Tea & Two Slices is a long-running local news round-up by NEEDS frontman and veteran dishwasher Sean Orr, who lives and works in Gastown, deeply aware of his privilege.

Via Bloomberg: College Kids Are Living Like Kings in Vancouver’s Empty Mansions. OK, first off…having an affordable place to rent doesn’t mean the college kids are “living like kings”. I mean, do you even know how much land a typical king owns? It’s like…a lot.

And second, WTF: “Sun doesn’t think Vancouver’s market is going to come back to its highs, especially at the top end. ‘Why would they come here and pay all that tax and feel like a criminal?’” Um, I don’t know about you but when I pay my taxes, I feel like a productive member of society, not a criminal. Third: “It’s like a candy store for buyers right now”. That’s a really weird way to describe buying a place to live.

Wheee! Meet The Social Media Accounts Gleefully Documenting Vancouver’s Housing Collapse. It’s hard not to feel a sense of uber-schadenfreude when you look at people losing money literally gambling on our city’s future.

Via the Vancouver Courier: Two 14-storey rental buildings proposed for last block of East Hastings in Vancouver…

The pilot program is limited to 20 rezoning applications and is one of the Housing Vancouver strategies designed to create the “right supply” of housing to better match city workers’ incomes. Proposals must have 100 per cent of the residential floor area as secured market rental housing, with a minimum of 20 per cent secured for moderate income households earning between $30,000 and $80,000 a year.

The easy comment would be “but what about those making less than $30,000?” But that would be ignoring the nuance in addressing housing affordability as a spectrum of needs. As I said a couple of weeks ago, they don’t call it ‘the missing middle’ for nothing.

Ah yes, this Province reader would rather the NDP government declare an futile war on sinkholes than house the most vulnerable people in our society: NDP helps ‘malingerers’ but won’t help hard-working people losing homes. Also who even uses the word ‘malingerer’ in the 21st century? Back to the 50s you go, Pat. Thanks for playing.

More from the Province: Bullies and mobs: Only-in-Vancouver spat between city and 4/20 organizers intensifies.

A scheduled performance by American hip-hop group, Cypress Hill, which has a long affiliation with the cannabis industry, has city officials worried that crowds — which already number in the tens of thousands — could become uncontrollable, and the board voted Monday night to send a letter to organizers to cancel the concert.

Event that has no history of “becoming uncontrollable” could get uncontrollable this year based on absolutely nothing but asinine conjecture. ‘But it’s legal. The organizers are bullies’ whines the park board. Legalization has only served to further incriminate pot users, lower cannabis quality, and raise prices. Medicinal pot patients do not have access. The real bullies are the cops arresting people for having the wrong weed. Carry on 4/20. Carry on.

Via Business in Vancouver: UCP win in Alberta bodes ill for BC…

Kenney has vowed to literally set up a $30 million “war room” dedicated to fighting the enemies of Alberta’s energy sector (i.e. environmentalists), cut off funding to the Pembina Institute, and immediately proclaim Bill 12, which he has threatened to use to cut off or at least reduce the flow of oil and-or refined fuels (gasoline and diesel) to B.C.

So he’s going to help us go carbon neutral? Sweet! Thank you, you homophobic cosplaying reactionary cowboy.

Also, his claim of “foreign funded special interests” is laughable considering the amount of foreign funds that are invested in the oil sands:

Or maybe—stick with me here—some basic journalism by, I dunno, professional reporters?
1. What’s the relative scale of foreign $$ in industry vs enviro NGOs?
2. Does US ENGO $$ disproportionately target Canada vs US & others?
3. Is there something wrong w global climate action? https://t.co/MBgXxRUmAx

— Sandy Garossino (@Garossino) April 17, 2019

Oh, and remember…without our LNG you don’t even have a product to put in the fucking pipeline you women-hating Randy from Trailer Park Boys-looking scumbag: The resource B.C. is piping to Alberta that nobody is talking about.

Foreign Intelligence Brief: Canada joins new alliance to save the world order — and the U.S. is not included.

Honour Bound: Crackdown Podcast is creating a radio show made by drug users about the war on drugs.

Bonus: ‘Partly Alive’: Scientists Revive Cells in Brains From Dead Pigs. Cool, so Re-Animator was a documentary then?