https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inriclaimed
Thursday, December 10, 2015
this sounds like a poison pill. remember: the government has ultimate discretion here, not poloz. and, i would hope that the liberals sack him if he decides to seriously do this. this sounds like harper pulling strings in the background, trying to create a disaster.
a big part of the liberals' tax policy, as it is, is meant to find a balance that increases revenue and prevents capital flight. combined with the dollar continuing to crash, this announcement seems designed for the sole purpose of scaring investors.
a corporate tax hike, followed by direct spending, would be more effective because it would actually spend the cash. this is just going to send money flying out of the country...
i'm serious.
i think this is a partisan move, designed to sabotage the government. and, the government should react very swiftly.
but, i mean...
listen. i'm a leftist. i'm into high corporate tax rates. and, a large amount of the canadian economy is tied to natural resources, meaning the argument around flight falls apart. but, if we want to diversify, we need to look at building economies that are more mobile and finding ways to keep them there. and, the arguments around minimizing corporate taxation are meaningful.
it's probably going to be more effective to do this using the "backroom deals" model than trying to force people to spend. that is, by using the tools of rhetorical persuasion. by sitting down and talking with people and convincing them to invest in this or that.
these heavy-handed, top down, punitive approaches don't work. that understanding is supposed to be something that this government is rooting itself around.
this is a policy perspective rooted in the previous government's ideology. and, i think the government consequently has a valid prerogative in asking poloz to resign.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/what-are-negative-interest-rates-and-how-do-they-work/article27669897/
K Fitzwilliam
Really, still beating on Harper????
deathtokoalas
he appointed this guy. and, if we end up with a conflict between the minister and the governor, it reduces to a process of completing the transition.
canadians tend to interpret the relationship between the minister and the governor through the prism of the federal reserve. but, this is false. the minister can override the governor, and in this case should.
that said, i'm not aware of morneau's position on this. but, it strikes me as inconsistent with the government's position on holding the corporate tax rate steady. i'm deducing. a little clarification would help.
--
Hallbfb
And seniors just keep taking it on the chin.....
deathtokoalas
boomers spent their entire lives trying to dismantle the welfare state, and now take a look around and wonder where it went. it would be easier to have empathy if they didn't play such a central role in the creation of the problems we have today.
--
Robf2
Ok, so we have an "economic crisis" and the BOC is charging commercial banks for their reserves. Are these commercial banks going to increase lending during a crisis? No. They are going to discourage deposits with fees. And the depositors who have been shunned, what should they do? One clever idea (courtesy BOC research papers) is to prepay your taxes :)
Superscape
It's actually the opposite- by charging banks for holding reserves with the BoC, it means that banks will be discouraged from sitting on their cash, and therefore lend it out.
deathtokoalas
no. they'll just pass on the cost to creditors, who will in turn be discouraged from leaving their money in the bank. that doesn't necessarily mean spending, and in most cases won't - in most cases it will mean flight.
a big part of the liberals' tax policy, as it is, is meant to find a balance that increases revenue and prevents capital flight. combined with the dollar continuing to crash, this announcement seems designed for the sole purpose of scaring investors.
a corporate tax hike, followed by direct spending, would be more effective because it would actually spend the cash. this is just going to send money flying out of the country...
i'm serious.
i think this is a partisan move, designed to sabotage the government. and, the government should react very swiftly.
but, i mean...
listen. i'm a leftist. i'm into high corporate tax rates. and, a large amount of the canadian economy is tied to natural resources, meaning the argument around flight falls apart. but, if we want to diversify, we need to look at building economies that are more mobile and finding ways to keep them there. and, the arguments around minimizing corporate taxation are meaningful.
it's probably going to be more effective to do this using the "backroom deals" model than trying to force people to spend. that is, by using the tools of rhetorical persuasion. by sitting down and talking with people and convincing them to invest in this or that.
these heavy-handed, top down, punitive approaches don't work. that understanding is supposed to be something that this government is rooting itself around.
this is a policy perspective rooted in the previous government's ideology. and, i think the government consequently has a valid prerogative in asking poloz to resign.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/what-are-negative-interest-rates-and-how-do-they-work/article27669897/
K Fitzwilliam
Really, still beating on Harper????
deathtokoalas
he appointed this guy. and, if we end up with a conflict between the minister and the governor, it reduces to a process of completing the transition.
canadians tend to interpret the relationship between the minister and the governor through the prism of the federal reserve. but, this is false. the minister can override the governor, and in this case should.
that said, i'm not aware of morneau's position on this. but, it strikes me as inconsistent with the government's position on holding the corporate tax rate steady. i'm deducing. a little clarification would help.
--
Hallbfb
And seniors just keep taking it on the chin.....
deathtokoalas
boomers spent their entire lives trying to dismantle the welfare state, and now take a look around and wonder where it went. it would be easier to have empathy if they didn't play such a central role in the creation of the problems we have today.
--
Robf2
Ok, so we have an "economic crisis" and the BOC is charging commercial banks for their reserves. Are these commercial banks going to increase lending during a crisis? No. They are going to discourage deposits with fees. And the depositors who have been shunned, what should they do? One clever idea (courtesy BOC research papers) is to prepay your taxes :)
Superscape
It's actually the opposite- by charging banks for holding reserves with the BoC, it means that banks will be discouraged from sitting on their cash, and therefore lend it out.
deathtokoalas
no. they'll just pass on the cost to creditors, who will in turn be discouraged from leaving their money in the bank. that doesn't necessarily mean spending, and in most cases won't - in most cases it will mean flight.
ethan maly
Orangutans are apes, nor monkeys. That's like saying that a ring tailed lemur or a slow loris are monkeys
jessica
+ethan maly
meh. humans are monkeys, too.
ethan maly
+jessica no we're technically great apes
Damon Teichroeb
Whoever was stupid enough to think that we humans came from monkeys should have never been a scientist. Prove me wrong once you have OBSERVABLE evidence of a monkey or ape or great ape transform into a human. It is very simple. Monkeys, apes, and great apes are animals and always have been.
jessica
+ethan maly
but, i have no problem in using the terms "primate" and "monkey" interchangeably. it's a perfectly acceptable colloquialism. tarsiers are a bit of a problem, granted. but not enough to deny the usage.
the offense comes out merely in a hierarchical perception. an ape is not merely a monkey. but, there's not a lion in the world that sees a human differently than any other monkey. it's a shallow anthropomorphic absurdity, really.
i mean, a lion might very well think it important to point out the difference between a leopard and a cougar. a leopard can roar. it is not merely a cat. a wolf may take great offense to being called a dog. but, we see them all as essentially the same thing.
Joshua Quint Norton
+jessica
You may. People with the slightest ability of differentiation wahtsoever - do not.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
hrmmn. and, what are these criteria that you believe are so obvious?
surely, you don't claim that it's dna.
Joshua Quint Norton
It's so clear what I said. So very clear.
So my response is go stick a porcupine in your eurethra and call it a puppy , you disengenious sophistic twat.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
it does not matter how angry you are. you have yet to put down meaningful separation criteria, let alone defend it from scrutiny.
Joshua Quint Norton
Well when I'm responding to such utter shite as 'We see dogs and wolves as essentially the same' (imagines a Pug and Wolf and giggles) I know I'm dealing with a sophistic diehard who will defend the most insane statements with the zeal of a true fuckwit.
So no. You don't deserve a response if you do not realise all labels are labels of convienience.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
but, dogs and wolves are scientifically classified as the same species.
Joshua Quint Norton
Again. go fuck yourself. I can read you like a comic book, only a lot quicker.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
i suspect that it would take you an unusually long amount of time to make your way through a comic book.
Joshua Quint Norton
Keep your narcissm to thyself.
I can tell you're an expert on it.
Fare thee badly. I'm out.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
many baseless insults, zero reasoned arguments.
i'll help you out on the disengage.
*plonk*
Fedor Steeman
+jessica There is in fact a host of synapomorphies (shared derived traits) that distinguish the superfamily of apes (Hominoidea) from other simians. Here's a few:
1. tubular tympanic bone
2. dental formula 2.1.2.3
3. broad incisors
4. primitive molars with rounded cusps
5. broad palates
6. broad nasal regions
7. large brain
8. no tail
9. reduced lumbar region
10. long upper limbs
11. wrist lacks an articulation between the ulna and carpel bones; have a fibrous meniscus
12. hind limbs: broad ilium, broad femoral condyles, large hallux
There are also many synapomorphies to be found on the molecular level like DNA, MtRNA and protein sequences that you can go look up yourself.
jessica
+Fedor Steeman
while those characteristics may be used to suggest that apes are a specific type of monkey, i don't see anything in that list that would suggest that an ape is a different thing than a monkey. i mean, you could make these kinds of arguments in comparing great danes to chihuahuas, too.
a valid characteristic, here, would have to necessarily define a monkey and be sufficiently different in apes.
Fedor Steeman
+jessica I really don't think you're qualified to asses the validity of morphological data. Especially when you think that these differences also can be seen within a species and that a single characteristic would be sufficient to define a group. That is ridiculous nonsense and by that you have just proven your complete incompetence. Why don't you go study zoological systematics with emphasis on cladistics AND mammalian morphology and come back then?
These are the anatomical details that actual scientists use to distinguish groups. The Hominoid clade is well-defined cladistically. It is true that the "monkeys" form a so-called paraphyletic grade group that especially strict cladists frown upon, but I have not heard of any of them propose to redefine this vernacular group name to include apes. Not so strict taxonomists have suits of characters for defining both delimiters of the "monkey" grade.
Zoologists, you know, people who actually know what they're talking about, call the monophyletic group that includes monkeys and apes "Haplorrhini", not "monkeys".
In vernacular, zoologists generally talk of "monkeys" as something distinct from "apes" and are fine with it. Now you may go maverick and throw around your own personal definitions, but no one has to accept those, because you're just some nobody on the internet.
jessica
+Fedor Steeman
again, there's a lot of anger here, but not a lot of reasoned thought.
the best characteristic you provided was the lack of a tail. but, then the deduction is that apes are just tailless monkeys. and, as it turns out, there are species of monkeys without tails (the macaque is one), anyways.
i'm used to people yelling at me when i frustrate them with the tyranny of logic. but, it is now as it always is - you simply have no argument.
again: you are providing a list of reasonable characteristics to define apes as a subset of monkeys. but, you have not provided any argument at all to suggest that an ape is not a monkey.
perhaps we should take a step back for a second to clarify a distinction, as i think it might be at the root (pardon the pun) of the difficulty, here.
a cladistic relationship is not a set-theoretical relationship. it defines a broad genealogical relationship between species. but, we don't claim that mammals are fish. and, likewise, we don't need a recent common ancestor to point out that dolphins and sharks are both aquatic predators.
the question of whether apes are monkeys or not is not a cladistic question, it is a categorical one.
what you need to do to provide a good argument here is what i said:
1) find some characteristics that uniquely define monkeys. what makes a monkey a monkey?
2) demonstrate that those characteristics fail to describe apes. how is it that what makes a monkey a monkey makes an ape not a monkey?
and, good luck to you.
i wouldn't have suggested that apes are monkeys if such a distinction were truly readily apparent.
Orangutans are apes, nor monkeys. That's like saying that a ring tailed lemur or a slow loris are monkeys
jessica
+ethan maly
meh. humans are monkeys, too.
ethan maly
+jessica no we're technically great apes
Damon Teichroeb
Whoever was stupid enough to think that we humans came from monkeys should have never been a scientist. Prove me wrong once you have OBSERVABLE evidence of a monkey or ape or great ape transform into a human. It is very simple. Monkeys, apes, and great apes are animals and always have been.
jessica
+ethan maly
but, i have no problem in using the terms "primate" and "monkey" interchangeably. it's a perfectly acceptable colloquialism. tarsiers are a bit of a problem, granted. but not enough to deny the usage.
the offense comes out merely in a hierarchical perception. an ape is not merely a monkey. but, there's not a lion in the world that sees a human differently than any other monkey. it's a shallow anthropomorphic absurdity, really.
i mean, a lion might very well think it important to point out the difference between a leopard and a cougar. a leopard can roar. it is not merely a cat. a wolf may take great offense to being called a dog. but, we see them all as essentially the same thing.
Joshua Quint Norton
+jessica
You may. People with the slightest ability of differentiation wahtsoever - do not.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
hrmmn. and, what are these criteria that you believe are so obvious?
surely, you don't claim that it's dna.
Joshua Quint Norton
It's so clear what I said. So very clear.
So my response is go stick a porcupine in your eurethra and call it a puppy , you disengenious sophistic twat.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
it does not matter how angry you are. you have yet to put down meaningful separation criteria, let alone defend it from scrutiny.
Joshua Quint Norton
Well when I'm responding to such utter shite as 'We see dogs and wolves as essentially the same' (imagines a Pug and Wolf and giggles) I know I'm dealing with a sophistic diehard who will defend the most insane statements with the zeal of a true fuckwit.
So no. You don't deserve a response if you do not realise all labels are labels of convienience.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
but, dogs and wolves are scientifically classified as the same species.
Joshua Quint Norton
Again. go fuck yourself. I can read you like a comic book, only a lot quicker.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
i suspect that it would take you an unusually long amount of time to make your way through a comic book.
Joshua Quint Norton
Keep your narcissm to thyself.
I can tell you're an expert on it.
Fare thee badly. I'm out.
jessica
+Joshua Quint Norton
many baseless insults, zero reasoned arguments.
i'll help you out on the disengage.
*plonk*
Fedor Steeman
+jessica There is in fact a host of synapomorphies (shared derived traits) that distinguish the superfamily of apes (Hominoidea) from other simians. Here's a few:
1. tubular tympanic bone
2. dental formula 2.1.2.3
3. broad incisors
4. primitive molars with rounded cusps
5. broad palates
6. broad nasal regions
7. large brain
8. no tail
9. reduced lumbar region
10. long upper limbs
11. wrist lacks an articulation between the ulna and carpel bones; have a fibrous meniscus
12. hind limbs: broad ilium, broad femoral condyles, large hallux
There are also many synapomorphies to be found on the molecular level like DNA, MtRNA and protein sequences that you can go look up yourself.
jessica
+Fedor Steeman
while those characteristics may be used to suggest that apes are a specific type of monkey, i don't see anything in that list that would suggest that an ape is a different thing than a monkey. i mean, you could make these kinds of arguments in comparing great danes to chihuahuas, too.
a valid characteristic, here, would have to necessarily define a monkey and be sufficiently different in apes.
Fedor Steeman
+jessica I really don't think you're qualified to asses the validity of morphological data. Especially when you think that these differences also can be seen within a species and that a single characteristic would be sufficient to define a group. That is ridiculous nonsense and by that you have just proven your complete incompetence. Why don't you go study zoological systematics with emphasis on cladistics AND mammalian morphology and come back then?
These are the anatomical details that actual scientists use to distinguish groups. The Hominoid clade is well-defined cladistically. It is true that the "monkeys" form a so-called paraphyletic grade group that especially strict cladists frown upon, but I have not heard of any of them propose to redefine this vernacular group name to include apes. Not so strict taxonomists have suits of characters for defining both delimiters of the "monkey" grade.
Zoologists, you know, people who actually know what they're talking about, call the monophyletic group that includes monkeys and apes "Haplorrhini", not "monkeys".
In vernacular, zoologists generally talk of "monkeys" as something distinct from "apes" and are fine with it. Now you may go maverick and throw around your own personal definitions, but no one has to accept those, because you're just some nobody on the internet.
jessica
+Fedor Steeman
again, there's a lot of anger here, but not a lot of reasoned thought.
the best characteristic you provided was the lack of a tail. but, then the deduction is that apes are just tailless monkeys. and, as it turns out, there are species of monkeys without tails (the macaque is one), anyways.
i'm used to people yelling at me when i frustrate them with the tyranny of logic. but, it is now as it always is - you simply have no argument.
again: you are providing a list of reasonable characteristics to define apes as a subset of monkeys. but, you have not provided any argument at all to suggest that an ape is not a monkey.
perhaps we should take a step back for a second to clarify a distinction, as i think it might be at the root (pardon the pun) of the difficulty, here.
a cladistic relationship is not a set-theoretical relationship. it defines a broad genealogical relationship between species. but, we don't claim that mammals are fish. and, likewise, we don't need a recent common ancestor to point out that dolphins and sharks are both aquatic predators.
the question of whether apes are monkeys or not is not a cladistic question, it is a categorical one.
what you need to do to provide a good argument here is what i said:
1) find some characteristics that uniquely define monkeys. what makes a monkey a monkey?
2) demonstrate that those characteristics fail to describe apes. how is it that what makes a monkey a monkey makes an ape not a monkey?
and, good luck to you.
i wouldn't have suggested that apes are monkeys if such a distinction were truly readily apparent.
it's not the content of the piece that is important here, that's really not even being considered, it's the process of going through the photoshoot. if there was a glossy photoshoot in the new york times, the same reaction would take hold; if the vogue piece was just writing, or even an interview, nobody would get upset, either.
and, the critics (i'm not really one of them....i'm in the "this is entirely irrelevant" category) have somewhat of a point. here's the thing: you do this once, you ruffle a few feathers but get away with it. you do it repeatedly, and it becomes a liability because it makes you look like a celebrity.
it's a good way to demonstrate the differences between how canadians see their politicians, in comparison to americans and brits. trudeau's name didn't help him in the general (although it was everything at the convention). in fact, it almost destroyed him. we react very badly to the idea of a kennedy family, or an upper class "ruling" us. we'd prefer to see our prime minister in donated clothes than in expensive ones.
it's a reflection of our past. canada has never seen itself as a rich country. and, in the broader sense of things, the truth is that it never really has been. we're a country of lumberjacks and refugees. this is alienating because it reflects a foreign culture that we don't understand and, frankly, don't like very much. even those that transcend this view of ourselves still broadly *like* it, because it's quaint.
if this goes away soon, it will be forgotten. but, as i pointed out with the brooch issue, this is something that they want to avoid, not something they want to perpetuate.
it's nothing of any importance. no intelligent person will have their upcoming votes affected by it. but, it is a massive pr error, in canada.
and, frankly, a smart pr team would have seen it as an obvious pr error before it happened.
the liberals had the best platform. that's why they won. let's write that out on the board 500 times, please, so we all understand it.
if you look at the archetypal "canadian icon" it's something like neil young. left-leaning, for sure. but, earthy. "real".
i've said this before: the right idea here is not the aristocratic pomp of a jfk. it's the populism of an rfk.
www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/12/10/justin-trudeau-sophie-gregoire-vogue-critics_n_8771490.html
Hannah Hanrahan
This is a well reasoned viewpoint, obviously not coming from partisanship. It's true for me. I was over the roof when Trudeau won the election and this has put an end to my elation. Vogue is fine. It's the analysis of this particular image that produces the problems. It's not an image I feel connected to as a Canadain. It's an image of a colonialized Canadian whose been convinced to allow themselves to be appropriated by a culture that is actually quite oppressive and that we don't really like . It promotes values we don't identify with, and in fact a lot of canadians have made their way as comdic cirtics of those values. We're comedians of all this pompous American riche, expensive fashion, sexualized celebrity elitism, not minions of it. LOL
jessica amber murray
i agree, but it's not entirely what i'm getting at. that's something else i was thinking about. canada was run by the silent generation all the way until 2006. if harper was a boomer (he was born in 1959, and doesn't strike me as a boomer...), he's probably the only boomer pm we'll ever have. rather, we seem to have skipped from the silent generation to gen x - while the americans skipped from the gis to the boomers and will probably skip gen x. and, canada may very well skip the millenials. we skipped the boomers, the gis and the lost. it would fit the pattern...
we may end up with gen x in charge for the next 40 years, just like we had the silent generation in charge for 40 years. this is all very crude and everything, but i think it's reflective of broad values. look at the liberals after 1965 and look at the stereotypes of the silent generation and tell me that it doesn't make sense. meanwhile, the americans completely skipped over them.
if this kind of commercialism is a defining boomer characteristic, it makes sense that gen x has tended to rail against it. and, as a country, our collective decisions over the next few decades may end up clustered around these generational stereotypes - as they ended up clustered around the silent generation stereotypes over the last several decades, generally pushing back against the boomer status quo of tax cuts and hyperindividualism. we could be on track to really double down on this, while the millenials carry on as boomer v 2.0 - boomers, but worse. we'd likely be wise to avoid them, as we were wise to avoid the boomers.
that may be the difference in the countries. we're staggered a half a generation. canada is silent--->x---->z; america is gi--->boomers--->millenials.
crude. sure. perhaps useful, though.
what i was getting at was more of a distance thing.
those pictures of steve-o in his cowboy garb are likely to elicit laughter for many years. but, there's a correctness of strategy in this in that it makes him look human. i'm still not sure about whether he really was, but he convinced enough people.
why was chretien invincible, and why did martin's ship run out of steam so fast? because chretien was a man of the people, and martin was seen as an upper class business person. the elder trudeau was moderately wealthy, but he made a strong attempt to seem down to earth. it didn't always work.
standing up on your first day of office and doing a photoshoot like this? it suggests some broad cluelessness.
but, as i stated previously, i could hardly actually care.
i will judge him solely on his legislation.
also, he wants to avoid jerry maguire memes.
"show me the bills!"
and, the critics (i'm not really one of them....i'm in the "this is entirely irrelevant" category) have somewhat of a point. here's the thing: you do this once, you ruffle a few feathers but get away with it. you do it repeatedly, and it becomes a liability because it makes you look like a celebrity.
it's a good way to demonstrate the differences between how canadians see their politicians, in comparison to americans and brits. trudeau's name didn't help him in the general (although it was everything at the convention). in fact, it almost destroyed him. we react very badly to the idea of a kennedy family, or an upper class "ruling" us. we'd prefer to see our prime minister in donated clothes than in expensive ones.
it's a reflection of our past. canada has never seen itself as a rich country. and, in the broader sense of things, the truth is that it never really has been. we're a country of lumberjacks and refugees. this is alienating because it reflects a foreign culture that we don't understand and, frankly, don't like very much. even those that transcend this view of ourselves still broadly *like* it, because it's quaint.
if this goes away soon, it will be forgotten. but, as i pointed out with the brooch issue, this is something that they want to avoid, not something they want to perpetuate.
it's nothing of any importance. no intelligent person will have their upcoming votes affected by it. but, it is a massive pr error, in canada.
and, frankly, a smart pr team would have seen it as an obvious pr error before it happened.
the liberals had the best platform. that's why they won. let's write that out on the board 500 times, please, so we all understand it.
if you look at the archetypal "canadian icon" it's something like neil young. left-leaning, for sure. but, earthy. "real".
i've said this before: the right idea here is not the aristocratic pomp of a jfk. it's the populism of an rfk.
www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/12/10/justin-trudeau-sophie-gregoire-vogue-critics_n_8771490.html
Hannah Hanrahan
This is a well reasoned viewpoint, obviously not coming from partisanship. It's true for me. I was over the roof when Trudeau won the election and this has put an end to my elation. Vogue is fine. It's the analysis of this particular image that produces the problems. It's not an image I feel connected to as a Canadain. It's an image of a colonialized Canadian whose been convinced to allow themselves to be appropriated by a culture that is actually quite oppressive and that we don't really like . It promotes values we don't identify with, and in fact a lot of canadians have made their way as comdic cirtics of those values. We're comedians of all this pompous American riche, expensive fashion, sexualized celebrity elitism, not minions of it. LOL
jessica amber murray
i agree, but it's not entirely what i'm getting at. that's something else i was thinking about. canada was run by the silent generation all the way until 2006. if harper was a boomer (he was born in 1959, and doesn't strike me as a boomer...), he's probably the only boomer pm we'll ever have. rather, we seem to have skipped from the silent generation to gen x - while the americans skipped from the gis to the boomers and will probably skip gen x. and, canada may very well skip the millenials. we skipped the boomers, the gis and the lost. it would fit the pattern...
we may end up with gen x in charge for the next 40 years, just like we had the silent generation in charge for 40 years. this is all very crude and everything, but i think it's reflective of broad values. look at the liberals after 1965 and look at the stereotypes of the silent generation and tell me that it doesn't make sense. meanwhile, the americans completely skipped over them.
if this kind of commercialism is a defining boomer characteristic, it makes sense that gen x has tended to rail against it. and, as a country, our collective decisions over the next few decades may end up clustered around these generational stereotypes - as they ended up clustered around the silent generation stereotypes over the last several decades, generally pushing back against the boomer status quo of tax cuts and hyperindividualism. we could be on track to really double down on this, while the millenials carry on as boomer v 2.0 - boomers, but worse. we'd likely be wise to avoid them, as we were wise to avoid the boomers.
that may be the difference in the countries. we're staggered a half a generation. canada is silent--->x---->z; america is gi--->boomers--->millenials.
crude. sure. perhaps useful, though.
what i was getting at was more of a distance thing.
those pictures of steve-o in his cowboy garb are likely to elicit laughter for many years. but, there's a correctness of strategy in this in that it makes him look human. i'm still not sure about whether he really was, but he convinced enough people.
why was chretien invincible, and why did martin's ship run out of steam so fast? because chretien was a man of the people, and martin was seen as an upper class business person. the elder trudeau was moderately wealthy, but he made a strong attempt to seem down to earth. it didn't always work.
standing up on your first day of office and doing a photoshoot like this? it suggests some broad cluelessness.
but, as i stated previously, i could hardly actually care.
i will judge him solely on his legislation.
also, he wants to avoid jerry maguire memes.
"show me the bills!"
it's admittedly surreal, but relax - it'll be over soon. you need a reality tv show to sustain this kind of media.
if we're lucky, though, some actual liberal party politics will rub themselves off on the democratic primary. don't hold your breath. but at least cross your fingers.
www.cbc.ca/news/trending/vogue-justin-trudeau-sophie-grégoire-trudeau-photo-1.3357616
if we're lucky, though, some actual liberal party politics will rub themselves off on the democratic primary. don't hold your breath. but at least cross your fingers.
www.cbc.ca/news/trending/vogue-justin-trudeau-sophie-grégoire-trudeau-photo-1.3357616
Wednesday, December 9, 2015
i actually agree that this is unhelpful. trying to cut emissions is one thing. coming up with a new argument for reparations for colonialism (and, canada was a colony in this period, not a colonial power - send the bill to the uk) is an issue of some importance, but not the issue at hand.
i hope that the focus on reparations by this group was not made at the expense of hiding other obfuscations made by our delegation.
i mean, if we're going to talk about reparations, the target should be our indigenous groups.
this is a broader argument, though, that i've had frequently with activists.
canada does not belong in a list of historical colonial powers like the uk, usa and france. rather, it belongs in a list of colonized areas like india and south africa. and, we have sometimes aligned with these blocs.
our indigenous peoples have the same entitlements for reparations that indigenous peoples do in other parts of the world. there's a lot of things we can do internally, sure. but we should also be lining up with india to push for reparations from europe.
but, people get confused for various ethnic and linguistic reasons.
we were never at the top of an empire. we were always a subjugated colony. we fought back a few times (consider the conscription crisis, for example). but, wealth never flowed into canada. it always flowed out of canada. if the basis of reparations is the righting the wrong that was the theft of resource wealth by force, we were always on the receiving end of this.
fighting for reparations from the uk is not exactly something i'd consider pressing. and, i'm not suggesting we should use this argument to resist contributing to the various funds. but, the truth is what it is.
www.cbc.ca/news/world/paris-climate-cop21-mckenna-wednesday-1.3356882
wyly
you make a number of good points...but we do have colonialism in our past, we did join the UK in an imperialistic war to subjugate the south african free states...
jessica murray
the question of reparations is to reverse the theft of resource wealth. i'm aware that canadians made up a part of the british forces in the boer war, but it didn't materially benefit us - there was no flow of stolen resources from africa to canada. rather, canadian soldiers were used as muscle to facilitate the flow of stolen resources to europe.
i mean, they sent indian soldiers, too. it's not really a relevant point.
as far as i know, it never happened. but, it's not outside historical plausibility to suggest that the british could have deployed indian, african or arabic troops to quell an uprising in quebec. had we gotten into a big fight with the americans, it would have likely happened.
london didn't see us in any kind of special capacity. we were just a source of certain raw materials, like any other imperial holding.
in fact, i looked it up and there were actually indian (as in from india) troops in the british contingent during the american revolutionary war.
wyly
interesting, I had no idea...I guess we shouldn't be surprised the Brits also used German troops in the Revolutionary war...if we were to dig deeper there likely others involved as well...
we could debate who "us" are...if at that time canada saw it self as part of the empire then we were benefiting ourselves even if the cash flow went to corporate head office/england...
jessica murray
although i may disagree, i might at least accept that this is a reasonable tory perspective. but, then, who are we repaying?
i mean, if we accept that canada was a part of the empire and benefited from it, surely we should accept that india and egypt were as well, and did, too. so, who does britain need to remunerate, then?
the problem with this whole line of thinking is that it attempts to interpret history through the constructs of a contrived theory (white supremacism) rather than through a rigorous process of historical fact. we conclude that canada has the same reparation responsibilities because it is white, rather than because of the need for any legitimate historical redress. the only way to construct any kind of argument here is "because of white guilt".
this focus on theory, and subsequent rejection of empiricism, has been a constant problem on the left for the last two-hundred years or so.
i hope that the focus on reparations by this group was not made at the expense of hiding other obfuscations made by our delegation.
i mean, if we're going to talk about reparations, the target should be our indigenous groups.
this is a broader argument, though, that i've had frequently with activists.
canada does not belong in a list of historical colonial powers like the uk, usa and france. rather, it belongs in a list of colonized areas like india and south africa. and, we have sometimes aligned with these blocs.
our indigenous peoples have the same entitlements for reparations that indigenous peoples do in other parts of the world. there's a lot of things we can do internally, sure. but we should also be lining up with india to push for reparations from europe.
but, people get confused for various ethnic and linguistic reasons.
we were never at the top of an empire. we were always a subjugated colony. we fought back a few times (consider the conscription crisis, for example). but, wealth never flowed into canada. it always flowed out of canada. if the basis of reparations is the righting the wrong that was the theft of resource wealth by force, we were always on the receiving end of this.
fighting for reparations from the uk is not exactly something i'd consider pressing. and, i'm not suggesting we should use this argument to resist contributing to the various funds. but, the truth is what it is.
www.cbc.ca/news/world/paris-climate-cop21-mckenna-wednesday-1.3356882
wyly
you make a number of good points...but we do have colonialism in our past, we did join the UK in an imperialistic war to subjugate the south african free states...
jessica murray
the question of reparations is to reverse the theft of resource wealth. i'm aware that canadians made up a part of the british forces in the boer war, but it didn't materially benefit us - there was no flow of stolen resources from africa to canada. rather, canadian soldiers were used as muscle to facilitate the flow of stolen resources to europe.
i mean, they sent indian soldiers, too. it's not really a relevant point.
as far as i know, it never happened. but, it's not outside historical plausibility to suggest that the british could have deployed indian, african or arabic troops to quell an uprising in quebec. had we gotten into a big fight with the americans, it would have likely happened.
london didn't see us in any kind of special capacity. we were just a source of certain raw materials, like any other imperial holding.
in fact, i looked it up and there were actually indian (as in from india) troops in the british contingent during the american revolutionary war.
wyly
interesting, I had no idea...I guess we shouldn't be surprised the Brits also used German troops in the Revolutionary war...if we were to dig deeper there likely others involved as well...
we could debate who "us" are...if at that time canada saw it self as part of the empire then we were benefiting ourselves even if the cash flow went to corporate head office/england...
jessica murray
although i may disagree, i might at least accept that this is a reasonable tory perspective. but, then, who are we repaying?
i mean, if we accept that canada was a part of the empire and benefited from it, surely we should accept that india and egypt were as well, and did, too. so, who does britain need to remunerate, then?
the problem with this whole line of thinking is that it attempts to interpret history through the constructs of a contrived theory (white supremacism) rather than through a rigorous process of historical fact. we conclude that canada has the same reparation responsibilities because it is white, rather than because of the need for any legitimate historical redress. the only way to construct any kind of argument here is "because of white guilt".
this focus on theory, and subsequent rejection of empiricism, has been a constant problem on the left for the last two-hundred years or so.
Tuesday, December 8, 2015
there seems to be more stories being floated to the media about who is responsible for blocking the deal than about realistic paths to actually getting one.
it's understood by outside observers that the saudis are not a rational actor in much of any context. that is a region that may legitimately become uninhabitable....well, unless you're absurdly rich and live in an air conditioned high rise. which describes enough of the population. the people with a voice, certainly. hey: the more the peasants starve in the sun, the less chance they'll revolt.
i have little doubt that they're being less than constructive.
but, if (it's clear: when) the deal fails, it's hardly going to rest entirely on their shoulders. we're just being conditioned to blame somebody.
it was "blame canada". then, we got a new prime minister with close ties to the whitehouse.
then it was "blame india". but, the argument collapses quickly under any cursory analysis.
now, it's "blame the saudis". and, it's hard to make the counter-argument. but, it's no less propagandistic.
www.cbc.ca/news/world/climate-talks-contend-with-both-villains-heroes-as-deadline-looms-1.3355327
GordonRobertson
The entire meeting is a charade perpetuated by deniers. The difference today is that the deniers are those who have ignored the 2013 IPCC announcement that no warming has been detected since 1998.
No warming = No climate change.
This meeting is about money managers trying to profit from an orchestrated catastrophe imposed on us by climate alarmists.
jessica murray
more nonsense.
can you do me the favour of actually reading that document?
or, is that even worthwhile, given that you're unlikely to understand it?
GordonRobertson
Which part don't you understand Jessica?
See page 6:
http://www.climatechange2013.org/images/uploads/WGIAR5_WGI-12Doc2b_FinalDraft_Chapter02.pdf
"Despite the robust multi-decadal timescale warming, there exists substantial multi-annual variability in the rate of warming with several periods exhibiting almost no linear trend including the warming hiatus since 1998. The rate of warming over 1998–2012 (0.05°C [–0.05 to +0.15] per decade)..."
Is it this one..."... including the warming hiatus since 1998"?
or this one..."The rate of warming over 1998–2012 (0.05°C [–0.05 to +0.15] per decade)..."
The first states very clearly there has been a hiatus in warming since 1998. Hiatus means stopped.
The second gives the figures of 0.05C/decade with an error margin of -0.05C to +0.15C. That could mean there was a slight cooling. Either way, 5/100ths of a degree C is considered an insignificant warming. You could not even see 5/100ths of a degree on a common room thermometer.
No model predicted this hiatus and all of them predicted far more warming.
The IPCC opinion comes from surface data. The inifinetly more accurate satellite data is showing no warming and little or no warming since 1979.
jessica murray
it doesn't appear to have been worthwhile, as you didn't understand it.
this is the part you are quoting, in context:
It is certain that Global Mean Surface Temperature has increased since the late 19th century. Each of the past three decades has been significantly warmer than all the previous decades in the instrumental record, and the first decade of the 21st century has been the warmest.
The global combined land and ocean surface temperature data show an increase of about 0.89°C (0.69°C–1.08°C) over the period 1901–2012 and about 0.72°C (0.49°C–0.89°C) over the period 1951–2012 when described by a linear trend. Despite the robust multi-decadal timescale warming, there exists substantial multi-annual variability in the rate of warming with several periods exhibiting almost no linear trend including the warming hiatus since 1998. The rate of warming over 1998–2012 (0.05°C [–0.05 to +0.15] per decade) is smaller than the trend since 1951 (0.12°C [0.08 to 0.14] per decade). Several independently analyzed data records of global and regional Land-Surface Air Temperature (LSAT) obtained from station observations are in broad agreement that LSAT has increased. Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) have also increased. Intercomparisons of new SST data records obtained by different measurement methods, including satellite data, have resulted in better understanding of uncertainties and biases in the records.
i'm not going to bother explaining this to you. i'm just going to give you another chance to try and understand it.
enough effort has been put into explaining this. if you still don't understand, nobody should care anymore.
GordonRobertson
Jessica given the data I provided from the IPCC in 2013, NOAA, the official climate experts in the United States have set out to rewrite that temperature record since 1998 to show a warming. NASA GISS is also rewriting the historical record, replacing cooler years with warmer years.
NOAA is priceless, however, provided you can find humour in their chicanery. There used to be 6500 global weather stations from which they derived surface data. NOAA slashed the number to 1500 and they are using climate models to fill in the missing 5000 stations using data from only 1500 stations.
As a student of science and someone not enamoured by pseudo-science, I understand only too well. I am a big fan of the scientific method and the anthropogenic warming theory does not meet the criterion of that historic method.
Neither am I a fan of the scientific miconduct currently being perpetrated by NOAA, a US government organization that answers to climate alarmists like Obama.
jessica murray
the thing about 1998 was that it was unusually warm. the passage that you cited attempted to explain why you wouldn't expect to see large trends since 1998, not to suggest that there has been a pause in warming.
it's understood by outside observers that the saudis are not a rational actor in much of any context. that is a region that may legitimately become uninhabitable....well, unless you're absurdly rich and live in an air conditioned high rise. which describes enough of the population. the people with a voice, certainly. hey: the more the peasants starve in the sun, the less chance they'll revolt.
i have little doubt that they're being less than constructive.
but, if (it's clear: when) the deal fails, it's hardly going to rest entirely on their shoulders. we're just being conditioned to blame somebody.
it was "blame canada". then, we got a new prime minister with close ties to the whitehouse.
then it was "blame india". but, the argument collapses quickly under any cursory analysis.
now, it's "blame the saudis". and, it's hard to make the counter-argument. but, it's no less propagandistic.
www.cbc.ca/news/world/climate-talks-contend-with-both-villains-heroes-as-deadline-looms-1.3355327
GordonRobertson
The entire meeting is a charade perpetuated by deniers. The difference today is that the deniers are those who have ignored the 2013 IPCC announcement that no warming has been detected since 1998.
No warming = No climate change.
This meeting is about money managers trying to profit from an orchestrated catastrophe imposed on us by climate alarmists.
jessica murray
more nonsense.
can you do me the favour of actually reading that document?
or, is that even worthwhile, given that you're unlikely to understand it?
GordonRobertson
Which part don't you understand Jessica?
See page 6:
http://www.climatechange2013.org/images/uploads/WGIAR5_WGI-12Doc2b_FinalDraft_Chapter02.pdf
"Despite the robust multi-decadal timescale warming, there exists substantial multi-annual variability in the rate of warming with several periods exhibiting almost no linear trend including the warming hiatus since 1998. The rate of warming over 1998–2012 (0.05°C [–0.05 to +0.15] per decade)..."
Is it this one..."... including the warming hiatus since 1998"?
or this one..."The rate of warming over 1998–2012 (0.05°C [–0.05 to +0.15] per decade)..."
The first states very clearly there has been a hiatus in warming since 1998. Hiatus means stopped.
The second gives the figures of 0.05C/decade with an error margin of -0.05C to +0.15C. That could mean there was a slight cooling. Either way, 5/100ths of a degree C is considered an insignificant warming. You could not even see 5/100ths of a degree on a common room thermometer.
No model predicted this hiatus and all of them predicted far more warming.
The IPCC opinion comes from surface data. The inifinetly more accurate satellite data is showing no warming and little or no warming since 1979.
jessica murray
it doesn't appear to have been worthwhile, as you didn't understand it.
this is the part you are quoting, in context:
It is certain that Global Mean Surface Temperature has increased since the late 19th century. Each of the past three decades has been significantly warmer than all the previous decades in the instrumental record, and the first decade of the 21st century has been the warmest.
The global combined land and ocean surface temperature data show an increase of about 0.89°C (0.69°C–1.08°C) over the period 1901–2012 and about 0.72°C (0.49°C–0.89°C) over the period 1951–2012 when described by a linear trend. Despite the robust multi-decadal timescale warming, there exists substantial multi-annual variability in the rate of warming with several periods exhibiting almost no linear trend including the warming hiatus since 1998. The rate of warming over 1998–2012 (0.05°C [–0.05 to +0.15] per decade) is smaller than the trend since 1951 (0.12°C [0.08 to 0.14] per decade). Several independently analyzed data records of global and regional Land-Surface Air Temperature (LSAT) obtained from station observations are in broad agreement that LSAT has increased. Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) have also increased. Intercomparisons of new SST data records obtained by different measurement methods, including satellite data, have resulted in better understanding of uncertainties and biases in the records.
i'm not going to bother explaining this to you. i'm just going to give you another chance to try and understand it.
enough effort has been put into explaining this. if you still don't understand, nobody should care anymore.
GordonRobertson
Jessica given the data I provided from the IPCC in 2013, NOAA, the official climate experts in the United States have set out to rewrite that temperature record since 1998 to show a warming. NASA GISS is also rewriting the historical record, replacing cooler years with warmer years.
NOAA is priceless, however, provided you can find humour in their chicanery. There used to be 6500 global weather stations from which they derived surface data. NOAA slashed the number to 1500 and they are using climate models to fill in the missing 5000 stations using data from only 1500 stations.
As a student of science and someone not enamoured by pseudo-science, I understand only too well. I am a big fan of the scientific method and the anthropogenic warming theory does not meet the criterion of that historic method.
Neither am I a fan of the scientific miconduct currently being perpetrated by NOAA, a US government organization that answers to climate alarmists like Obama.
jessica murray
the thing about 1998 was that it was unusually warm. the passage that you cited attempted to explain why you wouldn't expect to see large trends since 1998, not to suggest that there has been a pause in warming.
when was the last time a federal conservative balanced a budget?
did diefenbaker do it? maybe i could call my grandmother and ask her...
zero credibility.
watch mulcair on this. and watch him win arguments on it, too.
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/liberal-trudeau-question-period-isis-1.3353871
nope.
"Dief was quick to fund social programs and farmers to win votes. And despite talking fiscal responsibility, he never managed to run a balanced budget. "
who was the conservative before diefenbaker? bennett? did he actually manage one, or did he just push austerity and contribute to the depression?
RustBeltCAN
Conservatives have NEVER, ever been good stewards of our economy.
jessica murray
well, the budget has absolutely nothing to do with the economy, though.
i'm just pointing out that the ndp has more credibility, here. and that observers should expect mulcair to key in on that.
RustBeltCAN
bennet was a castrophy of mismanagement and corruption.
jessica murray
i'm still not sure if he pulled off a balanced budget or not, though.
Marc
Is Mulcair worth to be listenend to? NO.
jessica murray
well, if i cared about balanced budgets (and i don't...), i'd want to give somebody else a shot at it.
BrutalLogic
so that says a lot about Liberals does it not? You don't even care about balanced budgets! Let's just spend spend spend. Wait until we hit the wall. Notice how the currency plummeted as soon as it looked like Prince Charming would win? Notice did you how the TSX is going? Does not matter? We'll see when there is no tax revenue to pay for your handouts.
jessica murray
well, i wouldn't really call myself a liberal. i'm in the group of anarchist nutters trying to pull the spectrum to the left. the type that sees the liberals as the better half of bay street, and would certainly prefer them over the historical alternative, but is a good ten steps to their left.
and, no, i don't care about the tsx. unless you want to talk about transaction taxes.
but, regarding the conservatives running balanced budgets? fool me once, fool me...fool...how do i get to four with this thing?
did diefenbaker do it? maybe i could call my grandmother and ask her...
zero credibility.
watch mulcair on this. and watch him win arguments on it, too.
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/liberal-trudeau-question-period-isis-1.3353871
nope.
"Dief was quick to fund social programs and farmers to win votes. And despite talking fiscal responsibility, he never managed to run a balanced budget. "
who was the conservative before diefenbaker? bennett? did he actually manage one, or did he just push austerity and contribute to the depression?
RustBeltCAN
Conservatives have NEVER, ever been good stewards of our economy.
jessica murray
well, the budget has absolutely nothing to do with the economy, though.
i'm just pointing out that the ndp has more credibility, here. and that observers should expect mulcair to key in on that.
RustBeltCAN
bennet was a castrophy of mismanagement and corruption.
jessica murray
i'm still not sure if he pulled off a balanced budget or not, though.
Marc
Is Mulcair worth to be listenend to? NO.
jessica murray
well, if i cared about balanced budgets (and i don't...), i'd want to give somebody else a shot at it.
BrutalLogic
so that says a lot about Liberals does it not? You don't even care about balanced budgets! Let's just spend spend spend. Wait until we hit the wall. Notice how the currency plummeted as soon as it looked like Prince Charming would win? Notice did you how the TSX is going? Does not matter? We'll see when there is no tax revenue to pay for your handouts.
jessica murray
well, i wouldn't really call myself a liberal. i'm in the group of anarchist nutters trying to pull the spectrum to the left. the type that sees the liberals as the better half of bay street, and would certainly prefer them over the historical alternative, but is a good ten steps to their left.
and, no, i don't care about the tsx. unless you want to talk about transaction taxes.
but, regarding the conservatives running balanced budgets? fool me once, fool me...fool...how do i get to four with this thing?
when is the conservative leadership vote? 2017?
if she holds to harper's script that long, her successor will have a big hole to climb out of. bombing campaigns & tax cuts may resonate in texas, but it won't even hold the base in alberta.
trudeau should be more concerned about mulcair.
...and on his right, as much or moreso as on his left.
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/liberal-trudeau-question-period-isis-1.3353871
jplondon
save whatever damage mr mulcair can and likely will inflict on mr trudeau, mr mulcair will not be there four years from now.
jessica murray
i would like to think that this is true, but anybody at all that could have replaced him is gone. it's functionally a total purge of the party; there's literally nobody left. whether anybody likes it or not, this is now his party. he broke it, he bought it - and now he has to glue it back together. and, it will look very different when he's done, too.
elizabeth may, on the other hand, will probably not be the leader of the green party four years from now. and that's probably a very important truth.
RustBeltCAN
the NDP and CONs will be trading seat numbers next election.
jessica murray
yup. i think the ndp are moving into a space on the moderate right that paul martin wanted to move the liberals into. the cpc is in the process of falling back to socred irrelevancy. the left will be taken over by the greens.
expect big noises from mulcair on the budget.
paired with a less extreme social agenda, while the conservatives are having an existential debate on abortion, it will be an attractive combination for moderate conservative voters.
if she holds to harper's script that long, her successor will have a big hole to climb out of. bombing campaigns & tax cuts may resonate in texas, but it won't even hold the base in alberta.
trudeau should be more concerned about mulcair.
...and on his right, as much or moreso as on his left.
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/liberal-trudeau-question-period-isis-1.3353871
jplondon
save whatever damage mr mulcair can and likely will inflict on mr trudeau, mr mulcair will not be there four years from now.
jessica murray
i would like to think that this is true, but anybody at all that could have replaced him is gone. it's functionally a total purge of the party; there's literally nobody left. whether anybody likes it or not, this is now his party. he broke it, he bought it - and now he has to glue it back together. and, it will look very different when he's done, too.
elizabeth may, on the other hand, will probably not be the leader of the green party four years from now. and that's probably a very important truth.
RustBeltCAN
the NDP and CONs will be trading seat numbers next election.
jessica murray
yup. i think the ndp are moving into a space on the moderate right that paul martin wanted to move the liberals into. the cpc is in the process of falling back to socred irrelevancy. the left will be taken over by the greens.
expect big noises from mulcair on the budget.
paired with a less extreme social agenda, while the conservatives are having an existential debate on abortion, it will be an attractive combination for moderate conservative voters.
zappa would openly ridicule almost all of this.
if zappa were alive today, he'd probably be making novelty techno that sounds vaguely like psy and writing off any kind of hyphenated rock music as 20th century.
and, he'd no doubt have spent the 00s doing cracked out hip-hop, spitting rhymes over soundscapes that sound like mashups of squarepusher, mars volta, indricothere and flying lotus.
(if somebody has enough spare time for that, i'd like to hear it)
honestly. that is the absolute truth.
if zappa were still alive, he'd have ten or fifteen hip-hop records and would be heavily into abstract techno.
"shut up and play the return of the son of monster hip hop from hell, on your guitar, some more"
you've never heard a rap in 37. that's just 'cause zappa didn't live long enough to get to it. you don't understand what he would have done to hip-hop. you probably *can't*.
diffuser.fm/22-musicians-frank-zappa-would-love/#photogallery-1=23
if zappa were alive today, he'd probably be making novelty techno that sounds vaguely like psy and writing off any kind of hyphenated rock music as 20th century.
and, he'd no doubt have spent the 00s doing cracked out hip-hop, spitting rhymes over soundscapes that sound like mashups of squarepusher, mars volta, indricothere and flying lotus.
(if somebody has enough spare time for that, i'd like to hear it)
honestly. that is the absolute truth.
if zappa were still alive, he'd have ten or fifteen hip-hop records and would be heavily into abstract techno.
"shut up and play the return of the son of monster hip hop from hell, on your guitar, some more"
you've never heard a rap in 37. that's just 'cause zappa didn't live long enough to get to it. you don't understand what he would have done to hip-hop. you probably *can't*.
diffuser.fm/22-musicians-frank-zappa-would-love/#photogallery-1=23
this is slut shaming. where's the outrage?
it's very much unusually patriarchal for pop music. the topic of sexual infidelity is pretty normal in pop, but it generally takes the form of jealousy or inadequacy. it's generally in the form of a reflection regarding what went on, or in the form of a mea culpa in not being adequate. this is a reflection of 20th century culture, which was very much an objectivist culture in the sense that it was rooted in the idea that individuals need to take responsibility for the events that occur in their lives. our culture in the last century was that when bad shit happens, we primarily have ourselves to blame and need to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. this was true across the spectrum, starting some time in the great depression.
i think this is the first time i've ever heard infidelity in pop take the form of an angry accusation that implies some kind of transgression against the male "protagonist". the messaging in the song is i own you, and you have disobeyed my honour.
this is a massive step backwards, socially. but, it's not surprising. talk of the younger generation leaning left on civil rights is being skewed by media exposure, as it was with their grandparents. there is a massive silent majority that got their religion growing up from sitcom reruns and sees re-establishing the sanctity of the christian family as a means of placing order on a world full of chaos. it's a false concept of the past, but it's what they were given to digest and what they broadly think is an accurate reflection of it. they may be less judgmental than the conservatives of previous generations, and less interested in enforcing their values on others. but, they're being driven by some kind of awakening that is a reactionary consequence of some kind of existential angst and seem to have an actual desire to move in this direction in their lives.
not conservatism through draconian law. but, conservatism through popular decree. it's the kind of social revolution that socialists talk about, but in the direction of re-establishing a traditional hierarchy; falling back into the womb, where it's safe.
most are so lost in this, they won't even understand what i'm talking about.
a good way to see what i'm saying is to look at polling on abortion amongst young people.
on the one hand, they're pretty much the only generation that has ever had a majority opinion of being pro-choice. the culture war people have pointed to that to suggest they're a bunch of liberals. but, on the other hand, polls consistently show that a higher percentage of them consider it to be "morally wrong" - sometimes pushing 70%. the majority opinion from gen xers is that a fetus is just a rightless clump of cells. so, that's a hardened swing right on opinions about abortion, coinciding with less authoritarian views on disallowing it.
the majority opinion seems to be that it's rarely justified, but that doesn't mean that it should be disallowed. it's immoral, but that doesn't mean the government has a right to stop it.
one consequently needs to be careful in interpreting polls about these kinds of things with these kids, as they seem to have a tendency to break a lot of the conventions we're used to. the conventional narrative would consider that a contradiction. but, of course, it isn't a novel position. it's the position associated with right-libertarianism (and adhered to cautiously by some liberals). i think this label is pretty broadly applicable on a lot of things. you see the same thing with gay issues. media points to broadening acceptance, in terms of legal structures. but, those same kids are openly homophobic in their day-to-day language and tend to view gays as social outcasts.
they may lean left in the short term, but it's on the authoritarian axis and pretty pragmatic. it's probably at least positive that it's probably unlikely that they'll become more authoritarian as they age. but, if the right figures this out, expect it to adapt to it.
it's very much unusually patriarchal for pop music. the topic of sexual infidelity is pretty normal in pop, but it generally takes the form of jealousy or inadequacy. it's generally in the form of a reflection regarding what went on, or in the form of a mea culpa in not being adequate. this is a reflection of 20th century culture, which was very much an objectivist culture in the sense that it was rooted in the idea that individuals need to take responsibility for the events that occur in their lives. our culture in the last century was that when bad shit happens, we primarily have ourselves to blame and need to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. this was true across the spectrum, starting some time in the great depression.
i think this is the first time i've ever heard infidelity in pop take the form of an angry accusation that implies some kind of transgression against the male "protagonist". the messaging in the song is i own you, and you have disobeyed my honour.
this is a massive step backwards, socially. but, it's not surprising. talk of the younger generation leaning left on civil rights is being skewed by media exposure, as it was with their grandparents. there is a massive silent majority that got their religion growing up from sitcom reruns and sees re-establishing the sanctity of the christian family as a means of placing order on a world full of chaos. it's a false concept of the past, but it's what they were given to digest and what they broadly think is an accurate reflection of it. they may be less judgmental than the conservatives of previous generations, and less interested in enforcing their values on others. but, they're being driven by some kind of awakening that is a reactionary consequence of some kind of existential angst and seem to have an actual desire to move in this direction in their lives.
not conservatism through draconian law. but, conservatism through popular decree. it's the kind of social revolution that socialists talk about, but in the direction of re-establishing a traditional hierarchy; falling back into the womb, where it's safe.
most are so lost in this, they won't even understand what i'm talking about.
a good way to see what i'm saying is to look at polling on abortion amongst young people.
on the one hand, they're pretty much the only generation that has ever had a majority opinion of being pro-choice. the culture war people have pointed to that to suggest they're a bunch of liberals. but, on the other hand, polls consistently show that a higher percentage of them consider it to be "morally wrong" - sometimes pushing 70%. the majority opinion from gen xers is that a fetus is just a rightless clump of cells. so, that's a hardened swing right on opinions about abortion, coinciding with less authoritarian views on disallowing it.
the majority opinion seems to be that it's rarely justified, but that doesn't mean that it should be disallowed. it's immoral, but that doesn't mean the government has a right to stop it.
one consequently needs to be careful in interpreting polls about these kinds of things with these kids, as they seem to have a tendency to break a lot of the conventions we're used to. the conventional narrative would consider that a contradiction. but, of course, it isn't a novel position. it's the position associated with right-libertarianism (and adhered to cautiously by some liberals). i think this label is pretty broadly applicable on a lot of things. you see the same thing with gay issues. media points to broadening acceptance, in terms of legal structures. but, those same kids are openly homophobic in their day-to-day language and tend to view gays as social outcasts.
they may lean left in the short term, but it's on the authoritarian axis and pretty pragmatic. it's probably at least positive that it's probably unlikely that they'll become more authoritarian as they age. but, if the right figures this out, expect it to adapt to it.
Monday, December 7, 2015
Sunday, December 6, 2015
see, i think you're confused about what a police officer is though.
i need to be clear, though. i've made thousands of youtube, facebook and other media posts. all over the place. this is the first time i've typed the words "fuck the police". i know that they're mostly union stiffs, and they're mostly doing their job.
the problem is that their job requires that they go through training that teaches them to treat people differently based on their ethnic background - and that what their job is is to protect the property of the wealthy from the masses, through whatever means possible.
getting mad and breaking stuff doesn't solve anything. it just gives them an excuse to put you in a cage and enslave you. nowadays, chances are you're getting a stint working for some big company like nike. yes, even in america. they're just laughing at you.
but, this logic is fuzzy. the police cannot be treated as an independent and identically distributed random variable. they are paid to oppress people. that is their job.
fwiw, i'll gladly bite on the anarchist question, but only if i'm poked. i've had this argument far too many times.
i don't entirely agree with the argument i'm about to present, but i do think there's some truth to it. i really think there has to be some kind of psychological damage worked into desiring to go to work every day, pick up a gun and tell people what to do. something went wrong there, in that person's childhood. it's the same basic mentality that leads to mass shootings, it's just manifested differently.
but, there was a film released about ten yeas ago called the corporation in which the thesis was presented that corporations fit the clinical definition of psychopathy. if my memory serves correctly - and i have some doubt, but i'm pretty sure - there were various academics in that film (one was chomsky...) that pointed out that the role one plays as a ceo is not necessarily going to be the same that the role one plays as private citizen.
so, you could have a ceo that, in his private life gives tons of money to greenpeace and volunteers with planting trees, but, in his public life, facilitates the production of massive levels of pollution. as an individual, this person may strongly disagree with the actions of the company. but, he is both bound by his job responsibilities - and in fact by law - to do whatever maximizes profit, regardless of consequence. and, if he were to quit, somebody else would do it.
i think that something similar can be applied to police officers. they may be nice people, in their private lives. they may join anti-racist marches. they may be members of the aclu. but, in their job requirements, they have no option but to apply the principles of racial profiling that they've been taught. and, if they quit they can be replaced.
what that means is that focusing on the individual police is obscuring the issue. the racism is systemic. it comes from the department. and, it comes from lawmakers, too. meaning it comes via mandate from the dwindling white majority.
but, recognizing that reality doesn't change what a police officer is. and, what that is is not something that should be rationalized or romanticized. it's a social function that is designed to implement violence along class and ethnic lines to maintain the status quo of extreme inequality.
useful reading:
http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/17505/police_and_poor_people
i need to be clear, though. i've made thousands of youtube, facebook and other media posts. all over the place. this is the first time i've typed the words "fuck the police". i know that they're mostly union stiffs, and they're mostly doing their job.
the problem is that their job requires that they go through training that teaches them to treat people differently based on their ethnic background - and that what their job is is to protect the property of the wealthy from the masses, through whatever means possible.
getting mad and breaking stuff doesn't solve anything. it just gives them an excuse to put you in a cage and enslave you. nowadays, chances are you're getting a stint working for some big company like nike. yes, even in america. they're just laughing at you.
but, this logic is fuzzy. the police cannot be treated as an independent and identically distributed random variable. they are paid to oppress people. that is their job.
fwiw, i'll gladly bite on the anarchist question, but only if i'm poked. i've had this argument far too many times.
i don't entirely agree with the argument i'm about to present, but i do think there's some truth to it. i really think there has to be some kind of psychological damage worked into desiring to go to work every day, pick up a gun and tell people what to do. something went wrong there, in that person's childhood. it's the same basic mentality that leads to mass shootings, it's just manifested differently.
but, there was a film released about ten yeas ago called the corporation in which the thesis was presented that corporations fit the clinical definition of psychopathy. if my memory serves correctly - and i have some doubt, but i'm pretty sure - there were various academics in that film (one was chomsky...) that pointed out that the role one plays as a ceo is not necessarily going to be the same that the role one plays as private citizen.
so, you could have a ceo that, in his private life gives tons of money to greenpeace and volunteers with planting trees, but, in his public life, facilitates the production of massive levels of pollution. as an individual, this person may strongly disagree with the actions of the company. but, he is both bound by his job responsibilities - and in fact by law - to do whatever maximizes profit, regardless of consequence. and, if he were to quit, somebody else would do it.
i think that something similar can be applied to police officers. they may be nice people, in their private lives. they may join anti-racist marches. they may be members of the aclu. but, in their job requirements, they have no option but to apply the principles of racial profiling that they've been taught. and, if they quit they can be replaced.
what that means is that focusing on the individual police is obscuring the issue. the racism is systemic. it comes from the department. and, it comes from lawmakers, too. meaning it comes via mandate from the dwindling white majority.
but, recognizing that reality doesn't change what a police officer is. and, what that is is not something that should be rationalized or romanticized. it's a social function that is designed to implement violence along class and ethnic lines to maintain the status quo of extreme inequality.
useful reading:
http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/17505/police_and_poor_people
in a thousand years from now, if people still remember hockey a thousand years from now, few people will believe gretzky's stats.
various theories will appear to explain how it could be possible. a minority opinion may conclude it had to do with expansion, but it will no doubt be broadly overlooked with arguments such as...
there is no empirical evidence that expansion inflates scoring records
"it's unscientific", they will claim.
other theories will develop, that attempt to take into account occam's razor. some will no doubt argue that it was an honest transcription error that occurred when records were shifted from manual record keeping to digital record keeping, or perhaps that it was some kind of error in binary. are these numbers truly meant to be interpreted in base 10?
others will claim that they were exaggerations by the canadian government to intimidate the russians. cold war propaganda. attempts will be made to compare canadian accounts with russian accounts, and attempt to derive contradictions.
still others will claim that he never existed at all.
the few people that believe the historical record will be written off as lunatics, but will nonetheless angrily hit back at the academics. revisionists! ahistoricisms! it's written clearly in the sources....
various theories will appear to explain how it could be possible. a minority opinion may conclude it had to do with expansion, but it will no doubt be broadly overlooked with arguments such as...
there is no empirical evidence that expansion inflates scoring records
"it's unscientific", they will claim.
other theories will develop, that attempt to take into account occam's razor. some will no doubt argue that it was an honest transcription error that occurred when records were shifted from manual record keeping to digital record keeping, or perhaps that it was some kind of error in binary. are these numbers truly meant to be interpreted in base 10?
others will claim that they were exaggerations by the canadian government to intimidate the russians. cold war propaganda. attempts will be made to compare canadian accounts with russian accounts, and attempt to derive contradictions.
still others will claim that he never existed at all.
the few people that believe the historical record will be written off as lunatics, but will nonetheless angrily hit back at the academics. revisionists! ahistoricisms! it's written clearly in the sources....
applause.
this is the right way to criticize religion.
of course, muslims view the koran as a kind of "third testament" to begin with. it's an addition to the bible. same god. so, you should expect very large overlaps.
i know that my own story is that religion isn't something i thought about much until i was about 10 or so. and, when i started thinking about it, i took the initiative to pick the book up and actually read it. and, i did read it - from genesis through to revelation. i had to take the first part of it pretty skeptically, even at that age, but i'd heard the argument of non-literalism so i knew how to do that intelligently (seven days need not literally mean seven days). it was the book of job where i started to really recoil. by the end of it, i was convinced it was utter nonsense. if this god actually exists, it should be struggled against. but, it struck me as most likely that it can't exist at all. the level of assholery was just too much. if this god existed, it would have had to have already destroyed itself.
something that defined the era of christianity before the reformation was actually a restriction on reading the bible. you'd be in a lot of trouble if the monks caught you reading the verses - excommunication, and perhaps even a death sentence. only official church representatives were permitted to read it. as you can see, there's reasons for this: the threat of heresy through independent interpretation, the threat of people finding contradictions and the threat of simple revulsion of it's contents.
if there's a difference across cultures in today's world, it isn't that muslims are less educated. it's that most westerners are entirely clueless as to the nature of our own history. we have a year zero set at 1945. nothing relevant happened before that date. and, so we can't place anything in context.
this is the right way to criticize religion.
of course, muslims view the koran as a kind of "third testament" to begin with. it's an addition to the bible. same god. so, you should expect very large overlaps.
i know that my own story is that religion isn't something i thought about much until i was about 10 or so. and, when i started thinking about it, i took the initiative to pick the book up and actually read it. and, i did read it - from genesis through to revelation. i had to take the first part of it pretty skeptically, even at that age, but i'd heard the argument of non-literalism so i knew how to do that intelligently (seven days need not literally mean seven days). it was the book of job where i started to really recoil. by the end of it, i was convinced it was utter nonsense. if this god actually exists, it should be struggled against. but, it struck me as most likely that it can't exist at all. the level of assholery was just too much. if this god existed, it would have had to have already destroyed itself.
something that defined the era of christianity before the reformation was actually a restriction on reading the bible. you'd be in a lot of trouble if the monks caught you reading the verses - excommunication, and perhaps even a death sentence. only official church representatives were permitted to read it. as you can see, there's reasons for this: the threat of heresy through independent interpretation, the threat of people finding contradictions and the threat of simple revulsion of it's contents.
if there's a difference across cultures in today's world, it isn't that muslims are less educated. it's that most westerners are entirely clueless as to the nature of our own history. we have a year zero set at 1945. nothing relevant happened before that date. and, so we can't place anything in context.
isn't this exactly the same as his other songs?
regarding the issue over the view count, i think i'm more amused by how seriously youtube takes the sanctity of it's view count than anything else.
youtube actually seriously thinks this is a battle worth fighting in real time.
get your head around this.
regarding the issue over the view count, i think i'm more amused by how seriously youtube takes the sanctity of it's view count than anything else.
youtube actually seriously thinks this is a battle worth fighting in real time.
get your head around this.
the reality is that nothing can come from talking to a bunch of students *besides* a photo op.
the liberals are going to need some pressure, here. no doubt. we need the kids to keep this up.
but, ask yourself this question: if you're serious about this, do you spend your time negotiating with the capp and other emissions producing bodies, or do you spend your time hanging out and talking with kids? which approach would suggest this is serious, and which approach would suggest it's just politics?
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/cop21-paris-canada-youth-delegation-1.3352246
the liberals are going to need some pressure, here. no doubt. we need the kids to keep this up.
but, ask yourself this question: if you're serious about this, do you spend your time negotiating with the capp and other emissions producing bodies, or do you spend your time hanging out and talking with kids? which approach would suggest this is serious, and which approach would suggest it's just politics?
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/cop21-paris-canada-youth-delegation-1.3352246
this is actually a relatively useful point to make. the simple truth is that it's very cold, here.
if you take a survey of western canada, you'll notice something very interesting that most canadians are actually unaware of: there's a large percentage of toponyms that are of northern and north-eastern european background. finnish, norwegian, swedish, ukrainian. it was by specifically attracting settlers from these northern countries that we were able to settle the west and prevent american expansion. my maternal grandmother's mother's parents came here in the early part of the last century from finland and norway and settled in saskatchewan under this program of targeted immigration from northern europe.
somewhere along the way, the cold war seems to have gotten in the way. it would have been hard to migrate from russia or ukraine during those years. and, today, the scandinavian countries have comparable or higher living standards than we do.
but, if we really need the population increases (i don't think that's clear, actually...), perhaps we should be looking at attracting migrants from countries that are used to cold winters. it worked in the past.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/no-surprise-here-canada-a-turnoff-for-some-refugees/article27600848/
if you take a survey of western canada, you'll notice something very interesting that most canadians are actually unaware of: there's a large percentage of toponyms that are of northern and north-eastern european background. finnish, norwegian, swedish, ukrainian. it was by specifically attracting settlers from these northern countries that we were able to settle the west and prevent american expansion. my maternal grandmother's mother's parents came here in the early part of the last century from finland and norway and settled in saskatchewan under this program of targeted immigration from northern europe.
somewhere along the way, the cold war seems to have gotten in the way. it would have been hard to migrate from russia or ukraine during those years. and, today, the scandinavian countries have comparable or higher living standards than we do.
but, if we really need the population increases (i don't think that's clear, actually...), perhaps we should be looking at attracting migrants from countries that are used to cold winters. it worked in the past.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/no-surprise-here-canada-a-turnoff-for-some-refugees/article27600848/
Saturday, December 5, 2015
i guess i'm mostly directing this to people outside the country. concerned onlookers should realize that the truth is somewhere between the activist position that they're still in bed with the oil companies and the government position that they're going to save the world, with flair.
if you were paying attention during the election, you will realize that the government is not proposing anything close to a moratorium on fossil fuel development - that they did support keystone and are in favour of east-west, while expressing unhappiness about other pipeline projects. you have to be careful about how you interpret the keystone part. but, we are going to absolutely require blockades and court battles to make east-west unprofitable. otherwise, they will do this.
that said, you also have to realize that a lot of these kids are not old enough to remember living in a liberal government. if you're 23 today, you were around 14 when stephen harper was elected. i know paul remembers the chretien government; i must admit i'm not old enough to remember the first trudeau government, either, although he certainly is. but, what i'm getting at is that growing up in a world run by a democrat that cites reagan in speeches and is to the right of the first george bush on most issues, and where the left is constantly arguing that we're under a one-party system, is going to make understanding the liberal party of canada almost impossible for these kids. the liberals are not perfect - any leftist will find lots to criticize. but, they are a legitimately center-left party, too. it's been decades since the democrats could say that.
so, no: the liberals will not put a moratorium on tar sands. yes, they will work with industry to get the oil to market. but, expecting anything else is really pretty much absurd, given how economically important oil is to revenue (canada is currently in recession due solely to the cut in oil prices). the idea of keeping 80% of the tar sands in the ground is one way to reduce emissions. it's not the only way. that is, itself, american propaganda. the tar sands are bad but they are not fundamentally worse than burning coal, or methane release from fracking - which obama has championed. total canadian emissions are only 1.5% of global emissions. tar sands emissions are a fraction of that 1.5%. now, if they expand dramatically while other sources decrease dramatically? ok. but, it's a hypothetical argument that collapses when you reverse certain assumptions.
but, you can reasonably expect them to do a lot of other things. first, we have to diversify our economy a little. one of the best ways is switching to the production of clean energy, although the marijuana legalization should also help. increasing revenue from other sources will change the discourse dramatically, but the liberals will not dive in head first on this. they're also putting down $20 billion dollars on "green infrastructure", which is going to go into things like converting public transit, converting wastewater facilities and doing what's left to transition the grid. they'll put pressure on industry; expect some sort of carbon pricing. and, with a little bit of the kind of pressure that you're seeing here, stronger initiatives for conversion to electric vehicles are a strong likelihood.
it will not immediately come as a consequence of reducing tar sands production, but they will likely substantially reduce emissions in other ways. they will meet reasonable targets, relative to our share of emissions.
and, that is part of the reason these kids are being ignored. i mean, the major reason is that it's bad press - obviously. but, they're not pushing a reasonable plan, either. whether they realize it or not, and whether they like it or not, the government will accomplish more in talking to industry than they will in talking to students. and, when it's stated this bluntly, that's really pretty obvious.
despite the press, the outside world should not expect the world from this government. it should not expect them to shut down fossil fuel development in the short term (and, understand that the government cannot snap it's fingers and stop development, anyways - it's mostly privately owned). however, it should expect them to focus on diversifying the canadian economy, which will allow for better options in the near future. and, it should expect to see significant net reductions in emissions - even if it's not at the source of the tar sands.
canadians, on the other hand, should continue to put pressure on the government to act. they may not always get an audience. sometimes, they may end up in jail. but, the difference between the liberals and the democrats is that the liberals will act if they feel that fire on their feet and feel they can in a way they consider to be "responsible" - which is a reasonable concept of responsibility. so, as a canadian activist, you need to keep it burning. you'll get better results than the world you've grown up in might lead you to expect.
if you were paying attention during the election, you will realize that the government is not proposing anything close to a moratorium on fossil fuel development - that they did support keystone and are in favour of east-west, while expressing unhappiness about other pipeline projects. you have to be careful about how you interpret the keystone part. but, we are going to absolutely require blockades and court battles to make east-west unprofitable. otherwise, they will do this.
that said, you also have to realize that a lot of these kids are not old enough to remember living in a liberal government. if you're 23 today, you were around 14 when stephen harper was elected. i know paul remembers the chretien government; i must admit i'm not old enough to remember the first trudeau government, either, although he certainly is. but, what i'm getting at is that growing up in a world run by a democrat that cites reagan in speeches and is to the right of the first george bush on most issues, and where the left is constantly arguing that we're under a one-party system, is going to make understanding the liberal party of canada almost impossible for these kids. the liberals are not perfect - any leftist will find lots to criticize. but, they are a legitimately center-left party, too. it's been decades since the democrats could say that.
so, no: the liberals will not put a moratorium on tar sands. yes, they will work with industry to get the oil to market. but, expecting anything else is really pretty much absurd, given how economically important oil is to revenue (canada is currently in recession due solely to the cut in oil prices). the idea of keeping 80% of the tar sands in the ground is one way to reduce emissions. it's not the only way. that is, itself, american propaganda. the tar sands are bad but they are not fundamentally worse than burning coal, or methane release from fracking - which obama has championed. total canadian emissions are only 1.5% of global emissions. tar sands emissions are a fraction of that 1.5%. now, if they expand dramatically while other sources decrease dramatically? ok. but, it's a hypothetical argument that collapses when you reverse certain assumptions.
but, you can reasonably expect them to do a lot of other things. first, we have to diversify our economy a little. one of the best ways is switching to the production of clean energy, although the marijuana legalization should also help. increasing revenue from other sources will change the discourse dramatically, but the liberals will not dive in head first on this. they're also putting down $20 billion dollars on "green infrastructure", which is going to go into things like converting public transit, converting wastewater facilities and doing what's left to transition the grid. they'll put pressure on industry; expect some sort of carbon pricing. and, with a little bit of the kind of pressure that you're seeing here, stronger initiatives for conversion to electric vehicles are a strong likelihood.
it will not immediately come as a consequence of reducing tar sands production, but they will likely substantially reduce emissions in other ways. they will meet reasonable targets, relative to our share of emissions.
and, that is part of the reason these kids are being ignored. i mean, the major reason is that it's bad press - obviously. but, they're not pushing a reasonable plan, either. whether they realize it or not, and whether they like it or not, the government will accomplish more in talking to industry than they will in talking to students. and, when it's stated this bluntly, that's really pretty obvious.
despite the press, the outside world should not expect the world from this government. it should not expect them to shut down fossil fuel development in the short term (and, understand that the government cannot snap it's fingers and stop development, anyways - it's mostly privately owned). however, it should expect them to focus on diversifying the canadian economy, which will allow for better options in the near future. and, it should expect to see significant net reductions in emissions - even if it's not at the source of the tar sands.
canadians, on the other hand, should continue to put pressure on the government to act. they may not always get an audience. sometimes, they may end up in jail. but, the difference between the liberals and the democrats is that the liberals will act if they feel that fire on their feet and feel they can in a way they consider to be "responsible" - which is a reasonable concept of responsibility. so, as a canadian activist, you need to keep it burning. you'll get better results than the world you've grown up in might lead you to expect.
there's a lot of information being thrown around, and it's very hard to determine what is good information and what isn't.
my brief analysis of the situation is as follows:
1) information suggesting that the oil is being transported through turkey should be taken skeptically.
2) information suggesting that the oil is moving south should be taken less skeptically.
the reason for this is that one of the major conflicts in the region is between the turks and saudis for control of the oil. all information suggests that the primary mover here is the saudis, rather than the turks. turkish proxies remain in fierce battle with saudi proxies. it is contradictory to conclude that saudi proxies are shipping oil through turkey.
that said, it's not impossible that isis has switched sides. but, i don't see any direct evidence of this.
so, why would the russians do this? it is likely for internal consumption, and may signal a shift in russian hostilities to turkey. this would hopefully further shift nato's focus out of ukraine, which is what the russians were always angling for in syria.
the turks should take this extremely seriously.
3) suggestions that iraq is shifting towards russian influence should be taken seriously.
4) suggestions that the americans are funding isis as a part of a destabilization regime, and are not seriously targeting them, should be taken seriously.
my understanding is that the "big plan" here is saudi expansion into iraq and syria - and probably jordan and eventually lebanon as well. this is also happening in libya. sisi is essentially a saudi pawn. together, this creates the context of saudi territorial expansion. short term boundary lines are constructed around iran, turkey and algeria- although all three may see eventual destabilization. the idea is the reconstruction of a saudi-centered caliphate. the americans would have various reasons to support this, but it's being primarily driven by saudi money that is pushing for the historical british promise of a recreated arab empire, which was made during world war one and put on hold during the cold war due to russian influence in the region.
5) the possibilities for "blowback" are unclear, but substantial.
my brief analysis of the situation is as follows:
1) information suggesting that the oil is being transported through turkey should be taken skeptically.
2) information suggesting that the oil is moving south should be taken less skeptically.
the reason for this is that one of the major conflicts in the region is between the turks and saudis for control of the oil. all information suggests that the primary mover here is the saudis, rather than the turks. turkish proxies remain in fierce battle with saudi proxies. it is contradictory to conclude that saudi proxies are shipping oil through turkey.
that said, it's not impossible that isis has switched sides. but, i don't see any direct evidence of this.
so, why would the russians do this? it is likely for internal consumption, and may signal a shift in russian hostilities to turkey. this would hopefully further shift nato's focus out of ukraine, which is what the russians were always angling for in syria.
the turks should take this extremely seriously.
3) suggestions that iraq is shifting towards russian influence should be taken seriously.
4) suggestions that the americans are funding isis as a part of a destabilization regime, and are not seriously targeting them, should be taken seriously.
my understanding is that the "big plan" here is saudi expansion into iraq and syria - and probably jordan and eventually lebanon as well. this is also happening in libya. sisi is essentially a saudi pawn. together, this creates the context of saudi territorial expansion. short term boundary lines are constructed around iran, turkey and algeria- although all three may see eventual destabilization. the idea is the reconstruction of a saudi-centered caliphate. the americans would have various reasons to support this, but it's being primarily driven by saudi money that is pushing for the historical british promise of a recreated arab empire, which was made during world war one and put on hold during the cold war due to russian influence in the region.
5) the possibilities for "blowback" are unclear, but substantial.
the tactical value of a protest march has never been to create pressure on policy or raise awareness. activists have always understood that there are better approaches for these things. the purpose of the march has always been to intimidate - it is a militant process that demonstrates strength. if you could ask gandhi, he would tell you this. bluntly. whatever the reason for the march, or whatever the type, the idea has always been to reclaim the streets. and, as such, the apparently draconian response from the state is entirely justified in terms of self-preservation.
i need to be clear: i'm ideologically aligned with the protesters. i think we should reclaim the streets. but, only the most disconnected and most naive believe that the march is a purely peaceful act of protest that exists within a vacuum created by the event. marching is a revolutionary act. it always has been. and, of course the state will employ violence against those that organize against it.
the reason that marches are useless today is in the uneven level of weapons technology. even if marchers could arm themselves, even if they would choose to, there would be no fair fight with the security forces. in the real world, david never defeats goliath. it is simply a foolish tactic to take a drastically superior foe head-on.
staffing blockades is, in fact, the smarter approach. but, that in itself must be paired with legal action. i can only speak for the legal realities in canada, but the way we have to do this here is to create an indigenous protest, force the opponents to get an injunction and then tie the issue down in court. the ultimate legal question in most of these issues reduces to questions of private property rights, meaning the issues *must* be dealt with in courts, rather than in legislatures. the reality is that the elected officials often have little ability to intervene if they wanted to.
the message that a 500,000 or million or ten million person march sends is "this is the size of our army". it must intimidate the state into making a calculation.
the calculation the state needs to make is whether it feels it can defeat that army, or if it is better off avoiding the conflict in giving into those demands.
the british decided they could not defeat gandh's army. in the 60s, the democrats made a similar calculation regarding civil rights - that legislative changes were preferable to civil war.
but, today, we need such a large army to defeat their technology that the premise is virtually unthinkable. i mean, you could calculate a critical mass. but you'd need millions - tens of millions - to be in any way intimidating.
the targeted legal battles over property are consequently going to be far more effective in stopping further development and presenting financial arguments for transition. divestment is another more useful strategy.
this is useful;
http://central.d127.org/library/classprojects/gandhi/Documents/GandhisNonVioasaTactic.pdf
www.independent.co.uk/voices/dont-bother-protesting-at-the-paris-climate-change-conference-there-are-better-ways-to-tackle-global-a6760311.html
i need to be clear: i'm ideologically aligned with the protesters. i think we should reclaim the streets. but, only the most disconnected and most naive believe that the march is a purely peaceful act of protest that exists within a vacuum created by the event. marching is a revolutionary act. it always has been. and, of course the state will employ violence against those that organize against it.
the reason that marches are useless today is in the uneven level of weapons technology. even if marchers could arm themselves, even if they would choose to, there would be no fair fight with the security forces. in the real world, david never defeats goliath. it is simply a foolish tactic to take a drastically superior foe head-on.
staffing blockades is, in fact, the smarter approach. but, that in itself must be paired with legal action. i can only speak for the legal realities in canada, but the way we have to do this here is to create an indigenous protest, force the opponents to get an injunction and then tie the issue down in court. the ultimate legal question in most of these issues reduces to questions of private property rights, meaning the issues *must* be dealt with in courts, rather than in legislatures. the reality is that the elected officials often have little ability to intervene if they wanted to.
the message that a 500,000 or million or ten million person march sends is "this is the size of our army". it must intimidate the state into making a calculation.
the calculation the state needs to make is whether it feels it can defeat that army, or if it is better off avoiding the conflict in giving into those demands.
the british decided they could not defeat gandh's army. in the 60s, the democrats made a similar calculation regarding civil rights - that legislative changes were preferable to civil war.
but, today, we need such a large army to defeat their technology that the premise is virtually unthinkable. i mean, you could calculate a critical mass. but you'd need millions - tens of millions - to be in any way intimidating.
the targeted legal battles over property are consequently going to be far more effective in stopping further development and presenting financial arguments for transition. divestment is another more useful strategy.
this is useful;
http://central.d127.org/library/classprojects/gandhi/Documents/GandhisNonVioasaTactic.pdf
www.independent.co.uk/voices/dont-bother-protesting-at-the-paris-climate-change-conference-there-are-better-ways-to-tackle-global-a6760311.html
“when you do your best, you can’t do better.”
still the master of tautologies, i see.
he would have won a fourth majority. and, that might have spared us from harper altogether. but, it’s time to look forwards, now.
www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/jean-chretien-on-throne-speeches-honeymoons-and-hard-work/
still the master of tautologies, i see.
he would have won a fourth majority. and, that might have spared us from harper altogether. but, it’s time to look forwards, now.
www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/jean-chretien-on-throne-speeches-honeymoons-and-hard-work/
Friday, December 4, 2015
i think what people are saying with this is that, while they might not fully support military action, or may be uneasy about it if they do tentatively support it, they take the position that if we're going to fight this fight then we should fight it at full strength.
i mean, you've got 47% supporting total withdrawal and 60% supporting the continued use of jets. contradiction? not entirely, if the people that are supporting the jets are taking the position of "if we're going to fight them, let's go in full strength and get it over with and then come home right after."
see, that then brings up the question of whether that is a reasonable position. and, nobody informed of the position on the ground will argue that this can be done quickly.
honestly? i don't think this is an election driver, either. pollsters are still polling around the narrative put in place by the previous government - security, taxes and "strong leadership". that's not going to be the narrative of this government, and won't be the polling questions that will be relevant over the next four years. none of these issues were at the top of the list of any voters' survey.
but, if you take that step back from the data and think about it for a second, it's obvious. there's little reasons to think canadians would want this fight. but, we understand that they're bad guys, too. so, we're approaching it like toilet cleaning duty. we don't like it. we wish there was a better way. but, we know it's necessary.
what that means is that the government's task is to convince people that the pivot it's putting in place is the most practical way to deal with the issue. i think it's already halfway there, but it does seem to be losing the messaging on the planes - and i think that's largely because the media isn't "getting it". it's being presented as a pacifist way out, rather than a pragmatic tactical shift to best accomplish the goal of taking them out and then taking ourselves out.
(link to globe article lost)
i mean, you've got 47% supporting total withdrawal and 60% supporting the continued use of jets. contradiction? not entirely, if the people that are supporting the jets are taking the position of "if we're going to fight them, let's go in full strength and get it over with and then come home right after."
see, that then brings up the question of whether that is a reasonable position. and, nobody informed of the position on the ground will argue that this can be done quickly.
honestly? i don't think this is an election driver, either. pollsters are still polling around the narrative put in place by the previous government - security, taxes and "strong leadership". that's not going to be the narrative of this government, and won't be the polling questions that will be relevant over the next four years. none of these issues were at the top of the list of any voters' survey.
but, if you take that step back from the data and think about it for a second, it's obvious. there's little reasons to think canadians would want this fight. but, we understand that they're bad guys, too. so, we're approaching it like toilet cleaning duty. we don't like it. we wish there was a better way. but, we know it's necessary.
what that means is that the government's task is to convince people that the pivot it's putting in place is the most practical way to deal with the issue. i think it's already halfway there, but it does seem to be losing the messaging on the planes - and i think that's largely because the media isn't "getting it". it's being presented as a pacifist way out, rather than a pragmatic tactical shift to best accomplish the goal of taking them out and then taking ourselves out.
(link to globe article lost)
this is mostly nonsense. it made sense ten years ago, when the topic was bombing iraq for no discernible reason. but, bombing isis is not the same thing as bombing saddam hussein. that's the error this article is making, and perhaps the error that a small number of canadians continue to make.
what you see when you look at polls on this is not a stark ideological division, but a difficulty choosing between two aspects of our cultural heritage. we are both the country that avoided pointless fights in vietnam and iraq and the country that fought the hardest (western) battles in world war two, when the war was worth fighting. this isn't a wedge issue. it's two sides of the same coin: we don't like to fight, but we will when we feel we must. the hard part is in trying to understand what it is that is before us: is this a pointless fight for geostrategic positioning, or is there a really nasty enemy here that needs to be thoroughly annihilated? is it even somewhere in between? canadians will react relative to how they perceive this question.
the reality is that this was not at the top of any voters issue lists. the issues at the top of the list were health care and jobs. the liberals won the election on a rejection of conservative economic austerity, whether that austerity was real or perceived.
and, the reality is that the decision is neither political nor cultural but simply strategic.
you want obama comparisons? you can make a good one, here. it was well publicized that obama opposed the invasion of iraq. but, this was widely misunderstood by the media as a pacifist position. obama's position was actually very clear, to those that took the time to learn it: he did not oppose the invasion of iraq because he was a pacifist, or even because it was illegal, but simply because he thought it was strategically foolish. he thought it was going to bog his forces down in a pointless and unwinnable conflict, and he would have preferred to invade pakistan, instead, where the roots of the problem could be more effectively rooted out. you can look this up, it's absolutely accurate. now, he may not have been fully briefed. but, over a decade later, it is clear that he was right - if you accept the narrative we're presented with. iraq was a mistake because it prevented the americans from containing the bad guys in central asia.
ten years from now, it will probably be equally clear that the right choice is to train local forces to create stable, local governments, and not to rain down fire from the sky. but, it's less clear that our allies have the foresight to realize this and less clear that he's going to be able to stop them from making that error.
the irony here is that the mere idea of the wedge issue is a consequence of the previous government.
liberals have historically defined themselves via subtle thinking, not picking one side of a fight.
"involvement if necessary, but not necessarily involvement".
it's easy to call this "weak". but, this is our actual identity.
if it gets really bad, we'll send troops under a un or nato mandate.
and, virtually everybody will support that.
www.huffingtonpost.ca/alan-ramon-ward/isis-bombing-campaign_b_8700124.html
what you see when you look at polls on this is not a stark ideological division, but a difficulty choosing between two aspects of our cultural heritage. we are both the country that avoided pointless fights in vietnam and iraq and the country that fought the hardest (western) battles in world war two, when the war was worth fighting. this isn't a wedge issue. it's two sides of the same coin: we don't like to fight, but we will when we feel we must. the hard part is in trying to understand what it is that is before us: is this a pointless fight for geostrategic positioning, or is there a really nasty enemy here that needs to be thoroughly annihilated? is it even somewhere in between? canadians will react relative to how they perceive this question.
the reality is that this was not at the top of any voters issue lists. the issues at the top of the list were health care and jobs. the liberals won the election on a rejection of conservative economic austerity, whether that austerity was real or perceived.
and, the reality is that the decision is neither political nor cultural but simply strategic.
you want obama comparisons? you can make a good one, here. it was well publicized that obama opposed the invasion of iraq. but, this was widely misunderstood by the media as a pacifist position. obama's position was actually very clear, to those that took the time to learn it: he did not oppose the invasion of iraq because he was a pacifist, or even because it was illegal, but simply because he thought it was strategically foolish. he thought it was going to bog his forces down in a pointless and unwinnable conflict, and he would have preferred to invade pakistan, instead, where the roots of the problem could be more effectively rooted out. you can look this up, it's absolutely accurate. now, he may not have been fully briefed. but, over a decade later, it is clear that he was right - if you accept the narrative we're presented with. iraq was a mistake because it prevented the americans from containing the bad guys in central asia.
ten years from now, it will probably be equally clear that the right choice is to train local forces to create stable, local governments, and not to rain down fire from the sky. but, it's less clear that our allies have the foresight to realize this and less clear that he's going to be able to stop them from making that error.
the irony here is that the mere idea of the wedge issue is a consequence of the previous government.
liberals have historically defined themselves via subtle thinking, not picking one side of a fight.
"involvement if necessary, but not necessarily involvement".
it's easy to call this "weak". but, this is our actual identity.
if it gets really bad, we'll send troops under a un or nato mandate.
and, virtually everybody will support that.
www.huffingtonpost.ca/alan-ramon-ward/isis-bombing-campaign_b_8700124.html
i agree that it's a very bad precedent to set to pick and choose parts of an agreement you want to enforce.
but, if you want to be honest about this, the reality is that, as a canadian, i see little reason to hold to the agreement at all. it's not just marijuana - there's a few other substances that should be liberalized. and, the international law is obviously not preventing access to the ones that should remain illegal (meth, heroin, cocaine...). so, if we gain nothing by holding to the agreement, why kneecap ourselves on the pot for the sake of compliance?
i think canada should just withdraw from the treaties altogether, and support the creation of new treaties to replace them that focus on new approaches to restrict trafficking of the worst drugs.
but, if you want to be honest about this, the reality is that, as a canadian, i see little reason to hold to the agreement at all. it's not just marijuana - there's a few other substances that should be liberalized. and, the international law is obviously not preventing access to the ones that should remain illegal (meth, heroin, cocaine...). so, if we gain nothing by holding to the agreement, why kneecap ourselves on the pot for the sake of compliance?
i think canada should just withdraw from the treaties altogether, and support the creation of new treaties to replace them that focus on new approaches to restrict trafficking of the worst drugs.
Thursday, December 3, 2015
right now, i'm more concerned about passing legislation. this is the kind of thing i expected to see in the last week of his mandate, not the first week. so, i'm just glad the process is moving - that they're serious about making sure nothing gets stuck in the senate. that sounds insane, and it would be insane, and nobody would react in any way short of disbelief, but a lot fuzzy thinking could have interpreted it as a way to make the opposition look bad.
again: my primary concern is that it seems like they're focused on governing rather than politicizing the issue further, and that is a positive sign.
as for the proposal?
it seems symbolic, or at least does from those four points. i would have thought it would be formalized through the civil service. we'll see how that works.
basically? whatever.
i need to be clear that this was not a significant election issue, to me. not even top twenty issues. might make top 50, barely. the only way it worked into my thinking at all was in the context of being equally strongly opposed to an elected senate and an abolished one (but i would have considered voting ndp anyways, because i knew they couldn't do it). i would have actually preferred to vote for the status quo on the senate, if the option were available. the liberal ideas were preferable to me, simply for the reason that they were the closest to the status quo.
but, it otherwise had absolutely no effect on how i voted.
my primary concern is that their position on the senate does not become an albatross on the government - that it does not slow down legislation, or otherwise interfere with their ability to implement the substantive parts of their platform. this is a step in that direction, and that is good.
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/senate-advisory-board-non-partisan-leblanc-monsef-1.3348531
Johhnyb
Non-partisan is non-partisan. I would think that a partisan senate could slow down bill passage if it's partisan in favour of the opposition and could not do due diligence if it's partisan for the gov't. We'll always have Progressive and Conservative thinkers in the Senate and that's great. Now we will have senators appointed on merit not partisanship. You have to admit this Trudeau approach is the best yet and is doable now. Of course only time will tell.
jessica murray
i don't share your perspective on rejecting partisanship. when i hear terms like "bipartisan", what comes to mind is the idea of a corporate oligarchy controlling both sides of the debate. it's basically equivalent to doing away with the democratic process altogether, and placing power in the hands of the elite. this is not something that has helped obama, or made him appear in a more positive light to voters. rather, it's fueled a lot of apathy in government. americans thought they were electing a progressive democrat and instead got a moderate republican. it's emboldened the right, and collapsed the base. it's really a disaster, and trudeau should really be learning from this in trying to avoid rather than trying to emulate it. it plays right into the left's narrative that conservatives and liberals are basically the same thing.
i think the best way for left leaning policy makers to get their initiatives across is to start from a position to the left of where they really are, and let the debate pull them into where they actually are. ceding ground to the right merely shifts the entire discussion to the right. and, the liberals have hopefully learned that you can't do that in canada and hold power, because we don't have a two-party spectrum.
but, even if you could convince me that bipartisanship is a good idea, it's a ridiculous premise to begin with. even if you can drop the actual parties (and that's not within the realm of possibility), you're still left with convictions. or, at least, i hope we're still left with convictions. otherwise, we collapse into oligarchy.
we're consequently not really being given a choice between partisanship and non-partisanship. we're being given a choice between democracy and oligarchy.
i would prefer to see a liberal dominated senate that rubber stamps legislation than see that legislation slowed down and cut-up by a conservative body that pretends that it is somehow "non-partisan". and, if that body ends up rubber-stamping legislation, then it is not "non-partisan", either.
that's fine. like, i say - whatever. i don't care. i just don't want to see bills that i support sent back.
i'll acknowledge that the idea of putting limits on patronage appointments is a positive idea. i can't remember who it was, but harper actually appointed somebody that didn't know how to read. that is utterly ridiculous. it is a good idea to ensure that there are higher standards...
but, partisanship itself? that's not a bad idea, at all.
--
yokelman
The PM and MP's should not be allowed to appoint senators, the senate members should be voted in by the people and have an 8 year term limit.
jessica murray
yeah, then we can get absolute gridlock like in the united states. in the process, we can completely ignore our constitutional history, which explicitly attempted to prevent this.
great idea.
in fact, here's a better idea: why don't we just elect senators to their senate?
again: my primary concern is that it seems like they're focused on governing rather than politicizing the issue further, and that is a positive sign.
as for the proposal?
it seems symbolic, or at least does from those four points. i would have thought it would be formalized through the civil service. we'll see how that works.
basically? whatever.
i need to be clear that this was not a significant election issue, to me. not even top twenty issues. might make top 50, barely. the only way it worked into my thinking at all was in the context of being equally strongly opposed to an elected senate and an abolished one (but i would have considered voting ndp anyways, because i knew they couldn't do it). i would have actually preferred to vote for the status quo on the senate, if the option were available. the liberal ideas were preferable to me, simply for the reason that they were the closest to the status quo.
but, it otherwise had absolutely no effect on how i voted.
my primary concern is that their position on the senate does not become an albatross on the government - that it does not slow down legislation, or otherwise interfere with their ability to implement the substantive parts of their platform. this is a step in that direction, and that is good.
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/senate-advisory-board-non-partisan-leblanc-monsef-1.3348531
Johhnyb
Non-partisan is non-partisan. I would think that a partisan senate could slow down bill passage if it's partisan in favour of the opposition and could not do due diligence if it's partisan for the gov't. We'll always have Progressive and Conservative thinkers in the Senate and that's great. Now we will have senators appointed on merit not partisanship. You have to admit this Trudeau approach is the best yet and is doable now. Of course only time will tell.
jessica murray
i don't share your perspective on rejecting partisanship. when i hear terms like "bipartisan", what comes to mind is the idea of a corporate oligarchy controlling both sides of the debate. it's basically equivalent to doing away with the democratic process altogether, and placing power in the hands of the elite. this is not something that has helped obama, or made him appear in a more positive light to voters. rather, it's fueled a lot of apathy in government. americans thought they were electing a progressive democrat and instead got a moderate republican. it's emboldened the right, and collapsed the base. it's really a disaster, and trudeau should really be learning from this in trying to avoid rather than trying to emulate it. it plays right into the left's narrative that conservatives and liberals are basically the same thing.
i think the best way for left leaning policy makers to get their initiatives across is to start from a position to the left of where they really are, and let the debate pull them into where they actually are. ceding ground to the right merely shifts the entire discussion to the right. and, the liberals have hopefully learned that you can't do that in canada and hold power, because we don't have a two-party spectrum.
but, even if you could convince me that bipartisanship is a good idea, it's a ridiculous premise to begin with. even if you can drop the actual parties (and that's not within the realm of possibility), you're still left with convictions. or, at least, i hope we're still left with convictions. otherwise, we collapse into oligarchy.
we're consequently not really being given a choice between partisanship and non-partisanship. we're being given a choice between democracy and oligarchy.
i would prefer to see a liberal dominated senate that rubber stamps legislation than see that legislation slowed down and cut-up by a conservative body that pretends that it is somehow "non-partisan". and, if that body ends up rubber-stamping legislation, then it is not "non-partisan", either.
that's fine. like, i say - whatever. i don't care. i just don't want to see bills that i support sent back.
i'll acknowledge that the idea of putting limits on patronage appointments is a positive idea. i can't remember who it was, but harper actually appointed somebody that didn't know how to read. that is utterly ridiculous. it is a good idea to ensure that there are higher standards...
but, partisanship itself? that's not a bad idea, at all.
--
yokelman
The PM and MP's should not be allowed to appoint senators, the senate members should be voted in by the people and have an 8 year term limit.
jessica murray
yeah, then we can get absolute gridlock like in the united states. in the process, we can completely ignore our constitutional history, which explicitly attempted to prevent this.
great idea.
in fact, here's a better idea: why don't we just elect senators to their senate?
the government, almost entirely under mcguinty, did a very good job in transitioning the source of electricity, and for this they should be applauded.
but, they are approaching it with the wrong economic perspective. and, the more they deregulate, the worse this gets.
consider chiarelli's statement. "we needed to attract investment.". that's absurd. they could have created a revenue stream if they put the money down.
the ontario liberals are not the federal liberals. they don't have the same economic competency level.
the red tories actually had this right, but they're long gone. and, so, i really hope that the ndp comes out with a comprehensive plan to retake state control of the entire energy sector, from generation to transmission.
that is the only way that prices will ever come down.
yeah. the old ontario conservatives used to believe that electricity generation ought to be a publicly owned resource. and, this is actually a classical liberal position, as well. the current crops of ontario liberals and conservatives are both taking a very radical hayekian or rothbardian (dare i suggest randian) position on this that is simply not consistent with their ideological underpinnings.
the only hope on this file is the ndp. and, i really hope they take a strong initiative on a bold position. it's actually a guaranteed election win for them, if they can pull together the right vision.
i may even go so far as to suggest it's the only issue on the horizon in ontario that has any chance of leading to a change of government. and, i'd follow that up with the suggestion that it's important enough that it should happen.
we have excess capacity, and that is a good thing. if we want to seriously reduce emissions, we're going to need it. but, we shouldn't be punishing anybody for it or pushing for conservation schemes. we should be taking control of it and providing incentives to transition towards it.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/ontarians-paid-37-billion-above-market-price-for-electricity-over-eight-years-ag/article27560753/
--
Guest9
"Ontarians have paid $37-billion more than market price for electricity over eight years and will pay another $133-billion extra by 2032 as a result of haphazard planning and political meddling, a report from the Auditor-General says."
That is a completely misleading statement by the G&M and the Author of this article. The AG report does not say that at all. It does not say that the $37 bn and $133 bn excess payments are due to haphazard planning and political meddling. The AG report only says that those are its estimates of the Global Adjustments paid in the electrical system. Clearly, the Author has very little knowledge of how the electrical system works in Ontario and how to interpret the AG report. Global Adjustments are an important and necessary part of the electricity system and market in Ontario and they are not a waste of money for taxpayers or ratepayers. They do not come about because of mismanagement and politics. Now if the Author and the G&M want to debate whether Ontario's electric system should have a Global Adjustments system then that is a completely different topic and something that we can be debated. This is a completely misleading article and very poor interpretation of the AG report.
deathtokoalas
the global adjustment was actually initially meant as a rebate, but the suppliers figured out that was bad pr and spun the situation around. the "market price" is an essentially meaningless number, because it's kept artificially low to prevent those rebates from coming off as bad pr.
we can't get ahead on this unless we take control out of the hand of private producers and put it back in the hands of the people.
it creates this situation where people think if you "took the government out of the way" they'd be paying three cents per kwh, or whatever it's at. which is ridiculous. everybody would shut down. if you "took the government out of the way", the per hour price would simply rise to what you're already paying - and perhaps a little more, as the oeb does have some regulatory power.
but, they are approaching it with the wrong economic perspective. and, the more they deregulate, the worse this gets.
consider chiarelli's statement. "we needed to attract investment.". that's absurd. they could have created a revenue stream if they put the money down.
the ontario liberals are not the federal liberals. they don't have the same economic competency level.
the red tories actually had this right, but they're long gone. and, so, i really hope that the ndp comes out with a comprehensive plan to retake state control of the entire energy sector, from generation to transmission.
that is the only way that prices will ever come down.
yeah. the old ontario conservatives used to believe that electricity generation ought to be a publicly owned resource. and, this is actually a classical liberal position, as well. the current crops of ontario liberals and conservatives are both taking a very radical hayekian or rothbardian (dare i suggest randian) position on this that is simply not consistent with their ideological underpinnings.
the only hope on this file is the ndp. and, i really hope they take a strong initiative on a bold position. it's actually a guaranteed election win for them, if they can pull together the right vision.
i may even go so far as to suggest it's the only issue on the horizon in ontario that has any chance of leading to a change of government. and, i'd follow that up with the suggestion that it's important enough that it should happen.
we have excess capacity, and that is a good thing. if we want to seriously reduce emissions, we're going to need it. but, we shouldn't be punishing anybody for it or pushing for conservation schemes. we should be taking control of it and providing incentives to transition towards it.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/ontarians-paid-37-billion-above-market-price-for-electricity-over-eight-years-ag/article27560753/
--
Guest9
"Ontarians have paid $37-billion more than market price for electricity over eight years and will pay another $133-billion extra by 2032 as a result of haphazard planning and political meddling, a report from the Auditor-General says."
That is a completely misleading statement by the G&M and the Author of this article. The AG report does not say that at all. It does not say that the $37 bn and $133 bn excess payments are due to haphazard planning and political meddling. The AG report only says that those are its estimates of the Global Adjustments paid in the electrical system. Clearly, the Author has very little knowledge of how the electrical system works in Ontario and how to interpret the AG report. Global Adjustments are an important and necessary part of the electricity system and market in Ontario and they are not a waste of money for taxpayers or ratepayers. They do not come about because of mismanagement and politics. Now if the Author and the G&M want to debate whether Ontario's electric system should have a Global Adjustments system then that is a completely different topic and something that we can be debated. This is a completely misleading article and very poor interpretation of the AG report.
deathtokoalas
the global adjustment was actually initially meant as a rebate, but the suppliers figured out that was bad pr and spun the situation around. the "market price" is an essentially meaningless number, because it's kept artificially low to prevent those rebates from coming off as bad pr.
we can't get ahead on this unless we take control out of the hand of private producers and put it back in the hands of the people.
it creates this situation where people think if you "took the government out of the way" they'd be paying three cents per kwh, or whatever it's at. which is ridiculous. everybody would shut down. if you "took the government out of the way", the per hour price would simply rise to what you're already paying - and perhaps a little more, as the oeb does have some regulatory power.
absolutely nobody cares about the senate.
the one and only important thing here is that he's able to get enough bums in enough seats that his agenda doesn't get blocked.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/editorials/senate-reform-is-no-reform-at-all-and-could-have-unintended-consequence/article27587177/
the one and only important thing here is that he's able to get enough bums in enough seats that his agenda doesn't get blocked.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/editorials/senate-reform-is-no-reform-at-all-and-could-have-unintended-consequence/article27587177/
02-12-2015: turning the corner?
tracks worked on in this vlog:
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inriclaimed
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inriclaimed
Wednesday, December 2, 2015
thoughts on the most recent defeater record
i missed this in august...attention drawn to it by tour dates....just wasn't paying attention...
i've only listened to the record all the way through once, and will have to give it a few more tries. you don't really "get" a defeater record on the first listen. but, i'm comfortable in stating that if i'm going to connect to this at all then it's going to be on a purely lyrical level. that's not impossible.
i wouldn't be surprised to find out that this disc was well received by people that are closer to the mainstream core of the modern "(scr)e(a)mo" sound. hey, there's a relatively big audience there. and, it's not a complete 180 - there's plenty of things that jumped out that seemed very characteristic of the band's previous work. but, the blunt and honest immediacy - the starkly nihilistic juxtapositions and just blatant punk rock, however much adapted - that made them refreshing seems to have been replaced by what are kind of contrived melodramaticisms. i mean, i don't want to sound ridiculous. it was always contrived. but, it was a different kind of contrived - a more thematic and less calculated one. if you're a fan of the centre of the genre that they're moving closer to, you probably won't understand this criticism because it's the perfect description of every band that you're used to listening to. but, if you lean more towards older school punk rock or perhaps even straight up art rock, don't really have any affinity with "emo" and were kind of being pulled into this by bands that hover closer to the core of what punk was, you'll understand what i'm getting at. if you're that person, as i am, you probably really didn't want to hear them walk down this path. but, you probably knew it was coming, too.
i could probably handle some standardization in the aesthetic if the writing compensated for it. musically, i didn't pick up on that the first time through - i got the opposite impression. i'll have to see if i pick up on it, thematically, as i listen to it a few more times.
i'll say this though: i was initially put off by the stronger testosterone level on letters home. but, as i got to understand the story line, i began to realize that it couldn't have been any other way. it had to be badass. i'll have to see if this connects in the same way.
i know this is an extremely tentative review. maybe i'll post another comment in a few weeks or months. but, that's how this band operates. you just don't understand it the first time you listen to it; if you think you do, you definitely don't. that's why elitist critics like me are drawn to them, even if they're consistently cycling around a genre we would generally consider to exist purely in the realm of bad taste.
i've only listened to the record all the way through once, and will have to give it a few more tries. you don't really "get" a defeater record on the first listen. but, i'm comfortable in stating that if i'm going to connect to this at all then it's going to be on a purely lyrical level. that's not impossible.
i wouldn't be surprised to find out that this disc was well received by people that are closer to the mainstream core of the modern "(scr)e(a)mo" sound. hey, there's a relatively big audience there. and, it's not a complete 180 - there's plenty of things that jumped out that seemed very characteristic of the band's previous work. but, the blunt and honest immediacy - the starkly nihilistic juxtapositions and just blatant punk rock, however much adapted - that made them refreshing seems to have been replaced by what are kind of contrived melodramaticisms. i mean, i don't want to sound ridiculous. it was always contrived. but, it was a different kind of contrived - a more thematic and less calculated one. if you're a fan of the centre of the genre that they're moving closer to, you probably won't understand this criticism because it's the perfect description of every band that you're used to listening to. but, if you lean more towards older school punk rock or perhaps even straight up art rock, don't really have any affinity with "emo" and were kind of being pulled into this by bands that hover closer to the core of what punk was, you'll understand what i'm getting at. if you're that person, as i am, you probably really didn't want to hear them walk down this path. but, you probably knew it was coming, too.
i could probably handle some standardization in the aesthetic if the writing compensated for it. musically, i didn't pick up on that the first time through - i got the opposite impression. i'll have to see if i pick up on it, thematically, as i listen to it a few more times.
i'll say this though: i was initially put off by the stronger testosterone level on letters home. but, as i got to understand the story line, i began to realize that it couldn't have been any other way. it had to be badass. i'll have to see if this connects in the same way.
i know this is an extremely tentative review. maybe i'll post another comment in a few weeks or months. but, that's how this band operates. you just don't understand it the first time you listen to it; if you think you do, you definitely don't. that's why elitist critics like me are drawn to them, even if they're consistently cycling around a genre we would generally consider to exist purely in the realm of bad taste.
i'm really disappointed that i haven't yet heard the term "nanny state".
i didn't initially draw the connection between this and the uccb, because there isn't one. it just struck me as typical kneejerk fiscal conservatism, the type we see everywhere that can't place anything in context. and, once it was pointed out to me, it took me a while to work through it, because it's so convoluted.
but, here's the right way to think about it...
so, the uccb is a tax cut. the nannies are a perk employed by his employer. the correct way to look at the situation is consequently not that he's using tax dollars, it's that his employer is covering his child care.
now, it's true that his employer pays him in tax dollars. but, that's not the same thing as using tax dollars. i think it's important to stop at this point, because i think it's difficult to grapple with from both perspectives. and, i'd actually like to thank whomever brought this up, because it was a good mental exercise.
see, i understand that this is a conceptual jump that a lot of people won't be able to make. tax dollars are tax dollars are tax dollars. right? but, these people need to understand that, on the other hand, conflating the two things is the part that people like me needed explained to them - because we would never think to do so, otherwise. the difference between getting a tax cut and having tax dollars pay for employment related costs are such different things, that it would never cross our minds to link them. see?
whether your approach is that it's hard to see how to put the pieces together into a contradiction, or conceptually hard to separate these two things from each other, the right analysis has to be that these are two different things - because they are.
he's not getting a tax break. it just happens to be that his employer pays him in tax funds. and, once you realize that, the contradiction resolves and we can get back to talking about the climate conference in paris.
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/rona-ambrose-rich-trudeau-nannies-1.3347148
Billy McGruff
Whoaaaaaaaaaaa lmao
jessica murray
it's actually a really interesting question in perception, and logical pathways.
i mean, i wouldn't expect this from every seemingly ridiculous right-wing criticism.
but, this so convoluted that they really fluked out on something really interesting with this.
Alma_Fudd
Maybe cut back on the herb a bit?
jessica murray
well, you have to wander a little when the issue is this half-baked.
it's been almost two weeks, actually. frankly, i'm too old to be baked all the time.
i didn't initially draw the connection between this and the uccb, because there isn't one. it just struck me as typical kneejerk fiscal conservatism, the type we see everywhere that can't place anything in context. and, once it was pointed out to me, it took me a while to work through it, because it's so convoluted.
but, here's the right way to think about it...
so, the uccb is a tax cut. the nannies are a perk employed by his employer. the correct way to look at the situation is consequently not that he's using tax dollars, it's that his employer is covering his child care.
now, it's true that his employer pays him in tax dollars. but, that's not the same thing as using tax dollars. i think it's important to stop at this point, because i think it's difficult to grapple with from both perspectives. and, i'd actually like to thank whomever brought this up, because it was a good mental exercise.
see, i understand that this is a conceptual jump that a lot of people won't be able to make. tax dollars are tax dollars are tax dollars. right? but, these people need to understand that, on the other hand, conflating the two things is the part that people like me needed explained to them - because we would never think to do so, otherwise. the difference between getting a tax cut and having tax dollars pay for employment related costs are such different things, that it would never cross our minds to link them. see?
whether your approach is that it's hard to see how to put the pieces together into a contradiction, or conceptually hard to separate these two things from each other, the right analysis has to be that these are two different things - because they are.
he's not getting a tax break. it just happens to be that his employer pays him in tax funds. and, once you realize that, the contradiction resolves and we can get back to talking about the climate conference in paris.
www.cbc.ca/news/politics/rona-ambrose-rich-trudeau-nannies-1.3347148
Billy McGruff
Whoaaaaaaaaaaa lmao
jessica murray
it's actually a really interesting question in perception, and logical pathways.
i mean, i wouldn't expect this from every seemingly ridiculous right-wing criticism.
but, this so convoluted that they really fluked out on something really interesting with this.
Alma_Fudd
Maybe cut back on the herb a bit?
jessica murray
well, you have to wander a little when the issue is this half-baked.
it's been almost two weeks, actually. frankly, i'm too old to be baked all the time.
i'd just buy it. it's a lot easier. and, i don't need to be baked all of the time.
there are very heavy marijuana users out there. they really do need some help. most people, though, use it similarly to the way they use alcohol - a couple of times a month, and mostly socially.
www.cbc.ca/news/business/recreational-pot-business-regulation-in-canada-1.3345230
there are very heavy marijuana users out there. they really do need some help. most people, though, use it similarly to the way they use alcohol - a couple of times a month, and mostly socially.
www.cbc.ca/news/business/recreational-pot-business-regulation-in-canada-1.3345230
the infrastructure already exists. it's really just a question of passing a few simple laws and stepping back. really.
but, from the business perspective - and i've pointed this out before - the biggest opportunity is less in the plan itself and more in the offshoot industries.
plastics, for example. we already grow billions of dollars of pot. we throw away 90% of the plant as a waste product. this could be used to make a far more environmentally friendly from of plastic. and, that is but one of a huge amount of examples.
the reality is that, if this is done intelligently, marijuana could very well become not just *an* important industry but the country's *most important* industry, pushing oil out of the way in terms of revenue, gdp and jobs.
i really hope that the government sees the biggest possible picture, here.
www.cbc.ca/news/business/recreational-pot-business-regulation-in-canada-1.3345230
but, from the business perspective - and i've pointed this out before - the biggest opportunity is less in the plan itself and more in the offshoot industries.
plastics, for example. we already grow billions of dollars of pot. we throw away 90% of the plant as a waste product. this could be used to make a far more environmentally friendly from of plastic. and, that is but one of a huge amount of examples.
the reality is that, if this is done intelligently, marijuana could very well become not just *an* important industry but the country's *most important* industry, pushing oil out of the way in terms of revenue, gdp and jobs.
i really hope that the government sees the biggest possible picture, here.
www.cbc.ca/news/business/recreational-pot-business-regulation-in-canada-1.3345230
Tuesday, December 1, 2015
this is an interesting and in some places eye-opening discussion, for those that can follow the language. i'll admit that they lost me once or twice, but i was able to follow almost all of it. i think that's mostly because the discussion exists in a broader meta-scientific context, rather than a very specific biological one. that is, the primary question discussed is the pros and cons of different experimental approaches to determining the use of specific drugs. "bio-markers", here, is a kind of buzz word; the discussion cycles around it, but it's not really about it.
but, the fact that we're using buzz words in the first place in what claims to be a scientific conference should create a little bit of pause.
in thinking about how to react to this video (and i've had a few days, as it's taken me some time to move through it), something that came up a few times were some comments made by stefan molyneux (somebody i would normally be hesitant to quote or draw attention to) about global warming. now, he didn't make his argument well. but, he said something along these lines (i'm paraphrasing out of laziness, but it's pretty close):
the government program referred to as "science" is not the same thing as the epistemological approach we call science
he then used that insight to argue that we should be skeptical about government-funded research on climate change. it was more agnostic than anything else. and, as i say, he didn't make his argument well - partly because this insight, while actually quite astute, doesn't really conform well to what we know about how governments approach climate science. taking his insight and applying it to better to the world around us, i might suggest that he should have said:
the industry marketing program referred to as "science" is not the same thing as the epistemological approach we call science.
these two statements are not mutually exclusive. in fact, he might even agree with me in pointing out that both statements are equally valid. or, perhaps he'd throw around some absurd market theory about consumers choosing good science. as though consumers are equipped to do that, right? but, while acknowledging that both statements are valid, i need to suggest that it is the second that is more relevant in the world we live in
i think this conference very clearly demonstrates where the world of "science" as industry marketing interferes and comes into conflict with the world of science as epistemology.
but, the fact that we're using buzz words in the first place in what claims to be a scientific conference should create a little bit of pause.
in thinking about how to react to this video (and i've had a few days, as it's taken me some time to move through it), something that came up a few times were some comments made by stefan molyneux (somebody i would normally be hesitant to quote or draw attention to) about global warming. now, he didn't make his argument well. but, he said something along these lines (i'm paraphrasing out of laziness, but it's pretty close):
the government program referred to as "science" is not the same thing as the epistemological approach we call science
he then used that insight to argue that we should be skeptical about government-funded research on climate change. it was more agnostic than anything else. and, as i say, he didn't make his argument well - partly because this insight, while actually quite astute, doesn't really conform well to what we know about how governments approach climate science. taking his insight and applying it to better to the world around us, i might suggest that he should have said:
the industry marketing program referred to as "science" is not the same thing as the epistemological approach we call science.
these two statements are not mutually exclusive. in fact, he might even agree with me in pointing out that both statements are equally valid. or, perhaps he'd throw around some absurd market theory about consumers choosing good science. as though consumers are equipped to do that, right? but, while acknowledging that both statements are valid, i need to suggest that it is the second that is more relevant in the world we live in
i think this conference very clearly demonstrates where the world of "science" as industry marketing interferes and comes into conflict with the world of science as epistemology.
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