I'm quite mad you know.

After stephen (pissing-in-the-closet) harper was found to have won his majority government through election fraud (on an election that was called because of his demonstrated contempt of Parliament) I came up with a ludicrous notion of a campaign to force him to resign and have a new election called to be fought on the basis of respect for parliamentary democracy. It involved establishing the case that harper's right to govern over us was illegitimate; a months-long grassroots, door-to-door/in the streets, public outreach program asking people to join a campaign against harper, to an escalating series of protests, occupations and strikes.

I had this stupid belief that if you're going to ask why people aren't in the streets, "doing something" about harper, then you, yourself, should have a plan that you could suggest people try. Especially if (as it turned out) nobody else was really proposing anything. Obviously, trying to put meaning into the slogan "Educate! Organize! Resist!" was a completely moronic idea and saner heads prevailed. My proposal went nowhere.

[I've just recalled another instance of my pathological compulsion to put meaning into otherwise empty statements! And I blogged about it here but can't seem to find it. If I find it later I'll attach a link right "HERE." Anyway, I was on fazebock and someone posted a link to a news story about a current instance of police brutality in the USA. One of my fazebock frendz commented words very similar to "And the same thing will happen in Canada unless we do something." I asked him what he meant by "do something." He said that well, he wasn't qualified to make suggestions. I told him that as an adult citizen of Canada OF COURSE he was qualified, so what did he suggest? And he essentially said that we should all just keep pointing these things out and then a critical mass will develop and from out of that, SOMEBODY ELSE would suggest an actual plan. And then the problem would be addressed.]

So, as a result of the failure of my shit-for-brains strategy to stand-up against harper and his throrough abusing of our pseudo-democracy, and for a bunch of other asinine reasons (the inability of so many progressives to recognize that people such as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama and Justin Trudeau are monsters) (the way otherwise intelligent people allowed themselves to be swept-up in the utter insanity of "Russia-gate") I've become rather despondent lately.

"His mania for his mad schemes ending in (inevitable) frustration, the patient becomes listless, dissipated."

But, you know, at least I wasn't frothing at the mouth babbling about how the Left should actually DO SOMETHING rather than bloviate when we're faced with a challenge. At least I wasn't letting my delusions of omniscience cloud my mind and prevent me from realizing that petitioning corrupt psychopaths and holding afternoon rallies to DEMAND that our governments of corrupt psychopaths obey us OR ELSE NOTHING!!! really are productive exercises that achieve real results. It's just that I can't see these results and all the lefty-writing I read keeps saying how things are getting worse.

But sadly, I've had a relapse. As you know, Doug Ford got elected as premier of Ontario with a majority government. His election platform was practically non-existent (he'd put beer in corner stores and he'd cut taxes). But, to dispel the paranoid fears of all those centrists and leftwards voters he explicitly promised that nobody (presumably meaning those working for the provincial government) would lose their jobs.

Just like his dearly-departed, shit-for-brains, international laughingstock, homophobic, racist brother Rob had said (in the campaign for mayor of Toronto), Doug Ford essentially said that there were oceans of "gravy" of wasteful provincial spending (including municipal spending paid for with provincial transfers) that could be eliminated, thereby allowing him to provide tax-cuts and while still guaranteeing no cuts to provincial services.

Of course, everybody knew that this was bullshit. Everyone knew that upon becoming premier, Doug would pretend to find BILLIONS more provincial debt than the previous Liberal government had said there was; and that he therefore HAD NO CHOICE but to enact painful cuts. (But, obviously, he would still carry out his tax-cuts because those would spur economic growth ... except that they don't.) And, what makes this even more nauseating is that (as I said above) this all happened with his brother Rob and his yammering about all the "gravy" at Toronto City Hall. Rob Ford paid a bunch of outside consultants to go over the city's accounts and they informed him that there wasn't a lot of waste at all. Maybe he could fire the gardener who watered the plants on city property. Then the city could save about $100,000 and have a bunch of pots filled with dead ferns to show the public, but that was about it. Shamelessly, even though Doug Ford went through this exact same process 8 years ago, he was now imposing this insanity on the province, on Toronto, and every other municipality in Ontario, stupidly babbling about how he'll give them time and outside help to let them balance their budgets.

I could go on about Doug Ford's cruelty and stupidity and the genuine dangers for the future health of the people of Ontario but it's not hard to find other sources that can tell that story. Many of those other sources are written by the same sorts of people who fulminated about stephen harper for nine fucking years without ONCE proposing any serious plan to get rid of him. Even after he was found guilty of contempt of Parliament and exposed as having committed election fraud.

Yes! Yes! You can sense that my madness is consuming me once more! You're right! I'm quite mad you know! I'm convinced that a premier with such a sickening, dangerous agenda, elected by morons on a campaign of stupidity and lies, and who has a disapproval rating of 75%, SHOULD AND CAN be taken down. If only progressives could stir themselves to take steps to do so. Call me crazy. (That's what I'm doing.)

Apparently somebody on Fazebock called for a "general strike" against Doug Ford on May 1st, which was then about a week or two away. (I'm hazy on the timeline but I know it wasn't a great deal of time.) In response, literally thousands of people in cities across the province had their little rallies. Thousands of people! In a province of 13.6 MILLION. Or (to put it another way) 1,000's out of 13,600,000. In other words; "the usual suspects" plus dozens more. I went to a union rally the day before at Queen's Park to "defend" public health care. This "defense" consisted of the usual rigamarole of busing-in thousands of union members who got the day off to stand on the Queen's Park lawn and listen to criticisms of government policies and shout "SHAME!!!" every once in a while for a couple of hours and then, when it's wrapping-up, somebody announces how "We've sent the Premier a message today!" as well as instructing people to take the "struggle" back with them to wherever it is they're going.

As I've been saying for this entire post, I'm so bonkers that I see such obviously productive activism as an almost complete waste of time! And, furthermore, being the megalomaniac that I am, I feel compelled to force my harebrained schemes for doing something else upon innocent fellow progressives since I'm blind to the genuine, focused, strategically brilliant activism going on all around me.

And so, in yet another bout of frenzied, maniacal delusion, I concocted [once again] a plan to go beyond the [inarguably] brilliant strategy of whining on the internet and milling about in peaceful crowds on a public square shouting "SHAME!" for an afternoon.

It should go without saying that the fruits of my labours were stupid and insane. They don't even bear talking about if the subject is serious "resistance" to a dangerous, cruel, deluded government. But since the topic is how mad I am, I'll regale you with the wacky details:

1. Write an "omnibus petition" demanding that Doug Ford cancel his entire agenda of destructive policies
2. Have all the activists all across the province who would ordinarily turn-out for an anti-Ford rally (anti-poverty activists, union activists, parents of autistic children, public transit advocates, environmentalists, etc.,) and have them actually go [in pairs for moral support] to the people (pedestrians on the street/door-to-door to people in their homes) armed with the petition, information about how Doug Ford's policies hurt ordinary Ontarians, and a questionnaire. [Estimate that in Toronto perhaps 3,000 to 5,000 out of 2.7 million people. Hamilton, 300-500 people. Sudbury 100-300. etc.,]
3. The questionnaire will be used to gauge the level of support for action against Doug Ford's agenda, up to and including participation in a province-wide general strike. It also includes circulating the petition themselves among family, friends, co-workers, going door-to-door themselves to try to build a "snowball effect."
4. Have the petition completed by the summer. Ontario has 13.6 million people. It has 10.2 million eligible voters. Ford's disapproval rating is 75%. Imagine the impact of a petition with 6-7 million names calling on Ford to cease and desist?
5. To the extent that Ford tries to ignore the petition conduct protests, occupations, etc., while calling outright for a general strike. 
6. If Ford's response to the petition and the protests is disappointing enough (say, by October), set a date for a general strike. (Perhaps the end of November?) Have people told to wear something signifying their willingness to participate in a general strike. Make it known that employers who punish workers for participating in a general strike will bring down a world of hurt upon themselves. Communicate to the business-class that supports Ford that they should tell their boy to stand-down.
7. Have the general strike. See what happens. 

Now, obviously, I can understand why an ordinary person (like the healthy, well-adjusted ignoramuses I described in my last post) would find this absolutely insane from the get-go. But these stupid fuckers will be found pumping the last drops of gasoline from the pumps into their SUVs to try to flee the apocalypse that global warming will bring to them in a few years. Obviously their first reaction to all of this all at once is going to be a mixture of incomprehension and vague disapproval.

What surprised me (and only because I'm insane and couldn't have known better) is that anti-poverty, pro-labour movement activists would look at my plan and also find it completely ridiculous, without a shred of credibility, rotten nonsense from start-to-finish. You know; so CRAZY that the best response is no response at all. I mean, where to begin? Right? An all-encompassing petition? Going out and talking to people to educate them and find out where they stand? Introducing a concept like a "general strike" and getting as many ordinary people to warm-up to the idea first? What's a sane person supposed to do when faced with such drivel?

Last time (with my anti-harper stupidity) I reached out to groups like the Council of Canadians, precisely because they were NOT fire-breathing socialist radicals, but, rather, the sorts of ordinary, white bread, "respectable" Canadians who make up the bulk of our population that I felt were needed to construct an actual mass-movement. But (besides being insane) I guess my plan was also too militant for such gentle souls. So this time I decided to bring my plan first to a local anti-poverty activist who has decades of experience. He's done lots of good work on issues of housing and benefits for poor people and from his fazebock posts and other writings is a genuine socialist.

So I sent him a simple message saying that I was calling him out of the blue but I wondered if I could have 30 minutes of his time to lay-out a plan to stop Doug Ford. He said sure. Meet next week at this restaurant. Great. The day before the meeting he messages to apologize that he's sick. Can't make it. No problem I say. Get well soon. (From his fazebock activity I got the impression that he wasn't sick but that's probably my insanity talking.) So a week goes by and I message to ask if he's feeling better and can we meet. (I also take the time to explain in greater detail who I am, about my anti-harper ideas and their fate, and why I've reached out to him personally.) He says sure. So we meet and I spew-out the same gibbering insanity I've described above.  He says it sounds good and he'll bring it up to his organization at their next meeting. That's all I could expect from him at that point so I thanked him and said goodbye.

More than a week goes by. I message and ask him if there's been any response to my idea. He tells me the group had just met the day before I spoke to him and meets up every two-weeks. He'll be bringing it up the coming Tuesday. Well, that Tuesday was over a week ago and nothing. I didn't even bother to enquire. As is the point of this post, I'm dimly aware that I'm mad. Quite mad. Starkers. So bonkers that I came up with a political campaign that is so stupid that it should have gone without saying. Obviously I'm too fucked-up to understand exactly WHY it's ridiculous, but I'm able to read the embarrassed silences of others to know that in some way it's totally irredeemable. Total shit, through-and-through. The poor man has wasted enough of his time listening to my ravings. To pester him to the point where he's forced to embarrass me would be cruel.

However, still in the grip of my mania, last week I also emailed a more detailed description of my insanity to someone from the Ontario Federation of Labour, whose job it is to conduct political activism campaigns. (Which, up to this point, consists of the sorts of rallies I describe so disparagingly above.) Obviously, I've heard nothing back from this individual either. I'll give her two weeks. But I'm starting to grasp that the best response to an insane screed from some unbalanced nobody is no response. Because some of these crazies crave attention. And even a negative response will encourage them to continue with their time-wasting drivel.

If only I were a sane man! Then I'd be able to understand why it makes perfect sense to ignore a plan such as mine while at the same time posting on your Fazebock wall stuff like this:

"Boos are not enough. Empty the workplaces and fill the streets."

That was part of a short post referring to Doug Ford getting loud boos when he appeared at the Toronto Raptors Victory Rally.  It was written by the anti-poverty activist who had just blown me off. As I say, if I wasn't a lunatic I'd be able to grasp how getting a core of activists to actually talk to people and plant ideas for a general strike in their heads months ahead of actually trying to conduct one is utter insanity, but posting vague calls-to-arms to your 2,000 followers on Fazebock isn't. If I wasn't so kookoo-bananas I'd be able to understand that the best way to lead a general strike is to tell 2,000 of your friends to immediately leave their place of work and go outside into the streets. (I suppose he meant "right away" because otherwise, ... DAMN! If only I could figure it out!)

The fact of the matter is that, in my desire to understand, I actually commented on his post asking how we could bring that about. (He didn't answer.)

Not long afterwards, (on some political group somebody else signed me up for) another left-wing radical (who is a "friend" of some of my closer Fazebock "frendz") posted the following:

"As the resistance moves to general strike/dual power ..."

In my narcissistic cocoon of half-baked theories and delusions of grandeur, I apparently have been missing the "resistance" and its building momentum not just to an actual general strike, but DUAL POWER!

• Dual Power is both a type of institution and a strategy to change the world. Dual Power means new, independent institutions for people to meet their own needs in ways capitalism and the government can’t or won’t. Unlike nonprofits, where a board of directors (and usually wealthy donors!) makes the decisions, Dual Power institutions are created and controlled by the people they benefit. By developing them, people create a second kind of social, economic, and even political power, separate from government and capitalism. (That’s what the “dual” means, in duality with the current system.) These new community institutions then govern themselves using participatory democracy, which means that everyone plays an active part in decision-making.

Wow! Holy Christ! The Revolution is farther along than I'd realized! Doug Ford's reign of thuggery and error has galvanized Ontario's working class into constructing its own independent institutions of self-government and employment and social programs!

Not being able to grasp the realities that are right in front of me, I asked the gentleman whether it was really true that "the resistance" was going in the direction he said it was. He informed me that "a lot" of people in the labour movement were thinking this way. That the only question was whether we were going to demand that Ford change his policies or that he actually resign. The same thing had happened in the 1990s in the "Days of Action" against Mike Harris. Having participated in the Hamilton and Toronto actions I was aware that the Ontario unions carried out one-day general strikes in cities across Ontario between 1995 and 1998. And that nothing really changed after each one-day strike in one city. Harris stayed in power from 1995-2002.

Between late 1995 and 1998, Ontario unions called eleven "Days of Action" that were, in effect, political strikes against the provincial Conservative government of Mike Harris. The Days of Action were a series of rolling, one-day general strikes in different towns and cites, involving not only unions but also many social movements and community organizations.
Eventually Ontario's unions called hundreds of thousands of workers into the streets, shutting down many private businesses and public agencies, while also holding mass demonstrations and rallies throughout the province. While they did not succeed in bringing down the Conservative government, the strikes did challenge the Conservatives' anti-worker onslaught, and they helped develop a new group of labor and community activists.

Did I tell you about the time I "challenged" Evander Holyfield to a boxing match? My goal was to be the world heavyweight boxing champion. And while I didn't achieve everything I was after (he broke my jaw and knocked me out in the first 5 seconds of the first round) nonetheless, I "challenged" him and more people knew of my existence afterwards than did previously.

Sadly, as a result of my mental afflictions, these Fazebock statements by these two radical dudes appear to me to be stupid, deluded nonsense. As if it is not I who is the insane party, but rather, them. I apparently see things mixed-up and reversed. When Doug Ford is swept from power and the institutions of the working classes' "Dual Power" are up and running (I don't know when that will be because they haven't given me a timeline) perhaps then I'll be able to piece the clues together after the fact and slowly begin to grasp how it all came about.

[I think it needs to be pointed out that these statements were also made in the context of OPSEU's president saying they wouldn't protest at the upcoming "Ford-Fest" because they didn't want to "kick him when he's down." If OPSEU is part of the "resistance" they're obviously in the more conservative wing. Which makes you wonder who is leading the radical "general strike/dual power" wing. Argghh.]

Okay. Sarcasm time over. Lord help me but I can't see that these online yammerings about spontaneous general-strikes and "dual power" are anything other than stupid, childish, deluded nonsense. Gawdammit! I can't bring myself to believe that the Left's continued reliance on petitions and afternoon protests isn't Einstein's definition of insanity: "Doing the same thing over and over and hoping for a different result each time." I'm sorry, but I really don't see how it's insane to go out and talk to people to try to bring them over to your side. Leftists are always complaining about how the corporate media filters out opposing viewpoints. It's obvious from the internet that the mere existence of, and easy access to, Leftist analysis has improved that situation (which is why the oligarchy is trying so hard to block/discredit/smear alternative news sources) but not to a significant enough degree. Well, instead of impotently complaining about that; DO SOMETHING! Take your message directly to the people! And when you do, ... for FUX'S SAKE! ... have a plan for what you want to do with them!

This seems so blindingly obvious that I'm completely at a loss for the smug, stupid, lazy-assed refusal of these other "geniuses" to even want to discuss it.

So there you have it. Last post I talked about how brain structure and life experiences create the fearful, wretched creatures that are "conservatives." As well, I speculated on the mental make-up of apolitical types, saying that maybe their prodigious production of serotonin kept them self-centered, selfish, and incurious of the wider world around them. And, in this post, I appear to be talking about the mental incapability of the last piece of the puzzle: Those who know there's a problem and who want to solve the problem but seem totally incapable of even being able to begin thinking about the realities of HOW to solve the problem.

And all of this navel-gazing has made me think: I'm a pessimist but I'm not a "conservative." I would rather focus on the good things in life. I would rather have a good time. I don't like slasher movies or hospital dramas because the idea of teenagers being mutilated and people dying of disease doesn't entertain me. Nor do I enjoy zombie movies. I'll be dead myself one day. And while I don't want to be venerated I also don't want people to think of me as some potential brain-eating, stinking, rotting monster.

I'm a pessimist. Too many people are optimists. For no reason. Perhaps their fear of the reality of failure is what keeps them from looking seriously at what needs to be done. They sense the job is vast. Perhaps beyond them. So they'd rather content themselves with doing what they've always done. And that includes empty, posturing statements about "revolution" and "general strike" and "the people, united, will never be defeated!" and "hey-hey/ho-ho/[insert-name-here] has got to go!"

I can't escape the impact of politics on my life. But I can remove myself from actually caring about whether things will change. Given the incapacities of the progressive movement I honestly believe we're doomed. I'll continue to write, but just for my own diversion.