Nenya Kanadka

Today's dose of cheer:

Weird porn author who was dragged into Hugo Awards mess pulls off epic troll:

In which Chuck Tingle decides that if he does win the Hugo for Best Short Story, he will ask Zoe Quinn to accept it for him. (She has said yes, and changed her Twitter handle to "True Buckaroo," a Tingle reference.)


Petition: David Attenborough to change his name to "Boaty McBoatface":

After the public overwhelmingly voted to name a new British Natural Environment Research Council vessel "Boaty McBoatface," the UK government pulled a switcheroo, declaring the will of the people to be secondary to the judgment of humourless bureaucrats, and summarily named the ship the R.R.S. David Attenborough.

Accordingly, the ever-resourceful public are now petitioning to have Sir David Attenborough renamed to "Boaty McBoatface." It's a fine intervention, in the tradition of the petition to rename Stephen Harper to "Calgary International Airport".


List of Spacecraft in the Culture Series:

Speaking of boat names--I have never actually read Iain M. Banks's Culture books, despite being urged to do so, but the ship names are fantastic. I've been giggling my way through the list since last night. (If you have an opinion on whether or not I should read this series after all, please let me know in comments.)


(hee)

This is cool--a slideshow from Salon.com of a number of historic landmarks and important pieces of infrastructure that were built with New Deal/Works Progress Administration money back in the 1930s. This stuff was not only valuable and useful, it's still standing today.

Greatest Achievements of American Socialism

When Obama talks about "infrastructure", he's talking about catching up on back repairs that we've let slide, about building new things we've put off for ages, and about moving into the Century of the Anchovy. All of which needs people to do it, and therefore creates jobs.

Pretty cool. Yet again I'm hit with the thought, "Oh, that makes so much sense!" (Which is what I thought when, at the age of nine, someone explained socialized healthcare to me--damn I miss my BC CareCard.)


(hattip Pandagon)

Dupont Circle, Washington, DC, Jan. 19, 2009.





This is goodbye from the American people, you asshole. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

(Photos: Scott Wyngarden.)

THANK FUCK.

From the proposal to Congress for the $700 billion USD bailout:

Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.

(My emphasis.)

Seriously.

( In the style of Deiseach, I'm going to quote the whole thing. )

********************

Dudes. If you want SEVEN HUNDRED BILLION dollars of the taxpayer's money to throw at rich bankers who ran everything into the ground--you better have a better explanation than that.

Hattip to Slacktivist for the post title.

Four years too late, but finally the Canadian government admits Maher Arar was innocent.

From the comments:

Nobody erred on the side of caution, just to be on the safe side. They fabricated a case against a completely innocent man, because they were too lazy to hunt for real criminals.

and

In this case, Mr. Arar was hurt because nobody was willing to protect his, and by extension, our freedom. Our soldiers do sometimes die to protect us; to protect Canadians like Mr. Arar from injustice. Our soldiers' sacrifices have been disgracefully undermined by the RCMPs actions. And, most importantly, Mr Arar is 'our people'. He was not protected.

I am heartened by the disgust over this shown loudly by some Canadians in that thread, but saddened that some are bringing up the incarceration of Japanese-Canadians during WWII as a positive example...

I refuse to argue over whether it was more the Canadians' fault or the Americans', though I damn well think the RCMP should have been more careful, and should be in the future, knowing how twitchy the Americans are these days. You protect all your people, guys, and you bloody check out how accurate your intelligence is before passing it on. Smearing people whose cases you fucked up even after they turned out to be innocent doesn't inspire confidence, either. As for the Americans involved, I'll stop now before I start ranting, because bloody hell, Canada shouldn't have to worry that if they pass intel on to the US it'll get their citizens sent off to be tortured. *growl*