Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Oliver Milman and Damian Carrington report on Climate Action Tracker's recognition that we're headed toward 2.6 degrees of global warming without major policy changes - and that dirty fossil fuel emissions are continuing to increase. Nina Lakhani reports on a study showing that fossil fuel lobbyists outnumber every non-host delegation at the COP30 conference. And Ian Urquhart notes that the Mark Carney Libs are are among far too many governments serving as fossil fuel lobbyists rather than good faith actors - meaning that there's little reason for hope that Carney will take up the mantle of climate leadership as pitched by Shawn McCarthy. 

- Meanwhile, Jillian Ambrose and Fiona Harvey report on the IEA's recognition that a clean energy transition is inevitable - meaning that the people shilling for fossil fuel interests are only exacerbating both the climate breakdown, and the severity of an eventual economic crash. And Jameson Dow discusses how a corporate media narrative of electric vehicle denialism bears no relationship to reality. 

- George Monbiot discusses how the control of media by the ultra-rich is fueling an epistemic crisis. Timothy Caulfield notes that the normalizing of anti-vaccine ideology (which is resulting in the reemergence of diseases like measles which had previously been contained) is a direct result of political calculation by right-wing actors looking to undermine the concept of the public good at every turn. Jon Cohen examines how the Trump regime is actively destroying humanity's capacity to respond to the next pandemic. And Grey Moran exposes how Tyson Foods used Palantir surveillance to develop plans for the known results of the uncontrolled spread of COVID-19 - but not to actually lift a finger to keep its workers healthy. 

- Cora Lewis writes about the spread of online sports betting, as well as the obvious risks which have been foisted on the people least capable of managing them. And John Herrman points out how both gambling and resulting patterns of media coverage are spreading into the political sphere.

- John Stapleton points out the absurdity of the Libs trying to claim "inefficiency" as a reason for ending taxes on the wealthy while it pursues grossly disproportionate litigation to recover tiny amounts of social benefits. 

- Finally, David Moscrop joins the group of voices recognizing that it's absolutely futile for Canada to pursue a trade deal with a U.S. which is utterly incapable of being trusted either to accurately portray what's being negotiated, or to honour any deal which might be announced. And Dan Gardner writes that it's long past time for Canada to move past the "safe" position of deferring to the U.S., and instead take a leadership role in shaping the world we want.