* Transform Trade charity says British-based companies are among main bringers of cases based on [business-supremacy treaties].

These cases aim to use ISDS clauses (I Sue Democratic States clauses) to sue states that respond to their citizens' demands by adopting laws that protect the public but reduce the profits of foreign companies. Usually they force the retraction of those laws — or ensure the laws are never passed.

ISDS also stands for I Spread Death and Suffering. We must put an end to the regime of these treaties. It's not easy to effectively abolish the treaties, or for a country to pull out of them, since normally a country remains subject to the treaty for a long time after that.

What is needed is to make powerful countries pass laws that they will not enforce these treaties, perhaps limited to certain cases where those laws are crucial.

During the Covid-19 emergency, a few UK ministers imposed laws by decree, which Parliament hardly looked at. This could easily happen again.

*Let Saudi Arabia’s friendship with Putin be a wake-up call for the west.* But not only for realpolitik, and the larger goals should not be limited to human rights and democracy. Curbing global heating fast must also be a first-priority goal, and that means that, starting as soon as possible, we must keep the wholesale price of oil low and the retail price high.

The natural way to do that is with a heavy tax on fossil fuels that is scheduled to increase predictably every year.

Demand for surgical sterilization is increasing considerably in the US, and some clinics are offering gratis vasectomy. I don't think the rate is large enough to visibly affect the future population.

10% of dwellings in Canada are now uninsurable because the climate risk has become too great.

People whose homes are destroyed won't have the capital to buy another. Government must buy them out, while imposing building codes that make new housing safer.

The article did not mention tar sands, but the Canadian government has a duty to recognize that its tar sands exports are fueling disaster for Canadians (as well as for the rest of the world). Fossil fuel extraction is tantamount to planet roasting. The Canadian government must reverse its policy of supporting that.