The oil-rich Canadian cowboys who want their own kind of Brexit
Many of the Albertans who have concluded the province must secede from Canada contemplate the potential breakup of their country with regret, if not outright grief.
Not so Ron Robertson.
The retired police detective and leader of the Independence Party looks forward to the day Alberta, an energy powerhouse often compared to Texas, is unshackled from the rest of the nation.
His quixotic vision, sketched out to The Times over lunch at a Thai restaurant in a small prairie town, is not as outlandish as it once seemed.
Discontent with Canada's political elite has long festered in the western provinces, where residents complain of neglect from the establishment back east, but the oilmen, cowboys and cattle ranchers in Alberta's secessionist movement have been invigorated by
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The Guardian
2 hours ago
- The Guardian
Fired US librarian of Congress details callous dismissal in new interview
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The Guardian
3 hours ago
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Daily Mail
3 hours ago
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Hard drives and a cell phone seized from Dr Anthony Fauci could shed light on key decisions during the Covid pandemic - including lockdowns and mask edicts. FBI director Kash Patel revealed Thursday the Trump administration had recovered the devices, calling it a 'great breakthrough' and a 'victory for the American people.' Fauci was chief medical adviser during the pandemic but flip-flopped on crucial Covid safety information - such as mask-wearing - and sought to silence scientists whose views, including the lab-leak theory, clashed with received wisdom. Speaking Thursday on the Joe Rogan Experience, Patel outlined the government's continuing investigation into the origins of the pandemic and the federal response. Patel said investigators had long struggled to locate the devices Fauci used while serving as White House medical adviser - records that could shed light on key decisions surrounding lockdowns, mask mandates, and ties between Fauci's former agency and the Wuhan laboratory central to the lab leak theory. During the episode - where Patel shared a cigar with Rogan and touched on topics ranging from Covid to UFOs - he revealed the FBI had recovered the phone and hard drives just days before the interview was recorded. Patel did not clarify when the phone was in use, how investigators verified its connection to Fauci, or how the devices were obtained. Nor did he disclose what the FBI's 'multiple investigations' into the pandemic's origin have uncovered so far. It is unclear exactly when the phone was used and how they verified it belonged to Fauci. He also warned against drawing premature conclusions, noting 'everything's not necessarily in there' and that potentially relevant data may have been erased. Still, Patel called the discovery 'a victory for the American people' and said his team is actively reviewing the contents of the devices. Patel said: 'We found it [the devices], and at least we can tell the American people we've been looking because it is of public importance to figure out, did that guy lie? 'Did he intentionally mislead the world and cause countless deaths? 'We owe those answers to the American people, and the best evidence ever is always the people's evidence who created it. So now we're going to go and exploit those hard drives.' 'We did find it [the cell phone], we're not done, we're still looking and we're on the case.' Patel did not specify how his team got the old phone or how they verified it was Fauci's. Generally, a warrant is required to seize a cell phone, even for a government official. 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He and other public health experts also publicly dismissed the lab leak - with Fauci saying in June 2021 that it was 'a very, very, very, very remote possibility.' It later emerged that, as the head of the NIAID, he presided over the allocation of taxpayer-funded grants for virus-enhancing research at the WIV years before the pandemic began. A federal watchdog found the NIH 'did not effectively monitor' those experiments or check whether they involved pathogens with pandemic risk. Fauci also privately expressed concern the virus may have been the product of a research accident. Internationally, other intelligence agencies have also supported the lab-leak theory. The German Federal Intelligence Service (BND) carried out a secret investigation into the origins of Covid nicknamed Project Saaremaa during the pandemic, sharing the findings with the U.S. in December 2024. Investigators found unpublished dissertations from 2019 and 2020 that allegedly discussed the effects of coronaviruses on the human body. Additionally, uncovered materials revealed Chinese scientists had 'an unusually large amount of knowledge about the supposedly novel virus available at an unusually early stage.' Based on the materials BND agents found and analyzed, they used a 'Probability Index' to measure the reliability of information, which determined the lab-leak theory was 'probable' with an '80 to 95 per cent' certainty. Robert Redfield, former CDC director when the pandemic erupted, also accused American and British health agencies of shutting down concerns over potential lab leaks. He has previously told he is '100 per cent' convinced Covid was the result of scientists becoming infected while carrying out high-risk experiments to boost the infectivity of bat viruses amid low biosecurity in Wuhan labs. Fauci has denied all accusations of Covid being 'covered up' or originating from a lab. Last year he told a U.S. House panel that he had not suppressed lab leak theories or influenced research to discredit it. He has also called accusations that he covered it up 'preposterous.' Patel said: 'My mission has always been to put out the truth, whatever the consequences, whoever it's against. What did Fauci get wrong? From telling people not to wear masks to claiming vaccines stopped infections Don't wear masks, do wear masks As global concern for Covid was surfacing in March 2020, Fauci told Americans that there was 'no need' to wear a face mask. He said they may only help people 'feel a little better', and 'might even block a droplet' — but would not provide good protection. Less than a month later, he was forced into an embarrassing climbdown after it emerged the virus spread via droplets in the air. Fauci later insisted he advised people not to wear masks to ensure there were enough available for hospitals and healthcare centers. Covid did not come from a lab Fauci has repeatedly insisted that Covid did not leak from a lab in China. He called the theory a 'shiny object that will go away,' and brushed aside claims from other top experts as an 'opinion.' Fauci has now backpedaled, saying instead he keeps an 'open mind' although insisting it remains 'most likely' that the virus spilled over from animals to humans. Two shots will stop you catching Covid When the Covid vaccine roll-out was in full swing, Fauci said the immunity from shots made doubly-vaccinated people a 'dead end' for the virus, and even suggested they may no longer need to wear masks. Schools shutdown Schools were closed from March through to August 2020, something Fauci later expressed regret about. He has since admitted he 'should have realized' there would be 'deleterious collateral consequences'.
