wampus

Albertans should use the lowered threshold to get referendums to get a referendum on exiling Danielle Smith.

When the Nazi's came to power in Germany, they had less support amongst the public than the republicans do today.

If you think it fair to hold all of Nazi germany accountable for the atrocities that went on, there's no reason to pretend America is some "special" exception. Germans take responsibility for their past, with things like banning AFD -- even if a German can legit say "It wasn't me gassing those jews", they still recognise they were responsible for what occurred as a result of their inaction and apathy. In the US, like 30% of them didn't even bother to show up and vote. Apathy is no excuse, and not worthy of absolution. They literally elected a felon and a rapist.

Regardless, I still stick by the reduction in visits and the on going boycotts aren't about making them "realise our value" or whatever. It's a visceral recoil experienced on an aggregate scale, to the vitriolic bile being spewed by the people they elected, targeted quite literally at all of us here in Canada. If someone vomits on you constantly, you move the fuck away -- and it isn't about "wanting to make them miss you". It's about the vomit.

I agree with a chunk of this, but your note about 'reminding them at large of our value' is off. Most people I talk to here in Canada look at the issues in the states as basically untenable in terms of stability / trade / geopolitical unity. Supporting Russia, attacking their allies/threatening to militarily annex peaceful democratic areas like greenland, putting up BS reasons for trade tariffs (fent). The USA is a schizo trade partner at best, where for 4 years with the dems it may be 'normal', but when it flips repub its suddenly xenophobic dictator land, with less stability in its agreements than a third world military dictatorship -- at least those deals tend to last until the next coup, whereas Trumps agreements change based on his dementia; his administration has become comfortable with making up totally fake numbers even, which can change based on how they want to present the fake narrative about why they're doing whatever stupid crap they're doing. And there's no assurance it'll go back to a 'stable' dem setup for four years next time around -- the way it's trending, the dems will be locked up, with all their funding methods declared unamerican by EO, similar to the shakedown of the law firms that's happened recently as reported by 60 minutes.

If you live next to a family in a mansion, and they suddenly start flying a Nazi flag, beating/deporting their own maintenance staff (sometimes their own family too, by mistake), and screaming about how they're gonna take your house, you don't pull back on visiting as a way to 'remind them' of your value. You pull back because WTF, no. And if you can't move, and they were your main contact locally, you start lookin for other friends / buying guns and protection. Again, not to remind them of your value, but because fuck no.

As a non US person seeing this clip, all I can think is.... this isn't a surprise at all, the tariff stuff is basically blatant violation of existing trade agreements, being done based on Trumps whims without real justification. Him doing the same 'locally' is just more of the same.

Western alienation has been around for decades and decades.

It's difficult to consider something a threat, when it's become the status quo.

While I think they should decouple from Microsoft / US tech giants, I don't think there's a realistic hope in hell of it happening. This is why they have that 'easily or affordably' caveat in the announcement. They say they'll leave it to govt agencies to figure out if its easy / affordable to do.

So somewhere like BC's Financial Services Authority (the gov agency that oversees provincial credit unions, realtors, insurance companies), which stuck all of their stuff into Microsoft's Cloud, and retains a skeleton crew in terms of IT support staff (part of their public RFP for sticking things in the cloud, was admitting that fact).... will simply say it's too difficult and/or costly to decouple from their perspective. And they'll leave all that government regulatory stuff exposed to the US and the risk of services being cut off summarily as part of trade deterioration / extortion. It's grimly entertaining to acknowledge that our own government regulators are so dependant on the USA's services, that they can't function without them: it lends credence to the crap Trump says, frankly. He could practically 'turn off' our financial regulators by forcing Microsoft to deny service.

I'm pretty confident the government isn't "that" serious about any of this stuff. I've written to both my provincial and federal reps asking specifically about whether Microsoft / Tech-giant type subscriptions would be on the cutting board, and none of them want to commit to anything. They'll openly rip up any Elon contract though, because those are in fashion / a more obvious supporter of the stuff goin on down south -- and its a lot simpler to 'not build' something, than it is to alter existing stuff.

They have direct access/experience with Liberals making promises for election campaigns, and then doing whatever they want once in power. They have direct experience with a Liberal government causing housing prices to skyrocket at rates previously unseen -- the Liberals have literally presided over a period of Canada's history that utterly destroyed the dreams of many younger folks. They also have access to historical information highlighting how much easier it was for older generations, older generations who have voted consistently to 'pull the ladder up' from the next generation. And, most importantly I think, most people aren't fussed with researching years and years of history before voting.

And the disparity on fronts like housing has grown to a point where lots of younger people are basically saying "We'd rather watch it all burn, so you old people feel the same hopelessness as us". And again, I can't fault them for it.

It's not so much about "pro pierre", as it is "pro change". Carney hopefully will do things 'differently', but doing stuff like axing carbon taxes and removing environmental reviews from projects, isn't exactly a "hopeful future" for younger people who are watching things like Jasper and Lytton burn to the ground due to climate change. Carney is essentially an 'older' generation of Conservative, who was parachuted into the Liberal leadership because they feel like the Cons move right gives them an opportunity to move 'right' to garner more of the disenfranchised conservative voters, while the fear of a hard-right wing movement will keep their left-leaning supporters in line. It's a gamble that'll likely pay off, but it's not one that carries a whole lot of 'hope' given the circumstances. There's a reason more 'active' forms of left wing principles, like what you see AOC and Bernie touring on, have more appeal to the younger demo.

Fairly sure the younger cohort is deciding largely based on the past performance of the existing government. Justin's Liberals have been in power since 2015 -- for many 18-28 year olds, the Liberal government is the only party they've known / seen. And in that time, have things improved on the housing front?

Or did the government start off campaigning on it as an issue, but then when the issue spiked due to other Liberal policies (mass influx of immigrants post COVID), did they attempt to claim it wasn't a federal government responsibility? And they then flip flopped on that again, and re-assigned the guy they had in charge of the mass, chaotic influx of immigrants to be in charge of figuring out housing (Miller). A decade of promising advances on that file, and a decade of it getting exponentially worse. And it is exponentially worse, you just have to google charts on housing prices / historical trends to see it, there've been tons of articles in the news over the years screaming about it to the ears of deaf politicians. The party swapping leaders last second isn't going to erase that history, one that was supported by the party at large.

For example, the CMHC has a chart of averages/medians for the vancouver region here: https://www03.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/hmip-pimh/en/TableMapChart/Table?TableId=1.10.1&GeographyId=2410&GeographyTypeId=3&DisplayAs=Table&GeograghyName=Vancouver . From 1990 to 2000, the median went from 280k to 360k -- about 30% over 10 years, roughly 3% per year. Even back then it was considered a good move to buy/invest in housing due to the appreciation in value beating inflation targets. From 2015 to 2022 (the end of the tables data), it went from 1.09m to 2.06m -- about 89% in 8 years, roughly 11% per year. And that includes years where the COVID immigration disruption "briefly" flattened the increase -- it was up to 2m in 2018, dropped to 1.6m in 2020, and then shot back up once the flood gates were re-opened. Wages, to the surprise of absolutely no one, can't keep up with that sort of increase: it's completely unhinged. From a younger person's perspective, that's what the Liberals did.

That cohort is also young enough that things like Childcare will only apply to a small % of the group. Likewise, likely, for dental coverage -- many young people in Uni will get extended coverage from any parental work-coverage, and young people who work will have that potential coverage directly. Dental costs are also less 'present' and ubiquitous than housing costs -- you gotta pay rent monthly, but you don't need an annual root canal. Government Dental is a perk more for retired seniors, disabled/long-term unemployed people and middle-aged people who don't have coverage through work -- even the CBC ran stories focusing on the senior demographic for that one (the person highlighted, iirc, was a ~75 year old who'd worked in America most of her life, who is currently still working to pay for her dentures). Hell, even when I was in uni, at least one of my friends, who had coverage, didn't bother going to the dentist for years cause she just wasn't fussed. Even as a middle aged person, I'm personally not that fussed with anything the liberals / ndp promise the senior cohort -- many millenials are jaded enough at this point, that promises for boomers are viewed as things that will disappear by the time we get old enough to qualify, if we get old enough to qualify given how healthcare/GP access has also deteriorated: I fully expect to die younger than my parents. I can understand why an even younger generation wouldn't be in favour of putting in social supports for boomers -- at this point it isn't the boomers who are having to pay the taxes, its the boomers voting explicitly to give themselves perks at the expense of younger generations.

I think Pierre / the cons are a terrible choice, personally. But I can fully understand why the younger folks would be swayed by the idea of change, even if its just smashing things apart like we're seeing in the States. The last decade has been bleak, and there's no tangible reason to think that the promises of the party in charge during that decade are worth anything going forward.

Yes yes, tactics matter a bit, as does RNG. But it's still a fairly linear progression line. Like it's possible to get to the first on-land brain thing fight without hitting level 2. It's possible to win that fight as a level 1, with just you and shadowheart, technically. But its far far easier if you just play the way they intended, get to level 2 before that fight, and cheese it.

As noted elsewhere, I haven't even been interested enough to get to the goblin village. So Halsin, Minsc, Minthara are all people I never bothered to get to. Emo goth cleric girl is feminine, though it feels very niche -- like a 'token' straight semi-human looking girl. So if you want a 'traditional' partner, you're stuck with emo girl? meh. At least if you play as a girl you have a choice of more human looking partners.

Wyll I sorta just assumed was gay, cause all the others were already gay for my ugly little gnome -- plus you meet him while he's taking care of children in the camp, and he runs around in light armor/isn't a 'physical' character class. The most physical male in the first bit is asterion, but he is more agility/dex, which are traditionally more female oriented in d&d (I think old editions gave women +1 dex, men +1 str or something along those lines) -- and he's obsessed with sucking my gnome.

In a broader sense though, its the assertiveness of the different characters that I think causes the impression on my side. All of the women are pretty direct / blunt / to the point about 'most' topics (outside of story elements like shadowhearts whatsit); the men are sorta coy and demure.

There's a whole lot more they could've done in that space, but they left it essentially the same as previous games -- while I get that it's well executed, I don't think of it as having more 'depth' in this area than anything previous. So I find it boring / unmotivating.

Progressive feet and hand numbness.... sounds like untreated diabetes to me, based on symptoms I remember when my dad first got it. Definitely get checked / a docs input. Untreated, you can literally lose toes/limbs. I'd even consider starting to eat a diabetic diet while I waited for an appt, to see if it improved the situation.

As for the sex stuff, as an older guy, I reckon the bigger part is to find a partner you want to live with outside of the sexy-time stuff as a priority in general. Everyone ages and their bodies change, physical stuff is important but its not enough to maintain a longer term meaningful relationship, in my experience at least -- and ultimately, the time spent boning is a tiny fraction of the time you'd be spending with the other person in the long run. To add to that, I've had relationships in the past where we didn't do much of the direct penetration stuff, but I still found it really.... rewarding? titilating? gratifying? .... just making her eyes roll back / bite me as she climaxed and then collapsed exhausted. The endorphin release from intimacy isn't just about getting your rocks off, in some ways the feeling of knowing you can drive your partner nuts is better -- to me, that's what makes me feel 'virile', more so than simply fucking/orgasming myself. Biggest issues there was just making sure she understood I didnt feel a need to orgasm myself everytime we were together, so long as I rung her bell thoroughly.

I guess attendance over-estimation isn't restricted to politicians these days.

The GVRD has a population of about 2.5-3 million. There's no way 20% of the region trekked out to Surrey to attend this parade. Like 600,000 people is the entire population of Surrey.

It's strange, I still have real difficulty getting 'in' to Baldurs gate 3, even with all the media hyping it for a long time. And one reason for that is I don't find it all that 'deep', and its linear progression makes me lose interest partway through the starting areas (never gotten to the goblin camp or w/e).

Like take the romances. Even in the little bit that I played, the way affection is handled is just boring / tired / done. All the male chars are sorta femmy, all the female chars are sorta butch, and none of them seem to care that, like, I'm some tiny scrawny gnome bard. They all want to screw me, just cause I'm nice to them -- all the men turned gay almost immediately after meeting me, something I guess they had to tweak in a patch. And it all seems to happen based on pre-determined/defined relationship algorithms - be nice, gain a point towards boning NPC X, if you cross a threshold trigger an event. That's been done literally for decades and decades in the CRPG genre.

The encounters/combats are all really rigid and essentially scripted in nature, at least the parts I've seen. Go to point X, encounter monster group A, which is tooled to certain party level ranges. If you can't win, you've gone to an encounter out of the general 'order' you're meant to do them. Go back, find the encounter you missed to level up, then return and progress further. Again, very generic and something that's been done for decades.

Rigid party size, camp with toons you can swap in and out, complete with a skill retrainer guy. Immersion breaking, but again, a trope / mechanic that's been around for literally decades.