ON Rats

   

    "ON Rats" was chosen because it is a bit more sophisticated than "OH Rats!" or "EEK Rats!" and it likely reminds you more of an essay by Montaigne than Mulcahy. But, the exclamatory titles are more appropriate and the point being made here is that there are now a lot of rats. If you have read my unflattering posts about Toronto you will know that I was not surprised to learn that Toronto has lots of them.
   If I had acted more quickly I could have provided you with "Breaking News" which is now more valuable than the regular kind. I would have told you early on about the Ratscallions, if I had known that rats were going to become "a thing." The Ratscallions operate in Washington, which like Toronto, has many rats and again, I wasn't surprised to learn this. The advance news about the rapidly growing rat population in the D.C. area is from this article which begins with an Editor's warning: "This story contains descriptions and images of dogs hunting rats that could upset some readers.". Actually the title should be enough for you: ""Washington is Full of Rats: These Dogs Are Happy to Help With That: On Certain Nights, Behind Some of Your Favorite Restaurants, Roving Groups of Dog Owners Set Their Posse of Pooches Loose on Urban Rodents," Maur Judkis and Jabin Botsford, Washington Post, Sept. 13, 2024.
   This is now old news so I will not develop this story further and simply provide sources for those of you who may have missed this development while spending too much time reading about the other rats in Washington. The major points are that the rat population is booming and increases in the number of people and the temperature are mainly responsible.

  THE SOURCE which all the journalists depended upon is this one: "Increasing Rat Numbers in Cities  Are Linked to Climate Warming, Urbanization, and Human Population," Science Advances, Jan. 31, 2025.
"Urban rats are commensal pests that thrive in cities by exploiting the resources accompanying large human populations. Identifying long-term trends in rat numbers and how they are shaped by environmental changes is critical for understanding their ecology, and projecting future vulnerabilities and mitigation needs."
   The story was reported in Washington where obviously the Ratscallions have not been able cull sufficient numbers: "Urban Rats are Booming Around the World Due in Large Part to Rising Average Temperatures, According to an Analysis of 16 Cities Published Friday: The trend is most pronounced in Washington, D.C., followed by San Francisco, Toronto and New York," Washington Post, Jan. 31, 2025.
    Boston has more than Brahmins and Bruins: "Boston's Warming Climate Leads to More Rats, Study Says," The Boston Globe, Feb. 18, 2025.
"A study published in the journal Science on Jan. 31, said biologists using Boston’s 311 call data estimated that between 2011 and 2021, the city’s rat population increased by 53 percent..."
    Here is yet another reason to avoid Toronto: "Rats! Why Toronto’s Rat Population is Growing, and Will Likely Continue To Do So," By Alex Arsenych, Cp24.com, February 12, 2025.
    It made the National news: "How Canada's Cities Got So Repulsively Ratty: Canadians Are in an All-out War with Rats For Dominion Over our Urban Centers: It's Time to Take Them Back," Jadine Ngan, Maceans, Dec. 9, 2025.
    The problem is an International one: "Cat-sized Rats Are Attacking Our Cars," Rob Mayer, BBC, Feb.28, 2025. These rats are in Birmingham. 

   No, this does not give you an excuse to buy another cat. As you can see from the headline right above, these 21st century rats can be large. As well, if there are many of them, your cat may be outmatched. I recently was looking again at The Great War and Modern Memory and in it, found this passage:
  "The famous rats also gave us constant trouble. They were big and black with wet, muddy hair….Their hunger, vigor, intelligence, and courage are recalled in numerous anecdotes. One officer notes from the Ypres Salient: “We are fairly plagued with rats. They have eaten nearly everything in the mess, including the table-cloth and the operations orders! We borrowed a large cat and shut it up at night to exterminate them, and found the place empty the next morning. The rats must have eaten it up, bones, fur, and all and dragged it to their holes.” p.49 The Great War and Modern Memory, Paul Fussell.

   On a more positive note, there's always Alberta: "'Rat on Rats': Alberta Launches Campaign to Keep Province Rat-free," Steven Dyer, CTV News, Nov.5, 2024.
"For more than 70 years, Alberta has been designated rat-free by keeping rats from establishing a permanent population and dealing with any new infestations, the province said in a release."

The Bonus:
  For additional, sophisticated "ON" posts, see, for example:
"ON Ophiology"
"ON Worms" 
"ON Barfing"

Beyond the Palewall (14)

 

   Apart from the description above, I will add that this series allows me to note some items I found to be of interest, without doing much work. Besides, you probably missed most of the items in the news, that I point out, because you spent all of your time reading about Trump and/or Taylor, the two defining personalities of our time, perhaps of all time, forever. If the news doesn't get better next year I will start grabbing headlines from years when it was, or focus only on the bright side as Monty Python suggested. 

Bullets "R" US
  There has been some talk lately about Canada becoming a state in the United States. If so, Christmas shopping would sure be easier. Here in Ontario we have only recently and reluctantly allowed some alcohol to be sold in convenience stores. There, you can pick up a 6-pack and some ammo from a vending machine if you have forgotten to buy any presents. The story:

"Start-up Putting Ammo Vending Machines in Grocery Stores Plans to Grow: Dallas-based American Rounds says it makes selling ammo safer and more convenient, but some public officials and health experts worry about impulse bullet buying,", Jackson Barton, The Washington Post, Dec. 15, 2024.

Barred from Bar Harbor

  If you have purchased a cruise package you might want to check your destinations. People appear to be getting tired of tourists.
"In Some Port Towns, It's Residents vs. Cruises: 'We're Going to Eradicate Them:   "From Alaska to Maine to Virginia, Residents Are Using Their Voices and the Law to Preserve Their Communities," Andre Sachs, The Washington Post, Dec. 15, 2024.

"Around the world, from Venice to Juneau, Alaska, to Bar Harbor, Maine, residents are rising up against what they consider a scourge on their communities. They fear the vessels that they say pollute their air and water, drain the local economy and dispatch overwhelming crowds that diminish their quality of life. In Bar Harbor, for example, locals have described chaotic cruise days as packed as Times Square."

Suit Settling and the Decline of the Fourth Estate
   Even in MM Trump news cannot be escaped, but my excuse is that I wanted to display a quotation that is important. It is in an article reporting that ABC News is going to give the Trump Foundation $15 million, plus another $1 million for legal fees, because George Stephanopoulos said something that is not quite true, but mostly is. Here is the quote:

“What we might be seeing here is an attitudinal shift,” she added. “Compared to the mainstream American press of a decade ago, today’s press is far less financially robust, far more politically threatened, and exponentially less confident that a given jury will value press freedom, rather than embrace a vilification of it.”
("ABC to Pay $15 Million to Settle a Defamation Suit Brought by Trump:

The outcome of the lawsuit marks an unusual victory for President-elect Donald J. Trump in his ongoing legal campaign against national news organizations,"

By Michael M. Grynbaum and Alan Feuer, NYT Dec. 14, 2024.)

Update: MM can provide "BREAKING NEWS" with the best of 'em: 
"Trump Sues Des Moines Register and Iowa Pollster, Escalating Attacks on the Media: The Action is the Latest in a Series of Lawsuits Targeting News Media Companies," By Elahe Izadi, Laura Wagner and Meryl Kornfield, The Washington Post, Dec. 17, 2024.

Law and Disorder
   This new news is so bad, I have to include it: 

"Confidence in U.S. Courts Plummets to Rate Far Below Peer Nations:

Very few countries have experienced similar declines, typically in the wake of wrenching turmoil. Experts called the data, from a new Gallup poll, stunning and worrisome." Adam Liptak, NYT, Dec. 17, 2024.

   "Public confidence in the American legal system has plunged over the past four years, a new Gallup poll found, putting it in the company of nations like Myanmar, Syria and Venezuela.

“These data on the U.S. courts are stunning,” said Tom Ginsburg, an authority on comparative and international law at the University of Chicago.

  After the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade and the several prosecutions of Donald J. Trump, Professor Ginsburg said, “there is a perception that the judiciary has become inexorably politicized.”

2000 Mules Disappeared
   A couple of years ago the film, 2000 Mules,  produced by Dinesh D'Souza, spread the message that the 2020 U.S. election was affected by 2000 "mules" hired to deposit multiple ballots to benefit the Democrats. The tagline on the theatre poster was: "They Thought We'd Never Find Out. They Were Wrong."
   That tagline now can be turned around and used against Mr. D'Sousa, who admits mistakes were made, but apparently still believes the election was stolen. Even the WSJ reported this story:
"Dinesh D'Souza Says Sorry for '2000 Mules', Wall Street Journal, Dec. 5, 2024.
"Indulging Donald Trump's claims that the 2020 election was stolen has ruined many reputations. The latest is the unraveling of the MAGA mockumentary "2000 Mules." This week the movie's narrator, Dinesh D'Souza, issued an apology for misleading viewers....One voter featured by the movie, a Georgia man named Mark Andrews, was cleared of wrongdoing by state investigators more than two years ago, before "2000 Mules" hit movie theaters. He has sued for defamation, and motions for summary judgment are due shortly. "I owe this individual, Mark Andrews, an apology," Mr. D'Souza now says."
If you missed the film and the news about "2000 Mules" see the Wikipedia entry. 

You Need a Phone to Sit on the Throne
   This very clever headline caught my attention: "Can't Afford a Smartphone? That's Going to Cost You," Marc Fisher, Washington Post, Dec. 4, 2024. 
The District of Columbia signed a contract to have the company,Throne, supply "convenient, clean and free toilets for people who find themselves in urgent need. To use them, you need a phone (unless you are homeless and can get an access card from a library.) The author concludes:
"Too often now, in matters meaningful and meaningless, the good stuff is reserved for people who have smartphones or other digital tools. From parking garages to airplane movie offerings, it pays to be digitally equipped. More to the point, it hurts to be in the technological slow lane."

(As an older gent, I still think the idea is a good one and that there should be more public toilets, even ones only accessible by phone.)

Chikungunya (Something Else To Worry About)

  This is a deadly and costly mosquito-borne disease I was unaware of and I don't recall ever seeing the word --- "Chikungunya." A new report was released and then reported on in The Washington Post: "Mosquito-borne Disease Has Cost the World Billions, Researchers Say: Scientists Say There Were 18.7 million Chikungunya Cases That Exacted a Total Cost of Nearly $50 Billion Over a Decade," Erin Blakemore, Dec. 7, 2024. This is from the study from BMJ Global Health:

"Chikungunya is a mosquito-borne arboviral disease posing an emerging global public health threat. Understanding the global burden of chikungunya is critical for designing effective prevention and control strategies. However, current estimates of the economic and health impact of chikungunya remain limited and are potentially underestimated. This study aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the chikungunya burden worldwide."

The Lamprey (Some Good News for a Change)
  This title is from the National Geographic: "How Scientists Claimed Victory Over an Invasive Great Lakes Bloodsucker." 

 "In order to combat the highly predatory sea lamprey, which arrived in the region more than a century ago and immediately began to gobble up native species, scientists developed a new type of lampricide that has now killed off between 90-95% of the sea lampreys in the Great Lakes without harming the native species. 

"There is no doubt that this is an unprecedented victory anywhere on the planet, where you have a species this destructive, this widespread geographically, and yet still able to be controlled using a selective technique," said Great Lakes Fishery Commission's executive secretary Marc Gaden. "It saved the Great Lakes fishery." 
(As reported by Jeremiah Budin in TCD, Dec. 4, 2024.)

    Hold on - the good news was just reduced by this breaking news. Apparently covid even had an affect on the cold Great Lakes. 

"The Great Lakes Fishery Commission has announced the annual sea lamprey abundances for each Great Lake in 2024. In it, the commission noted that populations of non-native predatory sea lampreys are above targets in all five of the Great Lakes.

The sea lamprey, a highly noxious fish, spiked in numbers when field crews were constrained in their ability to conduct sea lamprey control in 2020 and 2021. Because of the sea lamprey’s life cycle, scientists are now seeing the ramifications of those reduced control seasons. Recent levels of sea lamprey control give the commission reason to believe that sea lamprey numbers are now on the way back down.
This was just reported by the Great Lakes Fishery Commission. See:"See Lamprey Populations Jump in All Five Great Lakes: Controls Were Relaxed in 2020 and 2021 Because of the Pandemic," SooLeader Staff, SOOTODAY, Dec. 17, 2024

Wave Power (More potentially good news, from Newport, Oregon.)

"This Seaside Town Will Power Thousands of Homes With Waves:

Wave Energy Has Been Untapped So Far, But an Experiment Could Unlock its Potential in the United States," Sarah Raza, The Washington Post, Nov.19, 2024.

   "At a moment when large offshore wind projects are encountering public resistance, a nascent ocean industry is showing promise: wave energy.

It’s coming to life in Newport, a rainy coastal town of nearly 10,500 people located a couple of hours south of Portland. Home to fishing operators and researchers, Newport attracts tourists and retirees with its famous aquarium, sprawling beaches and noisy sea lions. If you ask anyone at the lively bayfront about a wave energy project, they probably won’t know much about it.

   And yet, right off the coast, a $100 million effort with funding from the Energy Department aims to convert the power of waves into energy, and help catch up to Europe in developing this new technology. The buoy-like contraptions, located several miles offshore, will deliver up to 20 megawatts of energy — enough to power thousands of homes and businesses....
There is enough energy in the waves off America’s coasts to power one-third of all the nation’s homes, said Matthew Grosso, the Energy Department’s director of the water power technologies office.

We shall see. 

Disappearing Osprey and Complicated Supply Chains
   I will end this batch with some CANCON. It has been reported that the over- harvesting of menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay near where I grew up is having a devastating impact on the ospreys in the Md./Va. area. Oddly enough, the menhaden catch is being used to feed fish, where I now live. 

"Mystery of Disappearing Ospreys Might Have Controversial Explanation:

A new study suggests osprey chicks are starving in parts of the Chesapeake Bay because of a lack of menhaden, a primary source of food but also a major industry," Gregory S. Schneider, The Washington Post, Sept. 22,2024. 

"The company at the center of the battle is Omega Protein, which operates out of Reedville on Virginia’s Northern Neck. It’s a waterman town, named after a menhaden fisherman named Captain Elijah Reed who came down from New England in the 1870s. Boats run in and out of Reedville bringing menhaden to a processing plant that grinds the fish into meal and oil — partly to feed farm-raised fish in Canada."

Candid Cameras

 

Smile: London Adding Fifteen Red Light Camera

   It was announced about a month ago that London was increasing the number of red light cameras to 25. The purpose is to make our roads safer and statistically a sound case can be made for doing so. 

  At about the same time it was reported that in Washington, D.C., the 477 speed cameras reduced the number of those who were speeding. The money collected from the fines charged is substantial: "The Office of the Chief Financial Officer expects the cameras to bring in more than $1 billion in revenue over the next four fiscal years, though revenue is expected to plateau and then decline as people adjust their driving behaviors."

  Although those living in Washington requested even more cameras, city councillors here should be cautious before they go shopping for more. I vaguely remembered a photo radar issue from years ago and was able to find this related article: "The Politics That Brought Photo Radar to a Halt in Ontario in 1995: Enough Drivers Disapproved of System for PC Party to Promise to Kill It -- Which It Did," CBC, Archives, July 5, 2019. 

"The police liked photo radar, but some drivers in Ontario didn't.

And those disapproving motorists provided the impetus for Premier Mike Harris and his government to scrap its use in the province back in the summer of 1995...

Harris had led the Ontario Progressive Conservatives to a majority win at the polls the previous month, on a platform that included ending the use of photo radar.

And less than a month after that election, the PCs killed it, as they promised to do."

   Although red light and speed cameras achieve the purposes for which they are installed, and even can be profitable, politicians will probably pause a bit before buying any more.

The New Locations:
   The fine for running a red light is $325, so slow down at these locations.
(These are from one of the sources, but they are presented here in alpha order for MM readers.)

Commissioners Road and Wonderland Road South.
Fanshawe Park Road East and Adelaide Street North.
Fanshawe Park Road West and Aldersbrook Gate.
Hamilton Road at Highbury Ave North.
Oxford Street at Richmond Street.
Oxford Street East at Talbot Street.
Richmond Street and Fanshawe Park Road.
Sarnia Road at Wonderland Road North.
Southdale Road West at Wonderland Road South.
Veterans Memorial Parkway and Dundas Street.
Wellington Road South and Exeter Road
Western Road and Sarnia Road.
Wharncliffe Road North and Oxford Street West.
Wharncliffe Road South and Commissioners Road.
Wharncliffe Road South and Southdale Road East.

Sources: 
   "London Is Getting 15 More Red Light Cameras at Most Major Intersections: As Many as Five Drivers Per Day Are Issued a Fine For Running a Red Light in London at Each Camera," CBC News, June 11, 2024.
  "London About to Add 15 Red Light Cameras," Beatriz Baleeiro, London Free Press, June 12, 2024

   "D.C. Traffic Cameras Have Led to a Sharp Decline in Speeding, Data Shows,"
Washington Post, June 16, 2024. 

Beyond the Palewall (8)

 

Coming Soon Next to the Shawarma Shop Near You: A Private Clinic

   If you need a knee or hip replaced, you may be able to soon hobble down the street and get one, or two, or even four. Our government announced that more private options were being made available and that news was nicely conveyed by the Canadian correspondent for the New York Times: The Growing Private-Sector Involvement in Canadian Public Health Care Systems," Canada Letter, Ian Austen,

January 20, 2024.

This week, the provincial government in Ontario announced that it was expanding the number of private clinics providing medical services.

Right now, Ontario has about 900 such clinics, and they mostly offer medical imaging and cataract surgeries. Sylvia Jones, the province’s health minister, said this week that the government was expanding its program to include hip and knee replacements.

The province is being careful not to violate the Canada Health Act by requiring people to pay for medically necessary procedures. That would jeopardize the 20 billion Canadian dollars the province will receive this year from the federal government for health care. While the clinics will be privately operated, their procedures will be covered under the provincial health care plan as if they had been performed in public hospitals.

Ms. Jones said that the expansion would allow more such procedures to be performed and that doing so would cut wait times for patients. Her critics say it will further undermine the public system, that it may actually increase wait times and that it is a step toward full privatization of health care.

   You may not be able to read the NYT article, but you can read this 36 page report which has just been released: "The Scope and Nature of Private Healthcare in Canada," by Katherine Fierlbeck. It is published by the C.D. Howe Institute.
 A serious subject which I should not treat so lightly.

Boil Water Advisory in the Nation's Capital

   Not in Ottawa, but Washington. I mentioned in "Water Woes" that, soon we are all likely to  be very thirsty.  A recent headline indicated that it is true, even in D.C., where a great deal of water is needed for the scotches. In this article, one learns that even the citizens in the ritzy areas (Chevy Chase, Bethesda) were likely to experience problems. Apparently these city dwellers need advice that is much clearer than the water: “Do not drink the water without boiling it first,” the D.C. Water said in an alert issued Friday evening. (The water should be allowed to cool before drinking it.) ("Many Residents of Northern D.C. Are Asked to Boil Water," Martin Weil, Washington Post, Jan. 19, 2024.)

  Some related CANCON: A Canadian Press headline: "Long-Term Prairie Drought Raises Concerns Over Groundwater Levels," Bob Weber, Jan.20, 2024.

“The lowest water levels are all in the last seven years and the levels are much lower now than they were in the ’70s and ’80s,” Pomeroy said. “It'll be a climate signal that we’re seeing....” “It’s something we need to keep an eye on.”

Don't Bet On It

   At the end of last year, I suggested in "On Betting" that perhaps we should be as worried about the gambling situation as we are tired over watching all the ads promoting it. I did offer one source suggesting that money was being made and people are getting jobs in the gambling sector. If you think you can find better statistics related to Ontario, Don't bet on it.  
   Read, if you can, this good article: “Got Questions About Ontario’s Online Gambling Industry” Don’t Bet on Getting the Answers,” Simon Houpt, Globe and Mail, Jan. 19, 2024. He begins by noting that this gambling thing is supposed to be great and he attempts to find out how great from iGaming Ontario. He wasn't able to get much information from them, but it was easy to find out from the folks in New York and Massachusetts.

  

When Ontario announced a few years ago that it was giving the green light to online gambling, politicians made familiar promises about the scheme. It would be great for consumers. Great for the province’s tax revenue. Great for jobs, great for the local innovation economy. (They didn’t say anything about how great it might be for our blood pressure to be subjected to the ensuing flood of sportsbook ads.)

Since then, most of the talk about online gambling has focused on its downsides: the volume of ads; the disappointment in seeing heroes such as Wayne Gretzky or Auston Matthews encouraging fans to get into the betting game; the cautionary tales about addicts losing their homes, their jobs, their families, their lives.

Would the conversation be different if the government actually trusted the public enough to give them real information about the state of the industry?

For almost two years, iGaming Ontario (or iGO), which oversees online gambling in the province on behalf of the Alcohol Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO), has followed a policy of saying as little as possible. It releases quarterly snapshots that contain a handful of data to show things are going swimmingly.

Which they might be. Who knows.

For the first year of those quarterly reports, iGO revealed almost nothing. It published the total amount of money that had been wagered, but refused to outline how much came from the different types of betting: casino, sports, or online poker. It was hardly a vote of confidence in a promising industry.

It’s finally begun breaking out those figures. Still, it evidently believes most information is like thrash metal or direct democracy: potentially dangerous if released onto an unsuspecting public. And so it withholds data that might help Ontarians grapple with the emerging place of online betting in the province.

He then made a few phone calls and it seems our southern neighbours were rather chatty.

Other jurisdictions seem to recognize the benefits in giving the public access to timely, comprehensive information....

A quick scan of the information published by Massachusetts and New York may give you some idea of the warts that Ontario might be trying to hide.

Last month, mobile sportsbooks in New York State took in US$2.04-billion in total wagers. Of that amount, the market goliath FanDuel handled US$835-million, or about 41 per cent of all wagers. DraftKings handled US$773-million (about 38 per cent), and Caesars handled US$202-million (or almost 10 per cent)....

The Massachusetts numbers for December echo the winners-take-all landscape in New York. Of US$643-million wagered on online sportsbooks, DraftKings handled US$316-million, or 49 per cent. FanDuel handled US$187-million (29 per cent). ESPN Bet, newly rebranded from Penn Sports Interactive, handled US$50-million and saw its market share jump to almost 8 per cent from 6 per cent. The other five licenced operators handled the remaining 14 per cent of the action.

All of which is to say the industry looks a little like America itself: a few fat cats at the top, with everyone else scrambling to survive.

And what does the landscape look like in Ontario, where there were an astonishing 49 licensees operating 72 gambling websites – including, by my count, 30 sports-betting operations – as of Dec. 31, 2023? Are two or three foreign juggernauts dominating an industry the government had hoped would become a central player in the province’s innovation economy, as people suspect? Are Canadian-based companies, which have much smaller marketing budgets than the global behemoths, connecting with consumers? Are they barely keeping their heads above water? Are they targets for the industry consolidation that so many observers believe is inevitable? Will the jobs that the province trumpeted as a major reason to greenlight gambling never materialize, or evaporate? Will online gambling be yet another branch-plant economy of foreign giants?

The questions were not answered.