if this leads to decreases in car ownership in favour of more adoption of public transportation, it could be a net benefit to the planet.

housing is a right and the price of housing recently is a challenge. however, owning your own vehicle is a luxury, and it's not sustainable for every family to own their own car, or even two or three. the vast majority of people, particularly people that live in cities, should be forced to rely on walking, bicycling and taking the bus or subway.

making cars too expensive to own by hiking tariffs that put them out of the reach of young people is a step in the right direction in building a sustainable economy.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/business/autos/article/heres-why-car-prices-have-shot-through-the-roof-post-pandemic/

it's utterly baffling that washington expects israel to work with the islamic fascists that they installed in syria.

upon arrival in paris, mossad should immediately assassinate this nazi piece of shit that the americans are currently propping up in damascus.

that said, the united states briefly changed the monroe doctrine during fdr's presidency, and that is a change that should not have been abandoned and should be reconsidered.

it is a good idea for the various countries of latin america to form a common front, and canada and greenland should support that common front, but the spanish and portugese, let alone the french and english, need to not concern themselves with this, and be quiet.

The occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and interests of the United States are involved, that the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers.

We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those powers to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power, we have not interfered and shall not interfere. But with the Governments who have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have, on great consideration and on just principles, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any European power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States.

i have to point out that the indoor smokeless grill i bought a few weeks ago to cook the boneless chicken breast that i got at the food bank last summer (and has been in the freezer for months) is working quite spectacularly. the chicken cooks from a mostly unfrozen state (still very cold and a little icy, it's at the back of the fridge, near the vent to the freezer) very well, very plump and juicy and very grill-like tasting, but without any remote signs of char, burnt carbon, blackness, etc. it's a sandwich maker, too, so you pull the top down and squish it a little and it cooks right through in about five minutes. it produces almost no grease, but it's boneless chicken breast. i was initially wondering if i wasted the $30 and if i was going to use it, but i am sure i will use it. i haven't tried it for bacon yet because i actually want crunchy bacon bits for the chicken caesar but i could try it for the tomato sandwiches or bacon and eggs and see. i suspect it will cook salami/sausage and burgers quite well, as well.

i haven't post a recipe in a while.

this is my normal kale caesar salad, which i'm adding one half of a grilled chicken breast to, to make the chicken kale caesar salad:

- 110 grams of cut up green kale. it's usually curly, but sometimes it's not so curly.

- two cloves of garlic, chopped

- one avocado, chopped

- a handful of fresh dill, chopped

- one lime, chopped

- one orange, chopped

- 50 grams of broccoli florets, chopped (as topping)

- two pieces of whole wheat brown bread, cut up

- one cup of fortified, unsweetened soy milk

- one tbsp of nutritional yeast (with b12)

- three slices of slightly overcooked bacon, with the grease and oil it's cooked in

- one tbsp of olive oil margarine

- ten slices of cheddar cheese

- one tbsp each of paprika, hemp seeds, cumin, sunflower seeds, oregano, cayenne pepper, black pepper, dried dill

- as much as a half a container of store bought caesar dressing

- a lot of frank's hot sauce

+ a half of a boneless chicken breast, grilled on an indoor smokeless grill.

- served with a tall glass of grapefruit/orange juice

i realized the other day that it's just about the most nutritious salad imaginable.

notes:

- i am not into worcestershire sauce or dijon mustard, but who is? i find the mix of frank's (plus paprika and cayenne), nutritional yeast, cumin and soy, in addition to the store bought caesar, to be superior. the store bought caesar tastes like caesar and has a little egg and a little fish.

- i use chopped fresh limes, dill and oranges, not lime or lemon juice.

- i use whole wheat bread instead of croutons.

- i prefer the cheddar cheese to the parmesan

- the remaining seeds and spices are for iron and other nutrients and don't have a large effect on the taste

- i was using probiotic yogurt as a thickener at one point, but they removed all of the fortified vitamins after the trudeau government made fortification voluntary, so i stopped buying it. yogurt is a good medium for fortification but, without the added vitamins, yogurt is pretty useless, as food.

it's a big salad - a full meal. you might even need to split it. but give it a try.

i wasn't there and i don't know the details, but i don't imagine that chomsky would have thought that avoiding epstein may have in any way altered his behaviour. chomsky did not support bds because he didn't think it would work and he was probably right.

chomsky appears to have had his own self-interest at work in trying to develop contacts with wealthy members of the elite, and particularly wealthy jews. everybody knows who chomsky is, but it's not so easy to give them a call. chomsky appears to have been trying to leverage the contact with epstein to gain audiences with people that would otherwise not have called him back, for professional purposes. that's what the evidence i've seen suggests.

it's hard to know what was going through noam's mind when carol died, given that they had known each other their whole lives. chomsky was a pretty conservative guy, really. the premise that he'd be interested in little girls strikes me as absurd. but i don't really know.

it's probably not helpful to be too binary about this. might chomsky have gained something from this that was worthwhile to him, to his writing, to his audience? if so, what value would have boycotting epstein had, if it meant he lost access to source material?

https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/chomsky-epstein-and-the-responsibility-of-intellectuals

i'm not concerned about whether the maduro kidnapping breaks international law. there's not really any such thing as international law, unless countries decide to abide by it, and the united states has long chosen not to do that. it's sort of absurd to hold the united states to standards it rejects, under the force of no body that can enforce it. the cliche is that the state is a monopoly on violence. so, whose army will tell the united states to obey the law?

i'm more concerned about whether the kidnapping of maduro breaks american law, and whether there may be domestic ramifications in us courts.

i have suggested in repeated posts that the only way out of this mess is for the several universities in the area to buy these towers out and convert them into dorms. 

they legitimately look like decent dorm rooms. the universities can rent them out for 20 years and break even before they start turning a profit on them. this would pull large amounts of students out of the general housing market and open up more spaces for low income renters that want somewhere medium to longterm, rather than somewhere to sleep and study for 2-8 years.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cqxq32zzq8eo

the recycling here in ontario is changing dramatically for the worse starting now.

the new blue bin in ontario now accepts the following items, in addition to the items (glass/plastic/metal) that it was previously collecting:

- red bin items (paper)

- all plastic, even plastic not considered recyclable

- composite materials

- plastic lids

- freezer bags

- chip bags, candy wrappers, etc

- plastic bags

we have, for years, had municipally run recycling in ontario, so the different boxes accepted different materials. what's happening is that a collection of multinational firms including loblaws, tim hortons and macdonalds are taking over the recycling program through a joint venture called "circular materials".

several of these companies, most notoriously tim hortons, have been caught repeatedly throwing recycle in the dumpster, but this is even worse than that. they're actually melting it all down and converting it to diesel using a process called "advanced recycling", which is using massive amounts of energy to melt the plastic down and compress it back into fuel, producing carbon emissions in the process. 

now, they are openly admitting that this is why they're collecting the freezer bags and junk food wrappers, but a number of other changes to the process are extremely concerning.

- they are telling us not to bother sorting anything. all of it - legitimately recyclable plastic, glass, metal and paper along with unrecyclable plastic and the other waste - just goes into the same pile

- they are telling us to recycle everything with lids and caps on, even though they're made of different types of plastic, and you just can't recycle much of it

what this tells me is that even the recyclable material is just getting burned, because the diesel is more profitable. this is consequently the end of public recycling in ontario and the beginning of burning garbage for fuel.

the idea that the manufacturers should be responsible for collecting and recycling their garbage was kathleen wynne's, but the idea was to force the manufacturers to take their garbage back and reuse it, not for them to profit off burning plastic into diesel, which is filthy and backwards. the conservatives, however, are famously disinterested in any sort of sustainability. they're even trying to get rid of the bicycle lanes in several major cities, which is just short-sighted and petty. profit is everything; sustainability is irrelevant. so, ford has let them do this, and might have even encouraged it. this was't what wynne imagined, bu she also should have known better, as this is the inevitable collusion for profit that happens when you naively hand over policy making and decision making power to the oligipoly, out of goodwill. oops.

but here we are, now, and if you give a fuck and don't want your plastic material turned into diesel for mcdonald's trucks, you need to stop using the blue bin. this is something that needs to be boycotted.

1) don't put your garbage, like chip bags and freezer bags, in the recycle. these items are not recyclable and should not be burned to create diesel in a process that creates terrible air pollution and contributes to carbon emissions. continue to throw them in the garbage.

2) use the green bins to their maximum ability. compost everything you can, including as much crossover from the red bin as it will take.

3) look around in your area for independent recyclers that will take your recycling material and actually recycle it. circular materials is not recycling your plastic, it is converting it into diesel for their trucks.

4) if you have to use the new blue bins at all, restrict it to glass and metal, which cannot be converted into fuel and should continue to be recycled.

something else that's going to change with all of these benefits i'm getting now is the frequency of money coming into the account.

i'm used to getting one check at the end of the month, and a small check on or before the 10th. there's another $110 check every three months on the fifth (i just got my january deposit).

i should now also get a $200 check on the third thursday and a $400 check on or before the 28th. this month, that's:

3rd: $110

9th: $75

15th: $200

28th: $401

30th: $408

february, that will be:

10th: $75

19th: $200

27th: $809

march, that will be:

10th: $75

19th (thurs): $200

27th (fri): $401

31st (tue): $408

april, that will be:

3rd (fri): $110

10th (thurs): $75

16th (thurs): $200

28th (tues):  $401

30th (thurs): $408

there's no example i can find where i get paid every week, unless there's a string of holidays pulling the 28th way back to the 23rd or 24th. it would maybe be better if the cohb was the 25th, but i'm not complaining.

as mentioned, it's a big change to expect to have money when i need something, instead of constantly budgeting around an expectation of $0, and i've already been living that here since oct 1st.

it seems like i lost a few days.

i wanted to get out on the 29th, then the 30th and finally the 31st to talk about my rdsp with my bank, and was able to get out on the 31st and transfer $3500 into the rdsp at the very last minute. so that should get tripled, and i'll have to get $4000 in over the next 12 months to max out on the further contributions.

i am also transferring the account to a different bank.

i tried to get out on tuesday afternoon, but wasn't able to get in the shower, and has to fall asleep in the afternoon, instead. i was able to take a shower and get out on wednesday morning, get some groceries (i've been eating through a pile  of kale since) and get the transfer done, but i haven't been able to do much of anything except sleep and clean, since. i've developed a bout of really bad acne all of a sudden and it won't wash off.

i have to get this court document finished and am now very far behind on it, far enough that i'm going to have to change my approach to it.

i've been quiet the last few days because i've been sleeping and cleaning with almost nothing else in between.

nobody understands what trump is saying when he says the pentagon will "run" venezuela.

is he intending on sending in ground troops? he's apparently answered that question by making it conditional on whether the new president is a puppet or not.

so, if delcy rodriguez does what she's told, there will be no invasion, and if she resists, she's out too, apparently; apparently, that's what that means.

it doesn't sound like much of a plan to me. this is looking more and more like an international embarrassment, especially if maduro just gets released and the charges get quickly dropped, as i would expect they will be. he'll be flying home in no time, and he'll still be president when he gets home.

wow.

what a sad joke.

this guy is worse than ignatieff.

all evidence from all valid sources is abundantly clear that maduro won those elections.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-political-leaders-venezuela-maduro-9.7032642