Gregg: "Artifice is the kryptonite of public life..."

"We may all have the right to our opinions but we do not have the right to our own facts..."

More about that here in today's Great Gray Globe...

Oar not...

It's unclear at the moment, what with different sources touting vastly different he-said-she-said versions of the story on Sunday. But it seems at least likely that the reason the incumbent minority PM is so certain that those costly new stealth fighter planes he's set his heart on would cost ludicrously less, by at least half, than the figures that every other financial and military authority other than the PM and the Department of National Defence has come up with, is because they're ummm, gliders.

But us coyotes can see the, ummm, logic. Yeah. That's it. Logic. Because this solves everything. All the haters who've pointed out that our
economically-trained PM has never actually practiced economics - nor, apparently, economy of any kind - look like losers this time.

Because ordering motorless planes saves a veritable billions-and-billions bundle on up-front costs and downline engine maintenance. And it'll put the Canadian military at the tippy-top forefront of those petroleum conservation and low carbon footprint thingies. Just what the country needs to counterbalance that plethora of negative tar sands environmental impacts, I'm sure. Not to mention how much stealthier they'll be than everybody else's stealth fighters, if they don't make any noise.

How to make 'em go, then? Look no further than Canada's proud and ancient voyageur tradition, people! Just borrow the Olympic rowing team's supply of high-tech carbon fibre oars (to match the high-tech carbon fibre wings, y'unnerstand...) and paddle them suckers! Using penitentiary prisoners as galley slaves would, without a Tory doubt, save huge bucks on the big prison-building schema, too!

All done within budget, just like those prudent, conservative fiscal managers said they would! Problem solved! Mission accomplished! Where have I heard that line before? Never mind! How could I have ever doubted?

The worst part for the Stevester...

...about manipulating the country into another unwanted election, no matter how badly he wanted it, no matter how much he thought that maybe he could pull off a majority this time, was having to retool his usual, grim, authoritarian public persona.

He had to overcome deep personal distaste. To pretend to be warm and fuzzy, to con (heh...) the all-important female vote.

As Ottawa's chattering gaggles twittered themselves into a pre-electoral tizzy, Stevie-baby knew that the old quick fixes - like the much-lampooned blue sweater vest - were stale toast.

It'd have to be something bold enough to change minds without forcing him to change any of his deeply held, yet deeply unpopular, political stands. Yet something that spoke to his inner rockstar. So he hired rafts full of image consultants. Wrangled. Bit the bullet. Called in the fiberglas supplier that had done his hair for years. All the while, he feared that the gargantuan cost of retooling the factory dies completely would show him up as a hypocrite - or worse, a laughingstock - when the inevitable Access To Information Act requests uncovered it.

(Steverino's note to self: Kill that lousy act! Deader!)

Then, miraculously, the sales rep slyly suggested another fiberglas hair model already on the assembly line! It fit the bill perfectly...

Original photo: Remy Steinegger, Wikimedia Commons. You know where the hair came from...

My biggest fear...

...upon hearing rumours last night that some poor, misbegotten, and likely well-muddled schmuck was apprehended sparkin' a, ummm, small puddle of undefined burning liquid on the sidewalk outside the Prime Minister's official residence at 24 Sussex, was that this obviously dastardly crime of national import would go unreported.

Whew! Glad that's been taken care of! (1) (2) (3) (...)

Now they can jug up said schmuck in a real prison instead of an unreported one. Or worse yet, instead of the mental hospital he most likely needs. Because now is obviously the time to get tough on crime...

Unless of course, it was Maclean's Magazine columnist Paul Wells... I'm just sayin'.

Alrighty, then! Let the judiciary commence with the important book-throwing formalities. Everybody else, back to your Sunday morning hangovers, crappy take-out coffees, and matching breakfast sandwiches!

Lug nuts and the census

So, even when faced with near-universal opposition, and even when the Chief Statistician quits in protest, the government has no problem trashing the mandatory census long form: "It's intrusive!!!! We're pandering to our loony fringe base, dammit!!!!"

So we coyotes will try to explain the issue in terms that make sense to the would-be defenders of this move, WHO ALWAYS SEEM TO FULL-CAP THEIR (OFTEN FURIOUSLY UNGRAMMATIC AND ANONYMOUS) FORUM COMMENTS: the lug nuts on that cherished Chevrolet half ton you use to earn your living.

Suppose your neighbourhood garage guys - call 'em Steve and Tony - say outta the blue that they want to replace all your lug nuts with Dodge lugs, because they think Chevy is arbitrary and intrusive for insisting on Chev lug nuts. Hell (they reason), Dodge lugs look pretty much the same, so no problem, right? Oh, and? Steve and Tony can pump gas, but neither's ever worked as a mechanic.

Would ya buy that, Durango? Nope. Because you, lug nut connoisseur that you are, know that Chev and Dodge lugs have different diameters, thread pitches and chamfers. Assuming they even sorta fit, those babies are gonna strip out, or leave wheel slop. Your wheels will come off, someplace inconvenient and possibly fatal.

There are a bunch of trucky things you could customize that, arguably, wouldn't wreck the ol' Silverado's utility: running boards, exhaust stacks, a big pair of them fine-looking chrome bull balls hanging off the trailer hitch. Dodge lug nuts, not so much.

Now, assume your pickup is a census. (It's a metaphor, Durango. Work with it.) See, reliable census information is Canada's business edge. Lotsa smart people rely on it to make sure the country as a whole can earn its living more efficiently. As every civilized country in the world aspires to.

A mandatory long form is intrusive, but a small price to pay for citizenship in this country you claim to love so much. Much like obeying stop signs at intersections. We work co-operatively toward common goals, unlike, say, those anarchists you hated so much at the G20. To do anything else is to court rump of skunk, and madness.

A voluntary long form is pretty much like Dodge lug nuts on your Chevy - doesn't match. Reading statistical trends properly makes tracking changes accurately over time really important. Even if you label the data you collect by the same name, changing the method you use to collect it means that you can't reasonably compare it with, well, anything that came before. The wheels come off. Just like that Chevy.

Now, I'm only a dumb coyote, so here are my questions: why would you trust an ill-fitting lug nut named Steve to change that? Why does Steve think some lug nuts are more equal than others? And why, if Steve keeps saying his opponents are unpatriotic and unCanadian, is it always him that seems hell-bent on changing this country, lug nut by lug nut, into something unrecognizable...?

Just askin'...

Right there in black and white

So, a week ago, the Ottawa Petfinder asked the musical question, Does anyone like Nickelback?, in a story that stated, and I quote:

"On American prime-time TV, 30 Rock's writing team had proven the easiest dramatic shorthand for "egregious knob" was to show a character enraptured by the prospect of raising his Bic to the arena-rock strains of How You Remind Me."

And today, the Glob's Jane Taber (bless her inkstained li'l heart...) put a face on that egregious knob, with PMO flack Dimitri Soudas confirming it.

Having to buy a new keyboard after snerting hot Kona all over the old one? Totally worth it...

Putting the "Anti" into Social Networking. . .

Mister Sloppy had left an urgent summons in my voicemail. Wise coyotes do not casually deny evil geniuses of his calibre. I hoofed it across Centretown.

When he buzzed me in, I followed the whooping to his secret subterranean lair, where his manic keyboarding – two computers at once – gave me pause. So did the plethora of vintage mega-sized Jolt Cola empties. He only cracks his stash when he's kickin' coding old-school. Which is never good for the state of world.

"Ummm, so, how long you been at this?" I asked.

"Since the Prime Minister got hisself posted on YouTube three days back" he said, keyclacks barely slowing. "If Jurassic politicos are pretending to use social media, it's finally jumped the megashark. They think they’ll go viral, I’ll give ‘em freakin’ viral! It's almost ready!"

"What is, Sloppy?" I asked.

Fevered blue eyes blazed.

"The Next Big Thing!" He purred, grinning, well, evilly. In capital letters. "AntiSocial Media! Facebook and Myspace are tossing net privacy under the bus, people are sick of tweeting, dorks who don't understand social media are trying to warp it back into old paradigms they do understand. So it comes to this! Is my new Antisocial Networking site not genius?"

He waved at his monitors. "Here! You can only set your relationship status to, "Alone", "It's complicated" or "None of your damned business"! It automatically rejects all friend requests! And the only reject options are, "No response"; "Ewwww"; an LMAO emoticon; or an autogenerated phrase saying, "I'd rather...." followed by a random act of self-mutilation!

His speed and pitch rose.

"You can’t control your own friends list, but all other users can remove anyone from it! When you comment on someone's status, or insult ‘em on a comment thread, it’s visible to anyone except them!

"And get this! There's no way to just follow anyone. It's only got a "stalk" option! A bot program pops up your photo on every website they browse. An automatic search for every web photo of them slams together a tribute album site that auto-links to every page that references them. The album background wallpaper can be either candles or hand-scrawled protestations of love.

"And only by paying for a premium license do users gain the power to file virtual restraining orders on their stalkers! But they only limit how many times your stalkers’s pictures pop up on websites you browse – you can never block ‘em entirely! Cool app, or what!!??"

"I love it!" I yelled, trying to match his fevered tone as I edged back up the stairs. "For masochists!"

He didn't notice. At the rate he was going, I figured he might safely pass out in a few hours. At least until I heard another Jolt fizz open. Ol' Slop was bellowing, somewhat musically, something like, "Yo ho ho, I'm gonna rule the w-o-o-oooorld!", as I let myself back out.

I hadda admit right then, that insanity other than my own can be kinda disconcerting...

Ottawa's anti-prorogue rally

Ottawa's prorogue protest, timed to coincide with several dozen across the country today, wasn't exactly slick. It was long. The student cheer leaders were endearingly amateur. A speaker or two wandered lengthily off-track. And there looked to be a lot of ad-hoc cooks trying to salt their own spice into the bouillabaisse.

But ya know what? If it had all been slick clockwork, I would have been more concerned. That might've meant some oily pro had pumped backroom grease into what looks to be real Facebook populism, rising spontaneously among concerned citizens.

Ya know what else? It was big. Far larger than the coalition rally after Prime Minister Stephen Harper prorogued in late 2008.

Even so, I heard a trio that looked like pro journalists, asking each other as pros are sometimes wont, if there was any story.

We coyotes, amateur and unjournalistic to a fault, would say there is. It is this: Anger and frustration over Harper's cynical manipulation of the democratic process in general and the prorogation card in particular is grassroots, authentic, and to be reckoned with.

If no smooth professional political types are involved yet, it may well be because the PM's disregard for the niceties of traditional politesse confounded and hamstrung them.

But while he smugly ties Parliament in knots, apparently he forgets that the real power of this country rests in many millions of people who, while they may never step onto the Hill, care deeply that what goes on there should be aboveboard. Especially when somebody starts jacking around with it too much. There's irony in self-anointed populists being bitten by the populace they claim to represent. Based on today's event, the PM might do well to remember that. If he ever got it in the first place.

The poll bounce from his NAC gig seemed like a gift... *

...but the Tory brain trust quickly realized that keeping their robotic client's piano forte front and centre in voters' minds was going to be trickier than it had first seemed... **

* You didn't seriously think we were going to let this one go that easily. Did you?

** It did, however, have certain advantages over "Vote Harper And We'll Burn the Blue Sweater Vest" and "Vote Harper Or The Kitten Gets It".

Amused? An ESI Caption Contest

Prime Minister Stephen Harper met The Queen today at Buckingham Palace. Whatever could they be talking about?