need to look any further than the U.S. Postal Service, spending $4.9 Million per electric truck:

The US Postal Service has spent more than $3 billion in tax dollars on a brand-new all-electric fleet of mail trucks — and gotten just 612 vehicles for its money, according to a letter sent to Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) and obtained by The Post.

Former President Joe Biden’s 2022 Inflation Reduction Act set aside billions for what Ernst has since ripped as a green “boondoggle” that saw almost all of that amount paid to Wisconsin-based defense contractor Oshkosh to design and build 35,000 new environmentally friendly mail trucks.

But as of Nov. 10, only 612 of the battery-electric powered vehicles are on the road.

Money For Nothing

If college athletic broadcast deals are undeniably a win/win proposition, why doesn’t tuition fall accordingly? Likely because revenue from them isn’t used to offset tuition, but rather gets funneled into a college spending spree. These outfits are so much like government you barely notice the difference.

The Fed’s spigot of easy money and credit have fueled the conditions for financialization that contributed to the astronomical revenue increases witnessed in sports programming. The low interest environment paralleling the rapid increase in coaching salaries allowed companies such as Disney to significantly increase its debt to capture a coveted monopoly on SEC programming. Further, the demand for a piece of the college athletic pie, coupled with athletic department necessity to finance their competitive arms race, have led to investment firms seeking direct deals with American universities.

 

Keir Starmer’s Britain

Bigamy is illegal in Britain. But this law doesn’t apply if the marriages occurred outside of the country. So this should be no surprise to anyone:

UK to Increase Benefits for Additional Spouses in Polygamous Marriages from April 2026

From April 2026, the weekly rate for each additional spouse under Income Support will increase from £114.80 to £119.50, part of standard annual uprating confirmed in the government’s Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2025. This long-standing policy, dating back to the 1990s and clarified in 2004, recognizes polygamous marriages formed abroad for means-tested benefits, mainly affecting a small group of fewer than 100 low-income households who meet residency and income tests. Critics question using public funds for arrangements illegal under UK law, amid broader concerns over welfare spending and rising taxes, while supporters note it prevents hardship for valid dependents without promoting polygamy domestically.

Down The Primrose Path

Zelensky, back in the headlines.

Zelensky’s Government Sabotaged Oversight, Allowing Corruption to Fester

When Russian troops invaded Ukraine, Kyiv’s Western allies faced a dilemma: how to spend billions supporting a government fighting Russia without watching the money vanish into the pockets of corrupt managers and government officials.

The stakes were high because Ukraine’s vital wartime industries — power distribution, weapons purchases and nuclear energy — were controlled by state-owned companies that have long served as piggy banks for the country’s elite.

To protect their money, the United States and European nations insisted on oversight. They required Ukraine to allow groups of outside experts, known as supervisory boards, to monitor spending, appoint executives and prevent corruption.

Over the past four years, a New York Times investigation found, the Ukrainian government systematically sabotaged that oversight, allowing graft to flourish.

 

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