As Manitoba’s Public Utilities Board analyzes Manitoba Hydro’s Integrated Resource Plan, three points are apparent.

Navigating Manitoba’s disability services is difficult under the best circumstances.

Today’s AI promotion scams aimed at authors attempt to exploit their human vulnerabilities.

I WAS reading an article about the current wildfires written in a reputable paper by a recognized ‘environmental journalist’, but I stumbled to a halt when I read the following sentence: “While the skies over North America and Europe will eventually clear, this climate change-driven era of wildfire will exact a lengthy toll.”

What? Does he expect the skies to “eventually clear” of their own accord? We already know with high confidence (85 to 92 per cent) that next year will be even hotter than this year. What natural event or human action is going to return us to the old ‘normal’? Here’s a market tip: invest in companies making water-bombers.

Some people seek solace in the belief that this is just another El Niño event, a nine-to-12-month weather phenomenon that starts in the tropical eastern Pacific but affects the entire global system. It repeats every two to seven years. This time it is coming back in three years so, technically, it could be just another El Niño — but there are strong reasons to doubt that.

A normal El Niño temporarily adds only about 0.2 C to average global temperature, whereas the 2023-24 El Niño added more than 0.3 C. Much more importantly, that extra heat never went away again. It acted like a ratchet, taking us up past some invisible of no return, and we seem to be stuck there.

In June, the Canadian Museum for Human Rights opened a small exhibit focused on the human rights impacts of the forced displacement of Palestinians: infringements on their rights to life, education, equality, movement, and more.

Palestine Uprooted: Nakba Past and Present shares stories, memories and artifacts of Palestinian Canadians. It is on display in our Rights Today gallery, and that placement is intentional. It is a story unfolding before our eyes, demanding our attention.

The exhibit is also a reminder that behind every headline there are real people we must approach with empathy. Unfortunately, much of the coverage and commentary has failed to do that, often omitting Palestinian voices entirely.

Some of the dialogue, both critical and supportive, has contributed to the very things we need to resist — the dehumanization of one another, focusing on entrenched positions over dialogue and understanding.

For too many young Winnipeggers, the cost of a bus pass is a barrier. It can mean missing a class, turning down a job opportunity or staying home from a program that could change their future.

Free transit for youth in Winnipeg is a transformational policy that will pay dividends for decades to come — advancing key environmental, educational and poverty reduction goals in our communities.

As champions for young people across our city, BGC Winnipeg and the YMCA-YWCA of Winnipeg commend Premier Wab Kinew and Mayor Scott Gillingham for recognizing that investing in young people is investing in Winnipeg’s future. By uniting to make transit free for youth across Winnipeg, both levels of government are delivering a forward-thinking policy that has the potential to have generational impact.

At a time when families are stretched to their limits by inflation, free transportation for youth offers real, immediate relief.

Manitoba is living through several emergencies at once.

An HIV public-health emergency. A toxic drug crisis. Rising hepatitis C. Severe housing pressures. Communities asking for help before more people are lost.

In July, leaders from four Island Lake First Nations declared a regional public-health emergency. They described addiction, infection, homelessness and overcrowding converging in communities that do not have enough prevention, treatment or locally led care to meet the need.

These may look like separate problems.

‘Amor mundi’, love of the world, is a basic tenet of Hannah Arendt’s philosophy of life and closely related to her idea of republican (i.e., democratic) politics. Currently, Western democracies have strayed far from the ideals stressed in this view.

I was reading The Guardian the other day, which is one of the best, if not the best, newspaper for climate change coverage. I say this, despite the fact that it still silos the subject into a special section called “Climate Crisis and Environment.”

And it continues to publish front page headlines like “May and June heatwave kills about 2,700 in England and Wales, data suggests,” with no reference to climate change, until you hit the body of the story.

Which, quite frankly, is better than most newspapers do.

Indeed, in a recent issue of The Guardian, there’s an article about just that — the fact that an analysis of British newspapers revealed that 72 per cent of articles covering the U.K.’s June heatwave failed to even mention the climate crisis.