again....

in the united states, you have something called the hatch amendment act that bans political activity while employed in the public sector. we have something similar to this in canada, which allows for reasonable restrictions on free expression in order to ensure that public servants are actually acting in the public will, and are not being directed by outside institutions like political parties or, in this case, religious institutions.

i have a hard time distinguishing between a church and a political party, but that opens up another can of worms - i think churches should be treated as political entities under the law, and taxed as such, as well. removing the taxation exemption from religious institutions would be an excellent companion law, to really get the point across.

if you can't come to work without taking your scarf off, you're demonstrating a conflict of interest. and, the courts are actually pretty clear on the point - this is well within the confines of the law on both sides of the border, with little ambiguity around it.

this law would survive a charter challenge.

that said, i think the government made a big error in invoking s. 33 and it may lead to it's unraveling, in the end. there may be specific sections that are too broad, and in some ways it may not be broad enough. the court system should be brought in to help make the law better, not shunned as a threat to it's existence.

but, if you're in america, you want to think of it basically as a corollary of the hatch amendment act. that's how quebeckers are actually approaching it: they want a firewall between religion and government.

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2019/07/quebec-bans-religious-symbols/593998/

so, what am i actually doing with this judicial review?

well, they're three months late on the review (the statutory rec is 4 weeks; it's been four months), and have made no attempt to contact me, leading me to conclude that they're just not doing it. so, the idea is that i put this in front of a judge, and the judge yells at them to get off their donut-eating, racist fat asses and do something productive for society, for once.

i should call them, first, though, to get some kind of actual response.

if they give me something like "it's in process", then that's not good enough. if they give me something more detailed, with a specific end date, or evidence of extensions, then i'll need to wait.

for the rest of the morning...well, why don't i eat, actually.

i mean, rotating a few conservatives out might sound like a great idea right now.

but, it won't seem like such a great idea when the next republican president uses the same tactic to convert it into an ecclesiastical court.

sanders is usually better at this; he's stretching because he's desperate not to lose the court, and i get it. but, it's really not a good idea...

i'm not going to address the predictably silly aspects of this article, at the national review. conservatives are very silly people.

but, it is not hard to predict what would happen should this take off - whenever a new president takes over, they'd rotate the judges in that they like, and rotate the judges out that they don't. so, what was intended to be a check on power would become a rubber stamp.

i understand that the american left is very apprehensive about the court skewing to the right, but it has to look at this in the longer arc of history and just fucking deal with it until it can regain control using more appropriate measures. i may support shrinking the size of the court somewhat, but my official position is actually to suck it up and wait it out.

that said, there are ways to lure a judge off the bench. maybe one of the conservative judges might like a nice, cushy job as an ambassador to the virgin islands, for example.

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/how-bernie-sanders-would-destroy-supreme-court-%E2%80%98rotating%E2%80%99-justices-67082

https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/04/25/analysis/canada-pace-meet-paris-climate-target-two-centuries-late

why are historical liberal voters - not hardcore dippers, but card-carrying liberals - so frustrated with trudeau right now?

well, i'll never join a party. i'm an anarchist. and, i can only speak for myself, although i've pointed out a number of concerns, concerns that the party seems to largely want to address by arguing that they're changing direction. when you go to the party and say "you're doing this wrong", and the party says "actually, that's just the way we do it now.", then they shouldn't be surprised when people get up and walk out. i can point to miscalculations and bad logic all day, but at the end of the process you have to look at the execution and make your choices. if they want to do things wrong, you can't stop them.

trudeau seems to personally have a fondness for ronald reagan; i don't, i think he was a monster. but, it was reagan that uttered the lines - i didn't leave the democratic party, the democratic party left me. and, so i say goodbye to the liberal party, if it insists on burying itself into oblivion.

but, why is it losing so much support to the greens, specifically?

again, i can only speak for myself, here, but it's less a question of the propaganda and more a question of the actual policy. if you flip through these pages, you'll see that i had no delusions about the liberals shutting down pipelines, even if actually buying one is a little over the top. i stated over and over again that the whole point of their argumentative thrust was to act as a pr wing of the oil industry, and that the end point was more pipelines, not less of them - and that because the ndp have essentially the same position, the only way to shut down the pipelines is to stop them in court. so, i took the issue out of the political arena and into the judicial arena, which i would argue is where it actually belongs. in a liberal capitalist society, the legal question around building pipelines largely reduces to one of property rights, which is for the courts to decide, and not for the legislature to use a tyranny of the majority to bully through. the idea of this being in the "public interest" is fundamentally wrong, in a society based around the concept of property.

so, i can only speak for myself, but it's not the pro-pipeline thing that's pissing me off. i fully expected that.

but, it was the other side of the apparent contradiction that i was hoping would be better developed, because i realized that, from the perspective of a bourgeois capitalist party, there really doesn't have to be a contradiction. see, the liberals are all about money; it's the party of bay street. they're supporting the pipelines because all they care about is the money, then they pay lip service to environmental concerns in a ploy to maximize profit - i am not confused about any of this. but, you can make a lot of money by selling environmentally friendly approaches, too, like big infrastructure projects. if this is the bankers' party, and all they care about is the money, and they're broadcasting that they want to invest in clean technology because all they care about is the money, then you're left with a clear lesser evil choice over these western yahoos that would declare independence tomorrow if they could get away with it.

so, i didn't expect the liberals to not support pipelines, but they were broadcasting that they would also support transition because it was profitable, and that's not a contradiction from their bourgeois perspective, even if it seems to be one from any other perspective.

it was the best (realistic) choice on the table.

four years later, they've carried through with their pro-pipeline position as was expected, but they've done nothing substantive on transitioning the economy, at all. rather, they've introduced a (poorly designed) redistributive tax that will have no meaningful effect on emissions, and done a lot of pointless photo shoots. the infrastructure bank that was supposed to fund large scale projects as a subsidiary of the bank of canada using public money has instead been converted into a neo-liberal conglomerate to push "public-private partnerships" for corporate gain, and has essentially nothing to show for itself.

so, if they had spent quickly and lavishly on transition, i would have less reason to be angry about the pro-pipeline position. but, as they've done nothing substantive to actually transition, all we're left with is the expansion of the petro-state. i can't continue to support that.

and, why can't they announce these public works projects? why can't they announce a manhatten project for the climate, switch things into high gear and get 'er done? because they're hamstrung by the ideology of neo-liberalism, by market discipline, by an insistence that government not interfere in the private sector, and by a series of international agreements that make action of this sort potentially expensive. but, this is new to the party - they weren't like that under chretien, and certainly weren't like that under the elder trudeau. really, they were at a crossroads: would they accept these international agreements that were (mostly) signed by the conservatives, or would they tear them up like they used to say they would? and, they've become conservative-lite in every possible way, by upholding the international system, even as it's falling apart in front of them.

if tackling climate change means tearing up nafta and pulling out of the wto, then you tear up nafta and pull out of the wto. but, they didn't - they just let the targets slip by.

and, we're going to have to let them slip by, in turn.

but, if i'm being optimistic, i might present her as a more realistic face for the future of the party.

because she actually writes bills.

you know. the job.

this jayapal character seems to be a better presidential option than almost the rest of the field.

she seems to introduce a lot of very strong legislation, and seems to fundamentally get what the actual problems are. she seems to have an analysis, which is so rare.

it's too bad she was born in india, which bars her from the presidency.

this is kind of equivalent to the libertarian party hiring karl rove.

i saw this coming, but i'm still as baffled as everybody else.

ready or not, here they come.

https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2019/07/12/May-Hires-Kinsella/

i'm just skeptical about the return of the bloc.

i was pushing it a few years ago, but they're just meeting a lot of resistance.

so, if the ndp are cooked, and the bloc are stalled, the greens are what's left - which sounds facile, but that's quebec.

there's some problems, granted. but, we don't have to cite stiglitz to reject perfect information, here. it's a tipping-point process, before the mob mentality kicks in. where they're at it is not far from it....

well, what exactly happens if the greens win 50 seats in quebec?

it's probably still a liberal minority, at this point, as they would get most of them from the ndp.

but, the liberals would have little option but to listen to the greens, and very carefully, even if they can avoid coalition with them.

the greens are at eight in quebec?

that's a protest vote, but quebec doth protest (yeah, i know).

everybody knows this is about quebec, in the end. and, they tend to be unpredictable.

hey. i'm just thinking out loud.

https://www.hilltimes.com/2019/07/15/despite-green-partys-rising-popularity-in-polls-and-recent-successes-ndp-and-bloc-likely-to-be-more-influential-pollster-lyle/207983

i mean, did you americans stop to wonder if maybe you like trudeau so much because he's actually, kind of basically one of you?

this is, indeed, long overdue, even if it's just a first step.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/07/15/workers-our-homes-deserve-rights

and, if trudeau manages to win at all in october, it is quite clear that he's going to lose his majority.

trump is not known for being particularly articulate, but on a certain level i think he's making a valid point. and, i don't think justin trudeau is a very good source of information regarding understanding how things are done here in canada, considering that he seems to be more culturally californian than canadian or quebecois.

i'm reminded of parizeau blaming his referendum loss on "money and the ethnic vote". and, no, that wasn't that long ago.

these kids are not the future of the party - i don't expect any of them to be re-elected more than twice. they routinely say stupid things, and it's just a matter of time before it gets to them. i mean, maybe one or two of them will wise up, but i wouldn't count on it. what will be awful is if one of them sticks their foot in their mouth so badly that they lose their seat to a republican, as they're supposed to be in unloseable seats - which was the point of putting them there.

a lot of the time, the fact is that the basis of their cringe is that they're presenting a perspective that is considered to be backwards, here. those clearly anti-semitic remarks, for example. or, erasing israel from the map. i mean, is this representative ahmadinejad, or what? these are things that you expect people in oecd countries to know better than to state.

there was a famous line by adlai stevenson, who was very much the cultural forefather to the elder trudeau. as he was dodging shit being thrown at him by right-wing protestors, he insisted on pushing the cops off. why? because he didn't want to send these idiots to jail. what he wanted to do was send these idiots to school.

and, if it was anybody other than trump, you'd have expected something worded a little more along those lines.

but, on a fundamental level, he's making a valid point - the west is not going to learn much of value by adopting third-world perspectives about much of anything, and doesn't even really have the obligation to give those perspectives the time of day.

so, step one is done.

step two is the judicial review on the shelved police report.

well, yeah. why would he expect otherwise?

and, he doesn't, you can tell; he knows they're fucking with him.

and, frankly, if you want a reason why his numbers are falling, it's the coverage. he goes on cnn or whatever and they bash him for as long as he's there. then, he complains they don't give him enough time. are you a masochist, bernie? what the fuck?

he didn't get his momentum last time by talking to rachel maddow or wolf blitzer, he got it by end-arounding it and taking his message directly to the people. now, he's a talking head, and his numbers are falling - it's not surprising.

it's easy enough to argue that he needs the tv to get to a wider audience, but i don't think it's actually true. rather, i think he needs to be registering more younger voters, and that he should probably more or less tell cnn to fuck off. 

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/07/15/bernie-sanders-campaign-media-reject-1415832

i guess he'll want to get this dealt with as soon as possible.


https://www.politico.com/story/2019/07/14/asap-rocky-arrested-sweden-state-department-1415839

well, it seems like we got a summer here in ontario after all, even if it ends up being short.

the gulf's moisture - yes, a consequence of climate change - has overpowered the solar magnets. for a while. so, we're going to end up drenched in humidity and rainfall, as all of that water moves from the ocean to the great lakes, through the atmosphere as an intermediary.

the universe is driven by conflict and change, not by harmony or stasis.

i'll take it...

...but, enjoy it while it's here. it won't last long.

let's hope the guy upstairs stays away this week, so it doesn't get ruined by the air conditioner.

so, i finished the human rights application this evening, then fell asleep. it won't send over the virtual network connection in the virtual machine (i don't want adobe software on my dummy gateway), so i'm going to try over the chromebook, and then maybe at the library, before i resort to mailing it....

if there's a hearing, it seems like it will be in toronto.

but, that's done.

the three other suits i need to file are:

#2) a judicial review on the oiprd result. that's going to be in superior court, in london, and i'll need to serve the oiprd directly in toronto.

#3) the constitutional challenge. superior court. i'll need to serve in windsor, and maybe also in toronto..

#4) a judicial review regarding the access to information request. that should also be in superior court, and i guess i'll need to serve in toronto, as well.

so, when do you have the right to use force to stop an anti-abortion protestor?

when they stand in your way - and not before then.

talk is cheap, and the right to expression has to be much, much wider than telford & joly are allowing for.

these are arguably even abuses of power that necessitate some resignations; i haven't looked into it closely enough, but it's certainly straddling a line on acceptable behaviour from a cabinet minister, anyways.

again: if there wasn't a reason to delay the report, they would have released it.

they're essentially just sitting on it. because they know.

ok.

still nothing from the oiprd. time's up.

by statute, this should have been done at the end of april by the very latest. by the time i file at the end of the month, it will be three months past any reasonable release point. so, we'll let the judge rip them apart over that.

step one - human rights complaint.

if people inside or outside of the liberal party have a problem with this movie, then the appropriate thing for them to do is prepare a rebuttal to it and ask the venues for equal time.

just for the record: i don't think that the federal government should be trying to ban movies, whatever they are, and whether i like them or not.

liberals are supposed to be free speech advocates. what they're doing with this movie - which i have no plans to see - is just another reason to abandon the party, as they are continually taking these directions that are incompatible with the basic concepts of liberalism.

but, i decided a long time ago that i would not be voting liberal in october.

and, just for the record.

if you're going to cite him or his work.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/09/trump-clinton-immigration-economy-unemployment-jobs-214216

the way i would put it is that the error that the bourgeois press makes, often on purpose, is that it cites statistics that are true broadly for immigration in the context of debates that are specifically about low wage workers, and even more specifically about low wage workers from south and central america that migrate into the country over the mexican border. in the process of doing this, they skew the data, and often badly, as it simply doesn't make sense to use data about people coming from europe or asia to study in the universities and then apply it to people coming from mexico to farm the fields. if the source that you're reading or citing just talks about "immigration" as a uniform thing, without trying to separate into types of immigration, then it's glossing over data, and probably intentionally.

the issue with wage depression is very specifically applicable to workers in specific sectors, and you need to make sure your sources are being honest about it, if you want to make an honest argument, yourself.

i think that one of the best ways to understand the changes that have happened between gen x and gen y is to compare alanis morisette to taylor swift.

this is what alanis was like when she was a little girl, compared to what she was like as a grown-up.

meanwhile, this is what taylor swift was like as a grown-up:

and, this is what she was like as a child:

so, we can see that what we've had happen here is an inversion of adulthood and childhood.

i'll let you decide which is really more grown-up, and which is really more childish.

https://www.salon.com/2019/06/08/less-than-1-percent-of-u-s-farmworkers-belong-to-a-union-heres-why_partner/

so, to recap. what is the socialist position on ice? not a "progressive" position, and not a liberal or ancap position, but a position that is explicitly socialist?

1) cut funding for ice to zero, and redirect it to the department of labour, so that the state is no longer policing the supply of labour but rather enforcing the labour code. and, i mean this - i want cops out there searching out labour violations. something like 'e-verify' is nowhere near sufficient to properly police employers and ensure they aren't breaking the law.
2) drastically increased penalties for employers that violate the labour code. not fines, not slaps on the wrist, but serious consequences, including losses of license, shutting down businesses and lengthy jail sentences.
3) this crackdown should not be accompanied by attacks on workers. the idea is to ensure that everybody is on a level playing field - that employers are required to provide the same wages, benefits and conditions for immigrant labourers as they are for native-born labourers.
4) tying the minimum wage to inflation.
5) legislation that allows and encourages unionization in industries with large numbers of undocumented workers, and allows those workers to join the unions.

socialists will argue that the issue with ice is not merely a humanitarian issue, but a question of ensuring that migrants, who are workers, are entitled to protections and standards, so they are not exploited for the benefit of the middle class.

and, no, it's not just small businesses.

https://www.texastribune.org/2016/12/19/big-name-businesses-exploit-immigrant-labor

no.

stop.

it's simple.

migrants are workers. all workers deserve equal treatment. that is the fundamental axiom of socialism. employers that treat some workers differently than others, or prey specifically on those without legal recourse to defend themselves, are enemies of socialism and must be identified and prosecuted as such.

this should have the effect of reducing illegal crossings, as the market for illegal labour dries up. but, the basic issue is one of workers rights.

and, what you will see over and over again if you pay attention is that the democratic party does not care about the rights of the migrants as workers, so much as it seeks to ensure that this system that exploits them is not substantively disturbed.

http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/21284/wage_theft_Chicago_undocumented_workers_minimum_wage

but, i mean, you expect the republicans to push supply-side economics, right?

again: ice is the hr wing of the agriculture industry, and it's doing exactly what it was designed to do.

see, this is the problem, and the thing that needs to change.

"progressives" will focus on trying to make the system more humane, while fundamantally keeping it in tact. but, socialists understand that this is a waste of time, and that the root cause of the problem is a system - as well as a society - that is willing to look the other way in the face of widespread labour abuses.

the socialist position is to redirect resources away from a crackdown on workers and towards a crackdown on employers.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/31/us/illegal-immigration-employers-prosecutions.html

warren's approach to ice is the perfect example of why she's a textbook "progressive", and not at all a socialist, and why i cannot and will not support her candidacy in good faith.

what she's calling for is a reorganization of the service, which is rooted in the ideological positioning that the problem is not the system itself but the people within it. it's the old "bad apples" argument. so, she wants to reform the system, presumably so that it is better able to carry out it's initial purpose. this is the old "we've lost our way" canard.

ice has not lost it's way, and it's not being tarnished by a couple of bad apples. ice operates as a human resources arm of industry, and is doing exactly what the people that created it intended for it to always do. there is consequently no future in reforming it, unless you're just trying to reduce operating costs.

but, abolishing ice is not even enough, as it will be recreated again if the conditions which have allowed for it's existence - namely the lax enforcement of labour laws - are not addressed. abolition is a first step. but, an actual policy - a plan that is actually worth pursuing - would be centered around ensuring that all workers, everywhere, are entitled to living wages and proper protections, which means converting the immigration police into a labour enforcement unit. if america spent half of what it spends on policing immigration on policing employers, it wouldn't have an immigration problem. that would be actually taking control of the state for the benefit of the people; that would be an actual plan.

you won't get that from a "progressive" that fundamentally wishes to keep the status quo in place; you will need to support the socialist.

i just measured my own right now - and i haven't done anything strenuous since i came in saturday morning - and i'd say it was more like 48-54.

also, if you're curious, the doctor took my pulse last thursday.

after reading this, what do you think it was?

remember: my cholesterol is very low. but, that's just one metric.

ready?

scroll.






























































62.

and i was still a little sweaty from biking.

well, i guess it's progress, right?

fuck.

https://enwin.com/fluoridation/

no, really. all of these things are fundamentally the same.

1) somebody that gets caught discriminating against trans people or gay people uses "religious freedom" as an excuse, and accuses you of actually discriminating against them. and, they think they're smart.

2) somebody calling out islam on it's treatment of women or homosexuals gets accused of being "islamophobic", meaning they're the one being oppressive for calling out the culture on it's shit. and, the crowd thinks it's very smart for being sophisticated enough to work it through.

3) a black person reacting against a white racist gets accused of "reverse racism", meaning they're the actual racist, not the white person. and, the racist thinks they're very smart.

"religious freedom" is kind of the same thing as "reverse racism" or "islamophobia"; it's just a bullshit excuse that privileged people use when they get caught actually discriminating against somebody. but, the danger lies in actually legislating it or taking it seriously in a court of law.

again: if i could open up the constitution, i would abolish the concept of "religious freedom". but, the uk does not have a constitution, and the idea that you're going to find a precedent in common law for the premise that this is a substantive attack on his "religious freedom" is asinine.

he got fired because he refused to do his job correctly.

https://windsorstar.com/news/world/u-k-doctor-fired-after-refusing-to-refer-to-theoretical-six-foot-tall-bearded-man-as-madam-sues-government/wcm/5392b52e-99f7-494a-8733-307a08cd4460

i saw through this from day one...

in some sense, he's using the same kind of language we heard from other charlatans like barack obama, when he talks of "bipartisanism" and "ending partisanship". that is code for handing over power to the corporate sector, and has been for quite a while. but, he's added a new layer to it - he also talks of "independent oversight" in the same way, which essentially means removing oversight from government.

it's not that this is new, overall. i mean, that's what nafta is, to an extent. instead of having real courts apply real laws, they set up these kangaroo courts staffed by corporate cronies that rule on whether a policy will affect profits, at the behest of just about anything else. and, what are these kangaroo courts? they're "independent advisory committees - just like those phony nafta panels.

what is new is that i've never heard a politician talk like this, or to try to generalize the process so widely.

so, what we have here is really a whole new level of corruption, in a politician that appears to be actively working with industry to entirely dismantle the entire role of government oversight. it took way too long for people to figure it out, but better late than never...

https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/07/11/news/advisors-storm-out-and-accuse-trudeau-government-dithering-corporate-watchdog

freedom is not impossible the way that property is.

but, it comes with the same set of contradictions - and it is reasonable enough to argue that freedom is not a realistic end goal until property is abolished, first, for essentially the same reasons.

freedom is not merely a lack of restraint, but is rather a lack of restriction. for, even the most enslaved person can discard restraint, if they are willing to face the consequences, and to be free of consequence from your own actions is merely to enslave those around you to the ramifications of them. so, that is not freedom. freedom is only real when it allows for the actualization of responsible self-interest, in a way that minimizes harm to everybody else.

i was an asshole.

and, now i'm a bitch.

in actual fact, i can't imagine anybody suggesting that i was ever a very nice person at all.

that's never been my shtick in any kind of way. really. i've always been kind of distant, brutally honest and not very concerned about offending people or hurting their feelings. i've never been very concerned about what other people think of me.

if you're stuck in the fallacy of biological determinism and need to come up with a tactic, i guess i'd have been better described as the mysterious, distant weirdo that blows by you and ignores you in some kind of reverse psychological ploy. but, it's a big stretch - the fact is that i really wasn't interested, and that not much has really changed.

i'm not saying that blowing up the mullahs is necessarily the right answer. i understand that if the united states wants to win in iran, it's going to be a difficult process - and the chances are higher that it will lose. this will harm the united states, certainly.

but, i'm not an american. i don't really care if you win.

so, what i'm saying is that i'm not going to oppose a strike on iran in the same way that i opposed a strike on iraq. i was absolutely opposed to iraq - it was based on false pretexts, and it was not a smart move for anybody, except maybe the saudis. iran is really a different animal, and if a very specific kind of scenario plays out, it could be of a large benefit to real democracy in the region.

i mean, if there's a country in the region that we can build a real democracy in, that country is iran. and, if you really want stability, what you want in the region is actually democracy.

i nailed hitchens on iraq at the time, and i'd nail him again. but, his problem wasn't his logic; his arguments made sense. he just had very, very bad information. it's an open question whether he took all these wrong facts at face value disingenuously or not; you'd think he'd have been smart enough to work it through, so accusations of dishonesty are pretty relevant. but, if his facts weren't wrong, his argument would have been solid. i know; this is circuitous and awkward, but it's true, nonetheless.

the relevant facts to make a right choice will come out in the course of a debate, if we're lucky enough to get one. i may still oppose it, but my mind is not as made up now as it was in 2003.

http://www.socialismtoday.org/215/iran.html

by contrast, the baath party in iraq was the consequence of arab socialism being perverted into stalinism, so the socialist forces were already in power, there. saddam hussein obviously wasn't much of a socialist, but his party was historically a socialist party. so, taking down the baath party opened up a space for the islamists.

and, for the ignorant or naive, i'll remind you that this is the nature of politics in the middle east and has been for years: it's socialists v islamists. that's the political spectrum. this shia v sunni thing is a conflict on the right, and was mostly created by the imperial occupation.

in iran, the islamists are in charge, so knocking them out should open up space for the socialists - and that's potentially a good thing.
 
http://socialistresistance.org/the-iranian-revolution-socialism-and-theocracy/3826

now, do i think that if the empire goes in and topples the ayatollah that they'll set up a socialist state in replacement?

obviously not, no.

but, the way i'm approaching the question is not from a pacifist or pro-peace perspective. my interest is not to stop a war in iran. rather, what i'm asking is whether the forces of secularism, socialism and modernism are powerful enough in iran to take advantage of the chaos caused by the vacuum of power, in the way that al qaeada did in iraq. put another way: is the fantasy that the bush administration told you about iraq actually realistic when applied to iran? i think it's clear that it's more realistic; the question is whether it's realistic enough to back action to dismantle the regime, in the hopes that the socialists can seize power in the end.

but, the biggest problem in iran - and i've pointed this out before - is that the russians are already there. it's instantly a proxy war - it's korea, it's vietnam. and, even if the forces of modernism win in the end, you're looking at a thirty year war to get there.

so, i remain unconvinced that war is imminent.

but, i'm not necessarily opposed to it, and am certainly not opposed to it on the basis of being pacifist, if it is.

hey.

i'm a socialist.

that means i interpret the world through the lens of class conflict, and i support revolution everywhere i can, not that i want class harmony and world peace. those people are called conservatives.

so, solidarity, comrades. we will win, in the end, if we fight together.

iran may come off as relatively humane when compared to the saudis, but that shouldn't be used to erase or whitewash the iranian government's crimes against it's own people. iran remains a despotic state with a set of brutal, medieval laws that have created a horrendous humanitarian catastrophe, and any free thinking person should be supporting the overthrow of the iranian state by any means possible. this is a government that cannot be left in place, in the long run.

it's easy to pick sides when presented with a conflict of this nature, but this is a situation where nobody should be doing that.

a pox on both their houses.

do service workers deserve living wages, benefits, time off, holiday pay and all of the other things you get through unionized labour? of course they do.

and, do they owe us a living? of course they fucking do.

but, does it make sense to seize the mcdonalds and redistribute the hamburgers? it very clearly does not. you want to shut these kinds of things down altogether, actually, tell the customers to make their own fucking sandwich and tell the workers to find something better to do.

so, if you think you can just redefine socialism for a service economy, you've lost the plot. we should be focusing on something else, and that something else is an emancipation of our time.

the old paradox was that you need somebody to run the machines that make our lives easier, but this has largely eroded and flipped over: the existing economy enslaves us rather than emancipates us, and we consequently don't just not need anybody to run it, but would be better off shutting it down altogether. when conservatives yell about dismantling the economy, my reaction is something like "yes, please!".

i've made this point before. if you live in an agrarian society, where almost everybody owns property and produces their own products, then a free market system is the best way to maximize freedom. but, if you live in an industrial economy where class is a much more defined concept, then the socialization of production is a pre-requisite for any meaningful discussion of freedom. the problem with really existing capitalism is that it is applying free markets to an industrial economy, which by definition doesn't make any sense. so, now that we are moving into a post-industrial economy, we need to ask the question: what is the best way to maximize freedom? and, it seems to me that the answer must lie in a system, perhaps as yet unnamed and undefined, that focuses on alleviating the necessity of work. that is what is in front of us, and should be the economy we want to try and build: one where people are truly free to spend their time how they actually want to.

i haven't written this. i doubt i'll be the one that does. but, to do this, you need to start talking about redistributing resources in a way that collectivizes ownership, but not through the worker co-operative. if we end up with restaurant co-ops while the banks keep demanding their rent, we're just spinning in circles.

if the left wants to regain control of the ndp, it's going to have to organize and do it. an article like this merely states the obvious.

but, i'd actually advise against it.

the ndp is dead; the economy has changed, and organized labour is not the political force it used to be. let's move on to a post-industrial society, and let's take control of the green party in order to do it.

https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2019/07/08/Moderate-NDP-Has-Not-Worked/

i mean, if you want a really scary comparison, the fact is that maxime bernier has more in common with emmanuel macron than justin trudeau does.

i don't think we're walking down that path.

i don't think it's implausible that we might, though.

if the conservatives were actually in power, it might be a little different.

but, in this election, where the conservatives are in opposition, bernier is a much greater threat to the liberals - and the numbers are starting to show it.

i know the liberals try to present a specific idea about what they call "multiculturalism", and then viciously attack anybody that challenges them on it.

but, if you look at historical data from actual liberal voters, you're going to see a different reality than the party likes to project. these ideas that the party wants to define itself by are only going to get 60-70% from actual liberal voters, meaning there's a big opportunity to poach liberal voters by appealing to their hidden or not so hidden racism.

but, what i actually think - and i've pointed this out over and over again - is that race is not an important issue in canadian politics, and certainly not the way that it is in the united states. immigration is an issue, and maintaining a secular identity in the face of so much religious immigration is an issue, but race itself is not very important to most canadians. bernier consequently doesn't really offer anything different to most conservative voters. it would be a different story if he was appealing to things that conservatives actually care about - like lowering taxes - but he actually isn't doing that. however, he is appealing to pro-market liberals, that may want to do things like break up supply management, and that tend to lean towards secularism over religious identity, but may perhaps simply be looking for a protest vote - and unwilling to give it to the greens or ndp because they're too far left for them.

i mean, it's not such a crazy thing. really. to look at bernier as a valid protest, all you have to be is a capitalist, centrist liberal that doesn't like the direction that trudeau is taking the country in, but knows the conservatives are even worse. that's a potentially large demographic, actually.

if the trends continue, the libertarians are going to get stampeded and swallowed.

i don't know how likely that is. but, if even the leader of the libertarian party thinks it's time to cooperate and stop competing, there must be some cannibalism happening in the libertarian party - or at least more than usual.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/bernier-libertarian-party-merger-1.4827241

in canada, we now have, on the left,

1) liberals (in name only.).
2) socialists (in name only).
3) greens.
4) libertarians.
5) quebec nationalists.

the socialists (in name only) are in big trouble for october, and the libertarians could very well exit parliament at that time as well, while the greens and french nationalists are trending upwards.

together, these parties will get upwards of 70% of the vote.

on the right, you have one party: the conservatives, and they're to the left of what americans call centrist democrats. they'll get around 30% of the vote.

i need to reiterate the point.

maxime bernier is not swinging anti-immigrant conservatives.

what he's swinging are right-libertarian liberals.

....because, in canada, the libertarian movement is in coalition with the left, not the right. or, was, anyways.

this narrative is complete bullshit.

reliable polling has held the parties within the margin of error the whole time, which is an advantage for the liberals because they have a far better shot at the undecideds. support has not flowed from the liberals to the conservatives over the last few years, but rather from the liberals to the greens - and increasingly from the liberals to the people's party.

what the tory media tried to do here was set their party up with a lot of gramscian conditioning around something nobody actually ever cared much about. it's now realizing that the approach has failed, and trying something else.

it's a good demonstration of the limits of media power, and the fact that it can't always shape the voting decisions people make; while it may have succeeded in denting the liberals pretty badly, it has completely failed in propping up the conservatives. and, now it's dealing with the possibility of giving the greens the balance of power, as blowback.

i'll take it.

https://www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/suddenly-the-ndps-money-woes-make-sense/

listen: i actually don't think that a person's wealth is relevant in analyzing their politics. if a really rich person came out with politics i support, i wouldn't have a problem supporting them.

but, i don't want to support somebody that is entering politics because they think they're on a mission from god - that's scary, backwards stuff.

i'd be checking louisiana for chem trails, though.

haarp.

clearly.

https://www.theweathernetwork.com/ca/news/article/whats-behind-the-weird-track-of-invest-92l-and-other-july-tropical-storms

ok, not really - but if they were going to test a system, this is what it would look like.

In his late 30s, Steyer had "a revelation" and began an involvement in the Episcopal Church, the religion of his mother (his father was a non-practicing Jew). He has stated that during this time he became much more interested in religion and theology. This new interest reportedly galvanized his political advocacy.

nope.

next.

lots of baggage, there.

i wonder how tom sawyer would do in the south carolina primaries, though.

i'm actually not sure if tom sawyer is too young to run for president, or too old to run for president, at this point.

oh. tom steyer.

never heard of him. needs to work on name recognition.

this was completely organic, and i was just reacting to a guy falling on top of me.

also, this is a very old picture of me (blonde, white shirt) at a night birds show at the house of targ, in ottawa.

credit for the picture: marc gaertner. this is something he does, apparently.

admit it, you wish you were there.

https://thequietus.com/articles/25644-interview-cardiacs-tim-smith

and, i actually just stumbled upon this right this moment.

i'm going to get something to eat.

also:

https://www.google.com/search?q=cardiacs%20flower

if you're unclear about something that i've said or done, please go ahead and ask me questions about it. understand that i'm an unusually honest person that has been surrounded by incredibly dishonest people for the last several years and the filters that you've been receiving information from are simply not good sources of information. so, please ask me directly before you jump to conclusions, and realize the following point: i would take the position that if you're not going to even bother asking me for my side of the story, then your opinion is not valuable enough to be worth concerning myself with.

so, i'm back to what i was doing again, and i'm going to get this figured out one way or another in the next few days.

this article is illuminating in it's citations - and it's clarity in debunking many of the points used on both sides of the debate.

this could be an empirical question, but we'll likely never have any actual useful data until we try the experiment in real time, and, even so you're looking at shifting conditions. being an empiricist also means understanding the limits of the tactic.

http://internationalviewpoint.org/spip.php?article3839

https://reason.com/2018/07/02/libertarians-call-for-sex-work-decrim/

if you're really ra-ra about prostitution, and absolutely convinced that it's just a job and should be completely legalized, you're really expressing an ancap position and should be looking into a libertarian kind of party.

and, it's actually kind of obvious, even if the lines are pretty blurred. what you're arguing for is more capitalism, not less of it.

something frequently brought up in these articles is the idea that pushing sex work underground makes it less safe, but nobody ever presents any kind of reference to any kind of study when they say it. it's just assumed. i'm willing to challenge the truth of this claim, and even suggest that it's a bit reactionary, in the sense that it's ignoring basic market forces - something that marx or proudhon would not have done.

i would suppose that the argument, never really stated, would be that women are less safe if they're less policed. why are socialists parroting this claim?

i might rather suggest that when you decrease the supply of something while maintaining the demand relatively stable, the price goes up, and, as such, the bargaining power of the seller increases. a purely market-based argument would be that driving prostitution underground would make people more safe, and not less safe, as it would give the seller more control over the buyer. the counter argument would be that the buyer will react with violence, but i'm not sure this is well thought through; if they're going to react with violence when the price is x amount, why wouldn't they when the price is however much less? why is violence dependent on cost? and, if you're rather arguing that it's the lack of visibility that leads to violence, i might rather make the opposite point - driving the transaction underground makes it harder for violent people to find the sellers, and easier for a community to snub people it wants to avoid. a small industry advertised via word of mouth is no doubt far safer than one advertised to anybody and everybody in magazines or on the internet.

this issue aside, this is another prominent socialist journal explaining a kind of basic socialist position on prostitution: if there would be any prostitution in a truly free society at all, it would be very minimal, and the focus should consequently be on providing women with better choices, rather than normalizing what is probably the shittiest one.

http://isj.org.uk/the-sex-work-debate/

http://socialistreview.org.uk/393/debating-sex-industry

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2011/11/socialist-whores-what-did-karl-marx-think-of-prostitution.html

so, what do i want to hear from socialists - not ancaps and not "progressives" - regarding the issue of prostitution?

- decriminalization, but not legalization. don't send people to jail for this, whether it's consensual or not, but try and keep it underground, to keep the economic power in the hand of the sellers. this would functionally legalize independent sellers, while maintaining a strong and vigorously enforced prohibition on things like brothels, escort agencies and other corporate-driven prostitution models. that is, keep the means of production in the hands of the workers, themselves.
- this is important enough to state again: any attempt to corporatize prostitution should be aggressively opposed by anybody calling themselves a socialist.
- more funding for women in at-risk populations. this would include things like increasing access to healthcare, increasing access to education, increasing access to addictions services, more community housing and also increases in social assistance, like welfare.
- more of a focus on teaching men to treat women like people rather than products, and not to see sex as a meaningless high to buy on a market.
- i would also support aggressive action against sex trafficking, which includes aggressive action against pimps, escort agencies and other services that reduce prostitutes to salaried employees. if you're asking me if there's a difference between sex work and sex trafficking, i'd clearly state that the lines are pretty blurry.

once all of this is in place, if women still want to sell, that's up to them.

a lot of the sympathy in the general population around prostitutes' rights is based on the idea that it's an act of desperation - that you shouldn't punish people for trying to survive in such a harshly competitive, capitalist reality. you gotta do what you gotta do; blame the system, not the girl. ok.

but, this argument is taking a different position - it's not arguing that they can't find another job, or that the landlord isn't going to wait for the interview process to complete or that their kids' diabetes can't wait until the end of the month for the insulin shot. what they're saying is "i don't want to do something else. i want to do this. you're infringing on my rights to do what i want.".

well, that's a different perspective; this is not an argument from desperation, it's an argument from entitlement, and it's consequently very different in scope.

i don't think that there should be criminal charges attached to consensual prostitution; it's a reality i can't fathom, but we shouldn't criminalize consensual sex, if it's really consensual. but, i'm actually closer to bernie's position on this than i am to the pro-market, right-libertarian position that's recently creeped into the "progressive" "left": it's far more important to combat trafficking than it is to facilitate sex work as a profession, and if people that choose prostitution out of their own free will get caught up in laws designed to combat trafficking then that's not something i'm going to concern myself too much about.

if these people have specific amendments that can make their lives easier without reversing the general thrust of the bill, they should bring them forward. but, they shouldn't think they're the most important thing, here - because they're not.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/bjpqvz/fosta-sesta-sex-work-and-trafficking

if your primary focus on the border right now is in increasing funding for the private prison system, what are you actually supporting? and, if your primary concern is reducing the amount of spending, what are you actually doing?

don't misunderstand me - i think a good faith application of the court order to advance the best interests of the child means that you have to feed them, as you're quickly moving to place them into foster care. the whole point of the argument i'm making is to advance the best interests of the child. it's even the actual name of the legal doctrine at work, which nobody seems to want you to know about. but, that doesn't reduce to increasing funding for the prison-industrial complex - it rather necessitates an attack on the foundations of the system, itself.

and, this is the thing about "progressives" - they consistently dress up these right-wing, status quo policies in this humanitarian language, to essentially trick you into advancing a corporatist agenda. and, they are taking incredible advantage of social media, and your naivete, in order to do this, right now.

it's funny.

one of the things that the doctor i saw on thursday wanted to stress was that any kind of operation is going to result in me spending a lot of time alone, as though i don't already spend a lot of time alone, and as though i wouldn't rather spend most of my time alone. i'm a real deal introvert - not the kind of phony introvert that thinks it's cool to come off as introspective at parties, but the kind of person that legitimately needs very serious alone time, and a lot of it.

and, i understand that she wasn't just trying to scare me. she was trying to level with me - i know this is something that exists in the literature, and i understand that trans people have high suicide rates, partly for this reason. a bad transition is often times a life-ending mistake, both figuratively and literally. i get it.

but, i've been on hormones for years and years, now. i took a long time to make this choice, and i'm pretty confident in it.

regardless, that's actually not my experience. i get pursued by both sexes, at various levels of intensity. that night at the bathtub pub ended with me dragging a guy halfways down woodward, because he had his hands all over my ass and didn't get that i was walking away.  he followed me out because i was "the hottest girl in the bar" - which was full of prostitutes. strippers, i think, actually. frankly, it's a good thing i had an inch or two on him (and i don't wear heels) and was able to just plow through him. and, even the people that have given me shit are only telling you half the story. i'm pretty sure that one of the guys that was giving me shit on my works review tried to give me an open mouth kiss on the floor - a bold move that fell totally flat as i walked off, and could easily be the cause of some scorn. and, i think that that guy gary something may have been the person that followed me from the red bull to menjo's in mid-2017, told me stories about jamming with david bowie (does he tell that to all of the girls?) and then got pissy about me not wanting to fuck him. i don't, personally, have any trouble getting the attention of men, and i'm quite certain that i'd be having a lot of sex if i actually had any interest in it. a full transition would help with my sex life, not hinder it.

examples of statements said to me tonight by men:

"god, you're fucking hot. i'm so high. can you stay here and help me with my phone?"

which is maybe the lamest excuse of all time to get somebody to stand by you, but whatever. i accepted the compliment.

"my little brother transitioned, so i've spent a lot of time with transwomen, and you're really hot. it's too bad your voice gives you away, because i'd otherwise be trying to fuck you right now."

and i actually don't mind this kind of thing. i don't like being groped - at all - but i actually like the compliments and awkward sexual innuendo, to an extent.

in fact, i actually have minimal experiences with men grabbing me. it's the women that seem to think they have some kind of entitlement, and i want to draw some attention to it because it's becoming normal.

i'm still trying to figure it out, but i've come to expect that i'm going to get mauled or molested by at least one cis-woman pretty much every time i go dancing. sometimes it's subtle. there's this blonde girl that likes to sneak up behind me and adjust the straps on my tank top, and has actually been doing it now for years. i'm not sure what the point is, but it's harmless, and what do i do besides stay still and let her do it? and she always runs off after. i got lunged at at the xiu xiu show by somebody that had been brought there by her boyfriend, who was standing beside her (overheard a few minutes later: so, what are you doing tonight?). a few weeks ago, i got kind of mom-smothered, complete with a smooch. these are selected stories, it's not comprehensive. and, tonight somebody decided to walk up to me and sweep the hair away from my face, in a manner that was either checking for a wig or extensions (nope. it's my hair. all of it.) or getting ready to dive in on me. i'll never know, because her friend literally grabbed her and pulled her away, in apparent concern at about what was going to happen next. i don't know if she was drunk, or maybe on something a little more touchy-feely. it's a weak excuse, either way.

however you want to gender me, and i'm clear about how i gender myself, a certain subset of ciswomen seem to actually like what i've done with myself quite a bit.

but, it's making me understand that patriarchy is a hierarchy, and i'm at the absolute lowest rung of it. there's a concept of entitlement there, there really is.

as distant and aloof as i am, i don't rule out making out with people a priori. it's just that i'm kind of shy and like to move a little slower. like, maybe i might want to know your name and have a conversation with you, first, to start off with. people nowadays are just incredibly forwards, and being at the bottom of the hierarchy means i get the kind of physical advances from women that women don't like to get from men - and that they don't seem to even realize what they're actually doing.

let it be known: i clearly like to dance, and dancing is a good way to approach me. but, like, don't ask to dance with me, because then i think you want me to hold your hand and spin you around like a princess or something, and i'm not going to do that. don't get me wrong: i'm a stickler for consent. but, it's funny that you think you have to ask to dance, but don't think you have to ask to grope me. if you want to dance with me, just dance with me. and then come talk to me after.

i missed the ferndale show because customs was slow, and i spent the rest of the night in the diner because i couldn't find a late show. but, the fun part of the night was fun, even if i'm still trying to figure this out - even if we're maybe all still trying to figure this out.

she's a liar. flat out.


so, you don't know where she stands on medicare, and don't pretend that you do.

but, has anybody checked into the claim that she was actually bused? is that even actually true?

so, kamala harris appears to just tell people whatever they want to hear, basically.

no time for that. next.

fuck it. i need some fresh air.

and it's cold in here.

it's looking like the rain's not moving out of here until after 20:00, and i'm going to end up missing the early show.

that means i'm looking at catching the 21:00 or 21:30 bus over, and getting to ferndale for the last band. i might catch the one before it.  and, then i'll need to bike back, and potentially in the rain....

this is a local act; in fact, i missed them at pj's last week, too. this night isn't making sense for me, at this point. i guess i'll have to hope i catch them again soon....

i was initially considering a show at villain's in windsor, but on closer perusal, it's not that interesting.

tomorrow's flat out dead.

so, we're writing off this weekend, and i actually saw that coming. it's a shame, because i like the humidity, but i don't like the rain; i feel like i'm wasting the weather, after such an awful winter. and, while next weekend may also be a little slow, the week after looks solid. let's hope it stays nice and hot while the show schedule catches up.

if you're to have security in a bar, it's actual function is twofold:

1) to make sure people pay to get in. that's the real reason you have bouncers.
2) to stop men from fighting each other.

....and, yes, i think i was drugged at the works, but the funny thing about that is that i don't actually remember it.

and, is the night life safe in detroit or not?

the truth is that it's a dumb question that is essentially built on the premise of slut shaming. if your primary concern is sexual assault, you can't ask the question of whether somewhere is safe or not - it doesn't work like that. it doesn't matter what she's wearing, it doesn't matter what time of day it is, it doesn't matter if she was by herself, and it doesn't matter if the bar had security - and when i say it doesn't matter, what i mean is statistically, in terms of trying to predict patterns of prevention. the fact is that sexual assault is generally an act of control, and it's not usually a stranger at a bar but rather somebody you've known for years and deeply trust.

so, i'm not falling for this. i'm not answering this question. i'm not proposing these kinds of solutions. the science is crystal clear on this topic: there is only one way to prevent assault, and it's to teach men to stop doing it.

so, you're not safer in a bar with high security in a nice neighbourhood. you might feel safer, but it's a mental trick, and really a reflection of your own prejudices.

the correct answer is that detroit is as safe or unsafe as anywhere else.

i've now been here for a few years and been to a lot of venues and i've only ever really been bothered in a substantive way at one place, and that was the bathtub pub right downtown. i didn't realize it at the time, but there was a prostitution ring operating out of the space. that's been closed for a while.

on second thought, tonight seems kind of pointless, too. i really projected on the quality of the potential shows.

i could potentially hobble something together by hitting the sanctuary early and the loving touch late, but that is actually a lot of biking and then i'm back to drinking in the park from like 4:00-8:00 or something, which is a good enough time once or twice for the year, but i kind of want to save it for something else. if there's even anyone there, which is not guaranteed. this is actually probably going to come down to whether i want to go for a bike ride tonight or not....it at least looks like a beautiful night for it....

either the late night shows are especially underground this weekend or nobody wants to do one because there's lots of options for the rest of the summer opening up next week and nothing at all this week, as far as i can tell. there's been big shows at marble until 3:00 every night, though. it just seems like a lull. legit.

but, if i'm going anywhere tonight, it's to the loving touch, meaning i won't get back into the downtown core until at least 1:30. i guess i could try to hit last call at goth club. if i'm lucky. it's a stretch.

we'll see how i feel in a few hours.

i have made massive progress in paring down that list either way and should have the rest of the month planned out in the next few days, regardless.

and, what i'm saying is not merely a leftist diatribe.

it is actually a historical fact, that historians across the spectrum will agree to, if they've actually taken the time to look into it.

http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/17505/police_and_poor_people

if you think the pigs are there to make you safe, that's a statement of class and privilege.

for the vast majority of people, the pigs are not there to make you safe, they're there to create divisions and cause conflicts.

i also need to point something else out, as the situation unfolds, and i become more cognizant about it.

you may be hearing people say shit about me. maybe you already have. maybe you will in the future.

treat that as a litmus test: these people are undercover pigs. and, maybe you trust them...but, maybe you shouldn't.

and, i'm starting to figure out who they are.

i will reiterate: i'm harmless. i take heavy testosterone suppressors, and am actually in the process of getting my testicles removed, so any concerns about my motives are absurd and transphobic. i have no history of violence, no criminal record and actually have advanced clearance at the border. it is true that i was recently targeted by the transphobic windsor police, but i have no pending charges, i'm not under investigation, and the lawsuit i've been talking about to hold them accountable for a false arrest should be off the ground by mid august at the latest, and probably sooner. i expect a large settlement for the suffering i went through as a consequence of their open discrimination against me.

but, as it was with occupy, i'm going to stay quiet and just point it out. i don't want to get into a conflict with a pig, so i'm just going to take a mental note and an effort to steer clear.

but, what are some signs that somebody is an undercover pig?

1) in activist circles, the biggest telltale sign that you're dealing with a pig is agitation. if you're ever at an activist meeting of any sort, and somebody starts talking about making bombs or resisting violently, then that person is almost certainly a pig. we call them agents provocateurs and what they're doing is trying to entrap you. and, they're sneaky: when i was organizing with food not bombs in ottawa, i had one pig try to convince me to smash up a bar owner's car, because they were accused of sexual assault.

2) the general purpose of an undercover pig is to sow division. what they're trying to do is identify people like me that are some kind of ideological threat to the system - and when i say i'm harmless, i mean i'm harmless to you. i'm not harmless to them. they have good reason to fear me, because my deconstruction of their system is powerful, and subversive. - and turn the mass of people against them. so, with me, they're activating the crude, transphobic fears that the system pushes down from the top in order to try and scare you away from me. i'm happy to report that it isn't actually working, or at least not in the circles that i actually care about, but that's not going to stop them from continuing to do it. when you meet people that are trying to pit one group against another, or trying to single out a specific individual and attack them, that is a telltale sign that the person is an undercover pig.

if you meet an undercover pig that is trying to incite you to do something, entrap you in some way or turn you against something or someone, don't confront them. that doesn't help. you don't actually want the undercover pig to know that you know, because then you get on their list. you might imagine that it's a process of identifying them and running them out, but it doesn't actually work like that. rather, we all collectively need to be wise to them and who they are (and there's my anarchism, again) and work very subtly to undo what they're doing.

so, when you have an undercover pig trying to sow division and dischord, which is essentially fud, one of the best things to do is assert logic. is there evidence for the claim? no, listen - this is important, because the undercover pigs assume you won't do that. they assume they can just make shit up, and that you're too stupid to ask questions. the best antidote for divide and conquer is the reassertion of logic. even when you're drunk. always.

and, if the undercover pig is trying to incite or entrap you then you should get up and get out as fast as possible.

as mentioned, i actually don't think that anything that is being done is having any substantive effect. but, i'm becoming more and more aware that it's actually being done, and this is my official reaction: to know how to identify a pig when they're standing in front of you, and to be clear that this is what is actually happening.

"all good people are asleep and dreaming."

i just want to clarify what i said about mocad earlier, because we're increasingly living in a culture where we think it's ok to attack things for being different than us, and to a large extent that's actually what i'm trying to avoid.

so, i don't really like what's happening at mocad tonight: i think it's crude and greedy and bourgeois and pretty gross. this is apparently a part of a series that is going to feature foreign djs right in downtown detroit with inflated covers, over-policed spaces, over-priced drinks (no doubt) and gentrifying audiences, shut down before midnight. that's something i'd like to avoid, and i'd even use the word boycott. but, if i don't like it, and i don't want to be near it, does that mean i want to shut it down?

actually, i think it probably serves a purpose. and, i mentioned this in a previous post: let them have their own space. that is, if what they want is a place full of cops that caters to a more wealthy crowd that is afraid of poor people and their habits, then let them have it - and tell them to stay out of the dive bars, and to take the cops with them when they leave. because this is the exact opposite of what i want....

what i want is places in out of the way spaces - houses, warehouses, parks, etc - where the crowd mostly polices itself and the drinks are cheap, or brought by the patrons themselves.

because i'm an anarchist. and you're not.

so, if the kind of thing that mocad is doing tonight has the effect of keeping the kind of people that will go to a dive bar in an out of the way neighbourhood and complain that they don't feel safe out of those dive bars in out of the way neighbourhoods and in more wealthy neighbourhoods where they feel safer, then that is good for everybody. let them have their upper class spaces in the gentrifying zones; and let me have my lower class ones outside of them.

deal?

if i was concerned about wasting anything, it would be this nice warm weather, which is scarce, and not some worthless money.

they downgraded the 60% pop to 40% pop, but i usually rely more on the radar. it's more a question of where it's going to rain than if it's going to rain. it seems like the path shifted south, so the rain is coming through windsor rather than hamtramck.

what i'm missing is some potentially interesting noise in a basement, and a lengthy process of drinking while wasting time waiting for the bus, first at a dive bar and then in a park.

the thing is that i enjoy all of these things. but it's not like it's singular or anything. you could make the argument that i'm saving money, but i'd counter that i'm saving it to waste on something else, and it's actually not that much of a concern to me just right now.

i think tomorrow looks like a better night all around, though.

and, it looks like i should've gone.

*shrug*.

.......annnnd there's actually a flood advisory and major thunderstorm warning in hamtramck overnight. it's directly in the path of the system.

i had to really stretch to squeeze a night out of this, pulling together an experimental basement show, a sparsely attended techno night and an outdoor park party. if the weather's nice, it'll be great. if it's raining, it won't be.

my intuition is to stay in entirely.

yeah, i'm not doing bonobo. it's...

it's really overly co-modified. and, i'm not a detroit techno purist; i prefer idm from the uk. but, they're bringing in this kind of middling white instrumental hip-hop artist, setting the show up at 6:00 pm and shutting him down before midnight. for the not so low price of $25.

so, come to detroit and celebrate your independence by listening to a white brit appropriate your own music and sell it back to you for twice the price, in the complete wrong context? and, then you have to deal with the tight-ass security at the mocad, too. it's a bad deal. and, it's in some sense the new detroit: this is gentrification, and a lot of people aren't going to know any better.

if you're around, just go to marble, instead - they're open late, and in a very real way it's literally the exact place that a lot of this stuff actually developed out of.

i may show up there very late, but i'm doing something else entirely, if the weather co-operates. but, it's obscure. in fact, it's somebody's house, so, i'm going to avoid details until after the fact. it's one thing to invite you all to a bar; it's another to invite you to a house show.

it's actually a great night for bad music in detroit.

- snoop dog (lion? bear? dinosaur?) & bones thug 'n' harmony are doing an outdoor set, where all the potheads can enjoy the thunderstorms.
- jennifer lopez is playing the hockey arena

....and vanilla ice is in windsor. seriously. but, i'm not under much pressure to go. not even with both of them looking down on me, now.

this could be a really difficult conundrum for the kind of person of a certain age with absolutely no concept of taste, whatsoever. really.

there's a moderately well known dj, bonobo, spinning tonight, but it's in a weird venue and appears to likely be done before 11:00. it's at least outside, but it seems kind of lame to me to bring somebody in like that and tell them they're done before the bars open - unless there's a late party, and then that makes sense.

goth club is the same problem as always: they close at 4:00, if you're lucky. i need something going until 6:00 or 7:00. although it's friday, actually, so the saturday bus is early...hrmmn...

but, if there's a late party, i may rather go to the noise show at the old miami. i dunno.

or i may just stay in if the weather turns for the worse.i had to scratch a lot of things off to get here, and what's left is by default, and not all that compelling.

yeah. i noticed that.

i assumed he really thought we had uteruses (uteri?) sown in or something, and just kind of let it pass. i do hope somebody explained it to him, though.

the other option is more sinister, and he deserves the benefit of the doubt, a priori.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/07/02/2020-debates-trans-issues-227257

i need to be clear, though.

the only reason i was interested in the primaries last time is that you had a transformational candidate running. i didn't pay that kind of attention to 2012, or any previous democratic primary, or any previous american election.

the obituaries in the papers are ahead of themselves, but sanders is not doing this right and if he keeps along this path, he's going to lose. and, i'm simply not going to have the interest in analyzing a primary between elizabeth warren and joe biden; i have no horse in that race.

i'm not officially signing off, but i'm quickly losing interest.

but, it's going to rain tomorrow.

ugh.

they're all really, really bad, though. at least what's left. they all sound like they couldn't figure out what speed their older brother's cool records were supposed to play at, or something. or maybe grew up listening to their parents trying to jam on fentanyl.

and they're done at like 3:00. then, what?

no, i'm holding out for tomorrow. let's hope it clears up.

woo!

i'm a cynical ass, and i'd honestly be terribly bored. but don't mind me. have one for me. really.

U
S
A
!

U
S
A
!

if you are in detroit, and are horribly bored, your best bet is probably marble bar, where they're doing some kind of throwback to 1977 or something.

so, i had my follow-up today on the testicle removal procedure (orchidectomy)  and they claim they're following through with it. i'll need to wait for a phone call. but, you know that feeling you get when somebody says they'll call and you know they don't actually intend to? i dunno. these are doctors, you'd think they'd be forthright; i could be being paranoid. but, i'm going to have to stay on their ass about it.

i think what i'm waiting for is a call back to schedule an appointment for the surgery in toronto.

speaking of which, i finished my monthly cleaning routine on wednesday morning and, after a sleep, have spent the last roughly 24 hours clearing my event list of toronto concerts for july, as i am more than tentatively planning to go at the end of the month and to make a weekend out of it: i'll go down on a friday, serve in toronto and then file on the monday morning in london. i will check each of these discarded listings out as i'm working through the court documents, but i need to pare the list down to make it actually usable. so, i've been working backwards, and i think i'll be done soon.

i am thoroughly convinced that the oiprd review has been shelved, and that's fine, we'll let the judge deal with that. she won't be happy about it, trust me.

if there was a band playing somewhere tonight, i'd probably want to check it out. but, all i'm seeing are independence day drinking parties, and that's something i'd actually rather avoid. i mean, even if i was actually an american, i'd still want to avoid that. not my scene. sorry.

so, i'll be in tonight and potentially for the weekend - i'm not sure yet. but, the next task will be to get the event list into more of a normal looking shape for the rest of july.

and, what is my takeaway on this? i'm supposed to be trying to figure out where the fun went in this town. my conclusion is that there are still rock shows happening, but that "art rock" as a concept is mostly dead here. i like punk as a political vehicle, but i've never wanted to listen to the kind of barebones rock music that seems to dominate the detroit scene; i'd mostly argue it's pretty boring. the rock music that is organic to this place is midwestern and lower class both in identity and in attitude; it treats sophistication with suspicion and contempt, which was always the worst instincts in the punk scene. but, detroit remains a sprawling metropolis, and it's just a question of finding where the more meaningful outlet of expression lies. i think i'm better off looking in the noise, electronic and experimental scenes for a bit. and, i'm not sure the kind of rock music that i like is going to make much of a comeback, in the long run, although i'll have to keep looking for it. if it does, it won't happen here, and it might even skip here on tour.

so, i hit a "botanical fortress" show last weekend, which was a mix of post-rock, experimental, idm and noise acts. this show lasted late, so i got to the techno party late; it was also kind of lacklustre. there were some moderately interesting early rock shows, and an early trip-hop show, but i missed all of them. i was just late....but i'm usually late....so it wasn't the best night, but i insist it was the best path. i even sort of lost track of time, a little, as i had another trans person talking my head off all night.

the weekend before that, i found myself checking out a keyboard prog act on friday, an ambient show in the park on saturday afternoon, a not-so-doomy rock band called earth, a cyberpunk night and a couple of overnight techno parties.

i saw a noise show the weekend before that. and, if i head out this weekend, it's likely to be to shows of this sort; this is what is happening here right now that is of some actual interest to me, and where you're likely to find me in the short run.

that said, you'll also see me continue to check out touring bands, and these will mostly be more in the 90s rock tradition that i'm most comfortable in.

so, yes, we're in a down point, but it may be structural, and the creative music scene may be permanently shifting away from rock music and towards electronic music. and, how many times have you heard that? so, we'll see how that works out, but it's what i see in front of me just right now.

and, yes, i would be happy to see a more substantive creative/electronic/noise scene open up here. it's what i actually do, remember.

while my motives are rather different, and i may not like what comes next, i am fully in support of the decision by jason kenney to stop shipping alberta's oil by rail.

now, if we could just get him to stop shipping it by pipe, too...

i admit that i spent hours and hours and hours with this specific game.

on a windows 3.1 pc.

without internet access. the 14.4 modem was in the "computer room" for collective use. no router.

....around the time that u2's pop was released.

but, that's really the extent of it. honestly.

i mean, i remember sitting back and watching friends play these first-person shooter things and just wondering why they enjoyed it.

walking around with a gun and shooting things is something i'd classify as boring.

i would like to post a periodic reminder that there is a fake deathtokoalas out there. he appears to be a teenager, or young 20-something perhaps by this point, who lives in the city of new york.

the fake deathtokoalas is a gamer and owns, amongst other things, a twitch profile. i played games like civ 2 and command and conquer a little bit when i was his age, or a little younger, but have not touched video games of any sort in well over 20 years. the most advanced game console that i ever owned was a sega genesis that my dad bought me around '93 or so. and, i'm actually pretty ignorant about the topic; it's really not something that i ever had the slightest interest in.

all of my sites are on the right hand side of this blog. i don't have any interest in creating secret sites: i want you to be able to find my writing, which is why i've spent so much time centralizing it like this. so, if it's not in the list, it's not me. promise.

let's wait this out a little. i still think you have to see a sanders v. everybody dynamic emerge eventually, once the differences in policy are unblurred by a media that is dishonestly blurring them. the question is how big the sanders wing is and how big the everybody else wing is, in the end.

but, i mean, i don't know why you insist on two parties down there, anyways.

....but sanders is white.

and male.

that's not acceptable, a priori.

harris wants to cut taxes.

warren wants to break up the monopolies to encourage free market competition.

you put them together, it would be a dream republican ticket c. 1995, wouldn't it?

just about the last thing the united states needs right now is more tax cuts.

identity politics is a different thing, really - it's the idea that you are not an individual, but a representative of an intersection of physical traits that define your experiences and ideas and feelings. as such, you are best represented by those that have the same intersection of physical traits. the history in critical race theory notwithstanding, i've argued previously that this largely comes out of the statistical reality of trying to analyze variables, and pull patterns out of the data, but it's an inversion of the process into pseudoscience: instead of looking at the data and trying to pull meaningful variables out of it, you start with a set of predetermined variables and then try to force reality into it. so, you're essentially breaking statistics by making it deductive instead of empirical. as you're operating on circular logic, your deductions follow trivially from your assumptions (they were picked for that reason). but, it's easy to see why the marketing people like this.

that's not actually what we're seeing in front of us, though, or at least not in the sense that it actually works.

i'll invite you to do your own research into how elections worked at the beginnings of the modern era, when the vote was extended past the landholding classes and first to white men without property, and then to white women without property (white women with property could always vote.), and then to a wide assortment of other groups that were initially excluded from the process. how did that work?

well, to begin with, you have to understand that the vast majority of these people, these white men without property, were unable to read. they had little understanding of who or what they were voting for, or why it would or would not be in their best interests. so, you had ridiculous things like candidates giving out free beer in exchange for votes, and you had to find ways to direct these people that you were giving free beer to to vote for you, because they couldn't read the names in the list. so, you'd give them detailed instructions: it's the third option from the top and looks like this symbol: (insert name). or, you'd tell them what colour to vote for.

so, while these people did not understand what they were voting for, they were able to participate in the process via a little bit of direction, a little bit of help.

i think what you're seeing in the media's forceful adoption of what people are calling "identity politics" has more to do with low information voters, and is essentially a continuation of this process that you saw in the nineteenth century. instead of instructions and colour codes, the media is trying to operate via identity, but it's not actually about identity so much as it's about training them to do what they're told.

the major flaw in the left's approach for years has been it's insistence on trying to use laws to restrict the power of money in politics, rather than to try and teach critical thinking so people can work it out on their own. and, we've essentially reverted to a more primitive era as a result of it. now, we're stuck scratching our heads wondering why people are so fucking stupid - but we should have seen it coming and tried to reverse it.

ok, i went through this in 2016 and i'm adamant about actually learning from the process rather than making the same mistakes.

you don't want to pay attention to media polls as a measure of public interest, not even if they have good methodology; there is a conflict of interest at play, and they've been clear enough about what they want. you need to take a gramscian analysis to this: the media is not an unbiased arbiter that has an interest in accurately measuring public opinion, but rather an active participant in the process that goes out of it's way to create public opinion for the purposes of maximizing profit.

and, the media has been clear that it thinks a candidate driven by what it is being called "identity politics" (but is too crude to even be that) will drive ratings. so, it wants a female candidate because it knows that gender rivalry is good for ratings, or it wants a black candidate because it knows that race conflict is good television. it doesn't care about actual policy.

so, i'm standing here saying "you know, a corporatist democrat like harris isn't really that different than trump on most things, may be a little better on some things, and may be a lot worse in a lot of important ways.", whereas the media is saying "sanders and trump are the same candidate because they're both white men, and that's bad for ratings. we need somebody that looks different than trump to maximize ratings."

so, they'll flat out publish fake polls to try and create what they want.

but, there's a caveat: what they do is actually effective on a large number of voters. that is, if the media decides that x candidate won the debate, and broadcasts it for days or weeks, you'll start to see that coverage reflected in real polling.

wait for polls done by non-media sources.

but, the media is being crystal clear on the type of candidate it wants to support, namely somebody that looks different than trump, and it's just another hurdle for the left to overcome - albeit a very substantive one.

but, there's actually a very serious question being raised here: just how long can the prime minister hold out for, here? and is this self-discipline futile or self-defeating in the end, in the sense that it's just building anticipation?

i mean, i think people are perhaps overstating the role and purpose of the g20.

i spent years arguing and protesting in favour of abolishing the forum as a waste of time, so i'm not going to pivot towards getting upset that the president's daughter is overstepping on a security clearance. you don't really think they talked about anything substantive there, do you?

the g20 is a series of pointless photo-ops, meaningless declarations and distractions and financial giveaways to causes that bourgeois charities consider in vogue. it's more like a celebrity gala than a serious policy meeting. and, in that sense, ivanka is perhaps better suited to attend than most of the heads of states.

so, my position has not changed: the g20 is a waste of time and money and should be abolished outright. i don't care if the president brought his daughter to this waste of time and money or not, or why she was there.

i'm actually more curious as to why the dutch sent their queen rather than their prime minister.

but whatever.

to be clear: now trudeau has to get past ivanka to talk to trump. and that may be a difficult task.

ivanka would actually appear to be a buffer state, erected between donald and justin.

she seems happy enough to play the part.