A frothing political rant

Vote, $#@!

We have a civic election coming up in a few weeks. The candidates are out banging on doors and "literature" is being distributed. Just now I'm holding a glossy brochure for the incumbent in our ward.

Before you get any other message, absorb this. Go vote! There are many ways to do so. No matter how busy you are, there is something that will fit into your schedule. Just go do it!

I was asked how I decide who to vote for. As you might suspect, I have a process. First, I look at the incumbent. The question I ask is, are they doing a stellar job, or do they meet the diaper rule? I think Twain said it, that politicians and diapers should be changed often, and for the same reason. I'm a big fan of the diaper rule.

The incumbent is usually not doing a stellar job, though there have been exceptions. Next I eliminate all the white men and see what I have left. Yes, this is discriminatory and racist, but there are two reasons. One, these people have been running things since forever with results that can best be described as mixed. It's time for other people to have a chance. Second, and best of all from my perspective, it usually cuts the herd down to an easily considered size.

Time for a little digression about the neighbourhood I live in. I am sad to say my neighbours are deeply conservative, in both the small c and capital C senses. Federally, Prime Minister Harper represented this riding, mainly because it's one of the safest conservative seats in the country. Before him, it was Preston Manning, for much the same reason. Before that, and I'm reaching here, it was Bobbie Sparrow, who I'm pretty sure came from old money and was regarded as a safe vote, or at least that's the impression I got the one time I met her.

Provincially, Dave Rodney has been our MLA since forever. A complete non-entity, he tries to give a good appearance and do what he's told. Even in the diminished circumstances of the party, he hasn't been tapped for a leadership role of any kind, which tells it's own tale. Even in the NDP tidal wave during the last provincial election, he got re-elected. Sigh. Diaper rule, big time.

So here, with typically strong incumbents, (and in the current civic election our incumbent is the second most senior council member, having served since 2000) we don't get much in the way of people running against them. Pity, but I can't blame them. It's a safe bet to lose the election, and almost certainly lose your deposit.

Usually the hopefuls are other men, with a few women, and almost all of them are of the white persuasion. This area was not what you'd call ethnically diverse, though the new neighbourhoods south of Fish Creek have changed that somewhat. About time.

After considering the incumbent, my process is to look carefully at the the candidates that are not white men, if any. Not being part of the old boys club, or "one of us" as Humphrey Appleby put it, is a plus in my books.  It doesn't matter if they were born here or not. I'm a big fan of immigrants. I've worked with lots of them, and many have a hustle that has to be seen to be believed. Related higher education, or experience in other government, or in the local community association, or in some form of business is desirable, but not essential. With any luck the process stops here.

If I must, I consider what's left. I sigh deeply, and try to pick the least dangerous one. Any candidate trying to push my buttons on law and order is an instant turn off. A similar result happens to those who harp upon lowering taxes preferably to zero or further if possible, and at the senior levels of government actively try to game the system to lower taxes for them and their buddies. I believe that taxes are the price of a civilized society, and that the free market will not solve all problems better than government.

A quick example. Take the fire department. In no world does it make sense for a private firm to provide the services done by the current fire department. They would skimp on equipment and training, and I could just see someone checking the address before responding to an emergency call to make sure they'd paid their service premiums. I wouldn't put it beyond some predatory capitalists to set fires to create business. Oh no, not directly of course. They would incentivize the the process, and outsource it. There are numerous other examples.

Yes, it makes sense to keep an eye on government spending and try to make sure it lines up with the priorities that make for a better community. Keep in mind that it's bedrock economics that government spending should be somewhat counter-cyclical. That means in good times government should lower spending to pay down any accumulated debt, and in bad times increase spending via deficit financing if necessary to help stimulate the economy. The City cannot run a deficit, though of course it uses debt to finance infrastructure. Just about the only thing more expensive than building new infrastructure, is coping with the failures of infrastructure through lack of maintenance, or not building it in the first place.

There are any number of other boondoggles spouted by politicians to get your vote. I've mentioned a couple of them, lowering taxes and law and order. Another is cutting "the fat", usually taken to mean cutting union positions. The fact that union people usually happen to provide front line services doesn't mean anything to them, since them and their buddies don't work those jobs. They talk of looking for efficiencies, and are willing to hire expensive consultants (who just happen to be their buddy) to find them. They might be a one issue candidate, or closely related, be a complete loon in general. They prey on the fear of the outsider, people that are different than those in that electoral area. Often that means immigrants, or people of a different religion, or the LBGTQ community, but they'll demonize anyone to get a vote. Maybe it's appeals to the good old days, or bringing back good jobs.

Ask yourself if a candidate is creating division between people, or trying to build communities? Are they trying to prey on your fears? Do they gloss over specifics and get upset when you ask them questions? Look how they talk to minorities, women, immigrants, the homeless, or anyone they perceive to be of lesser status. Individually they are probably charming charismatic people, but look past the gloss. Look at who supports them, and think hard about their dog-whistling statements. How do they treat the other people running for that office? Are they treated as respected competitors to be vigorously debated, or as opponents to be destroyed?

We need look no further than the recent American presidential election. Many people are looking on Donald Trump with horror. I'm appalled that he got elected, and don't want to see anyone even remotely like him elected here. Only a fraction of American voters lost their minds enough to vote for him, but the damage was done by the majority that did not vote. I'd like to believe that if almost all voters had voted, he'd have lost in a landslide. Then again, Hilary's emails, and misogyny in general.

I believe that the more people vote, the more sensible the results are going to be. To many politicians now use wedge tactics that divide voters, and try to push out the moderate middle, and seek to inflame a minority that's just big enough to give them power. We have to resist such tactics, so get out there and vote!

And now to sooth you down after such a rabble-rousing blog (you have voted, right?) here's a butterfly and a sunset scene.

Destruction is easier

I'm not sure where this is going to end up, so I'm going to write it and find out.

It's easy to be appalled at the world as you get older. Consider Socrates, “The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise.” Just to remind you, he died a little over 2,400 years ago. So this isn't new.

People have been saying the world is going to hell in a hand cart since language was invented. Except it's not true. Not even close. Go find the oldest person you know. In my case that's a grandmother closing in on 100. Maybe it's your great aunt or uncle. Or someone in your knitting circle. Whatever.

Ask that really old person what it was like as a child. Bypass the reminisce of a simpler time and ask how they got around. Ask if they remember people talking about their friends and relatives that died during the Spanish Flu. (That was a THING 100 years ago in a few months, tens of millions died.) Ask about their reaction to electric lights, the automobile, penicillin, air travel (Zeppelin if they're old enough, DC-3 otherwise), indoor plumbing, or anything else that comes into your mind. Think about how you'd cope with that world.

Those are all things that smart people discovered, or invented, or made affordable. Usually over the protests of the people around them. The automobile has turned out to be a mixed blessing, I'll grant you that. Penicillin and other vaccines? No brainer good stuff, and in case you were wondering, not vaccinating your children is child abuse, unless an actual medical doctor tells you it shouldn't be done. Those homeopathy quacks and the like have nothing to say in the matter.

Electric lights, indoor plumbing, and other so-called conveniences of life are all good things, though it's fair to say we could be smarter about how some of them are used. Advances in science and learning how to live with each other in a democratic society have created the safest and most comfortable place to live that humans have ever had.

Yes, there are some blots on the copy book, as one saying goes. Canadian treatment of Natives. American treatment of essentially anyone that isn't a well off white man. German treatment of Jews and other minorities before and during WWII. Russian treatment of Ukrainians. This is hardly a complete list, forgive me if I haven't mentioned one that's important to you.

Previous societies have gone to war or endured civil strife over a great many issues, some of which seem important now, some of which are barely mentioned in history books. Since 1900 alone, millions of people volunteered to fight in some of the most horrific wars we've known. They had many reasons but lots of them include "just doing my duty", or "it's the right thing." Or one grunt saying laconically, "three square meals a day if I don't get killed."

We live in a peaceful safe place, but that doesn't mean the strife is over. When your founding documents start off saying "All men are created equal..." and when the Charter that has become the heart of our legal code says "
2. Everyone has the following fundamental freedoms:

(a) freedom of conscience and religion;

(b) freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication;

(c) freedom of peaceful assembly; and

(d) freedom of association.",

the people that don't have those things want in. Of course they do. You would too. Why wouldn't they? They want the same as what everyone else has, something that the documents say is theirs by birth, yet the gravy train has left them behind.

Except there is a faction of society that says, "Fuck you Jack, I've got mine." These are the people that set dogs on peaceful marchers for civil rights. These are the people who set the full weight of various para-military forces against people protesting pipeline construction. These are the people that turn a blind eye to acts of violence by white people. These are the people that gerrymander political boundaries to restrict voting effectiveness. These are the people that use the power of the state to control what can be said in public (think of Harper muzzling scientists), control who can be out in public, and restrict access to the levers of power to 'one of us.'

We have a free and open society that generally lets people say what they like in public, except there are limits. The classic one is that you can't shout 'fire' in a crowded theatre. In Canada you can't disseminate hatred, though that's a bit of a squishy line, and some people like to push the boundaries.

Civil rights was a test of 60's USA society. Now they have an idiot president stoking the flames of hatred by pandering to Nazi's. The Nazi regime was one of the most murderous and evil regimes in history, and it baffles me why anyone would willingly identify with it. Yet they do, marching with their tiki torches, doing the KKK salute, spouting Nazi slogans of hatred, trying to intimidate everyone else into letting them have their way. This mainly involves them being on top of whatever heap is important to them, and everyone else kowtowing or getting shot.

Donald Trump and his Nazi base are going to be the great test of our time in the USA. Are they going to come through and become a stronger society? Or is this going to break them, and they'll become another failed nation state? I certainly hope for the first of these.

Which brings me to Canada. We aren't immune. We have the same right wing idiots and their dog whistle politics, just not quite as blatant. I'd have hoped it would get better with Harper gone, but some of his toadies are still around, peeing the the water.

We have Jason Kenney trying to build a new (extremely) Conservative party on the ruins of the old ones. He's been using classic Harper tactics of division and abuse to get his way. Anyone from the progressive wing of the party is long gone, and it doesn't matter if they were pushed or jumped. It's funny, they have the same slogan (Unite the Right) as the Nazis marching in Charlottesville. I'm pretty sure Kenney has some of the same ideas, he just hasn't said so out loud yet.

One of his fellow travellers is Derek Fildebrandt. He didn't see anything wrong with claiming for an apartment paid for by the taxpayers (so far so good), and renting it out on AirBnB. Or claiming a per diem (again, so far so good) and claiming the individual meals. If I tried that when I was on an expense account the company would quite rightly have called it theft. So it is, and so it should be treated. He's resigned from the party (whatever it calls itself now), but he's still sucking on the public tit, to use his own language. He should be in court for theft, as well as the current hit and run charge.

We can't be complacent here. We have to watch our politicians like a hawk looking for lunch. All of them, and the wannabe's too. We have to call them on their dog whistling, call them on their efforts to graft more money (think of the committee that never met and billed for doing so), and call them on the stupid hateful things they say. Push back on their supports, even if it's your brother-in-law. Ask them if they agree with Kenney that a 15 year old should be held responsible for a murder he didn't commit, yet are too young to decide if they want to belong to a GSA. Ask them if they really trust a guy that won't say what his election platform is.

A lot of people have done a lot of work building up this country to what it is now. The work is ongoing, finding a way to involve everyone here, disaffected citizens, First Nations, recent immigrants and refugees, along with everyone else. It's hard building things. Deciding what, exactly to build, and where to put it, to say nothing of how to pay for it. I respect people that bring passion to these discussions, working for a greater good, even if they don't have all the facts.

I have no respect for people that want to tear down what's been built. Letting the poor fall into the cracks and paving them over is a common conservative tactic, all in the name of saving money, and those people were moral failures anyways. Rolling back equality laws. Restricting basic freedoms. These things are easy to do, if you have the required mindset. Trump has been a brilliant example. The only thing he seems to know what to do is undo what Obama had done.

I come back to that Australian General again. "The standard you walk past is the standard you accept." If you want better politicians, you have to demand they be better, and encourage better people to run for office. Yes it's hard. Yes you feel you have to keep up with Game of Thrones and your social media. Your job is really tough and leaves you knackered. Suck it up. Remember what that really old person said about life back in the day.

Our test is coming.

What I wanted to do Friday

Yup. Curl into a ball and snooze. I'd been thinking about a swim, but no. We ran a few errands, and I found out I'd forgotten my wallet when we went to vote. Once home I napped. Big time.

Voting, you ask? As it turned out when the Conservatives were defeated in the last election, the Great Troll Harper decided he didn't want to play anymore. He essentially left our riding without representation while he job hunted. Not that he did anything for us anyway.

A by-election was duly called, and we ended up with 7, count'em 7 candidates. The usual main party suspects ran. (Conservative, Liberal, NDP, and Green) In addition we had Libertarian, Christian Heritage, and something called National Advancement, which I'd never heard of before.

My take on them:
Conservative. Bob Benzen, a Harperite. Enough said.
Liberal. Scott Forsyth. The Liberal name is a millstone around any candidate's neck in Alberta. Physician. Photographer.
NDP. Khalis Ahmed Federally the NDP are considered a left-wing party, but they've been moving toward the centre lately. He is a geologist with a background in project and financial management.
Green. Taryn Knorren. Federally the Greens are centrists leaning towards the left. She is an education postgrad, and a policy wonk.
Libertarian. Darcy Gerow They want to cut the carbon tax, and reduce the federal tax rate to 15%. Their way of balancing the budget is to eliminate the Canada Revenue Agency. They will loosen the shackles of gun ownership. His personal statement is that everything the government touches "turns to s#!t". And yet, he wants to be government.
National Advancement. Stephen J. Garvey. Their party platform is a barge of dog-whistling intolerance imported from Trumpistan and translated into a variant of Canadian.
Christian Heritage. Jeff Willerton. They want Canada to be governed by biblical law. With them in charge of interpreting it, of course. At least they're honest about being intolerant.

Let me just say this was not a terribly difficult decision keeping me up at night. I would be delighted if any of Liberal, NDP, or Green won, because that would mean Benzen lost. Canada is all the better for the remaining taints of Harper being scrubbed away. However, my neighbours are a conservative lot, and the habit of voting Conservative here is strong. Our provincial conservative MLA was one of the few that survived the long overdue NDP flood washing out the Augean stables of 4 decades of Conservative rule.

While I'm on the political soapbox, I've been amusing myself watching the shit-show in the USA. Is there anyone that still thinks electing Trump was a good idea? As for their efforts to write a replacement for the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), they've been saying "NO!" to anything health related for 7 years now, and they couldn't break the habit. Part of the party wouldn't vote for it because it left in benefits for many people. Another part of the party wouldn't vote for it because it took benefits away from many people. Some were uneasy about the process that produced it, and some were probably pissed at Trump in general, and some were smart enough to realize it was all round bad policy.

All politicians lie. It's inescapable if they want to get elected in the first place, and stay in office after the next election. The trick is to tell plausible lies, ones with more than a hint of truth. The best ones are actually almost true, if you look at things a certain way, and allow certain assumptions.

But Trump tells palpably stupid lies. Many of them. Everybody knows they're lies, and lets him skate by. Well, not SNL. They had his number from the start. I nearly peed myself laughing at the Spicer skit. That's what you do with such people. You laugh at them. They can't take it.

I shouldn't be too complacent. As expected, Kenny won the leadership of the provincial PC party, which has nothing progressive about it. He was ruthless in driving out anyone with a pulse, I mean, with a heart, or a brain, out of the leadership race, and out of the party generally. And don't get me started on the federal PCs. They are hoping the Harper dog whistling will work once more, so they can get in on the gravy train, and reward their buddies, while they get off on the jollies of hurting the ordinary people they crow about so much.

That's enough serious stuff. I'm working through photography books, making notes, and thinking about my next photo-walk. There's still a couple of places left in Neil's Yukon trip in September. It's going to be great!

Next week is the long awaited day to drop into Resolve and get some prints done. I've never done anything like this before, and hope they can lead me through the various paper choices, and that I've got the files set up correctly.

There are hints of spring coming, but experienced Calgarians know there is going to be at least one more good dump of snow. In the mean time, people are tempted to get into their gardens and do something. Doesn't this look ready for some greenery?

Scary

There's lots of people that would think this scary.

Or this.

But no. I'm much more frightened by the illiteracy and rage in the comments of social media. Not here, of course. I don't get much spam, and all my readers are literate. They might not produce many comments, but they're all the finest quality. I haven't had to moderate out anyone in a very long time.

I don't know where all this rage came from. One expects children to have a melt down every now and then as they learn to cope with the world. But adults weren't supposed to. They were supposed to suck it up, deal with the situation, and vent elsewhere.

Somewhere along the line that stopped happening, and people felt free to vent whenever, wherever, about anything at all. I mind one example in an airport one evening. We were all lined up at the gate to get our tickets back, (this is when people had actual paper tickets), and they were sorting out what was going to happen next. The guy who had bullied his way into the front of the line was abusing the gate agent, and eventually he marched off threatening to call his buddy the Vice President. The next guy gave the poor agent a moment to regain her composure and asked politely what his alternatives were. Turned out he was going the same place as bully, as were a couple other people. The agent herded them aside, made a phone call, then said there was a plane with space, but they had to hustle to that gate, and the paperwork would be sorted after. They left with big smiles. Most of the rest of us had to wait, but we got an explanation.

There is no point abusing the gate agent, or the hotel lobby receptionist, or the wait staff in a restaurant, or any of hundreds of similar positions. There might not be anything they can do for you, but abusing them guarantees it. Sometimes, smiling at them, asking politely, gets you a surprise where they can actually do something. Maybe it's only to get a free beverage, but that's better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

And the comments section. All of you know the rule, never read the comments. Sometimes they're visible and you can't help it. Sigh. Once upon a time (before email was common) I was part of an organization that shuffled lots of paper around. Reports, letters, comments, whatever. I was point person for summarizing comments on a particular issue. Many of the comments were in fact literate albeit with varying degrees of passion. Some were not terribly literate, but expressed a viable and recognizable position. And then there were the comments summarized into the group "might as well have been written in crayon." I privately called them crayon comments. None were literate, most were incoherent, and many were brimming with rage about something.

That was many years ago, and it's only gotten worse. I don't mind a well written comment expressing even a passionate opinion that I happen to disagree with. I don't mind someone attacking my position,  perhaps even in vehement terms. What I won't put up with are the ad hominem attacks, the assumptions of stupidity, putting forth comments designed to enrage the other person, or holding a position that is just plain contrary to fact. I don't feel the need to quote examples, I'm quite sure you've seen it for yourself.

Back in the primitive days we used to allow smoking almost everywhere, and a large fraction of the population smoked. One suffered the smell of smoke everywhere. Then we realized the cigarette companies had been lying for decades about the health risks of smoking. The smartest ones had never started, and the smart ones who had started, quit. Then we started herding the smokers outside and more quit. I remember the fuss when they stopped allowing people to smoke on aircraft, and there are STILL incidents every now and then where people try to disable the smoke detector in the washroom. Idiots.

Now it's a bit unusual to find someone that will admit to smoking. You see them huddled in a pathetic mass the required distance from the entrance. Every now and then some smokers show up at Repsol, and the people near them in the locker room gag. I've seen people take their stuff and move away from the smoker. Since we don't get it much, we really notice the smell is disgusting.

It's much the same with the comments. When most people behaved politely in public, anyone tempted to lose it would work a bit harder at keeping control. They knew other people would lose respect for them if they lost their temper. When someone did lose it, and it was a major issue, they might be cut some slack. Maybe that's where the problem started. Hmmm. Maybe we should have given them a time out in a play pen.

Now people lose their shit over trivialities. The Starbucks coffee isn't quite right. Somebody in a car did something you didn't like, that didn't inconvenience you at all.  A bike lane was installed. You had to wait a few minutes for your dinner reservation because someone stayed a few minutes longer in a busy restaurant. A carbon tax of a few cents per litre when they didn't complain about a 25 cent per litre price raise.

I fear for our democratic institutions when we can't hold a polite conversation about grown up issues. There are not many black and white issues anymore, most are made up of murky shades of grey. There are any number of reasonable positions to hold on various topics, and we should be able to discuss them to come to common ground. That's how we get stuff done. It's called compromise. In the USA that's a dirty word now. Many legislators are doing the childish equivalent of holding their breath till they turn blue to try to get everything their way. A 90% win isn't good enough. Such are unworthy of the jobs they hold. I fear the same thing happening here.

And in AMA news, I'm up past 4,000 words in response to four questions. If you want to get a question in, best do it quick.

American politics

I woke up with a clear thought in my head this morning, comparing American politics to a football game. Some writers keep pen and paper by the bed for exactly this reason, but I had to stumble out to find my laptop. As I was typing frantically to capture my thoughts I also realized that while the moonrise yesterday was scrubbed because of cloud cover, moonset this morning might not be.

I haven't put the camera chip in the laptop yet to see what I have, but I know I didn't get the shot I wanted. That was the moon setting over the Tsuut'ina resort or convention building. Clouds were rolling in low on the horizon. But some of the others might be ok. On to the political thought, then a good photo at the bottom to cheer you up again.

Hillary Clinton is out there on the playing field. She's had several roles, but is trying out for quarterback. She knows most of the players, all the refs and coaches and management, some of the commentators, and many of the various technical people that  help make it all happen. Some people think she's a pretty good player, other people think she's cheating somehow. She'll sign autographs, but it's clear she doesn't really enjoy it.

There's lots of other players on the field playing various positions. Some, like the quarterback, have a glamorous role, other positions are one of a bunch. Others seem to be out there making it up as they go along, playing their own game. Some of the players are stars in their position, and some are nobodies. Players come and go, and the ball goes back and forth. The fans make much of some aspects of the game, many of which are trivial. The fans don't appear to notice that the price of admission and everything else is going up, or that the people in the box seats are getting a far better experience.

The Republicans have their end of the field and a playbook, as do the Democrats. There are certain standard plays they share, and there is a rule book. It allows for some tricks, but wider than that there are conventions about the game and how it is conducted. Both sides have generally respected these conventions, sometimes giving the appearance of a gentleman's club, or as some would put it, a fixed game.

Recently the Republicans has been bringing in a special team. The problem is that they aren't really playing the same game by the same conventions. They're more like the streaker that bursts onto the field and disrupts things. Entertaining. Maybe bringing a certain skill to evading the people that just want to get on with the game. But ultimately they're a distraction. They belong in the stands, not on the playing field.

And then there's Trump. He's the creep that when he shows up, the building owners call security and escort him off the premises. At least that's what should happen. So far he's wandering around the building making a big hairy nuisance of himself, saying he'd be a better player than anyone on the field, though he's never been out there himself. It's scary that some people believe him.

The other night I was out in the green space to do a dry run at shooting an almost full moon. No luck. The skies were overcast. Here's one of the other shots I took as I was standing around waiting.

Morning thoughts

This photo perfectly expresses my mood today.

Morning sun capturing the steam from brewing coffee. The house is quiet, even the cats are quiet. I just saw one of my neighbours out for a walk, but the street is otherwise quiet. As a pro tip, after I add water to the fresh ground coffee, (Uganda Bugiso if you're wondering), I also add it to the mug and thermos, so the coffee stays hotter. It's the little things.

I've just finished my morning reading, going through some web pages, Facebook, blogs, Twitter, email. Curtis has taken over my lap, which makes it a bit difficult to run the laptop. I'm fairly sure that he resents the electronics that distract me from the magnificence that is him.

Yesterday I finished reading Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall. It's the first book I've actually finished in a while. I've been wanting to do more reading. Somehow it's always been just a bit further down my list than I get to. Look for the list on the right side, under the blog archive, though there isn't much on it now.

But I like maps, and this is a book about the consequences of making political maps without fully considering the relevant geography. He talks about those consequences in a way that makes it easy to understand what happened, but without getting bogged down into details of some ancient feud. This is extremely readable.

If you read the paper and wonder why "those" people can't get along, this is an excellent primer, and has a bibliography for further details if you're so inclined. The first is  Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond, which is excellent! Marshall talks about Russia, China, United States, Western Europe, Africa, The Middle East, India and Pakistan, Korea and Japan, Latin America, and the Arctic. Given the subject matter, it's a good thing that Canada doesn't get mentioned much.

It got me thinking, though. Lots of human conflict involves being horrible to other people in the hopes they will knuckle under. The USA is particularly good at this, being horrible to nearly everyone, especially when it comes to air power. If there is one thing they're good at, it's dropping bombs and firing missiles at targets. Pity they aren't very good at picking the right targets.

We know from WWII history that bombing didn't break the spirit of people in British Isles or in occupied  Europe or in Japan. They carried on as best they could, and didn't stop until Russian boots walked through Berlin, or the atomic bombs were used in Japan.

Now we are running into asymmetric warfare, where a small group of people are opposing a regular army. The best example is in Afghanistan, where they have successfully repelled the Victorian British Empire, the Russians, and now the Americans. You'd think it would be clear by now that dropping bombs on such people isn't going to work. What would work, eventually, is the rule, "if it's alive and isn't one of us, kill it." That worked better before there were War Crimes Tribunals, and independent journalists.

The first rule to solving a problem is to stop doing the things that make it worse. Being horrible isn't working, and in fact makes things worse. Drop a bomb on a wedding party, and the survivors would have to be saints to not hate the people that did it. Why is anyone surprised they would seek revenge? If you want something bad enough, you will find a way to get it, even if it costs your own life.

It's hard to stop being horrible. The people you've been horrible to aren't easily going to believe you've stopped. Anybody that has ever listened to Donald Trump will never believe he will stop being horrible. His future depends on it, and sadly, there is an audience that likes him being horrible. So part of the solution is to deal with that, and get rational candidates for high political office.

But let's take a specific example. There are a huge number of refugees languishing in various tent cities. Often the camps are in countries that can't really afford to deal with them. Rich countries take a trivial number of refugees, and the USA is busy clutching it's pearls over numbers of Syrian refugees that can easily be counted in the dozens.

Enough of the dicking around. Build a town, a real one. A small city even. The idea behind the tent cities is that supposedly, the people will go home. Well, for all too many of them home doesn't exist anymore. Build a new home. Many of them. Provide clean drinking water, treat sewage, pick up the garbage, and all the various other amenities that cities offer. Many of the refugees themselves will have the skills needed.

Many people have the idea that refugees are poor, and poorly educated. That isn't always true. Maybe Canada got the cream of the crop, but from what I've heard, they have a burning desire to work, to contribute, to become part of the society. Why wouldn't you take advantage of that?

I say start building the city. Cities. Call it a speculative investment if you must. Think about the Marshal plan that rebuilt Europe after WWII. In a few short decades the Germans and Japanese when from being enemies to being foundational states of the Western economic system.

Yes, when you say billions of dollars, it sounds like a lot. But two things. That money builds something that could endure for generations; but a billion dollars spent on bombs only buys destruction. Think about where the money goes. It gets spent to buy material goods, to buy people's time. What do they do with the money? Spend it on goods and services till they get caught up. Money is like manure, best spread out.

I think it's worth trying. What's the worst that could happen? As near as I can tell, nothing worse than what's already happening.

On the fitness front I've been feeling like I'm verging on overtraining. The run is going really well, but the swim has been tough lately. I skipped a run and swim at the end of the week just to rest up a bit.

The runs on Monday and Wednesday went really well, 5 and 8 K respectively, about a 6:30 pace. Then Saturday was 15 K. I hadn't run around the reservoir in a while and Michelle was up for it. This morning, just by accident I found a blog post about the very first time I ran around the reservoir. You can find it here. We did the same route, in the same direction. 15 K, 1:43:30 for a 6:53 pace. For a long time we did long runs at a 7:30 pace, and the last few have been a bit quicker.

We were both feeling strong, starting at just over a 7 pace, and settling in just under that. Except for going up hills, this was a chatchatchat pace, her a little more than me. My quads and hams were feeling it a little, but not enough to slow down or stop. No walk breaks at all, compared to the last long run home from work, which was a bit of a shambles in comparison. What's really good about this run is that the last 2 K were fast. We went from a 6:45 - 7 min pace, to 6:25 then 6:18, and could have gone faster yet.

It was a beautiful day for a run, warm with a bit of overcast. Lots of people were out having a picnic along the path, but we weren't having to dodge too many dogs walking their idiot owners. We stretched after, watching the kids playing the water park at South Glenmore park. My bammy was talking to me a bit.

Bison burgers and lamb shish-kabob. So good.

The great camera adventure is going well. A software disc came with the camera, but my laptop doesn't have a disc reader. The replacement I downloaded turned out to be not quite the same thing. I was wondering why it wasn't "seeing" the camera images that I knew perfectly well were sitting in a folder right there. I had downloaded version 3.14, and needed a version 4.xx. Once I got that I was cooking with gas. I'm still figuring out how it works, and what changes make for a better photo.

One thing I tried was comparing the camera to the iPhone 6. Here's two shots of the garden from the iPhone. The first is the normal setting, and the second is zoomed in all the way, using the metal yellow flower as an aiming point.

Now, here are two photos from the Canon, shot from exactly the same spot, with the camera on automatic. The regular size looks much the same field of view. The iPhone actually looks like it zooms in a bit further. You can see a pink flower off to the left of the Canon photo, but not the iPhone. Maybe I didn't center it exactly.

Part of the trick here is that I'm not quite comparing apples to apples. The iPhone photos are JPEG's, with the phone and software doing whatever it does. The Canon photos are a RAW file, viewed in Preview, and captured in a PNG screen shot. The file sizes are similar. I'm not sure what they would look like if I opened with the RAW editor and captured a screen shot from there.

Here's the difference, enlarging part of each photo. The first is the iPhone. The Lamb's ears are blurry and discoloured and the back ground is completely blurred. The Canon photo zoomed in to about the same place shows much more detail and natural colour. The background foliage is clear as well. I can zoom into the photo even further, to where the edges start to pixilate. Of course, I can't tell what these look like in the published version of the blog. Maybe you're looking at the photos wondering what I'm babbling about.

I had a bit of the same experience watching a Blue-Ray disc of Miss Marple. I've talked earlier about the difference between the DVD version we have and the Blue-Ray. Last night I watched The Mirror Cracked from Side to Side. It isn't one of my favourites, but I think this one shows off how good the remastering process was.

Earlier this weekend we visited Vale's greenhouse in Black Diamond. They have an art show once a year. We didn't go on the day they had wine, oh well, but it's still nice to walk through and look at art. Much of it doesn't do a thing for me, but there were a few pieces that really called to me. I hadn't known you could get paint to texture like that. The one wheat field looked like real wheat blistering up from the canvas. Linda got another plant, I think it's called cups and saucers.

I want to get these lilies!

Millarville market opened up this weekend. It's a fun place to go anyways, and my buddy Lori D ran the half marathon. I'd considered it, but decided not to. Some other buddies showed up and we had a good time.

Did I mention that work renewed my contract till August 31? that was a bit odd, in that my boss and I had talked about the end of July to finish up some odds and ends. Then Penn West sold a zillion dollars of property in Sask, so maybe things changed. Still 80% time, which is nice.

And that's enough for now.

Rights and death

Here it is early March, and you'd think it was early May. It's been like this for a month or so, which leads to these two photos.

Linda is worried about these plants and others that are joining them. They're such optimists. They see warm weather and start to grow. They don't read weather forcasts and realize we could still get snow. It can be a cruel world out there, and gardens sometimes suffer. Calgary is hard on gardens. Chinooks. Hail. Snow any month of the year. Drought. Floods. The little plants just keep trying till they die.

Being self aware, humans think about the dying end of the cycle. Not so much when young, as evidenced by the kids that recently thought it was a good idea to slide down a bobsled track on a toboggan. Two of them died. We think about it more when older, when we have a bit more perspective on it. We don't notice the parade at first, then it's really slow, then the deaths come faster and faster till we're swept up in the great parade, and join all those people where ever it is that we go when we die.

This has been milling around in my head for a while, precipitated by the woman who recently won the right (got permission?) for a doctor assisted death, and had to travel to Vancouver. Let's write it out, shall we? For anyone new to my blog, I say what I think, and say why. You are welcome to respond in the comments, which are moderated. Disagreement is fine, but I insist on comments that are respectful.

I want to talk about the various people involved, listed here in no particular order: medical professionals such as doctors, nurses, and various specialists, and the administrative aspects of healthcare; the terminally ill, or those living with pain or a debilitating illness; those who have medical reason to foresee such a future; children; the families and loved ones of the people already mentioned.

For a start, lets separate out the issue of organ donors or transplants. My thinking is that all of us should automatically be considered, where possible, organ donors at death, unless we sign paperwork saying not to use our organs. All organs, every bit of us that's useful. My reasoning is that we're dead, we don't need it anymore. If something from me can extend someone else's life, or improve the quality of their life, have at it.

Let's also note conflict of interest. No person who stands to gain from a will should be allowed to have a say in that person's end of life. Even amounts of money that most would consider trivial, or articles that would normally be considered trinkets can have an impact all out of proportion. Maybe that means people have to be more careful about making their will.

Until very recently suicide was considered a horrible, unthinkable thing. Even dying was considered almost a last resort. We expected doctors to do everything in their power to preserve and extend our lives. Like so many things, that's gotten out of hand in recent decades. Any sort of life was better than death. Many people still believe this. I certainly don't.

Medical people.
Lay people see medical people as the gatekeepers of life and death. They have a heavy responsibility, no doubt about it. Most of us don't understand the complexities of the medical world. We rely on medical professionals to guide us, but the decisions are ours, or should be. Regardless if they think that getting test x is a good idea, I might not want to do it and it doesn't matter if it's a good reason (higher incidence of false positives than I'm comfortable with), or a stupid one (the voices in my head tell me it's a plot).

Here's where we run into the conflict between medical ethics and personal decisions. Medical professionals are paid to provide a service. It's a service requiring the highest levels of human skill and judgement, but a service to a patient none the less. The patient is the one in charge, with some exceptions we'll get to.

I do not want to see medical professions coerced into doing something they think is wrong, but it's not their life at stake. The life involved is the patient's. If the doctor can't or won't give the patient the care they want, they need to refer that patient to another doctor.

Please note I'm not saying the doctors should put down anyone that takes it into their head that a few days of feeling down are enough to end it all. Not at all. Part of the doctor's responsibility is to help the patient understand what options are available that might alleviate issues. There needs to be a process so that patient and doctor and family know what the fully informed and considered wishes of the patient are.

As for the rest of the health system, it must be structured around the needs of patients. We should be doing everything in our power keep people out of hospitals. We are all going to die. Period, end of story.  There comes a time when medical intervention is fruitless. Let's recognize and make provision for the inevitable. We need to build the appropriate facilities for people to be as comfortable as possible along those last, inevitable steps.

Patients.
Lets consider people in what is called "of sound mind." This is pretty straightforward. If they are in pain, have a terminal illness and see a messy end, or have written clear instructions with these situations in mind, then they get what they want. Yes, there's a process to make sure the various possibilities have been reviewed, and that the situation is as it appears to be. There is a line between a doctor going through a process, making sure the i's are dotted and the t's crossed, and trying to badger the patient into the decision the doctor feels morally comfortable with. Who can say how much pain another can bear or where the end of the rope is? The doctors need to suck it up, even if they don't like it.

Now let's consider those not of sound mind, for whatever reason. Dementia. Coma. Final stages of various diseases or conditions. Intellectual or developmental disabilities. Injury. For those who have left instructions relevant to the issue at hand, their wishes should be fulfilled. In these cases I think the doctor has a higher order or responsibility to ensure they are carrying out the wishes of the patient. This might be with the support of the family, or over the objections of the family. It behooves people that contemplate such a situation to make their wishes clear in a living will or other such document. It's probably smart to consult doctors when drawing up such a document. Everybody should have such a document, and if you are going into a situation where such a state is contemplated, you should make sure the medical system has a copy. If the family disagree, they need to suck it up.

Now, for those that have not left instructions for whatever reason. Maybe they never could, or left it too late. This gets messy. I heard of a case recently where the medical establishment clearly and unanimously agreed that a person was dead. The family disagreed. Ouch. In this case I'd expect the medical system to be choosing life, and doing what they can for the patient, until it becomes clear that it's hopeless.

The medical system can now rescue people that would have died only a few decades ago. We have more sophisticated tests and better medical technology. We have a better understanding of our bodies and what conditions we can cure or alleviate. This will continue to change, and wherever the line is now, it will move in the future. If several medical specialists in the relevant field are in agreement that someone is dead and unplugging life support is the thing to do, the family needs to suck it up and say goodbye. Their thoughts and feelings do not hold any weight against the preponderance of medical expertise.

There is some messy middle ground in there. Maybe the document isn't clear. Maybe the person has changed their mind, or a family member says they have. Maybe there is a new medical procedure and maybe it has risks and maybe the patient is in no state of mind to fully consider them. Maybe some family are trying to file a court injunction to prevent any permanent medical action. This is murky ground indeed, and it's best to leave government legislation out of it for now. I think it's better left to people specializing in medical ethics to examine such situations carefully, and as best as possible fulfill the patient's wishes.

I might as well bring up the crassest of factors now. Money. People will attempt to prolong or cut short the lives of "loved ones" in order to benefit from a will. Somehow the pain of another person takes second place to personal gain for some people. It's despicable. On the other side, every person in the medical system costs the taxpayers something. It's all very well if the system can do something for that person, and it's likely they can be up and around again. But when they can't be cured, should they really be in a bed where the focus is a cure, and the real cost is that someone else can't be getting that care. There should be beds appropriate to that situation, where the focus is on palliative care.

Another related topic while I'm at it. I appreciate that some people have faith, and that's fine for them. They are welcome to write their living will informed by faith.  But for them to project that faith onto someone else, and say god wants something for them is another form of despicable. If god wants something for someone he can darned well make his wishes clear by doing it.

But what about the commandment "Thou shall not kill." Or the Qur'an "17:33: And do not take any human being's life - that God willed to be sacred - other than in [the pursuit of] justice." There's been a lot of ink spilled on this topic, but my take on it is the various churches have built in enough exceptions that serve their purposes that it's hardly an absolute. Helping someone end their life under certain circumstances is not killing them in the same sense we normally use that word.

Children.
This one is a horror show for all involved, no denying it. Legally, children are incapable of forming an opinion until the age of majority, though in some cases teenagers have been allowed to express their wishes. Normally parents speak for children and make decisions on their behalf. What parent can be objective about their child? What parent can say anything but 'do what it takes so my child lives?' Cost means nothing to them.

Doctors and the medical system have a terrible burden here. They have to help the family understand the limits of medical technology and what the realistic outcomes are. Nobody ever wants to give up on a child. Sometimes it's the opposite, the parents refusing a treatment. Those specialists in medical ethics will almost certainly be playing a role here.

Family, and loved ones.
If I haven't made it clear, these people are not what the show is about. Their wishes are so far secondary to the clear wishes of the patient that they need not even really be considered. The medical system needs to have the stones to stand up for the patient.

The government's role in all this should be to enable and uphold patient choices, with sufficient opportunity for oversight to prevent patient wishes from being thwarted. All of this needs to be fact based. The sooner started, the sooner we can start dealing with thorny issues on a factual, experiential basis and revise laws if and when required. We can start training medical professionals in the subtle ethics of end of life issues.

We can start helping people write living wills that are clear and comprehensive so their end of life wishes have at least a chance of happening. Maybe they'll die in a demonstration of driver incompetence on the way to work tomorrow and it's all for nothing, but who knows? More and more of us are living longer and longer, and to be blunt some of us are taking longer and longer to die.

I don't remember the exact quote, but one doctor essentially said during an interview, "I've been helping my patients live my entire career, there is no way I'll help them die." I was very sorry to hear that. We are all going to die, and for all too many of us it will come sooner than expected or under circumstances we wouldn't wish for. Not everybody will take advantage even if the opportunity is there, but people should be permitted to express their wishes about their end of life, and insofar as practically possible, the medical system should help them achieve it.

Election day 2015 eve

Tomorrow is election day here in Canada. 3.6 MILLION Canadians have already voted in advance polls. That's out of about 26.4 eligible voters, so just over 13 % of Canadians have already voted.

The big question in my mind is not who is going to win.

No.

(Wait for it.)

Are you going to join us? That's the question. I've voted already. A number of friends and colleagues have mentioned voting already.

Maybe you haven't voted because you're undecided, and want to wait till the last minute to see if anybody says anything even more spectacularly stupid than some of things said already. Maybe you're waiting to see if your candidate gets thrown off the ballot, like a bunch of others have. Maybe you were traveling over the long weekend. There's lots of reasons not to vote at the advance polls.

That's fine. Just get your ass out to vote on Monday.

But maybe you think you're busy. Bah! Nobody is that busy. If you're on a shift schedule for the time the polls are open, your employer is legally obligated to give you time off to vote. Maybe you're afraid you'll be in a line up. Bah! You probably have a phone to amuse yourself with. Or bring a book. Go with your neighbours and chat. And really, the line won't be that long. You've waited longer in line ups for a movie. Just do it.

You won't get any sympathy from me if you don't vote. I'll figure one of a couple things. You're such a weenie you can't cope with the minor inconvenience of a line up, or the complexities of producing valid ID. You're too lazy or stupid to spend a few minutes to find out who the candidates are in your riding, what they and their parties stand for, and which of them is the best choice for you. About the only way you'll get my sympathy is if you were taken to the hospital after a demonstration of driver incompetence. Unless it was you.

I've made no secret of wanting the Harper government gone. The odds of him personally losing his seat are trivial. That is unless a whole bunch of my neighbours have been lying to pollsters and overcome the habit of decades. I suppose it could happen, enough Albertans voted NDP they became the provincial government.

No, Tuesday morning Harper will still be my MP. That's the way I'd bet. The only way it won't happen is if the Conservative party takes another historic drubbing like in 1993. As you might remember, only 2 Conservatives were elected. The same thing happening again wouldn't hurt my feelings a bit. If it does happen, I wouldn't be surprised to see Harper pull a Prentice, and resign the seat. He couldn't live with only one other MP to dominate, as the leader of the 5th party.

There is one circumstance where I won't be grumpy about a Conservative majority government led by Harper. Just one. Enough Canadians voting for that result that the non-voting bloc wouldn't change the results no matter how they voted.

I'm a huge believer in democracy, even if it is the worst form of government, except for all the others. If a large majority of my fellow citizens want Harper and the Conservatives, I'll go along with that. What breaks my crayons is when a government gets a small fraction of the overall vote, 24% say, and gets 100% of the power, and worse, gloats about what voters want. They don't notice that a majority of voters voted against them.

But I don't think that would happen. Polling suggests we're going into a minority government. The more people voting, the more likely that is. Go vote young adults, go vote! I have two big hopes out of such a result:

1. Set up some system of proportional representation federally and provincially. Same rules. One example, though there are many others, the Green Party got 7% of the vote, and one seat, instead of about 20.  Yes, splitting up the seats could lead to what is derisively called 'a pizza parliament', but I'd like to think it will express the will of the voters better. There could be a whole blog on this, stay tuned.
2. Repeal C-51 in it's entirety. Start from scratch to determine what threats we really do face from terrorists, if any, and how they are, or are not, addressed by the powers currently possessed by various law enforcement agencies. In case you were wondering, I am much more worried about the afore mentioned demonstrations of driver incompetence than terrorists.
3. A more minor hope is that the new government systematically undoes all the shit Harper did.

Call me a dreamer if you must, but there we are. The first makes it much more difficult for a paranoid monster like Harper from gaining such power again. The second restores the freedoms and liberties that Canadians enjoy, so that we are treated like citizens with rights, not potential terrorist suspects.

I'm going to be watching the results Monday evening, and paying close attention to the voter turnout numbers. Don't disappoint me!

Voted! Your turn. Time for a change.

Lots of good things happened today.

It started with cats purring in my lap, and coffee.

Then a wonderful chat with a buddy over more coffee.

More cats just now, as I'm writing.

I'm just back from voting. I couldn't wait to put an X beside someone else's name, other than Harper's. The pleasure was amazing. At least one of my readers gets the pleasure of reading Harper's name on the ballot, and voting for someone else. Maybe several readers, I'm not sure of the exact boundary for this riding.

But this is the key piece here, people. Vote. Get your ass out there and vote. A lady in a walker hobbled into a crowded polling station. Someone in a wheelchair was making their way into the parking lot. Lots of people there were leaning on canes. The grey brigade was out in force, and good for them. They got out and voted, and it might have taken a significant fraction of their resources today to do that. The volunteers said it was really busy at first, then steady all day. Good. We didn't have to wait long at all. The volunteers were wonderful.

What? You aren't voting? What's your excuse again? Say it louder. Uhuh. Yeah. You deserve a big kick in the ass. At the very least. Every vote is important. In the last provincial election one riding was tied. Exactly the same number of votes for two candidates. Don't tell me a vote doesn't matter.

You have 8 hours a day, for the next 3 days, plus several more hours today. Just go do it.

I firmly think it's time for a change. Harper has demeaned us. Demeaned Canada. This has been a disgusting election, with him trying every trick in the book to distract us from the real issues. They've cheated in the last 3 elections, with people going to jail over it. There's no reason to believe he won't do the same again. There's a reason the Organization for Security and Economic Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) is sending election monitors.

The only solution is to vote against in such massive numbers that the cheating doesn't matter. We've done it before. Remember Mulroney? How we collectively gagged and voted them out of office in such droves there were only two Conservative MP's left? We can do it again.

Consider the thought processes of a man who thinks the long form census is an invasion of privacy, yet writes legislation that let's the police monitor all forms of communication between ordinary Canadians, without a warrant, and essentially without oversight.

Consider creating second class citizenship, reinstating the medieval punishment of banishment. When you realize that they can strip a person of citizenship for terrorism related activities, and the Harper government thinks that protesting a pipeline is a terrorist activity, and they've been complicit in sending Canadian citizens overseas for torture, you should wonder if you are next. If you are an immigrant, or the child of immigrants, this should concern you. Once the precedent has been set, it will be expanded. Terrorists this week, disagreeing with Harper next month. Lese Majeste as a crime has gone essentially dormant, but I can see Harper bringing it back.

There is no end of reasons to vote against the Conservatives. You can look them up yourself, but the easy, simple thing to remember; it's time for a change. Governments should change. A decade of anybody is enough, and a decade of Harper incompetence is more than enough. What makes it worse, is railing against the Liberals for various faults, omnibus bills being only one, and then doing the very same thing himself when in power.

Go vote. Many campaign teams will help you get to the polling booth. Make a party of it, get a bunch of buddies together, vote, then celebrate. It won't take very long, and you are not too busy. You aren't. Just do it. To paraphrase my buddy Beth, Shut Up And Vote.

You've been waiting long enough

Yes, I know I've been promising a political rant for weeks. WEEKS!

You should know I brewed lots of strong coffee this morning. Fasten your seatbelt.

Until recently, as in a decade or so ago, Canada was this big empty place that didn't get paid a lot of attention. The famous Canadians you can name, Commander Hadfield excepted, live in the United States because you had to go there to play on a bigger field. Canada had a good, if vague reputation as a nice place to live, and was seen as a good player on the international stage.

Just after the second world war Canada had one of the biggest navies and a very well respected military. Over the decades it became a barely running joke. Our current submarine fleet is only a theoretical thing, since they can't go under the surface. The surface ships make the news because they've been taken out of service, or sunk as an artificial reef.

The Sea King helicopter recently passed the 50 anniversary of entering service. Think of that for a moment. How many of you are 50 years old? I once heard a helicopter service company rep describe helicopters as "an assembly of parts flying in really close formation." These helicopters have been flying in all sorts of weather on missions where lives are on the line, and not just the helicopter crew. They probably require more maintenance hours than flying hours now.

It's not like this is a surprise to anyone, but how is it our government can't buy suitable helicopters? How hard can it be? Helicopters are complicated things, true, but the operating envelop is well known, and there are lots of choices. You build your requirements, and you take your pick. But wait, it's the political requirements that take priority. Right. That explains everything.

The previous Liberal governments were seen as hostile to the military. Harper made hay with this, promising to properly fund the military, and buy better supplies. Some of that happened, it's true. But what else happened? Dig a bit deeper. Offices that serve veterans have been closed. The Harper government has spent $700,000 in court, trying to avoid supporting wounded veterans, saying they have "no special obligation."

I'm ashamed of my government for that. While I disagree about the efficacy of military solutions in many cases, we have to keep in mind these veterans did what they were told to do, as best they could in difficult circumstances. Most of them would say they weren't just serving our government, but also a higher cause, opposing various forms of extremism. We effing well DO have an obligation to them!

That brings me up the longest election in modern Canadian history. It's gone on and on, and to be truthful with you, I've tuned out from time to time. A small matter of Penn West laying off a third of it's staff, including nearly everybody I know there, has distracted me just a little. Yes, I'm still there. This week. Every time I think about it, or look at the political news I get more depressed.

We've all known that the behaviour in the House of Commons is a disgrace. Behave like that in any other workplace, provincial legislatures excepted, and you'd be fired on the spot. And that's before Stephen Harper became the first Prime Minister in history for being held in contempt of Parliament for not providing it legally required paperwork over the lies they were telling about the F-35. And that's before the various Senate scandals, many of which involved Senators named by Harper. And before losing a bunch of cases in the Supreme Court, where Justices he appointed find against him, because he was trying to do things that were clearly against the law. What does that tell you about Harper?

Is there anyone that thinks it's appropriate to pee in a coffee cup and dump it down the sink at any time, let alone when you are in a private home to perform work for the homeowner? I thought not. We all have to deal with bio-pressures, and I had thought that we had all been taught polite ways of asking where the toilet is. I guess not. I think it's telling that a person that would do that, would also think that running for office under the Conservative banner would be a good idea.

The phone prankster is just juvenile, which leads me to my next point. There's a concept called "grown-up."

"When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things." I had thought it was Shakespeare, but it turns out to be the bible.

It's a concept that seems to be lacking these days. Not just in politics, but in movies and other popular culture. This isn't to say that a fart joke can't be funny. They can be, in the right time and place. But constructing a whole movie around it seems a little over the top. This isn't to say an adult can't forget their dignity and play with their kids. They should, from time to time.

But holy doodle, is it too much to expect that our elected representatives would behave like grown-ups as they discuss the details of spending billions of our taxpayer dollars? I completely believe it's possible to discuss an issue with people that hold opposing or differing viewpoints. Grown-ups have learned that they can't always get their way. They've learned to compromise with others, to give up some of what they want to get something more important.

The American Tea Party is a group of people that are still emotional two year olds. They want what they want, even if it's stupid or against the law, and even discussing a compromise is treason. They have said they are about to engage in another round of holding their breath until they turn blue, to get their way.

The Harper government is channeling the Tea Party. Harper doesn't want his issues clouded with facts. He only wants what he wants. That's why he muzzles everyone but himself and his carefully prompted minions. Thats why they refuse interviews. They have nothing to say except their banal talking points dictated to them by the PMO. His carefully vetted event attendees are now verbally abusing journalists that dare to ask questions of the Dear Leader.

Consider the thought process of a man who thinks that the long form census is an invasion of privacy, and yet writes legislation to:

•  allow his security services to intercept any form of communication between Canadian citizens, without notice, without any meaningful oversight,
• detain people only suspected of a considering actions that might be a crime,
• criminalize speech related to "terrorism", where even discussing why someone might be driven to consider committing a "terrorist" attack, is itself a criminal act,
• allow business interests to muzzle objections to their plans on environmental issues.

I say it loud, and I say it proud, Harper and his Conservatives must go. I want the next government to spend the first few years undoing the omnibus shit Harper did. The economic stability arguments are a red herring, Harper is a poor manager. The security issues are another red herring. More people die in auto collisions in a month, than have ever been killed in terrorist attacks, and Harper's security state actions are not what keep us safe. 

Here's some voting advice. First of all, make sure you can vote. Make sure your friends and family can vote. Harper has been suppressing the vote by making it more difficult to do, on the spurious grounds of preventing voter fraud. There is no voter fraud. None. 

But Harper is afraid of the electorate. He doesn't want the poor, the young, the Native, the minorities, the environmentalists, the immigrants, or the socially active to vote, because they're likely to vote against him. Why ever would that be? Think about it.

Look at the various ads from people and groups urging you to vote Conservative. Are they like you? Are you a snout in the trough big business? Are you old, rich, male, and white like them? Are you afraid of people that are not like you? Do you think that people fleeing the bombed out ruins we helped cause are really coming here to take away your job? How many generations back was it YOUR ancestors fleeing another country? Native people excepted, we are all immigrants or the descendants of immigrants, and most of us not that many generations back. Trying to restrict immigration now, when we desperately need young working age people, smacks of "fuck you Jack, I've got mine."

Neither the Liberals or NDP are perfect voting choices. That's fine. Pick the candidate that seems most likely to defeat the Conservative. Maybe the Green candidate is only half as good as Elizabeth May, vote for them! Whoever it is, even the resurrected Rhino party, will do less damage to Canada than the Conservatives. Don't think about your "traditional" voting habits. The Conservatives are relying on that to split the vote. Lie to the pollsters. Lie to the people calling you and trying to get out your vote if you're Conservative. Be wary of people calling to give you election information. The Conservatives have been convicted of misleading the voters this way. Try to vote in the first advance poll, so if there's a problem you still have time to get it fixed.

This is an important election. Get out and vote! Encourage your voting age children to cast their ballot. If you think your vote is not important, keep in mind that in the recent Alberta Provincial election, two candidates ended up with exactly the same number of votes, 7015 each. A judicial recount decided the matter, and it ended up 7018 to 7012. A total of 3 votes changed. Don't tell me your vote isn't important.

Remember when your mother said

"If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all."

And Dorothy Parker said, "If you can't say anything nice, come sit next to me."

I have been known to have acerbic opinions on various matters from time to time. I had some yesterday. Lots of them. I slept on them. (Slept really well, btw.)

I feel much better about it today, mainly because I can count the hours in the office till vacation on the fingers of one hand. Today and tomorrow is a Maximo training course, then a part day on Friday. Many of my (ex) team members will be at the training course, since it's not on Penn West property, and not given by Penn West. I'm looking forward to catching up with them, and seeing how they are doing.

So I've decided, for now at least, that the better part of discretion (and employment) is to say nothing at all. Unless you sit next to me and bring a large coffee. A good chocolate chip cookie might loosen my tongue. (hint, hint)

There was another excellent swim yesterday, 1K 18:22 mostly relaxed, working on catch and stroke timing. Oddly enough I had the pool almost to myself. Then some water running, and some water core. That all felt really good.

The federal election has been heating up again. I'm personally appalled and disgusted by the antics of some of the candidates, though that limerick was hysterical. I don't know who wrote it, but they are a genius, on the site https://twitter.com/limericking.

A technician who once had a pee
In a mug that he happened to see
While visiting clients
To fix an appliance
Now wishes to be their MP.

Not anymore he doesn't, and good riddance. Who would ever hire him again?

Sick of it! Sick of it all. Grrrr!

I am snarly just now. Been that way all day, since shortly after getting into work.

Back with the Duffy trial was still a thing, I was interested in seeing the twists and squirms of the powers that be that have been caught with their hands in the cookie jar. The trial started up again today, and during a quiet moment I checked the tweets.

Sigh. Me and every other normal Canadian understands that the whole bunch of them in the Senate are thieving lying waste of skin excuses for humanity that don't even deserve to be on the group W bench. They've been caught and it's all over but the lying. Someone should audit every one of them to within an inch of their accounting lives.

The whole thing is just sordid and I stopped. I don't know if I'll start again.

I haven't been following Harper's sanctimonious holier than thou lies. I'm sick of him and all his works. He's the perfect example of the big lie working. What he represents is not the Canada I grew up with, but rather is the complete opposite of it.

It's really hot and humid here, and it doesn't help that I have to wear a sweater in my office. My feet were freezing as I huddled over, brooding over the injustices of SQL and a badly organized database filled with bad data.

The last batch of wine was ready to be racked and stabilized. Let's just say it got stirred HARD, and that's why there are no swear words in tonights blog.

It wasn't all bad. I had a lovely lunch with a buddy, and a nice massage that beat up all the muscles in my legs. All of them. I almost cried. I'm glad I took Friday off. Maybe I should take Thursday too. And maybe Monday.

Fed election 2015, essay 2

Tonight was the leaders debate. Yes I watched.

Ever since "You had an option, sir, you could have said no" the debaters have been so prepared to avoid giving an opening that there isn't much give and take. There is nothing spontaneous about them any more. So in that sense, I think they said what they wanted to say. They've practiced so much that a few key words in a question triggers an automatic response that might or might not have much to do  with the question.

Harper has no choice but to continue the spin he has put on things. Nice of him to admit we are in a recession now. He's been doing this for a long time now, and he's good at his image. He certainly wasn't going to show that any punches landed. He knows his talking points and he's prepared to repeat them till he's blue in the face.

I think May showed her preparation best. Facts, figures, clear, concise. I was impressed. We all know she isn't going to be Prime Minister after the election, and she knows it too, so she's playing to a bit of a different audience. Unquestionably it was better having her there than doing without her.

Mulcair had me puzzled for a while. He seemed very stiff at the beginning, while trying to come across as friendly. I'm not sure it was a good mix. He's beginning to take some heat on his positions, and that's a good thing.

Trudeau needed to do well in this debate to get back into the fight, and overcome the "just not ready" narrative. I think he did that, up until his loopy closing remarks. That was such a shift into the touchy feely world I was surprised. I don't think he undid himself there, but he didn't do himself any favours.

Did it change my perceptions? I don't think so. Harper is on my ballot, but the other 3 are not. I need to do some research on the actual candidates in my riding. As I've said, if the Green candidate is half as good as May, they'd get my vote in a heartbeat. I'll see.

I watched on the Maclean's site, and I was disappointed in the coverage. They tried to do too much, and it seemed rushed. I like it when they find someone that really knows their stuff, and they let them talk. The quick cuts between interviewers just wastes time and distracts me.

So far, nobody at work is talking about the election. Nobody at all. My take on it so far is that nobody wants to think about it for a while.

Fed election 2015, essay 1

Since I'm almost positive I'll be doing more than one of these during the epic, tedious, propaganda stink bomb that Harper is pleased to call an election, I thought I'd better name them clearly. You are going to get the opinions of a real, ordinary, working Canadian, as opposed to the mythological entity Harper invokes at every opportunity.

If you're here, you're either a political junkie, or a big fan of my writing. Hello and welcome. You can find other political rants using the "politics" label over on the right. I'll try not to repeat myself but you might want to start here, with recent commentary on the Alberta provincial election.

Here's the rules. I love comments, and I moderate them. I'm fine with reasoned disagreement, but will ruthlessly delete incoherent rage filled spasms of bile. I'm not going to tell you who to vote for, that's your business. I'm going to point to various issues, and let you make up your own mind.

Canadian elections over the last 100 years or so have been about 6 weeks long. That seemed to be plenty of time for people to discuss the issues and make up their minds about who should be elected to appear to run the country. I have some pretty cynical notions of who actually runs the country. Two sayings come to mind, "He who hath the gold makes the rules", and "Permit me to issue and control the money of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws!" as attributed to Mayer Amschel Rothschild.

The Conservatives certainly have the money, and have demonstrated the will to spend it, particularly on negative advertising.  Even without watching television I know of the "just not ready" bit of arrogance. By election day, if Harper has his way, every Canadian alive will be parroting it back as a response to any statement by anyone. (Sort of like Conservative members of Parliament.) "Smithers, what do you think of the 4th quarter projections?" "Just not ready!" I hope our tottering economy can take the blow.

Just so you know, Harper's name will appear on my ballot, but don't blame me, I've never voted for him. My neighbours, however, seem to like him. Or rather, more accurately, they are afraid of what the other guys might do. I'd like to think with the election of Notley we'd be over that objection, but maybe not.

In any case, we are going to hear endless scary stories about Trudeau and Mulcair, and their respective political parties. But what I urge you to do is look at the facts. Look at what Harper has actually done, as opposed to what he says he has done. I'm not saying he's lying, oh no, he's just being politically expedient with the truth.

And this is going to go on for months! All August, and if he thinks anyone is paying attention that isn't being paid to be doing so, he should seek medical help for the other delusions that would go along with it. All September, when many of us are trying to get the kids settled into school routines, and us back into a serious work routine. Two thirds of October. It's turning my stomach as I think about it. Elections and medicines are both good things, but the proper dosage is critical. 11 weeks is overdoing it.

Harper has to wear his record. He's a hard working kind of guy, and he's been hard at work micromanaging every file to his personal satisfaction. If you're reading or watching something that the government is saying or doing, it's a safe bet that either he or one of his short-panted minions in the PMO approved it. Then they go suppress competing opinions.

The Liberals are still wearing their record for two reasons. The most obvious is the party leader's name. I think it's safe to say that most Canadians recognize the name Trudeau. In Western Canada any number of people have mastered the knack of saying the name while spitting. The other reason is that Chretien and all his scandals aren't that long ago. One of the reasons the Conservatives were elected was that they promised to be open and transparent and ethical. The latest Senate scandals tell you how that turned out. When you come right down to it, the Liberals and Conservatives are two wings of the same party. Old, entitled, corrupt, arrogant.

The New Democratic Party is carrying baggage from many years of saying dumb things because they knew they wouldn't get elected. They talk openly about (gasp) raising taxes, and other changes to the political order that make the powers that be very nervous. There was an Ontario NDP government that did dumb things, and that got everybody excited. They forget that the Tommy Douglas NDP government produced 16 straight balanced budgets, including the introduction of medicare, and during troubled economic times. So far, and I admit it hasn't been that long, Notley has scarcely put a foot wrong. I speak with many people who are pleasantly surprised.

The Greens are trying hard, I'll give them that. Or rather, with some spectacular exceptions, May, the leader is. You don't hear much about the party. If the other MP's were as hard working as May is, I'd be a lot happier about the state of the federal government. Let's just say she has unfortunately let her mouth off the leash a few times and leave it at that. I don't think anyone would say they are ready for prime time, unless there's more than kool-aid in the kool-aid. But as a protest vote vehicle, hmm, who knows?

The Bloc Quebecois. A purely Quebec party of no real relevance other than a protest party. No variety of Quebec separating from Canada more than it already has is going to happen. Quebecers have got it good and they know it.

Maybe there is an independent running in your riding. I love their optimism, and every one of them should be inducted into the Order of Canada for putting their time and money where their mouth is when it comes to trying to make Canada a better place. Certainly I would never do anything so quixotic, I'd rather write about it.

So there's an introduction. Let's see what campaign trail shenanigans inspire the next blog. The astute of you will recognize that it's tough sledding for me when it comes to choosing who to vote for. Voting against is easy. I could vote myself to an empty ballot in a heartbeat. In my blue sky dreams I would create a ballot form that had "None of the above" at the bottom, and if that choice had the most ballots, we'd do the whole thing over with a new slate of candidates. Repeat as needed.

I'm going to be looking for a reason to vote for one of the candidates. I hope you do too, and I implore you to get out and pick one of them, especially if you traditionally don't.