How The Wurlitzer Works...Post Alberta Election Pipeline-A-Palooza Edition.

AllYourPushes'RUs
BoxedCompassVille


After Jason Kenney brushed off an unexpected* stomping from Charles Adler prior to returning the Albertalands to their rightful owners, John Ivison quickly set the anti-Lotuslandian Wurlitzer throttle to eleven in the pages of the NaPo:

...While many voters want the premier-designate to attempt diplomacy before turning off the taps that supply British Columbia, the study suggests voters are prepared to “take meaningful action to bring the B.C. government to heel.”...


Which is all fine and good considering the friendly concerned.

But what, exactly, is this 'study' that the good Mr. Ivison refers to?

Hmmmm...

Let's go back and check:

...A new study of public opinion in Alberta by communications firm Navigator, based on eight post-election focus groups, suggests Albertans want premier-designate Jason Kenney to get very aggressive very quickly when it comes to taking on the federal government, environmentalists, intransigent provinces and anyone else who gets in the way of their quest to build an oil pipeline to new markets...

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Gosh.

Did you see what I saw?

The fine folks from an even finer spin doctor factory...errrr... 'communications firm' ran some focus groups.

In other words, there was no poll.

And there was no sample size or indication of the subset of the population sampled.

And there was no estimation of potential validity.

And there no margin of error.

And thus there was, essentially, nothing.

And yet Mr. Ivison was only too happy to fling the prop that was pushed his way with great vigour.

Surprised?


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*Allegedly.


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Sunday Set, April 21, 2019....Treehouse Songs

Tunes by our Neil, Mr. Springsteen, Blaze Foley and Lucinda Williams.




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Image above is Blaze Foley and Sybil Rosen at their Treehouse in the Georgia woods.


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The Not Quite Ready For Sunshine Breakfast After Treat Postage Stamp Party Favour.

Link

I mean, seriously, not even BC Ferries, who gets it very wrong, gets it this wrong.

OK?


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Mr. Eagland, also of the VSun, sure as heckfire hopes that Canada Post didn't look to Kraft and its N.B. Cheescake for inspiration.


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Policy Notables...WTF Does This Even Mean?

Toah!Toah!
Toah!Ville


It looks like a new approach developing affordable rental housing near transit locations may be coming to Lotusland.

Carlito Pablo has the story in the GStraight:

...It involves the creation of a regional fund as a low-cost financing tool to support the development of what is known as “transit-oriented affordable housing”, or TOAH. Raymond Kan, a senior planner with Metro Vancouver, wrote in a report that this fund could “incrementally improve the delivery of affordable rental housing”...


But.

How does this 'Transit-Oriented Affordable Housing' (TOAH) initiative actually work?

Well, according to a blurb attached to Mr. Tan's planning report,  this:

...“These funds are not intended to bend regional market forces, but rather to target a modest amount of financial resources towards the creation or preservation of affordable rental housing in specific geographies consistent with regional plans”...


I mean, honestly, what the heckfire does that even mean?



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Interestingly, in the San Francisco Bay Area, the most excellent Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative has apparently pledged $500 million to a local TOAH... Gosh, just imagine what we could do if the very finest of the fine folks of that ilk  just paid old school Eisenhower/Diefenbaker era-style taxes instead?



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Come Monday...

AllYourCramming'RBelongTo
UsVille


Normally, when I go to the lab on Saturdays the surrounding environs are pretty much empty except for the skateboard punks having their way with the big hunk of cement across the street.

But today was different.

Because classes ended on Thursday...

Which means that fun time is over and a whole lotta kids are pushing all the stuff they can into their brains so that they can spew it out all over the exam sheets come Monday.

Imagine that!



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Quite honestly, now that I'm an ageing part of the overlord academic class, I have a hard time imagining how I was able to commit to the 14 hour cram days for weeks on end back in the days when I was an undergradual...Seriously.

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Pineapple Upside-Down Poll.

DumbAnd
DumbererVille


This was then...

President (George W) Bush will leave office as one of the most unpopular departing presidents in history, according to a new CBS News/New York Times poll showing Mr. Bush's final approval rating at 22 percent.

Seventy-three percent say they disapprove of the way Mr. Bush has handled his job as president over the last eight years.

Mr. Bush's final approval rating is the lowest final rating for an outgoing president since Gallup began asking about presidential approval more than 70 years ago...



This is now*...

George W. Bush has turned his unpopularity upside down.

Six in 10 Americans, 61%, say they now have a favorable view of the 43rd President of the United States in the latest CNN poll conducted by SSRS, nearly double the 33% who gave him a favorable mark when he left the White House in January 2009...


Which begs the question...

If the very fine folks being polled no longer understand that two plus two does not equal five, can they even tell that up is not down and black is not white?



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*That 'now' is actually about a year ago...One can only wonder how much higher the good Mr. Bush's moranic favo(u)rables have risen since then.
And, just to be clear...I, for one, do not believe that this collective upside-downery stops at the southern edge of the 49th parallel.


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