Thursday Morning Links

This and that for your Thursday reading.

- Hamilton Nolan discusses how the Trump regime is going far out of its way to build the U.S.' economy on scams and corruption. And Lisa Needham discusses how the deployment of military troops to cities is plainly based at intimidating minorities rather than public safety (particularly as mass shootings and serial assassination attempts directed at public servants have been ignored), while Bill Kristol writes about Trump's pattern of giving the worst people the most power. And Lawrence Lessig highlights the dangers of complicity in the face of extortion. 

- On that front, Charlie Angus rightly warns Mark Carney not to play along with Trump's "golden shield" plans to tether us (at massive expense) to the U.S.' military even more tightly. And David Zipper discusses resesrch showing that Canada and the U.S. are headed in starkly opposed directions when it comes to traffic safety. 

- Damian Carrington reports on the record heat wave which hit Nordic countries in July as an example of the inability of anybody to escape the costs of a climate breakdown. And Alexandra Mae Jones reports on what continues to be the second-worst wildfire season on record in Canada - even as Kent Mundle points out the need for us to be prepared to take in climate refugees facing even worse around the globe. 

- Isaac Phan Nay interviews Jasmine Ramze Rezaee about the well-established flaws in Mark Carney's trickle-down theory. 

- Finally, Brian Shearer reports on Washington, D.C.'s success building large amounts of housing through direct public investment - in contrast to the Carney strategy of trying (at the behest of greedy developers) to hand freebies and concessions to rich people in the hope that they'll meet social needs rather than merely extracting more wealth for themselves.