Interest rates will likely be paused by the Bank of Canada. That’s the Bay Street Wisdom after the latest monthly numbers showing Canadian economic activity contracting. I said contracting. When the economy slows down and is doing exactly that, it’s not a time to raise interest rates. The Bank of Canada will next week announce where it stands. But it will likely stand down on the idea of pushing interest rates up. It might even tell us that the interest rate increases have indeed put the brakes on the economy which is what they were intended to. The Bank may in its inimitable understated way declare Mission Accomplished. Most people who know things believe the Central Bank will push the pause button – offering relief to those who worry about rates escalating.

In the US Courts another member of the Far Right group known as the Proud Boys has been sentenced for his January 6th Crimes. Dominic Pezzola, who smashed a U.S. Capitol window with a stolen police shield, will be doing 10 years of hard time. His partner told the court Pezzola was getting drunk and watching Fox News and then described him in ugly, dirty vulgar ways that need not repeating for an audience that knows what vulgar means. The leader of the Proud Boys was sentenced early this week to 17 years in the Penn.

In Canada, A new poll suggests nearly half of Canadians are living pay cheque to pay cheque. Half the country is having anxiety about not being flush. Young people are most likely to be feeling broke. The political beneficiary is the Conservative Party. The politics of financial anxiety have opened a flesh wound for the liberals. If things don’t get better in the next 18 months it will morph into a mortal wound.

From the Wall Street Journal on this Friday, September 1st the story behind the story of why Elon Musk bought and soiled Twitter. The Journal writes The way that Musk blustered into buying Twitter and renaming it X was a harbinger of the way he now runs it: impulsively and irreverently. It is an addictive playground for him. It has many of the attributes of a schoolyard, including taunting and bullying. But in the case of Twitter, the clever kids win followers; they don’t get pushed down the steps and beaten, like Musk was as a kid. Owning it would allow him to become king of the schoolyard.

I’m Charles Adler. Thanks for coming into my yard for 3 minutes that matter