The Doom That Came to Cowtown

The United Conservative Party released their Policy and Governance Resolutions for the upcoming legislature. It's pretty much a shit show from start to finish.
Governance Resolutions (1-19)are mostly minor changes to how government operates. Stuff like who's eligible for constituency associations, whether you can use a physical membership card, etc. The biggest thing is that #17 which says there must be a leadership review if the party leader loses an election/by-election.

I imagine these things could be manipulated to give subtle biases to rural or right-leaning ridings, but honestly my eyes glazed over. It's a case of me knowing that they're all bad actors, and assuming the worst.

And speaking of the worst, the policy proposals are where the real evil meat is. They fall into several broad categories.

Damn You Ottawa

No one ever lost votes blaming Ottawa for their problems.

#1 Defend Alberta’s economy and autonomy by opposing all attempts by the Federal government to impose net zero by 2035.

Straight up obstructing the federal government. You can tell what their main priorities are since this was #1 on the list. We might want to screw the gay kids, and support wing-nuts, but we will always, absolutely, support our Oil and Gas Overlords first and foremost.

#15 Recognize that Albertans have many endangered God-given rights and freedoms that are not formally affirmed in The Canadian Constitution, its enactments or Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

This goes into more detail, but boils down to wanting US-style bill or rights (especially the “rights” of the really wacky states, and guns guns guns). Also note the inclusion of “God-given”. This came from our Premier's riding, and I just wish she'd move to rural Idaho already, since she likes it so much.

Also, they describe the Convoy protests as the "2022 truck parking problem", and boy howdy, are they still angry that Ottawa invoked extreme measures to put a stop to it.

Let Assholes be Assholes

These are all about letting the wing-nut freak flag fly without facing any consequences. Note that it won't protect you.

“Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition …There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.” - Frank Wilhoit.

#2 Protect an individual’s right to free expression.

It goes on to point out that people are criticized for having opinions, and sometimes even fired for them. Basically, the UCP wants to make it illegal to suffer the consequences of your actions. This will become a theme as we go into different categories.

And remember, this won't be used to keep you from being fired for voting New Democrat. But if you try to keep convoy protesters out of your store, watch out!

#25 make the Alberta Human Rights Tribunal and all other administrative and regulatory body hearings subject to the same rules of evidence and burden of proof as followed by the courts.

Organizations can no longer have ethical obligations for their members, only legal ones. And because these organizations typically don't have the apparatus for investigating or prosecuting crime the way the justice system has, this effectively means no sanctions without a pre-existing conviction, or more effort than their willing to spend.

#28 Require all regulatory professional associations and trade organizations to limit investigations of their members for complaints regarding professional conduct of their members to instances of activities that occur while ‘on the job,’ and limit the application of any Code of Conduct to professional activities and exclude personal affairs.

You can be a tiki-torch wielding convoy participant wearing actual swastikas, but I can't fire you, provided you only do it on your day off.

COVID Bullshit

They rode in on a wave of wing-nut anti-vaxx/anti-mask bullshit, so you knew there was going to be a lot of this. Because even the tiny impositions we had to put up with compared to other countries was an affront to their right to hang out at Tim's and breath on the cashier.

#3: Protect a medical practitioner’s right to research, speak, and write; and protect Medical Doctors and all healthcare professionals from having their licenses to practice threatened for publicly expressing professional medical opinions in any public setting.

The goal here it to eliminate consequences for healthcare professionals who spout nonsense.

#4 Protect an individual’s right to informed consent decisions regarding their own body.

The goal here is to eliminate consequences for patients who accept nonsense. Also, patients already have consent. I think this is here to force doctors to put up with patient nonsense. i.e. it's less about refusing treatment, it's about not allowing the Doctor to contradict the patient who wants woo treatment.

#7 Protect an individual’s right to privacy and confidentiality of their health care information.

No vaccination status cards ever again. Because the rational people aren't allowed to protect themselves from the irrational people.

#16 Enshrine the doctor-patient relationship by:

protecting Alberta physicians from undue third-party interference,

to neither compel physicians to prescribe treatments nor prohibit them from prescribing treatments, and

to include the right of physicians to prescribe off-label medications using their best discretion with the informed consent of the patient.

Hamstring the Alberta Medical Association, specifically so they can't sanction doctors who prescribe ivermectin.

Anti-Trans bills

Of course they're anti-trans. Were you not paying attention? They'll go after the merely LGBQ folks next you know. And after that, people who don't perform Ozzie-and-Harriet gender roles close enough. Alternative sexuality terrifies these people.

#8 Require Teachers, Schools, and School Boards to obtain the written consent of the parent/guardian of a student under the age of 16 prior to changing the name and/or pronouns used by the student.

If you're dad is going to beat the shit out of you for being queer, the school isn't going to give you a safe space. Better stay in the closet. Also, they get to dead-name you.

#17 Support a comprehensive Bill of Parental Rights which ensures that all legislation will recognize and support parents’ rights to be informed of and in-charge of all decisions to do with all services paid for by the province, including education and health care.

I feel it's always worth asking, a parent's right to what? And the answer is to treat their children like property they can control, instead of human beings they have obligations to.

Mostly this is an anti-trans bill, but it's fractally bad since it also means under-age kids can't seek treatment for other things ranging from embarrassing to traumatic without exposing themselves to their parents. No birth control for you little Susie, and god help you if you need an abortion, or even something as simple as a vaccination.

#29 Protect inmates who were female at conception and are housed at correctional and remand centers for women operated by Alberta Correctional Services by refusing to house any inmate who was male at conception at said correctional and remand centers.

We're going to protect women, by making sure that some of them get the shit kicked out of them in the men's prisons.

Anti-Education

The more you're educated, the less likely you are to vote conservative.

#6 Ban post-secondary institutions from the use of race as a factor in any admissions program or procedure.

They want to eliminate affirmative action. Can't be a white supremacist if you don't keep the non-white's below you.

#9 Ensure post-Secondary institutions shall be places of free thought and learning of employable skills by eliminating all Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) offices at all public universities, colleges, technical institutes, and trades schools and all adult education institutions. They are not places for indoctrination of identity politics, reverse racism, or radicalization. Any postsecondary institution that maintains a DEI office, policy, or equivalent shall lose government financial support.

They want to eliminate any accommodation for anyone not a white, het, cis, able-bodied male. And they'll starve post-secondary to do it. Also notice the language of “indoctrination”. You're free to be an anti-masking lunatic who screams at the cashier, but not to provide a hand up to a discriminated minority. Freedom indeed.

#19 Implement a school voucher system to ensure that education funding follows each student and enhances the vision of school choice.

We already have a voucher system. This makes it more explicit, and insures they get more funding (presumably at the expense of the public system).

#20 Ensure that teachers, schools, school boards, and third parties providing services to kindergarten to Grade 12 schools do not provide access to materials of a sexual, racist, or abusive nature, including, but not limited to, books, handouts, online materials, and live events that are not part of the Alberta Program of Studies.

No telling the kids you're gay. And certainly don't suggest books to kids trying to figure out why they're different from the others. Best to stay in the closet and implicitly tell them they should stay in the closet too.

Typical Conservative Bugaboos

Their hit parade. This is a catch-all for shit conservatives hate.

#5 Protect Albertans’ right to have access to goods and services using cash and the option to bank with provincially regulated institutions that supply cash instead of Digital Currency.

This is a combination of typical Conservative opposition to technology, fear of (((global elites))), and being pissy that some stores didn't accept cash during the lock-down.

Also, there's been no serious proposals to eliminate physical currency. Even if we were to do it, it's the sort of thing Canada wouldn't do first. We'd wait until a few European countries did it first. Which they're not.

#10 Oppose the federal expansion of Medical Assistance in Dying (“MAiD”) qualifying criteria to include those suffering solely from mental illness and oppose the future legalization of MAiD as a care option for minor children.

Because if you want to die, you must therefore be mentally ill.

Note the opposition to “future legalization of MAiD... for minor children”. Like, is anyone seriously floating this? Or are they just pulling a “think of the children”? Anyway, Cons don't like assisted suicide.

Wait! If they're successful at this, and then they subsequently get fetuses declared “people”, they've just done an end-run around legal abortions.

This one is worse than I thought!

#12 Prohibit any land use or development planning initiatives that would restrict movement of residents as per Section 6 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms

They go on to say that this is explicitly anti-15 minute cites legislation, based off of the usual misunderstanding of Oxford's taxation proposal. Also, a prime example of Cleek's Law.

#21 Not support the establishment of solar farms in the areas of the agricultural Canada Land Inventory (CLI) Class 1, 2, or 3 soils.

Well, it's not a ban, just a “not support”. Probably because telling farmer's “no” outright might cost them votes. But they're sure not going to support renewables, because of our Oil & Gas Overlords.

#22 End provincial funding for supervised consumption sites.

Of course. Those junkies should just die or move to Vancouver.

Miscellaneous, Possibly Not So Evil Proposals

I can't really judge these, but I'll list and comment anyway.

#11 support programs, eliminate red tape, and reduce taxes for the succession of the family farm to the next generation of farmers in our primary agricultural sector.

I guess.

#13 Prevent concerns about electoral fraud in Albertan elections by (at a minimum) banning, except by plebiscite, all use of any and all electronic machine for tabulation or counting of ballots for any provincial election.

I do like paper ballots. And wasn't happy with the last bullshit senator-in-waiting election being part of a scantron with other measures. It mean't I couldn't effectively refuse the ballot.

#14 Support the establishment of a Digital Bill of Rights that outlines the following rights.

They list the rights, and I don't really have a problem with them.

#18 Encourage increased nitrogen production in our petrochemical sector to reduce costs and improve the availability of fertilizer for Alberta farmers.

Note they say encourage, not require. It's a motion to ask our Oil & Gas Overlords nicely to do something.

#23 Work with the provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba, Yukon Territory and the Northwest Territories, and the States of Alaska and Montana, and all associated First Nations as partners, to secure one or more Transportation Utility Corridors (TUCs) to the Hudson Bay, the Mackenzie Delta region, and/or Alaska.

This expands a previous bill so that we work with more jurisdictions than just Manitoba and Saskatchewan. It seems fine, but it is part of a “get a pipeline to somewhere” bill, so not ideal.

#24 Divide the roles and responsibilities of the Minister of Justice position into separate ministries of Attorney General and Solicitor General.

I'm worried this is an attempt to hamstring both proposed ministries (though it's likely just an attempt to expand the number of cabinet ministers), but nothing obvious is coming up. It does mean that the people who prosecute cops won't be the people in charge of the cops, so that's ok in a platonically ideal sense where a conservative government would actually prosecute cops.

#26 Support fair, efficient, open, and competitive consumer and industrial electricity market and conduct a review to determine market competitiveness and whether there is excess market concentration resulting in high electricity prices and if so, determine methods to correct the excess market concentration.

Half-measure. They should go farther and drag them back to being a government utility. I'd rather my utility bill was smaller and went towards making the grid better rather than a millionaire's yacht collection larger.

#27 Repeal the no fault Insurance (also known as Direct Compensation for Property Damage) legislation in Alberta and return to torte-based (also known as at-fault based) insurance.

I guess.

#30 Ensure that social assistance support programs such as Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped (AISH), seniors’ benefits, and the Alberta Child and Family Benefit continue to be indexed to inflation.

This is a good idea, but they should make the current amounts livable first. Having a not-good-enough value indexed to inflation means it will never be good enough. Also, note that this is the last proposal, so it's the least likely to be gotten to.

Summary

Anyway, it's about 2/3 evil (21+/30). If it's bad, they're for it. If it's good – especially if it gives a shit about real people, they're against it. Hard to believe we could do worse than a Kenney government, but Smith said “hold my beer”, and here we are.

I'm planning on voting today. Here are my thoughts:

For Mayor, my first priority is keeping Jeremy Farkas out. The front runner is Jyoti Gondek, and I'm likely to vote for her on the basis that she's not conservative, and seems to be a policy wonk. That's not to say that she's progressive - she identifies as a centrist, which could mean damn near anything. I'm hoping it means "progressive, but not willing to admit that in Calgary when an election is going on", rather than "social progressive/fiscal conservative" which is always bullshit.

My current councillor is Sean Chu, who is: 1) against everything that's good, 2) for everything that's bad, 3) almost certainly going to be re-elected.

That's not to say he's the worst candidate for Councillor. That would be Shane Roberts, who lets his freak flag fly on his website, immediately comparing mask mandates to the Holocaust.

That leaves the two grown-up: DJ Kelly and Angelea McIntyre. They both seem OK, and support a lot of things I like, the Green Line for example. McIntyre wants to work against continued sprawl, and that pushes her ahead of Kelly in my book.

For public school trustee, there are four new candidates and the incumbent. I think the new curriculum, dragging Alberta back to the 1930s, is the big issue.

Althea Adams is the current trustee, and she's been inoffensive. Her website seems to be pretty weaselly about needing to "work on" the new curriculum.

Claudia Fuentes is part of the Take Back the CBE slate, which seems to be a stealth Conservative group. That rules them out for me.

Najeeb Butt has a ton of glowing language about equality on his website, and no policy priorities that I can find. Could be good, could be bad, who know?

Oun Saegh appears to be a paper candidate. No web site, did not respond to the media. If he can't put in the effort to run, I won't put in the effort to vote for him.

Laura Hack is likely getting my vote. She doesn't like the new curriculum, which is a plus. Also, she seems to be the most progressive.

If I vote for anyone for the bullshit "senator" election, it'll be Duncan Kinney on his explicitly "this is some bullshit" platform. White hat trolling is something I can get behind. Normally, I'd formally decline my ballot (I've done that in previous "senate" elections), but some idiot decided paper ballots you put an X on are too old fashioned, so all of the provincial ballots are combined into a single scantron. Declining isn't an option if I want to vote on the other two questions. And if I don't pick anyone, they can't tell if that's a refused ballot, or I'm just a clueless moron. Pretty fucking unhappy about that.

The other bullshit referendum is on the transfer payments. Since Alberta isn't actually hard done by in Federation, and I understand how transfer payments work, I'll be voting to keep them.

In the almost-but-not-entirely-bullshit referendum on time zones, I'll vote for the status quo, on the basis that UTC-7 for five months of the year is better than UTC-6 for twelve months of the year. We really should match BC at UTC-8 (we literally use 120°W - the center of ideal UTC-8 - as part of the border between the two provinces), but that's not one of the options.

And finally, of course I'm going to vote for fluoridation.

It's 9:30 on a Sunday night. I'm downstairs reading blogs, and Gerry is upstairs watching awful anime. Typical Sunday night really. Then there's a knock at the door.

"Hello", says Gerry.
"Hello, can I speak to Jeff Callaway?"
"I'm not sure who that is."

Hearing this, I join the conversation.

"Who are you looking for?"
"Jeff Callaway. I was told he lived here."
"A John Callaway used to live here, before I bought the place from his dad Barry Callaway. Barry owned both sides of the duplex, but he died a few years ago and his widow Cora sold the other half last year. I have no idea where John or Cora are now. Never heard of a Jeff though.
"Jeff is a UCP candidate, and this is listed as his address. You're saying he doesn't live here."
"Not even a little bit."

Since I haven't come all the way up the stairs, the mysterious stranger continues.

"Anyway, I'm with CTV News. Thanks for answering the door on a Sunday night."
"No problem."

Gerry and I exchange quizzical looks.

"He's not our UCP candidate, must be in another riding."
"Can they do that?"
"It's frowned upon, but sure - riding boundaries change and you can't expect your MLA to move every time that happens."
"I guess they can do that or pretend to live in the basement of their parent's retirement condo.

Excitement over, we all go back to what we were doing. Later, It dawned on me that CTV news wouldn't be hitting someone's house at this time of night for something the riding association could deal with during business hours unless it was urgent. So I looked him up.

Oh! He's that Jeff Callaway.

Aside: It bugs me that the corrupt, authoritarian, creeps are likely going to win on Tuesday. Do what you can to make that not happen folks.

Have you heard the exciting news? There's a new political party in Alberta - the Alberta Advantage Party!

They describe themselves as right-of-center, but then you look at their policies:

• Voter recall (not right-wing in and of itself, but a big shibboleth of right-wing parties).
• Picking which immigrants we accept, like Quebec does. They say nothing about whom they'll accept, but I'm guessing Syrian refuges aren't going to be a high priority.
• Deregulate the agriculture industry.
• Abolishing gay-straight student alliance (GSA) legislation - you know, that thing that keeps teachers from outing the gay kids to their parents. I got nothing pithy to say about this one, it's just straight up reactionary-evil.

So, yeah, "right of center" in much the same way that being on the ten yard line is "slightly off midfield". Though, if everyone you ever talk about is exactly like you, you might get the feeling that you are the center. Kinda the same thing that makes people who earn $250000/year think they're average.

At least they haven't described themselves as socially-progressive-but-fiscally-conservative. A philosophy that I think is akin to being fine with your ocean liner rescuing shipwreck victims, so long as they can swim fast enough to grab the hull, because you sure don't want to be inconvenienced with the ship slowing down and throwing some ropes.

I'm all for more conservative parties, because the more the right-wing vote is split, the more likely we'll get another New Democratic government, and they've been doing a good job. At the very least, the Alberta Advantage Party is doing a great public service for people who think Jason Kenney shouldn't be able to muzzle his MLAs when they say the quiet bits out loud; and also realize that Derek Fildebrandt is a clown.

As for next year's election, I do fear that the UCP will win. Mostly this is due to math - conservatives will take all the rural ridings, plus 1/3 of Edmonton and 2/3 of Calgary. If these splinter parties do anything, it will be to grab a handful of the rural ridings. Once in the Legislature, they'll basically vote with the UCP 90% of the time, but bitch about how it isn't right-wing enough for them.

But maybe we'll get lucky a second time and AAP will truly take the place of the Wild Rose party and split the right-wing vote. I can hope.

If you're reading this, I'd really appreciate it if you read it to the end, and didn't comment on it until you've given what I write some thought. Really go over what I'm saying and try to understand why, rather than just having a knee-jerk negative reaction to it. You don't have to agree with me, but I like to think that if you're reading my blog, you're someone who won't just poo-poo what I write.

One of the things that I've known imperfectly over the years, and have been trying to get better at, is that when people say they've been hurt, you should believe them. If I tell you I got mugged, or my car was stolen, or my house burgled, your default reaction should be that these things have happened. You shouldn't immediately be thinking that I'm making it up, or that I'm exaggerating, or that it doesn't matter, because I've got plenty of money and I won't miss it. Maybe you would be skeptical, if you had good reason to be, but lacking that, you should believe me. Me being robbed is not a far-fetched claim - people get robbed every day.

Similarly, if a woman says she was raped, you should believe her. That shouldn't be a controversial statement, but I often find that it is. Yes, we have courts for determining legal guilt, but only some ridiculously small percentage of rapists are ever convicted. In the face of that, the least I can do is believe the women who tell me this. We know women get raped all the time. The #MeToo movement should have told you all that, but it shouldn't have had to. And I can do more than simply make a mental note of it - I can try to make the world an easier place for them in some microscopic way by, say, not inviting her rapist to a party I know she's going to be at. "Why are you punishing him?" I hear you cry. Well, I'm under no obligation to invite anyone to a party I'm throwing, or have a party at all. There's over seven billion people in the world, and I'm not punishing them by not inviting everyone. So I hope that clears up the idea that me not inviting someone to a party is some kind of punishment. I do know that I'm not contributing to someone's victimization though.

Maybe you see where I'm going with this. The Edmonton Pride parade was disrupted by protesters who didn't want police participation. The demanded that the board listen to the four demands they have, and when the board said they'd do so, they got out of the way.



I think it's worth remembering that the protest was entirely peaceful, and ended when the board agreed to listen. Not to do anything mind you, just that they'd give it a fair hearing. For the board's part, they did this and agreed to the four points after the protest ended. And I'm happy they did - the four points are perfectly reasonable demands.

But I bet a lot of you object to the first point: That the Pride Society uninvite the Edmonton Police Force, RCMP and military from marching in future parades. Give a little thought as to why that is a demand. It's because for a lot of LGBT folk, the police are not their friends. They've been beaten and harassed by the police. Hell, Pride started as a protest against police brutality to the LGBT community. And this isn't ancient history, you could find LGBT folk who will tell you personally about how they've been mistreated by the police recently. And you should believe them. No seriously... take a deep breath, don't immediately jump to defend the police (they can cope, I assure you), and believe them.

Now, if a bunch of people tell you they don't want their abusers present at their party, do you really want to object? Would you do that for a group that's not the police or military? Should neo-nazis be able to crash the local synagogue's picnic? It's in public after all, and we don't want to exclude anyone*. If your objection is but they're the police, then you're missing the point. The police shouldn't be exemplified, they should be questioned more than any other group. Because we've given them a lot of power that the rest of us don't enjoy. They need to constantly earn that power - they need to demonstrate every day, that they've earned our trust. And if one trans kid has gotten harassed by some bully with a badge, then no, the police don't get to participate in the Pride Parade. No, #NotAllCops harassed that kid, but the system made it so that that one cop got away with it. That cop might just be one "bad apple", but the point of the adage about bad apples is that if you let it stick around it will spoil the bunch. If they want to claim they're all individuals, then they can leave their uniforms at home and attend Pride as individuals, if it's so important to them. I bet there's cops who do exactly this now.

They wear their uniforms every day, and they are praised everyday, as demonstrated by the number of people who have lost their shit over this issue. Do they have to be praised in the Pride parade too? Do they have to be everywhere? Is their no space where people can just be without having to genuflect? Isn't it all a little greedy?

Pride has told groups to take a hike before. To participate, you really ought to support LGBT rights. It's why the Conservatives weren't allowed in. Do you really think a political party that is demonstrably against LGBT rights should be allowed to participate. The New Democrats have new Trans-friendly drivers licenses, and the Conservatives voted (in caucus) to effectively neuter Gay-Straight Student Alliances. If Pride wants the NDs there and the UCP to take a hike, I frankly can't blame them. And if they feel the police and the military are only claiming to be pro LGBT-rights, but don't actually deliver in their daily behaviour, then I can't blame them for not wanting them there either.

"But it's such a little thing", I hear some of you say, "Can't they just let the police into the parade, as a sign of goodwill?". Well, yeah, they could. But let me turn that around - if it's such a little thing, why can't the police just let it slide? Why can't the police say "Ok, we respect your wishes and we won't make an issue about it"? Why is it always the victims that have to be infinitely tolerant? I mean, you believe them, don't you?

Maybe there will come a day when the police are welcomed back into the Pride parade. I think they have to be on good behaviour for a long time before they even ask, frankly, but that's me. When Pride feels the cops are their friends, they'll invite them back. I hope that day comes sooner than later.

*Aside 1: Tolerance movements don't have to be tolerant of groups who are intolerant. There's plenty of good philosophical reasons why, and you can go look them up if you care to, but I want you to just accept that as axiomatic for now, because I'm not having a debate about it here and now.

Aside 2: I'm a cis-white-straight-middle aged-male professional. I'm soaking in privilege. If you've listened to this whole piece, and think I have a point that you didn't see before, ask yourself why you believe me and not them. And as a privileged male, yeah sometimes it hurts my feelings when people tell me stuff like this. But I cope because all it does is hurts my feelings. People with less privilege than me are getting more than their feelings hurt.

Aside 3: If I got some pronouns or acronyms wrong, please be forgiving.

I'm happy we dodged a bullet this morning and elected a progressive mayor and mostly progressive city council.  Still it bothers me that it was a tight race.  Nenshi was literally named the best mayor on Earth, and a guy with no platform and a questionable past *still* got 43% of the vote. Hell, Smith got more votes in wards 13 and 14 (though they are the bluest of the wards in this city, so if he was going to win anywhere, it was there).

Donald Trump is a loser.

• He lost the popular vote by almost three million people. Loser.
  
• He only "won" the electoral vote because Russia and the FBI threw it for him. People who "win" by cheating? Losers.
  
• Bankrupted several times. Loser.
  
• Can't run a profitable casino. Loser.
  
• Brags about assaulting women. Loser.
  
• Doesn't pay his fair share of taxes. Loser.
  
• All of his business ventures resemble grift more than they do actual businesses. Loser.
  
• Is so thin-skinned, he can't stand being satirized on TV that he has to attack them on Twitter. Loser.
  
• Won't release his tax forms, probably because he's afraid that people will see he doesn't have as much money as he claims. Loser.
  
• Has so few friends, he doesn't know enough people to fill all the federal government positions he needs to. Loser.

Going forward, I think the best protest strategy is to call him a loser. All. The. Time.

Every protest, chants of "LOSER". Every sign, a picture of Trump labelled "LOSER". Everyone interviewed on the media should make a point of calling him a loser. Repeat it over and over until it sticks - until his name is synonymous with loser.

And don't try to explain it - don't give reasons for why he's a loser. Don't give him something to argue against. "Well, he's a loser because of X, Y, Z. Nope. He's just a loser.

He will lose his fucking shit. Because the overriding trait of Trump's psyche is that there are winners and losers, and he wants to believe he's a winner. Don't let him think that. Remind him that he's a loser from now until he vanishes from the public eye. Every protest. Every Op/ed piece in the news. Every time he has to meet someone who's not one of his sycophants. I want to hear all the Democrats in Congress chanting "loser". I want him to meet Angela Merkel at the G7 and have her whisper "Verlierer" in his ear.

At first, he'll respond like a grade-school kid. "I'm not the loser, you're the loser."

Next, he'll try to ignore it, while still responding to it. "People are still calling me loser. Pathetic."

Eventually, he'll try to shield himself from the relentlessness of it. He will not succeed if everyone who opposes him sticks to this.

Trump should exit office (hopefully sooner, with criminal charges pending) thinking that running for President was the worst mistake of his life. Because he became President, and he's still just a loser.

Anyway, that's just my thoughts on President Trump. I've got another post brewing over dealing with Republicans in general.

I woke up this morning to the news that Donald Trump is President-Elect.

Fuck.

I haven't looked at any news or opinion pieces about this yet, but I do have some thoughts.

The Blame

• Voter suppression tactics in numerous states, aimed towards minorities.
  
• The media, for trying to make the race "even", by weighing Trump's many many sins, against a lot of manufactured hearsay about Clinton. You hear people say "Crooked Hillary" enough, and you start to believe there's something to it, despite the lack of evidence. Now, the fact that Clinton lost will be cited as evidence that she must have been crooked.
  
• The FBI. Seriously? WTF.
  
• Third-party voters who think that voting is akin to some kind of consumer activity, rather than a civic duty.
  
• Political tribesmen, who think that political parties are like the local sports team, and you have to root for them, because you've always rooted for them.
  
• But most of all, I think we can blame the fact that there are simply a lot of misogynistic, racist, authoritarian assholes, and those people looked at Trump, warts and all, and said "I want him to be president".

Some random thoughts...

The Supreme Court is going to go conservative. The deciding vote is going to be a Trump nominee, and a lot of the Justices are getting old. Maybe Ruth Bader Ginsberg can last another four years, maybe not. Maybe Trump will nominate his sister.

Kiss goodbye to any progressive actions of the last eight years. I fully expect the Affordable Care Act to be effectively abolished in the next two years. Oh, maybe there'll be something called that, and there'll still be a requirement to buy health insurance; you just won't get anything for it. It'll be a tax payable to corporations.

Some pissant little country is going to get thrown up against the wall, just to show the world that Trump means business. I really hope it's not us.

That said, Trump is going to use the political machinery to go after his enemies, of which there are many, because he views anyone who disagrees with him, or makes fun of him, as the enemy. The difference between him and Nixon is that Nixon tried to keep it secret and got impeached for it. Trump will likely be quite open about it, and be praised for it.

I really feel sorry for the women who came forward about Trump's assaulting them. Maybe you'll have a case for immigrating to Canada based on persecution?

The Republican Party still can't stand the guy. They'll be fine with working with him, just like they were fine with voting for him, so long as he signs anything Paul Ryan puts on his desk. If he doesn't, I think they'll be happy to impeach him and get behind Pence. At no point will a fight between Trump and the Republican party mean a relaxation of their being awful to America.

Finally, I really did think "Do you want to write this? You could have jack-booted thugs coming to your door in a few years." Ultimately, I decided, what the hell - If things ever get that bad, they'll be plenty of things I've written over the years that will get me shot. It's too late to worry about that now.

Here's to hoping he's just a Berlusconi, and not a Mussolini.

Jim Wright opined on Facebook that Donald Trump was going to win last night's presidential debate against Hillary Clinton. A few brief points:

• He didn't want Trump to win. He's a progressive, and also has a brain in his head.
  
• He was wrong.

Why did he think that? Because Presidential debates aren't really debates, they're opportunities to go over your talking points while simultaneously savaging your opponent - two things that Trump is allegedly good at. Debates of this sort are reality TV writ large, and Trump is a master at reality TV.

The logic of Trump-is-good-at-reality-TV, therefore, Trump-will-do-well-in-the-debates only holds if the first part is actually true. I'm not convinced. Certainly Trump is a popular reality TV show subject, and The Apprentice certainly did well enough. But was that Trump? My alternate hypothesis is that The Apprentice had a really good bunch of editors and producers who took the full stream of effluent that comes from Trump's mouth and selected the most entertaining/coherent bits. It would be like finding lost jewelry in the sewer. Possible, even likely, if you have enough sewer to search.

In his rallies, he has an audience that was preselected to be ideal. Hell, the audience literally attacked people who were present that were likely to be critical. That's the live audience equivalent of having good producers. If you can't control the output, control who has to listen to it.

In short, Trump isn't the talented one in this equation, his producers are.

Naturally, not having his producers be part of the debate means he had none of those advantages. Instead, he was dealing with a career politician with years of experience in rhetoric and dealing with hostile audiences. That the polls don't show a bigger beating really just reflects the ideological divide in America right now.

My prediction: the Trump team will release edited versions of the debates that will show their boss in a positive light. That these will be roundly criticized doesn't matter. The people criticizing aren't the target audience. I hope his editors are well-paid, though I doubt it.

--- post script ---

I wonder if Trump is starting to deal with dementia. The stream-of-consciousness rants, the denials of the lies he's told - maybe he really doesn't remember them. What if this isn't just his colossal ego - it's how dementia expresses itself among the loud and egotistical.

I mind my own business in public bathrooms, and everyone else should too. I've likely shared a bathroom with plenty of transgendered folks in my life. It bothered me not one iota.

More Republican Senators have been charged with bathroom indecency, then trans-folk have. Your kid has a higher chance of being molested in the rectory than in the food court bathroom.

So why are all these laws popping up? Specifically, why are they all popping up now?

1) Trans-rights advocacy is finally being noticed in the media.

2) There's a US presidential election coming up. GOP movers and shakers want to make this an issue so that Democratic contenders will be asked their opinion. A Democrat comes down for trans-rights, they will lose socially conservative voters. Come down against it, and they will lose votes from socially progressive voters. Conversely, since there aren't any progressive Republicans anymore, this can't hurt their own party, and it can only hurt the Democratic party. Will that be enough to flip some of the states that are in ties? Who knows. I do know that there was a flurry of states passing anti-same-sex-marriage statutes immediately before the 2008 election, for the same reason.

It's all about the election. That Republicans can make people suffer is just gravy for them.