Canadian Election

As of today the Conservatives are ahead of the Liberals in the polls here in Canada, followed by the NDP and the Quebec Bloc. This just amazes me--the Conservative leader, Stephen Harper, is an idiot, yet he's very popular here in Alberta. Just to make it clear on why Harper is an idiot: he made a big deal out of the Iraq invasion, saying Canada should have taken part. That alone means there's no way I can vote for him--if he were in power when the US invaded Iraq then Canadians would be directly taking part in that idiocy. His domestic policies are even more bizzare, but somehow he is getting votes in western Canada and even Onterrible. I think people in Canada are just sick of the corrupt, over-fed Liberals, and see the Conservatives as the only viable option. Nobody is going to win a majority in the upcoming election, so we'll likely have a conservative minority government, which will be a cluster. This might actually be a good thing--the Bloc, Liberals and NDP won't let really idiotic legislation through from the conservatives, same for the conservatives with the NDP, Liberals, and the Bloc. On the other hand everybody will be doing deals and trading for pet programs, our budget surplus likely won't be in a year or two.

I'm going to vote Green. Here in Alberta the Greens don't have a flower's chance in a Canadian winter of winning, but the Greens now have official party status due to getting something like 4 percent of the vote in the last election. We're seeing a lot more of the Greens in the media, and their long-term view is something we really need in our politics. A lot of people think of the Greens as being primarily a bunch of tofu-eating tree huggers, and many are, but they are the only party really saying anything different in this election--they are at greenparty.ca, check it out. They are for proportional representation, something I'd like to see, for smarter health care, for fair trade (not the multi-national companies as is Harper), etc. This guy makes a much better case than I can: for voting Green. So, with all the massive power of this forgotten blog, I'm endorsing the Green party for 2006! I'm not eating any tofu though, that stuff is nasty and reportedly may in fact be bad for you...

Our (Wild Rose riding) Green Guy is Sean Maw, seems like a good candidate.

Workout January 2

Trying to finish off a video edit and hating it, but still managed to hike/run for an hour on Lady MacDonald with Kim and Chili, then hit the Vsion in the evening. The Vsion is great for training, where else can you boulder on plastic with your ice tools in a gym? Quentin and I marked a 25-move drytool problem then got really pumped trying to do it. Eventually did it, but I was still really beat up from the Cineplex on Saturday--it's amazing how just six routes mixed climbing can destroy my body. In sport climbing I need to climb at least ten hard routes to get this messed up, and even then it's usually just my forearms and a few isolated muscles that get torched from hanging on, not every muscle in my body. Anyhow, did a few laps then did sets of front levers and handstand pushups. Even though I was tired both of those went better than they have the last few times, my ass is only mostly sagging on front levers instead of totally, and I hit a massive FIVE handstand pushups on my first set... Following sets were stronger too. Starting to balance for at least half of the handstand pushup movemet each time too instead of my feet sliding on the wall, fun to see improvements.