Author: Milan

Open thread: oil by rail

The CBC is reporting today that the oil production cuts enacted by the NDP provincial government to try to raise fossil fuel prices have made oil transport by rail less viable.

The possibility of exporting the bitumen sands by rail when pipeline capacity is exceeded has highlighted how fossil fuel advocates take climate change inaction as a given. They posit only two scenarios, a certain amount of oil being shipped by rail or shipped by pipeline, and then say that since the pipeline option is cheaper and safer they should clearly be built. That misses how the most important reason for stopping pipelines is to keep the oil in the ground. Using the bogeyman of a more dangerous transport option to promote a less dangerous one ignores the obligation to decarbonize.

Fossil fuel production needs to be squeezed in every possible way: by imposing carbon taxes, by requiring them to pay remediation costs for damaged areas and abandoned equipment, by stopping new export infrastructure, by withdrawing investment from the industry, and so on.

At root, climate change is a problem where fossil fuel users impose harm on climate change victims because of the convenience, power, and profit that fossil fuels provide them. Forcing communities to accept bitumen exporting trains to pass through has a similar dynamic.

Highly detailed, well-sourced, powerful testimony from Jody Wilson-Raybould

“For a period of approximately four months between September and December 2018, I experienced a consistent and sustained effort by many people within the government to seek to politically interfere in the exercise of prosecutorial discretion in my role as the Attorney General of Canada in an inappropriate effort to secure a Deferred Prosecution Agreement with SNC-Lavalin. These events involved 11 people (excluding myself and my political staff) – from the Prime Minister’s Office, the Privy Council Office, and the Office of the Minister of Finance.”

…

“In my view, the communications and efforts to change my mind on this matter should have stopped. Various officials also urged me to take partisan political considerations into account – which it was clearly improper for me to do. … We either have a system that is based on the rule of law, the independence of the prosecutorial functions, and respect for those charged to use their discretion and powers in particular ways – or we do not. While in our system of government policy oriented discussion amongst people at earlier points in this conversation may be appropriate, the consistent and enduring efforts, even in the face of judicial proceedings on the same matter – and in the face of a clear decision of the DPP and the AG – to continue and even intensify such efforts raises serious red flags in my view.”

Read the full text of Jody Wilson-Raybould’s statement to the House of Commons justice committee

Rolling dice with neurons

One virtue of anxiety is sometimes you do come up with a new approach to solving a problem the 1000th time you think it over, even if you haven’t learned any pertinent information in the interim.

The new approach is probably bad, but at least the rate of new ideas never falls to zero and so there is a corresponding value, albeit with diminishing marginal returns, to rumination. When presented with complex, unforgiving, long-term problems, that may be indispensable.

My tutorial objectives

  1. Make students feel their time has been used well
  2. Give them an opportunity to comment on an important topic
  3. Deepen their understanding of concepts necessary for success in their papers and exams
  4. Point them to ideas beyond the scope of the course, but which they can look into on their own
  5. Make everyone feel respected