Are these the issues that matter?

From The Star's article on the PA Primary:

Conversely, should she [Clinton] win by 10 points or more, the race could fundamentally change at this late hour and the Illinois senator's inability to win another large state, which will loom large in the 2008 general election, will give Clinton an enormous boost for a final sprint.

This makes absolutely zero sense. It's not as bad as Clinton arguing that because she won California and New York, she should be the nominee (after all, I could run against the McCain in CA and NY and win--these two states are Democratic. Period), but it's up there. Because in case it hadn't occurred to anyone, the primary is a contest between two Democratic candidates--not against McCain. The issue is not whether Obama can beat Clinton in PA, but whether he (or she) can beat McCain. The "inability to win another large state" is meaningless when the only contestants are the same party.

Second:

Clinton leads among hunters, bowlers (after a stunningly bad bowling photo-op by Obama) and gun owners, the two are tied among beer drinkers (after Clinton's shot with a beer chaser in Indiana).

If this isn't an argument for restricting suffrage, I don't know what is. So Clinton suggests that she used to go hunting (really? I'm calling shenanigans on that one) and so people who hunt vote for her. And Obama has a bad day bowling and suddenly he'll make a worse president? To be honest, I would rather my president be very bad at bowling, because that suggests too much time spent in the bowling alley and not enough time doing things like, say, learning policy. The beer thing is nonsense.

We are in the current disaster that we are facing (i.e. 7 years of Dubya) precisely because people cared about these issues. Dubya was the guy who you could sit and have a beer with. He was "one of the guys" (which, of course, was demonstrably false: he was no more one of the guys than anyone else who'd lived off Daddy's money and going to private schools his whole life). He was in touch with "the common man." He hunted. He has a ranch. He was a dude.

Forget that he had almost no meaningful experience in government. Forget that my parents' dogs have been out of the country more times than he had. Forget that he was semi-literate and barely articulate. None of that mattered, because he was just a regular guy, and we all just want regular guys to be the leader of the most powerful country in the world.

Screw it. From now on, let's just randomly select the president. And no one with any sort of non-working-class background can be involved in the lottery.

UPDATE: An exceptional article from Andrew Cohen.

Some choice bits:

It's hard to get elected president if you're seen to be too smart. George W. Bush, who is the money and name of the elite, won twice when charm trumped intellect. He was reassuringly simple. Al Gore was seen as wooden and brainy. John Kerry spoke French, wore a field coat and rode a windsurfer. Both lost, and so did America.

snip

When the Roosevelts, Wilson, Kennedy and Clinton got into office, all were kinder to the poor than to the rich. On the other hand, the soothing Ronald Reagan and the brush-clearing Mr. Bush cut taxes for the wealthiest Americans. Neither was accused of championing the underclass.

The question, then, isn't who is a member of the elite and who is not, as measured by whom you'd prefer to have a beer with - the reason, it is said, that the amiable Mr. Bush was elected twice.

The president should come from among the elite - on the assumption that the people deserve the candidate with the most experience, the best judgment and the greatest ability to lead - none of which implies arrogance or aloofness.

C.V. Wedgwood--one of the greatest historians of the 20th Century who, sadly, isn't widely known--made this exact point in an essay (which I can't find online)--that we should want out leaders to be people we look up to. We should want truly exceptional people running our governments and our institutions.

Sadly, that seems to be forgotten in the US.

Fingerprinting foreigners

Now the United States has truly gone insane.

This is a wonderful, bumper-sticker faux solution that looks like it's doing something when it actually is not. Where on earth is the actual showing that finger printing every last visitor to the United States when they leave the country will do anything to make the country any safer? This is as bad as making us throw out water bottles or take our shoes off--measures that somehow make it look like the government is doing something, while not doing anything substantive. It makes housewives in Nebraska happy, but I can't see in any way what it will do.

Other than, of course, decrease tourism.

And the cost?

The overall economic impact on companies, passengers and the government is expected to exceed $3.5 billion, industry lobbyists said, at a time when carriers are struggling with safety concerns, high fuel costs and passenger complaints.

So we're concerned with our airlines going bankrupt, with rising costs, and the fact that domestic air travel is misery (paying for your drinks and your peanuts, paying extra for basically everything), and we're going to drop a $3.5 billion dollar surcharge on consumers?

Good thinking.

Riots?

Huh?

Muslims riot whenever anyone says anything bad about Mohammed.

Tibetans riot when they feel oppressed by the Chinese.

Montrealers riot . . . when they win?

Condi must go

Or be tried for war crimes, better still.

Don't Question the Stork Theory

So cool

2000 frames in one second:

Happy Proclamation of the Constitution Day!

Entire Country Goes Crazy

OMG. I seriously cannot believe that this is just show, or this is just people doing what they're "supposed" to be doing. Not when everything you read about North Koreans actually believing this shit that they get fed.

Example #2 of patheticness

Further to this post, Aaron Wherry again points out the absurd nonsequitor of the day (scroll down). Apparently the Tories can come up with nothing more substantive in their question period answers than "The Liberals are Bad." Even if the question has nothing to do with Liberal policy.

Onward:

Stephen Fletcher, taking a question on a safe-injection site in Vancouver. "As I mentioned, Mr. Speaker, our government will review the research very carefully. No decision has been made. However, as I have the floor, I am reminded that the Liberal Party and its leader have no policy, no leadership and no vision for the country. That is why the people said no to a Liberal government."

And, for the record, the question was from Libby Davis--who isn't even a Liberal!

Examples of how pathetic the government is

All the Tories can seem to do these days is say "Well, the Liberal were bad when they were in government."

Witness this wonderful exchange between MHF and Jim Prentice.

Ms. Martha Hall Findlay (Willowdale, Lib.):

Mr. Speaker, the numbers speak for themselves. Why is the Conservative government doing nothing to stem the slow death of the 250,000 strong well-paying jobs we have in Ontario, jobs created by the up to now innovative and world leading auto sector?

Hon. Jim Prentice (Minister of Industry, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, I welcome my friend to the House. To carry on dealing with things that were not dealt with, this government is taking care of infrastructure. My friend of course was not in the House, but at the time that there was a Liberal government in this country, we allowed a situation to develop. The Detroit-Windsor bridge crossing is a single bridge built before the Great Depression and carries more trade than the entire United States-Japanese trading relationship.

Yet, this bridge is beyond capacity. The former government did nothing about it. This government is addressing it. It is at the top of our priorities and we will fix that bridge situation.

Um. I don't seem to recall MHF asking about the bridge. As she herself noted:

Ms. Martha Hall Findlay (Willowdale, Lib.):

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his generous welcome and I would like to point out that my question really did not have to do with bridges. It had to do with jobs.

Once again, the Conservative government, instead of finding solutions for the many families who are losing their livelihoods, is only blaming Ontario. It is time to stand up with Ontario. These Canadian families are asking, why are the Conservatives letting them down?

Hon. Jim Prentice (Minister of Industry, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, if I can assist the hon. member in bridging from bridges to jobs, the truth of the matter is that this bridge is central to our automotive industry and to the competitiveness of our industry.

The former government did not appreciate that. That is why the bridge is jammed up. That is why there are 8,000 tractor trailer units a day using the bridge, sometimes taking up to eight hours. We cannot be competitive if we allow that to persist. The former government did not do anything about it. It relates to jobs. We are dealing with it.

Crazy. They all just have their talking points in the Government and no matter what the question, the talking point comes out.

Excuse me Olympic torch protesters?

But do you even know where Tibet is?

Can you name its capital?

Can you tell us when China occupied it?

When China occupied it, was it a thriving multi-cultural democracy, or a feudal backwater?

I know saying "Free Tibet" is all very trendy, but really, if you're protesting, it would be great if you actually knew what your issue was. Because it seems to me that so many of the "Free Tibet" types are a bit like pageant queens who always say they want "World Peace"--it's a mantra you can invoke to look like you're Cool and Caring and Sensitive.

********

None of this is to say that I think China's a good country or that it should have the Olympics. Far from it, as I said a while ago. Hairy Fish Nuts has a good point too. ("Learn the lesson tyrants and dictators, make the West some money and you can do whatever you like. Poor Saddam all he had to do was open some Nike factories and he'd be gassing Kurds to his black heart's content.")

But there are far more reasons to protest China getting them than simply the Tibetan issue.

You can also bet that if China weren't the place everyone needs money from and is a big-ass market, the fact it's not a democracy would have derailed it nicely. Honestly, if we actually cared about these things, the IOC would put forward criteria for being an Olympic host: Stable democracy, respect for the rule of law and human rights (Sorry, USA, you'd be out), etc etc etc.

Political Joy

U can ttly has it.

I don't get it

Back in high school, they always told us that the definition of a "state" was the entity that had the monopoly of power--police/military. I don't disagree with that as a definition. That is why states can act--because they set up laws and can thereby enforce them. And why companies--that may or may not have larger revenues than the governments of the state they are in--cannot.

So why on earth do we tolerate militias in Iraq?

I know the issue is far more complicated, but surely the only real way to stabilize Iraq is to ensure that the national government can project its power and enforce its laws. As it stands now, anyone who gets enough followers and enough guns can effectively defy the state. That doesn't really lead to stability, where any group can ignore laws as it sees fit (particularly when the groups are split along religious or ethnic lines.)

Europe in the 30s would be an instructive example. But then, our current leaders don't seem to care about learning from the past. Or from, say, fact.

Maybe he should strangle someone

Taking a break from making fun of the cro-magnons who trawl this space with semi-literate comments, made from the safe anonymity of their double-wides fresh from drinking a bottle of Jack and beating their wives, this column by Aaron Wherry is instructive, particularly for those who, like us, are Dion fans.

He takes Valpy to task for his column which basically suggests that Dion has to become more of a politician--i.e. to jettison his policy-based approach, jettison exactly the reason why he was selected in favour of a more-American style focus on sound bites and dashing images.

It speaks in most part for itself, but one exchange deserves to be singled out.

Valpy wrote this drivel:

But it's Mr. Dion's comportment that is considered the black hole of his problems. Environics' Michael Adams puts it bluntly: “This man has to be more masculine. He has to think about how to be more masculine" ... And it is Stephen Harper, not Stéphane Dion, who is seen as having carved out the territory of the archetypal male.

[WTF? More "masculine"? We're talking about Prime Ministers of Canada, not army generals or football commentators or something. Do we really care? And is chubby Stephen Harper, who probably can't even grow a beard and hasn't seen his own dick over his belly in years, really all that masculine? Is this how we should pick our PM--based on what kind of a jock he is? The Americans tried that one and look how they ended up.]

Wherry responds:

Michael Adams is probably a very smart man. But this is likely the most dispiriting assessment of politics in Canada this century. If leadership has been reduced to a question of manhood, then we are even more silly a society than previously imagined. For a good chuckle, turn the question around. How big of a man do we really think Mr. Harper to be? Does anyone believe him to have ever thrown a punch in his life? Perhaps to settle this we should demand our prospective political leaders proactively disclose their penis size.

Awesome.

[For our American readers, the "maybe he should strangle someone" is in reference to this.]

This is what we face

Here is a comment that was put by some "anonymous" reader to this post. I hesitated to publish it, not least because it's cloaked behind the veil of anonymity (i.e. cowardice), but at the same time, it's also vaguely worth posting to make it clear to however few straight readers we have (okay, however few readers we have, period) that this is this stuff we face, every day, even in 2008. So without further ado, our enlightened reader said:

Homosexuality is a perversion of sexuality no different from pedophilia. Homosexuals are obsessed with putting the genitals where they don't belong. It's a sin.

Right and wrong is NOT determined by public opinion nor personal opinion. Homosexuality is wrong and that's a universal, immutable, objective truth.

Well then. At least this guy can spell.

While I could take apart the comment, I'll let its stupidity stand for itself, save to say this: I knew I was gay not because of where I wanted to stick my dick (and trust me, that was very much the LAST thing I ever wanted to do back when I was 15), but because of who I became emotionally attracted to.

Sweden's nefarious master plan

Via LA Times and Wonkette.

When our long national nightmare is over

Look here for solutions. This should be required reading.

When did you choose to be straight?

Teh awesome:



I've always said that those who say it's a choice are those who've never had to make it.

More on Tory lunacy

Mike and an Anon commenter are not as alarmed as I am about Harper's plan to reopen the Constitution to play with Quebec nationalists and win over their votes.

However, the Globe today came out swinging, and I agree:

Even if the Conservatives wish only to string Quebeckers along with vague promises, they risk creating a national melee that would include aboriginals, provinces outside Quebec and various interest groups seeking new powers. It is hubris to think that any government or party can control the terms of this fraught debate. Out of former prime minister Brian Mulroney's failed Meech Lake Accord (1987) and his failed Charlottetown Accord (1992), came the 1995 Quebec referendum in which the sovereigntists fell just a few thousand votes short of a majority. More recently, when Liberal leadership hopeful Michael Ignatieff inflamed nationalist passions not quite two years ago by setting out the elements of future constitutional reform, those emotions inexorably gathered force, a momentum not lost until the House of Commons recognized the "Québécois" as a nation within Canada.

Lawrence Martin is a little more pragmatic, observing (alas, subscription needed) that Quebec dominates political thinking far more than it should:

The PM's Quebec preoccupation is driven by politics, of course. Mr. Harper doesn't see many potential gains toward his majority in the West and so concentrates where he sees the most available seats.

The preoccupation is also driven by the media. Quebec still supplies many of the country's key commentators. The obsessive coverage of Liberal missteps in Quebec, a province that is no longer even close to being the party's bread and butter, is the most recent example. Ontario towers over Quebec as an electoral prize. British Columbia is big and fluid. But they rarely rate a mention.

And notes that this might help the other parties:

Although many in the media have wrongly been predicting the demise of the Bloc Québécois for the past decade, there is a larger possibility this time that it can be overtaken. To do so, Mr. Harper must have his party appear as sympathetic to Quebec nationalism as possible.

It's dangerous, though, pollster Nik Nanos was saying yesterday. It opens the door for the other parties to paint the Conservatives as pandering to separatists. One of these days, even Western Canadians, as docile as they've been, might get exercised over that kind of thing.

So perhaps there is a hidden silver lining. We shall see.

This is madness

This is lunacy. The first paragraph terrifies me. The second proves that the Tories will do anything to win a majority now, no matter what the future consequences.

OTTAWA — The Harper government is telling Quebec that if the Conservatives win a majority in the next election, they will look to reopen the Constitution and give more meaning to their recognition of Quebeckers as a nation.

Emphasizing the Conservative receptiveness to “Quebec's historical demands,” Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn raised the possibility of winning 30 to 40 seats in the province, up from the current 11.

I was a teenager during the Mulroney constitutional wars, and I remember just how divisive special status for Quebec was. I can't imagine it would be any better now.

Harper will bring the country to the verge of ruin just for 4 years with a majority.