Today I passed!

For the first time in my life, I wasn't carded by an LCBO cashier who was carding regularly! W00t!

Testing the Hill and Knowlton predictor

I decided to take the actual popular vote and plug it into the Hill and Knowlton predictor to see if it got it right.

Hill and Knowlton predicts:

Con 143
Lib 74
NDP 38
Green 0
Bloc 52
Other 1

Actual results:

Con 143
Lib 76
NDP 37
Green 0
Bloc 50
Independent 2

So that's 6 wrong out of 308, or 98% accuracy with perfect poll results.

Voter's Resources

This is a post-dated post. If the date and time indicated for this post have not yet passed, there may be new material below.

Getting Started

First, go to the Elections Canada website and type in your postal code to find out your riding, your candidates, and where to vote.

If you have not received your voter information card, you can still vote on election day, you just need to take ID.

Your employer has to give you enough time off to ensure that you have three consecutive hours off during polling hours.

Issues

The platforms:

Bloc Quebecois (Click the link that contains "anglais" for the English version
Conservative Party
Green Party
Liberal Party
NDP

To help you figure out which party is best for you:

The Toronto Star's quiz
theundecided.ca

Strategy and Predictions

My "How to Vote"
My "Where to Vote"
My "How to Vote Strategically"

To help you with strategic voting:

Election Prediction Project
Hill and Knowlton Election Predictor You can use the poll results provided (scroll down to the Polls box at the bottom left, or the Globe and Mail's aggregate poll, or any other polls you can find.
DemocraticSPACE Strategic Voting Guide and seat predictions (PDF).

If I've missed anything or left any dead links, let me know.

No problem!

Dear Dear Abby's Correspondents:

You might be interested in my analysis on the use of "no problem" as a reply to "thank you".

Voted

Today I actually had to wait in line to vote, which has never happened before. It was the most crowded polling station I've ever been at. I'm not sure if this means high turnout, or if it's just because there are at least two (and possibly as many as four) new buildings in the hood since the last election. There were a lot of young voters there (or at least people who were dressed like they'd never been to the 80s before) and so many people were en couple that I felt kinda awkward not having a date.

I didn't get to pet a doggie (every election I've ever voted in that turned out positively I got to pet an awesome doggie on the way to or from voting) but I did see six awesome doggies (including an itty bitty baby puppy, a pointy pointy greyhound, and a little guy with the floppiest ears I've ever seen). I don't know how many awesome doggie sightings make up for one petting. I also saw like half a dozen cute babies/toddlers, but they don't seem to influence the outcome of elections.

I also saw scrutineers for the first time ever (unless they were there before and I didn't notice them). I saw three Conservative scrutineers and none from other parties. My riding is universally considered a safe Liberal riding.

I wish they timed the election returns better. The Atlantic returns come in, and then it's hours and hours until the rest of the country happens. Why not either everything at once, or staggered more regularly so there's a constant stream of results coming through?

Or I wish there were some way to let people who've already voted access the blacked-out information from other time zones. I've already voted! They can't influence me! Let me watch the returns!

On empathy

Recently there has been discussion about the importance/relevance of empathy when it comes to politicians setting/discussing economic policy. But I think people (or at least a few very loud people) are missing the point in this discussion.

When we talk about empathy, we don't mean getting a pat on our head and a hug and our feelings validated. We mean that the politicos grok our reality and govern accordingly. Even though most people would agree that it's important in principle, ultimately it doesn't matter to ordinary Canadians whether our economic indicators look good on paper. What actually matters to us is whether we can afford cheese and dental work and internet access. We don't care about the TSX numbers, we care about whether we will still be able to afford to retire at 65 as promised by our pension managers. We don't care what the unemployment rate or job growth numbers look like, we care that if today our household financial situation looks good and our job looks stable so we splurge and get our hair done, the situation doesn't suddenly reverse so that next week we're sitting there regretting our gorgeous red highlights because now our drug coverage is gone and we could have gotten a refill of our kid's prescription for that money.

Assuming that consumer spending is in fact important to a sound economy, the powers that be would do well to cultivate empathy. If we think they just care about on-paper indicators, we're going to batten down and hoard our assets to ride out the storm. But if we know that they've got our everyday realities in mind, we're more likely to go ahead and buy some gouda for a treat or get those red highlights.

Things They Should Invent: election night drinking game

Seriously. We need a drinking game for watching the returns tomorrow, but I got nothing.

If you're into placing bets, it would also be fun to place bets on what time the TV people are going to call the outcome of the election.

Edit: I prefer a more complex drinking game, where you drink based on random and unpredictable occurrences, or as punishment/reward. But failing that, here's a quick and dirty version:

Every time you find yourself yelling at the TV, take a drink.

Edit: I made one. Here it is.

Christina Aguilera vs. Andrews Sisters

Christina Aguilera vs The Andrews Sisters - Boogie Woogie Candyman
by goldrausch

Dear weather: WTF?

On Tuesday there's supposed to be a humidex of 30. Next Sunday it's supposed to go down to 2. WTF? No wonder the leaves are turning in the wrong order!

Fleeing from buses

Heading home on the GO at night, driving through an eerie fog, sitting next to a creepy man who apparently had never seen a v-neck t-shirt before, my ipod kindly serving up Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (I don't even know why I have that on my ipod), I found myself thinking of Tim McLean.

Some people have criticized the other people on Tim's bus for fleeing the bus instead of fighting off his attacker. However, sitting there looking around my bus, it occurred to me that even if people in general were morally obligated to fight the attacker, everyone who was sitting in front of Tim was morally obligated to leave the bus.

Why? Because you can only exit the bus through the front door and the aisle is only one person wide. If anyone who was in front of the attack had tried to help, they would have had to run towards the back of the bus, thus blocking the aisle for anyone who wants to flee.

It is everyone's own prerogative to put their own life at risk to help someone else (or for any other purpose, really). But we don't have the moral right to prevent one innocent from saving their own life in order to attempt to save the life of another innocent. To run from the front of the bus back to where the attack took place would be like if firefighters ran into a burning building to save some trapped people, and in doing so blocked the way of people trying to flee through the fire escape.

ITunes questions

1. How do I get itunes to ignore album artwork? I don't care about the album artwork. I don't need it on my ipod, I don't need it on my computer, I don't need itunes taking up my valuable time and processing power fussing around with album artwork. How do I get it to completely ignore and disregard it?

2. Is there a way to get Genius to generate playlists without actually starting to play them? I want to play with Genius while I listen to music, but I don't need to hear every song I generate a playlist based on. I just want to play with it.

Weirdest disclaimer ever

The following is copy-pasted direction from the terms and conditions of the itunes software update:

THE APPLE SOFTWARE IS NOT INTENDED FOR USE IN THE OPERATION OF NUCLEAR FACILITIES, AIRCRAFT NAVIGATION OR COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS, AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL SYSTEMS, LIFE SUPPORT MACHINES OR OTHER EQUIPMENT IN WHICH THE FAILURE OF THE APPLE SOFTWARE COULD LEAD TO DEATH, PERSONAL INJURY, OR SEVERE PHYSICAL OR ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE.

Damn, there goes my plan to build an itunes-powered nuclear spacecraft!

Another voting tool

To help you decide which party is best: theundecided.ca

Again, pick your favourite answers to identify The Best Party, and your least favourite to identify The Worst Party. Keep the weighting the same.

I don't find this one as comprehensive, but it exists so I'm adding it to the list.

Discourse Analysis

Sitting for a taped interview with Steve Murphy, the anchor for CTV Halifax, Mr. Dion had been asked: "If you were prime minister now, what would you have done about the economy and this crisis that Mr. Harper hasn't done?"

"If I had been prime minister 2½ years ago?" Mr. Dion replied.

"If you were the prime minister right now," Mr. Murphy explained.

Mr. Dion started talking about his 30-day action plan to tackle the crisis but had trouble enunciating and asked to start again. "I've been slow listening to your question."

Mr. Murphy repeated the question. Mr. Dion asked: "If I was prime minister starting when? Today?"

At one point a Liberal aide came in to explain the question.

There were language and communication problems here, but it was bi-directional. Let's walk through.

First, the interviewer asks:

"If you were prime minister now, what would you have done about the economy and this crisis that Mr. Harper hasn't done?"

This is not phrased optimally because the wording of the first clause it not carefully chosen. As Anglophones, we can see what he's getting at, but it is never stated explicitly. The entire point that was misunderstood is contained in the words "would have done," which show that the interviewer meant what would Mr. Dion have done in the past and up to now during his mandate. However, French would not put meaning here and the Francophone brain therefore would not have thought to seek meaning here. French tends to use the conditional willy-nilly, when they're trying to be polite or trying to imply "allegedly" or to add more syllables to make it sound better, so the mere presence of the conditional is not necessarily meaningful. The Francophone brain would therefore look for temporal cues elsewhere in the sentence. And there is in fact a temporal cue elsewhere in the sentence in the word "now", but it is misleading. The interviewer doesn't actually mean "right this minute, on October 9, 2008." He means "in the run-up to and during the current economic crisis."

A better wording would have been to clearly state "If you had been Prime Minister since 2006, what would you have done..." or even to remove the red herring and emphasize that the meaning is in the conditional with "As Prime Minister, what would you have done..."

To properly interpret this sentence, Mr. Dion would have to a) recognize that the key meaning is in the would have done, which is not a place a Francophone brain would normally look for this meaning, b) know to reject the only explicit temporal cue in the sentence, c) recognize where the wording was and was not carefully chosen, and d) correctly infer the intended meaning.

So Mr. Dion asks for clarification by stating his interpretation as a yes/no question:

"If I had been prime minister 2½ years ago?"

As you can see, Mr. Dion did interpret the initial question correctly. However, this statement of his interpretation is not worded optimally for an Anglophone brain. The meaning is in the "2.5 years ago", which is the essential piece of information that (to the Francophone brain) was missing from the initial question - depuis 2.5 ans. However, the Anglophone brain is looking for meaning in the verbs because English likes to carry meaning in its verbs

A better wording would have been to put more meaning in the verb, such as "If I had been elected PM 2.5 years ago?"

To properly interpret this sentence, the interviewer would need to avoid inferring primary meaning from the pluperfect of the verb "to be" and instead recognize that the important point is "2.5 years ago"

So the interviewer attempts to clarify:

"If you were the prime minister right now"

This is the biggest communication breakdown in the whole conversation. The interviewer was confirming Mr. Dion's interpretation, but he did not use any affirmatives or repeat any of Mr. Dion's key words. In the absence of affirmatives or repetition of key words, I think the vast majority of people would not interpret a statement as confirmation, regardless of the actual content of the statement. (Example: I'm giving you directions. You ask me "Is it the green building?" I reply "It's #731." When you're at the right corner looking for #731, you're not even going to glance at the street number of the green building, are you?)

A better wording would be "Yes, if you had been elected PM 2.5 years ago" or "If you were elected PM in the last election" or "If you were PM during this economic crisis that started last week" or any other response containing a range of time and/or an affirmative.

To properly interpret this sentence, Mr. Dion would have had to ignore his every instinct (in any language) about how people usually go about confirming other people's statements, and infer the time range that has not yet been spoken out loud.

So Mr. Dion took this to mean that he's PM starting now and started outlining the plan in his platform. Then (apparently in response to the interviewer's reaction to his response), he asked to start over, again asking for the same clarification but this time more clearly:

"If I was prime minister starting when? Today?"

That "starting when" is the key point, the depuis that was missing from the initial question.

I'll bet you anything when the staffer came over to clarify, their clarification included the word (or if they were speaking English the concept of) depuis.

My Ugly Betty ship

I now have a ship for Ugly Betty:

Daniel Jr. + Justin

Not right now, but maybe 5-10 years in the future.

How to get women to stay at home with the kids

It seems some of Antonia Zerbisias's correspondents take offence at the fact that some mothers might go to work instead of staying at home with the kids. But they're going about this all wrong. Instead of starting with blogs and emails trying to convince people that a mother at home is the right decision philosophically and ethically, instead of trying to achieve it by default by eliminating other child care options, they need to take the opposite approach and start with labour conditions.

For example, if I had a husband and children, I would have to have to have to keep working. We'd have no choice. Why? Because I was fortunate to stumble upon a rare job with drug and dental coverage, life insurance and disability insurance. Neither mi cielito nor any other man I have ever met who would make a vaguely compatible partner has had such a job. The vast vast majority of jobs we've ever seen advertised or are otherwise aware of that we might be reasonably qualified to do have been temporary or contract positions with constant uncertainty. Under these conditions, before we even get to the question of whether the salary is sufficient, it would be downright irresponsible for me to leave my job if I had a child, because that would be leaving the child without insurance coverage and with no safety net in case of emergency. And even if we didn't need the money right this minute, even if we could do without the insurance for a few years, it would be irresponsible for me to let go of this job because it is very unlikely that either I or my husband would be able to find another comparable job if needed.

Now if we lived in a world where everyone with post-secondary education and a few years of work experience can automatically get a job that has benefits and pays enough to support a family, and if they lose that job they can easily get another, then people can go around leaving perfectly good jobs. And after this goes on for a while and people grow comfortable with the fact that good jobs are available free for the taking and you can just stop working and stay home without any disadvantages except the loss of your income, then you can start talking about who you think should stay home. But until all jobs can support families, there's no way you will ever be able to convince anyone to quit a job that can support a family.

So revolutionize labour conditions first. Lobby for an economy where a typical job can support a family. Lobby for a stronger social safety net so people don't need to be earning and squirreling away every possible dollar in case of job loss. Create a world where someone can stay home. Then people will be open to hashing out the details of who should stay home and why.

The problem with abusive relationships

The problem with abusive relationships (apart from, you know, all the real problems with abusive relationships) is that they've ruined walking into doors for everyone.

Last night I actually did walk into a door. I'd left a closet door open that I normally leave closed, then I forgot about it when I went to the bathroom in the middle of the night without turning any lights on. And the only think I could think is "Shit, I hope I don't get any bruises, no one will ever believe me!" Then I lay awake trying to think of excuses for my door and come up with a convincing story that wouldn't lead anyone to conclude that I was being beaten.

Luckily I didn't have any bruising when I woke up, just a teeny little bump with no discolouration (not even a goose egg, a robin egg maybe) that no one will even notice if they're not looking for it.

But this comes in a close second to winning the internet

Notable defenstrations in history

What? How can I go to sleep when the internet is full of stuff like this?

YouTube imitates xkcd

I hereby declare whoever did this the winner of the whole internet.