The US and Canada both have dairy tariffs in place. However, they functionally do not exist because they are only applied after a quota is met. For example, last year Canada charged a 0% tariff on all US dairy imports because the total volume of trade never breached the quota limit. This has basically been the case since NAFTA.

Canada, on average, actually charges lower tariffs than the US. That was true before Trump’s trade war and remains true today.

Their lack of scruples is a skill in itself.

I may be misremembering but I’m pretty sure the same character appears in Nioh or Nioh 2. A Japanese game made by Japanese developers. A cameo, but a representation of an historic figure and not some random person plucked out of historical obscurity.

I probably won’t play the game because I’ve never really been a fan of the Assasin’s Creed style but imagine getting your knickers in a twist over something that no one is forcing you to play. There are a bajillion other games. So weird.

Benny Hill music intensifies.

Well, I hope you can afford me the benefit of the doubt when I say that my critque comes from a left leaning perspective. I see this kind of response a lot online, particularly in left leaning spaces: “the left’s authoritarianism is a conservative conspiracy” with a generous helping of accusations of ‘both sidesing.’ I don’t think those characterizations are true or helpful.

The general public in most western nations all more or less agree with the flagship policies of the left. Whether that be universal healthcare, freedom of choice, marriage equality etc. The question then becomes; why do people vote against their own beliefs? What is it about “The Left” that is so unappealing that people would rather vote for fascists?

It seems to me that the reason the left is doing so poorly in Europe and NA is because we’ve been hijacked by purity spirals, exacerbating our already greater proclivity to fracture. Our message is not reaching the people who would be inclined to vote for left leaning policies because it is drowned out by so much of the more authoritarian online discourse, some of which has spilled out into real life politics. That’s not to mention our aversion to recognizing or admitting fault in our own movement. We’re each like the proverbial frog in boiling water; complacent to the growing failings and dangers within our own movement because we’ve slowly become acclimatised to it.

The authoritarian tendencies of the left’s flank are, in my opinion, partly to blame for some of what we are seeing unfold and my fear is that unless we can acknowledge and reign in some of that we will, as a society, continue to careen toward something considerably more awful than Trump, Le Pen, Farage, Poilievre, Meloni etc. The backlash to the backlash will compound and compound until society ruptures.

Of course it could be that I am entirely too pessimistic and the future will be bright and rosey.

I think that left politics are more compassionate and probably better for more people, particularly working class people so I absolutely am not a centrist in that regard.

In terms of extremism/authoritarianism; everyone’s susceptible to it and I don’t think online discourse helps things, particularly when it comes to assumptions about others’ motives and our lack of charitability.

Tesla Chrome and Android by X incoming.

There are always consequences, some more productive that others. Note that I am not claiming that progressive politics are authoritarian, only that there are authoritarian tendencies on the far left end of the progressive spectrum. I would probably class myself as progressive. Green/Labour left is probably closer.

Where one might say ‘overly zealous’ another might say ‘authoritarian.’

Yeah, quite different. The Civ style hex based grid took a bit of getting used to.

There is a tendency amongst those on the political extremes to:

Silence opposing voices; Push for, and sometimes implement the policing and criminalization of certain speech; Root out ‘enemies’ through witch-hunts and humiliation rituals or ‘struggle sessions’; Enforce a conformity of ideas and opinions through the threat of ostracization, humiliation or violence. Instill a culture of fear around speech or activities contrary to the ‘party line.’ Amongst other things.

That’s the problem with ‘deplatforming.’

The crazies migrate to another platform and then that platform gets bigger and crazier and perhaps eventually competes with the original, more mainstream platforms.

Or just use your local taxi company like we used to. They often have their own app and prices are usually competitive with the Big Tech alternatives, sometimes cheaper.

On one hand; not a bad strategy if your aim is simply to have tariffs dropped, even for a short time. Appeal to Trump’s narcissism by promising him a Canadian leader aligned with him.

On the other hand; wtf?

No.

The crazy conspiracy guy I know uses Brave, so that already put me off.

Only on the Sunday shows?

“Could.”

It sure looks like Americans do want rich people with political influence considering they just voted for a billionaire promising a cabinet of billionaires.

It’s super fucked up, is what it is. What is going through the heads of these people? Lead in the eyeliner?

It’s weird, because there’s inarguably been a ‘vibe shift’ away from the more authoritarian side of progressive ideas and politics, and for a while it seemed the backlash was unstoppable and far-right. I hope we are starting to see a ‘vibe shift’ away from the extremes of the right, too. It can’t be healthy for a society to swing from one extreme to the other. I suppose social media, and the difficulty with communicating nuance on such platforms is partly, maybe wholly, to blame.

We love Frostpunk in this house.