Hat Day!

RowUpon

RowVille


Littler (but now pretty much fully big), e. started her project a little over a week ago.

In fact, last weekend when the two E's and me went out for our traditional mad scramble shopping day, e. was dragging a huge bag of yarn along with her.

And then, on Wednesday, she sent us the picture above.

Why 18 different hats?

Because that is precisely how many kids e. is working with these days.

As you can imagine, when I saw the videos her charges joyously receiving their hats, one by one, with explanations of why their particular design and colour scheme had been chosen for them alone, I became extremely verklempt in the best of all possible ways

Here are all the hats in a stack, which I also get an immense kick out of:

****

It turns out that e.'s project was inspired by a teacher, Madame T, who did a similar thing for the entire class when she was a little kid.

Speaking of which, here is the actual littler version of said kid of mine, which was recorded not long after the seed was planted by that most ingenious of memory makers, Madame T...

.

Who Goes Quisling?

TheCaving
ClassVille

A few days ago, we noted that ABC News turtled when it settled a frivolous lawsuit from an authoritarian politician bent on running the free world by the 'rules' of professional wrestling.

That settlement was first reported last Saturday, Dec 14th.

And here's what happened five days earlier:

...Debra O'Connell, the Disney executive who directly oversees ABC News, dined with Mr. Trump’s incoming chief of staff, Susie Wiles, in Palm Beach last Monday, according to two people briefed on their interaction. The dinner was part of a visit by several ABC News executives to Florida to meet with Mr. Trump’s transition team...

Now.

As Charlie Angus recently noted, quislings can never be trusted to act in the public's interest when the going gets tough.

OK?


____
The post's title comes from a very famous, and still highly relevant, essay by Dorothy Thompson for Harper's in August of 1941...And, yes, you got that date right.

Image at to top comes from this historical perspective piece by the late, great Joe Schlesinger of the CBC.



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Speaking Truth To Disinformation.

MemoryIsADangerous
ThingVille


Charlie Angus, above, in a not surprisingly empty House of Commons, pointing out how and why quislings do not stand up for Canada.

_____

Tip 'O The Toque to reader EE for the heads-up...



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Too Big To .... Fight?

TheMouseThatDidn't

RoarVille


You often hear about gargantuan corporate behemoths that are deemed to be, rightly or (often) wrongly...

...Too big to fail.

Think of, for example, Wall Street banks during the financial crisis of 2008.

But another thought popped into my head when I saw the following item over the weekend:

ABC News is set to pay $15 million to settle a defamation lawsuit brought by Donald J. Trump.

{snip}

Under the terms of a settlement revealed on Saturday, ABC News will donate the $15 million to Mr. Trump’s future presidential foundation and museum. The network and its star anchor, George Stephanopoulos, also published a statement saying they “regret” remarks made about Mr. Trump during a televised interview in March...

Now.

Given that ABC is owned by Disney, and given that the House of Mouse is likely worried that the incoming Trump administration could make its life difficult in all sorts of realms, regulatory or otherwise, one can only wonder if the massive company decided that it is just too big to risk any fight whatsoever with Mr. Trump.

Just like Mr. Bezos' Washington Post and Mr. Soon-Shiong's Los Angeles Times before them.

Not to mention MSNBC and Joe Scarborough schlepping on down to Palm Beach recently.

It seems to me that all of this is much, much worse than this thing that has been dubbed to be 'sane washing'.

Because, essentially, it is becoming increasingly clear that these conflicted corporate giants are scared to do anything that will upset the new king.

And that is very scary, indeed, for anyone working for those teetering giants that is still trying to actually speak truth to power.

If you get my drift.


_____
This idea was crystallized for me when I listened to the usually pugnacious Anne Applebaum speak with former WaPo columnist Greg Sargent this morning...I must confess that I was very surprised by Ms. Applebaum's somewhat conciliatory 'this is not that really all that different than business-as-usual' tone.

While I beat her to pixel punch by a few minutes, Marcy Wheeler does a much better job of explaining what is really scary for a democracy in all of this, including Mr. Trump's making made men out of the tech bros...MW also gives Ms. Applebaum a bit of a hard time as well, mostly given that it has been apparent for some time now that Trump is following the press-cowing strategy of Victor Orban...
Finally....I realize that the drama involving Mr. Trudeau and his caucus will likely be pretty much done by the time you read this, but..Just in case...The most insightful live blogging I've seen on this is being done by Evan Scrimshaw.

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Soccer Party Revisited: The Zero Point Two Percent Solution.

HaveTheyNo

ShameVille


By now you may have heard that the BC United Party sent an Email to its 'supporters' last Thursday begging for money:

...“The need is substantial — we must raise hundreds of thousands of dollars in the coming weeks to fulfill our obligations and ensure the party remains registered so that the membership will have the opportunity to decide what is next,” BC United wrote.

“Together, we have raised this amount of money before and we believe we can come together to do it again and make sure our community is made whole. There is no alternative. Either we raise the funds required to meet our commitments, or BC United will be unable to continue.”...

Gosh.

Maybe I missed it but...

When Mr. Falcon abruptly pulled his team from the field back in August, I'm pretty sure that it wasn't the 'membership' who decided anything whatsoever.

And besides, it is very likely that the 'membership' is now wondering what it is, exactly, that the current Soccer Party braintrust would like to 'continue' to do with their money.

Especially given that it would appear that approximately 19, 953 of the 20,000 party members had already decided that they did not wish to 'continue' to have anything to do with the party by the time Election Day rolled around back in the fall:

...(On election night) the party hosted a fundraiser featuring former premier Gordon Campbell at Vancouver’s Sutton Hotel. Invitations were issued to 20,000 party members, and it was billed as an election watch party. Inside, the mood was anything but celebratory, as Mr. Campbell addressed just 47 seated guests who bought tickets to the event...

Imagine that!


_____
Quoted passage 1, above, is from a solid piece by Mike Vanden Bosch in the Fraser Valley Today.

Quoted passage 2, above, is from just the kind of insider access, clout club-type piece you would expect from Ms. Hunter in the Globe...I must admit, however, that I laughed out loud on the bus this morning when I read that only 47 of the former faithful were willing to pony up to attend the attempted resurrection of GordCo, 2.0...I quickly settled down when it became apparent that I was freaking out a number of the over-caffeinated kids nearby who were on their way to campus to study and/or write a final or three.

Image at the top of the post?...Why that's Mr. Campbell in the middle with Kevin Falcon grinning over the boss' left shoulder back in the spring of 2009 (i.e. the last of the post-BC Rail glory days of GordCo 1.0)...As for the venue?...Well, I figured EE might have a thing or two to say about that...

Off topic, but...If the context-free stories about recent events in South Korea have left you scratching your head, this piece in Foreign Policy by academic Lami Kim, will help clear things up for you...Essentially, the current leader Yoon Suk-yeol, the guy lawmakers have just impeached, tried to hold on to  power by initiating a self-coup involving martial law that pulled the military back into things - which has happened before there with devastating consequences...

Finally, I was sad to learn that Owen Gray has decided to shutter his CanPoli blog 'Northern Reflections' due to health and other issues...Northern Reflections has  been around just about as long as this little F-Troop blog and I've always admired, and have often tried to emulate, how Owen responded to and engaged with readers in the comment threads...

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Is East Still East In Bitcoinland?

Monetize
EverythingVille


Former Spam-A-Lot-Teer from the old Smilin' Sammy days, Mike Klassen, put forward the other Vancouver council motion of note that was approved this week.

Which is to have city staff seriously look into moving the VanEast cross that sits high on the hill above the wrong (i.e. right) side of the False Creek Railroad Flats Track, to somewhere more appropriate because:

..."This is a really important piece that people should be able to see better," said Klassen, speaking on the CBC's The Early Edition. "It's become really almost symbolic of the working class east side of the city and a lot of people love it."...

{snip}

..."Wouldn't it be nice to go visit the [Cross], sit and watch the sun go down and have that experience of being there whether you're a visitor or local."...

But.

As you might expect from a councillor seeking favour from our Bitcoin Bro Mayor of the Moment, it turns out there is an end times capitalist commercialization razor in Mr. Klassen's idyllic Eastside apple:

...(The motion) goes on to say a relocation plan should include "opportunities for revenue generation, such as branded merchandise and on-site food and beverage service that support the monument's upkeep and enhance community engagement."...

Surprised?

_____

The quotes from neospam-land, above, come courtesy a solid piece on the subject by Karin Larsen of the CBC.


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Nevermind The Lotus... Bring On BitcoinLand!

VancouverNeverReallyWasVegas

BiggerCasinoVille


In case you missed it amongst all the superficial 'Make Vancouver Crypto Friendly!' headlines, the recent blather from Vancouver mayor Ken Sim is about more than becoming best bud's with the bitcoin bros.

To wit, the following is taken directly from Mr, Sim's council resolution (see point #13):

"...It would be irresponsible for the City of Vancouver to not look at the merits of adding Bitcoin to the City’s strategic assets to preserve the City’s financial stability..."

Yes.

You've got that right.

Mr. Sim is doing his best to shame/scare our fair city's citizenry into seriously considering speculating with their own tax dollars.

What could possibly go wrong?

_____

Update Thursday December 12th...The resolution passed...Only the two Green Party councillors voted against.

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Manifest Destiny's Child Mind.

HockeyIsNoLongerOurTopExport

CanuckistanmikitaVille


From the transcript of Mr. Trump's appearance on NBC's Meet The Press, yesterday:

..."We’re subsidizing Canada to the tune over $100 billion a year. We’re subsidizing Mexico for almost $300 billion. We shouldn’t be — why are we subsidizing these countries? If we’re going to subsidize them, let them become a state."...


Of course, as you may have already guessed, it appears that Mr. Trump wrongly assumes that an export trade surplus is a subsidy.

And our top subsidy...errrrrr...trade export to his fine country?

Oil.

Gosh. 

I wonder what the super fine folks currently running the Albertalands think of these latest developments?


______
It is very likely almost certain that, beyond tariffs, Mr. Trump has no current plans to push annexation forward at this time...After all, developing such plans would actually take work and coordination...However, Trump's statement yesterday certainly puts the lie to claims that his raising of the 51st state concept during his meeting with Mr. Trudeau a week or so ago was just a joke in the multilateral machine.


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The Currency Of The Swiftie.

WorkingForTheManEveryNight
AndNotDayVille


A certain busker I know did very well, indeed, during the Grey Cup Sunday just past.

So much so that, at the end of the night, the guitar case was filled to bursting with all manner of bills, many of which ended in zeros.

All of which totalled up to something approaching the second of the four words in the title of what some consider to be Wes Anderson's best Hungarian movie.

So.

Given all that, I, for one, had been very keen to see how things would go during the Swiftian invasion of downtown Lotusland this weekend.

Alas, the take from the first of the three nights that will finally end the interminable era was much reduced compared to that generated by those who revere a game with just three downs and the ghost of Annis Stukus.

Why?

Well, one credible hypothesis put forward by said busker is that, unlike Grey Cup fans, the Swifties were not bombed out of their minds when they exited the venue and poured into the train station.

It also turns out that a great many of Ms. Swift's fans prefer to spread joy and prosperity by dropping friendship bracelets into the proverbial hat rather than cold, hard cash.

Go figure.

_____

Earworm in the subheader?...The transit cops in the station where the busker was working last night said that they hoped to see her again tonight as they think her singing helps calm the madding crowd...Which brings us, of course, to...This!

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The Gzowski Method, Man.

YourMornings
HisSidesVille

How much of (Peter) Gzowski’s interest in people is an act? 

“I would say none,” he replies. “Some people would say a lot. A certain amount of feigning has to be involved, but if you feign long enough, anything eventually becomes interesting.”

Dave Cameron, 'The Dark Side of Saint Peter'

Ryerson Review Of Journalism, 1997

Invoking the methodological secrets of long gone CBC radio morning man Peter Gzowski?

What am I on about this time?

Well.

All is explained in the SongPod below (words first this time, followed by an old Tom Waits cover at the end)...

______

Word worm in the header?...It's a rip-off of the title of an early John Irving book...Although, to be completely honest, I argued with myself for quite some time about whether or not the comma in my version belonged.

For those interested,  here's a bit of an oral history of the lives and shortish intertwined times of Tom Waits, Rickie Lee Jones and Chuck E. Weiss.


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Florida Man Dines With Bilingual Guy.

JupiterIsNotAPlanet

InThisStateOfAffairsVille


Sheesh:

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP), Nov 29th, 4:50pm EST — Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has flown to Florida to meet with President-elect Donald Trump at his Mar-a-Lago club after Trump threatened to impose sweeping tariffs on Canadian products.

A person familiar with the matter said Trudeau will have dinner with Trump. The official was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter and spoke on condition of anonymity...

By now there are at least eleventy billion hot takes out there on what Mr. Trump's tariff threats actually mean.

And if any puffed-up pro-media pundit pretends that they know what will happen, their mouth is very likely filled to bursting with mouldy lima beans because no one, including he who originally 'truthed' it, has any idea what the ultimate outcome will be.

But one thing we do know for sure, based purely on past performance....

The US'ian president re-elect loves any and all fawning he receives in the wake of a good punching down against those he perceives to be in a position of weakness. 

Which is precisely what he will get tonight, regardless the grade of rubber in the chicken simmering in the Mar-a-Lago kitchen.

Because, just by flying south, Mr. Trudeau has painted white spots all over his back, sans antlers.

****

Having said all that, I will offer a take on why Mr. Trump went full metal tariff-a-palooza on Canada and Mexico in the first place.

Which is that it was an exercise in deflector spike spin jamming against a tiger that could really bite in a future trade war.

Put another way...

Who's talking about China now? 

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Sunday SongPod - Stolen Car (BSpringsteen Cover)

IntoThe

DarknessVille


This time it's Springsteen's 'Stolen Car', a tune that he says was the bridge from 'The River' sessions to what would become 'Nebraska'.

And yes, just in case the E's were wondering, there is a Phoebe Bridger's cover.

****

After the warbling is done I briefly discuss my concerns with Central Lotusland's 'Broadway Plan'. 

Brian Palmquist and City Hall Watch have more on that subject here and here.

Slouching Towards Fascism?

PollingThemselvesTo
Entropy'sInevitableEndVille


Well.

Mr. Gaetz is gone.

So.

Maybe that 59% is thinking everything is gonna be alright after all?


_______

Rip off in the header?...Just in case you haven't read it recently, Ms. Dideon's piece on the aimless delusions of a number of the denizens of  Haight Ashbury in the summer of 1967 can be found...Here.


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It's All About The Base - BC Conservative Shadow Cabinet

It's just a part Mr. Rustad's Dreamy Team, above.

Which has me wondering...

Can dogs whistle parental rights and sports into one unified (non-existent) portfolio's merry base-filled tune to rule them all?

The culture war loving base, I mean.



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They Can No Longer Pretend.

TheEasternEdgeOf

TheMediterraneanSeaVille



Today, November 20th, 2024, one of the 15 members of the UN Security Council vetoed a permanent ceasefire and hostage release resolution in Gaza.

That one member was the United States.

Therefore, it is clear that the Biden Administration, which is now completely free of the bounds of electoral uncertainty, can no longer pretend that it is committed to having the killing stop and the hostages released.

According the Guardian, U.S. deputy ambassador to the U.N.  Robert Wood says it's all about the 'compromise language' put forward by the U.K. that didn't make it into the resolution that resulted in the veto:

...“We regret that the council could have incorporated compromise language the UK put forward to bridge the existing gaps ... With that language, this resolution should have been adopted,” Wood, the US envoy, said following the vote...

But here's the thing.

The U.K., which, like the U.S., is a permanent member of the Security Council, ultimately voted in favour of the resolution.

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Ballistic Clones Of Cy.

TheOldsYellingAt
(FastMoving)CloudsVille


Look.

It was pretty darned windy last night as, as Keith noted, the barometric pressure changed abruptly.

Trees did come down and power was lost.

But why, suddenly, must we all become 'fraidy cats because of something dubbed by the hype-makers as a 'bomb cyclone'.

After all, wasn't this really just a pretty good winter storm that, as of the moment (i.e. Wednesday lunchtime), has pretty much blown itself out?

Heckfire.

Even the BBC had to go all the way to Seattle to find a tragic fatality. Although, to be fair, we're not sure if they also went to Nanaimo to check on the status of e.a.f.'s roof.

Meanwhile...

As can be seen in the image above, it appears that GarFish got to the power line trail before me this morning and used the mechanical scissors on his E-bike to clear the way.

Selah.



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My (Late) Morning Ride.

Hogan'sHeroes
PatchesVille


There was a lot of snow on the mountains over in that slanted, northern-most part of Lotusland this morning, presumably dropped by last night's storm that also washed the flotsam and jetsam of the Grey Cup revelry into False Creek down at sea level.

Unfortunately, because I had to rush down into the bowels of the hospital-industrial complex first thing this morning for a thesis defense, I didn't get a picture of those mountains (although I'm sure NVG was walking all over them!).

Later, as the noon o'clock hour approached, I was riding my way up onto the pointy grey plateau and what did I see in the shadows but little patches of the white stuff, one of which is pictured above.

Winter, such as it is in these parts, is on us my friends.

And what would be the point of this little F-Troop-listed 'Blog of the Olds' if we didn't discuss the obviousities of the weather occasionally.

OK?

________

Subheader?...Pretty much every time LeBeau, Newkirk and/or Carter, etc.,  popped the lid on a tunnel and poked their heads out before heading off into town to do pretty much whatever they wanted there would always be little snowy patches, just like the one shown above, scattered about on the ground...Apparently, it was always just about, but not quite, winter at Stalag 13.

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Pure Joy On A Sunday.

This was filmed on Hollywood Boulevard in 1964.

Watch it right through till the end - you won't be sorry. 

For littler e., the part you will dig starts at 2 minutes 50 seconds.



______
The guy who made this, John Harris, used to get his young friends together on weekends, when they weren't engaged in their day jobs,  to make little movies like this... One of Ms. Garr's day jobs at the time was background dancing in crappy Elvis movies...Like Ms. Garr, Mr. Harris, who later moved to the Monterey Peninsula and became a movie theatre impresario, also died recently.

One can only wonder if Ms. Garr had a premonition about the 'Guaranty Building' whose front door she slams forcefully at the beginning of the video...Why?...Because much later it would become part of L. Ronnie Hubbard's posthumous. real estate empire.

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He's A Sawmill Worker For F*ck's Sakes.

ThinkI'llPickUpThePhone
AndBuyYouOneToCallYourOwnVille


Go read Beer on Horgan.

Now.



.

Crap.

 

I sure am glad to hear that, in the end, he got back to Victoria where he belonged to be with all of those who meant the most to him.

****

More, later, including a story of how the then young Horgan once good naturally called this not particularly proficient lacrosse player 'Chicken Legs' a very long Braefoot/Stevenson double park time ago.

(it's a descriptor that's still pretty much true, by the way, no matter how much bike riding I do)

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Their Own Reality.

TheAftermathCtd

RealityInterruptedVille


The above is from the fine folks at Ipsos via Mike the fellow biologist:

I bring it up in the here and now to give reader E.E. their due regarding their take on how things got this way:

...Blame it on a decaying American educational system and 40 years of Reganomics, and the decline of the middle class, especially in the USA...

E.E.'s comment is backed by a quote from way back in 2002 that was never quite confirmed to have come from Bush the Younger's chief propagandist Mr. Karl Rove:

"(W)hen we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do"

The point?

They, meaning all manner of Republicans, not just the Trumpian manosphereisterians of the moment, started building this thing that that destroys people's ability to view reality for what it actually is a long, long time ago.

OK?


_______

And, yes, I did go to that very fine ear worm in the kicker, above.


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The Revenge Of The Yutes!

TheAftermathCtd
YouthIsWastedOnTheWrongPeopleSometimesVille

It turns out that it's not just the olds hooked on Rupert Murdoch's propaganda channel, or worse, who are the entire problem.

And/or suburban soccer moms.

What it's all about this time, Alfie?

The youth:

I mean, just look at those shifts. 

And while young men shifted 28 points to Trump since 2020, young women moved 14 points that way as well.

It's got me wondering if, perhaps, this has less to do with Mr. Rogan's podcast and more to do with the Covid generation getting its revenge on the world.

________

Subheader's ear(ish) worm?...This!


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We're Still Waiting...

TheAftermath

CorporationsArePeopleMyFriendVille

I don't know about you but, personally, I'm still waiting for the puffed-up punditry down south, and that includes those superfine never Trump Republicans at the Bulwark, to open up the memory hole in the back of their collective heads and pull out the following, written by West Wing guy Aaron Sorkin on the OpEd page of the New York Times back in July:

...The problem in the real world is that there isn’t a Democrat who is polling significantly better than Mr. Biden. And quitting, as heroic as it may be in this case, doesn’t really put a lump in our throats.

But there’s something the Democrats can do that would not just put a lump in people’s throats with its appeal to stop-Donald-Trump-at-all-costs unity, but with its originality and sense of sacrifice. So here’s my pitch to the writers’ room: The Democratic Party should pick a Republican.

At their convention next month, the Democrats should nominate Mitt Romney...

I mean, can't you just imagine good old Tim Miller and/or David Brooks feasting on that one?

To which I would answer now, just as I screamed at the Sulzberger family's pixel screen back in the summer...


Jeb!


________

Subheader?....This.



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The Once And Future Silkiest Of Roads.

It'sAlwaysTwentyMinutesToNine

SomewhereVille


The lede of the latest from the world's pre-eminent Brooksologist, Driftglass:

A few years from now when the New York Times building lies in ruins, you will still find Mr. David Brooks there, sitting amid the rubble like Mrs. Havisham, wearing tatters, keeping himself warm by burning remaindered copies of The Road to Character and offering to trash "the Left" for the price of a meal, a first-class Acela corridor train ticket and a $60 glass of top-shelf airport scotch.

Mind you, he will reassure you, his condition is temporary. On his uppers only due to mistakes that will no doubt be rectified soon. Sure, things look a little bleak now. And, sure, Mr. Brooks' "teevee" appearances are now limited to sitting next to a discarded Amazon shipping box with the words "Meet the Press" scrawled on the side and fielding "questions" from a potato Brooks calls "David Gregory", but this is all just a misunderstanding. A glitch in the Beltway matrix. Just as soon as No Labels or the McCain/Lieberman party get back on their feet, and the Sulzberger family finishes up their vacation at whichever reeducation camp they've been assigned to, and that sweet-sweet Third Way money starts rolling, Brooks will be right back in the clover ...

Go read it all in its searing Swiftian satirical splendour...Here.

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The Band Wore Blue Shirts...

  ...And The Music Played On.

It was not a great morning for C. 

She had to be up early to take a sedative before I drove her down to the off-hospital, West Broadway Medical Industrial Complex located in Lotusland Central for some oral surgery.

All went well and she is now upstairs snoozing while various and assorted pharmaceuticals wear off.

Me, I booked off work for the occasion and am now down in the Subterranean Homesick Blues Room (i.e. the basement) trying to get caught up.

Truth be told however, especially given what happened last night and all that will soon follow, it was good to be out and about with all the other folks scurrying about getting on with their lives this morning.

As for the aftermath? 

I'm avoiding it all for the moment waiting for the sturm, drang and cacophonous clanging of the newscycle to dissipate before the real analysis begins.

____

Earworm in the header?...This!

And, if you really want to be blown away by The Man (in blue) shown above...This.

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All Gone To Look For America.

WeHaveNeverHitchhikedTo

SaginawVille

I have a confession to make.

Which is that I have something in common with Elon Musk.

Because, like Mr. Musk, I went to the United States on a student(ish) visa back in the go-go 1990's.

According to a trio of investigative journalists at the Washington Post, Musk ignored a major stipulation of his visa and never actually went to school, in this case graduate school in Palo Alto. Instead, Mr. Musk helped start a company called Global Link, which later became Zip2. Initially, pre-universal search engine, the company sold businesses a service that would give them an online presence. In 1999, just before the first the dot-com bubble burst, Zip2 was gobbled up by Compaq for 300 million dollars. At that time, the immigrant from South Africa, who was not, to the best of anyone's knowledge, eating the pets of Silicon Valley, made a cool 22 million.

I went to America on the reverse brain-drain ticket, which was a J-1 visa designed to lure STEM-types trainees to the country, many of whom stay legally afterward. I was a post-doctoral fellow at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory which is perched above the University of California campus about half-way up the East Bay Hills. Initially, I was involved in a kind of public/private scientific partnership with a now famous pharmaceutical company that survived the bursting of the first biotech bubbles back in the 1980's. I worked feverishly on the project when I first got to the new lab in Berkeley and everything was set to really get rolling after a big Friday afternoon meeting about six months into my tenure. The following Monday my boss got a call from the company saying that they had decided to go 'in a different direction' and the project was dead. So much for curiosity-driven research.

In the end, the science part of my time as a post-doc worked out well enough that I got a few serious job offers, the best of which was to return to Lotusland, which we did a few years before Mr. Musk cashed in for the first time. 

Just as, and perhaps more, importantly than the science stuff, the life thing really worked out well when C. and I lived in Berkeley. It was a truly exciting place to be at the time and we made many wonderful friends. We also had the first of our two wonderful kids, then tiny, now Bigger, E., and we  came to love America and it all it can, and quite often does, stand for.

Here's hoping all of that has a chance to continue.

For America, I mean, come Tuesday...

______

While I was really, really steamed at the time, it turned out to be a stroke of luck that the original post-doc project was killed by the company...Why?....Because it never would have worked...We were chasing after something in the soups produced by tumour cells that doesn't exist!...And just in case you might be, for some crazy reason, remotely interested in what we're chasing these days there's...This.

Image at the top of the post...At the infamous UC Berkeley Sather Gate with the two E's on a visit back to town a bunch of years after we left for home.

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Falcon's Ghosts Haunt Rustadville.

From Rob Shaw, breaking away from the herd while writing for Glacier Media:

...In Richmond-Steveston, the Conservatives refused United candidate Jackie Lee. He went on to garner 2,354 votes as an independent, undercutting the less-impressive Conservative candidate Michelle Mollineaux and handing the riding to the NDP’s Kelly Greene by 484 votes.

Same thing in Vernon-Lumby, where United candidate Kevin Acton, the mayor of Lumby, pulled in 4,266 votes, knee-capping Conservative Dennis Giesbrecht and giving the riding to the NDP’s Harwinder Sandhu by 477 votes...

Now, of course, it was Mr. Rustad and his minions who rejected Kevin Falcon's ghosts of the Soccer Party past who, if they had been taken on in those two ridings, could have flipped the entire election result.

So, what does the good Mr. Rustad have to say about it all?

Here's more from Mr. Shaw's piece...

...“There was a lot of people that were dissatisfied (with Falcon’s decision) and wanted to carry on with the fight,” said Rustad. “It's unfortunate.”...

Unfortunate, indeed, for the denizens of grammar-challenged Rustadville.

As for the rest of us?

I beg to differ.

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In British Columbia 45% Wins, And Wins Often.

NoLeaderNoProblem
1952Ville


If you have been perusing British Columbia's punditland since Election Day you will have often read about how poorly David Eby did and how lucky he is to still be Premier.

Case in point, the following from Rob Shaw writing in various and sundry Glacier Media print organs:

Imagine attending your own funeral when suddenly — miraculously and inexplicably — you jolt back upright amongst the living. That’s a bit like being a BC New Democrat these days. The party lost its majority government on election day, faced the prospect of either being out of office entirely or grovelling to the two BC Greens for votes, and then abruptly regained its lifeline in Monday’s final count process to emerge with its majority intact...

{snip}

 ...More than half the voters did not support Eby or the BC NDP in the election. He lost numerous ridings and cabinet ministers. The province is badly divided after a brutal election. Is he the premier to bridge the growing gap between rural and urban B.C.?...

But did Eby really do so poorly with voters, overall, compared to previous BC NDP winners?

Well.

Rather than just prattling on with further fuzzy and thoroughly non-productive pundit parrot talk, why don't we have a look at the actual  numbers...

1972 - Dave Barrett's NDP wins a solid majority with 39% of the popular vote. WAC Bennett's Socred's lost when they only garnered 31% of the vote due, at least part, to the siphoning of 19% by David Anderson's Liberals.

1991 - Mike Harcourt's NDP wins an overwhelming majority with 41% of the popular vote. Rita Johnson's Socred's reach the end of the road when they get only 24% thanks in large part to the 33% garnered by Gordon Wilson's Liberals.

1996 - Glen Clark's NDP wins a close one, with a majority, due to the efficiency of the Dipper's 39% of the popular vote. Gordon Campbell's re-branded Liberals garner 42% of the vote and lose, given that Jack Weisberger's one-hit Reform wonder likely swiped more of their 9% share of the vote from the Liberals than Gordon Wilson's flash-in-the-pan PDA swiped from the NDP to garner their measly 6% vote share.

2017 - John Horgan's NDP forms a minority government with 40% of the popular vote together with Andrew Weaver's Greens, who hit their high water mark at 17%. Christy Clark's Liberals, who actually won the most seats, were ultimately the big losers despite the fact that they also garnered 40% of the vote.

2020 - The big one. Horgan 2.0 wins a massive, Harcourt-like NDP majority with 48% of the popular vote. Andrew Wilkinson's Liberals garner 34% and Furstenau's Greens slide slightly to 15%.

2024 - David Eby's NDP wins his squeaker majority with 45% of the popular vote. John Rustad's Conservatives lose with 43% of the vote as Furstenau's Greens wither down to 8%.

My point?

David Eby just won a greater share of the popular vote than any other BC NDP premier in history except for John Horgan 2.0.

As for the crack, bolded above, from Mr. Shaw about how poorly Eby did because 'more than half' of British Columbians did not support him?

If you go all the way back to 1952 only one BC Premier, ever, won a majority of the popular vote.

And that was Gordon Campbell in the most unusual, and exceptional, clock-cleaning that was 2001. 

To be absolutely clear here, this includes Wacky Bennett, who did not top 50% in any of his six majority wins in a row that spanned from 1953 to 1969.

Interestingly, in every single one of his victories, and that includes his party's pre-majority minority win in 1952, Wacky was greatly assisted by vote splitting, most often due to a significant percentage of folks pulling the lever for the Liberals.

So...

Stick that in your puffed-up pundit pipe and smoke it!



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It turns out that, in that 1952 election, the Socreds formed their minority government, with 30% of the vote, when they made WAC their leader AFTER the election. Just imagine how different this province might be today if the CCF, then led by Harold Winch, pictured above, third from right, who won 34% of the vote, had not been ambushed by Liberal leader 'Boss' Johnson's preferential vote machinations that year.


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Under The 'O'...Number 47.

ThisAin'tNoBingo

ThisAin'tNoFoolingAroundVille


From Elections BC, Monday at 6:00 pm:




And it looks like Chad Skelton's modelling was correct.

Because...

In the end the flipper was Surrey - Guildford:

There will likely be judicial recount in S-Guild as well as in Kelowna Centre where the Con lead is now down to 38 votes. Mr. Skelton also called that one correctly as coming close but not quite flipping.


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There are no longer any issues in the initially concerning ridings of Juan de Fuca and Surrey-Centre where both Dippers pulled away nicely during the mail-in and absentee counting.

Mangled Earworm in the subheader?....Most definitely...This!

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The French, They Have A Different Word For Everything.

 

Link

French lessons?

But what about all that time spent at the Sorbonne?

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On A Sunday Morning Sidewalk...

Ain'tNoRoadsLikeScholarly

RhodesVille


A few notes for this weepy Sunday morning coming down...

Data guy, whose work I miss in the Vancouver Sun, Chad Skelton, has been tracking the rate of change in the close ridings in the BC Election so far. He presents a cogent case that none of the ridings where the NDP has a slight lead will flip Con. Conversely, he does think that Surrey Guildford, but not Kelowna Centre will change from blue to red....4.5 Stars.

Speaking of the Vancouver Sun....Vaughn Palmer blames Sonia Furstenau for sticking by her principles and not playing footsie with John Rustad because, apparently, it will prevent her from gaining leverage over David Eby. What's worse, the Dean of the Legislative Press Gallery, with an assist from current BC Conservative supporter Andrew Weaver, blames Furstenau, who was not the leader at the time, for doing the same thing in 2017.... 0.5 Stars.

It's very difficult for anyone who has been following election updates, even official Elections BC updates, on social media feeds not to notice that the whackaloons are already starting to bleat about voting machines, unreasonable delays, phone-assisted voting,  'late' votes and Brinks trucks, et cetera....Negative Eleventy Billion Stars.

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Earworm at the top of the post?...This!

Want more on Mr. Kristofferson, including the genesis for his biggest hit?...This.

And why not just call the post the title of the song?....Because, Driftglass.



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Will The Orange Stay The New Green?

BC Election Count Update....Early Sat Afternoon, October 26th...

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Saturday at 4pm...Update at bottom of post

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So.

It looks like those mail-in ballots are swinging, hard, toward the NDP.

The two seats they were ahead by a whisker in,  Juan de Luca and Surrey Centre,  are now looking a little more comfortable (the former has gone from 20 ahead to 106 in the lead; the latter has gone from 96 ahead to 162).

That would leave things at Dipper 46, Con 45, Green 2 (you need 47 for a majority, plus you need a speaker which would make commenter Trailblazer's suggestion of one of the two Greeniacs becoming the speaker a realistic possibility).

But...

The gap has closed considerably in Surrey Guildford where the election night Con lead of 102 is now down to 14.

And, get this, Castanet is reporting that the relatively close Kelowna Centre (Con by 148 on election night) has 800+ mail-in & absentees still to count. If that flips orange....Well?

Next Elections BC  update should come soon, maybe even later this afternoon... 

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Elections BC explains the process they are using - which should conclude Monday....Here.

Meanwhile...While we're still looking back at last week's election here in Lotusland, the good Doctor has gone east and is already working on the next one.

And, just in case you thought the 49th parallel was protecting us from such codswallop, Mr. Musk's algorithm is amplifying the braying of the whackaloons re: election rigging.

Update, 4pm Saturday Oct 26th...JDF, Dipper by 106...Surrey Centre, Dipper by 178...Surrey Guildford, Con now only up by 12...Kelowna Centre Con lead shrunk to 72...Elections BC says that mail-in ballot counting is continuing and the next update is scheduled for tomorrow/Sunday at 1pm.

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We Don't Need No Stinking Endorsements!

AmazonStateOfMind
NotTheRiverVille


From Sewell Chan, writing in the venerable Columbia Journalism Review yesterday:

On Friday, the Washington Post’s publisher, Will Lewis, announced that the paper would no longer make endorsements for president—after its journalists had already drafted an endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris. The decision was made by Jeff Bezos, the paper’s owner...

For the record, the same thing just happened at the Los Angeles Times.

Ian Bassin and Maximillian Potter, also writing in the CJR, have dubbed this type of cowardly hedging of bets as 'anticipatory obedience' from such titans of the US'ian (formerly) free press.

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Image at the top of the post...Extreme weather fuelled drought in the Amazon basin.


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This Speaker Thing...

It'sAll

InTheChairVille

So.

You've probably heard all the blurble and gurgle about this speaker thing on the TeeVee and in the public prints without having the situation actually spelled out in terms of the, you know, basic math of the thing.

Essentially, you need 47 plus 1 (for the speaker) to rule the province of British Columbia. So with the Dippers currently at 46, total,  they would still be fine if they made a deal with the 2 Greeniacs.

But if the Dippers lose one of the recounts going on in either Juan de Fuca (NDP up by 20*) or Surrey Centre (NDP up by 96), they would lose that majority and, to rule, would have to find Darryl Plecas 2.0 from the other side to act as speaker which could be tough given the vice grip of the Whackaloons on the Conservative party.

And then there is the 'worst case scenario', explained by Cindy Harnett in the Times Colonist with an assist from political scientist David Black:

...If the worst case for the NDP happens next week and they lose two seats in the recounts, the NDP would fall to 44 (or 46 with Green support) and the Conservatives would bump up to 47 but because they would have to produce a Speaker they’d be back down to 46...

Can you imagine any Dipper flipping in that worst case?

Me neither.

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*I assume that the JDF lead has shrunk from Saturday night's 23 to 20 today given that Elections BC is now indicating that the 100% of the ballot boxes (rather than Saturday night's 99.77%) have been reported.
Something else interesting from Ms. Harnett's piece is that she quotes Adam Olsen as saying that Sonia Furstenau can play any part she wishes to with the Greens moving forward...

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Is Orange The New Green...Again?

EveryVote

CountsVille

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Update: Monday morning...In the original post written Sunday morning below, I mention two ridings, Juan De Fuca (Dipper up by 23) and Surrey-Guildford (Con up by 102) where things could still change...I had missed one, Surrey Centre (Dipper up by 96)...That changes the analysis a little because, in the unlikely event that those two orange seats were to go Con we would be in real base-bent crazy town territory...I'm starting to hold my breath again.

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There are now 93 provincial ridings in British Columbia.

Which means that you need 47 to form government.

As you can see from the screenshot, taken this morning from the Elections BC website, the Dippers and the Cons both fall just short.

Which, of course, means that, if things stay the same, the Greens will hold the balance of power.

Of course, that was also the case in 2017 when John Horgan and Andrew Weaver made their deal that, in my opinion at least, gave us a pretty darned good government.

Could the same thing happen again?

Well, luckily, given his recent comments in support of the climate change denier Mr. Rustad, Mr. Weaver no longer leads the provincial Greens.

But the big question is - who will actually lead the Greeniacs going forward?

Will it be Sonia Furstenau, who lost her race, not in Cowichan, but instead in Beacon Hill?

It's going to be interesting to see what happens there, given the potential for both the power and the glory, not to mention good policy, down the road.

And it looks like the Greens and Mr. Eby might have a little time to sort things out because, as you can see from the image above there are still 0.23% of the votes to count. This small sliver represents out of district votes and mail-in ballots which, apparently, will take about a week to collect, collate and count.

Do those votes matter?

Potentially, yes, but it is unlikely.

By my reading the two ridings that could flip are Surrey-Guilford, where the Con is currently up by 102, and Juan de Fuca, where the Dipper is up by just 23.

So.

Let's say, worse case scenario, the Cons hold Surrey-G and the Dippers lose JDF...That would make it 46 Cons (not enough to win) vs. the Dippers 45 (enough to hold on if they make a deal with Greens to go to 47).

Thus, I for one am now able to exhale and almost relax while we wait for the final numbers to be posted by Elections BC next Saturday.

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One of the big surprises was the Greens winning handily in the fully vote split riding of West Van Sea-to-Sky...That, I think, is ironic given how the riding that GordCo's development bund built, may very well have saved us...Somewhere, I'm pretty sure the ghost of Rafe Mair has a little smile on his face this morning.

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This Band Could(n't) Be Their Life (Anymore)

MayAllTheirNickelsBe
DoubledVille

Those who stop by here once in awhile may know that I've been hooked on the music of Japandroids, the sometimes shambolic Lotuslandian duo, for quite awhile now.

The basis of the hooking is pretty straightforward, barb-free and clean.

I listen to their stuff and/or use my digital whiz-bang cheater amp to generate cheesy takes on their most iconic riff because doing such things makes me feel like a kid again.

And when I was a kid I always hated it when my favourite bands broke up - usually for the most squalid and/or saddest of reasons.

But now Brian King and David Prowse have just put out their latest album and simultaneously called it quits, the latter for the best of reasons.

Essentially, they both know that they have lives to live and that doing it with their band behind them is their best chance to do just that.

I'm not sure that I could have handled that explanation when I was twenty-five but now that I am (this very day to be precise) sixty-five, their decision makes me very, very happy indeed.

Selah.


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Earworm in the header?...This!

As for the Bookworm?...Well, begrudgingly due to the faintest whiff of the co-optation (that's the snotty 'No  Sellouts!' kid in me coming out again)...This!



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