General Politics thread

I haven't thought about Dennis Kucinich since he was the anti-Iraq war primary candidate in 2004. I'm disappointed to find out he's a bit crazy now, but I would have had to been watching Fox News to know he's a regular there.

Wow, I guess A.A. Milne's fiction was more prescient than I'd given it credit for.

I still think there is a lot of fetishization of the military on our country on both sides so I would not rule it out. It may not be a gateway, but it does give a certain cache to their political goals. Much more so than just being a lawyer or something. Tammy Duckworth might be good example on the D side. Not saying it would be her running, but I could see someone like that getting the D nomination.

More on Chinese censorship from the always-great-on-anything-Chinese Language Log.

Also a bit of digging around reveals that Obama’s commonly used for Tigger (due to the height difference) and Abe Shinzo is, amazingly, usually cast as Eeyore.

Amazed that people still say stuff like “Buddhist countries are inherently more peaceful and tolerant,” completely missing the highest-visibility genocide going on right now.

The Moscow Times has been running this very nice feature for the past month or so, profiling a subsection of average Russians around/turning 18 and thus having lived their whole lives under the Putin presidency (Generation P, the title, is a dual reference to an earlier novel by the ever fascinating Victor Pelevin). It's a loose and interesting little feature just letting the profiled individuals shoot-off their thoughts on all manner of things in ways that are at times charmingly Extremely Teenager-ish, sometimes more profound and altogether very Russian.

the conservative provincial party here in Ontario just had a clusterfuck of a leadership race, due to the former leader having been ousted over allegations of skeevy conduct, very much of the "come on dude, that's gross, and you should know better" but not quite meeting any threshold for legal action, natch. there was a bunch of song and dance, much political hay was made, and a bit of blood in the water as things got messy and internal strife was sorted.

and now Doug Ford is the ostensible leader of the provincial chapter of the party. (a party I have no love for and zero faith in, but it's still disappointing nonetheless.)

Doug. Fucking. Ford.

you guys remember Rob Ford? the blowhard former mayor of Toronto embroiled in some rather salacious scandal a few years back? the so-called "crack smoking mayor" with pretty obvious ties to some shady characters? Toronto rarely merits international news, but that managed to be seedy enough to cross the border, from what I'm told.

anyway, his brother has somehow managed to continue being a going political concern in spite of all that, remaining a Toronto councilor and eternally bloviated blowhard. and now he's almost guaranteed another term of power by the other major party in the region who has long since had a stranglehold, the Liberals, who have a rather painful history of treating the province like their own personal fiefdom since they consistently win a significant percentage of elections in a lock.

oddly enough, I think they're almost all universally terrible and I wouldn't trust any of these oily motherfuckers with selling me more than an overpriced coffin, let alone a viable political platform, but this really seems like the stupidest of all possible outcomes for any and all concerned. it does next to nothing for resetting the natural equilibrium that ought to happen when the incumbent party keeps doing stupid shit and takes their entrenched power for granted.

politics is fucking depressing.

Lucan, what would your reaction be if this was just the stepping stone to Douglas Ford somehow becoming the next PM of Canada?

Not that I think this is at all a good idea, but there's been some talk about Biden giving it the ol' college try in 2020. He didn't serve, but he was around for the draft. 

Biden is already a two-time primary loser, but if he wants to embarrass himself after being a perfectly cromulent veep whatever. That will take care of itself long, long before the convention.

Making people think politics is depressing may or may not be a deliberate strategy of the Ontario Conservatives. When people think "all politics is bullshit" then they're more likely not to vote, which allows the minority of well-organized conservatives to squeak out a win.

I'm unsure if the NDP will see gains or losses. On the one hand, the ruling Liberals have been in power for 15 years and voters generally like to change the party in government every 10 years (this probably should have happened in the last election or the one before that but the Conservatives bungled their campaigns). Plus while the Premier appears clean there have been the usual cases of corruption springing up from the rest of her peeps as well as some various missteps.

However, people may be so fired up by the ABC (Anyone But Conservative) movement that they throw their support to the Liberals in the belief that voting for a third party of social democrats splits the left-centre vote and lets the Conservatives in, thus keeping the NDP in 3rd place.

Anyway, on to the important parts of election talk - unsubstantiated gossip and allegations not backed by evidence. This isn't so much rumour as it is a widely accepted fact, as it's pretty widely known that ole Dougie sold hash back in high school, but I have it on good authority that it was dry and shitty. Do we really want a man in charge of Ontario who can't even supply good hashish?