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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦

@johnwlast.bsky.social
296 followers 986 following 84 posts

Collector of trivia, sometimes for profit

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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
Noema Magazine @noemamag.com · 04/06/2026
“The notions of borders, nations, alliances & war that helped sustain ‘the long peace’ of the late 20th century are crumbling. In their place, something far less stable has emerged: a world in which the gray zone is no longer the exception, but the rule.” — @johnwlast.bsky.social #war #geopolitics
noemamag.com
Why Conflict Feels Constant Now | NOEMA
“Gray zones” were meant to describe places on the brink of war. Increasingly, they define the entire world.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
Gift link for non-subscribers: foreignpolicy.com/2026/03/25/c...
foreignpolicy.com
Canada Faces Its Finland Moment
Like Helsinki during the Cold War, Ottawa today is threatened by a bellicose and powerful neighbor.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
With an increasingly erratic U.S. breathing down our necks, #Canada feels a lot like #Finland in 1948 — only our options are a lot, lot worse. New from me in @foreignpolicy.com ⬇️ foreignpolicy.com/2026/03/25/c... #cdnpoli #politics #foreignpolicy #InternationalPolitics #geopolitics
foreignpolicy.com
Canada Faces Its Finland Moment
Like Helsinki during the Cold War, Ottawa today is threatened by a bellicose and powerful neighbor.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 03/03/2026
Extremely online conspiracy theorists are plotting to take down Canadian federation. And the U.S. government would like to help. My latest for @newrepublic.com: newrepublic.com/article/2069... #cdnpoli #ableg #abpoli #51ststate
newrepublic.com
The MAGA Plot to Take Down Canada
A growing movement of MAGA-pilled Albertan separatists would happily break up the country to be closer to Trump.
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
The New Republic @newrepublic.com · 02/03/2026
Recent months have seen the escalation of a brazen campaign by separatists in the oil-rich province of Alberta to dismember the country and lease its resources to an expansionist American regime—with direct support from officials in the U.S. government. trib.al/jPu1QtT
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 21/02/2026
Crazy that this was written half a century ago. Eerily familiar. www.equator.org/articles/our...
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 08/02/2026
You may not even realize it, but Canada is an outlier in demanding women seek a prescription to get birth control. Is it about patient care — or patriarchy? www.cbc.ca/news/health/... @canadahealthwatch.ca #health #sexualhealth #birthcontrol #sexed #pharma #otc #drugs
cbc.ca
Why do Canadians need a prescription for birth control when most of the world doesn't? | CBC News
Some Canadian doctors say patients on birth control need monitoring. But medical authorities in other countries increasingly disagree.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 06/02/2026
Why are Canada's athletes dressed like Grimace
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 13/08/2025
( Heavily paywalled but shhhh.... ) archive.is/AuHwq
archive.is
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 13/08/2025
I'm back in the pages of National Geographic with a piece about wolfdogs — why people can't stop loving them, despite their dangerous qualities, and why they trouble conservationists working to keep the wild wolf alive. www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/arti...
nationalgeographic.com
Demand for wolf-dog hybrid pets is surging—and that's a huge problem
Wolfdogs are becoming a popular choice worldwide with people looking for furry companions. Conservationists are growing increasingly concerned these hybrids could interbreed with wild wolf populations...
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
Charlie Warzel @cwarzel.bsky.social · 23/05/2025
Lots of nostalgia for the golden age of magazines/expense accounts/travel and decadence. But whenever I take a spin through the Atlantic's archives, I yearn for the days of magazine writing where people were literally like, here is simply a piece of food/geography that exists
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 14/05/2025
Well it certainly seems like everyone's worst expectations of Carney's cabinet have been confirmed, looking forward to the liberal doom spiral of the next 2.5 yrs
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
The Long Now Foundation @longnow.org · 08/05/2025
The Catholic Church has been undergoing a long, slow shift, playing out on the timescale of centuries: a shift to distance itself from the popular enthusiasms of its most devout parishioners. Read @johnwlast.bsky.social on the tensions within sainthood: longnow.org/ideas/saints...
longnow.org
Saints Without a Cause
The Catholic Church has been undergoing a long, slow shift, playing out on the timescale of centuries: a shift to distance itself from the popular enthusiasms of its most devout parishioners.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 27/04/2025
look, I made a podcast about cod codcast.transistor.fm/episodes
codcast.transistor.fm
The CODCAST | All Episodes
This four episode podcast series explores the discovery of a sound. It is a faint but distinct sound produced by a fish, the Arctic cod. Only recently have scientists realized how important sound is i...
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 21/04/2025
Pope Francis is probably going to be fast-tracked to sainthood, so this time I want GOOD miracles, people. No random healings — I want translocations, exorcised demoniacs, strange odors!
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
slate @pleasebegneiss.bsky.social · 18/04/2025
[letting a demon possess my body] sorry about the mess
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 18/04/2025
Been a while since I've been in Canada but are people really living in terror??
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 16/04/2025
Surprised to see this article fail to mention arbitrary search and detention as a reason for falling travel. Surely outside the minds of the California tourism board that's the biggest reason, no? www.cbc.ca/news/politic...
cbc.ca
Nearly 900,000 fewer people went to the U.S. in March as cross-border travel plummets | CBC News
The number of cross-border travellers going from Canada to the U.S. dropped by nearly 900,000 in March compared to the same month last year, according to the latest U.S. Customs and Border Protection ...
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 15/04/2025
Social media truly reminds me every day that democracy is failing because most people don't deserve it. Bring back the Freemasons ffs someone's gotta save us
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 15/04/2025
I swear to God people are so fking stupid we're not making it out of this decade alive. "What are your sources" and he just asks a different habitually wrong AI (this one from Elon Musk ffs!). Meanwhile TWO WEEKS AGO there was a full factcheck from the public broadcaster: www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
William B. Fuckley @opinionhaver.bsky.social · 14/04/2025
I don't really have anything especially profound to say, but yeah man this is it. They won't obey even the most milquetoast SCOTUS orders and are talking about sending US citizens to foreign gulags. It's happened here.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 13/04/2025
White Lotus S3's ending is the most depressing and unedifying possible from all its many storylines and I'm not sure why I sat through a whole season for it.
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
andy vs. @im-all-id.me · 11/04/2025
Google maps needs a route option called "See the most cows"
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 11/04/2025
The bigger point here is, have you ever met someone who attended a political rally who isn't some rabid weirdo? Like, who cares about crowd sizes? Surely they are not representative of the broader voting public!
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 11/04/2025
This is a very satisfying read: www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...
cbc.ca
Liberals and Conservatives said their rallies drew thousands. We decided to count | CBC News
Crowd sizes have become a discussion point in this election. The CBC News’s visual investigation unit looks at some of the images from those rallies to try to determine whether the reality fits with t...
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 10/04/2025
👀 www.noemamag.com/the-good-soc...
noemamag.com
The Good Society Department | NOEMA
Once upon a time, there was a federal government department that helped design and distribute tools for living the good life. What happened to that vision?
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
Jon Bois @jonbois.bsky.social · 09/04/2025
[at the front of a bread line] uh yeah, uh. uh, i’ll have the uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. huh. i’ll uh, i’ll. oh you know what? here’s what i’ll do. i’ll get the uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 09/04/2025
Got a close friend's wedding coming up. Half of the party is Moroccan, and half the party is from the Midwest. I don't envy him in this moment.
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
Boo!-per Lund @cooperlund.online · 08/04/2025
You know, one of the main threads running between Trump, Musk, and El Salvador is cryptocurrency, and if I’m a country who’s concerned about preventing what’s going on in America from happening there, one of the steps I would take, and quickly, would be making cryptocurrency illegal.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 08/04/2025
I wrote about this recently for Noema! That time was also defined by the fruits of an activist, interventionist and progressive government — one that changes the market, not with tariffs, but with research and guidelines that make life in consumer society better. www.noemamag.com/the-good-soc...
noemamag.com
The Good Society Department | NOEMA
Once upon a time, there was a federal government department that helped design and distribute tools for living the good life. What happened to that vision?
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 07/04/2025
Genuinely thought this was satire
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 07/04/2025
This is from Goldman Sachs, predicting the next US recession. Let no one tell you boycotts are not effective!
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
matthew ellis @matthiasellis.bsky.social · 07/04/2025
It is 2008. I am starting my first career and watching the stock market tumble double digits in a single day. It is 2020. I am making a career change and watching the stock market tumble double digits in a single day. It is 2025. I am making another career change and watching the stock market tumb
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 06/04/2025
Opportunistic price gouging in Canada?? Hard to believe.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 06/04/2025
Lol called it www.cbc.ca/news/politic... NDP I'm available for hire as a strategist just give me a call already.
cbc.ca
NDP's Singh drops 'I'm running for prime minister' messaging two weeks into the campaign | CBC News
As Jagmeet Singh heads into his third week of campaigning, the NDP leader is dropping his assertive messaging that he is running to be prime minister.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 06/04/2025
You just know some overfed "strategist" has told them that people don't vote for parties they don't think can form government. They're wrong! For the love of God, get new staff!
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 06/04/2025
It's not a strategy forever but it makes a hell of a lot more sense than pretending you can be prime minister while barely holding 3 seats!
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 06/04/2025
I've never understood the NDP tactic of pretending, in the face of all evidence, that they are campaigning to run the country. Why not say explicitly you want to control the balance of power, offer policies that pull the liberals to the left, and focus on a few dozen winnable seats?
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
Sunder Katwala (sundersays) @sundersays.bsky.social · 05/04/2025
If I were rich enough to live anywhere on the planet, but didn't like Italy, Italian food or the Italians I would consider simply not moving to Italy. I wouldn't do lavish photoshoots disparaging Italy before moving there! (Times)
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
TreatOrTrix Point Never 🎃 @toriimacdaddy.bsky.social · 03/04/2025
This is just how the economy’s gonna work from now on.
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 04/04/2025
Hilarious that my first successful tweet on this site is about how much I hate this place
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 04/04/2025
It's time to reject the idea that government is bad and wasteful. History shows that good, big government is possible — and maybe even essential to ending our ever-enshittifying present. My latest for @noemamag.com: www.noemamag.com/the-good-soc...
noemamag.com
The Good Society Department | NOEMA
Once upon a time, there was a federal government department that helped design and distribute tools for living the good life. What happened to that vision?
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 04/04/2025
The work of this bureau to make products better helped make the "Golden Age of Capitalism" possible — the same "great" society today's libertarian traditionalists desperately want to turn the clock back to. But there's a reason they don't mention it: it's textbook "big government". 😱 /3
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 04/04/2025
Turns out, for nearly half a century the Bureau's team of women scientists pioneered ways to *make life in consumer society better,* from mildew-resistant fabric to ergonomic counter heights to the perfect roasting temperature for a pork loin. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bureau_... /2
en.m.wikipedia.org
Bureau of Home Economics - Wikipedia
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 04/04/2025
Four years ago I went looking for videos about remodeling a kitchen and found this PSA from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. youtu.be/2N9RCQjPqh4?... I was blown away that the U.S. government produced something like this. What the hell was the "Bureau of Human Nutrition and Home Economics"?? /1
youtu.be
A Step Saving Kitchen, 1949
YouTube video by US National Archives
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
Noema Magazine @noemamag.com · 03/04/2025
“For an administration that campaigned on making America ‘great again,’ there is remarkably little curiosity about what version of government, exactly, elicited such widespread acclaim.” — @johnwlast.bsky.social #government #consumers
noemamag.com
The Good Society Department | NOEMA
Once upon a time, there was a federal government department that helped design and distribute tools for living the good life. What happened to that vision?
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 04/04/2025
Truly if my government banned every social media app there would be like a week where I was bored or frustrated and then everything about my life and society would be improved
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
Katie Martin @katie0martin.ft.com · 03/04/2025
Your tariff rate is your star sign divided by the number of boys you've kissed, multiplied by one
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Reposted by John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦
leon @leyawn.bsky.social · 02/04/2025
my new theory is that once you have a certain amount of money and wealth you start to go crazy and detach from reality. that number is different for everyone. for me it's $20
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John Last 🇮🇹 🇨🇦 @johnwlast.bsky.social · 01/04/2025
I confess only to God and the giant glowing skeleton bigthink.com/the-past/cri...
bigthink.com
The 1920s plan to make criminals confess to a terrifying skeleton
Would you confess your crimes to a skeleton with "an unnatural ghastly glow"? Inventor Helene Shelby thought you would.
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