Pentagon adds 20 vaccination teams

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Pentagon has approved the deployment of 20 more military vaccination teams that will be prepared to go out to communities around the country, putting the department on pace to deploy as many as 19,000 troops if the 100 planned teams are realized. The troop number is almost double what federal authorities initially thought would be needed.

Chief Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said Friday that Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin’s latest approval brings the number of COVID-19 vaccination teams so far authorized to 25, with a total of roughly 4,700 service members. He said the teams, which largely involve active duty forces, are being approved in a phased approach, based on the needs of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

So far, only one of the first five teams approved last week has actually been announced and deployed. That 222-member team from Fort Carson, Colorado, has arrived in Los Angeles, where it will help with a federally run vaccination site at California State University. Kirby said the team expects to begin working on Monday.

He added that the department expects to have more details soon on where the other four will deploy.

The Biden administration has said that delivering the vaccine to Americans is a top priority, raising questions about why the rollout of the teams hasn’t moved more quickly.

The Pentagon first received the original request from FEMA in late January, for 100 vaccination teams with a total of 10,000 troops. Kirby said only one team has been deployed so far because it is a complicated process that requires co-ordination with local and state authorities to identify the right locations and determine the infrastructure and support that is needed. He said it takes time to set each site up correctly.

WASHINGTON (CP) — A senior adviser to two former U.S. presidents delivered a stark message Friday to Canadians hoping for the resurrection of the Keystone XL pipeline: get over it.

The project is gone and not coming back, said John Podesta, who was White House chief of staff in the final years of Bill Clinton’s second term and a senior counsellor to Barack Obama.

“I think Keystone’s dead,” Podesta told an online panel discussion hosted by Canada 2020, a prominent think-tank with deep ties to the federal Liberal party.

President Joe Biden signed an executive order on his first day in office that rescinded predecessor Donald Trump’s decision to let the pipeline project cross the CanadaU.S. border.

“He’s withdrawn the permit, he’s not going back. He made that commitment,” Podesta said of the president.

“We’ve just got to get over it and move on and find these places on clean energy where we can cooperate... I think there’s no turning back at this point.”

Podesta was joined by Gerald Butts, a former principal secretary to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau who’s now vice-chairman at the political-risk consultancy Eurasia Group.

Butts was less declarative about Keystone XL and acknowledged the impact the decision will have on a Canadian economy that’s heavily dependent on the health of the Alberta oilpatch.

But he agreed the time has come to move on.

“There’s no changing the current administration’s mind,” Butts said.

“We should spend as much time as possible on the things where we agree and minimize our disagreements, as most productive relationships do.”

The expansion, first proposed in 2008, would have ferried more than 800,000 additional barrels a day of diluted bitumen from Alberta to refineries and ports along the U.S. Gulf Coast.

Its demise, Butts said, has more to do with an “astronomical increase” in domestic oil and gas production in the U.S. in the intervening years than anything Canada could ever say or do.

“Presidents Trump, Obama and Biden had something that no president really since Eisenhower, maybe even Truman, has had at their disposal when it comes to oil and gas, and that is choices,” he said.

“They’ve exercised those choices to the detriment of the Keystone pipeline and to the broader Canadian economy.”

Biden’s critics, meanwhile, show no signs of planning to give up the fight.

Alberta Premier Jason Kenney, whose provincial government is invested in Keystone XL to the tune of about $1 billion, has all but declared war, promising legal action and calling on the federal government to consider “proportionate economic consequences.”

Republicans on Capitol Hill, particularly those representing Midwest states with thousands of jobs dependent on the project, have also continued to question the president’s priorities.

The Keystone XL decision quickly focused attention on the potential fates of two other prominent cross-border pipelines, both owned by Calgary-based Enbridge Inc.

One is Line 3, which crosses the Canada-U.S. border in Minnesota and links the Alberta oilsands with the westernmost tip of Lake

Superior. It’s set for a $9.3-billion replacement.

The other, Line 5, picks up where Line 3 ends and runs through the Great Lakes to Sarnia, Ont. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer wants Line 5 shut down, an order Enbridge is fighting in court. It would rather replace a portion of the pipe.

The White House has not signalled a direction on those projects except to say they are “part of what our climate team is looking at and assessing,” in the words of press secretary Jen Psaki.

That may reflect the competing interests that are likely at work within the Biden administration itself, said James Lindsay, senior vice-president at the Council on Foreign Relations.

“This is a case in which you have elements of the Biden coalition or constituency, in essence, at odds,” Lindsay told a briefing last week with the Washington Foreign Press Center.

Climate hawks want pipelines shut down to limit U.S. dependency on fossil fuels, while labour leaders and economic experts argue in favour of good, sustainable jobs, he said.

Proponents also argue that since both Enbridge projects involve replacing existing lines, the case for allowing them to proceed should be easier to make, he added.

“The challenge for a Biden administration is the reality that even when you want to work with close partners, there are going to be issues over which you disagree,” Lindsay said.

“You want to work with others; that means to some extent you have to acknowledge their interests. But at times your own interests may take you in a different direction.”

As much as everyone appreciates a day off with pay, I’ve never been a fan of this holiday. It was a votebuying strategy by Christy Clark and the BC Liberals just prior to an election.

It costs businesses thousands of dollars in additional wages and lost revenues.

And, while there’s no debate everyone love families and family should be the most-important thing in everyone’s life, perhaps something more significant could be recognized on the February long weekend.

Bah humbug.

——————— Valentine’s Day, on the other hand, is a celebration I appreciate. Cards, romantic songs (“I Will Always Love You” — Dolly Parton version), chocolate, flowers and a quiet evening at home are on everyone’s list of things they love about Feb. 14. I also appreciate the tiny, red cinnamon-heart candies which you can only seem to find around Valentine’s Day.

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In theory, forgiving student debt is a marvelous idea. It’s unfortunate that so many talented young people are unable to attend postsecondary education because of the financial burdens that can take decades to pay off, not to mention the personal stress. My concern is, if we forgive student loans, is that fair to the ones who worked hard and saved to pay off their debts in the first place?

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One of the reasons, perhaps, that our politicians and bureaucrats don’t seem to be totally focused on a proper vaccine rollout is that they’re working. They’re getting a paycheque. They are not suffering, at least not financially.

I plead with everyone, please do your absolute best. We want to see our friends again. We want to hug our parents. We don’t want to see our fellow Canadians dying unnecessarily. We want our jobs back. We want the economy to grow. Seniors are scared, children frightened. Please, we are all counting on you.

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After watching the Super Bowl on the same weekend as a European soccer match, one thing I prefer about soccer is the play-by-play. They use one person in the booth. There are long periods of silence where you hear the noise of the game and the audience noise. You can think for yourself. You can turn to your mates and say, “That was a nice play the defender just made.” You also don’t know what the announcer looks like. They never show him on camera.

With North American sports, they are always blasting noise at you. The commentators never shut up. There’s no such thing as dead air.

And why do they need a panel of five or six experts in the pregame, halftime and post-game?

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At a recent education committee meeting, Okanagan Skaha School District trustee Tracy Van Raes suggested scrapping the Foundation Skills Assessment (FSAs) tests for one year due to the added strain on teachers and students during the pandemic. Except for support from trustee Dave Stathers, it didn’t go anywhere. I agree with Van Raes, but it should be up to the Ministry of Education and not individual boards.

James Miller is managing editor of

The Penticton Herald.

Email: james.miller@ok.bc.ca

DEAR EDITOR:

Re: the editorial of Wednesday, Feb. 10 (Herald) and Feb. 12 (Courier) by James Miller about Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s failed vaccine rollout. So good — this had to be said.

Congratulations and thanks.