"hi. my name is erin, and i come from a long line of tools."

so, he knows his name literally translates to "erin, the tool", right?

it's fitting.

really.

this is a track i tend to find whenever i need to recover or regroup in some way. it's both general and specific enough that it works in pretty much any imaginable context, so long as you need to sit and rest for a while.

I think I'll quit to the valley
Regain my strength and start again

that's today.

back to the struggle, tomorrow.

so, i told you there's a story coming. what am i doing today?

first, i'm going to allow for some reflection before i react. when you go through something that is objectively baffling, it is often a good idea to stop to think before you act. so, i'm processing.

i will at least confess that i've done grocery shopping for the month, and i had put off eating for a bit leading up to late yesterday. so, i've got a few days to catch up on.

and, i told you i was sore...

so, i'm resting my aching body, for right now, catching up on eating and more or less waiting until i stop hurting before i decide what to do next.

i'll have something written up when i'm ready. it won't be more than a few days.

this is the right way to deal with conflicts in freedom of expression - you let both sides yell at each other, and declare the loudest screamers the winners. that's the demos asserting itself, that is democracy, and that is what is right.

the police have been criticized for protecting this bigot, but just remember: while they are there to serve and protect, it's just not to serve or protect you. it's to serve patriarchy, and protect property.

what's important is that everybody yelled at each other instead of using force against each other. while the police presence could have perhaps been less, from what i've seen, this is otherwise a model of how this sort of thing ought to be done.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/west-end-vancouver-lgbtq-protest-david-lynn-1.5707395

but, note the absolutely stupid coverage from the corporate fascists and religious bigots at ctv/global, which is consistently an embarrassment to the country:
https://globalnews.ca/news/7309794/angry-crowd-anti-lgbtq-preacher-david-lynn-vancouver/

this is why the headlines at google news are about a relatively small protest in a tactically positioned, but otherwise unimportant, country that acts as a buffer state between germany and russia.

what's happening in belarus doesn't appear to be that different than what's happening in portland, so some perspective is required, and i would consider sanctions to be largely counter-productive.

the russians are trying to get him to push through some constitutional reform packages, which is a far more productive approach to the situation.

i'm not a fan of lukashenko, and i would like to see him resign, but the likelihood that what's happening in belarus is going to lead to a change in government is about on the same order that trump is going to resign over racism protesters - it's a strange narrative picked up by western propaganda outlets, usually largely as a distraction tactic, but it's not remotely reflective of reality.

the fact that they are, in fact, mostly allowed to protest (something that would not be true in most of the middle east) really speaks for itself.

belarus is in the russian sphere, and the russians need to deal with it, which means bringing in some kind of constitutional system that allows for democracy and a long overdue change of government - or submitting to an eventual violent overthrow, some day in the distant future, if they refuse to adjust to what people actually want.

i would advocate statements of solidarity with democracy and non-interference, at this time.

this is my major criticism of much of the mainstream environmental discourse around things like "new deals" - if you let the capitalists take the lead on this, they'll just turn it into another scheme to make money with.

we saw this with carbon trading which, when not done right, is just another way to trade derivatives, and defraud governments and institutions out of money. it's just one example...

we need direct government spending, and we need to take the profit motive out of it, or it will never actually work at reducing anything except wealth equality.

i recently suggested that carbon capture was going to be inevitable, whether we like it or not, but we want to avoid turning it into an industry, and this report from a usually reliable left of centre source is consequently very disappointing. the purpose of any carbon capture proposal should not be to make money or create jobs, to the point that any approaches towards it should specifically be budgeted in such a way so that they create structural deficits - this should be unprofitable by design, so as to avoid creating an enterprise around the process, and to prevent anybody from profiting from it. we should be looking at this the same way that we look at health care, not as another way to exploit the environment to maximize accumulation.

so, they want to talk about essentially building factories that eliminate carbon from the air and operate essentially as power plants. i promise you that this will increase total emissions, and if you buy into this you're just a useful idiot.

generally speaking, if you're approaching the climate crisis as a way to "greenify capitalism", you're just running on the spot. we need to get beyond capitalism, and we've run out of time to play footsie with the capitalists and hope we can seize ownership in the long run.

https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/august-2020/canada-cant-achieve-climate-goals-without-supercharging-carbon-removal/

better ideas would be around planting trees, and creating other structures that essentially act like trees, even if they're not trees. so, we could engineer materials that trap carbon from the air and line them up on the roads, or all over our buildings. there's been work with materials that are sponge-like (to increase surface area) and are a better way forward than a power plant masquerading as ccs.

green may refer to the environment.

it could also refer to greenbacks...

as these issues become more prominent, it is important that we only accept post-capitalist solutions that are likely to actually work and are clear in rejecting and turning away capitalists that want to talk about jobs and gdp, and are ultimately just using it as another angle to make money.

this is something not many people know about.

but, the germans were so intent on stopping us from landing in europe, that they sent subs to montreal to sink the ships before they got there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_St._Lawrence

ugh.

can we nationalize this already, please?

fuck...

https://www.cp24.com/news/u-s-firm-makes-bid-for-cogeco-rogers-to-get-canadian-assets-1.5089164

we know who we are.

don't tell us we don't.

i want to clarify a point.

the russians & chinese were, by far, the most damaged nations in the anti-nazi alliance. it's not even close.

but, of the five eyes nations and satellites in africa and south america, as well as india, canada was hit harder and contributed more than any other nation.

we fucking hated the nazis, and we fought hard to wipe them out.

while we should be sombre and reflective - and are - it's also a justified point of pride, and if you ask canadians, it comes out, when pushed.

canada's response to the war very much mirrored the americans, in terms of increased industrial capacity, and we came out of the war as a relatively strong military power, which seems to have scared the americans. with the onset of the cold war, and the realization that we'd be caught in the middle of it, our focus shifted to trying to stop active conflict between the major powers, and the embrace of a system of global governance to maintain stability.

this is actually widely written about, so i'm not really sure what he's talking about.

but, the truth is also that the role that canadian soldiers played in the war was largely as pawns and cannon fodder for the imperial states, like britain and, later on, the united states. canadian solders (along with australian soldiers) actually did much of the heaviest fighting, and assumed much of the highest casualty rates, in both theatres of the war. our national myth does exist, and is around things like the massacre at dieppe and similar massacres that occurred in the pacific; while our soldiers were seen as disciplined and well trained, and were consequently actually feared more than most others in the alliance by the enemy, the high casualty rates we experienced no doubt contributed to our character as a nation after the war, and the realization of how much more badly we would suffer, should this happen again - as we'd be the ones actually fighting the war on the ground, not the americans or the british.

so, it is very much true that canada is what it is today due to trauma from the second world war, and perhaps that has something to do with mr. cook not liking the way we talk about it.

but, we do talk about it - we just do so a little bit differently, and perhaps in a more adult manner, than you see in hollywood films like saving private ryan.

we suffered and sacrificed more than any other country in the western alliance, and the rest of the world knows that, and so do we - it's why we're a little different than the yankees to the south.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/ww2-second-world-war-pacific-japan-anniversary-1.5708496

it was at least an absolutely beautiful day here yesterday, even if it ended in a ridiculous torrential downpour.

and, the story has a happy ending.

but you'll need to wait for it.

the kind of masculinity that comes out of these situations when you're forced to get what are at their core exceedingly macho guys, some of which are more comfortable with their sexuality than others, interact with 120 pound transwomen in tight or revealing clothing is often confusing and contradictory, because one minute they're grab-handing you like you're a dude, and the next minute they're telling you to make a sandwich.

everything else aside, the story of the night was a really stark experience of coming face-to-face with sheer patriarchy.

the story will come in time as my head is still blurry, but i was actually told by one of the better cops i was dealing with at about 3:00 am on tuesday morning to go home and make sandwiches.

and, i don't even think he realized what he said.

"liz is not a republican....

anymore.

i don't think.

hopefully.

hey, look over there."

i would, however, support kennedy if he primaried warren, and i hope he does, and i hope he beats her, and i hope she rejoins the republicans when he does, because that what she really always has been.

markey, while low key, is just about the best senator out there.

shhh.