Note
The app for independent voices
The Martinis will continue until…well, until I get tired of Martinis.
Coming soon.
Angel in the Waters (amzn.to/3RUhG0c) is a modern* classic, and the best for talking about a new sibling growing. Parents are gonna cry though.
*anything post-dating my childhood is modern.
You made it, you own it
You always own your intellectual property, mailing list, and subscriber payments. With full editorial control and no gatekeepers, you can do the work you most believe in.
“If we are horrified by [forgiveness]—if it disgusts us, or infuriates us, or brings us to tears—it’s a sign we’re getting shocked out of our pious nonsense for once and seeing the truth of the thing.”
A perfect little read to start the Triduum.
Great discussions
Join the most interesting and insightful discussions.
A “Breakfast Club” reunion is making the news. So, now’s a good time to read the piece I wrote a few months back for its 40th anniversary.
Very good news! Not only is Abrego Garcia alive, Salvadoran authorities, reversing their initial refusal, allowed him to meet with Senator Van Hollen, who called Abrego Garcia’s wife to “pass along his message of love.” The police-state machine blinking in the harsh light of global scrutiny?
Grow your publication on Substack
With recommendations, referrals, and a powerful growth network, Substack creators spend less time on marketing and more time on their craft.
In the final stages of a (currently very long) essay on Fr. Vincent McNabb O.P., a dominican friar and Catholic radical of the interwar period, deeply influential on Dorothy Day, Chesterton, Maritain and (I strongly suspect) J.R.R. Tolkien. McNabb’s activism was in part an extension of the Arts and Crafts movement’s political expression,…
The Christian vision of linear time has shaped the West. It's counterfeits have wreaked havoc. When we lose Christian theology, but retain linear time, we open the door to utopianism.
You made it, you own it
You always own your intellectual property, mailing list, and subscriber payments. With full editorial control and no gatekeepers, you can do the work you most believe in.
World-class writing
The best stories, ideas, and culture right at your fingertips.
Count me in!
The Methaphone by and
“We carry our phones everywhere. It feels strange and unsettling when we can't feel them. We twitch, worried we've lost something.
methaphone can fill that hole in your back pocket, can fill that hole in your hand.”
"The Eucharist is the Sacrament of Love; It signifies Love, It produces love. The Eucharist is the consummation of the whole spiritual life."
— St. Thomas Aquinas
Grow your publication on Substack
With recommendations, referrals, and a powerful growth network, Substack creators spend less time on marketing and more time on their craft.
Literally: oh, my God. I feel compelled to print this.
Happy Holy Thursday to all my brother deacons!
Grow Your Audience
Marketing isn’t all on your shoulders. More than 50% of all new free subscriptions and 25% of paid subscriptions come from within our network.
This is how a Christian acts…. Good for you Erick!
You made it, you own it
You always own your intellectual property, mailing list, and subscriber payments. With full editorial control and no gatekeepers, you can do the work you most believe in.
According to some folks on social media, educated people don't believe in 'fairy tales'
The data says: Someone with a masters degree is just as likely to believe there is life after death as someone who didn't finish high school.
ReLiGiOn iS tHe oPiAtE oF tHe mAsSeS, amirite?
🔭 PLATFORM VIEW: Olivia Chow’s plan to “fix CaféTO”
🔗 LINK: oliviachow.ca/olivia_ch…
🔧 DOABLE? Yes.
💰 COSTED? Not quite.
✨ OVERALL: ⭐️⭐️½ (2.5 out of five)
Despite being the clear frontrunner and favourite to win next week, it’s been a while since I looked at an Olivia Chow policy proposal.
There’s a simple reason for that: she has not released a lot of policy proposals lately. I’ve had little to review.
Her campaign has posted just three news announcements in June. Two of them are about endorsements, not policy. The latest — posted June 15 — is at least a kind of a policy announcement, so worth looking at.
Chow promises to “improve the CaféTO program so that more businesses are encouraged to apply and we can enjoy more patios.”
The program clearly needs improvement. This year’s roll-out saw fewer applications than past years after changes were made to the process, and then a rash of delayed/denied pemits.
A fix is needed, but Chow’s plan is frustratingly vague. Her first action item is to, “Ensure that businesses and BIAs are receiving prompt and full information so they can plan ahead and hire staff.” Good! But how?
The second action item further emphasizes the vagueness of it all: “Provide financial supports or relief to businesses and ensure the fees are fair,” Chow says. There’s a good case for doing this. But how will these financial supports be funded? What sort of fees will she deem fair? None of it is spelled out.
The third item is the most detailed, spelling out a plan to “Assign responsibility of the program to one city division, establish a team to execute the program and coordinate across other divisions, and ensure there is a focus on providing good service for business owners” as well as “[setting] a goal of maximizing the number of patios by making the application system transparent, easy, quick, with fewer barriers and an approach that encourages approvals.”
Again, it would be nice to see some kind of costing attached to this. Presumably the City will need more staff dedicated to the program, and those staff will want to get paid.
But it is at least somewhat heartening that several of the specifics of Chow’s plan are the same as recommendations in a motion for a year-end report on the CaféTO program moved by Councillor Paula Fletcher at last week’s meeting of Toronto City Council. The synergy suggests that Chow is in a strong position to start working with City Council to make immediate and positive progress, should she prevail on Monday. That’s not nothing.
PLATFORM VIEW is a daily(ish) feature by City Hall Watcher on Substack Notes. Got a request for a candidate policy proposal I should review? Let me know.
Related notes
I haven’t come across a more insightful piece than this on what Pierre Poilievre’s past tells us about where he stands in our dramatically altered political present.
Remember Trump is still planning to annex Canada. Once the election is done the noise will ramp up again. Poilievre will cave. Carney will stand strong.
Vote Liberal for Canada!
