Some good news out of Nunavut

We hear that the Federal government of Canada has turned over control of resources and other areas of federal jurisdiction to the territorial government of Nunavut, the farthest northern territory of Canada, inhabited mostly by Inuit (formerly called Eskimo). This is a big deal. More later.

Here's the "More Later."

In Canada, as in the United States and I believe Australia and New Zealand and other colonies (Brazil?) the indigenous people were forced to surrender their claims to the land they lived on in exchange for small reserves.  These settlements, whatever they said gave control  of valuable or potentially valuable resources to colonial settlers.  The resources have become ever more valuable and strategic in recent years.  This Nunavut settlement seems to put the territory on the same footing as the Canadian provinces, which have a great deal of practical autonomy (see the case of Alberta and oil).

We'll see how it works out.  And if it has any effect on other countries' approach to indigenous issues.

Facts and speculation on the Little Ice Age in Scotland 1645-1715

From the BBC news site. I particularly liked this:

The late Prof HH Lamb, a world renowned climatologist, investigated the impact of the Little Ice Age on Scotland for part of his book Climate History and the Modern World.

He wrote of arctic ice expanding further south and of reports of Inuit people arriving on Orkney between 1690 and 1728. One was said to have paddled down the River Don in Aberdeen.