swaziland.

is this:

a) a reverse transliteration of 'switzerland'.
b) south waziland
c) a very small, landlocked country in africa
d) a weapons manufacturing facility
e) a fictional land that some christians made up to trick you into giving them money.

my mother remarried when i was in grade school; he was a lebanese christian with a colonial french name, so i guess my mom was attracted to middle eastern looking men at the time (my father being quite phenotypically italian and/or jewish). they met through alcoholics anonymous...

he was not initially very christian or very strict about it, but that changed very quickly after they were married. around grade 6 or 7, my mom eventually had to kick him out for punching a hole in the wall out of anger - sober. fwiw, she ended up dating the guy that fixed the hole in the wall....but only after a lengthy binge...

anyways.

they sent me to one sunday school class, when i was around eight or nine. it was at a methodist church in the south of kanata, at fallowfield & eagleson. we went all the way across the city because he didn't want the people at the church to know he had adopted children from his wife's previous marriage; she only went to a service or two, and even i, as a young kid, could figure out the marriage was over after that. that was an insult she never accepted, and that i don't think he ever even understood.

that's as long as i lasted before getting banned - one sunday. and, why?

because i picked (e), and argued the point rather vehemently.

the correct answer is, in fact, (c).

why was i so confident, though?

because i knew the name of every country in africa, could identify each one on a map and even knew the names of all of the capitals. swaziland simply did not exist, because, if it did, i would know where it was, and what it's capital was.

the problem was that my map didn't have swaziland on it, because it's so incredibly small.

but, i would not be deterred. convinced that my fellow children were being taken advantage of for nefarious aims, i disrupted the meeting until it was cancelled, shouting slogans and lecturing the fellow students to think for themselves.

when i came back the following week, we both had atlases with us, and she was able to convince me that the place at least existed by pointing to an area that was listed on my map as a protectorate, rather than a country, although i refused to concede the point, nonetheless - i could see that swaziland existed, but that didn't mean it was a country. what was it's capital? and, it's surrounded by south africa. how can it be a country inside of another country? that was an impossibility to my young mind. so, i was able to see that swaziland is at least a real place, even as i remained skeptical about it's status as an independent state. i walked out convinced i had made my point, and the church was scamming people for aid money, like they do on tv.

they handed me a copy of the beatitudes and asked me not to come back.

i read them.

...and i liked some of them, but didn't like others.

memories are strange things, huh?

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

i missed this.

but, i never seriously entertained any other option.

https://www.thenation.com/article/a-new-report-raises-big-questions-about-last-years-dnc-hack/

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

perfect!

i know comte from calculus, mostly. his theorems, or at least as they've come down to me, were always very tidy.

except we should update the names of the months, and they should be subject to renewal every century.

there should be space for einstein, darwin, heisenberg, turing and godel to start off with - and little room for religious icons or war criminals.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positivist_Calendar

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

* godel's month should be the last one, so it is either inconsistent or incomplete

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Fixed_Calendar

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

actually, 13 months is better than 14 months, here.

364 = (2^2)*7*13 = 13*28 = 13*(4*7).

that way, all 13 months have exactly four weeks.

yeah.

that's how you do this...

then, you get new years as a free day, and new years gets to be two days every four years (most of the time).

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

oh, and i don't really care about the dates of the rituals.

sorry.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

"you want to have days that exist outside of months? what are you, some kind of anarchist or something? that's lunacy.."

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

this person agrees.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-rosenthal-february-too-short-0202-biz-20160201-column.html

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

is february inherently unjust?

hear me out, here.

now, i should point out before i start that this doesn't affect me, personally, because my income is fixed, monthly. if anything, i do a little better in february. but, i remember doing the math on this years ago and being peeved by it.

so, consider somebody that is paid hourly and has a monthly rent to pay. that person is going to lose 2-3 days in february (7.5*15*3 = $337.50), and yet also have to pay about 6.66% extra rent for the month, due to it only being 28 days, which, at $700/month (what i'm paying...) would be $46.66.

so, that's about a $400 shortfall. and, you even lose money in the leap year.

what a rip-off...

i understand that our calendar is not arbitrary. but, do we really have to split the 365.2422 days up quite like this?

365 = 5*73.

that's a high prime number, isn't it?

364 = (2^2)*7*13 = 26*14

so, if we had 14 months of 26 days, and a special free day that is not in a month at all, we could even this out a bit better. on leap years, we could have two free days, instead.

who do i petition for this?

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

and, i'll repeat once again that i've never seen a gun before in my life.

ever.

and, i hope i never do, too.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

there is no legislative solution to the gun problem in the united states.

this is something that has to happen in the form of a social revolution.

jagnmeet singh must cut his beard.

america always says "this is not who we are".

but, what america has to do, here, is look in the mirror more carefully, realize this is who they are, stop living in denial about it and change themselves accordingly.

that has to happen at a deep cultural level, in discussions between fathers and sons, and not by passing authoritarian laws that nobody is going to listen to, anyways - perhaps for no other reason than that the law exists.

after all, prohibition did a good job getting rid of heroin and prostitution, right?

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

again: i hate guns.

but, i know that the problem in the united states is the gun culture, and not the gun industry.
 
i would consequently argue that sanders' position on guns was far more progressive than clinton's was; i'd even go so far as to argue that listening to him talk about this topic was one of the things that made it clear to me that he was a legit independent candidate, and not just another party stooge. for, clinton was - like many democrats - keen to broadcast a set of positions that she was clearly going to backtrack on (as she sold the worst kinds of weapons to the worst kinds of human rights abusers), whereas sanders was taking a more subtle, more thoughtful, more intelligent and more realistic approach to the issue that, if implemented, may have actually had some actual effect.

i don't see any reason why assault rifles of this sort should be available for purchase.

but, i don't think that banning their sales is going to reduce the violence, either.

i'd be more likely to support this kind of ban for the reason that, once it's passed, it can be crossed off the list. and, i do not mean to be dour, but once these things keep happening post-ban, perhaps more people will come around to sanders' more thoughtful analysis of the situation.

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/bernie-sanders-guns_us_5a89ad60e4b004fc31934edb

jagmeet sing must cut his beard

let me out....!

i've been clear that i hate markets and want to at least escape them (art cannot be based on demand, or it is no longer art, but merely a commodity), but graeber is as close to my views as anybody else is on this topic.

i intially typed that i wanted to destroy them, but that was a little bit emotional of me, and i pulled back; if somebody designs a functionally useless, but environmentally friendly, piece of hemp plastic that people want to buy, what the fuck do i care? right?

i just want a way out...and that's something starving artists have been screaming for centuries...

http://www.businessinsider.com/most-american-workers-are-slaves-2014-4

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

a ubi is not full communism.

but, it would be the most important step our society has taken towards emancipation since the 60s. and, it would immeasurably eliminate the unquantifiable level of wasted talent attached to the unfortunate continuation of what is truly unnecessary labour in the 21st century.

it would drastically improve the province's quality of life. and, this is what i care about - not budgets and taxes.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

this is something else that i've been in strong support of for years, and would like to hear an update around before the election.

i don't see this as buying votes, even if the premier does (and she seriously might). i conceive of this as an artist's grant; this is in truth exactly the kind of society i want to build - one where people are free to explore their ambitions, without succumbing to the tyranny of the market, and getting stuck in the doldrums of wage slavery.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/basic-income-cheques-going-to-400-households-as-project-gets-off-to-slow-start-1.4329212

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

and, here comes the media to convince you to give away your freedoms in exchange for security from a threat that doesn't exist.

right on schedule.

i have yet to see anybody else figure this out. and, that itself is a sad indictment on america, itself.

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/mueller-s-russia-indictments-prove-american-election-laws-are-inadequate-ncna848941

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

it's just a reminder, though:

the united states never bothered to release a shred of credible evidence tying osama bin laden, al qaeda or really anybody else to the 9/11 attacks.

but, we know what the history books will say, and no doubt already do say.

i can sit here all day and scream "but...but....", but it's not going to make any difference. and, likewise, those that study history, and understand it, will have to accept that this is simply an unsolved case that won't ever get resolved.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

it's not my fault, i was sleeping.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3qm2tTD_oQ

you know your misanthropy runs deep when even your subconscious dream state starts throwing stuff around like this:

i don't want knowledge,
i want certainty! 

fucking humans...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddn-5uKH6MU

i ignored the germans.

zee germans.

everybody ignores the germans...

i did it on purpose, this time. could they have done this? better than the russians could have, as the stasi didn't go through the same period of technological stagnation and, frankly, decline after 1980.

it's not in german interests...

but, i do think that  the germans took down the world trade center.

i repeat: i think the germans were behind the wtc attacks.

it's funny how we don't register that everything happened in berlin, isn't it?

motive: to crash the dollar, to bring in the euro as the global reserve currency.

and, i'm actually not convinced that the americans actually figured it out, potentially making it the crime of the millennium.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

to begin with, let's note that what's happened in the jump from the hacking to the social media is a classic bait and switch.

i frankly don't think it matters if the russians ran social media bots. that is protected speech under the first amendment. to me, the bigger questions are surrounding why it is that the fbi is cracking down on free speech, and using this kind of fake crisis as an opportunity to do so.

but, let us put that aside to address the hacking allegations.

my understanding of this is that it was sophisticated enough that the list of suspects is very short:

1) israel
2) the cia
3) china

aaron kind of unconvincingly drops the point he should be pushing back on. "sure, it could have been the russians..."

the quick story is that russia went through a total collapse at the same time as the technological revolution. the russians were always way behind us and needed our help to keep up (see sutton). but, the technology situation is really dire, due to that perfect storm.

putin has spoken at length about the need to end russia's reliance on american technology.

and, it's worse than you might imagine, for them, too. the intelligence consensus has long been that the russians rely on microsoft products and other american technologies that make it easy for america to get into their networks, but never developed the state capacity - which is different than random hackers - to engage in information warfare in any meaningful sense, because they lack the basic infrastructure to do it.

so, i frankly don't think that the russians actually have the capability to do this.

but, we're looking at other suspects, nonetheless.

if it was china, and any evidence existed, they would be targeted immediately, although there is little motive for the chinese to prefer trump (and i agree that the russians at least hate hillary, even as i'm less convinced that they love trump).

that leaves israel or the cia. but, i don't think you have to actually choose.

and, aaron is in fact aware of the evidence tying israel to the mess, because i've heard him talk about it. netanyahu is quite partisan in the united states, clearly preferring the republican party.

collusion becomes occam's razor, in the case of israeli involvement, due to how closely mossad works with the cia. there are examples of mossad working behind the cia's back, but that was a long time ago, and the state department's shady behaviour in making unsubstantiated claims doesn't uphold the idea that they were in the dark.

but, regardless of the extent of israeli involvement, it can't happen without ultimate direction from the cia, who leaked to assange, who then became their useful idiot.

the evidence is there, if you wish to look for it.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard

actually, i apologize.

i only moved across the street, but i switched ridings.

and, this one is actually competitive.

looks like i'll have a race to pay attention to....

as mentioned: my preference would be to return the sitting government.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windsor_West_(provincial_electoral_district)

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

first idea:

turn your fucking tv off.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

oh, and i got my first "normal" electric bill.

< 120 kwh.

with the rebate?

$0.

i'm being responsible with my usage, and being rewarded for it. i might suggest others give it a try, if they think their bills are too high.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

i'm sure the government would rather have me on their side, nonetheless.

but, my focus is going to be on preventing the conservatives from winning, and depending on how the numbers play out, that might mean broadcasting that only the ndp can win.

we're not there yet.

and, i frankly think horwath is a good 30 degrees to the right of wynne, and not likely to carry on with the things i like about the sitting government - i don't want it to come to that.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

i've been clear that i don't see a reason to change the government in ontario, which has made some errors, but is, overall, moving in the right direction.

yes, hydro lines are a natural monopoly, and it doesn't make sense to privatize them. that's my only substantive criticism of the government: it has privatized a couple of things that it should have kept public.

and, i'll admit i kind of wish i had a medical records system. like, i wish the system worked; that would be a useful thing for people like me that have trouble keeping track of things like vaccinations.

but, broadly speaking, these are minor criticisms; i am broadly in support of the trajectory of the sitting government of ontario.

as i'm in an ndp lock, if i find myself voting, it's only going to be in the scenario where i need to try to stop a pc landslide.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard

but, i mean..

...yes, a green bin program is exactly the kind of thing that's going to pull me into a voting booth.

as would be threats of cancelling one.

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

i guess we should expect more info in the spring.

https://www.ebr.gov.on.ca/ERS-WEB-External/displaynoticecontent.do?noticeId=MTMzOTI0&statusId=MjAzNzAz

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

i am strongly, strongly in favour of this.

but, it's going to require a helluva stick.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/banning-food-waste-ontario-organic-compost-1.4244374

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.

so, i'm coming up against a problem surrounding compost.

for years, i dropped my compost off at a muslim youth group. yes: i'd rather have dropped it somewhere else, somewhere secular. but, at least i wasn't wasting it. and i couldn't find anywhere else...

the youth group shut down, and now i have nowhere to bring the compost.

the ideal solution would be to set up a green bin program, but the city council says it's too expensive - a laugh, considering that they've built two new city halls over the last decade. there would no doubt be plenty of money for this, if they'd stop wasting it on themselves.

the truth is that there isn't any popular support for this, here.

i live in an old apartment with potential rodent and roach issues. i shouldn't even be leaving leftovers out. the idea that i can compost this myself, in this building, is a non-starter. what i do is leave it in the freezer until i find somewhere to compost it...

the ontario government has mused about setting up green bin programs, province wide. this would be something i'd vote for.

right now, my freezer is nearly full, and i'm running the risk of having to empty it a second time (i didn't find out the old drop-off was closed until a few days before i moved, and i just had to get rid of bags and bags of organic material, because my new freezer was a lot smaller than the old one).

the city council will never pass this here. the city votes ndp, but it's not very educated, and consequently tends to view any kind of environmentalism, including things as basic as bike lanes, as a waste of money. it's a city full of dumb union stooges that just don't care about the environment; this is a city that is very much susceptible to a trump or ford like demagogue, should one appear. sadly, a local politician could probably win an election in this city by promising to cancel all recycling altogether.

i'm not exaggerating: people really just don't care, here, to the point that they get angry and hostile over the costs. it's depressing, but i know better than to think you can convince these people of anything...

so, if this is not legislated provincially, it won't happen.

in the mean time? wish me luck. but, i have a month to figure this out, at most, before i need to start clearing. and, i don't think i'm going to find anybody to take it...

jagmeet singh must cut his beard.