Dawson and Vanier have moved most of their final exams online.
Updates from November, 2020 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
Vincent Ouellette, the teacher denounced by several students recently in Montreal North for making racial slurs, has lost his job. A further investigation had shown that Ouellette had been notorious for offensive remarks for a long time.
Jack
This is really a big story that was covered by every media organ in Quebec, except one. The kids who brought this idiot down created a FB page describing their experience with this “ teacher “.Check out their FB page Beliers Solidaires.
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Kate
Three people were arrested Friday in a case of identity theft of Quebec teachers. Later report from CBC.
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Kate
QMI continues with its theme of criminals at the casino: the premier asked Loto-Quebec for explanations to which its president responded, weakly, that they can’t keep anyone out but minors, troublemakers and moneylenders. QMI went on to find evidence of criminal money deals going down with desperate people on the premises.
Is it racist to call a moneylender a Shylock?
Nick D
Yes, it is, defiinitely. (“Ah no, but it’s in French, so it’s totally different!…”) I see that they have changed the text but the term is still in the URL.
thomas
Isn’t there poetic justice in mobsters victimized by state sponsored gambling?
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Kate
I remind you, at the request of one of my readers, that the link to Mobilité Montréal is over there on the right, if you’re on a desktop, just above Recent Posts, and that it is therefore no longer necessary for me to link to media articles about weekend traffic.
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Kate
The federal government is going to pay to extend the REM to the airport.
Faiz imam
Very interesting that the dept of finance is straight up paying $600 million for this, as opposed to asking the newly created infrastructure bank to provide a loan for the purpose.
I wonder how that sort of decision is negotiated.
Also I wonder if this impacts in any way the extension to Dorval station, which Is obvious and is best done now when the machine is literally in the tunnel.
Apparently they will announce it next week.
Ant6n
But remember, cdpqinfa is paying 51% of the full construction cost, which is why they have monopoly control over everything. Oh and since they take on all the risk, which the minority shareholders (qc, fed givt) are apparently not, cdpqinfra is entitled to preferred dividends giving them most of the profit of the scheme.
Le sigh…Ephraim
Yes, but there is less income from the airport spur, in that they can’t really build around it for extra profit.
Phil M
If I read this correctly, which I may not have, though I trust Google Translate better than my own French, the feds are providing a loan, that would be repaid by ADM eventually.
Also, if the REM is taking the risk, and absolving the govt partners, I think it’s relatively fair that they should benefit from first dibs on profits. That’s always how it goes with venture capital.
ant6n
The point is they`re not taking the risk: originally CDPQInfra were supposed to pay for the airport station, it was part of the project. Then they gave the airport super a minimal design, which the ADM considered inappropriate, and told the aiport “if you want something better, pay for it yourself”. That cost for that airport station has gone from 250M to 600M. that´s one of the ways that CDPQInfra has taken project risks (cost risks) and shoved them back to the public. In return, the public won´t get any equity (which would mean that by now we have control again, because we pay for most of it).
Presumably, the project is conveniently sliced so that the airport station doesn´t belong to the REM – so CDPQInfra can still claim the 51% ownership. This has happend multiple times for this project, necessary infrastructure that belongs to this project was taken out of the REM and given to the public, then they got some loans and some funding out of certain development funds, none of which gave the government equity in return.
So overall CDPQInfra has taken on very little of the increasing project costs, while still mainting the contolling ownership stake. And this is all within a contract framework that gives them preferred dividends because suppossedly they´re suppossedly taking on greater risk.
This is not a normal PPP-contract.
(Mark my words: if this starts operating and for whatever reason the ridership is low, which is unlikely but possible given Corona, CDPQInfra won´t take that risk of low operating profits either, but get another subsidy)
david211
My blood runs cold when I see anything reminding me that Chrystia Freeland is that finance minister. Like, is the media asleep at the wheel? Does the role of finance minister no longer require any subject matter expertise? Starkly insisting that we not forget: the people running the show don’t know what they’re doing.
Ephraim
david211 – It’s not really who is at the top, but rather, the function bureaucracy below. The people at the top make decisions, mostly on offer. For example, we can lower tax on group A by taxing group B, which id politically favourable to your political messaging and promises. You just want to avoid being in group B all the time. Or you give group B something to placate them, like a TFSA.
So, politicians would need to have backgrounds in law, political science, international relations, economics, statistics, etc to be able to actually fully function. But the actual requirements to get elected are… NONE.
David77
Ephraim – I know it, and it’s what’s so worrying. We’re talking about a so-called ‘super minister’ and her function is to preside, and get Justin’s top line priorities implemented. It’s scary.
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Kate
Covid hospitalizations have risen over 200 in Montreal; on Thursday 1464 new cases were reported in Quebec, the highest yet. And yet I’m hearing more and more about people being expected back at the office, as if everything is tickety-boo. It most certainly is not. People want to feel things have normalized, whereas if anything, they’re verging on a shitshow.
Tim S.
Every day I pass by a ground-floor open plan office with nice big windows onto the street. No attempt at social distancing, some people make a half-hearted effort to wear a mask but most don’t even try. They’re mostly young intern types, and I wonder which megalomaniac boss running the place has decided the situation doesn’t apply to their business.
DeWolf
I see the same thing, Tim. Lots of ground-floor offices where nobody wears masks. Between that and the schools, it’s a reminder of why we’re still seeing such high case counts two months into red zone. Also a reminder of how mystifyingly inconsistent the Quebec government’s approach to masks is. Apparently we should only be concerned about transmission between strangers but not colleagues and classmates?
Thank god the museums and restaurants are still closed! /s
dhomas
The government is failing tremendously in their communication plan. You can’t tell people “this virus is super dangerous and extremely contagious! You should avoid being in contact with anyone.” while also telling them that is ok to go to work and for kids to go to school. Most people will not take it seriously as the line is blurred between what is acceptable risk and what is not.
Here’s an anecdote from my personal experience. My upstairs tenant lived as a shut-in with his two kids at the beginning of the pandemic when they closed down the schools. His kids would never leave the house, and he would leave the house to get food in full gear with a mask and gloves (still not sure how I feel about him leaving his 8 and 6 year-old kids alone at home). When he would come pay the rent (still in cash, unfortunately), he would stay much further away and mention how scared he was of the virus. Yesterday, he threw a birthday party for his daughter. She even invited my daughter (we politely declined).
People are not scared anymore and are not being careful. And a lot of it has to do with inconsistent messaging.
MarcG
I needed to take a taxi last night for an emergency (in retrospect should have taken Communauto) and had to ask the driver to put his mask on, and there was no plastic divider. At least he didn’t say anything when we rolled the windows down.
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Kate
I find it so odd that we have Black Friday even though we don’t have American Thanksgiving. People were lining up overnight in hopes of getting deals.
I can’t help seeing this as a way for retail to clear older stock out so they can put out more expensive stuff for Christmas shoppers. Am I mistaken?
Blork
The link between Black Friday and Thanksgiving is tenuous. I think it’s primarily because most USers are off work today so hey, might as well go shopping. Canadian retailers are just riding the wave of free publicity about it that drifts up from south of the border.
I am so not a Black Friday shopper, but then every Black Friday I suddenly realize “wait a sec; there are some things I want/need, so why not buy them now and save some bucks?” (Which is different from the frenzy of shopping for things you don’t want or need, just because you got caught up in it.) But then I can’t remember what it is I’m thinking about buying.
And yeah, I think it is a way of clearing out old stock. The company I buy underwear from sent me a Black Friday specials email, and I though “why not?” since I do wear underwear. Why not buy it now, cheaper, instead of waiting a few months and paying full price? But then none of the styles/colors I wanted were available in my size, so no deal. :-/
One other thing: loads of software and online services on sale today, so if you were thinking about trying premium versions of this or that, or that photo editing software you’ve been thinking about, etc., today’s your day.
Kate
Yes. I bought two of the Affinity apps, which I’ve wanted for awhile and which were on sale this week.
Incidentally, I used some of my Patreon cash for this, and thank everybody again.
Meezly
Exactly, Kate. Clearing out old stock to make way for shiny new stuff. Also so many chain and box stores are owned by American companies now. In an American capitalist’s mind, Canada is just one big annexed state of 37 million consumers.
Azrhey
By a quirk of the calendar canadian thanksgiving is different from USian one. But at least we HAVE a Thanksgiving. I find it so WEIRD to go to random online portuguese and Spanish shops and find Black Friday deals plastered all over in big swats of yellow and black with poorly animated turkeys at the edges. TURKEYS!
Paint me unimpressed! consumerism rant. capitalism rant. americaa imperialism rant.
dhomas
Black Friday became increasingly popular with Canadians around the late 2000’s. In 2007, the Canadian dollar was worth more than the US dollar. However, most goods here were still priced about 30% higher than in the US, mostly just because they always were due to the historical exchange rate. Canadians were buying tons of stuff in the US with their newly found purchasing power. And then they discovered Black Friday. These deals combined with the high Canadian dollar got tons of Canadians to go spend their cash South of the border. By the time Canadian Boxing Day sales came around, consumers had nothing left to spend or nothing left they wanted to buy for themselves. Canadian retailers were hurting. So, they decided to throw their own Black Friday sales to take back some of those retail dollars. And it mostly worked.
Black Friday does have some decent deals. But a lot of it is also a legal form of bait and switch. “This TV is 85% off (only 10 in stock per store)!”. After those first ones are sold, people who came in looking for a TV buy something else with a higher profit margin. Those deals might even be loss leaders to drive more sales. Boxing Day is more about clearing out of stock that didn’t sell very well in the period leading up to Christmas.
Kate
Good history, dhomas. Thank you.
david211
I had almost completely forgotten about boxing day sales, which were huge when I was young.
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Kate
Around 80 animals died when the Biodome shuffled them around to do its recent renovation.
qatzelok
The reset was hard on them.
Hahaha… oops
Meezly
That is so unfortunate. I guess the renos must have been necessary to update old infrastructures. The transport of so many animals requires complex planning, very specialized knowledge/experience and lots of money and resources. I imagine with multiple obstacles like delays and budget constraints, it’s probably not surprising there were bio-casualties.
Kate
CBC news at 13:00 had someone on saying a weasel got into a bird enclosure, among other things.
I had a friend who worked in a downtown pet store, back when such places sold animals. One night a ferret got out of its enclosure, and it methodically went through the entire store and killed every single rodent pet in the place. Every mouse, gerbil, hamster, rat and guinea pig. The ferret wasn’t even hungry – it was just on a killing spree.
I can only imagine what the weasel did to those birds.
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