kimmy

What you're talking about has nothing to do with guns and everything to do with the psychological effects of being in a combat situation. The number of Canadian civilians who find themselves in combat situations involving firearms is vanishingly close to zero. It's not a rational argument against gun ownership. It might be a pretty good argument against handgun carry, though. -k

The Toyota acceleration defect was real, and killed at least 5 people. I'm not making excuses bad business behavior. As I told eyeball above, I'd be thrilled to see executives who made these decisions prosecuted. I'm just pointing out that your interest in this particular recall is obviously due to a politics-related agenda. -k

That's false-- they knew they had a problem as early as 2005. Ford survived their exploding Pintos, and exploding Explorers, and the transmissions that shifted from park to reverse unexpectedly and ran over people. Toyota survived their uncontrolled acceleration defect. And I expect that despite current bad press, GM will survive this. They're a profitable company, despite what some people seem to think. The 2008 bailout was-- and I think you already know this-- not simply a result of declining sales, but also of the crisis in the financial industry which was a 3-headed monster because first off it left GM and Chrysler unable to obtain financing for operating expenses, secondly left consumers unable to obtain financing for vehicle purchases, and thirdly destroyed the economy and consumer confidence to the point that few people were buying cars, period. -k

Internal combustion engines are 30-40% efficient, and electric motors are 90%+ efficient. Combustion engines waste more energy overcoming friction, compressing air-fuel mixture, and as unused heat, than they convert into power at the output shaft. Electric engines by contrast have only I^2*R losses and a minimal amount of friction. So even with losses resulting during conversion and storage of electric energy, electric motors still have a huge edge in efficiency. Combustion engines start at a huge technological disadvantage, and the only thing that tilts things in their favor is that current technology for storing electricity sucks. Gasoline is currently easier to store and carry than electrical power. Gasoline currently has a lot more energy-per-pound than current electrical storage technology. Gasoline is currently more economical than battery packs. Those things are currently true, but they will not be true forever. Battery technology is advancing rapidly. And there are other electrical storage technologies on the horizon-- graphene supercapacitors, for example. Electricity *will* replace gasoline in automobiles. It is not a question of if, but when. And when that day comes, General Motors will be in trouble if they don't have electrical technology of their own. That's why the dummies who are cheerleading against the Volt are missing the bigger picture. There are people who look at to-date sales of the Volt and say "GM ought to pull the plug on the Volt because the sales are low". That could be compared to telling the Fisher Carriage Works company in 1905 "why are you guys worried about building chassis for horseless carriages? Horseless carriages are a tiny share of the market! Wagons is where the money is." -k

eyeball, I share your interest in seeing corporate executives held personally accountable for decisions they're responsible for. However, I think the waters got muddied here. This has nothing to do with the Volt, and nobody is suggesting that the people who allowed unsafe products to continue to be sold should be given a pass because the Volt is "green technology". To be specific: the faulty airbags were sold in the following vehicles: -Chevrolet Cobalt, 2005-2007 -Chevrolet HHR, 2006-2007 -Pontiac G5, 2007 -Pontiac Solstice, 2006-2007 -Saturn Ion, 2003-2007 -Saturn Sky, 2007 None of this involves the Volt. All of this occurred prior to the bailout. And an attempt to link the faulty airbags to either the Volt or the bailout is an act of sheer fraud and dishonesty by pinheads with axes to grind. -k

I was wondering too, because "The Rains of Castamere" was also the episode title of season 3, episode 9 ("the Red Wedding episode"), so I looked it up. Remember last season when Cersei took Maergery aside and told her the story about House Reyne of Castamere, "the second richest family in Westeros", the Lannister bannermen who decided to rebel against the Lannisters? Tywin extincted the Reyne family, killing every last man, woman, and child, and hung their remains from the walls of Casterly Rock as a warning to every other family in the Westlands who might have had notions of rebelling against the Lannisters. (Cersei pointedly notes that the Tyrells are the second richest family in Westeros, and suggests that Maergery learn from the error of the Reynes.) Minstrels wrote "The Rains of Castamere" about Tywin's slaughter of the Reynes, and became popular with Lannister soldiers, to the point that it became known as simply "the Lannister song". The "cat of a different coat... a coat of gold or a coat of red" refers to the Reyne sigil, which was a red lion, and the rebellion was nicknamed the clash of lions. I just read that the minstrels playing "The Rains of Castamere" was the signal for the slaughter of the Starks and Tullys to begin at the Red Wedding, and Catelyn was the only one who recognized the song, although it by then it was too late. And who are you, the proud lord said, that I must bow so low? Only a cat of a different coat, that's all the truth I know. In a coat of gold or a coat of red, a lion still has claws, And mine are long and sharp, my lord, as long and sharp as yours. And so he spoke, and so he spoke, that Lord of Castamere, But now the rains weep o'er his hall, with no one there to hear. Yes now the rains weep o'er his hall, and not a soul to hear. -k

:D :lol: The whole wedding feast was pretty awesome. I mean, the result, obviously, but everything leading up to it was filled with that knot-in-the-stomach tension that makes this show so riveting. Starting at the dwarf pageant and proceeding right through the confrontation between Joffrey and Tyrion... that growing sense of dread... something horrible is going to happen. And the outcome was unexpected and delightful. I wasn't sure it was really going to happen until the blood vessels in his skin and eyes started bursting. Then I was like "yep... this is really happening! He's not coming back from this!" And the best part is that Cersei got to watch helplessly. Maybe she has an inkling how Cat Stark felt now. -k

Patently false, as Gosthacked argued in the very first sentence of the opening post that "guns are not the problem". -k

I am vraiment blonde, only half Ukrainian, and quite good at math. However I confess that I deliberately understated the number and length of the paragraphs in my post, as an attempt to cash in on the wildly popular Three Short Paragraphs phenomenon. -k

Here is what she planned to say when she accepted the honorary degree that the university offered then revoked. A snippet: The situation at Brandeis University creates a weird clash of competing values, where conservatives are upset that the university pulled the rug out from under a feminist atheist, while progressives are happy that an African feminist got kicked off campus. -k

Canada has a very large number of firearms, but our gun crime rates are extremely low. When was the last time Canada had a school shooting? Was it that Kimveer Gill thing in 2006? Why is there such a marked contrast between Canada and the US in that area? -k

Frozen is one of the most successful films of recent years, and one of the most successful animated films ever-- in the same company as Shrek or Lion King at the very least. It was top 10 at the box office right from its release in November continuous to the DVD release a couple of weeks ago. It's pretty much a global phenomenon, with huge commercial success internationally as well as in North America. I gather that the soundtrack has been very successful as well, and they just won Oscars for best song and best animated picture. I watched it last week, and really enjoyed it. It's visually stunning, and I loved the characters. I'm not usually big on musicals, but the songs in this were very good. I had to go on IMDB afterward to find out who sang Kristen Bell's character Anna's songs. Kristen Bell sang them. I had no idea she could sing. Idina Menzel (or Adele Dazeem, as John Travolta introduced her at the Oscars...) provides the voice of Elsa and sings the "Let It Go" song that is one of the movie's high points. They originally intended to make a movie based on the Hans Christian Anderson story "The Snow Queen", but the end result bears no resemblance to the fairy tale, other than having both snow and a queen. I read somewhere that Elsa was originally intended to be a villain, but the songs the songwriters wrote for her changed the writers' perspective about her and they came up with a story that makes her a very sympathetic character. So... after watching this thoroughly enjoyable and seemingly innocent movie, I was shocked to learn that it is actually a source of controversy -- CONTROVERSY!! -- as various people with axes to grind came after Anna and Elsa to further their various causes. The first of these causes: the shocking amount of white people in Frozen has outraged people who feel that there should be an affirmative action plan for animated characters or a racial quota for Disney princesses or something. Just because it's set in a little Norwegian town of centuries gone by doesn't mean they couldn't have had African princesses, I guess. So there was a thing on the internet where people posted their Africanized pictures of Anna and Elsa with the hashtag #thiscouldhavebeenFrozen because snow and African princesses go together like peas and carrots I guess. When I think of Hans Christian Anderson stories, I usually picture African characters, obviously. Perhaps they could have had Arabian princesses. And instead of Norway it could have been set in Arabia, and instead of snow, Elsa's magic covers everything in sand, and instead of an ice castle, Elsa builds herself a sand castle, and instead of Frozen, it could have been called Sandblasted. That would probably have worked well too. Slightly more rational criticism pointed out that the male lead-- Kristoff-- was modeled after the Saami-- Scandinavia's indigenous people. Kristoff wears traditional Saami garb and travels with a reindeer-- just like the Saami did. Yet Kristoff is blond! Surely Kristoff should have been a person of color! Well, as these photos of Saami demonstrate... ...it turns out that "indigenous" is not a synonym for brown. The other complaint about Frozen is that it's SATANIC GAY PROPAGANDA aimed at INDOCTRINATING young girls into HARDCORE MAN-HATING LESBIANS. That was how one American pastor described it, anyway. Others have present this idea without the hyperbole. The argument is this: Elsa lives in fear of everyone finding out she is different, afraid that they'll hate her if they find out-- this could be a metaphor for a gay person living in the closet, afraid of bigotry if they are found out. The "Let It Go" scene where Elsa embraces her magic power could be a metaphor for coming out of the closet. Elsa only finds happiness when she embraces her magic-- the movie is metaphorically telling gay people that they have to come out of the closet to find happiness, right? Well, it could be symbolic of those things, but it is actually symbolic of experiences that are almost universal as people grow into adulthood. The "Let it go" scene is really about the decision to put aside other peoples' expectations and choose your own way in life. It could be about someone coming out of the closet, but it could equally be about telling your dad "I'm quitting proctology school and joining the rodeo" or quitting your job as an accountant to start your own business. Elsa's experience as a child growing up hiding her terrible secret could be symbolic of a gay person, but it is equally applicable to any shame-inducing experience that people struggle through, especially children. The idea that Elsa finds happiness by "coming out of the closet" actually doesn't follow from the movie. Her life actually gets a lot worse. What saves her is that in the climax of the movie, she finally understands that she is loved, unconditionally, just as she is. Accepting that we are worthy of being loved is an important thing, and sometimes a difficult thing, and not just for gay people. -k

I like MacTavish too. He's the only one of the bunch who I don't think is an idiot. I like many of the things he did this year, like bringing in larger tougher guys and David Peron and Boyd Gordon and the goalie situation. I am sure that Tambellini was not really running the show while he was here. I think that Lowe was part of every decision Tambo made, and that worries me because I don't think that is going to change. You can't have a guy who has screwed up this much for so many years continue to be an authority figure in the organization. Anyway, whatever nice things MacT did this year, we're 29th in the league. Last year we were 24th. This year our winning percentage is .401, last year it was .469. This year we're bottom 10 in special teams. Last year we were top 10 in special teams. Last year the goals against were 19th in the league, this year they're 30th. Last year the goals for were 20th, this year they're 26th. It seems like they're worse in every area. Why did they get worse? The lineup looks better on paper, the YoungStarz™ are more experienced... the team should have gotten better, shouldn't it? It kind of makes me sad that we got all those #1 draft picks and Taylor Hall seems like the only guy who is going to become a star caliber player. I know it is too soon to really know what RNH or Yakupov are going to be but they don't seem that great to be honest. RNH is a twig. Yakupov is a short little one dimensional guy. If you could go back in time, would you pick Seguin and Landeskog instead of Hall and RNH with those two #1 picks? Right now it seems like it would have been better... and RNH is supposed to be the franchise center. It seems like every rebuilding team has a better center to build around. Honestly I am just depressed about the whole thing. -k

I hate it. I wish Kevin Lowe would just go away and not come back. He's not just bad at his job, he's so incompetent that he doesn't even realize what a crappy job he's doing. He thinks he's a brilliant hockey mind. He's a perfect example of the Dunning-Kruger effect. I would be hoping for them to fire Dallas Eakins, except I'm afraid they might replace him with Dave Lumley or Lee Fogalin or Daryl Katz's kid or something. The nepotism is out of control. Like, if Dallas Eakins could choose his own assistants, he'd have picked Steve Smith and Kelly Buchberger? The head coaches other teams get to choose their own assistants, don't they? It bugs me that the Calgary Flames have been rebuilding for 13 months and they're already farther along than we are after 5 years. I hate what a disgrace the Oilers are and it infuriates me that the guy who corkscrewed them into the ground is the same guy is still in charge. Its horrible. I can't stand it. -k

OBC? -k

Mike Gillis was out of the playoffs for 1 day and got fired. Kevin Lowe has been out of the playoffs for 8 years and still has a job. -k

The expectation of a PQ majority was the reason Marois called an early election in the first place. And it seemed likely until that dude put his foot in his mouth re:separation. Does it say something about separatism that a separatist party lost the election by talking openly about separatism? -k

No kidding... I think Maisie might be a foot taller than when we first met her. I'll have to have a look at some season 1 to compare to present day. I think this might be the first time we've seen her smile since season 1 as well. I loved the scene with Arya and The Hound so much. If there's one thing we've learned, it's that if Sandor Clegane wants chicken, you should get him a chicken. It reminded me a bit of Jules Winston and the Big Kahuna Burger, or Colonel Landa and the glass of milk. And the closing shot: despite what Sandor had said earlier, Arya has her own horse. They often use different music for the closing credits, and the closing music they used in this episode was particularly lovely. So... that Dornish prince knows how to make an entrance. So... Dario the mercenary is a completely different dude than last season. I read somewhere that Dario v1.0 has been cast as the new star of the Transporter movies, and they picked a new Dario because they were concerned that he wouldn't be available for shooting. Dario v1.0 was sexy. Dario 2.0 seemed pretty meh. I wonder if Cersei's suddenly cold demeanor towards Jaime is her way of pushing him to move on with his life. It would be the best thing she could do for him. Being Lord of Casterly Rock would be a sweet gig. He's a moron for passing that up to be with a woman he can never actually have. -k

There are reasons these laws came to exist in the first place? And reasons why the Supreme Court chose not to do away with the rules entirely? Justice Roberts wrote in his decision about his belief that disclosure provides a "safeguard". What are they safeguarding against? -k

Well, let's be realistic. If you're an independent creator (whether it be writing, visual art, computer games, designs for 3d printing, or whatever) piracy isn't your biggest problem. Finding an audience for your work is your biggest challenge. If you get to the point where people are looking to pirate your work, you're already on the brink of stardom. I think that independent creators are probably much better served by new-style distribution methods than they were before. How would an author get paid before? He has to write his work and then aggressively market it to possibly dozens of publishers, right? Unless he's already established, it's not easy to convince a publisher to take a chance on his book, because it's a big financial investment for them. But now we're in a world where an author can post his work to Amazon in a marketplace where people are able to search for exactly what they want. And there's no cash outlay for Amazon to host the book, and it's more appealing for a consumer to spend a buck or two on an e-book by an author they've never heard of than spend $12 or $20 on a hard copy of a book by somebody they've never heard of. -k

So again, why any restrictions at all? Why any rules at all? If giving money to politicians is protected free speech, why can't people and companies just give as much of their money as they want to whoever they want without going through hoops like disclosures or super-PACs? -k

I agree: the first parts of the medley were pretty meh, but the Kill the King part kicks ass. I haven't kept track of Metallica for quite a while, but it's nice to know that they still know how to metal. It's hard to believe that Metallica has been around for so long. They are apparently even part of the dictionary of my web-browser-- if I try to misspell Metallica, a red squiggle appears underneath. I am not very familiar with Dio, except for his stint with Black Sabbath. That's all before my time. I get the impression that many metal fans look down on Dio-era Black Sabbath as an inferior product, kind of like Sammy Haggar -era Van Halen or something. However, I think it stands on its own. My familiarity with Dio-era Black Sabbath (and Black Sabbath period, actually) started with the movie Heavy Metal, which featured two Black Sabbath songs in the final act. The first is E5150, a blood-curdling instrumental that is used in the opening moments of the final act. In a post-apocalyptic earth, a stream of pilgrims are trudging through the ruined landscape seeking a mysterious green glow on the horizon. Perhaps they hope it offers salvation of some kind. But it doesn't. Not at all. E5150 is the music that plays as the pilgrims are engulfed by a mystic green sludge that transforms them into bloodthirsty zombies. The title is fitting. E5150 = E-5-1-50 = E-V-I-L ...and if evil was a sound, this is what it would sound like. The second Black Sabbath song featured in Heavy Metal is The Mob Rules, which is the song that plays as the bloodthirsty zombies raze the last bastion of civilization to the ground. E5150 is not included on the movie soundtrack, but both songs are on Black Sabbath's Mob Rules album. On the album (and often at concerts) E5150 is an intro for The Mob Rules. Here are tracks 4 and 5 of the Black Sabbath "Mob Rules" studio album. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDQTUfLds-E -k

So with Google Chromecast now available in Canada... do I want it? How does Chromecast stack up against alternatives like the Roku box, Apple TV, or the media streaming capabilities in a PS3? Do these gadgets really do anything that I can't already do with my PS3? I hear there are "channels" for these streaming gadgets, but I am not really clear on what these "channels" offer. -k

If one has decided that giving money to politicians is a protected form of free speech, then why should there be disclosure requirements, a ban on direct contributions from corporations and unions, or campaign financing laws of any sort? -k