Jagmeet Singh is Canada's most expensive MP, Poilievre is the cheapest - "NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh is currently topping out as the highest-spending individual member of Parliament in the House of Commons, while Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre ranks as the lowest. The latest figures on MP expenses were released in late March, and they show that for the first three quarters of the last fiscal year (April 1, 2023 to Dec. 31, 2023), Singh expensed $533,533 in his capacity as the MP for Burnaby South. In that same time period, Poilievre claimed $143,201 in expenses related to his role as the MP for riding of Carleton, roughly a fourth of Singh’s total. Poilievre was also one of only a handful of MPs whose constituency expenses didn’t include a single dollar for “travel” or “hospitality.”... As for the expenses of the prime minister, while Justin Trudeau is famed for his sky-high travel expenses, the latest figures do show that his Montreal constituency office also ranks as one of the cheapest in the country to operate. In one quarter, Trudeau’s Papineau riding even stood out as one of the only offices aside from Carleton to rack up zero travel or hospitality expenses... But when it came to “hospitality” expenses, the clear champion was the Bloc Québécois. Despite representing less than 10 per cent of the House of Commons, all three quarters analyzed by the National Post found that a Bloc MP was consistently among the top five spenders on hospitality."
Meme - sinisterpixel: "If you think 256 is an "oddly specific" number, you *probably* shouldn't be writing tech articles"
peachezprogramming: "Yikes"
"WhatsApp increases group chat size limit to 256 people. It's not clear why WhatsApp settled on such an oddly specific number"
Meme - "Anybody remember when Ottawa was named the most unloyal city inb the world because it had the highest amount of Ashley Madison users (meet ups for infidelity) it was found that dating a girl in Ottawa means she's most likely cheating on you with 2 other people"
Hennyeggsbenny: "Normie NPC? Ottawa has one the highest reddit user base per capita. We're anything but normies."
">thousands of Ottawans posting about how their pets can't sleep
>not single person saying their baby was up crying all night
Curious"
Meme - "And this is why we were asked to leave the museum *re-enacting dramatic Deposition*"
Death of Common Sense Will Spell the End of Free Societies - "I gently asked her whether she genuinely believed the postmodernist foundational tenet that there are no universal truths. The astute reader might notice the logical problem here, as the latter tenet is itself construed as a universal truth! Setting aside this embarrassing conundrum, she retorted with complete assuredness that indeed all knowledge is relative. Surely, I replied there must be some universals otherwise the pursuit of scientific truths is an utter illusion... I asked her whether it was a universal truth that within the human species it is only women who bear children. Surely this is an absolute fact, no? After rolling her eyes in utter disgust and taking a few huffs and puffs, she replied that she was amazed at how sexist my example had been. At this point, my doctoral student, my wife, and I were truly baffled. The feminist explained that in the spiritual narrative of a particular group of Japanese people, it is the men who bear the children! Hence, by purposely restricting childbearing to the physical/biological realm, I was being sexist. Sure, in the biological realm, it is the women who give birth but in the spiritual arena, it is wholly conceivable for men to be the child bearers. Whereas I was well aware of the nonsensical babble of postmodernists, I must admit that this was a new height of delusional thinking. I composed myself and decided to provide one additional and final example... I asked her whether it was indeed a universal truth that from any vantage point on Earth, the sun rises in the East and sets in the West... she used the tools of deconstructionism to "tease apart" my latest universal. Deconstructionism argues that reality is a linguistic creation. Hence, there is no objective truth to speak of, as all information is constrained within subjective linguistic bounds. She proposed that I was putting labels on things, and she refused to play such games. She did not know what I meant by "East" or "West." These were arbitrary labels. What did I mean by "sun"? That which I called the sun, she might refer to as "dancing hyena" (her actual words!), to which I wryly replied: OK, the dancing hyena rises in the East and sets in the West. Better yet, the dancing hyena gives me a dancing hyena burn on my fat stomach if I lay out too long without any dancing hyena protection! If you think that this is an isolated incident that is otherwise unrepresentative of postmodernists, academic feminists, or deconstructionists, you'd be wrong. These anti-science movements have spent the greater part of the past four decades polluting the minds not only of bright academics but also of generations of students who were otherwise impressed by the obscurantism and fake profundity of these intellectual charlatans. The concerted efforts of several exemplary scientists have managed to slowly eviscerate the influence of anti-science movements on university campuses. For example, the physicist Alan Sokal purposely submitted a nonsensical postmodernist paper containing pseudo-randomly generated passages to Social Text, one of the elite journals in the field. After it being accepted, Sokal confessed his ruse albeit this did not seem to embarrass the editors. After all, since all meaning is relative, the editors construed his randomly generated nonsensical paper as meaningful! These anti-science movements coupled with cultural relativism, political correctness, and an ethos of self-guilt regarding all geopolitical realities will prove the demise of Western civilization. It is such babble that caused nearly all of the American news media to offer hallucinatory explanations regarding the recent Times Square incident including that the alleged terrorist did this because he had defaulted on his mortgage payment, and hence was facing great financial strain. Both the media and Obama officials are under a strict edict to avoid uttering the most obvious of geopolitical facts"
A Movie Star, Some Player Pianos, and Torpedoes - "Actress Hedy Lamarr... was an inventor... she and Antheil began work on one of Lamarr’s invention ideas—a radio-guided torpedo with synchronized anti-jamming frequency hopping."
Volkswagen Italy mocked over unfortunate Instagram handle - "Volkswagen’s Italian branch — which goes by Volkswagen Italia — was mocked by social media users after the car dealership launched its Instagram handle “@volkswagenitalia.”... The unfortunate handle also brought back a slew of awkward spellings such as the hashtag “#susanalbumparty” which went viral in 2012 when then-icon Susan Boyle released her first album."
Does Anyone Know What 'Populism' Means? - The Atlantic - "The way populism is often applied suggests that its use is more for effect rather than explanation"
The Bizarre Social History of Beds - "For most of human history, people thought nothing of crowding family members or friends into the same bed. The 17th-century diarist Samuel Pepys often slept with male friends and rated their conversation skills. One of his favorites was the “merry Mr. Creed,” who provided “excellent company.” In September 1776, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin famously shared a bed in a New Jersey inn with only one small window. Adams kept it shut, but Franklin wanted it open, complaining that he would suffocate without fresh air. Adams won the battle. Travelers often slept with strangers. In China and Mongolia, kangs – heated stone platforms – were used in inns as early as 5000 B.C. Guests supplied the bedding and slept with fellow tourists. Bedding down with strangers could lead to some awkwardness. The 16th-century English poet Andrew Buckley complained of bedmates who “buck and babble, some commeth drunk to bed.” Then there was the Great Bed of Ware – a massive bed kept in an inn in a small town in entral England. Built with richly decorated oak around 1590, the four-post bed is about the size of two modern double beds. Twenty-six butchers and their wives – a total of 52 people – are said to have spent a night in the Great Bed in 1689... why go to an office when you can rule from the bedroom? Each morning, Louis XIV of France would sit in his bed, bolstered by pillows, and preside over elaborate gatherings. Surrounded by courtiers like the gossipy Lord Saint-Simon, he composed decrees and consulted with high officials. During the 19th century, beds and bedrooms gradually became private spheres. A major impetus was rapid urbanization during the Industrial Revolution. In cities, compact row houses were constructed with small rooms, each with a specific purpose, one of which was sleeping. Another reason was religion. The Victorian era was a devout age, and Evangelical Christianity was pervasive by the 1830s. Such beliefs placed great emphasis on marriage, chastity, the family, and the bond between parent and child; allowing strangers or friends under the covers was no longer kosher. By 1875, Architect magazine had published an essay declaring that a bedroom used for anything other than sleeping was unwholesome and immoral... A 2019 survey found that 80 percent of teens brought their mobile devices into their bedrooms at night; nearly one-third slept with them. In a way, technology has reverted the bed to its earlier role: a place to socialize – chatting with friends, maybe even strangers – late into the night. And we can only wonder how many tweets President Trump has composed while burrowed under his blankets... participants who banished smartphones from the bedroom reported being happier and having a better quality of life. Maybe that’s because these devices eat into our sleep."
See also, Richard I and Philip II sharing a bed. Clearly, according to Queer History and LGBT History, homosexuality has been pervasive in history
20 Slang Terms From World War I - "Basket Case
Blimp
Booby-Trap
Cooties
Dingbat
Flap
Kiwi
Strafe"
Religion Is About Emotion Regulation, and It’s Very Good at It
Boost your immunity: Cold and flu treatments suppress innate immune system. - "Boosting your immunity is actually a pretty bad idea. Even if these remedy and prevention products did what they purport to, you wouldn’t want them to. We have two complementary immune systems: innate and acquired. Innate immunity is the body’s natural, knee-jerk reaction to an unknown infection. Innate immunity is fast, broad, and incredibly nonspecific. When it gets activated, you know the feeling all too well—fever, cough, runny nose, and body aches. In short: inflammation. You can already see why you might not want to “boost” this part of the immune system... The real work of neutralizing an infection is the purview of acquired immunity, the targeted branch of your immunologic military that is built up over your lifetime... the innate immune system rages on for much longer than necessary. While the acquired immune system’s antibodies have already fought and won the real battle, the innate branch just doesn’t get the communiqué, so it fights on unwittingly. As we all know, coughs and runny noses can linger for weeks, even after the mildest of viral infections. This is why boosting your immunity seems like such a bad idea. Over-the-counter alternative-remedy products can’t boost your acquired immunity. Even magical thinkers would have to acknowledge that the only way to do that is through vaccination—something that too many alternative-remedy users seem to shun—or a bone marrow transplant, a dangerous but often necessary treatment in certain blood cancers that also increases immune system cells. That leaves innate immunity as the only target of these over-the-counter remedies that claim to enhance your natural immunity. But who would actually want that? Last I checked, no one wants fever or a runny nose. The mainstay of treatment for symptomatic cold viruses is to suppress, not boost, our crude and clunky innate immune responses... In general, extremes are bad. Too much immunity (for example, autoimmune responses) can lead to allergies, tissue damage, and even anaphylaxis. Too little immunity, say from chemotherapy or HIV/AIDS, and you’re at risk of deadly infections that most people clear with ease. Our bodies have evolved toward a balance, but sometimes innate immunity is overzealous and needs curbing."
Eric Weinstein on X - "Q: How do you know that String Theory isn’t working as physics despite expert assurances to the contrary?
A: No one at all is in any way worried about the Iranians, Russians or Chinese getting their hands on our cutting edge String Theory."
Who is/was the genuinely toughest actor in Hollywood movies? - Cinema - Quora - "At the age of eighteen, Sessue Hayakawa was the young son of a noble Japanese family. His ancestors were samurai. Like many youths his age, Hayakawa dreamed of one day having a glorious army career, fighting for the Imperial Navy and kicking some foreign butt in the name of the Emperor. However, a day before he would enroll, he was dared by his friends to dive to the bottom of a deep lagoon. An excellent swimmer, he managed, but when he came up, he had a terrible headache. A doctor told him he had ruptured his eardrums. As a result, he failed his Navy physical… Having disappointed his samurai father, young Sessue went home to his parents and locked himself in his room. Alerted by the frantic barking of the loyal family dog, his father knocked on his son’s door. Silence. Without a moments doubt, he kicked in the locked and barricaded door. Inside he found a gruesome sight… Sessue was stabbing himself, attempting to commit seppuku, ritual suicide. By the time his father managed to wrestle the dagger from his hands, he had stabbed himself a staggering thirty times… Carrying him in his arms, as fast as he could, he rushed the young man to the nearest hospital where, miraculously, his son survived. It took some time for him to recover from his gruesome injuries. When finally he did, he was sent by his family to America under the guise of studies. In reality, it was to distract him and give him a sense of purpose again. Now that he could no longer find the glory he was after in the Navy, maybe he could find glory elsewhere?... The public found him broodingly handsome, devilishly attractive. He emitted a sense of danger that the female audience in particular could not get enough of. However, Hayakawa was still an Asian male. And as a non-white man, his on-screen and off-screen success was seen as a threat by many white men. Especially when he played, at times, a romantic lead rather than a villain. He carried himself with the air of an actual aristocrat, as he was an actual aristocrat. And it made him into the Asian equivalent of Rudolph Valentino. No one could stare at a girl more menacingly, more sexily. Or simply light a cigarette with the same class and nonchalance. His success carried on off-screen as well… Sessue got a lot of attention from female admirers. And he slept with a lot of beautiful Hollywood starlets, showgirls and actresses, extras… producers wives… you name it, he got it! At some point his Japanese wife and him even adopted some kids he fathered by Irish showgirls — he was particularly fond of Irish showgirls. He made no secret of the fact that two of his three children he fathered by white women, causing quite a scandal in his day and age of rampant racism and xenophobia.
Weird how when sexually threatened by Asian men, American men desexualised them, but when sexually threatened by Black men, American men hypersexualised them
Meme - "Is it just me or has Mcdonald's gone from a happy child to a depressed middle- aged adult? *bright coloured building with unique shaped roof vs dull grey square building*"
Meme - "Most people at parties: *kissing*
Me: If you stab a man in winter, steam will rise up from the wounds."
bea's bad blog - "every millennial who was online from 2000-2008 has a specific phrase from a YTP that will activate them like a “manchurian candidate” sleeper agent, causing them to spout gibberish for 40 straight seconds"
Taking the bull by the horns - "The item in the Good Oil said: "New laws in Australia next year may spell the end of the traditional bull bar, the heavy-duty protection fitted to the front of vehicles. Supporters say bull bars protect the vehicle's radiator and headlights from damage when it hits an animal such as a kangaroo. Opponents see bull bars as weapons against everything else on the road and cite surveys that say they are involved in up to 20 per cent of annual pedestrian fatalities. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau says about 90 people - pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists, drivers and passengers - die in collisions with bull bar-equipped vehicles each year... The Federal Government in Australia will next year introduce a law governing vehicle frontal protection systems, popularly known as bull bars, 'roo bars, or nudge bars. There are already guidelines in place - such as the banning of non-certified bull bars on vehicles made after 1996 - but some current designs will be outlawed as a result of the new laws. The legislation is expected to ban sharp-edged bull bars as well as add-ons such as fishing-rod holders, CB radio aerials or clamps for spotlights... Supporters on both sides of the Tasman say bull bars save lives and help to prevent damage to a vehicle's headlights and radiator when it hits an animal. This is more likely in Australia, where there are an estimated 20,000 kangaroo/vehicle collisions each year. Opponents say bull bars serve little purpose, are intrusive in a collision with another vehicle, contribute to pedestrian deaths and are little more than a fashion item in cities. Even the most ardent supporters of bull bars question their usefulness in cities. A study done in 1998 by the University of Adelaide found that the damage to a child's head when struck by a Toyota Prado equipped with a small-diameter steel bull bar was 10 to 15 times worse than the damage inflicted without one."
Aka roo bars
Useful Information for Foreign Tourists in Sapporo: Sand scattered over the icy roads. - "If you visit Sapporo in the winter, you may notice that sand is scattered over the frozen surface of slippery roads. This sand is an anti-slip agent that is used on winter streets so that pedestrians can walk safely. Grit bins, usually installed near intersections, contain bags or plastic bottles filled with sand and are available for use at all times. Since anyone is free to scatter this sand, Sapporo locals often take the initiative for the benefit of others who walk after them. Spread the sand in a zig-zag pattern over sections of the pavement you feel are too slippery. This is just one example of snow country altruism. The grit bins are equipped with a storage space where emptied bags and plastic bottles can be returned. This is not a trash bin, so take care not to leave regular garbage there."
Meme - "NEVER GIVE UP *miner giving up just before hitting the seam of gems* *miner continuing and going to hit the seam of gems*
Tristan @TristanGHill: thank you minecraft, after I saw this I went to the casino and lost absolutely everything."
Meme - "Wilma Dickfit is with Barry McCockiner.
Married Barry McCockiner"
Meme - "Ezra Miller. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Miller at 2017 San Diego Comic Con
See also
List of messiah claimants
List of people claimed to be Jesus
List of solved missing person cases"
Amagasaki derailment - Wikipedia - "Investigators speculate that the driver may have been trying to make up this lost time by increasing the train's speed beyond customary limits. Many reports from surviving passengers indicate that the train was traveling at a faster than normal speed. Furthermore, it is speculated that the driver may have felt stressed because he would have been punished for the two infractions... Drivers for JR West face financial penalties for lateness as well as being forced into harsh and humiliating retraining programs known as nikkin kyōiku (日勤教育, "dayshift education"), which include weeding and grass-cutting duties during the day. The final report officially concluded that the retraining system was one probable cause of the crash. This program consisted of severe verbal abuse, forcing the employees to repent by writing extensive reports. Many experts saw the process of nikkin kyoiku as a punishment and psychological torture, not retraining. The driver had also received a non-essential phone call from the general control station at the time he was rounding the bend... It has been speculated that the driver was so stressed about the inevitability of going back to nikkin kyoiku due to the prior infractions from that morning that he did not notice that the train was going too fast. When the driver did notice it, four seconds before the derailment, he used the service brake instead of the emergency brake, presumably to avoid another infraction, since the use of the emergency brake had to be justified."
Dangerously Right of Marx | Facebook - "Apparently Kotaku's owners have switched to a focus on "tips and guides" and given its remaining 7 writers the unreasonable task of "50 guides per week". The speculation is that they want the rest of the staff to quit or else fire them for not reaching the new strenuous deadline (thus not being owed severance). The editor in chief resigned."
Meme - Kaguya's Top Gal @hayasaka...: "The writers for Kotaku are literal prostitutes"
Alyssa Mercante @alyssa_merc: "I'm just gonna go back to sex work because at least then when get fucked a lot I'll get paid well for it"
Meme - "APES! RIDE WITH ME AND WE WILL DEFEAT THE HUMANS AND RULE THIS WoRLD!"
"UH... CAESAR? MY HORSE BROKE."
"UGH... AGAIN? WELL, QUICKLY Toss IT AWAY AND GRAB A FRESH ONE!"
"RISE of the DAWN of the PLANET of the HORSES"
Meme - Woman to baby: "You're going to hate me when you're a teenager. But I love you so much! I'm scared! It's Not fair! I'll be a cool mom, you can do drugs if you want. A little cocaine"
Man: "Give me that baby"
Meme - Dumbledore: "ONLY A PERSON WHO WANTED TO FIND THE STONE, BUT NOT USE IT, WOULD BE ABLE TO GET IT"
Harry Potter: "SO IF I'D JUST STAYED IN MY ROOM, VOLDEMORT WOULD HAVE HAD NO CHANCE OF GETTING IT?"
Dumbledore: "YES, IDIOT CHILD"
Comment: "Here's where I really love the SuperCarlinBrothers theory about this being part of Dumbledore's big plan. Basically this was an initial litmus test to see if Harry would have the underlying fortitude to take on challenges such as these. As Dumbles says here, the stone was never really in danger, and if he were *really* trying to protect it, he wouldn't leave a bunch of challenges that could be solved by first years."
Meme - Doctor preparing for prostate exam: "Ok Steve, try not to get aroused."
Patient: "My name is Paul..."
Doctor: "I know. I am Steve."
Meme - This is the best thing I've seen in at least 6 or 7 minutes: "it's time to end cars forever!"
I still see left wingers claim that it's a conspiracy theory to say that some people want to ban cars
Meme - Cody: "You didn't stop. You were stopped"
@AyishaMuhamad: "We should never have stopped."
Readers added context: "Muslims have not stopped their conquest of their own volition as this post implies; but rather the numerous attempts to forcefully expand Islam were stopped, often at great cost, by various defending powers over the centuries."
Meme - "TELL ME THE TRUTH PETER. I'M READY."
"MRS INCREDIBLE ISN'T NATURALLY THICC. SHE INFLATED HER ASS TO MAKE IT LOOK THICC."
"*SOBS* YOU'RE LYING. TAKE IT BACK! *SOBS*"
Meme - "NO Smoking *Arabic*
Don't speak French *Arabic*"
Meme - Storm to sad Rogue: "AW HELL NAW KAREN! KEEP your BLAND ASS POTATO SALAD TO YOURSELF."
Meme - Law B-Day @SlyPerformer: "If like the Anime version of it enough, I'll actually try Cp, i honestly never gave it a fair shot cause of how controversial it was."
Poe's Law 3.33 You can (not) redo: "HAAAANK! HAAAANK! HANK, DON'T ABBREVIATE CYBERPUNK."
Meme - "Thank me later *fleshlight made of ground beef*
Great success *fleshlight with bigger hole*"
Meme - "The future is dangerous. Don't go any further Please.
Hotel Balmoral Karuizawa"
