The richest man owns X. The second and third richest men control Google. The fourth richest man owns Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. The fifth richest man owns The Washington Post. And now the sixth richest could soon take over both Paramount and Warner Bros. See the problem here?

This is the true State of the Union, such as it is

www.reuters.com/legal/govern...

The Ford Pinto had a death rate of 85 people for 10 million cars sold. The Cybertruck hasn't sold 10 million, but the fatality rate so far maths out to 1,452 people killed per 10 million sold. The Cybertruck may be the deadliest road car, for the occupants, ever sold. fuelarc.com/evs/its-offi...

Back when I was working in the DC buro of the NYT, it was a real treat to overhear one side of a call when a certain reporter there found out a source had lied to him.

More of this, please. The folks in this grassroots group are heroes. Haven Watch lives by the promise, “No One Walks Alone.” Day or night, they show up. When people are released from ICE detention, volunteers meet them in the cold, disoriented, and exhausted. Beautiful and devastating all at once.

“Roll up the windows, park in a sunny spot, and let the sun do its magic—in a couple hours, your baby will have all the toxins flushed from its system,” Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Donald Trump's federal agents should be unmasked and identifiable. Period, full stop.

I regularly see people wondering how it's possible that there are so many musicians and writers and film makers and artists from a tiny nation like Iceland. And the answer is really simple: State funding for art education and artists. I literally get a salary from the government to write books.

Great piece from @dsquareddigest.bsky.social, which touches on one of the big theories for why English-speaking countries do especially badly at housebuilding: Adversarial and litigious common law systems (Anglo) vs judge-led civil law systems elsewhere. samf.substack.com/p/build-the-...

So much of the rot in this country stems from our failure to fund public goods and regulate private wealth. In that context, people who need your money won't care how terrible you are. www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/n...

This is the guy Trump named as Secretary of Health and Human Services. Great going, America.

“Staff members at the United States’s premier infectious-disease research institute have been instructed to remove the words “biodefense” and “pandemic preparedness” from the institute’s web pages, according to e-mails Nature has obtained.” www.nature.com/articles/d41...

This week marks a year since 10% of the CDC work force was fired. We are more vulnerable to the next pandemic,outbreak monitoring is crumbling, measles is basically endemic again,vaccine guidelines are now RFK Jr fan fiction. All it took was one year.

Canada must support Cuba open.substack.com/pub/noralore...

Danforth bike lane Friday February 6

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt says Trump didn’t see the racist part of the video because the eye holes in his white hood were interfering with his field of vision.

Bezos could retrieve something from the disaster of his ownership of the @washingtonpost.com by emulating the Scott family in 1932. Give the paper away and endow it with, say, $1.5 bn. And have an independent trust run it in the public interest.

This morning at the Minnesota State Capitol. An ice sculpture that reads "PROSECUTE ICE". I'm told the organization behind the sculpture is Common Defense.

This might be a great year to say no to their $100 million budget increase demand.

+1 (separated Bloor lane, 11 days post-storm)

🇨🇦Vancouver councillors want ICE-Gestapo banned from FIFA World Cup events. ICE-Gestapo has been murdering US citizens. "We don’t want it disrupting the success of an event that we, collectively, have invested a lot of money in,” #Cdnpoli #CanadaSky🇨🇦 www.ctvnews.ca/vancouver/ar...

the Epstein files are really devastating because they remind me of how many girls and women miss out on professional opportunities, mentorship and careers because of how many powerful, rich and influential men only view girls and women — and interactions with them — through the lens of sex

This is still my favourite one:

I want someone to love me as much as my elected representatives love parking spots.

again we do not really do a good job of explaining how wealthy people like Jeff Bezos are his net worth is $253.2 billion. so he could take one million dollars, and just light it on fire and then do it again tomorrow and again the day after that and then do it every day for 693 years and 8 months

This is the reality of train travel in Canada

Washington Post Begins Sweeping Layoffs- “saving” the paper by firing its staff. www.nytimes.com/2026/02/04/b...

In no functioning country is this allowed.

Investors are betting big on virtual pharmacies selling lifestyle drugs, where a prescription can be just a few DMs away. This sector raises tricky questions about physician ethics, the role of profit in healthcare, and what happens when patients come looking for specific prescriptions. New from me:

Wait times + backlogs for cataract surgery pushed the pulicly-funded procedure into private for-profit clinics. But when a patient becomes a customer, how can you know if you really need what you're being offered or if it’s just an upsell? From @alisonmotluk.bsky.social: thelocal.to/cataract-sur...

I want to laugh at it but sadly it’s true.

Only 5 more days until the first Eglinton Crosstown shutdown.

Read this (gift article) www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

This notice about PubMed made me sad

I’m still not sure if enough Americans fully understand how hard it is for the rest of us to continually see polls showing “how unpopular Trump is” when he’s he’s still ridiculously and shockingly more popular than he should be in any sane nation.

For a while, it looked like our society was serious about making work life more family friendly. It's a sad day when a large employer, like mine, decides to take a giant step backward.

How Privatized Cataract Surgery Helped Ontario’s Wealthiest—and Left Others Behind thelocal.to/cataract-sur...

BREAKING: The two federal immigration agents who fired on Minneapolis protester Alex Pretti are identified in government records as Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raymundo Gutierrez.

This is exactly right

This is infuriating and unacceptable

Wow -- incredible!!!

Leading American companies — including Palantir, Deloitte, and private prison giant GEO Group — raked in over $22B from ICE and CBP contracts last year. Do not forget who is profiting from cruelty and human suffering.

Trump's skin is thinner than a paper straw halfway through a McDonald's milkshake.

This came in the same budget that axed a luxury tax on yachts. www.thestar.com/news/canada/...

“We are witnessing the total breakdown of any meaningful system of accountability for federal officials. …The national government is becoming functionally lawless, and the legal system is struggling to contain his corruption.” www.nytimes.com/2026/01/26/o...

Doug Ford said it had to close because the roof was unstable. Massive snow dump, roof just fine. Doug Ford lies.