Dynasty, s3: Canadian Politics 2018

wish ashton had won :c

Ugh: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-election-campaign-fundraising-party-donations-1.4638698?cmp=rss

As someone who voted for him, I agree that Singh is a little disappointing on KM btw.

I too wish Ashton had won (I voted for her and the lefties I run with endorsed her) but I'm not sure she wouldn't have capitulated on KM

Between this and the fucker who brandished a nazi flag during the May Day protest, I'm pretty pissed at my city right now: http://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/major-neo-nazi-figure-recruiting-in-montreal

One person does not make a city.

Of course, of course. If anything, the response has been exactly as it should. But I'm still a little disappointed.

Also, so long, Amir Khadir, I disliked lot of the posturing during the 2012 student protests and I can't shake the pro-indépendance stance of the party he belonged to but here's to someone who fully believed in equality. Plus you know, being a MPP in Quebec with that name was huge deal for lots of immigrant kids who dreamed of being in politics in 2008. I remember I was having a beer with a bud at Dieu Du Ciel! when he showed up to talk to people, beautiful day, my bud knew him well from the students protests and we discussed Krugman, I was just starting to read on economics and he was so sweet to point me to some directions and authors I would potentially enjoy. Shortly after he started speaking to another group of young students and he told 'you know I come from a country, Iran, that created the most beautiful thing in society', the students were curious to know what it was, he answered 'taxes', I thought that was brillant, and I told him to never say that on television and he laughed real hard.

Sometimes I do feel like the best and brightest and wisest of canadian politics are these unambitious MPPs.

Well put. He will be greatly missed indeed.

published a couple days ago

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/technology/article-canada-facing-brain-drain-as-young-tech-talent-leaves-for-silicon/

Canada’s best and brightest computer engineering graduates are leaving for jobs in Silicon Valley at alarmingly high rates, fuelling a worse “brain drain” than the mass exodus by Canadian doctors two decades ago, according to a new study.

...

(O)ne-in-four recent science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) graduates from three of the country’s top universities – University of Waterloo, University of British Columbia and U of T – were working outside Canada.

The numbers were higher for graduates of computer engineering and computer science (30 per cent), engineering science (27 per cent) and software engineering, where two out three graduates were working outside Canada, mostly in the United States. Nearly 44 per cent of those working abroad were employed as software engineers, with Microsoft, Google, Facebook and Amazon listed as top employers.

...

“When we see certain fields where upward of 65 per cent of a graduating class are leaving for the U.S., I think there should be concerns there that our homegrown companies aren’t even going to be able to access some of that talent. If we found in the 1960s that 60 per cent of our auto workers were leaving to work in other countries … we probably would have held a royal commission.”

...

A separate 2017 survey by students from that year’s graduating class of the University of Waterloo systems design engineering program found that 60 per cent were moving to the United States for work. “There’s a premium on California and New York jobs” among graduating students, said Joey Loi, one of the 2017 survey’s authors, who himself moved to San Francisco to work for Dropbox.

...

surprise, surprise

i remember a couple years ago saying my friends were all moving to the u.s. because they couldn't find work in canada and one ilxor had some deranged comments to say about that -- i don't remember your name unfortunately

but just to clarify, there *are* jobs in canada, but they're all low-paying ones and doing menial tasks, which a lot of people refuse to do, so, yes, they stay unemployed looking for better opportunities. this is what they mean when they say "i can't find work"

also, i was reading this: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/06/opinion/jordan-peterson-canadian-deference.html

and a few things ring true:

Canada is home to many more Jordan Petersons than Justin Trudeaus. Mr. Peterson is — to use one of his favorite terms — something of a national archetype, the default setting of the Canadian male: a dull but stern dad, who, under a facade of apparent normalcy and common sense, conceals a reserve of barely contained hostility toward anyone who might rock the boat. To these types, those who make a fuss are bothersome and ignorant at best, and probably dangerous and destructive too.

...

Canadian conservatism is not brash. It is not belligerent, it is not loud. It is not Fox News. But our most popular columnists all deliver the same message: Things are the way they are for a reason. Those who agitate for change are stepping out of line.

That Jesse Brown thing was so absurd. The dude does some good work at times but wtf when he gets on this shit. I can't imagine the NYT printing something like that about any other country, even written by one of its citizens: picking one infamous person, arguing that he somehow epitomizes the character of the country as a whole, and then 'backing this up' with a bunch of random and cherry-picked incidents from national history, most of which hardly reveal anything unique about Canada.

I'll read the first article but I for one am doing my part to reverse the brain drain trend at the end of the month.

that's fair

for what it's worth, i somehow feel like i am more open minded than vancouverites when i go back, and i attribute this to my living in los angeles so long

it's kind of cliche to say, but there is a "small town mentality" that is still very persistent at least among the people i encounter -- they don't think "big"

and what i mean by that is they deal with things at a much smaller scale (with reason, i understand, because canada has a smaller population), but because of it they miss some important nuances

and of course, fiscally, canada remains a conservative country

That Jesse Brown thing was so absurd. The dude does some good work at times but wtf when he gets on this shit. I can't imagine the NYT printing something like that about any other country, even written by one of its citizens: picking one infamous person, arguing that he somehow epitomizes the character of the country as a whole, and then 'backing this up' with a bunch of random and cherry-picked incidents from national history, most of which hardly reveal anything unique about Canada.

― No purposes. Sounds. (Sund4r), Saturday, May 5, 2018 2:37 PM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I don't even think Peterson is the epitome of Canadian conservatism, he represents an unorganised new faction at best. Also, not exactly sure that there is more 'Petersons than Trudeaus' in Canada, that statement seems out of nowhere and demands statistics. Love Brown too, I support Canadaland on Patreon, he is doing mostly fantastic work and whatnot. Perhaps Brown is the one who epitomizes Canada the best: brillant and sensible man, who from time to time just needs to bash Canada for not being like the US enough. Which ties to the brain drain that's also been discussed.

Also lots of example of idealism over the past 10 years in Canada, starting with Idle No More.

Traditionally, a real Canadian conservative is closer to a pre-brexit british tory than Peterson and his angry rhetoric and his inability to keep calm.

I have the dull face of Harper printed on my eyes from 9 years of him being the head of government + 4 elections, it's going to take more than one book and a social media phenomena to have the archetype of Canadian conservatism to be replaced.

Definitely agree

xp

i mean, if you don't think this describes stephen harper:

a dull but stern dad, who, under a facade of apparent normalcy and common sense, conceals a reserve of barely contained hostility toward anyone who might rock the boat. To these types, those who make a fuss are bothersome and ignorant at best, and probably dangerous and destructive too.

we are clearly living under two different cultures/canadas, because these people are quite common or at least the canadians around me and i have encountered them quite often

I'm unconvinced that that sort of person is exceptionally more common in Canada than in other countries. Except for "Dad", I could make an argument that it describes Hillary Clinton.

And I'm actually unconvinced that it does describe Peterson, although it probably works for Harper. There is nothing contained about his hostility: he is a boat-rocker who talks about his crusade against 'postmodernism' in the language of war.

I don't see how any of the things that Brown points to are evidence of a uniquely Canadian tendency towards deference. Among British settler states, it is the US that is the more exceptional case in having fought a war of independence. The handling of G20 protests was unfortunate and infuriating but I don't see how it was worse than the handling of protests at e.g. the 2004 RNC or the J20 protests. Centrist or right-ish moves on the part of the NDP or Liberals don't seem that different to me from similar moves that have been made by UK Labour or the Democratic party.

Just shared a prediction about tomorrow night's debate with a friend. Either Wynne or Horvath, or both, will bring up Rob at one point, as they should, if you frame it in terms of Doug's reckless verbiage when the story broke--he was slandering journalists left and right, even though he undoubtedly knew the story was true. But Ford will turn it around on them with some well-rehearsed for-shame theatrics, and he'll "win" that part of the debate.

sund4r

i'm not sure if you are disingenuously overlooking the nuances of brown's argument

peterson has a lot of traits of the canadian archetype. not every facet of peterson's personality is a canadian archetype

brown is building an image of a canadian archetype that involves various conservatives, and this includes harper, it could easily include rob ford and doug ford jr.

canada's main economic resources inform our culture: it is an old school, conservative-style way of doing business because it comes from mining resources, where once stability is reached, a bourgeois is created that stays in power and itself creates a conservative culture (you can see it in shows like dragons' den vs shark tank)

i watch and read popular canadian news outlets and most of them sound conservative to me

liberals are conservative

and we had a staunchly conservative government before them

having said that, i think just like in vancouver, i'm going to wager that toronto and montreal have small but thriving pockets of free-thinkers that are mostly found in art and academic circles, but not outside of that -- as in, not in business or management

Yeah the centuries old mission to create a Canadian archetype is doomed.

Brown's argument doesn't seem particularly nuanced to me but tbf I'm unlikely to ever get on board with a piece that tries to argue a sweeping claim that "x is the default setting for the [ nationality][ gender]".

Except for people in the West Island let's be fair.

F#A#oo, I will give you that you seem to at least be attempting to make a more coherent argument than he does. The point about a resource economy is an interesting one. There is a nuanced argument to be made about the differences between Canadian and American conservatism owing to Canada's inheritance of British Toryism (including Red Toryism) and roots in United Empire Loyalism. More generally, the combination of a constitutional monarchy and Westminster Parliament with decentralized federalism, of American Loyalists and a virtually abandoned francophone colony, probably has produced a unique political culture but I don't think it breaks down to what Brown seems to be breaking it down to (and "more Petersons than Trudeaus" really needs more support, as VHS said). Our major print news outlets do all mostly tend to the right, except for the Toronto Star, mainly because of Postmedia's stranglehold on ownership. I don't think there's a sensible case to be made that, overall, Canada is a more right-wing country than the US (or most of the anglosphere) if that's what you're saying.

the thing about this, and why i'm so open to others' views, is that there is a very personal feel to this

meaning, i speak from my own, yet limited, experience, and i think brown does, as well

and while i actually would love to have the stats and numbers, i think because of the type of canadian identity that is exported and sold to the rest of the world (the nice, progressive canadian), those types of numbers are difficult to come by, so for all we know i may be full of it

the reason for this is like you say, there is a stranglehold and information is undoubtedly less accessible in canada than in the us (i would be surprised if you disagreed with me on this), because of the oligopoly and almost monopoly the government holds on a lot of industries

but i am a little paranoid and generally do not trust government to act in the best interest of canadians

so because of this, i look to voting trends, but ya, it's all good

ON debate off to a start. Some surprising enthusiasm for Horwath.

This is my first real exposure to Horvath. (Sorry--it takes an election to rouse me into paying attention.) First impression, very good. Ford, meanwhile, struggles to string together a few sentences.

Politicians never stay within the time limits during a debate--except Ford. They've got him programmed well: "They're gonna give you 45 seconds to answer, Dougie. Don't ever, ever, ever use more than 30 of them."

Is anyone else experiencing issues with the stream at http://toronto.citynews.ca/cityvote-the-debate/? Is it because I'm in the US?

"'Six Million Dollar Man,' Doug--just keep saying 'Six Million Dollar Man.'"

Ha, Horwath seems to be doing better than Wynne so far and is starting to persuade me. Ford makes no sense half the time and, depressingly, people still seem to favour him. Horwath's question, m/l, "be upfront, what are you going to cut?" was v good imo.

She framed it really well with the comparison to Harris and Hudak.

OTM

Man, he has trouble with this whole hand-motion/talking coordination.

Can't watch this right now but GO ANDREA FFS

Wow, the three post-mortem commentators all liked Horwath best.

Except for the guy talking now, who's saying Ford won because he didn't accidentally say he was going to kill every fourth new-born during his first 100 days. I take his point, but Horvath was far and away the best.

Yeah, I'm seriously considering voting NDP now. If so, it will be the first time since 1999 that I do so provincially, although I've voted NDP federally in every election since 1997.

do it! do it!

i mean, this is an ABF election

Well, the PCs won't win my riding, regardless. (I was going to say "Ottawa Centre will elect a Tory when Massachusetts votes for a Republican Presidential candidate" but, actually, the latter has happened more recently than the former.)

Oh National Post...

http://i1091.photobucket.com/albums/i389/cryptosicko/IMG_0996_zpsvkpcveat.jpg?t=1525717360

http://i1091.photobucket.com/albums/i389/cryptosicko/IMG_0996_zpsvkpcveat.jpg?t=1525717360

lol

trying to figure out which local trot is running the ONDP twitter

Chariot of the Proletariat 🔥🔥🔥 pic.twitter.com/xy9v0dnf8n

— Ontario NDP (@OntarioNDP) May 9, 2018

in other local developments, guess who's a fucking moron

Here’s the link https://t.co/uTNW9UaKug

— Jason Chapman (@_JasonChapman) May 9, 2018

why are they asking trump about ontario politics