There’s always a selfish reason for why the Ford government would do this, and it doesn’t surprise me that this is coming out.
Though to be fair, this is also from the same Ford family of guys who read the god-damn newspaper while they are driving on the Gardiner-Express. Of course they would be personally offended that they are - checks the notes - punished for breaking a driving violation.
Oh, are you talking about House Centipedes? Great for controlling other insects in your house!
And also, at my current phase in my life, the closest thing I’ll have to some creature cuddling me at night.
In addition to what gonzo mentioned, here is something else to consider:
There are only two significant political parties in the US. FPTP isn’t much of a big deal when it comes to a two-party system (since one party is guaranteed to win a 50+1 vote [50% plus one vote, for plural majority]), but you add a third or more, and suddenly you start realizing the flaws of such a system.
If three parties are split 33-33-34, the 34 wins 100% of the riding. This would be in spite of not having earned 66% of the vote. Imagine how much worse this becomes when you add a fourth party, or a fifth, etc. You might imagine, then, that people might start being angry at a democracy when ~80% of the electorate are angry at not voting for the winning candidate, which is entirely possible and has happened - if not in Canada, then at least famously in Britain in one of its ridings during the 2010s sometime there.
Thankfully, in one sense, you guys don’t have to deal with the majority of the electorate not electing the winning candidate. However, I don’t think that is outweighing all of the problems that the two-party system is leading to, to be quite fair…
2 Hot takes:
This is likely going to lead to the Conservatives splitting between the reformers and the moderates once more, as either is going to believe the other side is inhibiting their ability to lead a new government. Reformers will likely solidify everywhere between the East of the Rockies and West of Ontario (Eastern BC and all the Prairie Provinces, I’m thinking), while the Conservatives will have to once again fight for representation largely in Ontario and (maybe) the Atlantic Provinces.
It would be nice to see the Right-wing splitting their votes the same way the Left does for NDP and Liberals, if for no other reason than to help make Minority governments more prominent in Canada as a whole; however,
The following statement is entirely relevant to this game:
Fuck Jimmy.
I don’t want to comment one way or another on the health and well-being of Doug Ford in this particular instance, other than to say thank god he didn’t actually die, but for those of us who have had any regular experience driving on the 401, how are we fucking surprised by this?
The driving is absolutely atrocious even without dangerous, reckless and incompetent drivers, and our infrastructure and institutions basically are forcing more and more drivers to be on the roads, even when the science explicitly states that the only way to reduce traffic is to reduce the number of cars on the road, full stop. Do you think, by chance, that this would have happened on a train? A bus? I know that there are physical and logistical impracticalities of getting the Premier transported securely and safely outside of a dedicated transport vehicle, BUT THAT IS EXACTLY WHERE WE THE PUBLIC ARE STUCK.
I’m sure another fucking highway to nowhere will solve all our problems…
Yeah, that’s probably correct… but what the hell kind of a solution are we supposed to be looking for? Reason is being lost on them, and it becomes increasingly exhausting to try and convince them to not believe in something they want to believe in.
Maybe it doesn’t do anyone any good, but I’m fucking tired of pretending that their opinions are in any way valid.
I’m gonna bet that someone is connected to Enbridge and they had people whispering to Doug “hey, just so you know, gas is clean. It doesn’t burn dirty, you can’t even see the fumes! It’s totally fine, you can trust us with a bigger contract!”
I don’t know, but that’s management’s excuse. It’s their right to manage, even if it’s a shit job.
Like I said, it’s exhausting dealing with people who are just absolutely disconnected from driving conditions on these roads. And to me, it seems like management is perfectly okay with closing their eyes to the issue.
Good, challenge Ford. Don’t let him get away with dumb shit like this.
I don’t work for TTC but another transit agency. I mentioned to my union rep that we should be using the cameras WE ALREADY HAVE (in case we get into accidents) to record when people do shit like this in front of our buses, and they said that was a really good idea. I also submitted a service enhancement form to management to suggest this very idea.
You know what their response was?
“It is a privacy concern.”
Yes, taking pictures of license plates, WHICH ARE LEGALLY REQUIRED TO BE DISPLAYED WHEN ON PUBLIC ROADS, is somehow considered to be a PRIVACY ISSUE by a PUBLIC TRANSIT AGENCY.
This is what our management is like. Suffice to say, I’ve given up on expecting anything better anytime soon.
The guy has 34 felony counts on him, as is. What’s one more legal violation, at this point?
I refuse to recognize the existence of Manitoba, no matter the correct answer /s
It’s been a fucking decade, man…
You know, I work a pretty stressful job, and I think a lot of that stress and anger came from, in some twisted way, a misguided faith of sorts. I did believe that people were, at the very least, capable of making the most sensible decision when given overwhelming evidence of good vs. bad choices; that they intentionally make bad choices either because they weren’t given enough information or were acting intentionally selfish or duplicitous in some way. So whenever I had to deal with someone trying to exploit a loophole or arguing about how they swear they are going to x and such place and will pay at a later time (when you know they won’t do so), it would frustrate me, because I did believe that they were capable of making better choices.
This election is proof that people are just genuinely dumb and hopeless, to a far and large extent. Choosing to omit your own vote, or willingly voting for him, is beyond imagination. We have seen so much of what he has done in the past 8 years now, at minimum. They know what he will likely do in the next 4 years. And they still chose him. Or chose not to participate.
So I’m choosing not to feel angry at people anymore, to not give a shit if they break the rules for whatever reason they justify. Because why be angry at something if you have lost faith in it being better?
I have the distinct feeling that this movie could have been produced in the US, which, let’s be fair, they would not really understand how a succession crisis would work in Canada (Also, we have another Trudeau in office, so it’s not entirely unrealistic for a son to take over). Or if it is a Canadian producer, they likely over-simplified the process by which a son could suddenly be elevated to the position of PM, which… yeah, a movie isn’t really gonna cover how difficult that would be.
More than anything else, my biggest concern is real simple:
Drunk driving is going to go up WAY MORE.
Based on all the drivers I have seen on the road, too many of them lack the restraints to actually follow the rules and not do dumb shit, such as texting while driving, following the rules of the road and giving proper space / signaling, road rage, etc. And we know that there already is a bad enough problem as it is with drunk driving, and how so much of our infrastructure is designed around the necessity of having a car, rather than alternatives for getting around (public transit, primarily).
But now you can drive down to whatever 7/11, gas station, Mac store in your area, grab a six-pack anytime between 7am to 11pm, even on Friday nights? Good luck having all those corner stores trying to enforce the same “no-serve” policy that LCBO and Beer Store employees are expected to follow. You’ll have a lot more bad sales being made where people who shouldn’t be mixing booze with driving (as bad as their latter skills may be, alone) will absolutely be able to do that easier and being far more of a danger on the roads. That is where the biggest costs of drinking is going to come from. And Canada, much like other North Americans, do not have a responsible relationship with booze and drinking.
It is going to be a shit-show for whichever government has to follow in the steps of Ford. Hope you like taxes going up to deal with the consequences of more drunk drivers on the road!
So Indexes are supposed to be a little more rigid than just having companies being “removed on a whim” - you would more likely find that on a mutual fund, which are individually managed, versus an index. That being said, I did look into the difference between Dow and S&P 500, and… well, yeah, the former is selected by a committee who generally pick for the top 30 performing companies, while the latter is just a list of the 500 largest publicly traded companies. I think it is generally not used as a good indicator of economic health, as opposed to the S&P (based on a quick Wikipedia read).
I think a few people might consider it only because it’s been running since 1896, and there haven’t really been a lot of changes as to who gets on / off the Dow (58 since inception). So honestly, more than anything else, it’s just really bad PR for investors who might care that Intel is doing so poorly that it’s being kicked off one of the longest-running indexes, which is never good news. Might rattle them enough to where they start demanding big changes, which is likely what Intel needs.
To be fair, yes, Canada has the second-largest land mass on the planet. ~90% or more of that landmass is largely inhospitable for larger communities though, whether it’s the Canadian Shield and the fact we can’t grow any crops on that or dig through tough rocks, the Tundra and Arctic (where it is way too cold to grow anything, much less settle), vast distances of forests - it is a lot tougher to build infrastructure in most of Canada, leaving it pretty much to the places already with larger population sizes. And even then, most people are still choosing to go to the three cities and immediate outlying areas where the most economic influence and possible social connections are - Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal.
It would seem deceiving, given how large Canada is, but there are very few places outside of those major metro centres where people want to live, or can even live comfortable lives and be productive. Honestly, given how little good land is available in Canada, it would make far more sense to cut down on suburban developments and focus on higher-density, transit-minded communities. Single-family homes are way too inefficient for what we actually need, and having politicians and citizens who demonize quadplexes and other high density options do not help at all.
Saudi Arabia: “I am assuming direct control.”
EA: “Wait, I know this line…”
SA: “I am the vanguard of your destruction. This corporation is over.”
EA: “Fffffuuuuuuuck…”