And this is why I use a Mac January 29, 2007
Posted by politicsranter in Technology.add a comment
http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/175801
Because they only persuade me to do things with their slick hipster image (and awesome computers) rather than force me to with a silicon fist.
Crazy News of the Day January 24, 2007
Posted by politicsranter in Media, News.add a comment
Check these out:
http://www.thestar.com/News/article/174429
http://www.thestar.com/News/article/174384
The similarities are strange. At first I thought they mashed together two articles by accident. Then I realized, that no, it was indeed someone out stabbing 20-year-olds with tiny, helpless dependents this morning.
If someone stabbed my dog I would stab them right back in the eye.
The Two Frenchlands January 23, 2007
Posted by politicsranter in News, Politics.2 comments
The end of this article makes me giggle. In an exasperated way.
The Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said that Royal’s “interference in the affairs of another democracy is inappropriate.”
So if you want to mess with a democracy, don’t even think about it. That’s a sacred cow. But if you want go in and screw up with any other kind of governance system, that would be just dandy! Yay ethnocentricity!
Hibernation January 12, 2007
Posted by politicsranter in Media, News, Politics.13 comments
So the Liberals have lost yet another one. Jean Lapierre has quit the party to go host a TV show. He’s also said that he ran to serve Paul Martin, and now that Martin is gone, he’s out. It makes me wonder – has he been sleeping for the last year? Is he now just realizing that Martin is gone?
+ + + + +
Rick Mercer did a pretty grand job of skewering the Accountability Act this week. You can see the video on his site. I understand the premise behind it (limiting donations so that when people are elected they aren’t beholden to certain interests because of money is a big part) but I think the downside outweighs the benefits. Political campaigns are tres chers (expensive!). Regular people don’t have that kind of dough sitting around, meaning lots of smart, capable people are getting left out. When Ontario MPPs raised their salary (man, I wish I got to vote on my own raise) they said that the money they were making wasn’t enough to attract top level people. I argued that there are plenty of top level people who would love to make 88 grand a year. Some people shot back, “Yeah, but they’re not running” as though they didn’t want to. But I don’t think that’s the case. Most people working at non-profits and schools and such don’t have the money to run a campaign, even if it means they’ll make more money later.
If people can now only get donations of a max of $1000 per donor, it could make a huge difference in who can run. Say you have a rich old aunt who wants to give you $200,000 for your campaign. Well, too bad for you. What’s that? You can’t afford to run otherwise? Well, again, too bad for you. This is democracy, friends. It’s not about giving everyone an equal shot. It’s about giving a shot to those who can buy one.
Digging a bigger hole January 10, 2007
Posted by politicsranter in News, Politics.5 comments
George W. has decided to send more troops to Iraq.
<sarcasm>What a great strategy! I know that when I fuck something up royally, my first instinct is to fix it by increasing my fuck-up efforts.</sarcasm>
It’s a bit like the time that my sister’s friend lit herself on fire trying to throw a bowl (yes, a bowl) of gasoline on a bonfire and the people around threw booze on her in an effort to put out the flames. The flames went out eventually, but not before she burned her eyebrows and nose right before her prom.
Super Hilarious Coincidence Time! January 9, 2007
Posted by politicsranter in Entertainment, Funny!, Media.1 comment so far
One of the lovely things about WordPress is that it has a built-in stat counter. It’s not extremely detailed, but it does tell me what search engine terms people used to find my blog. Some are perplexing (Who is googling my full name? I didn’t even think it was on this site, not that I care) but most are fairly normal. Yesterday came my favourite one of all time:
“THE BEATH PENALTY”
Now, clearly this person was meaning to search for the death penalty (at least I really hope so), and found my Saddam post. What makes it so great it that if they were going to make a typo, they could have hit any number of other keys, but they happened upon the “b”. For those of you who don’t know me, my last name is Beath. The fact that they typed it in all caps makes it even more authoritative and hilarious. From now on, if anyone pisses me off, I shall tell them that they’d better watch out or THE BEATH PENALTY is coming down on their ass.
Odd couple part II January 9, 2007
Posted by politicsranter in Politics.add a comment
Maclean’s has a good article on the whole potential Conservative-NDP alliance.
I suppose the other side is that now the Cons might have to pander to the NDP, as happened with the Liberal budget, but I think the NDP has more to gain by not having an election anytime soon (sad to say, but they’d lose seats for sure) and as an extension of that, propping up the government. They both need each other, really. It’s kind of scary.
Odd couple January 6, 2007
Posted by politicsranter in Politics.6 comments
From The Star:
There has been a lot of speculation in the last couple of months that NDP Leader Jack Layton might keep the Tory government alive in exchange for tougher environmental measures. Theoretically, an NDP-Tory alliance could have enough seats in the Commons – 154 – to win any non-confidence vote in the government.
Way to sell out, NDP. My disillusionment with the NDP has been growing lately, and this is the wost part of why. Other reasons including Jack Layton’s constant grandstanding. (No one will take you seriously, Jack, if you’re constantly blustering about everything, yet not really knowing what you’re saying. See: Afghanistan.)
