Drifting Towards Oblivion

I really don't know what's going to happen. Humanity (coerced or duped by our elites) is determined to continue along the path to ecological Armageddon. One of the worst offenders was Canada's stephen harper government. And now he's got a majority government. Extra-parliamentary protest is a sad joke. Tiny bands of the already converted unite to shout something for an afternoon and if the numbers get anywhere serious, highly-paid pigs are available to smash their skulls in.

The political awareness in this country is a joke. Except for the fact that the NDP, under the radar, appears to be gaining strength. The desperate economic climate, the naked amount of class warfare in this country (instigated by those at the top) must be having some sort of impact on the attitudes of Canadians, far from the editorial boards of the mainstream media, where whole departments are dedicated to providing "Lifestyle" news to the most affluent 30% of the population, besides blathering yet again for Canadians to be "patient" as the "progress" continues in Afghanistan.

Of course, the NDP, being what it is, will probably reinvent itself into some version of the Liberal Party. (Indeed, some people are arguing that this "pragmatism" is just what the NDP needs, and that those fools who made it a "religion" are going to be disappointed as the party leadership "matures." The possibility that we might have to thank those "fools" and their struggling to keep the NDP as true to their principles as it remains, for attracting voters away from the unprincipled Liberals doesn't even occur to them.)

I'm simply at a loss. In the 3-d world, I have, over the past month or so, tried to reach out to other groups to come together and discuss possibilities for resistance, only to be met with silence. (Or derision, as "left-wing" political groups turn out to be anti-union, anti-protester, pro-business, middle class dweebs.) I haven't bothered with my local NDP riding association since two e-mails asking for a group meeting or online discussion in order to send a message to the party leadership have been met with silence. I'm not surprised that I'm expected to be a source of funds for the party and not so much a source of ideas. I am surprised at the depths of irrelevance of party membership though.

The reason I spend time in politics is because our present path is the path to species suicide, with social-economic meltdown as the appetizer. I have no illusions that had I dedicated my life to earning money (within the limits of my patience) that I would have amassed enough to insulate me from the uncertainty of late capitalism. If things are going to be made stable and whole for ordinary people, it is going to have to come from politics, not the capitalist marketplace.

Right now though, politics seems as barren a field as the job market.

Gotta Love That Ayn Rand!

The rest of the article is important too, but ya gotta love this!

The Right’s priorities hit home at a town hall meeting held by Rep. Rob Woodall, R-Georgia, when he chastised one of his constituents who worried that Ryan’s plan would leave Americans like her, whose employer doesn’t extend health benefits to retirees, out of luck.

“Hear yourself, ma’am. Hear yourself,” Woodall lectured the woman. “You want the government to take care of you, because your employer decided not to take care of you. My question is, ‘When do I decide I’m going to take care of me?’”

However, another constituent noted that Woodall accepted government-paid-for health insurance for himself.

“You are not obligated to take that if you don’t want to,” the woman said. “Why aren’t you going out on the free market in the state where you’re a resident and buy your own health care? Be an example. …

“Go and get it in a single-subscriber plan, like you want everybody else to have, because you want to end employer-sponsored health plans and government-sponsored health plans. … Decline the government health plan and go to Blue Cross/Blue Shield or whoever, and get one for yourself and see how tough it is.”

Woodall answered that he was taking his government health insurance “because it’s free. It’s because it’s free.”

Self-reliance, it seems, is easier to preach to others than to practice yourself.

Woodall’s explanation recalled the hypocrisy of free-market heroine Ayn Rand, whom Rep. Ryan has cited as his political inspiration. In her influential writings, Rand ranted against social programs that enabled the “parasites” among the middle-class and the poor to sap the strength from the admirable rich, but she secretly accepted the benefits of Medicare after she was diagnosed with lung cancer.

A two-pack-a-day smoker, Rand had denied the medical science about the dangers of cigarettes, much as her acolytes today reject the science of global warming. However, when she developed lung cancer, she connived to have Evva Pryor, an employee of Rand’s law firm, arrange Social Security and Medicare benefits for Ann O’Connor, Ayn Rand using her husband’s last name.

In 100 Voices: An Oral History of Ayn Rand, Scott McConnell, founder of the Ayn Rand Institute’s media department, quoted Pryor as saying: “Doctors cost a lot more money than books earn and she could be totally wiped out.”

So, when push came to shove, even Ayn Rand wasn’t above getting help from the “despised government.” However, her followers, including Rep. Ryan, now want to strip those guaranteed benefits from other Americans of more modest means than Ayn Rand.

It seems it’s okay for average Americans to be wiped out.

Just when you think that you can't be surprised!

ETA: Ayn Rand accepting medicare is disputed. That she received social security payments isn't disputed by anyone, and I don't find that to have been hypocritical, as she could say she was reclaiming what had been taken from her against her will earlier.

Um, Vic Toews? You might want to "re-think" that one.

I put re-think in quotation marks because Vic Toews has got shit for fucking brains and I highly doubt that he "thinks" about much of anything.

But here and here, Toews and his fellow harpercon scum are seen justifying removing Canadian Forces from helping with the clean-up after a Quebec flood, NOT apparently as punishment for Quebec voters having rejected harpercon villainy, but because they're worried that they'll displace private sector service providers inspired by the idea of profiting from their misfortune.

Furthermore, the services you're asking for -- if they were authorized -- would place the Canadian Forces in competition with the private sector, at the local or provincial level, which could perform this type of repair work.

Ah! But Vic! Doesn't the same logic justify having all our work in Afghanistan carried out by mercenaries and private prison contractors? Why should we deprive mercenaries of a chance to make a buck out of some misplaced devotion to archaic ideas about who should fight wars on the taxpayers' dime?

Toronto Should Support Toronto Pride

It's great publicity for the city.

Kids don't walk down the hallway in highschool and get hissed at: "HETERO!!!" and then have to run for their lives.

A celebration of human rights shouldn't have to rely on corporate funding like the frikken' Santa Claus parade.

"Slut Walk" reflections of a 40-something white guy

So, I was sitting down having a conversation with (seriously) one of the most beautiful women in the world, and she asked me my thoughts on "Slut Walk" and I said it was a good thing.

Because I have a soft spot in my heart for sluts. For me it's a term of endearment. Sure, sluts might be carrying something, ... sometimes they catch these things from people who really aren't sluts, because STDs are the luck of the draw and not divine punishment for having a strong sexual appetite.

And besides, if you don't want to catch something from a slut (not that all sluts are carrying STDs anyway), then don't fuck a slut.

But all that is neither here nor there. We're also talking about "dressing like a slut." As in, ... that'll get you raped.

I'll tell you all something. No means "NO." And I'll tell you something else: One time I was walking home from a party (a drunken early-20's) and I was begging this jeune-fille to let me fuck her when we got to her place and she kept saying "no" and when we got to her place and I dutifully took my place on the couch I gave her a kiss on the forehead and she looked at me with this surprised look on her face, that that was really the end of it. But she'd told me "no" at least half a dozen times so it was "no."

Another gal, ... same story, but she seemed sober (I don't know, I was quite drunk and I'd met her and some friends at an all-nite coffee shop and she seemed sober enough to drive) so she drove me home and I still wanted to talk, so even though she'd told me "no" I asked her in for a night-cap (this is the 1980s when "none for the road" was a revolutionary concept) and we talked and drank for about an hour until i was too tired and drunk for anything and i said "Well, i'm about ready to collapse and I guess you'll want to get going" and she looked at me mystified.

Thing is, "No" means no.

Because listen guys. What if I only drunkenly imagined those looks of confusion? What if the sober reality is that neither of those young women wanted to have sex after all? The weaker party, in a just world, should always be free to change their minds. And those in a position to force their wills should, in a just world, always defer to their opposites as equals. Because that's what the stronger would want for themselves should they find themselves in a position where they are the weaker party.

I'm glad that I erred on the side of caution in those instances. I'm glad that I didn't allow some stupid drunken delusion lead me to committing a crime I would forever regret.

Because if your step-daughter is sitting on your couch watching tv and she looks really attractive in her youth and femininity, ... she's not asking you, her step-father, to rape her.

If you brow-beat some drunken female into submitting to you and she lies there crying and coming in and out of consciousness, ... you're not having sex with her, ... you're raping her.

And, it's like this: If some woman happens to have a nice set of curves and she likes some attention now and then, or if she wants to attract a guy at a dance-club and then PICK one of the guys she's attracted, ... or shit, even if she wants to drive guys crazy and go home, ... none of that is any reason to assault her.

Personally, as I've said, I like sluts. They make me feel kindly. I would rue the day if all the stupid rapists in the world convinced all the women who wanted to dress like sluts to not dress like sluts.

But hey. Isn't reality the way it is whether we like it or not? Aren't there sexist creeps out there who will take some mini-dress and high-heels as a sign saying "Rape Me"?

Well, yes. But here's the thing: If a guy goes out jogging at 10pm. is he asking to be held down and fucked up the ass and then get his throat slit so he won't be able to tell anybody about what just happened?

No?

So, why should women have to live their lives according to the whims of scumbag losers?

Because, when people talk about women reducing their chances of being raped, ... they often just leave it at that, ... as if there's no further work to be done. As if telling women to accommodate sexism is enough.

Because that's what it is, ... sexism. The idea that the female gender is inferior to you, ... that you can impose yourself upon it, ... , that it doesn't matter, ... that they're all "sluts" or whatever, ... that they deserve it, ... that YOU deserve them, ... etc., etc., ... it's SEXISM that makes guys rape women. (I disagree with feminists who say it's about power, not sex, ... I think it's the male desire for sex, and wishing to have the power to be able to take it regardless of the other person's feelings, ... although i'm no expert on the mindsets of rapists, so I'll leave it at that.)

So, ordinary folks who say, "Don't dress like a slut, because ..." might not be validating rape, but they're enabling it, because they leave it at that. They leave it to innocent women to accommodate rapists.

But when cops do it ... it's worse. In the same way that somebody at a restaurant can make a racist slur, but if the waiter does it, ... that's discrimination. Cops don't get to say to wealthy people who've been burgled, ... "What did you expect? Ostentatious home. Three car garage. Ferrari in the driveway. You're asking for it!"

The law says: "Don't break into people's homes and steal their shit." END OF STORY.

The law says: "Don't hold somebody down and physically assault them." ALSO END OF STORY.

So, when cops say "Don't dress like a slut," ... they're totally giving out the wrong signal.

Women have their own individual sexualities. End of story. Whatever they do with it, ... it's NEVER an invitation for you, or any other creep who gets the idea into his stupid head, ... to impose yourself into their life and scar them with memories of your sick, stupid, violent, twisted, loserdom forever.

The Status Quo

Okay. Let me see if I've got this straight: Me and all the other Canadian leftists that I know, ... ALL of us, share the following principles ...

We're "Stalinists." Which is to say that we advocate locking-up our political enemies and then executing them, with or without the benefit of a show trial. This is because ... I don't know really, I'll need someone to explain it to me.

We're also "fascists" because fascism and Stalinism are two sides of the same leftist, authoritarian coin. This is because fascism is a movement of the left. This is because ALL leftists believe in worshipping the collective over the individual.

It stands to reason, then, that all rightists are champions of the individual. Unless, and until, all individuals are free from any obligations to any society anywhere, ... unless every individual is free to do anything but break a business contract (and the only power the state must have is to be able to enforce contracts between consenting individuals), we are not truly free.

The right-wing is about individual freedom.

Except that the roots of "conservatism" are in the protection of ancient cultural traditions, which are not to be lightly discarded.This is the conservatism of Edmund Burke, who, besides recognizing the powerful importance of tradition in maintaining the peaceful social order, regarded the masses as "the swinish multitude." The traditions that Burke and others upheld were based on the feudal past, of rigid hierarchy and religion.

So, there's a disconnect between present-day conservatives (who are now some variant of 19th Century liberals) and the roots of their own political organizations.

But anyway, the Conservative Party of Canada is the best guarantor of individual freedom for Canadians, and the Liberal Party of Canada is really a close second, given the impotence of its "progressive" left-wing.

Both parties would also be the champions of democracy against the inherent "Stalinism" of the NDP and its supporters, with the Conservatives, once again, being the best defenders of democracy (within the limits of a democracy that is restrained by a respect for individual rights a-la 19th Century liberalism as enshrined by the 20th Century Liberal liberal Pierre Trudeau's Charter of Rights and Freedoms).

Furthermore, it is the Conservative Party that should naturally be the best defender of our Westminster system of parliamentary government.

Have I got that right?

Because it's all a little confusing. What with the fact that it's the mainstream, respectable, Conservatives, Liberals, Republicans, and Democrats who believe in locking people up without charges, indefinitely.

It's the Conservatives who have recently trampled all over the basics of Westminster-style parliamentary democracy; shutting down Parliament to avoid a vote of non-confidence, and again, to avoid handing over evidence to establish whether the government is complicit in the war crime of torture.

It's the Conservatives whose last outrage is to refuse to divulge the cost estimates of their policy proposals, prepared by state bureaucrats paid by the taxpayers.

It's the Conservatives and the Republicans who want to impose their perverted religious values on all of us, and who seek the freedom to start wars without any oversight. (Actually, given Obama's blatantly illegal aggression in Libya, and the Liberals conniving with the Conservatives to avoid any debate when extending our occupation of Afghanistan, it appears that neither mainstream party has a monopoly on lawless, arbitrary war-making.)

Anyway, ...

Democracy is supposed to be better than this ...

... by this point anyways.

That is all.

I am S-OOOOOOO disappointed with "Canada" these days.