Hunter Thomson

Social credit was the anti-NDP coalition party of its time. In British Columbia, there wasn't much of a coherent ideology beyond not being the NDP. For example, Social Credit reduced royalty rates on resources, but also nationalized the entire energy sector in the province. Other provinces had Social Credit parties that had actual ideologies, but I can't speak to them. I'm unlikely to win thanks to the nature of my public profile, but I'm certainly going to give it a shot to see what i can do. I doubt many others on here have sought elected office, but it would be very interesting to share stories.

Thank you! I'm glad you enjoyed it. I may put something about the election in The Pit, if there's any interest.

Thank you for your kind words, I think this is the first time we've met, so it's a pleasure to e-meet you. It's a truism of politics to say it, but your politics are... weird. That's the only way I can describe #ONPoli and that's based on having relatives in Burlington. But its a truism that all politics is weird to outsiders, and I'm sure #BCPoli must be just as baffling to people outside of BC. I'm not as active this year, as I'm normally out on the front lines, but I'm too busy to wear out my shoe leather this year.

In two months, my home province of British Columbia will be heading to the polls. I'm looking forward to the campaign, and hopefully in displacing the long-ruling BC Liberal government, which has had a continuous legislative majority since the 2001 elections that obliterated the BC New Democratic Party. Now, politics in British Columbia are different from the rest of Canada, so here are the important players. BC Liberal Party - Their leader and the current Premier is Christy Clark, who became Premier after winning the party leadership after former Premier Gordon Campbell was appointed High Commissioner to London. Premier Clark was, at the time, a radio host and former member of the Legislature, and won the leadership after a protracted leadership campaign. The BC Liberals, contrary to their name, are the main 'conservative', free enterprise party in British Columbia. Their membership reflects a combination of national Liberals and Conservatives, and is the direct successor to the Social Credit Party as the leader of the capitalist, free enterprise coalition in British Columbia. The Liberal Party vote has a floor of around 40% that does not leave the party, no matter what. BC New Democratic Party - Like their federal cousins, the New Democratic Party is the progressive, social democratic party in British Columbia. Our (Full disclaimer/disclosure: I'm a paying member of the BC NDP and have served as a party officer since 2009) leader is John Horgan, who won the leadership in late 2013 after our previous leader surrendered a 25 point lead in the polls. The party and its predecessor the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation have been the main social democratic party in British Columbia since 1933, and has been one of the top two parties in terms of vote share and seat count since the party's inception. With the exception of 2001's massacre, the party can consistently expect around 38% of the vote in any given election. BC Green Party - A progressive leaning Green Party that focuses on sustainable development and environmental protection as their main policies. The Green Party is lead by Andrew Weaver, an environmental scientist from the University of Victoria, and he is currently their only elected member of the Legislature. The party has been experimenting with new policy ideas, including a proposed pilot project for a universal basic income. The BC Green Party was created by dissident New Democrats in the 1990s, angry that the NDP government of the decade opened up part of the Great Bear Rainforest to development. Some recent polling has shown the Green Party surging in support across the province, taking around 20% of the popular vote. BC Conservative Party - The BC Conservatives are a new party, fighting their second election in their newly constituted form. Parties with the name 'BC Conservative' have come and gone, with the party being de-registered as an active party at several points over the last seventy years. The party currently has no leader after the previous leader, Dan Brooks, resigned the leadership for the second time in as many years. The party is not currently included in many election polls. With all of that contexty stuff out of the way, let's get to the interesting bits, the actual campaign! This year's election is being fought over the context of a number of different economic strains on the budget. Last November, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the BC Liberals unconstitutionally destroyed the teachers' contracts and required the government to reduce student-teacher ratios and class composition (the number of students with individualized education plans) back to the 2002 ratios. This necessitated over a billion dollars in new funding to the public education system and the subsequent hiring of over three thousand new teachers (a process that is still ongoing). This is a particularly black mark for Premier Clark, as she was the Minister of Education that initially destroyed those contracts. Adding to the financial strain on the government is the Ministry of Children and Family Development, which has been repeatedly under attack by critics for allowing children in care to die, and without even ensuring adequate care for the children. As a case in point, the most recent investigation covered an 18 year old in care who was placed into a motel as his housing by the Ministry. Additional funding has been promised, which has impacted the budget projections for the government. The Liberals have also been rocked by various ethics controversies, including accusations made against Health Ministry workers that directly led to the suicide of an accused graduate student who was later found to be innocent of the accusations. Finally, the government has been frustrated in its attempts to create a liquefied natural gas industry in the province, and failed to halt federal approval for the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion leading to the Pacific Ocean. In the government's favour is the fact that the NDP hasn't won an election since 1996, and has only won three times in all of its history in British Columbia. The Liberals have much more money to spend on the campaign, and most of their incumbents are running again. Many of them also remember that at this time before the last election, they were trailing by 25%, so being in a tied election right now is a far more comfortable position for them than they faced the last time they faced the electorate. The NDP, traditionally supported by the labour unions, is facing an internal revolt as private sector construction unions are beginning to endorse the anti-union Liberals, thanks to the Liberals support for massive construction projects that would lead to more union jobs in the province. This has sapped the organizational strength from the New Democrats going into the election, at a time where they could potentially be capitalizing on Liberal failures. The New Democrats also face renewed strength in the BC Green Party which shares an electoral base, especially on Vancouver Island where nearly a third of the NDP caucus is elected. My home district is a bellweather riding that normally votes with the overall provincial winner, though in 2013 we backed the NDP thanks to superb organizing and volunteer efforts. I'll be interested to see whether the parties can break out of their traditional bases. The Liberals have strength in rural and suburban British Columbia, but face difficulties in some of the inner suburbs and the main cities, as well as Vancouver Island. To win, the NDP has to start performing in rural British Columbia and sweeping the suburbs along with its traditional progressive coalition. For the Greens, winning more than just the leader's seat will be seen as a successful campaign, though some Green insiders are hoping to supplant the NDP as the main opposition party to the Liberals. That's a lot to take in about the BC Politics scene, so let's all take a quick break before I start talking about my favourite subject - my political career. In 2018, the municipal elections will be happening (In Canada, different levels of governments have elections in separate years from each other). I'm planning on contesting the local school board elections in my hometown. The place I live is one of the few communities in British Columbia with organized municipal political parties, and my relationship with the dominant party would be considered strained at best. They have accepted me again as a paying member of the party, but in the past years I've attempted to defend my seat on the executive and was defeated for opposing the party stance on affordable housing. Since that's an issue of Council and not the school board, I'm hoping that it will not be used as a weapon against me in any potential nomination contest. For those who don't know, I'm currently a private school teacher teaching in Downtown Vancouver. Now that I've been on the teacher side of the field, I see the importance of strong leadership in education, and I'm hoping that my past experiences in policy formation and execution will help me as a potential school board trustee. Beyond the negative publicity of attacking my own party, the members who turn out for nomination races do otherwise have a favourable opinion of me, particularly those who have served with me in the leadership. There's also residual support in the LGBTQ community in the city due to my organizing and lobbying in favour of a local anti-discrimination school board policy that was enacted in 2011. Passing the policy over vocal objection both on and off the school board garnered lots of positive media coverage, but after seven years those views are unlikely to have remained with the electorate. Which is fine, I'm not running to defend the policy or even to expand it. While I'm proud of the work I did to create the policy and defend it in the election of 2011, I'm not focusing on it as a campaign platform. My focus is to be on expanding access to trades training programs and advanced placement programs. The province, in partnership with the local school boards, offers a program known as ACE-IT, which provides students with practical experience and their first year trades training in a trade of their choice. The program is entirely funded by the district, and helps reduce the time needed to become a journeyman tradesperson. However, there's a lack of knowledge about these programs being available, and each school only offers a few of the programs, creating a patchwork where students in some parts of the city do not have access to the ACE-IT program at all. Expansion of the College Board's Advance Placement Capstone program is another goal of mine. It's currently being run as a pilot program in two of the eight secondary schools in the district, and I'd like to expand that program to all students in order to provide that additional benefit to students pursuing post-secondary educations. Of recent issue is the idea of the district being a 'sanctuary district'. While I'm supportive in principle, I'm interested to see what happens with the new policy and how the district staff interact with federal immigration authorities over the next year. This is service for me. I believe in giving back to the community and the schools that helped shape me, and while I have no quarrel with any of the school board trustees currently on the board, I feel that many of them have served their community for long enough, and that new voices are needed to replace those individuals seeking their eleventh term on the school board. Changing educational technology and new pedagogical practices necessitates the need for new voices at the board of education to ensure that the students of my city are best served, especially with the rollout of new provincial curriculum guidelines and additional provincial funding to uphold the Supreme Court ruling. As a new teacher who's recently obtained my teaching certificate, I feel that I would be an articulate voice for the new generation of educators that is not being heard at the board level right now. Whew. That's all of it. I'll write another one of these soon, but I'd love to hear what people think about the BC Political scene, or any advice for a campaign I may or may not end up running. For the record, this won't be the first campaign I've run or worked on. I've been a past campaign manager, past candidate and past paid staffer for a few campaigns, so I already know what kind of costs are going to be involved. See you later blog buddies!

It's personal for Brian. I hate that it becoming personal is why too many of our allies get involved, but at least there's that. I can accept that from Brian Burke. Sure, that could be part of it. But there were lots of youth group options before that would have been much safer for LGBTQ youth than sports would have been in the 1990s. I was a boy scout then (boy howdy, how the mighty have definitely fallen since then~!) and it was more arts-oriented than sports were. The trend is what confuses me. Yes, sports participation is down among all people and there's something to be said about that as well, but the biggest thing my own research showed was that LGBTQ youth weren't getting involved in sports because they thought it was unsafe for them to be there. There's no reason for why that would be less true in 1998 than it is now, and that's the part that I'm not understanding from the UBC study. Even the UManitoba study done concurrently with my own showed that LGBTQ youth would get more involved if they knew of safe places to join a team.

The University of British Columbia (Go Thunderbirds!) released new research this month claiming that LGBTQ youth participation rates in sports have drastically reduced over the past twenty years, and that less than a third of LGBTQ youth participate in sport now. The research indicates that in 1998 more than half of LGBTQ youth participated in sports. Both the trend of participation and the incredibly high rate of participation found in the past seem suspect to me. I have no doubt that there were LGBTQ youth participating in sports in the 20th century, but I don't think for even a second that half of all gay boys were playing sports back then. Obviously my experiences are anecdotal and the study is a massive research proposal with a huge N, but there were no gay people playing sports in all the years I played, and I live in a particularly gay-friendly city. The research contradicts my own research done through the University of British Columbia and research done out of the University of Manitoba. Both of our studies indicated that participation rates were much lower, but that they were increasing as acceptance increased. It's very interesting to me to read this study, simply because it contradicts so much other research. Not that the research that I did and the UManitoba study agreed with each other either, but we had similar trendlines. This new study seems to fly in the face of the idea of increased visibility leading to increased participation rates for LGBTQ youth, especially since my own research showed that youth are eager to participate in safe environments, which are increasing all the time. I'm interested to hear what other people think about the research and whether you think it makes sense in a North American context, given that there's been an increasing number of organizations (You Can Play, Gay Games et al.) which are actively working to increase the visibility of sport in the LGBTQ community. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095254616300916 https://medicalxpress.com/news/2017-02-gay-lesbian-bisexual-teens-sports.html

Thank you everyone! Rumours of my death have been greatly exaggerated. I had a wonderful birthday made all the sweeter because of these wonderful birthday messages. Thank you all! <3

Happy birthday Curtikins!

I love how I come back to this thread only for it to have turned into the Dax Symbiont lifeline timeline. God bless you fellow Trekkies, live long and prosper.

Wherever life takes you, I hope your journey is made in the company of good friends. Best of luck to you AJ.

A very happy birthday to you, Krista!

More Dax would be good, but as I recall, early-mid 23rd century was around Audrid and Tobin Dax. Audrid was only on the homeworld... and Tobin was just a little too neurotic to be a good main character. But yes, more Trill and other species that didn't get a lot of screentime in the other series. Shran kind of killed things for Andorians, but Tellarites are a canon founding member of the Federation, and we've never had a Tellarite MC.

You get extra likes (somehow) for mentioning points 4 and 5. I'm done with time travel and the borg (and especially time traveling borg) as a plot device in Trek. Both of them have been done to death, and very rarely to any good effect.

Such an interesting split between the two sides of Cory's family. They're very different from each other. Your ending is perfect for the chapter and completely makes sense. Nicely done Dayne-chan.

Happy birthday, Gregorian Calendar! Oh, yeah. Happy New Year I guess.

Hubs is a bit crazy, isn't he dearie? Although I have to admit that MMT actually sounds interesting. Maybe after Wild Card?

A very happy birthday to you, Tim. I hope it is everything you hope for.

“I need to find a way to make this right.” I knew I shouldn’t have done it, but I didn’t expect anyone to find out and for it to blow up in my face as badly as it did. Alexa and I were taking the same major, so of course we had the same classes at Northwestern. That’s where I met her, at a guest lecture on structural engineering. It didn’t take long for us to figure out we played for the same team, but as the only two girls in many of our engineering classes it did mean we were subject to the

They gave me a full teaching contract for January today. That didn't take long. It's half time, but every day.

My thoughts and prayers go with you, always. Remember you are surrounded by love, friends and family.

Hehehehe, the story is open to interpretation that way. You live in Toronto, you know what I'm talking about with the snow and ice. Though thankfully real life Toronto wouldn't allow its citizens to suffer through a storm in such disarray. As for whether they're dead or not... I suppose it could be either. I dislike disabusing my readers of notions, and I'm not going to say which I had on my mind, except to say that it was just below freezing today and I hit the snooze button three separate times before getting up.

Prompt: It began last night. Everything electronic stopped working. This was followed by every vehicle no longer working. Everyone began to panic, but that was nothing compared to the fact suddenly no one, not even the animals or insects could make a sound in your town. What happened and will the town forever be silenced. Story: Everyone thought the world would end with a bang. A thermonuclear fireball that obliterates everything and everyone you hold dear and makes certain to leave no su

I can't believe no one has said anything on this. Your discussion with Kevin was fascinating to read for its political-philosophical perspectives on the world. I'm out-classed both in terms of the literature I can draw upon and in terms of raw intellect, but it would be interesting to debate you and your foundational beliefs as a soft-right Republican. Having said that, such things are not allowed on GA and my perspective doesn't have a true analogue in America so it wouldn't work. Very interesting, I'm looking forward to the continuation of the story and what is coming for the CBDT. Lots to chew on here, especially the idea of someone dying who leaves a legacy behind.

I've been hired as a substitute teacher, and thus have slightly fewer complaints about being underemployed!

Real. A douglas fir is going down for my enjoyment. It'll get hauled up to the house in a week or two. I think this year I'm going to throw away the salt dough ornaments I made as a child, that one star cookie is almost as old as Drew.