An insult to every Canadian

Or at least every Canadian who still imagines this to be in some sense an independent sovereign state.

Check this out from CBC; US Justice Department in talks with Meng Wanzhou. 

You know the story. World Cop USA is hot to show Iran and China who's the boss. They make up some totally illegal bullshit sanctions, and then charge Meng Wanzhou, CFO of one of China's iconic brands, for violating those bullshit sanctions.

Getting their hands on Meng would be a real score. What a great way to humiliate China! And humiliate China we must.

They are communists.

They hate freedom and democracy.

They are determined to take over the world.

Therefore, we must hate them. We must rally with our allies to stymie them at every turn.

Meng was savvy enough to avoid US airspace, but when Uncle Sam tapped PM Fluffy with the job of nabbing her, Trudeau was delighted to oblige.

And here we are, two years later, and the Wall Street Journal reports that the US government is negotiating not with the government of Canada, but with Meng directly!

Because it matters not a whit what the government of Canada has to say on the matter. The government of Canada will be happy to go along with whatever decisions are made in Washington.

Winter strikes again!

Every year, winter catches me by surprise.

As a guy who survived long enough to get a pension, you'd think I'd have spotted the pattern by now, but no. Winter is a complete shock every year.

Although winter does not officially commence for a few weeks yet, the winter weather has moved in. The school kids got a day off yesterday, and the snowplow drivers are getting decent hours. 

December one isn't a bad time for winter to start. I would say January one isn't a bad time for it to end.  So things are looking good!

Not really. 

Every news outlet I turn to is still hyperventilating about Trump's reluctance to officially throw in the towel. The purpose of the hysterical hyperventilation is to make you think it matters whether it's Biden or Trump in the White House for the next four years.

It makes no difference whatsoever. If anything, we increase the odds of serious conflict with Russia and China with a President Biden, because he is very much favoured by the warmongering classes whose money elects presidents.

But either way, rest assured the rich will prosper, and the rest of us are fucked.

Street racing then and now

I've occasionally taken a run down memory lane to revisit the glory days of street racing. Oh, those were glorious days alright! We thought we were the coolest cats in town, melting the polyglas tires off our 340 Dusters (275 hp) and 396 Novas (375 hp).

Over the years my cohort has shed a lot of tears bemoaning the fact that the "younger generations" don't have the interest to keep the sport of driving fast cars fast alive...

What were we thinking?

In the old days, something that made an honest 500 hp was considered a scary ride. Nowadays half a dozen manufacturers will happily sell you over 700 hp off the showroom floor. The youngsters tuning the twin-turbo Vipers and 1000 hp Mustangs today would consider the twelve second rocketships of my era embarrassingly slow.

The "tuning" is different too. It used to involve screwdrivers and feeler gauges. Now it seems to involve plugging in a laptop. Sounds simple enough, but I haven't a clue what they're actually doing with the computer technology. My computer know-how is pretty much maxed out when I watch these videos, never mind tuning a 1600 hp engine from my laptop.

And the speeds they're hitting these days are incomprehensible by 1970 standards. These guys are dipping into the sevens at speeds approaching 200 mph. Those would have been funny-car times back in the day. Now they're doing that with cars that have power steering and air-conditioning!

So, apologies to the younger generations - you've obviously kept the flame alive!

But here's what I find sad. Back in the day, any goober with a job could get into the game. I don't think that's the case anymore. Driving fast cars fast has become a rich kid's pastime.

Pity!

Meet Mickey Two-Traps

Into a world short of heroes, a new legend is born; Mickey Two-Traps.

Mickey's adventures in the pantry have gone viral in Mouseworld. Many have ventured into the pantry. Few have lived to tell the tale.

And what a tale Mickey has to tell! 

"The morons who own the joint have gone in for those laughable Victor "quick-set" traps. Right away the odds of surviving go from zero to fifty-fifty. That maybe led me to let my guard down a little, but I wasn't ready for what happened next. Thinking I'd caught a whiff of peanut butter, I went into the corner to investigate, and... WHAM!

When I came to, I tried to shake the damn trap loose, but I couldn't see anything, and next thing I know, I back right into another trap! 

SNAP! 

Now I got one trap on my head and another one stuck on my ass and I'm starting to think I might not make it home... 

And then, a miracle! The dorkshit who set the traps gives me a lift out to the compost heap and let's me go free!"

Yup, it's all true. They're raising pints in Mickey's honour all over Mouseworld. He has become a living legend. 

Enjoy the glory while you can, Mr. Two-Traps. I've set up an old-school Victor "original" in the pantry, just for you.

Come back any time you like.

Greasing the skids for war on China

The Yellow Peril demonization pogrom continues apace in Canadian national media. At the Globe and Mail it fell to Campbell Clark to carry the can today; "Canada must embrace Biden's China alliance."

There's an obvious typo in the title; it's an anti-China alliance Biden is crafting, and he's hot to trot. In fact, in his first call with Justin after the election, and apparently Campbell was on the line, Biden was "effusive about working with allies."

How effusive was he? Not effusive enough. Mr. Clark suggests we "should be pushing" Biden in the right direction lest he waver in his resolve to confront the Yellow Peril, "we" being the allies who have shivered through four years of darkness waiting for the light of freedom to shine again in Biden's City on a Hill.

Meanwhile, over at the CBC, Evan Dyer wants us to follow Australia's lead and ramp up the Yellow Peril rhetoric. Perhaps if we join Australia in pushing back against Chinese aggression it'll stiffen Biden's spine? That's a somewhat unlikely scenario. Canada and Australia together spend about 7% of what the US spends on "security" every year. Fortunately, the prospects of pipsqueak me-too nations like Canada and Australia bringing China to heel are purely imaginary.

After four years in the shadow of the Orange Ogre, The Nations of Virtue are uniting again behind the leadership of the Exceptional and Indispensable Nation, the nation with the most powerful military machine in history.

Be afraid.

Best of times for Amazon and Walmart; worst of times for independent retail

As Toronto re-enters lockdown on account of the "second wave," there's umbrage in the air over the fact that Walmart and some other big chains will remain open, while independent retailers are forced to close.

Independent retail has been up against it for a long time, long before the pandemic. In a nutshell, the reason is this; people would rather save a few cents shopping at Amazon or Walmart, than to pay a little more and keep their local independents in business. 

The pandemic is the final nail in the coffin for a wide swath of independent businesses. We'll be happy enough to blame the virus for their demise, when the truth is that everyone who's ever shopped Walmart, Costco, or Amazon deserves a share of the blame. 

When we are conditioned to measure our lives by how much crap we consume, a retail model that optimizes crap-per-dollar will inevitably prevail.

Shame on all of us.

The worst of times; the best of times

Have you noticed that all the folks telling you you gotta stay home have cushy jobs where they can work from home?

While this plague is the worst of times, it's the best of times for folks who know how to make hay under the pandemic sun. Check out this headline; How billionaires got $637 billion richer during pandemic.

And it's not just billionaires. 

This pandemic summer has been the busiest in memory for building contractors around here. Real estate is booming. Folks who can afford it aren't shy about building new homes.

And don't cry too many tears for the front-line workers. Any nurse who's been working double shifts for the last six months is having paydays like never before in their careers. They're buying those new builds.

There's a Harley dealership in Pennsylvania having its best year ever. Seems every other yokel in the county signed over their covid check as a down payment back in the spring. Most of those purchasers were operating on the "we're fucked anyway" premise. The world is going for a shit anyway, so I might as well get a couple of months tooling around on the Harley of my dreams.

By the fall, most of these customers had defaulted on their loans, and now the dealer gets paid by the lenders to repo all those bikes. 

Business has never been better!