How often has the US attacked targets in Pakistan with unmanned drones, and how many of those killed have been children, civilians, putative insurgents, or "high-value" military targets? The Bureau of Investigative Journalism has prepared an interactive graphic to help answer these questions, which you can try for yourself by clicking the screenshot below.   Definitely worth a look. The bureau summarizes the results: The justification for using drones to take out enemy targets is appealing because it removes the risk of losing American military, it's much cheaper than deploying soldiers, it's politically much easier to maneuver (i.e. flying a drone within Pakistan vs....

27 March, 2013

Do wind farms make some people sick? Or do false claims of a connection between wind farms and illness make people sick? The question arises because opponents of wind farms often contend they cause illness, but scientific studies have consistently found little or no evidence to support such a connection. [This report by Ontario's Chief Medical Officer of Health is typical.*] Now a team of public health researchers at the University of Sydney in Australia has collected every known public complaint of wind farm-induced illness in that country (those filed with the wind companies themselves, those filed with three government commissions, and those...

17 March, 2013

Contrarian reader Peter Barss waxes philosophical about the primal draw of radio-storms and weather-porn: It 's exciting to sit in our warm, safe living rooms listening to dire warnings of impending weather doom. It's even more of a thrill to turn on our flat screen TVs and watch weather gals and guys get whipped by wind-driven snow as they stand outside yelling into their microphones so they can be heard over the howling "weather bomb." We live in a society that is soft and luxurious. One of the luxuries we indulge is the illusion that if we just do everything right we...

01 March, 2013

Most of the listeners who responded to my debate with CBC manager Andrew Cochran about the network's (in my view) inflated coverage of weather are just fine with the CBC's weather treatment. [caption id="attachment_11355" align="alignright" width="300"] Highway conditions at 3:30 pm, February 20, when Cape Breton schools closed early due to forecasts of possible freezing rain that evening: Pavement dry; precipitation nil.[/caption] This doesn't surprise me. Some people like being frightened about weather, just as others like being frightened about crime. Lurid coverage of crime by some media has led to a sharp increase in the public perception of personal risk from...

01 March, 2013

Kudos to Andrew Cochran, Maritimes Regional Director of the CBC, for agreeing to debate the network's hyperventilated coverage of routine weather events. We hashed it out in an extended session this morning on CBC Cape Breton's Information Morning program. Longtime Contrarian readers know I think Nova Scotia has lost all perspective about weather, working ourselves into a lather over events we would have taken in stride 30 years ago. The CBC is one link in this chain of timorousness. Environment Canada, which issues daily "statements,"  "advisories," and "warnings" about routine weather inconveniences, is another. School officials arbitrarily grant paid holidays to hundreds of...

28 February, 2013

A curmudgeonly friend writes: Last winter, the Nova Scotia Prescription Monitoring Program ruined my wife’s first vacation in eight years. The Program exists to restrain the abuse of prescription drugs, something I thought prescriptions themselves were for. To this end, among other things, the Program provides the police with information about legal (that is to say legal) drugs you are taking (you may have thought that information was confidential). But the hammer in the Program’s toolbox is its ability to intimidate doctors out of doing what they believe is right for their patients. To wit, from the Program’s FAQ: “If the Program has reason to believe...

22 August, 2012

In just nine days, NASA will attempt to place its Martian Science Laboratory on Mars. It's an operation so fraught with extreme technological challenges, the space agency calls it seven mintes of terror. By the time radio signals reach Earth and alert scientists that Curiosity Rover's perilous descent has begun, it will actually have been over for seven minutes, and rover will be dead or alive on the surface of the red planet. H/T: Alexis Madrigal...

27 July, 2012

H/T: YNW [Update] Our friend the cranky physicist comments: A true contrarian would look at the actual risks of the asbestos and it's removal as well as the cost to taxpayers from how we overreact. That was also my first reaction, because I get that not all asbestos is dangerous in all circumstances. But, hey, school ended today. Couldn't they have waited a week?...

24 June, 2012

John Malcom doubtless didn't enjoy having to respond to a scathing Auditor General's report on his last week as CEO of the Cape Breton District Health Authority. Doing so, however, gave him one last chance to demonstrate the exemplary leadership he displayed in 15 years as head of the authority. Jacques Lapointe released a harsh report on operational shortcomings at the district and provincial levels that contributed to two outbreaks of C. difficile bacteria—infections that caused five deaths. "As CEO, the biggest mistake is my mistake," Malcom told reporters Wednesday, in response to the report. "I under-resourced the infection control department. So I...

31 May, 2012
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