Try not to hold an election in the middle of a global pandemic if you don’t have to, mkay?

Happening in the World: The results of the Canadian elections are out, and incumbent Prime Minister Justin Trudeau managed to retain power despite falling short of the majority he hoped to win. Notably, Trudeau used his powers as prime minister to call for a snap election in mid-August i.e hardly two years into his current term as prime minister of a minority government. He had hoped that his handling of the pandemic would compel voters to vote in favor of his party— however, the fact that he choose to do so in the middle of the pandemic likely angered voters who did not support the ruling Liberal Party as enthusiastically as was expected (Reuters).

Happening in the US: New court filings reveal that Donald Trump’s campaign had determined that their claims about election fraud were baseless, even before Trump and his lawyers held a news conference that promoted election conspiracy theories. Their conspiracy theories had accused Dominion Voting Systems, a voting machine company, of working with an election software firm, investor George Soros and Venezuela to rig the presidential election against Trump. An internal memo prepared prior to the November 19th news conference expresses that they had already determined that these allegations were false— notably, Sidney Powell and other lawyers went ahead and filed four lawsuits against Dominion despite these findings (NYT).

Happening in NYC: Yesterday, Google announced that it plans to buy St. John’s Terminal in Manhattan for a whopping $2.1 billion— in what is being called the largest purchase of commercial real estate in the US since the beginning of the pandemic. Notably, Google also owns. the Chelsea Market building (bought for $2.4 billion in 2018). The increasing number of commercial buildings in the area, however, is reducing the area’s stock of affordable housing—with new development also threatening neighborhood character and the existence of historical buildings (Gothamist).

Happening in the Columbia community: At 7:30 PM today, head over to today’s edition of ‘Nonfiction Dialogues’, an evening series by the School of The Arts. You can watch Professor Lis Harris interview acclaimed writer, Emily Bernard about her work. The event is online and you could find more information about how to register for it here.

Poem of the week: Okay, so Richard Wilbur’s The Writer is a poem that I often find myself reading and reading every time I’m trying to get myself to write something, anything, just for the sake of writing. But I think it could be comforting to anyone that’s trying to do something creative and whimsical—while struggling to remind themselves of why it matters: “It is always a matter, my darling, / Of life or death.”

Bird’s eye view via Bwarchives