Wednesday, September 30, 2020

BC Election Update...The (Unkown) Ghost In The Horse Race Poll-Making Machinery.

TheNumbersMadeThem
DoItVille


By now you've likely heard about the 'Dipper Madness' numbers from that Ipsos poll commissioned by the fine folks at Global TeeVee:

...A new Ipsos poll conducted for Global News suggests the BC NDP has substantial leads in voter preference and leadership, and in every region in the province.

The NDP has an 18-point lead over the BC Liberals just one week into the campaign, the poll suggests.

The BC Liberals are next at 33 per cent support, followed by the BC Greens at 12 per cent....


And we agree that they are, indeed, hard to ignore.

Heckfire.

Based on the seemingly insurmountable leads across every demographic as well as in the riding-rich regions of Vancouver Island and the Lower Mainland, you can even see how the BC NDP braintrust came to the conclusion that they 'had' to call this fall's snap election if they saw anything even remotely similar in their own internal numbers:

However, there is one Ipsosian number that seems to have escaped serious attention and or scrutiny so far:

...These results exclude the 31% of British Columbians who are undecided or express no preference...


Don't know about you, but that 31 percent sure seems like an awfully big, potentially horse race changing, number depending on which way things break down the backstretch.

So much so that I would not be surprised if the good Mr. Wilkinson were to soon promise a free puppy for every household by Thanksgiving and pumpkins full of gold-plated chocolate bars for everyone to hand-out as tax- and deficit-free trickster treats on Halloween.

Or some such thing.

OK?


_______
There's something else telling in those Ipsos #'s also, which come from the list of most 'important' issues that voters are apparently/allegedly considering...Climate change and the environment do not even crack the top five, which likely says a thing or three about those things that are lacking in Mr. Horgan's current policy initiatives.



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Special Edition HST Wednesday...The Dangerous Myth Of Objective Journalism.

SoCrookedHeNeedsTheServantsToScrewHisPantsOn
EveryMorningVille



“So much for Objective Journalism. Don't bother to look for it here--not under any byline of mine; or anyone else I can think of. With the possible exception of things like box scores, race results, and stock market tabulations, there is no such thing as Objective Journalism. The phrase itself is a pompous contradiction in terms.”
Hunter S. Thompson
In: Fear And Loathing On The Campaign Trail, 1972.


****

1972 was a long time ago, indeed.

And yet, still, big time American 'journalism', for want of a better word, still clings to the faux concept of objectivity which, in the face of a true danger to the Republic like Donald Trump and his enablers, greatly contributed to the spectacle of last night's first debate, wherein Joe Biden couldn't afford to just sit back and let Fred's son spew his garbage, unabated, for 90 minutes.

Why?

Because if Mr. Biden had done so he would have been found to be pretty much equally at fault, regardless.

Perhaps we should let James Fallows, writing in the Atlantic a few weeks ago,  explain:

...Everyone in journalism has sat through countless discussions of the limits of objectivity. But the power of the impulse still shows up now, in 2020, in several distinctive ways.

One is a habitual, even reflexive presentation of claims or statements that a reporter knows are not of equivalent truthfulness, as if they were....

One is a habitual, even reflexive presentation of claims or statements that a reporter knows are not of equivalent truthfulness, as if they were. (Thus, “false equivalence.”) A stark recent example was an AP story on September 4, with the headline “Dueling Versions of Reality Define 1st Week of Fall Campaign.” It began:

NEW YORK (AP) — On the campaign trail with President Donald Trump, the pandemic is largely over, the economy is roaring back, and murderous mobs are infiltrating America’s suburbs.

With Democrat Joe Biden, the pandemic is raging, the economy isn’t lifting the working class, and systemic racism threatens Black lives across America.

The first week of the fall sprint to Election Day crystallized dizzyingly different versions of reality as the Republican incumbent and his Democratic challenger trekked from Washington and Delaware to Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and back, each man on an urgent mission to sell his particular message to anxious voters.

All the conflicting messages carry at least a sliver of truth, some much more than others .

The “some much more than others” phrase is a way to signal what the reporter certainly knows: that Joe Biden’s claims are within the realm of normal political spin and emphasis, while Trump’s are not true. ...



Gosh.

If only the USian proMedia would stop with their objectified nods and winks and actually tell the public precisely what they actually know to be demonstrably false, religiously without fear of being accused of bias.

It seems that would go a long way to helping America get out of the mess it has gotten itself into.

Even without the muddying of all waters, demonstrably fuzzy-false or otherwise, by the fine folks from the enabler-adjacent Lincoln Project.

If you get my drift.

OK?


_______
Meanwhile, in Portland....


.

Monday, September 28, 2020

Just How Smart And Logical Is Mr. Wilkinson, Really?


AllOurRegressiveTaxShifts
WereThemVille

__________

Update at bottom of post
__________

The above headline was placed above a Canadian Press 'profile' of the good Mr. Wilkinson by Camille Bains.

Now, for the moment at least,  let's leave aside the the fact that those specific descriptors of the current BC Liberal leader, which the Vancouver Sun for some strange (editorial?) reason decided to first cherry pick and then trumpet, came from noted unbiased observer and honest broker, the ol' turdstormer himself, Mr. Bill Bennett. 

Instead, let's have a look at how truly 'smart' and 'logical' Mr. Wilkinson is being when it comes to comes to medical services plan (MSP) premiums.

You remember MSP, premiums, right?

Those were the massive revenues that were generated during the super-fine times of the previous BC Liberal government's regressive tax shift in which massive revenues were gouged from the backs of rank and file British Columbians.

How massive was both the shift and the gouging?

Well, at the end of the super-fine government times of Mr. Wilkinson's party, it was precisely this big, as noted at the time (i.e. 2016) by Paul Willcocks: 


So, with that bit of historical memory mining in mind...

Fast forward to this past weekend when the BC NDP, whose recently dissolved government stopped the gouging, had this to say in the wake of an announcement by leader John Horgan to build a new hospital in Terrace as noted by the CBC's Joel Ballard:

...The NDP sent out a news release to journalists warning that a Liberal government would reinstate monthly premiums for B.C.'s medical services plan (MSP)...


Almost immediately, the good Mr. Wilkinson, showed his historically bereft political 'smarts'  on the Twittmachine:



Now, given this statement by Mr. Wilkinson, you might also think that, if he was being 'logical' and true to his suddenly conjured anti-gouging left-leaning ideological stance, he would also fully support the anti-regressive revenue raising replacement tax that the BC NDP instituted to to help shift the BCL-bloated MSP off of the peoples' collective back.

Well...

Not so much...

...He (Wilkinson) wasn't as direct when it came to making a commitment about the future of the employer health tax despite being pressed by CBC News.

But back in May of 2018, during an interview on CKNW's The Lynda Steele Show, Wilkinson said he would like to get rid of a number of NDP taxes including the employer health tax, which he said " is going to drive up the costs of doing business in B.C. and drive employment out of B.C."...


Imagine that!


______
Full marks to the MoCo's Mr. Ballard for doing a little historical memory mining himself with that last sentence,  quoted, above.
Update, 6pm Monday....Gosh, a funny thing happened as this post was being composed this morning...The logical Mr. Wilkinson put on his smartypants so that he could shout 'Deficits don't matter!'...Or some such Norquistian thing.


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Saturday, September 26, 2020

Is It Just A Coincidence That...

ARollingViralTideGathers
NoMossyFibersVille



Is it just a coincidence that the USian schools with the biggest football programs have the largest numbers of COVID cases?





Something tells me that a whole lotta young kids just might not be able to go home for Thanksgiving without endangering their elderly loved ones.

OK?


.

Friday, September 25, 2020

'A Different Eye'

NevermindThoseSixteen
YearsVille



BC Liberal leader Andrew Wilkinson was in Maple Ridge yesterday.

Bob Mackin was there to record said leader's words for posterity:

...Wilkinson also referred to the party’s upcoming environmental platform. The former president of the B.C. Mountaineering Club fondly recalled a summer kayaking trip.

“So if you can wait a few days, we’ll be putting together an environmental package that I think will make people smile and make them look at the BC Liberals with a different eye,” Wilkinson said...



Good grief.


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Thursday, September 24, 2020

I Once Wrote A Book...


AllTheFiftyCentWords
ThatFitVille



Well, actually, I co-wrote a book with a bunch of folks not long ago.

And, at least according to the photographic evidence, my Dad read it, but probably not for pleasure.

He lives on Vancouver Island.

This is the cuurrent COVID situation there according to the good folks at the BC-CDC:



Unfortunately, given the much, much higher numbers over here in the lower mainland, C. and I just can't to bring ourselves to visit Victoria for Thanksgiving this year, especially if it is only to force Grandpops to endure photo-ops with dusty academic tomes, etc.

I guess, in that sense at least, we are in absolute agreement with our current Prime Minister.

Especially when it comes to visiting somebody in their ninth decade.

So...

It looks like we're going to have to crank-up the Zoom machine, big time, on Thanksgiving weekend.

Maybe one of us can point the laptop camera at the TeeVee.

After all the Seahawks play the Vikings at home that weekend.

OK?


.

Ballad Of A Club Adjacent Man.




HeWalksIntoARoom
WithAPoliticalPencilInHisHandVille



In case you missed it, media club adjacent man about South VanIsle Town, Mr. Norman Spector, wrote an open letter to British Columbia Lieutenant Governor Janet Austin last week in which he said:

"...Fundamentally, the CASA ('Confidence And Supply Agreement' between the NDP and Green Party) has brought about a remarkable change in political culture in B.C. — spawning as you have observed “cross-partisan teamwork” that has rarely been seen in this famously polarized province. For this and the other reasons set out above, I respectfully recommend that should Premier Horgan now request that the Legislature be dissolved, you should send him away to think about it..."


Interestingly, that letter  ended up on the front page, above the fold, of the Victoria Times Colonist (see above).

Which begs the question, how did it end up in that coveted bit of print media real estate?

Well, maybe it had something to do with what Mr. Spector wrote in the letter's preamble:

"...I am writing to you as a former Constitutional adviser to the Premier of B.C. and to the Prime Minister of Canada. More recently, I advised Andrew Weaver and the B.C. Green Party, and was present at the table, in negotiations with the B.C. Liberals and B.C. NDP that produced the Confidence and Supply Agreement of 2017, delivered to Government House by Mr. Weaver and John Horgan after it was formally signed by their MLAs..."


Now.

Regarding that last bit, let's leave aside the Mr. Spector's explicit illustration of his vested interest for the moment, and return to the actual history of the thing because, around here, we have a memory and we like to use it. 

The following is from the time of the CASA signing (i.e. the Summer of 2017):



****

Having said all that, how does the good Mr. Spector feel about Ms. Austin's actions now, a week after the publication of his letter?

Well...



Gosh.

I didn't realize that it is Ms. Austin's 'job' to agree to the recommendations of private citizens, especially those able to get said recommendations on the front page of the local newspaper.

Or not.

OK?



______
And why was Mr. Spector waxing derisive about Ms. Austin's job performance in a response to that particular tweet from CBC's 'On The Island' morning drive time radio show?...Honestly, the logic, pretzellated or otherwise, truly escapes me.
There is still a 'Club?'....Darn tootin'.


.

Wednesday, September 23, 2020

Why Is It That...

Pixellation
NationVille



Why is it, exactly, that Ellen Degeneres' head is renting high end real estate in the low resolution version of BC Liberal leader Andrew Wilkinson's Twittmachine feed?



That is all.

(for now)



.

There Is (Still) A Club...Part Deux.

AllTheirAccesses
'RThemVille


From Rob Shaw's latest VSun piece, which is a content/specifics/data - lite look at his pick of provincial battleground ridings:

Richmond-Queensborough: Liberal Jas Johal only won this new riding by 300 votes in 2017, despite his high profile as a former Global B.C. reporter. Now, the NDP is throwing everything it has to knock him off — not just because the race is close but also because Johal has proven to be one of the Opposition’s most effective critics.


Gosh.

Can't help but wonder where that most fabulous insight about Mr. Johal's 'effectiveness' came from.


______
Part One of our latest Lotuslandian corpMedia ClubLand series is....Here.

There Is (Still) A Club.

AllTheirAccessIs
ThemVille


Laila, by going against 'Club' convention by actually digging, has learned that the Legislative Press Gallery of British Columbia willingly entered into an agreement with the provincial government to do all their business by phone. 

While this was understandable through the first months of the pandemic it is curious that the highly controlled, limited questioned practice went on right up until this week when suddenly the live pressers were everywhere.

Now, while I can fully understand why the Dippers milked this fully in effort to control the message, why would the Ledge (mostly) Boys have gone along with it for so long.

Well, as Shannon Waters of the independent BC/Politics Today has repeatedly chronicled, the overwhelming majority of those highly controlled and rationed calls on the phone-in's went to the representatives of the big corpMedia outlets:




As you might expect, the Keef himself was not amused by Ms. Waters exhaustive documentation of the bleeding obvious (no ron intended):



In my opinion, what is really offensive is a group of super fine corpMedia Club types going along to get along in an effort to enshrine their goddess-given right to exclusive insider access.

OK?


_________
The pact between the government and the ledgies was so iron-clad that, as Laila further noted, even Bob Mackin had to agree to play by the pact's rules to gain any access to the phone-ins whatsoever.
Just in case you were wondering, our criticism of the Club goes way back.



.

Tuesday, September 22, 2020

Ahead By A (Quarter) Century...

9,129DaysIsA
LongtimeVille


I got an Email from the super big boss at the place where I work the other day.

Usually these things are meant for everyone, and recently they've been all about, as you might expect, online teaching and the like.

But this particular message was personal.

And it had a letter attached.

A letter that congratulated me for working at the very fine public institution concerned for twenty-five years.

Which led me to smack myself upside the top of the head and ask...

Where the heckfire has all that time gone?

****

When we arrived in Vancouver in the summer of 1995, Bigger E. was two years old and littler e. was still a gleam in her Mom's eye.

It was C. who found the first house we lived in, a rough-around-the edges bungalow in Mackenzie Heights on the westside of town that cost us $1,200 a month. Two years later the off-shore owners offered to sell it to us for $255,000. We balked (yes balked!) and moved to a crazy shanty town on the edge of campus that we loved, not for the buildings, but rather for the people. For a good chunk of the next eight years we tried to build a co-op nearby and almost succeeded only to have our hopes dashed by the BC Liberal Party's version of BC Housing.

I've felt terrible ever since because we were the community group that showed GordCo's, Inc.'s money men that it was possible to extricate land from Pacific Spirit Park. The parcel concerned, which we lost to a developer because our fully-financed $12 million dollar plan for 42 families was about a million shy of the hastily assembled competitive sealed bid mark, was a small one. In contrast, the GordCo-jacked parcel that followed was massive and, in my opinion, it tore the heart right out of the park.

Anyway, in the aftermath of the loss we moved to the eastside of town where've been ever since.

The lab moved as well and I like where it is now. The colleagues are great, the students and post-docs are even better, and we're doing some of our best work right there, right now.

It's just weird how fast you go from being the young trouble maker who can, and does, do everything at the lab bench, to the old guy who mostly manages, raises money, dispenses advice, and writes.

Really weird.

OK?


_______
Image at top of the post...The two E's not long ago, all grown up now.
When our former landlords asked us if we wanted to buy that bungalow I truly and honestly thought they were crazy....Of course, the dirt is now worth more than 10 times what they were asking at the time.
Why were we a million shy on the co-op, which was an equity thing, at that total cost to family number ratio?....Because we had a sliding scale plan that would make it possible for everyone concerned to get in on the action regardless their income level...Me, always with the pipe dreams...Would I do it differently with a 2nd chance?...I'm really not sure, to be honest.
Speaking of the Tragically Hip, E. and I have been working on a cover of 'Ahead By A Century'...I've just been unhappy with my playing on it so far....But it's coming.


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Can Anything Be True When Everything Is?

FlingEverything
PropVille


What do lickspittles do when 'their' president and his head of the CDC say precisely the opposite thing about the timing of the roll out of a vaccine against a virus that has killed hundreds of thousands of your fellow citizens?

Why, you, the lickspittle,  go on the TeeVee and tell the citizenry that they're both right.

Martin Pengelly has the story in the Guardian:

....Appearing on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, assistant health secretary Adm Brett Giroir said (the CDC's) Dr Redfield was “correct” but offered a less ringing endorsement for (president) Trump, saying: “The president is correct in the segment that he spoke about.”...

{snip}

...Giroir was asked why Trump was “making promises about a vaccine that none of his experts agree with”.

“I think there’s a lot of misunderstanding here,” he said. “And I think everybody is right but they’re talking about different aspects...


Sheesh.


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By Dinnertime Yesterday I Was Ready To Run From The Dipper Tent Screaming...

DuplicityTimesMendacityEqualledClarklandia
SquaredVille


By dinnertime yesterday I was ready to run from the Dipper tent screaming.

And then I saw this...



Good grief.



_______
Clearly, the Dipper braintrust has doubled-down on the fact that people like me and mine have nowhere else to go. Unless...


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Monday, September 21, 2020

Hot Take Time Machine...The Ron Gets Even More Obvious Than Usual.

RingLardner
HeAin'tVille


The old sportswriter, Ron Obvious of Globe Harbour, already has his take on the B.C. provincial election call up and running.

Here is the lede:

On the same day it was revealed that B.C. now has the highest per capita number of COVID-19 cases in the country, Premier John Horgan called a snap election.

That’s either chutzpah or stupidity. Maybe both...



And here is the kicker:

...(Horgan's) performance as both NDP Leader and Premier since then has been impressive. He has given the party a foothold on power it hadn’t had since the 1990s. But this election call is a gamble that could jeopardize the New Democrats' time in government and have a deleterious impact on Mr. Horgan’s legacy.


All the rest is nothing but filler just in case you were worried you missed something over at BellGlobeTSNEverythingElseLegacyMedia that you and 5,100,000 of  5,120,184 British Columbians didn't know already.

OK?


_______
Who is this imposter, anyway?....After all, everyone knows the real Ron Obvious once already took a bite out of Chichester Cathedral.


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Election A-Go-Go...Looks Like They Didn't Take That Drive Through The Woods After All.

OhMeOhMy
OhVille



From the new leader of the BC Green Party:



Obviously, a 'meeting' with Mr. Horgan was not enough.

Instead, she and he could have taken a leisurely Friday afternoon drive through the woods, with the top down, taking the back road between ridings while they ironed things out using proverbial hammers and tongs...



****

On the plus side, at least now we will no longer be inundated with the neverending 'Will-he-or-won't he?' specu-talk in every corpMedia organ grinder monkey outlet in the province.

Then again, it will likely only switch to endless bleatings of 'Will the strate(r)gy backfire on the Dippers?'

I guess we're going to find out.

And soon.


.

Your Morning Audio...When Musical Worlds Collide.

 


Jason Isbell is a guitar player, songwriter and singer who grew up in Northern Alabama. He is also one of the last, best things about the Twittmachine.

Lisa Christiansen is the traffic and music reporter on the local Lotuslandian CBC Radio One afternoon drive time show. She also does all kinds of things music bizzy around Vancouver and across Canuckistan.

Bigger E. knows them both. One musically, one literally, kinda/sorta...




Sunday, September 20, 2020

Plastics Are Made From Oil And Gas...Everything Else Is Public Relations.

BanningSingleUseBagsWillNotGetIt
DoneVille


Don't know about you, but in our house we do our best to recycle pretty much everything, including all that plastic that just about everything that is packaged comes in or is lined with.

So.

As long as we are recycling all that, it's not so bad that we use it, right?

Wrong.

...(The American) EPA used data from the American Chemistry Council and the National Association for PET Container Resources to measure the recycling of plastic....(T)he amount of recycled plastics is relatively small—3.0 million tons for a 8.4 percent recycling rate in 2017...


Hmmm...

If less than 10% is being recycled, where is all that plastic going?

Well, it most often either burned or dumped in landfills, often overseas:



And what isn't dealt with in those two ways inevitably makes its way into the ocean.

So.

How did we get bamboozled into believing that plastic recycling matters?

A joint effort by NPR and PBS' Frontline has gotten to the bottom of it.

And it turns out that it is exactly for the reason that you might  have already surmised...

...NPR and PBSFrontline spent months digging into internal industry documents and interviewing top former officials. We found that the industry sold the public on an idea it knew wouldn't work — that the majority of plastic could be, and would be, recycled — all while making billions of dollars selling the world new plastic...

{snip}

... (Plastic) industry companies spent tens of millions of dollars on (misleading) ads (that plastic recycling programs were working) and ran them for years, promoting the benefits of a product that, for the most part, was buried, was burned or, in some cases, wound up in the ocean.

Documents show industry officials knew this reality about recycling plastic as far back as the 1970s...



Imagine that!


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Friday, September 18, 2020

Uh Oh...

NewLeader
New ApproachVille


It looks like the Green Party's new leader, Ms. Furstenau, has not yet taken that drive through the woods with Mr. Horgan, top down, to hammer out that deal that we were talking about/hoping for the other day...



Hmmm...

Does this signal that we are one step closer to a fall election?



________
And why, exactly, am I receiving Email requests from individual Dipper candidates asking for donations specifically for nomination contributions?
Here's the link to the Green Caucus' statement.


.

Wednesday, September 16, 2020

What's Next....?



Gosh, what's next...

Activist judges?

Community organizers?

Horgan actually hates lacrosse?

Sheesh.


.

Your Morning Audio...Do Right, Right Now.

SavingTheCoalition
InAConvertibleVille



Sonia Furstenau, the new BC Green Party leader, is not Andrew Weaver.

But.

Instead of going to a game, maybe she and John Horgan can take a nice long drive with the top down through the hills of southern Vancouver Island this weekend so that they can hammer out a deal that is beneficial to all.

If not, I fear we will have provincial election in the next few weeks.

Anyway, the theme of the difficulty of doing the right thing, right now, is embodied in an old Gillian Welch song that has been stuck in my head for awhile now....




______
Gosh,
do they even make EV rag tops?



.

Herd Mentality.

That'sANiceLittleCitizenry
You'veGotThereVille


The president of the United States held a town hall yesterday that was covered, straight-up, by one of the major American television networks:

...At the ABC town hall, the president also said the virus would “go away”, with or without a vaccine. This would happen because of “herd mentality”, he said. It is unclear whether he meant herd immunity, because he repeated the phrase several times.

“It would go away without the vaccine, George,” he told ABC journalist George Stephanopoulos. “With time it goes away. And you’ll develop like a herd mentality. It’s going to be herd developed, and that’s going to happen. That will all happen.”...



Now, of course, the outrage is being directed at the gaff as is inevitably the case in our gotcha! world.

But.

Clearly, Mr. Trump was signaling that he and his are, indeed, doubling down on the herd immunity strategy just in case his now railroaded and warp-speeded FDA does not approve a vaccine before November 3rd.

Which means that he is willing to sacrifice hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of his fellow country people in the name of a political fall back strategy.

Seems to me that is a much bigger story than a gaff.


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Tuesday, September 15, 2020

The Deep(ly) Fascistic State.

Warp
EverythingVille



From Sharon LaFranerie at the 'failing' New York Times:

The top communications official at the powerful cabinet department in charge of combating the coronavirus made outlandish and false accusations on Sunday that career government scientists were engaging in “sedition” in their handling of the pandemic and that left-wing hit squads were preparing for armed insurrection after the election.

Michael R. Caputo, the assistant secretary of public affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services, accused the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of harboring a “resistance unit” determined to undermine President Trump, even if that opposition bolsters the Covid-19 death toll.

Mr. Caputo, who has faced intense criticism for leading efforts to warp C.D.C. weekly bulletins to fit Mr. Trump’s pandemic narrative, suggested that he personally could be in danger from opponents of the administration. “If you carry guns, buy ammunition, ladies and gentlemen, because it’s going to be hard to get,” he urged his followers...



I mean, who needs Q when you've Caputo.

Meanwhile, very serious USian pundits everywhere, like, say, this one, continue to play the electoral horse race game straight-up as if nothing truly unusual and/or destructive is going down.



.

Monday, September 14, 2020

The Keef Report....The Revenge Of Shawnigan Lake.

HaveMemory,WillUse
ItVille


Remember this from early 2016?

More than 500 people gathered at Shawnigan Lake on Vancouver Island on Wednesday morning to raise awareness about the effects of dumping allegedly contaminated soil near the community's watershed.

The province has granted a permit to allow the dumping of salt water dredgings from Port Moody into a quarry near the Vancouver Island lake. But thousands of people in the area north of Victoria rely on the watershed for drinking water.

"We want people to understand this is not an NIMBY issue. This is a contaminated landfill that got approved without going through the government's own process," said Shawnigan Lake regional director Sonia Furstenau...



And, remember how the Keef responded to a righteous local citizen uprising backed by a then little known regional director:




Well, it would appear that our favourite TeeVee political pundit man has been proven wrong.

Again.


_______
And how, specifically, was the good Mr. Baldrey already wrong about this thing originally back in the pre-2017 provincial election day?... Well, this.


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COVID-19...The Rise Of Potemkin Regulatory Agency Villages.

PayAttentionToAllThePresident'sMen
BehindThatCurtainVille


David Gorski is a medical doctor and cancer research scientist in Detroit Michigan.

As such, I know his research work professionally.

I also know his work in the blogosphere, where he often battles medical pseudoscience and quackery of all kinds at the 'Science-Based Medicine' website.

To be clear, Gorski has proven his bonafides, to me at least, in both realms, many, many times.

Today, he has decided that Americans and, by extension, Canadians as well  (given that we've already  placed vaccine orders with American firms), cannot trust the CDC and the FDA when it comes to all things COVID-19:

"...Now that we’re around the six month anniversary of the first lockdowns to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, I saw a story over the weekend that led me, at the risk of being too “political,” to ask a very disturbing (to me) question: Can we still trust the CDC and FDA (and other federal agencies, like the NIH, ostensibly dedicated to upholding policy based on good science)? Although the answer is still yes for most topics, for COVID-19 increasingly the answer is no. I fear that the list of topics on which the CDC and FDA can no longer be trusted will only grow if Donald Trump is reelected and that, even if he isn’t, some of the changes weakening the firewall between political appointees and the career scientific personnel of these agencies might be permanent and difficult for a President Biden to reverse..."


Gorski, as he always does, then lays out the evidence, in detail, to support his conclusion.

He then goes on to point out that even big Pharma, which often rails at all things regulatory, is concerned:

"...So unusual is the pressure for a vaccine coming from this administration that even big pharma is pushing back, with nine drug companies, three of which have COVID-19 vaccines nearing completion of their phase 3 trials, signed a joint pledge:.."

****

Importantly, and obviously, vaccine efficacy and safety are not problems that can be solved by pundits, pols and/or ad-makers seeking to maintain their political savviness while they simultaneously attempt to shift public opinion a degree or two before November 3rd.

OK?



.

Friday, September 11, 2020

The Keef Report: Wagging The Lagging Indicator's Tail...Again.

AllYourLaggingIndicators'R
HimVille



Remember when the good Mr. Baldrey said this a few weeks ago?




Well, today our man from the snowy globed TeeVee found a brand new comparator and said this:




Which is all fine and good if you want to ignore curve position and rates of change, etcetera.

However, if one focuses on how our hospitalizations have changed since our active cases started to rise sharply once again, there is the following to consider:



OK?


_______
As always, previous Keef Reports can be found...Here.



.

Your Morning Audio...Youth Is Not Always Wasted On The Wrong People.


NoCornInThis
CapraVille


What does the old guy on the porch yelling at young George Bailey and Mary Hatch about how youth is wasted on the young have to do with a kid from Chicago that has just been 'discovered' by Kris Kristofferson?

Well, hit the triangle below to find out - and then get the bonus of having Bigger E. do her thing...




_____
By the way, that old guy on the porch, Dick Elliot, would re-surface 15 years later as Mayor Pike on the Andy Griffith Show...Imagine that!


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It Ain't He, It Ain't He, He Ain't No Unfortunate Son

IronyIsDeaderThanADiscarded
BoneSpurVille



Mr. Trump went to Michigan for a potential super-spreader event yesterday.

And when he arrived, someone thought it would be a good idea to play John Fogerty's ode to privilege in war time...

  
Suckers and losers, indeed.



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Wednesday, September 09, 2020

The Rabbit Hole Runneth Over...

AliceDoesn'tLiveThere
AnymoreVille


From the Associated Press:

"Mike Pence and top officials from Donald Trump’s campaign are slated to attend a Montana fundraiser next week hosted by a couple who have expressed support for the QAnon conspiracy theory, according to an event invitation obtained by the Associated Press and a review of social media postings..."


The 17th letter of the alphabet...

It's not just for whackadoodle congressional candidates anymore.




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