PN:
Joe’s Comment – Another week of reprieve. So far, so good. First week of November and it hasn’t snowed or frozen hard. Some rain this week, but not enough to make the back yard impassable.
Lots of projects to put away for the coming coldness and snow.
Finally paid my property taxes.
I know good and hard what happens when the government screws the pooch – the mil rate goes through the roof.
This property has appreciated (according to the annual government assessment) over $700,000.00 CAN in a brief 18 years.
I don’t know what they call that in your neck of the woods, but here in Vernon BC, Canada, it is called rampant inflation.
I got a good laugh today.
The purchasing power of my pension when I retired in 2002 is now only 55% as much!
Blood sucking parasites at every turn.
Despite the $$$ dilemma, I’m in very good spirits, great health, and getting around with no medications or prosthetics.
Not bad for a man closer to 75 years than 74.
Seven more rants to the end of the year.
Bring it on…..
Canadiana
Carbon Tax
Given the espoused rationale from the lips of Chief Rainbow Socks, our fearless (because he’s oblivious) and feckless (because he’s obtuse) federal leader – he imposed a carbon tax to save the World™!!! (or some such tripe) – it leads people to speculate. What up?
Joe is good at calculus. He ponders the penultimate question: if we kill by starvation, or decimate the fiscal life of everyone on the planet in order to “save” it, whom precisely is the benefactor? By ruining millions (maybe billions) of lives, what is the deliverable?
More concisely, just whom or who are we saving the planet for? Excuse the dangling participle. Some emergencies allow for ignoring the rules…… (that be sarcasm, matey!!)
The ultimate question is in everyone’s mind – what is MY fate…..
Is that imbecilic puppet on a stick drama queen (aka Prime Minister Justin Trudeau) doubling down on what is undeniably a political ploy to garner votes?
The answer is a profound YES!
Joe and I watched with incredulity the “pardon” extended for the down easterners in the Maritime provinces – no carbon tax on household heating products – while telling the westerners that they should vote for Liberals, lots more Liberals.
It is enough to affirm the veracity of an H.L. Mencken thought or two as applied to the Canadian version of political graft –
The last quote is golden. Or platinum – your choice.
“Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows!”
Even The Shadow is mystified at the motivation, the belief empowering Our Beloved Leader to sacrifice We The Canadian People at the alter of Globalism.
What is it with small unimportant inconsequential people who want to be leaders? The quality called “leadership” is obvious, not oblivious. Paraphrasing supreme court justice Potter Stewart, “you know leadership when you see it“.
Joe says Canadian politics is obscene. And may as well be pornography.
Which leads to a recent opinion editorial from that great Canadian, the man who uses many words when a few will do, the man perpetually capable of voluminous bloviating, Rex Murphy. Here is his commentary on the carbon tax.
The above is NOT a criticism of Mr. Murphy. He is a stalwart champion of the Canadian People, the Mud Peckers, the Dirt People, the Salt of the Earth. Indeed, Joe and I are envious of Mr. Murphy’s glibness and vocabulary, and understanding of Canadian history.
We also think that his commentary on the carbon tax contains facts, and much truth. From his Op-Ed –
…..”He just cancelled the carbon tax for heating oil in Atlantic Canada. The tax which he and his docile, obedient and grey cabinet have defended with the fervour of one of those dated Sunday morning TV preachers. It was the mother of all taxes since — from the beginning of time, and possibly earlier — it was the ONLY tax that once paid, would (so the Liberals incessantly howled) be followed by a cheque from the government larger than the tax.
And why was this planet-necessary policy amended for Atlantic Canada? First hint: it was not love. Second hint: polling during a Liberal nose-dive. It was the trembling or broken hold on the people’s trust currently on full display, and the irresistible need to grab on to anything that might stem or slow the Liberals’ Gadarene down-flight to voter dismissal, that brought on this Earth-shift in policy.
No hint. Fact. It was Liberal politics. For make no error, if four provinces in the Confederation can be manumitted from the carbon tax crusade, then logic and its stronger cousin — reality— insist that the other six and the territories will not only demand the same relief, they may, which premiers Scott Moe and Danielle Smith have already made clear, provide the relief by their own efforts.
Confederation is a balance of partners, or it was before climate alarmism became the excuse and the shield for the vastly overreaching and imperious Trudeau regime. Premiers make policy, too.
Take away the carbon tax and you take away the whole great game. If that once immutable requisite for a climate commitment on the scale Trudeau has given can be tossed as “inconvenient” (I owe Al Gore its slippery use here) to winning five or six seats in the next election, what remains of principle? What can be believed on any lesser front or issue? If politics trumps the planet for this government, if winning East Coast seats is more important than saving the world … so be it. It was good while it worked.
What’s left of this shambling, shifting and scandal-adhesive government? Not much but more unctuous speeches, unpersuasive photo-ops at (already) troubled EV projects, and — capstone — Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault, ex- or not so ex-Greenpeace activist, offering more friendly salutes to China’s great work on this file (opening two more coal mines a week seems to be Beijing’s aim), and more of his feverish speeches for a dying cause.
…… The Atlantic Excision — as I shall call it — from the imperious imposition of the world-saving carbon tax, puts Trudeau in direct and executed opposition to his first and only principle — combatting global warming. What’s he going to say in Paris the next time: “Hey, two-thirds of Canada has a carbon tax?”
The tax is dead. Its author did it in. And perhaps, make that likely, his party with it.”
According to Herr Murphy, the cat is out of the bag, the jig is up, the course has run, the Emperor has no clothes…..
Good bye carbon tax, good bye Liberals, hello marshmallow pie.
Joe and I see it from another perspective. The old Mensa adage that “half the population is below average in intelligence”, and our own observation that there is no Left, no Right, no Center, colours our thinking. There are only people. Some of the people are satisfied with the status quo and their efforts are to keep it so. Others of the people are NOT satisfied with the status quo, and their efforts are to change things. Still others are oblivious to their surroundings – some deliberately, delinquently, purposely. Others of the oblivious are too young to know, too stupid to comprehend (low IQ), too ill to care, so old that they are too inept or impotent to assert their point of view. And so it goes……
One more HL Mencken and Joe will let it go. Mr. Mencken restricted his comment with an adjective. Joe and I believe you can remove the words “the American” or substitute it with any other modifier, it rings true –
For the uneducated and lazy (Joe and me), here’s a definition of manumitted.
Culture
The Hodge Twins
Joe and I have been watching the Hodge brothers (aka PatriotTwins) for years.
They have “gathered their feces” as the popular vernacular phrasing goes.
As “people of color”, much like another set, Diamond and Silk, they are operating in the gray area the progressives haven’t yet succeeded in gagging.
Consequently, the Hodge Twins speak their mind without outright blocking and defunding. Joe appreciates their sense of humor, and their willingness to speak about racial matters without rancor or bias:
Science
CO2 – Dr. William Happer
This is a hero of Joe and me.
The following video is a recent presentation – October this year (2023).
Every presentation from Dr. Happer we see, we learn new facts, details, and interesting information.
A tough crowd.
Dr. Happer fields every question aptly, without theatrics, without rancor, even when his bona fides are challenged.
The truth will out:
Another relatively recent Dr. Happer. Same data. Additional personal history. Additional personal scientific accomplishment detail. For posterity (Ub2b videos come and go….):
Health
Dr. Paul Mason
An Australian hero, carrying the banner of human nutrition, and broadcasting sane dietary advice.
In this video from Low Carb Down Under, Dr. Mason gives a brief history of how western government “Food Pyramid” recommendations were a political not nutritional construct.
Joe and I have been watching Dr. Mason for years. The first appearance in our rant was Sunday Rant – 0521.
Dr. Mason advocates low carb high fat as a path to optimized health:
Sanity4Sweden
Sven is our “foreign correspondent”.
Joe and I watch him on a regular basis.
Today’s episode mentions doctors in Canada.
One Canadian doctor, William Makis, claims the total number of doctors who have died due to the COVID vaccinations is 93 to date.
Sven does his usual excellent presentation.
The COVID guilty will come to justice eventually, thanks in part to the grass roots journalism of many folks like Sanity4Sweden:
Here is an interview of Dr. William Makis by Laura Lynn Tyler Thompson:
Dr. Mark Trozzi
This Canadian doctor is being disciplined for telling the truth about the COVID “vaccines”. He has lost his practice. He has been ostracized. He is about to be penalized.
Why? (You might ask…..)
Well, he did what was right and just and moral and ethical instead of what he was told to do.
He is one of the courageous doctors who have been shouting the truth since the onset of the “pandemic”.
Joe and I consider him to be a hero, and outstanding Canadian doctor:
Joe’s Garage
AI
An update on robotics and artificial intelligence from “DigitalEngine“.
Joe says we should replace all politicians with robots immediately.
That way, if they FUBAR or SNAFU or try to solve problems nobody has, you can unplug them.
What a Beach Boys moment!:
Fred Dibnah – Steeplejack
The following video is from the BBC Archive.
It is a short introduction to Fred Dibnah, a steeplejack, with scenes of him working to dismantle what looks like a 200 foot tall industrial chimney.
Brick by brick.
The video is from 1979.
Joe and I marvel at Fred’s aplomb and down-to-earth attitude.
Joe says seven thousand pounds ain’t worth scaring the bejesus out of our self every day at work.
No safety gear, a rickety wooden ladder up the side of the chimney….. and he comes down for tea!
An amazing glimpse of a “career” most likely no longer extant: