On the DEWLine 2.0: Dwight Williams

Night of contrasts: as white supremacists are trying to frame honest protestors across the USA for looting and vandalism, we also had the Crew Dragon launch today and the 2020 Nebula Awards are being handed out via streaming video. Surreal. Hope, fear and anger all at once in my heart and mind right now.

...and in this case, it's an equally old version of Opera. You've already seen the issues that the website has with Firefox versions 48 and 72 on my Mac.

AKA Vice-President Mike Pence.

I'm looking at this item from The Guardian about his visit to Ireland and how he treated the metaphorical carpet while he was there. (Hint: it wasn't a thing that a polite guest willingly does to a carpet.)

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/sep/05/mike-pence-ireland-shat-on-the-carpet

One of the Guardian article's sources, if you're interested:

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/miriam-lord-how-mike-pence-shat-on-the-new-carpet-in-ireland-s-spare-room-1.4006979

(Clearly, some news services in Ireland and the UK have their own opinions on newspaper headline language that differ from the Canadian Press Stylebook!)

Meanwhile, there's a story on Twitter about Iceland's response to their own visit from the Theocrat in Waiting:

https://twitter.com/Heklina/status/1169307235098533888

And I am reminded that Ottawa's own mayor just "came out" himself two weekends ago. If Pence does visit us again, maybe we take a page from the Icelandic playbook?

Thanks to "Budgie" Barnett for having pointed the Icelandic angle.

Are we ever going to be able to tell our own journalism success stories in movie form in Canada?

I'm betting that Canadian libel/slander case law will still say "NO".

Asking because I remember getting my time and money's worth from Spotlight and Good Night, and Good Luck, and I expect similar satisfaction from The Post in a week or two.

It’s been not quite a full week since the Brexit vote happened. There’s a lot of wreckage to assess and understand the nature of here. To be fair, I am not certain that I do understand any of it just yet.

There’s the demographics of it. Scotland and Northern Ireland versus England and Wales. Old versus young. The splitting of the Conservatives’ ranks, along with UKIP versus everyone else.

There’s the murder of Jo Cox.

That last item doesn’t seem to get much attention since the results of the vote broke. Not from the commercial news services, or the publicly-owned ones either. And the sick joke of it is that her killer – judging by his reply when asked his name for the court’s records – may have gotten exactly what he wanted.

That makes me angry.

As a Canadian, I am one of those people across the planet indirectly affected by the Brexit vote. Most likely, the effect will be on what there are of my retirement savings. But since I’m not a citizen of any of the components of the United Kingdom, there are a number of people who will no doubt tell me that it’s not my knitting to worry about.

The problem with that is, as I have said, that I am affected by the choices of others regardless of that fact. The same applies to the American election process underway at the point when I wrote these words. I am going to be hit by consequences. I have a stake in the outcome of these things, despite not having a lawful vote in most of them.

As a Canadian, I cannot help but look back at the two referenda on Québec independence. As a non-Québecois, I had no legal voice in the outcome, but as a Canadian, my future was going to be impacted anyway. And there were those people who – some cheerfully, some in resentful anger over past offences against them by others – told the people in my situation that ours was to shut up and let it happen to us.

That too made me angry.

That anger couldn’t be allowed to overwhelm me. Others did allow it in their own hearts. Still more channeled that anger in more productive ways, or so I think looking back. That’s part of why there’s still a mostly united Canada.

Another part is the Clarity Act. Brought in during the Chrétien administration, it set up rules for how referenda on seccession from Canada should be held: with clear Questions and a clear majority percentage to trigger the beginning of any negotation process that results from the answers to such Questions. By contrast, the political parties of the UK seem to have made the error of going with a simple majority instead. Not unlike the “Fifty plus one” stance of the Québec separatistes and those who agreed with such rules elsewhere in Canada, whatever else they thought of the separatiste project to begin with.

That the Brexit referendum is officially non-binding seems to cut no ice at all with the winning side, nor with the leaders of the Remain forces. Certainly not with key figures of the European Union who insist that “leave means leave”. The call from such people now is to bind the whole of the UK to such results. No matter the narrowness of the Leave side’s win, no matter the breakdown of the vote’s demographics, no matter the misgivings of many who did vote Leave and now find themselves shocked at the reaction and consequences.

Simply bind and damn them all.

And that too makes me angry.

And I do not know where to put that anger yet.

To further enhance the sense of scale re: Nimitz-class aircraft carriers vs. the SHIELD Helicarrier class depicted in the Marvel Universe Handbook by Eliot R. Brown. Assumes that the length of both vessel classes are equivalent. Graphic cross-section of Nimitz-class CVN is derived from the Hampton Roads Daily Press web feature on the USS George W.H. Bush.

Source URL for the Daily Press cross-section graphic: http://www.dailypress.com/news/dp-cvn77-01,0,5744629.htmlstory
( Techno-graphics after the cut! )

The Ontario election didn't quite go as I'd either hoped or feared. A mixed blessing, and we continue more or less as before. At least we didn't go all the way into nightmare territory this time. And maybe McGuinty will re-list eye exams under medicare coverage in Ontario. I could certainly use that break. My eyesight is not a luxury item.

I am disturbed by the lack of voter turnout in my current home province, though. I was hoping for more of us to show up.

tammy212 noted that the Nobel Peace Prize winners for 2011 have been named today: Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Leymah Gbowee and Tawakkul Karman, "for their work in advancing women's rights and the role of women in peacebuilding efforts." Worthy souls, one and all.

Clive Doucet notes one of the differences in political culture between Canada and France.

Another nosy question, prompted by our current tsuris here in Bytown on the Outaouaias. Assuming you have such in your city or town, and that you use it, of course.

(Before I forget, if your system has a website, could you add a link to it?)