Don't blame me, I'm voting Rhino
Hi, hello, I have been a little quiet lately. But I'm here! Around, reading and pootling around the internet and finding strange things.
I have new windows in my apartment! They're nice. They all open and you can tip them in to clean the outside. :D
The weather has been gloooooooooorious these last couple days, intermittent thunderstorms excepted. 20 degrees, how I missed thee. Yesterday afternoon, I made pu my own "Yay, spring is here!" cocktail out of the stuff I had to hand: 1 oz. vodka, 1 oz. peach schnapps, juice of one blood orange, two small scoops lemon sorbet, handful of raspberries. NOM.
A lot of my (non-grad-school-related) attention is focused on the current election. A couple weeks ago the government was toppled in a confidence vote and Parliament was dissolved, kicking off a six-week campaign. The Conservatives were found, for the first time in the history of the whole freaking Commonwealth, to have lied to the House and were in contempt of Parliament. This is the party and candidate (Stephen Harper) who campaigned on a promise of transparency and accountability, but who have stifled hostile governmental committees, refused to submit to audit, had Parliament freaking prorogued in the middle of the global economic implosion rather than face a confidence vote, stalled climate science funding, made vast military spending plans without a bidding period, stacked the unelected Senate (which Harper promised to get rid of since he hates the Upper Chamber so much), altered signed documents, misquoted the Auditor General (the most trusted public servant in the country) to make it sound as if she had found their spending of $1.2 billion on the G8/20 summits to be above-board, and now, on the campaign trail, Stephen Harper will only answer 5 questions about his platform, and will not allow dissenting students at his events.
And this is just what I hear about through the CBC.
And yet, they are still polling close to 40%. That's enough to win them another gd minority. Am I living in the twilight zone, here?
I blame old people.
A VAST part of the problem is that the left is divided among four parties (if you count the Liberals as left, which is questionable sometimes.) But anyway, if the Bloc Quebecois would just go away, we'd be in business. Maybe Video Professor Jack Layton and the NDP could form the official opposition sometime. I'd like that. Or if Harper didn't have his voting base convinced that coalitions are Evil and not allowed in multi-party systems. Uh. The other problem is Single Member Plurality, or First Past The Post. It's not representational. 1 million people voted in 2008 for the Green Party, and they won no seats. 1.4 million people voted for the Bloc Quebecois (federal separatist party; yeah we know), and they got 49 seats. Total BS.
And the stupid part is, the BQ's Gilles Duceppe is the most honest party leader out there., That guy only has to campaign in one province, and wins there all the time, so he just doesn't give a shit. He'll call out anybody. Too bad he's a sovereigntist. If it were the Bloc Canadien, I might vote for the guy.
As it is, the Liberals or the NDP are my options. I like the Green Party okay, but the don't wow me and they have a snowball's chance of winning in my stupid blue riding. I'm kind of leaning towards Ignatieff. I like his "bitch, please" response to Harper's attack ads re: Ignatieff having lived outside of Canada. The man was teaching at Cambridge and Harvard, Stephen, that's not a legitimate enough reason to be an expat? Your problem sounds like anti-intellectualism.
Anyway. I am so fucking sick of Lord Sweatervest and his BS. I want him GONE.
I may just vote NeoRhino. They support higher education through building taller schools, which I can beleive in. Also, I feel Misha Collins would support this choice.
Speaking of: Misha Collins faked an orgasm in front of a con audience and Jensen.. Yeah, you read that right.
I may have died a little. I would die completely, if I could manage to watch it all the way through without being overcome with contact embarrassment.
Actors, you guys. I don't even.
(This video of a girl post-wisdom-teeth-extraction also hilaritized me, but it's awful hard to follow the other thing.)
I have new windows in my apartment! They're nice. They all open and you can tip them in to clean the outside. :D
The weather has been gloooooooooorious these last couple days, intermittent thunderstorms excepted. 20 degrees, how I missed thee. Yesterday afternoon, I made pu my own "Yay, spring is here!" cocktail out of the stuff I had to hand: 1 oz. vodka, 1 oz. peach schnapps, juice of one blood orange, two small scoops lemon sorbet, handful of raspberries. NOM.
A lot of my (non-grad-school-related) attention is focused on the current election. A couple weeks ago the government was toppled in a confidence vote and Parliament was dissolved, kicking off a six-week campaign. The Conservatives were found, for the first time in the history of the whole freaking Commonwealth, to have lied to the House and were in contempt of Parliament. This is the party and candidate (Stephen Harper) who campaigned on a promise of transparency and accountability, but who have stifled hostile governmental committees, refused to submit to audit, had Parliament freaking prorogued in the middle of the global economic implosion rather than face a confidence vote, stalled climate science funding, made vast military spending plans without a bidding period, stacked the unelected Senate (which Harper promised to get rid of since he hates the Upper Chamber so much), altered signed documents, misquoted the Auditor General (the most trusted public servant in the country) to make it sound as if she had found their spending of $1.2 billion on the G8/20 summits to be above-board, and now, on the campaign trail, Stephen Harper will only answer 5 questions about his platform, and will not allow dissenting students at his events.
And this is just what I hear about through the CBC.
And yet, they are still polling close to 40%. That's enough to win them another gd minority. Am I living in the twilight zone, here?
I blame old people.
A VAST part of the problem is that the left is divided among four parties (if you count the Liberals as left, which is questionable sometimes.) But anyway, if the Bloc Quebecois would just go away, we'd be in business. Maybe Video Professor Jack Layton and the NDP could form the official opposition sometime. I'd like that. Or if Harper didn't have his voting base convinced that coalitions are Evil and not allowed in multi-party systems. Uh. The other problem is Single Member Plurality, or First Past The Post. It's not representational. 1 million people voted in 2008 for the Green Party, and they won no seats. 1.4 million people voted for the Bloc Quebecois (federal separatist party; yeah we know), and they got 49 seats. Total BS.
And the stupid part is, the BQ's Gilles Duceppe is the most honest party leader out there., That guy only has to campaign in one province, and wins there all the time, so he just doesn't give a shit. He'll call out anybody. Too bad he's a sovereigntist. If it were the Bloc Canadien, I might vote for the guy.
As it is, the Liberals or the NDP are my options. I like the Green Party okay, but the don't wow me and they have a snowball's chance of winning in my stupid blue riding. I'm kind of leaning towards Ignatieff. I like his "bitch, please" response to Harper's attack ads re: Ignatieff having lived outside of Canada. The man was teaching at Cambridge and Harvard, Stephen, that's not a legitimate enough reason to be an expat? Your problem sounds like anti-intellectualism.
Anyway. I am so fucking sick of Lord Sweatervest and his BS. I want him GONE.
I may just vote NeoRhino. They support higher education through building taller schools, which I can beleive in. Also, I feel Misha Collins would support this choice.
Speaking of: Misha Collins faked an orgasm in front of a con audience and Jensen.. Yeah, you read that right.
Click to viewI may have died a little. I would die completely, if I could manage to watch it all the way through without being overcome with contact embarrassment.
Actors, you guys. I don't even.
(This video of a girl post-wisdom-teeth-extraction also hilaritized me, but it's awful hard to follow the other thing.)