Quiet Canines Podcast

Video recorded at Makwa Sahgaiehcan First Nation on July 27, 2026, shows an RCMP officer punching Rose Georgina Angus, an Indigenous woman, several times in the face while another officer uses a Taser against her. The RCMP says Angus punched two officers and resisted arrest. She faces six charges, including two counts each of assaulting and resisting police, plus obstruction and cocaine possession. After reviewing footage from cameras worn by the officers, the RCMP initially concluded that its officers used reasonable force. Saskatchewan’s Serious Incident Response Team is now investigating the officers’ actions under its mandate to act in the public interest.

The North West Mounted Police, the RCMP’s predecessor, was created in 1873 as Canada extended federal control across the Prairies. Federal policies forced many First Nations on the Prairies onto reserves, while Mounties enforced restrictions that confined them there. Under the pass system, First Nations people needed written permission from an Indian agent to leave a reserve. Government lawyers recognized the system as illegal by 1892, yet Mounties continued applying it into the 1930s.

The force also enforced attendance at residential schools. RCMP members served as truant officers under the Indian Act, searched for children who fled, forcibly removed some children from their homes and fined parents for their children’s absence. About 150,000 Indigenous children were separated from their families through the system, which the Truth and Reconciliation Commission described as cultural genocide. The RCMP’s own 2011 report concluded that its participation contributed to distrust among Indigenous people.

My question for you is: Should an institution responsible for cultural genocide be policing First Nations communities in Canada?

Let me know if you want me to make a separate video detailing the use of force training I received from the RCMP.

When asked to discuss the migrant crisis where more than 50,000 people crossed from Morocco into Spain, it is important to look at the human cost. Many individuals swam around the breakwaters to reach the shore. At least 72 people drowned or were crushed during the crossing, and more than 1,000 required medical treatment. The response from populist politicians on the right was entirely predictable.

Donald Trump called the situation an invasion and claimed that the same scenario will happen in America if the Democrats win. JD Vance stated that the event is a reminder of mass migration and radical globalist policies from the political left. Elon Musk asserted that the entire budget of Spain will be destroyed by illegal migrants. Giorgia Meloni called the crisis a threat to the borders of Europe, while Marine Le Pen claimed the influx was encouraged by the Spanish government itself. Nigel Farage warned that the migrants will be heading to his country too, calling the event a stunning warning about the consequences of lax border control. Right wing parties in Spain also used the word invasion, criticizing the government for failing to protect the borders, and some even organized a rally at the border while the crisis was unfolding.

These politicians are all using this tragedy to push a political agenda that opposes immigration. They deliberately use the word invasion to make people afraid, and they position themselves as the only leaders who are strong enough to protect the nation. However, this conversation completely misses what caused the tragedy in the first place. It ignores the question of why so many people would risk their lives in this manner.

The root causes are tied heavily to climate and economic survival. Morocco recently endured seven consecutive years of drought. These weak harvests cost 157,000 jobs. Unemployment among young people reached close to 40 percent in a country where agriculture supplies close to 30 percent of all employment. Looking ahead, the World Bank predicts that as many as 216 million people will be displaced inside their own countries by the year 2050, which includes 19 million people in North Africa alone. Africa accounts for less than 4 percent of global carbon emissions, yet its population faces the most severe droughts, floods, and food insecurity caused by the pollution of wealthier and more industrialized nations. This is a profound global injustice because the continent that did the least to cause the climate crisis is paying the highest price for it.

Personally, I do not want a politician who wants to build a wall. I want a leader who admits and takes responsibility for causing the intolerable conditions that these migrants find themselves in. I do not see an invasion when I look at this crisis. Instead, I see a Moroccan waitress who saw a chance to support her parents and her daughter. I see a 24 year old person who cannot find a job anywhere in Morocco. I see a hungry 23 year old person who was prevented from buying food by Spanish authorities. Ultimately, we must remember that a child remains a child even after crossing a border.

By now, we have all seen enough clips of Donald Trump spouting nonsense and racist rhetoric. Have you ever noticed that he behaves a lot like other politicians? What do all of these politicians have in common? They all seem to hate immigrants. They all love to talk about social cohesion and national pride. They also say the most outrageous, ridiculous, and unverified things.

The most important similarity is that they are all just symptoms of a failing economic system. The fact that they all exist at this precise moment is not a coincidence. The current system is in a severe crisis. It is a global framework that requires constant extraction for profit, where a small minority owns everything we need to survive.

In order for this minority to maximize profits, they need everyone to keep buying their products. If no one can afford them, a major crisis occurs. When the economy hits this point, the problems become too loud and inequality becomes too visible. When workers start to notice and complain, the system produces distractions.

The system will focus on immigrants, refugees, transgender individuals, or student activists. They give us loud politicians to focus on instead. Every theatrical outburst and racist provocation performed by these politicians is designed to keep the public outraged at individuals. It stops people from examining the system that finances, platforms, and produces them.

This makes people believe that if we just vote out one bad politician, the system might work. People think it can be reformed, which is exactly what the ruling class wants. This is why everyone dissects specific fumbled sentences while ignoring the biggest donors. The billionaires, banks, and corporations who fund these campaigns are responsible for the crises we face in the first place.

Outrageous politicians serve one purpose. They distract the masses from an ongoing class struggle. Every time we name an individual as the problem without tying them to the system, we help that system for free. If the issue is not one specific leader, it will be another politician with the same recycled vitriol.

If you want a society where people like this are not the focus of politics, you must look at the root cause. You need a system where the billionaires who finance them do not have complete control over the economy and our lives. To change things, you have to start learning about the structural systems that actually give us the tools to make a real difference.

Here’s the most important thing you need to know about October 19, which is referendum day in Alberta. It’s an election, which means your voice is only heard if you get out to vote.

There are going to be 10 questions on the ballot. Not every Albertan even realizes that. Five of the questions are anti immigrant questions designed to blame people who have legally come to work or study in Alberta and who are paying taxes for the UCP government’s failure to plan for health care, education, and public services, which is their responsibility.

Four questions are so called Constitutional questions which cannot be solved in a referendum by one province. The last question is, of course, the separatism question. The one about Alberta no longer being part of Canada.

Now look, if you want a shorthand for how to vote, I would vote no to the 9 questions and option 1, Stay in Canada. But I live in BC, so I can’t vote.

If you want to read the questions in detail because they are deliberately worded in a confusing fashion to get the outcome that the UCP government wants, Danielle Smith has openly said she wants everyone to vote yes on the 9 questions, and they are actively out trying to convince people to vote that way because this will give them a mandate they were not elected on.

You should go to the Elections Alberta website and, while you’re there, register for a special ballot so you can vote in the referendum by mail. It is going to be a long election day on October 19, and we don’t want anyone turning away because they don’t want to wait in line. So sign up for a special ballot today. Remember, this is your chance to have your voice heard.

If you have any questions or concerns, shoot me a message.

Kerri Lynn Findlay sells out British Columbians to the Trump administration.

Just in case you needed another reason not to trust Conservatives. We have an NDP government in BC, but members of Kerri Lynn Findlay’s Conservative caucus quietly met with U.S. Ambassador Pete Hoekstra and agreed to advocate for the removal of BC’s liquor ban.

Conservative Forestry Critic Ward Stamer said that American liquor would “absolutely” go back on shelves under the BC Conservatives, revealing that he said the same thing to the Trump administration directly: “That would be a measure of good faith, and that’s what we suggested to the American counterparts a couple of weeks ago. Unfortunately, we aren’t the government right now.”

When challenged on Trump’s history of arbitrarily hitting Canada with more tariffs despite Canadian concessions, Stamer defended Trump unequivocally: “No, he doesn’t. I disagree with that. I think that these are negotiating tactics.”

Are you kidding me? Trump is an erratic buffoon, and the BC Conservatives are treating him like he’s a master negotiator.

I just heard Scott Jennings, who goes on CNN and whose job is to defend Trump. He said, “The administration looks like a monkey having intimate relations with a football.”

And this is the government that Kerri Lynn Findlay admires.

Then the Conservatives issued a press release attempting to blame Trump’s tariffs solely on Premier David Eby while letting Trump completely off the hook. The statement read, “British Columbia cannot afford a trade war, but that’s exactly where the NDP’s reckless and reactive trade policies have led us.”

This just confirms that the pro Trump faction is in control of the BC Conservatives. Kerri Lynn Findlay and her team are so loyal to Donald Trump that they’re justifying his attacks on our country and meeting directly with his administration to undermine BC’s negotiating position.

Every elected official should be on Team Canada, but Kerri Lynn Findlay is on Team Trump. British Columbians can’t afford a Conservative government that would sell them out to Trump.

We have been so focused on what’s happening in Alberta and the US interference in that province, but it appears that there’s just as much interference happening behind the scenes in BC.

I don’t know about you, but I am looking forward to the day when Trump is a distant memory. The last thing I want is a government in BC that looks anything like the Trump administration.

Let me know what you think about this story.

The Saskatchewan Party Government has a bad habit of using public funds as their own personal piggy bank. Most recently, Premier Scott Moe used public funds to attend the funeral of Senator Lindsey Graham, a person who has been supportive of Trump’s plans to annex Saskatchewan, calling them the 51st State and imposing job killing tariffs on its economy. Do you think we should call on Scott Moe to reimburse the Saskatchewan taxpayers for his personal trip to Lindsey Graham’s funeral? Do you think it’s appropriate for the Premier of Saskatchewan to be openly supporting somebody who was instrumental in creating such devastating impacts on the Saskatchewan economy and on the rest of Canada?

Portrait of the current president of the United States. The medium used is one I have concocted from water and horse manure, which seemed appropriate considering the subject.

In Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury imagined book burning to keep knowledge from the public. In 1984, George Orwell imagined records disappearing into a memory hole so power could control the past. Anthropic had a different motive, but its method belongs in a dystopian novel: destroy physical books and lock their contents inside a corporate system the public cannot inspect.

Anthropic called the operation Project Panama. An internal planning document called it an effort to “destructively scan all the books in the world” and told employees not to discuss it outside Anthropic. Within about a year, Anthropic spent tens of millions of dollars acquiring millions of books.

Vendors removed the bindings, cut the pages, scanned them and sent the remains for recycling. The files entered Anthropic’s private library as material for its AI models. Each physical copy disappeared from circulation and could no longer be read, lent, donated, resold or preserved.

In June 2025, a federal judge ruled that converting legally purchased books this way qualified as fair use. Anthropic had replaced each physical copy with one digital copy and had not shared or sold the file outside the company. A separate $1.5 billion settlement, approved in July 2026, covered digital books Anthropic downloaded from pirate libraries.

ISBNdb now markets purchases of 1,000 to 1 million books to AI developers. It promotes books published before 2022 because their human writing is uncontaminated by AI generated text. It offers confidentiality and admits that book destruction creates a public relations problem.

Some booksellers report sudden orders for hundreds of obscure and out of print titles. They suspect AI buyers, but anonymous purchases make those suspicions difficult to prove. Scarce copies could disappear into private databases without the public knowing who bought them or what was destroyed.

Orwell’s Party destroyed records to control the past. Anthropic destroyed books to improve a product. The motives differ, but Anthropic’s process still shifts power from accessible physical evidence to an institution that controls the archive. The public cannot inspect Anthropic’s library or trace Claude’s answers back to the books that shaped them.

AI developers value older human books because AI generated writing is polluting online training material. They are consuming human culture to escape the contamination their own products created. The memory hole has a scanner now, and it belongs to a private company.

Indigenous knowledge from 1,400 years ago is helping Peru confront drought. More than 1,400 years ago, Indigenous people in what is now Peru learned how to turn a mountain into a reservoir. High in the Andes, they built channels of stone and earth called amunas. The name comes from a Quechua word meaning to retain.

During the rainy season, the channels divert water from streams and spread it across porous hillsides. The water sinks into the soil and travels through cracks in the rock. The mountain then releases that water weeks or months later through springs and streams. Water that arrived during the rainy season becomes available when communities need it during the dry season.

Scientists tested one surviving system near the community of Huamantanga. They placed a tracer dye into an amuna and monitored springs farther down the mountain. Traces appeared between two weeks and eight months later. The average journey underground lasted 45 days. Researchers calculated that restoring similar systems across key areas supplying Lima could delay 99 million cubic metres of water each year. That could increase dry season river flows by an average of 7.5 percent.

Lima is a desert city of more than 11 million people. It depends heavily on water from the Andes, where shrinking glaciers, changing rainfall, and rising demand are increasing pressure on limited supplies. Communities in the upper Rímac basin are now restoring the amunas with support from scientists, engineers, and conservation groups. Since 2016, five communities and Aquafondo have rehabilitated 86 kilometres of channels.

Monitoring estimates that these restored amunas help move more than 15 million cubic metres of water underground each year. Local committees maintain the channels and preserve knowledge passed down across generations. Modern science is measuring a system Indigenous communities understood centuries ago. Climate adaptation is often presented as a race to invent new technology. In Peru, part of the future is being secured by restoring knowledge that has survived for 1,400 years.

Let me know what you think of this story.

I did not think there was a billionaire as unlikable as Elon Musk, but this guy just might be. Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke, worth an estimated US$11.4 billion, recently said that people with guaranteed pensions should become dependents and lose their vote. He argued that people with a stake in the future should decide instead. Under his logic, anyone paying zero income tax would receive zero votes, while people paying between $1 and $100,000 would receive one vote. The number would rise to five votes for anyone paying at least $500,000. He also described Toronto town hall participants as retired, unemployed, unemployable, and useful idiots.

Longtime residents of the tight knit, historically artistic community of Wychwood Park in Toronto have described Lutke and his billionaire tech bro friends as detached and slightly disturbed, comparing them to a nest of raccoons that had taken up residence in your yard. Populism frames politics as a struggle between ordinary people and a powerful elite. Right wing populism usually defines that struggle through culture and national identity. Left wing populism defines it through class, wealth, and corporate power.

Billionaires become its clearest targets because extreme wealth creates extreme influence. Billionaires can finance political movements, employ lobbyists, own media outlets, and secure access to governments. Global billionaire wealth reached $18.3 trillion in 2025. Oxfam estimates billionaires are 4,000 times more likely than ordinary people to hold political office. Tobi Lütke just showed us why the left wing populists are correct. Many of the problems we are facing today are because of guys like this. It is really no different than an aristocrat with contempt for the commoners.

Left wing populists argue that billionaires already possess excessive political power, but Lütke wants to give wealthy people even more. Someone should remind Tobi that historically, when the wealth gap became too extreme and the ruling class refused to compromise, the commoners resorted to violent revolution. I am thinking about the French Revolution in 1789 and the Russian Revolution in 1917. He should be reminded that there are way more of us than there are of him and his raccoon tech bro buddies.

Let me know what you think in the comments.