What Was Their First Clue?

Claws of the Panda 6 Comments

From the people who brought you men punching women in the face for sport;

A former chief investigator for the World Anti-Doping Agency said on Monday that the organization was “broken beyond repair” and had misled the public following disclosure of its decision not to discipline 23 elite Chinese swimmers who tested positive three years ago for a banned drug.

The investigator, Jack Robertson, said in a five-page statement that the agency’s handling of the positive tests and its response to the criticism it has faced demonstrated that it needed to be completely restructured to become “truly independent.”

Mr. Robertson said the agency, known as WADA, had made false and defamatory statements about how its top critic — the United States Anti-Doping Agency — handled a separate and complex doping case. WADA’s accusation that the American agency had mishandled the case and had been hypocritical in criticizing WADA came amid an escalating feud between the two agencies over whether WADA is capable of policing doping in international athletics.

“WADA has gone from enforcer to appeaser,” Mr. Robertson said.

It’s a NYT piece that will likely drop behind the paywall, so read the rest in the extended entry.
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Today In The Vote Rich Rapey-Beheader Community

Pallywood Shiny Pony 24 Comments

Trouble in Rainbow City…

The Liberal Party of Canada is the latest major group to withdraw from the annual Ottawa Pride parade after organizers pledged solidarity with Palestinians in a statement earlier this month.

The federal political party’s decision comes as some embassies, civil servants, and local organizations pulled out of the event amid the controversy.

“In light of recent decisions made by the Capital Pride board, the Liberal Party has decided not to participate in Capital Pride events this year, and instead will host our own event to celebrate Ottawa’s 2SLGBTQI+ communities,” said Liberal Party spokesperson Parker Lund in a statement.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has previously taken part in the Pride parade in the nation’s capital, as have some other prominent political leaders. […]

The wave of backlash began after Capital Pride issued a statement on Aug. 6 expressing solidarity(opens in a new tab) with Palestinians and accusing the Israeli government for “pinkwashing” the ongoing Israel-Hamas war by citing its LGBTQ2S+ inclusivity in an effort to “draw attention away” from its actions in Gaza.

The statement condemned, “in the strongest possible terms,” the Hamas terrorist attack on Oct. 7, 2023. It also pledged to “recognize the ongoing genocide against Palestinians” in opening remarks at 2024 Capital Pride Festival signature events, among other commitments.

While some organizations, such as Queers4Palestine Ottawa applauded Capital Pride for pledging to boycott Israeli companies, the statement drew considerable backlash from Jewish residents and advocacy groups such as B’nai Brith Canada and the Jewish Federation of Ottawa.

When The “New Rules” Don’t Apply

Shiny Pony We Are All Treaty People You Might Be A Liberal 28 Comments

Blacklock’s- Told Aboriginal “Boneheads” To “Get A Job”: New Senator

Liberal Senate appointee Charles Adler in a radio broadcast called Indigenous people uncivilized “boneheads” who should “get a job.” Adler’s remarks on Radio CJOB Winnipeg were so vulgar they prompted a formal complaint by the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, records show.

“I don’t believe in living on reserves,” Adler said in his Adler On Line broadcast. “I don’t believe in ghettos. I don’t believe in federal government policy.”

Adler described First Nations as dishonest. “Do you think people of this community believe people running the reserves, the chiefs, are honest, have integrity?”

Update! Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs Asks Governor General and Prime Minister to Recall Appointment of Charles Adler to represent Manitoba in the Senate

It’s Not My Fault

Quackery The Libranos 26 Comments

Blacklock’s- I Am Not To Blame, Says Saks

Addictions Minister Ya’ara Saks’ office in a briefing note it is “inaccurate to claim” its decriminalization of cocaine and opioids is to blame for an increase in overdose deaths in British Columbia. Coroners’ data show deaths increased 16.5 percent in the period of decriminalization.

Minister Saks’ office did not cite any data or research to explain the increase in overdose deaths. “This is an extremely complex health crisis,” said the note Criticism That The Exemption Is Leading To More Overdose Deaths.

Your Moral And Intellectual Superiors

AI Media There Goes The Narrative 21 Comments

Facts are stubborn things.

Washington Post columnist Meghan McArdle ripped the community of fact-checkers who have tried to hold former President Trump accountable during his political career, admitting they’ve ultimately failed to hamper his support and have hurt their own institutions.

The author, a staunch critic of Trump, accused those of trying to prevent the spread of Trump’s “disinformation” of being arrogant and mistaking their own opinion with objective fact. She even accused them of censorship. All of this, she wrote, has ultimately led to voters questioning them and other institutions more than they’ve ever questioned the former president.

“After eight years of all-out disinformation warfare, Trump’s approval ratings are holding up better than public trust in academia and journalism,” McArdle lamented.

The columnist began her piece by describing the idealized mission of the Trump era fact-checkers, saying they “devote themselves to checking the internet for bad facts and bad actors — and especially for the malevolent impulses of Trump.”

However, they didn’t save the world in her estimation. At best, they dinged Trump on some of his bragging and, at worst, they censored true facts in their thirst to correct him.

“Some of their efforts have been useful, including their fact-checking of Trump’s more frenetic flights of fancy,” she said, adding, “But the larger effort has been repeatedly marred when the disinformation experts have acted as censors, suppressing information that turned out to be true and spreading information that was false.”

McArdle provided some of the major examples of this suppression, examples that most of the media participated in at the behest of these fact-checkers.

“Recall when it was ‘misinformation’ to suggest the pandemic might have started in a Wuhan lab. Recollect how a bevy of putative experts assured us that Hunter Biden’s laptop was probably a ‘Russian information operation’ rather than … Hunter Biden’s laptop.”

She added a more recent one, stating, “If these memories have faded, remember that just a couple months ago, we were hearing that videos of President Joe Biden’s obvious decline were actually expert-certified ‘cheap fakes.’”

Related: Journalist Resigns After Being Exposed for Fake, AI-Generated Quotes

Y2Kyoto: South Africa Waves Hello

Y2Kyoto 25 Comments

There’s an old joke about weaning the dog off food by reducing his ration by a kibble each day, until one day, he didn’t need food at all.

As summer heat strikes, the US grid increasingly relies on a kind of invisible weapon — the “virtual power plant” — to prevent blackouts.

Each VPP brings together large numbers of homes and businesses whose owners have agreed to use less electricity when needed — or even send some of their own back to the grid — in exchange for a financial incentive.

Participants just have to let the operators take control of their usage to balance supply and demand when the system’s under stress, usually by setting the thermostat a few degrees higher or tapping electric vehicles and on-site batteries.

Pool enough customers, and it makes a big difference. Energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie says the VPPs already deployed or under development in the US will be able to save as much juice as 33 nuclear reactors can produce.

The Libranos: Comfy Fur For Adler

Shiny Pony There Goes The Narrative 26 Comments

Discontent…

SEN. TALK RADIO — Imagine telling CHARLES ADLER as he first walked off his Sun News Network set in 2011 that he’d one day sit in the Senate — and JUSTIN TRUDEAU, then a rookie opposition MP, would be the man to put him there.

Head-exploding emoji.

But the Ottawa fishbowl woke up Saturday to a press release. Trudeau had nominated Adler for a Manitoba seat and TRACY MUGGLI, a healthcare executive and two-time Liberal candidate, for a spot next door in Saskatchewan.

— Prairie discontent: Playbook reached out to Northern Affairs Minister DAN VANDAL, Manitoba’s only man in Cabinet, in case he had a view.

Vandal did, in fact, express an opinion.

“There are many eminently qualified Manitobans who are better suited to represent our province than Charles Adler,” read a short statement from his office.

OK, then.

h/t Mike

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