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466

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2022

« on: January 19, 2022, 05:54:23 PM »

Personal politics in Alberta: the Justice Minister of Alberta has been asked to take leave after CBC reporters revealed he called Edmonton's chief of police in 2021 to discuss that he had been ticketed for distracted driving https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-minister-of-justice-jason-kenney-1.6318678 and anti-vaxer former Calgary mayoral candidate Kevin J. Johnson fled the country for Montana before being arrested by American police and sent back https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/kevin-johnston-released-bail-unlawful-at-large-calgary-edmonton-1.6319660 He is also facing jail time in Ontario. 

The minister, who is black, says he called because he was concerned that he had been racially profiled.

"In the last year, (former mayoral candidate) Johnston has been convicted of hate crimes, three counts of contempt, criminal harassment of an AHS employee and causing a disturbance at a downtown Calgary mall when he refused to wear a mask."

Oh, and a woman in Ontario was abducted by unknown parties in police gear claiming to be police https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-suspects-who-abducted-woman-in-wasaga-beach-ont-claimed-to-be-police-2/

467

History, Science, and Interesting Information - The Great Library / Re: History yays

« on: January 18, 2022, 03:53:07 AM »

Tod the cutler and Matt Easton have some fun with a video playing around with javelins with throwing-loop (Latin amentum, Classical Greek ankylē), fletched javelins, and Late Roman lead-weighted war darts (plumbatae) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSIrR0Jo09Y

468

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2022

« on: January 15, 2022, 06:48:24 AM »

Systems collapse is politics/government-adjacent.  In the last few months, many suppliers overseas stopped shipping to Canada or started charging ridiculous fees like CAD 55 for a 5 x 5 x 30 cm low-value, slow package.  The destruction of local highways by flooding obviously delays things but "slow" is not the same as "not shipping at all."  And yet some orders from the UK are relatively normal-priced.

Does anyone know of anything recent on the state of supply chains?  Many of the ones I saw were focused on the state of ports and trucking in California, and then omicron came.  The US Postal Service does not seem to have raised its rates.

469

History, Science, and Interesting Information - The Great Library / Re: History yays

« on: January 02, 2022, 06:17:59 PM »

Some historians have finally come out with a response to Pinker's Better Angels: The Darker Angels of our Nature  I hope they picked 17 quantitative thinkers, some of the reviews did not focus on Pinker's many empirical, epistemological, and logical fails but on nonsense like "well, have you considered that because of population growth the absolute numbers of deaths are increasing?"

The dramatic decline in violence is obviously correct, but Pinker is not competent to show it.

470

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Canadian Politics 2022

« on: January 01, 2022, 11:21:27 PM »

This is a placeholder for a new politics thread!  This year there will be a provincial election in Ontario under their new fixed-term elections act.  Federally, we have all the issues which Justin Trudeau said he wanted to deal with in 2015 and then found would annoy powerful people to actually change, plus the pandemic, extreme weather which is straining provincial resources, a protectionist United States government, a genocidal and slightly less peaceful than usual Chinese government, and the fallout from the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban.

Edit: oh, and the latest attempt to end the culture of sexual harrassment in the Canadian Armed Forces

People who like personal politics suspect that Justin Trudeau will resign circa 2023 to give the party time to align behind and publicize a new leader, but its really not clear who would replace him other than finance minister and deputy PM Chrystia Freeland.

471

History, Science, and Interesting Information - The Great Library / Re: History yays

« on: December 29, 2021, 05:06:19 AM »

For Jubal: wife-and-husband team Digital Hammurabi has a chat with an Egyptologist about a new game called Assassin's Creed: Origins https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AG5NmoA3rYo (he liked it)  They also have an interview with Bart Ehrman on textual criticism of the New Testament https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MtfAJsbqLA

472

General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up VII - New Year, Same Plague, Same Booze Up

« on: December 29, 2021, 04:19:10 AM »

Correction: I am working on the 31st not the 29th, but I am seeing a friend tomorrow so if I can drop in it will only be for a few minutes.

473

General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up VII - New Year, Same Plague, Same Booze Up

« on: December 27, 2021, 02:42:48 AM »

Unfortunately I am working on the 29th.  Fortunately I will be earning money on the 29th after 3 years of unemployment! 

474

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: UK politics: Post-Brexit edition

« on: December 18, 2021, 01:26:52 AM »

It occurs to me that the Tory Christmas Party Scandal is a lot like the scandal in Alberta where several MPs spent the end of 2020 on vacation somewhere warm after telling their constituents to stay home this year?  Hypocrasy tends to annoy people who otherwise don't pay attention to government.

What does "throwing the kitchen sink" at a riding look like in a small-party, UK context?

475

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2021

« on: December 15, 2021, 03:43:51 AM »

Former Wildrose Party head Brian Jean has become a United Conservative Party candidate, and just told a reporter that Jason Kenney must step down https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/brian-jean-gunning-to-replace-alberta-premier-kenney-1.6285753 As in the UK Conservatives, I think there are forces within the party who want to sacrifice the leader to keep the scam going.  But I don't know that changing leaders could keep the UCP in government in Alberta, especially since there is a large faction within the United Conservative Party which does not want public health measures to contain the pandemic.  And without public health measures, everything continues to get worse and the reality-based community votes the government out.

476

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2021

« on: December 10, 2021, 06:39:38 AM »

Some internal squabbles: three UCP MLAs in Alberta voted against their party's bill to loosen up the laws governing party memberships and finances while a former Progressive Conservative MP publishes an op-ed calling Kenny's faction of the United Conservative Party "republicans".  I think a lot of the animus from the right against the PCs was because they were seen as selfish and slow-moving, not abstract ideological differences.  So a binary split like that is not very good analysis, but its a powerful political weapon (traditional Canadian conservatives versus a new foreign import).

Edit: The Ceeb has a summary of Alberta Bill 81, which also has clauses restricting union criticism of government policy and loosening the tight rules for political donations which the NDP introduced https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/albertans-should-be-taking-notice-of-bill-81-here-s-why-1.6280351

And Laurentian University in Ontario, which suddenly declared insolvency and is firing tenured faculty and shutting programs, is fighting the legislature's demand to turn over financial documents about how it became insolvent.  Since the legislature has police forces and the uni does not, and Laurentian is a public university, its hard to see how this could end well for the board of directors.  The legal form they are using is called a speaker’s warrant.

What about straight-to-gay conversion therapy?

s/ they are saving that for the aftermath of the next snap election in 2022 /s

477

History, Science, and Interesting Information - The Great Library / Re: History yays

« on: December 06, 2021, 09:25:50 PM »

Dr. Dirk Obbink has not responded to the summons in the USA, so Holiday Lobby now has the right to claim USD 7m from him.  Unfortunately, that means that there will not be a trial in a country where Oxford can't sweep uncomfortable revelations under the rug (he may still face trial in the UK). https://brentnongbri.com/2021/12/03/update-on-hobby-lobby-vs-obbink-case/ I want to know who swindled him out of the money he was paid for selling other people's papyri, and where the other missing papyri are.

478

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2021

« on: December 05, 2021, 05:03:22 PM »

The big US bill contains a clause supporting electric and hybrid vehicle production in unionized shops in the USA.  That would hurt car plants in Ontario, and so gets a lot of attention in Ottawa.  https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/canada-blitz-washington-evs-1.6271842

The new parliament opened by passing a ban on gay-to-straight conversion therapy as a kind of multi-party icebreaker.  We will see what happens when more contentious bills come up.

The Green Party of Canada are considering closing their newly-unionized national office to reduce costs as they approach bankruptcy.

479

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: US Politics 2021

« on: December 01, 2021, 03:17:18 AM »

Since there is a lot of talk about the US revenge killings in Afghanistan after the fall of Kabul, its worth saying that according to https://airwars.org/conflict-data the US has quietly ended its murder campaigns in West Asia and North Africa.  That is a good example of an administration making the world better in the ways it can do by just refusing to give permission to do bad things (versus the things which require new laws or institutional reform which take longer).  The drone strikes began under Bush II and continued under Obama and the previous president, so there was a lot of bureaucratic momentum behind them.

480

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2021

« on: November 28, 2021, 05:16:56 PM »

The US has doubled its tariff on Canadian softwood lumber to 17.9%.  This tarriff goes back to the 1990s, and every time the US loses in court and just launches another appeal or carries on regardless.  I am bemused by the kind of US person who intones solemnly about the "rules-based international order" when the US does what it likes just like any other hegemon.

The Trudeau government will be fighting a lawsuit against the RCMP for its misogyny and/or racism and/or culture of immunity for bullies.  The RCMP is a paramilitary organization which reinvented itself after the Winnipeg General Strike in 1919 for domestic intelligence (spying on lefties and commies).  It lost most of its intelligence roles in the 1980s after scandals in the 1970s. So it has many cultural issues similar to those of the Canadian Forces, with an additional dose of false pride (RCMP cadets are indoctrinated that they are the best police force in Canada, if not the world).  This, and the continued use of the RCMP to arrest indigenous people blocking corporate incursions into their territory, is another good example of how 2015-Trudeau's feminist and pro-indigenous language did not lead to fundamental shifts in policy.