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Dec 13 2023

Ceasefire fallout. Anglophone attacks. Tait questions. The Roundup

Dec 13, 2023
David Akin's Roundup
Clippings of #cdnpoli, #media, and #tech content aimed at those with an interest in Canadian politics and policy. And sometimes Canadian postage stamps.
Canada
Trudeau urges pause in Israel-Hamas conflict, backs ‘sustainable ceasefire’
The joint statement from Trudeau, Australia's Anthony Albanese and New Zealand's Christopher Luxon says there is no place for Hamas in the future governance of Gaza. [Global]
Liberal MPs are set to gather for what is expected to be their final caucus meeting of the year, a day after Canada shifted its stance to join to join international calls for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. [CP]
Canada joined 152 other nations voting in favour of a resolution calling for ceasefire in Gaza. [National Post]
The latest Abacus Data survey reveals a five percentage point drop in support for Poilievre's Conservatives. Support for the Conservatives came out at 37 per cent; support for teh Liberals was 27 per cent; support for the NDP was at 19 per cent. [TorStar]
His comments come as the government is dusting off a Second World War-era housing plan to ignite the pace of home construction in Canada. [Global]
Violent extremists who lack the means to carry out an attack in Canada could compensate by perpetrating hoaxes with the help of artificial intelligence, says a newly released analysis. [CP]
The federal New Democrats say they won't be calling for House Speaker Greg Fergus to resign over a video that was shown at a partisan event, but they want to see him face "tough disciplinary measures." [CP]

Longtime Liberal Carolyn Bennett says she is retiring as the MP for Toronto-St. Paul's after 26 years. [TorStar]
From the provinces
The Beer Store will remain on the case for recycling and distribution. [TorStar]
Tom Mulcair: There have been so many antagonistic moves by François Legault's government, it’s hard to know which ones to include. [Montreal Gazette]
Murray Mandryk: There were meetings of old friends — strange to have to travel half way around the world to get together with the gang from Alberta and B.C. [Regina Leader Post]
Elsewhere
Zelenskyy’s push for more Ukraine aid appears to fall flat among Republicans
Zelenskyy's visit to Washington comes as Republicans are insisting on linking further aid to strict U.S.-Mexico border security changes, putting the funding at risk of collapse. [Global]
Biden's comments mark a stark shift in tone after weeks of unwavering support for Israel's campaign in Gaza, and were his most critical yet of Netanyahu's handling of the conflict. [Global]
President Joe Biden's pledge to restore American credibility around the globe is at risk during the congressional debate over support for Ukraine. [AP]
A team of meme-makers has been flooding social media with pro-Trump posts riddled with sexist and racist tropes. Donald Trump is cheering them on. [NYT]
Robin Abcarian: A free press and the 1st Amendment protect democracy, which is why Orange Jesus and his allies are laying the groundwork for a war on reporters. [LA Times]
Media

The federal government will begin early in the new year the search for a new head of CBC/Radio-Canada, Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge said Tuesday as she faced questions about her confidence in the current leader. [CP]

La ministre du Patrimoine canadien, Pascale St-Onge, estime que le voyage en Australie de la présidente-directrice générale de CBC/Radio-Canada tombe à un bien mauvais moment. La Presse révélait mardi que Catherine Tait participe à une conférence sur la radiodiffusion publique à l’invitation de l’Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). [La Presse]
Our findings suggest that the bulk of the population has a meaningful share of political content available from social peers, that the majority of this content originates from traditional sources of political information (media organizations, journalists, and politicians), and that media organizations are the dominant and direct source of political information on Twitter for nearly 20% of the sample population. [The International Journal of Press/Politics]

Musk’s actions as CEO prompted journalists to question the broader legitimacy of social media as a journalistic tool. However, rather than abandoning Twitter entirely, journalists employed strategic disconnection in order to reconcile their continued Twitter use with their normative discomfort. These findings not only provide empirical evidence on the effects of Musk’s takeover, but also showcases how strategic disconnection can be used as a method of resistance to unwelcome influences in the media sector. [Journalism]
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Sci/Tech
The World Depends on 60-Year-Old Code No One Knows Anymore
An alarmingly large portion of the world's business and finance systems run on COBOL, and only a small community of programmers know it. IBM thinks Watson can help, but it's not guaranteed. The Canadian government operates a lot of mission-critical systems on machines running COBOL. [PC Mag]

"Mixture of experts" Mixtral 8x7B helps open-weights AI punch above its weight class. [Ars Technica]

The timeplyr R package was accepted on CRAN in October 2023. A direct quote from the CRAN page is that it provides a set of fast tidy functions for wrangling, completing and summarising date and date-time data. [Alan Yeung]
The Calendar
  • 0930 ET: 025B West Block -  The CPC National Caucus will meet.
  • 1000 ET: 225A West Block -  The LPC National Caucus will meet.
  • 1330 ET: Room B30 Senate Building -  Senate Committee on Ethics and Conflict of Interest for Senators | Case of privilege concerning events relating to the sitting of November 9, 2023
  • 1400 ET: Senate - Deputy PM and Fin Min Chrystia Freeland and Innovation, Science and Industry Francois-Philippe Champagne testify at the Senate Committee of the Whole on grocery prices.
  • 1630 ET: 415 Wellington - S.C. on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics (ETHI) | Meeting  97 - Use of Social Media Platforms for Data Harvesting and Unethical or Illicit Sharing of Personal Information with Foreign Entities
  • 1630 ET: 125B West Block - S.C. on Foreign Affairs and International Development (FAAE) | Meeting  90 - Canada's diplomatic capacity.
  • 1630 ET: 125-B West Block - S.C. on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics (ETHI) | Meeting  97 - Use of Social Media Platforms for Data Harvesting and Unethical or Illicit Sharing of Personal Information with Foreign Entities
  • 1730 ET: 135B West Block -  The National Council of Canadian Muslims speaks to reporters.
  • 1845 ET: Room B45 Senate Building -  Senate Committee on Transport and Communications | Study the impacts of climate change on critical infrastructure in the transportation and communications sectors and the consequential impacts on their interdependencies
  • 1930 ET: 125B West Block - S.C. on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities (TRAN) | Meeting  96 - Bill C-33

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