My Morning Rides.

NoCakeNoRain(Yet)NoMelting
CarnarvonParkVille


A few podcasts I've really enjoyed on the morning ride into work recently...

Christopher Guest on Maron - it turns out that there really is a method in his mad(cap)ness.

Jonathan Goldstein and Heavyweight are back! - The first episode is a touching one about JG's longtime nemesis Gregor's Mom.

The MoCo's Frontburner, which is more often miss than hit for me, had an excellent recent episode on the incredible life and times, including how he's dealing with the coming end of his life with dementia, of Robert Munsch.

That is all for now, although, to be clear, I am starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel and, despite the changing of the seasons, it is not dying.

The light I mean.

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As for the ear worm in the sub-header...Not going to touch that one.


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Saved By Younger e's Bell.

Something'sHappeningThere
AshevilleNorthCarolinaVille


No matter how much I tried to pretend it wasn't looming out there just over the horizon back in the dog days, I knew it was coming.

And when the first few weeks of the new term hit, it was like the madness of pre-tenure days all over again.

Luckily our youngest kid, e.,  had a plan.

Which was to give me Friday night off by taking me to Malkin Bowl in Stanley Park to watch a kid named MJ Lenderman do his thing.

And it was really great.

And now that I've tabbed out the tune and mangled it a few times, I'm pretty sure I know what a beach house in Buffalo is and, perhaps more importantly, what it isn't...

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The scene in Asheville?...This...Of course, once normoid geezers like me find about a thing like that it's likely already gone, or at least passing...

Off(ish) topic...Ya, I realize the trolls are afoot once again...I've just been so darned busy...I'll bring in the removal service once I get a little time.

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Hot Mic In Beijing.

NuclearError

IHaveNoFearVille


From Pjotr Sauder of the Guardian:

It was the stuff of Bond villains. Two ageing autocrats, their younger ally in tow, ambled down a red-carpeted ramp before a military parade in Beijing when a hot mic picked up a question that seemed to be on their minds: how long could they keep going – and, between the lines, might science allow them to rule for ever?

With advances in technology, Russia’s Vladimir Putin assured Xi Jinping via his translator that “human organs can be constantly transplanted, to the extent that people can get younger, perhaps even immortal”.

The Chinese leader replied: “By the end of this century, people may live to 150 years old.”

Nearby, North Korea’s Kim Jong-un – three decades younger than the two 72-year-olds – appeared to take note with a smile....

Gosh.

Does that mean that, when he wrote Neuromancer more than 40 years ago, William Gibson knew that...

Some of it was true?


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Earworm in the subheader AND the kicker?....This!



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My Afternoon Ride.

 

Came back across the Salish Sea this afternoon...

To the best of my knowledge the Wacky One was not at the helm of the fine Spirit Class boat we rode in on.

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The Accidental Parcel Post Solution?

UnitedWe(Can)
StandVille


The coming US'ian tariffs on goods travelling stateside from Europe has parcel post services across the pond in a paralyzing quandary.

Jon Henley, writing in the Guardian explains:

Postal services across Europe have suspended most parcel shipments to the US, citing widespread uncertainty about the impact of new import tariffs announced by Donald Trump.

 {snip}

...PostEurop, an association of 51 European public postal operators, said that if no practical solutions could be found before 29 August, it was likely that all its members would suspend the bulk of parcel shipments to the US...

Of course, this is a potential disaster for European businesses that export products, particularly in small packages, direct to consumers in the US.

And, hopefully, the parcel flow stoppage will be short-lived.

But.

Is it possible that this is an accidental, yet serendipitous, illustration of an important principle about how the capricious, arbitrary and often destructive actions of the Trump regime can be effectively resisted?

Which is to act collectively, both domestically and internationally, on a whole lotta levels.

In other words, what if the Ivy League US'ian schools stopped trying to resist alone and instead were to group together in an alliance.

Or if all Blue State governors formed an economic bloc (which is something that JB Pritzker of Illinois suggested the other day)?

Or if all Canadian soft wood lumber exporters agreed, with government support, to only ship to said Blue State Bloc?

Or if Canadian and Eurasian governments got together and did the same?

Heckfire.

I'm not even sure any of the still to be formed alliances above would even have to act - just the realistic threat of such collective actions would likely force the retreater-in-chief to do just that.

Retreat, I mean.

OK?


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The business of Canadian and European governments getting together to act in concert from a trade perspective is something  that our newly re-minted opposition leader apparently wants to shutdown from the get-go.

Tangential ear worm buried in the levels of the text of the post?...This!



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I Don't Often Disagree With Evan Scrimshaw, But...

DisagreementsAbound
ArmChairPunditryVille


I really enjoy reading Evan Scrimshaw's stuff.

His heart is in the right place and he is hard-headed when it comes to thinking about what it takes for realistic progressives to win and do the right thing after they do.

But on this very recent take I think the good Mr. Scrimshaw is off base:

...Out in BC, the Greens are having a leadership contest - a topic, admittedly, that wouldn’t usually warrant a column. But, with David Eby having the slimmest of majorities and neither of the Greens MLAs running for the job, it’s an opening for Eby, if he wants to follow in John Horgan’s footsteps and ratfuck the next Green leader. In 2020, Horgan called the election for the same week the Greens elected Sonia Furstenau leader, depriving her of any time to bed in before the election. If Horgan’s act is repeated, a fall election would be on the cards - especially given Eby waited last time, and nearly lost for it, he’d be smart to go early...

Now.

I'm not opposed to the idea of the BC NDP taking us back to the polls early on principle, particularly if it's done because there is a realistic possibility of pushing the Whackaloonian Party back into the political, if not the literal, wilderness.

However, the idea that it can be done by capitalizing on yet another slide in Green support is just not realistic.

Because we are no longer talking about Andrew Weaver's, or even Sonia Furstenau v1.0's, BC Greens taking 15% or more of the popular vote. 

Instead, last fall Furstenau v2.0 garnered a measly 7%.  In other words, there is nothing for Eby to pick up there. And, to get riding specific, if the one Green seat at play (i.e. West Van Sea-To-Ski) were to flip it is actually more likely to go Whackaloonian than Dipper.

And then there is the following, also from Mr. Scrimshaw:

...(M)ost of all, (the) fact that the Greens could be about to elect a genuine f*cking lunatic also makes the case pretty well for an early election.

Emily Lowan is, to be quite blunt, the worst serious candidate to lead a party with actual elected officials in my lifetime. She is a dream to the NDP, because if the Greens are stupid enough to pick her as leader she will lead the party off the cliff...

...Her platform is best described as a fever dream for the worst of the Left - people who plainly have not realized that this isn’t 2018 anymore and that the issue set has changed...

Which is fine, as far as it goes.

But consider this...

There are quite a few disaffected left-sided Dipperian voters 'round here, including some readers of this little F-Troop-list blog, that are not happy with some of the more 'pragmatic' policies of Mr. Eby's government.

Thus, a chunk of those folks are starting to look for a place to go that is not coloured orange.

And if a few percent of them go with a more left-leaning provincial Green Party, well, there are a lot of ridings that the Dippers saved from Whackaloonianism by the skin of our collective teeth in 2024 (see Surrey-Guildford numbers at the top of the post for example)  that could go the way of lifestyle shaming, book burning, absolutist austeritical lunacy next time around.

OK?

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A Worthwhile Read...

WhyAccountability

MattersVille


The following is the sub-header atop a piece by Owen Jones in today's Guardian:

The west faced no reckoning for the death and destruction it wreaked in Iraq. That made the war crimes we’re now witnessing (in Gaza) inevitable...

Mr. Jones' thesis is thought provoking and the evidence he provides to support it is very difficult to dismiss out of hand.

To wit:

...A war of aggression, deemed illegal at the time by the then UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, plunged Iraq into murderous chaos. At a conservative count, 300,000 Iraqis suffered violent deaths, according to the painstaking research of Iraq Body Count, about two-thirds of whom were civilians...

{snip}

...(T)he Iraq war proved that Arab life is cheap indeed. Only a reckoning could have given it value...

A very worthwhile read, indeed.



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Arkansas Uber Alles.

ResurrectingJim

CrowVille


The lede of a front page piece by Debra Kamin in today's NYTimes (web archive link):

In the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas, nearly an hour from the closest city, a small group of homesteaders is building an exclusive community from scratch.

Applicants to the community are screened with an in-person interview, a criminal-background check, a questionnaire about ancestral heritage and sometimes even photographs of their relatives.

The community’s two architects — a classically trained French horn player who has livestreamed his own sex videos, and a former jazz pianist arrested but not charged for attempted murder in Ecuador — say they must personally confirm that applicants are white before they can be welcomed in...

The story is an excellent bit of investigative reportage.

However, the Grey Lady's headline writer and, presumably, the editors who approved it just couldn't stop themselves from throwing a phantom 'objective journalism'  punch in the subheader:

...Housing rights experts say a community restricted to white residents is illegal, but the creators believe they could win a potential challenge in court in the current political climate...

Sheesh.

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Image at the top of the post?...This.

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HST Fridays...Wild Hunter's Circus-Circus Vision Comes True.

EveryCornerIsMichiganAndBalboa
NowVille


That was then:

'The Circus-Circus is what the whole hep world would be doing on Saturday night if the Nazis had won the war. This is the Six Reich. The ground floor is full of gambling tables, like all the other casinos...but the place is about four stories high, in the style of a circus tent, and all manner of strange County-Fair/Polish Carnival madness is going on up in this space. Right above the gambling tables the Forty Flying Carazito Brothers are doing a high-wire trazeze act, along with four muzzled Wolverines and the Six Nymphet Sisters from San Diego.....

This madness goes on and on, but nobody seems to notice. The gambling action runs twenty-four hours a day on the main floor, and the circus never ends......Stand in front of this fantastic machine, my friend, and for just 99 cents your likeness will appear, two hundred feet tall, on a screen above downtown Las Vegas. Ninety-nine cents more for a voice message......

I could see myself lying in bed at the Mint Hotel, half-asleep and staring idly out the window, when suddenly a vicious nazi drunkard appears two hundred feet tall in the midnight sky, screaming gibberish at the world: "Woodstock Uber Alles!"

Hunter S. Thompson.
Rolling Stone #95, Nov. 1971
Reprinted in: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Warner Books, pp 46-47.

That was then(er):

'Bush is really the evil one here and it is more than just him....

We're the Nazis in this game, and I don't like it. I'm embarrassed and I'm pissed off. Yeah. I mean to say something and I think a lot of people in this country agree with me.'

Hunter S. Thompson, January 2003
Interview with Mary Suma, KDNK Radio, Roaring Fork Colorado
Reprinted, and Audio Archived by Democracy Now

This is now, on the streets of Washington DC:

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Subheader?...This!

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Be Careful What You Say.

FreeSpeechAin'tNecessarilyFreeFor
WeAndTheeVille


Clearly, fifty-five million was a number designed to capture the lazy, click bait-hungry wing of what's left of the corpMedia, because it's everywhere today based on the lede of an AP story by Michael Lee:

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration said Thursday it is reviewing more than 55 million people who have valid U.S. visas for any violations that could lead to deportation, part of a growing crackdown on foreigners who are permitted to be in the United States...

And how will the regime finger these terrible, no good, super-bad people, the great majority of whom* are not even currently living within the regime's borders?

...The (visa) reviews will include new tools for data collection on past, present and future visa applicants, including a complete scouring of social media sites...

So, be careful what you say.

And/or type.

Including 'round here.

Ha!


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*According to figures cited in Mr. Lee's AP story approximately 17 million green card and temporary visa holders currently reside within the regime's borders, which, using my extensive long decision skills is less than one-third of that 55 million number....

And who will make the really big money off this branch of the social-scrapey fascism?...One good bet would be the algorithmists at places like, say, Palantir, for real.

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(Passively) Slouching Towards Fascism.

SurelyTheSecondComingIs
NotAtHandVille


It would appear that US'ian Democratic leaders are desperately attempting to hold on to a center that no longer even exists.

Mike the Mad Biologist, who lives and (still) works (I think/hope) in Washington DC, enumerates and critiques their strategy:

1) Vote against Trump’s legislation. This is good, even though too many Democratic senators have voted to confirm Trump’s nominees–those nominees would have passed anyway, but telling voters his nominees are bums is good.

2) Stand back and let everything, including the economy, go to shit. This is largely in Trump’s hands and he seems to be doing a ‘good’ job of it. Of course, if you’re one of those people whose life has gone to shit, and Democrats could have tried to do something, you might feel differently!

3) When things are bad enough, voters will somehow, in an unfavorable media environment, realize that it’s all Trump’s and Republicans’ faults, and then they will vote accordingly.

It’s not much of a plan, but it’s what they’re going with. It’s a ‘good’ plan in the sense that the leadership and their consultants can’t really be blamed–if it fails, they can just blame economic improvements or ‘the left’ for not clapping loudly enough.

So.

There you have it - the Democratic Party braintrust has decided to do little more than wait until everything turns really, really bad such that the voters smarten up and sweep them back into the power center.

But, here's the thing...

The current regime has already demonstrated that they will put thugs and the troops on the streets of two major US'ian cities for no good reason at all.

Given that, why should the braintrust expect that the regime won't just double the public thuggery everywhere that certain 'types' of voters must be intimidated such that they don't show up at the polls next November?


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Header, subheader and lede manglement?....This!


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The Missing 'Why' Of The Trump Slump.

WildHunter'sCircusCircusStory
GoneBadVille

Another day, another story on how the policies of Mr. Trump have led to a significant tourism slump in the United States.

This one is from the Associated Press that starts like this:

Tourism in Las Vegas is slumping this summer, with resorts and convention centers reporting fewer visitors compared to last year, especially from abroad, and some officials are blaming the Trump administration’s tariffs and immigration policies for the decline.

The city known for lavish shows, endless buffets and around-the-clock gambling welcomed just under 3.1 million tourists in June, an 11 per cent drop compared to the same month in 2024. There were 13 per cent fewer international travelers, and hotel occupancy fell by about 15 per cent, according to data from the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority...

The piece then moves on to the 'who'.

As in who is responsible:

...Mayor Shelley Berkley said tourism from Canada -- Nevada’s largest international market -- has dried up from a torrent “to a drip.”..

And then, ultimately, the story gets  to the anecdotal 'why':

...Travel agents in Canada said there’s been a significant downturn in clients wanting to visit the U.S. overall, and Las Vegas in particular. Wendy Hart, who books trips from Windsor, Ontario, said the reason was “politics, for sure.” She speculated it was a point of “national pride” that people were staying away from the U.S. after U.S. President Donald Trump said he wanted to make Canada the 51st state.

“The tariffs are a big thing too. They seem to be contributing to the rising cost of everything,” Hart said...

Now, I have no doubt that national pride and tariffs are factors.

But.

To carry on with the anecdotes for the moment...

Many folks I know including, especially, friends with more pigment in their skin then mine, have mentioned that a major reason they are not travelling south across that 'artificially drawn line' is because they don't want to be hassled, have their devices scanned, be detained, or worse.

In other words, many Canadians are not willing to put themselves in harm's way just so they can buy cheap gas and/or gorge themselves at the Circus Circus buffet.

Assuming, of course, that the latter is still a 'thing'.


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Earworm in the sub-header buried deep in the desert sand?...This!



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The Monetary Madness Of Mayor Sim.

CryptoTown

ByThePoolVille


From the inimitable Lotusland watcher Mike Howell, now writing for Business In Vancouver:

Mayor Ken Sim continues to make his rounds as an advocate for bitcoin and is scheduled to be a featured speaker at a two-day conference this weekend at the Vancouver Convention Centre...

{snip}

...The mayor’s participation in such conferences and being a guest on various podcasts stems from a motion he successfully presented to city council in December 2024.

His motion directed staff to explore options to make Vancouver a bitcoin-friendly city by undertaking a comprehensive analysis of the potential to integrate bitcoin into the City of Vancouver's financial strategies.

That would include, but not be limited to, accepting taxes and fees in bitcoin.

The mayor has also called for the potential conversion of a portion of the city’s financial reserves into bitcoin “to preserve purchasing power and guard against the volatility, debasement and inflationary pressures of traditional currencies.”...

And when the bloom comes off the pyramidal-shaped the bitcoin rose, errrrr, tulip?

Well...

If we lose our civic shirts in the collapse, at least we may still be able to heat a local body of water:

...This weekend’s conference also features a segment titled, “heating Kitsilano pool with bitcoin mining.”

Sim has shown interest in the topic, with him recently posing in a photograph posted via the X social media platform with staff at Mintgreen, a Canadian cleantech company specializing in heat recovery from bitcoin mining...

Sheesh.


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The Railway Men Who Financed Gordon Campbell's Government Before And After It 'Leased' BC Rail.

SaleNotSale
999YearsVille

In the wake of the news that CN Rail has decided to let go of a stretch of track that once ran BC Rail trains before they it was leased to CN by Gordon Campbell, and currently runs the rolling hotels of the super-fine Rocky Mountain Railtours, we take you back to a post from the ancient times, otherwise known as 2010.

****

In recent posts we have established that two of British Columbia's private Railway Tycoons,  David McLean of CN Rail and Peter Armstrong of Rocky Mountaineer Railtours each gave, either personally, or through their companies, at least $250,000, each, to the BC Liberal Party of Mr. Gordon Campbell since the latter became leader way, way, way back in 1993.

And, on the flipside, both private Rail Tycoons have done very well, indeed, in the wake of Gordon Campbell promise-busting dismantling of a very public Railway soon after he became the Premier of British Columbia in 2001.

Specifically, with the destruction of a 90 year-old statute that required BC Rail to run a public passenger service, followed shortly thereafter by the tainted/not tainted/sale/not sale of BC Rail to CN Rail, Mess'rs McLean and Armstrong ultimately came up aces by any and all financial measures one could choose to use and/or trumpet.

But here is something that most folks, even those who have been paying attention (including, initially, myself) may have missed.

Which is the fact that when Mr. Armstrong's Rocky Mountaineer/Great Canadian Tours private passenger business started rolling down the formerly public BC Rail tracks it was NOT Gordon Campbell's hand-picked 'executives' of the doomed Crown Corporation that Mr. Armstrong ultimately had to negotiate with to get the deal done.

Instead, it was David McLean and CN Rail:*

...In September 2004, Canadian National Railway Co. announced (Peter Armstrong's) Great Canadian had been selected to operate tourist trains on its newly-acquired British Columbia Rail routes...

Which is somewhat ironic, given Mess'rs McLean's and Armstrong's willingness to bankroll the efforts of Mr. Campbell from the very beginning, don't you think?

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We're back in the present now...The bolded bit, above, is from a November 2004 post from the late great PublicEye Online whose proprietor was the now academician Sean Holman...There is a whole lot more info on 'historical' Railgate players there for those of you who are interested...




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The Ties That Bind.

ProspectThis

CaribooVille


What with all that is going on in the world these days, I had completely missed the following as reported by Jennifer Thuncher in the Squamish Chief back in mid-July:

The Canadian National Railway Company (CN) has declared its plan to decommission part of its railway line from north of the railyards in Squamish through to 100 Mile.

The railway is mandated to release its railway line plans to the government and the public, which it did on July 11.

Its three-year plan shows it'll decommission its “Squamish subdivision” of the railway line heading north of the District of Squamish to Lillooet—from mile marker 43.00 through to 157.60.
CN also released its intention to decommission the line from mile marker 157.60 to 257.00, which is on the Lillooet subdivision of the line that stretches past 100 Mile...

Gosh.

Didn't that stretch of track used belong to an outfit that we, the people of British Columbia once owned?

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Image at the top of the post?...This.

Subheader?...This.




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