A feast of flavours

Elon Musk wants to buy Twitter, make it 'maximally trusted'

In 10 days, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has gone from popular Twitter contributor and critic to the company's largest individual shareholder to a would-be owner of the social platform — a whirlwind of activity that could change the service dramatically given the sometimes whimsical billionaire's self-identification as a free-speech absolutist.

Twitter revealed in a securities filing Thursday that Musk has offered to buy the company outright for more than $43 billion, saying the social media platform “needs to be transformed as a private company" in order to build trust with its users.

“I believe free speech is a societal imperative for a functioning democracy,” Musk said in the filing. “I now realize the company will neither thrive nor serve this societal imperative in its current form.”

Later in the day, during an onstage interview at the TED 2022 conference, he went even broader: “Having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilization."

RRC to replace president next year

From July 29: The board of Red River College won’t renew president and CEO Paul Vogt’s contract when it expires next year, saying it “wants to go in a different direction.” Critics of the decision say they fear it’s politically motivated and one called it “the worst personnel decision at a Canadian college, maybe ever.”

Pallister’s pogey plan panned

OTTAWA — Premier Brian Pallister's gambit to have Manitoba public servants work reduced hours and collect employment insurance would be a financial nightmare for Ottawa, with cities across the country demanding equal treatment.

“It's a really big deal to ask the federal government to pick up the tab on public-sector salaries at the provincial level,” said Wilfrid Laurier University economist Tammy Schirle. “That’s a huge ask.”

On Tuesday, Pallister said the only way Manitoba can avoid laying off public servants during the pandemic is to reduce weekly hours for non-essential employees.

He has asked Ottawa to allow such workers to collect employment insurance for the days they’re off work. That’s in line with EI's work-sharing program, which has only been used for private-sector employees.

West End bistro offers modern take on indigenous comfort food

If you want to talk about the notoriously elusive idea of Canadian cuisine, it helps to start with indigenous food. Feast, which opened late last year on the corner of Ellice Avenue and Sherbrook Street, offers a modern take on traditional First Nations ingredients, beautifully showcasing bison, pickerel, corn, wild rice, sunflower seeds and berries, along with some creative adaptations of bannock and fry bread.

Owner Christa Bruneau-Guenther offers up First Nations cooking in an open, airy, light-filled space finished with white-and-black semi-industrial decor. Well-positioned as a West End community hub —next to the Adam Beach Film Institute and the Bandwidth Theatre, and across from the West End Cultural Centre — Feast clearly has a lot of regulars, with servers greeting some customers by name.

There’s a lot of locavore-influenced comfort food here, served in hospitable amounts. In fact, if you’re eating lunch at Feast, you might want to plan for a light supper.

The stick-to-your-ribs chili ($9.75), satisfyingly seasoned but not spectacularly spicy, is made from grass-fed bison and a mix of beans and topped with made-in-Manitoba Bothwell cheddar. Piled-high “Indian tacos” ($9.25-10.75) start with a plate-sized circle of crisp fry bread, which is then heaped with bison chili or maple-chipotle chicken, shredded lettuce and salsa, and drizzled with lime-inflected sour cream.

High on passion, low on fuel

It’s a story as old as rock and roll: some kids hop in a van, fill up on cigarettes and gas, and let ‘er rip on the Trans-Canada Highway in pursuit of fun, fame and fortune.

Or, failing fortune, a wad of 20s and loose change to cover gas on the way home two weeks later.

If they turn on the radio before reaching the Perimeter, hopefully the bad news and bad vibes they hear won’t persuade them into pulling a U-turn.

In June, it was reported that Manitoba’s annual inflation rate had jumped to 4.6 per cent in May, topping all provinces alongside Nova Scotia. Statistics Canada said drivers were paying the highest for gas since June 2022, when Russia’s invasion of Ukraine threw global supply chains into chaos.