The Left Wing Redneck

  A recent tempest in a tea pot was about gas stoves and their potential hazards to health and environment.  The usual suspects have climbed on their soapboxes, the loony left demanding the sale of gas stoves be banned, and the right wing-nuts proclaiming that the right to buy a gas stove is right up there with assault rifles. After an exhaustive five minute internet search, I have discovered that gas stoves may result in a statistically higher incidence in childhood asthma, may leak methane when turned off, and may release nitrogen oxides when they are used. Burning natural gas has also been blamed for the release of toxic chemicals, such as benzene. So cooking over open flames might be dangerous, who knew?  Digging a bit deeper it turns out that the source of leaked gas inside homes was due to leaks in gas lines.  So plumbing might also be dangerous, or perhaps the plumbers are dangerous.  I wonder what the ban the gas snowflakes will do when they find out tha...

  People who write for a living are all excited about ChatGTP, that generates an intelligently written response or explanation on almost any subject. I gotta admit, it's amazing. ChatGTP has a huge knowledge base and provides a well worded response to almost any question.   On the other hand, reports are coming in that some i phones  are sending false emergency calls for accidents that never happened at amusement parks and ski hills because the phones were programmed to automaticially detect accidents based on their motion detectors.  Go for a roller coaster ride, fall off your snow board, put your phone in the glove box and hit a few potholes, and your phone calls 911 on you.   The latest 'feature' included with almost any household appliance is  the ability to connect to a smart phone.  You might wonder why your phone needs to speak to your refrigerator.  You now have the ability to turn off your bathroom light in your Oshkosh hom...

  Liberal democracies buy their stuff.  Liberal democracies provide a wide variety of opaque financial instruments to hide their wealth. Liberal democracies sell them the technology and weapons they need to stay in power. Liberal democracies abide by the rule of law, in other words with the right lawyers it is possible to get away with just about anything. If things go south at home, somewhere in the liberal democratic world a safe haven will be provided for the right price. What's not to love?

As the great Canadian Border and Capital Cities blockades wind their way down, we might ask where were the police?  This was far from the first Canada's first blockade rodeo. When the Indians (as in First Nations), environmentalists, G20 summit protesters, strikers, unemployed workers etc., take to the streets the police can be counted on to show up in full riot gear ever ready to restore order.  Maybe they learned from past mistakes, or maybe cops are reluctant to bust the heads of their drinking buddies.   Most Canadian cops are smart enough to keep their opinions off social media, but there are a few who have not gotten the memo yet .  Which is yet another reason that our police forces need greater diversity.  With a better selection of pissed off oppressed minorities the cops would be able to respond to any flavor protest with equal enthusiasm.   

  As Queen Elizabeth II's record reign winds down to its inevitable conclusion, Canadians are thinking about who will be our next head of state.  Canada is a constitutional monarchy and Queen Elizabeth is Canada's head of state.  As she is a very busy lady, Elizabeth delegates queening to Canada's Governor General.  At one time the British Monarchs chose their proxy from a pool of unemployed British aristocrats who might benefit from being thousands of miles away from their liege, but these days the Monarch is even too busy to choose Governors General, so lets Canada's Prime Ministers pick who will represent them. Being that Elizabeth is 95 as  this is written, Canada can expect a new monarch sooner than later.   For the same reason Barbados, another of the Queen's realms, have chosen to convert from a constitutional monarchy to a republic.   Which has some Canadians wondering whether Canada should do the same.  Not that Canada has anyth...

When opinions are criticized, we are told that every one is entitled to have an opinion even if it is wrong. Unless, of course, you disagree with this.  

Dick, Jane and Spot  go to school The redneck,is a boomers, people born between 1946 and the late 1950's.   We are called boomers because our parents had lots of kids, so they named us the baby boom.  Now that we are senior citizens the baby part was dropped.   An interesting thing about being a boomer is that apparently no one saw us coming, despite  census data that would have revealed that we were not sneaking up on anyone.   The most memorable thing about my school years is that every school I went to was under construction. Every one of my schools also  had 'portables' trailer park classrooms planted in the schoolyard.   One of my schools was so short of teachers it was staffed with old warhorses who should have been retired decades ago.  My grade 5 teacher used to fall asleep like clockwork every day, right after morning recess, he had to be at least 70 years old. When we got to College, it was the same as our school days.  ...