Quotulatiousness

October 8, 2022

First BoJo “Miss me yet?” meme time?

Filed under: Britain, Government, Media, Politics — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

Dominic Sandbrook on the terrible, awful, very bad start to Liz Truss’s Premiership:

If you believe the mainstream media, it has been yet another cosmically dire week for the Conservatives. But let’s stop going on about all the little things that went wrong, and concentrate instead on what went right. Nobody died. Liz Truss got through her speech without losing her voice, losing her mind or falling off the stage. The pound is back up to its level before Kwasi Kwarteng’s Fiscal Event. And maybe, just maybe, things are going to come right after all.

The winter energy crisis won’t be as bad as everybody fears. Inflation will start to come down. By the spring, that enormous Labour poll lead will be a fading memory. And as the next election approaches, ordinary people across the land will throw their caps in the air and cheer the name of Good Queen Liz …

No. No, I can’t do it. Tempting as it is to tilt against the conventional wisdom, sometimes you just have to face facts. The conference was awful. The speech was awful. This has been the worst start to any premiership, I think, in recent history — perhaps even in all British history.

Perhaps some readers will think this very harsh. But one close Truss ally, speaking off-the-record to the Financial Times, didn’t seem to think so. “I just went back to my hotel room and cried,” he said. “It’s a total disaster.” That’s pretty much what the general public think, too. In focus groups this week, the words that came up again and again were “incompetent”, “useless”, “untrustworthy”, “dangerous” and “clueless”. The punters aren’t always right, of course. But this time they are right, aren’t they?

“Our policy is great,” Penny Mordaunt told a fringe conference audience a couple of days ago, “but our comms is shit.” But if your comms really is shit, then who cares about the policy? Who even knows about it? Communicating your policy is the very essence of politics. If you can’t do it, you’ll never win another election.

I watched Truss’s speech through my fingers, embarrassed not just by the sheer lack of content, but the comically wooden and childlike delivery. It speaks volumes that in their desperation to find something, anything, nice to say about it, sympathetic papers applauded her for staying calm after she was interrupted by hecklers. Only somebody who had never heard of Harold Wilson, Margaret Thatcher or Tony Blair — all of whom were brilliant at dealing with interruptions — could have possibly thought this worth applauding.

For although academics and activists often prefer to talk about the abstractions of ideology or the nuts and bolts of policy, performance really, really matters in politics. To some extent, in fact, performance is politics. Even in a parliamentary system, you need a messenger who embodies the message, a leader who can charm and explain. Watch Thatcher talking to Robin Day in 1984, or Jim Callaghan being interviewed by Thames TV’s This Week in 1978, and it’s like entering a different world. Whatever their ideological differences, Thatcher and Callaghan are seasoned, accomplished performers, at the top of their respective games. They think about the questions. They talk in complete sentences, even complete paragraphs. They give long, considered, serious answers. They seem like impressive, well-informed, formidable people. Then watch Truss again, and try not to weep.

October 7, 2022

The “two movies on the same screen” effect: most Canadians see impending collapse but our “elites” think everything’s peachy

Filed under: Cancon, Economics, Government, Media, Politics — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

Tara Henley contrasts the reality many Canadians are facing day-to-day with the out-of-touch “laptop elites” who, as a class, did great through the last two and a half years and who have no clue at all why anyone would see the state of the country as anything like a collapse:

Pierre and Ana Poilievre at a Conservative leadership rally, 21 April, 2022.
Photo by Wikipageedittor099 via Wikimedia Commons.

There has been much discussion lately about the state of our nation — and whether or not we, as a society, are in decline.

Former journalist and Justin Trudeau speechwriter (and current Substacker) Colin Horgan published a provocative essay at The Line last month, arguing that our country is vulnerable to extremists who believe that “the current system of liberal democracy is inherently corrupt and corrupted, verging on collapse, and that, in the extreme, its downfall can and should be hastened by acts of violence”.

Horgan worries that Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre — who’s been actively speaking to this ambient vibe of distress and dissatisfaction — could accelerate such destabilization.

Poilievre does not say extreme things, Horgan concedes, but Poilievre’s message is “still poison” because “what he telegraphs is the vision of a social order at a tipping point, with the suggestion that it can be easily pushed over”.

In short, Poilievre has tapped into “an Internet language of decline”.

There’s a thriving cottage industry in the Canadian legacy media doing everything they can to tar Poilievre as a Canadian Hitler and to continue the re-typing and re-phrasing of government talking points for the mass market. The government subsidies to “approved” media outlets will help keep the lights on a bit longer as they continue to lose audience share — and trust.

Our quality of life has been eroded for some time now. Wages have been stagnant for decades. Precarious work is the order of the day, both for the working class and professionals. Rents and property prices are through the roof; according to the Globe and Mail, since 2000, domestic home prices have increased by 420 percent. Inflation is high. Gas is expensive. Food costs are up. We are coping with a crisis of social isolation. Our opioid epidemic rages on.

Meanwhile, pandemic policy has benefited the laptop class and harmed the most vulnerable among us. (See lockdowns and school closures, for starters.)

Indeed, there has been extreme winners and losers during the COVID era, which saw a massive transfer of wealth upwards. Billionaires in this country, in fact, saw their wealth increase 68 percent during the pandemic.

Should we be surprised that those on the losing end are expressing their frustration?

[…]

Things have only gotten worse as the pandemic has dragged on and citizens have been hit with high inflation and rising interest rates (while also staring down other looming financial catastrophes).

According to an Angus Reid poll out this week, nine out of ten Canadians have cut their household budgets due to inflation and high prices. And 46 percent of Canadians say their personal finances are worse off now than they were at this time last year.

But if the material conditions in this country are dire, so too is the national mood.

In fact, there is a gaping wound at the centre of our national psyche.

Essential workers have laboured throughout the COVID crisis, endangering their health and that of their families, in order to keep society running. In return for their heroic efforts, the unvaccinated among them — many of whom previously contracted COVID and have natural immunity — have seen themselves ostracized and smeared as racists and misogynists. Their fundamental values have been mocked in the public square, and their basic rights and freedoms, including freedom of expression, have been compromised. Some have lost jobs, social lives and more for declining vaccination.

To comprehend the human toll this has taken, one need only look to the grassroots #TrudeauMustGo campaign on Twitter.

The consequences of vaccine mandates should have been covered in great depth by our national press. But instead, the Canadian media largely fell down on this story, often generating coverage that uncritically reproduced the Liberal party line.

Trust in the Canadian news media is now at its lowest point in seven years.

And judging from the reader mail I get, the Liberals’ decision to turn vaccine mandates into a wedge issue has had significant social consequences — tearing apart families, communities, and workplaces in ways that may take years to recover from.

All told, what we are witnessing is not merely a state of decline. It is a form of collapse. A collapse of the social contract. A collapse of the expectations we grew up with — that if you worked hard and respected the law, you could have a home, a family if you chose, and, crucially, a say in our democracy.

What we are living through is a collapse of life as we knew it in Canada.

What was once a stable, prosperous, diverse democracy is now a nation divided, rife with fear and anger, and financial and social instability.

Not only has our Prime Minister failed to grasp this, but he’s actively stoked tensions.

Churchill and the Queen

Filed under: Britain, Government, History — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

In The Critic, Andrew Roberts outlines the relationship between Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Queen Elizabeth II:

Queen Elizabeth II and Sir Winston Churchill, with Prince Charles and Princess Anne in the foreground, 10 Februrary 1953.
Official photograph via Wikimedia Commons.

Winston Churchill was besotted with Queen Elizabeth II: the word is precise. He worshipped and adored her. His relations with some other members of the royal family were, on occasion, complicated — not least when King Edward VII was sleeping with his mother. But for the late Queen he had nothing but an almost puppy-dog love.

[…]

When King George VI died unexpectedly on 6 February 1952, aged only 56, Churchill was devastated, weeping copiously both on hearing the news and at the funeral. Of the new monarch he told his private secretary, Jock Colville, that “he did not know her and that she was only a child”.

Nonetheless he saw an opportunity of romanticising the country’s situation. “Famous have been the reigns of our queens,” he said in his BBC broadcast on the King’s death. “Some of the greatest periods in our history have unfolded under their sceptre. Now that we have the second Queen Elizabeth, also ascending the Throne in her twenty-sixth year, our thoughts are carried back nearly 400 years to the magnificent figure who presided over and, in many ways, embodied and inspired the grandeur and genius of the Elizabethan Age.”

Although she was his sixth sovereign, Churchill was the new Queen’s first prime minister and old enough to be her grandfather. For all the 51-year age difference — or perhaps because of it — Churchill quickly grew devoted to her. “There was one lady by whom, from 1952 onward, Churchill was dazzled,” noted Colville. “That was the new Queen. Here was a woman whom he respected and admired more than any man.”

[…]

On 24 January 1965, 70 years to the day after the death of his father Lord Randolph Churchill, Sir Winston died. The Queen waived all custom and precedent to attend his funeral at St Paul’s Cathedral. She added a message in her own handwriting to the wreath of white flowers that was placed upon his coffin: “From the Nation and the Commonwealth. In grateful remembrance, Elizabeth R.” It echoed that which Churchill had placed on her father’s coffin, simply saying “For Valour”, the motto of the Victoria Cross, and a reference to the late king’s moral and physical courage during the Second World War, and perhaps also at the battle of Jutland in 1916.

[…]

The Queen decided Churchill should have a State funeral following his stroke in 1953. Once he had recovered, she told him so. The plans had to be rewritten several times over the next 12 years because, as Lord Mountbatten joked, Churchill kept on living but the pallbearers kept on dying.

There is a powerful symmetry to the friendship of monarch and premier that the next State funeral after Churchill’s was to be the Queen’s own, a full 57 years later.

QotD: King Agis IV’s and King Cleomenes III’s failed reform attempts in Sparta after 371BC

Filed under: Europe, Government, Greece, History, Quotations — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

In order to serve in the army as a hoplite” rel=”noopener” target=”_blank”>hoplite (the Greek heavy infantryman who was the basic unit of every polis army) – the key concern around the declining Spartiate citizen body – a man had to have enough wealth to afford the arms and armor. In a state where – because of the oft-praised Spartan austerity – functionally all wealth was tied to the land, that meant that any new Hoplites needed to be given land in order to be able to serve. But all the best land in Sparta was tied up in an ever-shrinking number of kleroi.

Thus the Spartan state might grant marginal, borderland to small groups of freed helots – the neodamodes and the Brasidioi – but actually bringing up the military strength of the polis in full could only be achieved by de-consolidating the kleroi – the best, most productive land (because you can only support so many hoplites on disputed, marginal land). This is one thing, of course, that the wealthy Spartiates who dominated the state were unwilling to do. The mothakes and hypomeiones, pushed to the edges of Spartan society, might be brought in to make up the difference, but unless they were made equals – homoioi – this was a recipe for instability, as seen with Lysander and Cinadon. This is the other thing the Spartiates were unwilling to do – if I had my guess, because for the poor Spartiates who still clung to their status (and might still use the Apella to block reform, even if they couldn’t use it to propose reform), that status differential was just about the only thing they had (apart from all of the slave labor they enjoyed the benefits of, of course).

(A different polis might have tried to make up this difference by either hiring large numbers of mercenaries, or arming its own people at state expense, as a way of using the fortunes of the rich to fund military activity without expanding the citizenry. But, as Aristotle notes – (we’ll come back to this when we talk about Spartan war performance) the public finances of Sparta were pitiful even by ancient standards – for precisely the same reason that deconsolidating the kleroi was politically impossible: the state was dominated by the wealthy (Arist. Pol. 2.1271b). With no real source of wealth outside of landholding and all of the good land held by the Spartiates, it seems that Sparta – despite being by far the largest polis in Greece and holding some of the best farmland outside of Thessaly, was never able to raise significant revenue.)

Instead, the clique of wealthy Spartiates arrayed about the kings did nothing, decade on decade, as the Spartiate citizen body – and the military power of Sparta – slowly shrank, until at least, in 371 it broke for good. But what is perhaps most illustrative of the dysfunction in the Spartan political system is the sad epilogue of efforts in the second half of the third century (in the 240s and 220s) to finally reform the system by two Spartan kings.

The first effort was by Agis IV (r. 245-241; Plut. Agis). By the time Agis came to power, there were only a few hundred Spartiate households. Agis tried to reform through the system by redividing all of the kleruchal land into 4,500 plots for Spartiates and another 15,000 for the Perioikoi (who might also fight as Hoplites). Agis gets the Apella to support his motion – his offer to put his own royal estates into the redistribution first earns him a lot of respect – but the Gerousia, by a narrow margin, rejects it. Agis is eventually politically isolated and finally executed by the Ephors (along with his mother and grandmother, who had backed his idea) – the first Spartan king ever executed (I have left out some of the twists and turns here. If you want to know Plutarch has you covered).

Cleomenes III (r. 235-222) recognizes what Agis seemingly did not – reform to the Spartan system could not happen within the system. Instead, he stages a coup, having four of the five Ephors murdered, exiled eighty citizens – one assumes these are wealthy and prominent opponents – and possibly had the other king assassinated (Plut. Cleom. 8, 10.1; Plb. 5.37). Cleomenes then redistributed the kleroi into 4,000 plots and made his own brother his co-king (Plut. Cleom. 11), essentially making him a tyrant in the typical Greek mold. He then set about continuing his war with the neighboring Achaean League in an effort to re-establish Spartan hegemony in the Peloponnese and presumably retake Messenia (which by that point was free and part of the Achaean league).

It was far, far too late. Had this been done in the 380s or even the 350s, Sparta might well have resumed its position of prominence. But this was the 220s – Macedon had dominated Greek affairs now for a century and the Antigonids – the dynasty then ruling in Macedon – had no intention of humoring a resurgent Sparta. In 224, a Macedonian army marched into the Peloponnese in support of Sparta’s enemies and in 222 it smashed the Spartan army flat at Sellasia, almost entirely wiping out the Spartiate citizen body – new and old – in the process (Plutarch claims only 200 adult Spartiate males survived, Plut. Cleom. 28.5). The victorious Macedonian – Antigonis III Doson – for his part re-crippled Sparta: he occupied it, restored its constitution to what it had been before Cleomenes and then left, presumably content that it would not threaten him again (Plut. Cleom. 30.1). The time when a state with a citizen body in the few thousands could be a major player had been over for a century and the great empires of the third century were in no mood to humor self-important poleis who hadn’t gotten the message.

Bret Devereaux, “Collections: This. Isn’t. Sparta. Part V: Spartan Government”, A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry, 2019-08-29.

October 4, 2022

“… apparently the future of science is BAJEDI (Belonging Accessibility Justice Equity Diversity and Inclusion), which is quite a bit cooler than mere DEI”

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Government, Politics, Science, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

And you thought the stuffy old National Science Foundation was only supporting pale, stale, cisgendered white male research? Think again!

I’ve written many times about the National Science Foundation and its increasingly politicized conception of “science”. As an independent federal agency with a nearly $9 billion budget, the NSF is a behemoth in the world of academic science, shaping research agendas and the future of the professoriate. And apparently the future of science is BAJEDI (Belonging Accessibility Justice Equity Diversity and Inclusion), which is quite a bit cooler than mere DEI. Here’s a current funding opportunity for scientists:

The federal agency that funds research projects like “Probing Nucleation and Growth Dynamics of Lithium Dendrites in Solid Electrolytes” is moving hard into the business of social justice, with career-making grants that will focus STEM researchers on the problem of racial grievances. Here’s how much money is available for that racial equity program:

The premise underlying this turn toward equity-focused science projects is that “science scholars who are underrepresented in STEM produce higher rates of scientific novelty”. Innovation is grounded in race and ethnicity; the more gloriously intersectional you are, the more creative you become. Imagine the boldness of a transgendered Asian Pacific Islander astrophysics, and how much newer and fresher our conception of the universe is when it doesn’t come from straight white males.

And so the NSF wants to fund “diversity champions” who will freshen up our science with BIPOC innovation — which means adding more sociologists to the team of geophysicists: “When developing proposals, the PI team should acknowledge the need for increased engagement from social and behavioral science experts to address issues related to BAJEDI in the geosciences and include these best practices and experts in proposed projects.” […]

It’s a real cultural revolution in the world of academic science.

QotD: “The world bought British and British was best”

Filed under: Britain, Government, History, Quotations — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

So much has been promised in the past, so much has come to nothing, no wonder they are sceptical. And impatient. Already I can hear some of them saying: “The Conservatives have been in five months. Things do not seem to be that much better. What is happening? Do you think the Conservatives can really do it?” We say to them this: Yes, the Conservatives can do it. And we will do it. But it will take time. Time to tackle problems that have been neglected for years; time to change people’s approach to what Governments can do for people, and to what people should do for themselves; time to shake off the self-doubt induced by decades of dependence on the state as master, not as servant. It will take time and it will not be easy.

The world has never offered us an easy living. There is no reason why it should. We have always had to go out and earn our living — the hard way. In the past we did not hesitate. We had great technical skill, quality, reliability. We built well, sold well. We delivered on time. The world bought British and British was best. Not German. Not Japanese. British. It was more than that. We knew that to keep ahead we had to change. People looked to us as the front runner for the future.

Our success was not based on Government hand-outs, on protecting yesterday’s jobs and fighting off tomorrow’s. It was not based on envy or truculence or on endless battles between management and men, or between worker and fellow worker. We did not become the workshop of the world by being the nation with the most strikes.

I remember the words written on an old trade union banner: “United to support, not combined to injure”. That is the way we were. Today we still have great firms and industries. Today we still make much of value, but not enough. Industries that were once head and shoulders above their competitors have stumbled and fallen.

It is said that we were exhausted by the war. Those who were utterly defeated can hardly have been less exhausted. Yet they have done infinitely better in peace. It is said that Britain’s time is up, that we have had our finest hour and the best we can look forward to is a future fit for Mr Benn to live in. I do not accept those alibis. Of course we face great problems, problems that have fed on each other year after year, becoming harder and harder to solve. We all know them. They go to the root of the hopes and fears of ordinary people — high inflation, high unemployment, high taxation, appalling industrial relations, the lowest productivity in the Western world.

People have been led to believe that they had to choose between a capitalist wealth-creating society on the one hand and a caring and compassionate society on the other. But that is not the choice. The industrial countries that out-produce and outsell us are precisely those countries with better social services and better pensions than we have. It is because they have strong wealth-creating industries that they have better benefits than we have. Our people seem to have lost belief in the balance between production and welfare. This is the balance that we have got to find. To persuade our people that it is possible, through their own efforts, not only to halt our national decline, but to reverse it and that requires new thinking, tenacity, and a willingness to look at things in a completely different way. Is the nation ready to face reality? I believe that it is. People are tired of false dawns and facile promises. If this country’s story is to change we the Conservatives must rekindle the spirit which the socialist years have all but exhausted.

Margaret Thatcher, “Speech to Conservative Party Conference”, 1979-10-12.

September 30, 2022

Witness about to testify on Bill C-11? Time to break out good old Parliamentary bullying and intimidation tactics!

Filed under: Cancon, Government, Politics, Technology — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

It’s had to believe, but the Liberal government continues to defy expectations in their continued mission to prevent public participation in political processes, as Michael Geist documents here:

“In the east wing of the Centre Block is the Senate chamber, in which are the thrones for the Canadian monarch and consort, or for the federal viceroy and his or her consort, and from which either the sovereign or the governor general gives the Speech from the Throne and grants Royal Assent to bills passed by parliament.”
Photo and description by Saffron Blaze via Wikimedia Commons.

The Senate Bill C-11 hearings have provided a model for the much-needed, engaged, non-partisan inquiry that was largely missing from the House committee’s theatrics in which the government cut off debate on over 150 amendments. But this week those hearings attracted attention for another reason: serious charges of witness intimidation and bullying by government MPs, most notably Canadian Heritage Parliamentary Secretary Chris Bittle (yes, the same Bittle who last month suggested I was a racist and a bully for raising concerns about Minister Pablo Rodriguez silence over Canadian Heritage funding of an anti-semite as part of its anti-hate program).

The Globe and Mail reported late on Tuesday night that Bittle – together with his colleague, Liberal MP Lisa Hepfner – had sent a letter to the Lobbying Commissioner to seek an investigation into the funding of Digital First Canada, a group representing digital first creators. The letter may have been shopped around to other MPs as Liberal MP Anthony Housefather has told the Globe he did not sign it. DFC’s Executive Director, Scott Benzie, had appeared before the Heritage committee months ago and Bittle used his time to focus on the organization’s funding. Leaving aside the fact that government MPs reserve these kinds of questions only for critics of Bill C-11 (there were no similar questions this week from Ms. Hepfner to the Director of Digital Content Next, whose organization supports Bill C-18 and counts Fox News among its members), the timing of Globe story was incredibly troubling. The Lobbyist Commissioner letter was apparently filed nearly two months ago and Benzie had been assured that he was compliant with the law. Yet the story was presumably leaked to coincide with Benzie’s appearance before the Senate committee last night.

The letter and leak smacked of witness intimidation and bullying with the government seeking to undermine critics of the legislation hours before a Senate appearance. Indeed, the entire tactic felt like the policy equivalent of a SLAPP suit, which are used to intimidate and silence critics through litigation. By the end of the day, the tactic had clearly backfired on Bittle and the government. Conservative MP John Nater filed a point of privilege in the House of Commons, arguing that Bittle had attempted to intimidate a Senate witness.

    I rise on a question of privilege, for which I gave notice earlier this same day, regarding the conduct of the member for St. Catharines, who attempted to intimidate Scott Benzie, a witness appearing before a committee of the Senate studying Bill C-11, an act to amend the Broadcasting Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other acts, as reported yesterday by the Globe and Mail.

    While I appreciate that this attempt to intimidate relates to proceedings of a Senate committee currently studying Bill C-11, the culprit in this case is a member of the House, and that same witness appeared before the House of Commons Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage during its deliberations on Bill C-11, an appearance where Mr. Benzie, no doubt, first established himself as an undesirable witness for the government on the merits of Bill C-11.

The government response was surprisingly muted with MP Mark Gerretsen simply asking for a couple of days to formulate a response, perhaps recognizing that defending Bittle would mean defending the indefensible.

September 28, 2022

This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Infrastructure

Filed under: Architecture, Bureaucracy, Government, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Kite & Key Media
Published 31 May 2021

America is a land of constant progress. Sometimes it seems like there’s nothing we can’t accomplish. And then we try to build something…

In recent years, infrastructure projects have taken way too long and cost way more than they should. Boston’s “Big Dig”, for example, took 15 years and cost more than 5x as much as projected. California’s High-Speed Rail was supposed to run between L.A. and San Francisco by 2020. Instead, some track nowhere near either city might be ready by 2027.

Why can’t America build quickly or cost effectively anymore? A well-intentioned regulatory law from the 1970s has a lot to do with it…

When the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) first took effect in the 1970s, the environmental impact analysis it required from builders before a project could begin would often run less than 10 pages. Today, the average is more than 600 pages.

Maybe delays and ballooning costs are worth it to protect the planet, right? Here’s the crazy part: NEPA doesn’t even guarantee that. In some cases, it’s actually making us less green.
(more…)

September 23, 2022

Is This Atlanta Streetcar “The Worst Transit Project of All Time”?

Filed under: Economics, Government, Railways, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

ReasonTV
Published 22 Sep 2022

Transit ridership, especially rail, has collapsed post-pandemic, but the Atlanta BeltLine Coalition says now is the time to take federal dollars and build a $2.5 billion streetcar.

Full text and links: https://reason.com/video/2022/09/22/i…

—
Twenty-three years ago, Atlanta-native and architecture and urban planning student Ryan Gravel had an experience that opened his mind to what urban living could be.

“My senior year I spent abroad in Paris and lived without a car for a year and traveled by train everywhere,” says Gravel. “And within a month of arriving, I had lost 15 pounds. I was in the best shape of my life because I was walking everywhere, and the role of the physical city was made clear to me in a way it really had never been before.”

For his Georgia Tech master’s thesis, Gravel sketched out a plan to make Atlanta more like Paris. He proposed redeveloping the land along the city’s historic rail lines to create a 22-mile loop called the Atlanta BeltLine. He proposed turning the city’s abandoned industrial areas and single-family home neighborhoods into business districts and walking trails. And he proposed connecting downtown to the rest of the city all with a new train running along the entire Atlanta BeltLine.

“I never imagined we would actually do it,” says Gravel.

But they did — for the most part. Cathy Woolard, who was president of the Atlanta City Council, read Gravel’s thesis and decided to use it as a blueprint to remake much of the city. Today, the Atlanta BeltLine is a walking and biking trail, parts of which are bordered by retail and condos.

But one piece of Gravel’s grand vision didn’t get built: The train.

Today, Gravel runs a co-working and event space along the BeltLine, which also serves as a gathering place for urbanists interested in making Atlanta less dependent on cars. He says that the train line is essential for improving city life.

“In those early days, when we built the movement behind the [BeltLine] project, it was around transit,” says Gravel.

The three COVID relief bills set aside $69 billion in federal funding for local transit agencies to operate and add to their transportation systems, meaning that Atlanta might finally get its train—with many American taxpayers who will never step foot on it picking up much of the tab.

Many American cities have used federal money in the past to build rail transit lines that suffer from dismal ridership, that are expensive to maintain, and that are a major drain on their budgets.
(more…)

QotD: Ron DeSantis for Caesar?

Filed under: Government, Politics, Quotations, USA — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 01:00

Oswald Spengler suggests that we’re in for a period of Caesarism, which is warlord rule that maintains the trappings of the old system. It might be as simple as [Mussolini]’s old litmus test: Do the trains run on time? But, since this is Clown World, fake and gay: Are the lights on for more than two days running?

Ron DeSantis, for example, has gotten a lot of Grillers’ panties moist, and while that’s one of the strongest possible arguments for the proposition that he’s just another Swamp Thing — Ace of Normies might not remember how hard he used to squeeeee for fucking Paul Ryan, but I do — it’s nonetheless true that Ron DeSantis has acted at least kinda sorta like … what’s the word?

Ah yes: An adult.

Ron DeSantis’s response to Covid was pretty much exactly what even the most flaming moonbat liberal governor would’ve done as late as 1990, because there were still some grownups in politics back then. Now that the entire Swamp is filled with autistic Mean Girls with PMS, the State can’t carry out even its most basic functions. Governors still have real power […], and there are a few of them that aren’t totally retarded, and so I’d imagine we’ll see a period of retail-level Caesarism — the lights are on three days a week in Nebraska; quick, everybody load up the Conestoga wagon and head for Omaha!

Severian, “Friday Mailbag”, Founding Questions, 2022-06-17.

September 22, 2022

Why Electronic Voting Is Still A Bad Idea

Filed under: Government, Politics, Technology — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Tom Scott
Published 9 Dec 2019

We still shouldn’t be using electronic voting. Here’s why.
(more…)

September 20, 2022

Pierre Poilievre and the role of the Governor of the Bank of Canada

Filed under: Cancon, Economics, Government — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

In The Line, Jen Gerson looks at new Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s threat to fire the head of the Bank of Canada if and when he becomes Prime Minister:

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre at a Manning Centre event, 1 March 2014.
Manning Centre photo via Wikimedia Commons.

In May, Poilievre claimed that Macklem was “surrendering his independence” to the government of the day by using quantitative easing — printing money — to ease the COVID economic crisis. During the party’s English-language debate in Edmonton, Poilievre also said he would fire the governor if he ascended to prime minister.

This, very rightly, ticked off a lot of people. The governor of the Bank of Canada ought to be independent of daily partisan machinations for very good reason; we don’t want the person setting inflation targets to be subject to political pressure, otherwise we would risk a lot more money printing to pay for social programs in the short term, and devaluation of our currency in the long term. So threatening to fire the governor because he or she failed to hew to an incoming government’s wishes is a bad idea. We want that person to stay above the partisan fray.

A Conservative ought to understand this better than most.

Further, much of our inflationary woes is the result of international supply chain issues, which is something beyond the governor’s control. The bank’s defenders have been quick to make this point. Looking at overall increase in the monetary supply, including the significant amounts of money that was pumped into the economy for pandemic relief measures, in addition to the thwack of cash sitting on the banks’ books in the form of potential debt, I suspect that this argument is still highly debatable.

Regardless, the response to Poilievre’s comments from the bank itself was interesting. Although he didn’t call for the firing of his boss, Paul Beaudry, the deputy governor of the Bank conceded that Poilievre had at least a smidgen of a point.

“The aspect that we should be held accountable is exactly right,” Beaudry told a news conference in June. “Right now we completely understand that lots of Canadians can be frustrated at the situation,” he said. “It’s difficult for a lot of people. And we haven’t managed to keep inflation at our target, so it’s appropriate [that] people are asking us questions.”

Macklem himself acknowledged that he had misjudged the possibility for a serious inflationary period back in April. He deserves praise for admitting this! It’s difficult for people in senior roles to admit they were wrong and seek to course correct. One might even argue that his humility on this point demonstrates a personality that is particularly well-suited for his role.

So I want to reiterate that I think threatening to fire Tiff Macklem is a bad idea. It directly undermines the independence of his office, and it places blame on the bank for inflation, when the causes of that inflation are, at best, not his fault, and at worst, still not perfectly understood.

That said — again, messing with the independence of the bank is bad, m’kay — there is a historical precedent for this kind of institution-meddling chicanery. The last politician to threaten an unpopular Bank of Canada governor for political gain was that notable far-right populist … Jean Chrétien. That was back in 1993, in a situation that almost perfectly mirrors the economic and political dynamics of today.

In the ’90s, the incumbent Conservatives had appointed Bank of Canada governor John Crow, who had set interest rates to about seven per cent in order to keep inflation in check. If that figure, which is closer to historical norms than we like to remember, makes you eye your mortgage renewals a little warily, so it should. The Liberals, who were gunning to take over the government from the Conservatives, had argued that Crow’s obsession on maintaining low inflation had worsened a recession; they wanted Crow to prioritize reducing Canada’s unemployment rate instead.

Of course, if that sounds like a potential prime minister taking swipes at an ostensibly independent agent of the Bank of Canada, well, that’s because that’s exactly what it was. And media at the time recognized this at the time.

I think this is another case of a politician indulging in a bit of “bad policy but good politics” rhetoric. Unless he actually means it…

September 19, 2022

QotD: Representative government

Filed under: Government, Law, Quotations, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

If it’s to work at all, representative government has to be representative. That is, it must be consented to by the governed. But not only did we not consent to be ruled this way, we couldn’t. Just to take the most obvious problem: We have no idea who our rulers actually are.

Hawaiian judges are our kakistocracy‘s public face, but all the decisions that matter are made long before the hacks in black get involved. As we know, we Americans commit, on average, three felonies a day. If, when, and how these come to the State’s attention are almost completely random. This is true for any law, actually, and because it is, it’s not really an exaggeration to say that your livelihood, and often your actual freedom, depends on what side of the bed the cop got up on this morning.

If The Authorities notice you when they’re in a good mood, you skate. If The Authorities are in a bad mood, though — tired, hung over, had a fight with the spouse, whatever — you’re screwed. What actually happens to you depends on the lawyers, a.k.a the most incestuous little fraternity on the planet. Whether they choose to prosecute or not, and for what, and what deals they make over a drink or seven determine what happens to you once you get in front of hizzoner … who, of course, is also butt-buddies with all the lawyers who appear in his chambers, since he was one of them not too long ago and they remain his entire social circle.

Who in his right mind could possibly agree to this? No, forget “right mind” — it’s simply not possible for anyone, not even someone as far out on reality’s fringes as the SJWs, to consent to this. Those “people” (in the strict biological sense) think houseplants have human rights, but not even they would agree to have their life’s course determined by two dimbulbs with great hair and ugly neckties cutting deals with each other in a dive bar.

But so long as we fetishize the form of “representative government,” it can’t be otherwise. As folks in Our Thing never tire of pointing out, had The People ever been consulted about our preferences, at any time after 1963, we’d still be living in a White Christian nation with a solid manufacturing base and a minuscule military footprint. If it were possible to throw the bums out, we would’ve thrown out every bum on every ballot since at least Calvin Coolidge. But we can’t throw the bums out, because the process is rigged.

Severian, “Form > Process > Outcome”, Rotten Chestnuts, 2019-09-06.

September 17, 2022

Is it still a conspiracy theory if more than 50% of Canadians believe it?

Filed under: Cancon, Government, Media, Politics — Tags: , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

Chris Selley posted a link to this rather eye-opening Abacus Data poll summary by Bruce Anderson and David Coletto:

We recently completed nationwide surveying among 1500 Canadians. The focus was on the levels of trust people have in institutional sources of information, and belief in conspiracy theories. This is the first in a series called “Trust & Facts: What Canadians Believe”

44% THINK MUCH OF THE INFORMATION FROM NEWS ORGANIZATIONS IS FALSE

Almost half of those interviewed found themselves agreeing with the statement “much of the information we receive from news organizations is false”.

While this means a majority of Canadians have some trust in news organizations, more than 13 million adults (extrapolating 44% to an adult population of 29.5 million) don’t.

Those with no post-secondary education, Alberta residents and those on the right show greater mistrust. But by far the biggest differences are visible when we look at party affinity. The vast majority of People’s Party supporters don’t trust news organizations and a (smaller) majority – 59% – of Conservative voters feel the same way.

Among those who think Pierre Poilievre is the Conservative leadership candidate who best reflects their views, 55% don’t trust media information, while among those who identify with Jean Charest the proportion is much lower, at 27%.

52% THINK OFFICIAL GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTS OF EVENTS CAN’T BE TRUSTED

More than half of those interviewed found themselves agreeing with the statement “official government accounts of events can’t be trusted”

As with trust in news organizations, those with no post-secondary education, Alberta residents and those on the right showed markedly higher levels of mistrust in government.

Majorities of People’s Party, Conservative and Green Party voters indicate mistrust. Those on the left and Liberal voters show higher levels of trust.

September 15, 2022

The promise of grand “green” plans versus the reality when the plans are implemented

Filed under: Cancon, Economics, Environment, Government, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

Elizabeth Nickson on the contrast between how things like the “Green New Deal” are represented by their proponents and the media and what their actual real-world outcomes are like:

“Forest fire” by Ervins Strauhmanis is licensed under CC BY 2.0 .

Ever wonder what happens to a region once it is “preserved”? Right now, all through the US and Canada, governments are taking giant bites of land, and locking them down under the guidance of the UN’s Agenda 2030, which means a full 30% of the land and waters will be “saved”. If anyone notices, the local media preens and praises itself. Aren’t we all so wonderful and enlightened and caring, the PR says, and the newspapers copy it line-for-line.

No, it’s terrible. It is possibly the very worst thing ever. Set-aside land degrades. There aren’t enough bureaucrats in the world to take care of it. Besides out in the forest or up on the ranges is decidedly not where a civil servant wants to be. As a result none of them know what they have done. It’s a loop, politicians, stupid women and beta males, civil servants engaged in a masturbatory celebration of their goodness and triumph over commerce. From hipster neighborhoods all over North America a song of self-praise rises like smoke into the air.

Except now, right now, I sit in a smoke haze courtesy of the set aside forests in Washington State which are burning. Look, this is simple to think through. In the early 90’s Clinton ratified the spotted owl preservation plan and hundreds of millions of acres of forest were left to themselves, no cutting, no grazing, no firewood collection, no thinning, no fire breaks, no removal of dead trees, especially not beetle-killed trees. In fact, no touch.

What happens when a formerly industrial forest is left to itself? A thousand tiny trees start to grow right up against each other. They grow like carrots that haven’t been thinned. They grow so thick they can’t get light. They draw all the water from the ground, they end up like tinder. Around them brush grows — it too cannot get light or much water so it too is desiccated. It grows up the trees, trying to get at the water in the trees, and acts as a fire ladder

Boom.

Massive canopy fires, which, since they decommissioned the roads into the forest, are very very difficult to either brake or put out.

On every single environmental metric, in every single system, these people destroy the land. What they do is exactly the opposite of what they claim. They take massive amounts of tax money to “save” land and then they destroy the resource. And the towns in the resource area. And the families, and the tax base.

I could go through every environmental goal, and tear it apart. None of them use science that is provable. It can’t be duplicated, its assumptions are wrong, its statistics fiddled. Tens of thousands of papers are used to create these policies, written by the environment movement through its NGOs, funded by rich morons from old families, most of whose ancestors created environmental devastation themselves. I can refute the math and assumptions of EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM given a maximum of four hours and one phone call. No one challenges these studies, and these abominations then become law. Law that destroys the water and land.

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