The forests that are burning in Canada are a section of the boreal forest. The boreal forest is the world’s largest land biome. It circles the northern hemisphere across Canada, Alaska, Russia, and Scandinavia. Fires are a natural part of the forest’s life cycle, but what’s going on in Canada isn’t normal. Millions of acres, in Northwestern Ontario, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and British Columbia are on fire. It’s an area the size of the entire U.S. south. You could probably send every wildfire crew on the planet to Canada and they would still be helpless to slow the burn. And, of course, this is the result of climate change.  See Canada’s Forests Will Burn and Burn by Joshua Partlow at The Atlantic.

As you’ve probably heard, the jet stream is carrying the smoke into the upper Midwest U.S. and on to the mid-Atlantic region, slamming New York City especially hard. Where I’m living north of the city it hasn’t been too bad, although I’ve smelled smoke all week. I think it’s worse in New York because the smoke fills up the concrete canyons and doesn’t have anywhere else to go. Where I’m living there are more open spaces and trees and such. But I understand the smoke is all up and down the mid-Atlantic, including Washington DC.

So our idiot president has decided to hit Canada with more tariffs to retaliate for the smoke. He thinks Canada isn’t properly managing its forests and needs to send crews in to rake up the dead leaves or something so their aren’t any fires. Some Republicans in Congress want to sanction Canada for not dealing with the smoke. I’m assuming these bozos are all climate change denialists. In truth, Canada should sanction the U.S. for pulling back climate change measures because our president is an idiot.

In other news, the House has passed a reconciliation budget bill that contains several elements of the SAVE America Act. And now it goes to the Senate, where it will hit some roadblocks. It’s very possible the Parliamentarian will remove SAVE America Act provisions, and I’m reading that the same Republican senators who opposed the bill in previous votes still oppose it now. One of those senators is Mitch McConnell, who is still absent, so that’s one less no vote. But I understand that it’s more than likely most if not all of the SAVE America provisions won’t make it into the final Senate bill. Fingers crossed.

In war news, two more U.S. service members have been killed, and one is missing.

On a more positive note, see They Were Charged With Assaulting ICE Agents. The Cases Are Crumbling. by a team of reporters at the New York Times.

The New York Times found that the Trump administration has filed assault charges against more than 550 people who were caught in its immigration dragnet — far more than previously known. Of the more than 400 cases resolved so far, nearly half have unraveled: Juries acquitted defendants, judges threw out charges, or prosecutors withdrew them. …

…The Times obtained court filings for every assault case and reviewed hearing transcripts, interviewed witnesses and federal officials and watched videos of dozens of encounters that led to criminal charges. The review, the most comprehensive to date, suggests that the administration’s use of the law has often been less about protecting federal agents than about providing legal cover to cow protesters and immigrants into submission.

“There seems to be a pattern of charges being filed without any merit,” said Jimmy L. Arce, a former federal prosecutor in Chicago who served on a commission that investigated immigration raids in the city last year. He added that some defendants were “having their speech criminalized by the U.S. attorney’s office.”

A few people  have been convicted, but most of the cases brought against protesters have fallen apart.