Canada Letter: Bernie Sanders, Health Care and Hydro

The Times’s recent Canada-related coverage with back stories and analysis from our reporters along with opinions from our readers. View in [Browser]( | Add nytdirect@nytimes.com to your address book. [The New York Times]( [The New York Times]( Saturday, November 4, 2017 [NYTimes.com/Canada »]( [Bernie Sanders, Health Care and Hydro]( By IAN AUSTEN When Bernie Sanders made his way to Toronto last weekend, Margot Sanger-Katz, a health policy reporter in The Times’s Washington bureau, tagged along. Her [resulting article]( in [The Upshot]( is both a nicely drawn portrait of Mr. Sanders’ excursion and a thorough comparison of Canada’s health care system with that of the United States. Ms. Sanger had some additional thoughts about the trip for Canada Letter readers: [Senator Bernie Sanders during a visit to Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto last weekend.] Senator Bernie Sanders during a visit to Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto last weekend. Aaron Vincent Elkaim for The New York Times It was probably about the 10th time that a patient or doctor in Canada used the word “fair” that I started to realize how important the value was to Canadians. Mr. Sanders was making what his staff called a “cross-border learning tour,” though it was clear from the start that he already knew quite a lot about the Canadian system, and had found much to like about it. He is pushing hard for the Democratic Party in the United States to embrace the notion of a single-payer health care system like Canada’s. His legislative proposal shares [many Canadian particulars]( — government-financed insurance, no direct payment at the point of care, private doctors and hospitals, global budgets. But Mr. Sanders also clearly admires and envies the values that lie beneath the Canadian system — a commitment to equity and a right to health care that [is less commonly heard]( when Americans talk about what they want from their system. In many ways, he was in Canada to learn about how to achieve that change of heart. At a public event, he was asked how to make this change by Dr. Danielle Martin, a physician, hospital executive and advocate. “The journey is not easy,” Mr. Sanders said. “The journey never has been easy for human rights and human dignity.” Afterward, I asked Dr. Martin whether she thought the sentiment or the policy had come first in Canada. Did Canadians embrace a government health care system because they believed in equity? Or did they come to value equity because they’d been exposed to a health care system that promoted it? Some of both, she said, but “the system itself creates a language.” “We’re not genetically different people here on the other side of the border,” she said. “There is no reason why we would have different values, except there was a movement here.” And I have two related questions for you: Is public health care a defining feature of Canada? If so, how is that reflected in the nation? Please email your thoughts to nytcanada@nytimes.com so that I can share some of them with other newsletter readers Read: [What Did Bernie Sanders Learn in His Weekend in Canada?]( Held Back My colleague Dan Levin updates a [story]( he’s been following in British Columbia: [Opponents of the Peace River dam in British Columbia gathered near the project, known as Site C, in October 2016.] Opponents of the Peace River dam in British Columbia gathered near the project, known as Site C, in October 2016. Andrew Testa for The New York Times Christy Clark, the former premier, pushed construction of the Site C dam by saying that it was needed to maintain a reliable supply of electricity. But opposition to the dam, which would flood 51 miles of the Peace River, mounted. Opponents claimed the project not only violated indigenous rights, but was also unnecessary. Yet Ms. Clark’s government blocked a review of the project by the provincial utilities commission, which had been created to ensure British Columbians got the best bang for their buck. A year later, the future is looking troubled for Site C. The New Democratic Party, which now holds power, ordered a review. The commission’s final report, released this week, is, well, damning. It found that Site C is nearly 2 billion Canadian dollars over budget and likely behind schedule, while noting that its forecasts for future power needs were “excessively optimistic.” The new government will now decide Site C’s fate, with a decision expected next month. Read: [Canada’s $7 Billion Dam Tests the Limits of State Power]( Northern Excursion The Daily 360 went to Iqaluit, Nunavut, to create an immersive video of throat singing by Tanya Tagaq and Laakkuluk Williamson Bathory. I could almost feel the warmth of the wood stove in the room. Watch: [Big Music in Small Rooms: Throat Singing]( Sit Back The staff at Watching, The Times’s guide to movies and TV, has put together a list of new offerings by Netflix in Canada this month. It’s heavy on classics and includes Mel Brooks’s “Young Frankenstein” and Oliver Stone’s “Wall Street.” Read: [The Best Movies and TV Shows New on Netflix Canada in November]( Pick Up When BlackBerry still made phones, I often collaborated on articles with Brian X. Chen, The Times’s lead consumer tech writer. He’s not someone who is easily impressed. But two days with an iPhone X, which came out on Friday in Canada at a staggering starting price of 1,319 Canadian dollars, left him full of both praise for the device and caution for consumers. “The iPhone X feels ahead of its time, perfect for a target audience of technology enthusiasts and obsessive photographers,” Mr. Chen wrote. “Everyone else may want to wait a while to buy.” Read: [The iPhone X Is Cool. That Doesn’t Mean You Are Ready for It]( Dubious Claims Gina Kolata, a Times science writer, [has looked into]( journals” — academic publications that will print just about anything, including a spurious study claiming that people can slim down by eating chocolate. In her article, she quoted Derek Pyne, an economics professor who took on the uncomfortable task of analyzing the publications of his colleagues in the schools of business and economics at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops, British Columbia. [His study]( (which appeared in a reputable journal published by the University of Toronto Press) found that 15.5 percent of his colleagues’ papers appeared in dubious journals, including the entire output of one faculty member. Eduardo Luzzatti Professor Pyne told me that he suspects the use of predatory journals to puff up academic résumés is likely to be more common at smaller universities where there’s lower expectation that professors will find a place for their work in prominent journals. He also found a connection between higher salaries and larger grants for professors who went to doubtful publications. That, he said, could create trouble for Canada’s publicly funded university system. “The taxpayer might come to get upset,” he said. Read: [Many Academics Are Eager to Publish in Worthless Journals]( Centre Ice [The N.H.L. Redefined Slashing, and the Penalty Box Got Crowded]( Statistics show that the National Hockey League is serious about its crackdown on slashing. [Voices Grow Louder for Merger of Women’s Pro Hockey Leagues]( There’s a growing consensus that it’s time for the Canadian Women’s Hockey League and the National Women’s Hockey League, which is based in the United States, to come together. Trans Canada [Trump’s Trade War With Canada]( In Opinion, Paul Heinbecker, a former Canadian diplomat and senior government adviser, called on the United States Congress to block President Trump’s attacks on the North American Free Trade Agreement. [A Canadian Composer’s Death-Obsessed Search for Connection]( The Times’s classical music critic Zachary Woolfe attended a Toronto performance of works by the Canadian composer Claude Vivier, whose music explores the connections between the living and the dead, and whose life ended in a murder by a stranger. [House Hunting in ... Ottawa]( The Times’s International Real Estate column highlighted a condo in Ottawa’s Landsdowne Park that overlooks the stadium hosting the Grey Cup later this month. [Richard Hambleton, ‘Shadowman’ of the ’80s Art Scene, Dies at 65]( During the 1980s, hundreds of black-painted silhouettes began appearing on buildings in Manhattan. The menacing figures were the work of Richard Hambleton, a conceptual artist from Vancouver, British Columbia. He died this week, and Richard Sandomir’s obituary tells the story of a life which, at times, was as black as Mr. Hambleton’s art. HOW ARE WE DOING? We hope you enjoyed our Canada Letter. Tell us what you think and what you’d like to see, at [nytcanada@nytimes.com](mailto:nytcanada@nytimes.com? subject=Canada%20Letter%20Newsletter%20Feedback). LIKE THIS EMAIL? Forward it to your friends, and let them know they can sign up [here](. ADVERTISEMENT FOLLOW NYTIMES [Facebook] [FACEBOOK]( [Twitter] [@nytimes]( Get more [NYTimes.com newsletters »]( | Get unlimited access to NYTimes.com and our NYTimes apps. [Subscribe »]( ABOUT THIS EMAIL You received this message because you signed up for NYTimes.com's Canada Letter newsletter. 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