I'm not sure what else to say, besides that science today fascinates me. We've found species we thought to be extinct, recently realized that the chicken pox vaccine will not last the average human into old age, and how this...the beginnings of human morality (a feature of humanity long thought to have been exclusively our) might be found in primates.

Have a look, this from the NY Times.

Cheers

Bonus of Sunshine!

A quick bonus for all my missed days!
Eternal Sunshine rains upon all of us in time for spring!
Cheers.

Long time

My apologies to my three dedicated readers for having neglected my posting for so long. A daily update isn't as pleasant a prospect when you're staring down the barrel of presententations, proposals, and essays as big my ego.

So we have a budget bonanza today! The recent Tory budget, while appreciated by a Tory supporter such as myself, has nonetheless received a fair amount of hollow flak from Harper's detractors, One of whom is none other than Dion, who claims the budget ignores the Aboriginal community (psst, Mr. Dion, was it not the last decade of Liberal leadership that put the Aboriginal community in an even worse state? Paul Marting wearing a headdress at one or two Aboriginal functions didn't put the money back into their state funded child care system, did it?)

Check out the latest:

Commentary from The National Post

Commentary from Chief Running Scared himself.

And this from The Post, on a new report that does its best to strike at the root of home-grown extremism.

Good luck on your work, everybody; I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Smoke or Die

I hold no strong opinion on pot laws either way. Personally I don't see the harm in decriminalization, but to take the marijuana laws to such extremes seems more than a little ridiculous. If this woman has over four different deadly maladies, is she really participating in the on-going transportation and hustle of illegal substances? She has scoliosis for God's sake.

Get the full Story here.
Ugh.

I apologize for the brief entries lately. It's been a hectic few weeks. Cheers to everyone in the blogosphere, and yes, props for Guarav for the generationterrorist.com link. You're a champ buddy.

Not on Ellis anymore

Canadians. God love us for our ability to smile at a bad situation, and to blindly ignore the havok we wreak upon ourselves. Call it pluck, as many would. It's that good ol' Canadian spirit that dominates every gaze in the mirror.

Too bad the face looking back isn't our own anymore. It's an aggregate of sorts, a constantly shifting identity. I personally fear for this future we're building for ourselves in Canada; the foundation is not stable.

A new report indicates that the Canadian birth rate is not where it should be. We currently stand at 1.5 births for every married Canadian couple. That's less than reproduction rate, keep in mind. For every two people, we breed 1.5 children. It's a new age, frankly, and the writing has been on the wall for a while. Our culture demands that we never give in to growing up - the eternally young are the idols of next year. Men and women need no longer take 9-5 jobs; they can become career students, travel the world, devote time and energy to a global consciousness, etc etc. The motivation and intentions are good, I would not deny that. But we're losing the Canadian family. No one will think about settling down to have a few kids; we've championed a rootless lifestyle that sees parenting as the last marker of no longer being carefree. Having one life to live doesn't include living for lives you bring into the world.

So we have adults that refuse to grow up, a Neverland of the North. And thus, we rely on that "highly skilled workforce" that we import from other countries, not only to build our skyscrapers and economically-friendly public transportation systems, but to build the country and its ideology for us too.

Our population growth over the last 5 years has been 5.4%, and we're not acheiving that by having 1.5 kids per scarce "cookie-cutter" family, as some would sneeringly deride them. So we continue to ship people in, relying on others to maintain the size of our wonderful country. I see something wrong with this. This is not an anti-immigration statement. I believe in immigration as a social good, both for the country and for those who desire a new home. But we rely too easily on a foreign solution to a domestic problem, and only continue to lose our validity as a self-sufficient, self-supporting nation.

Beatle Squishing

This from apple.com/trailers...

A Moulin Rouge-esque film is soon to be released that features, a la I Am Sam, a soundtrack consisting entirely of Beatles covers. Were that not enough, the story seems to float upon the buoyancy of the songs as well. Set in the 60s, it follows a group of college kis reliving turbulent times of social unrest, all the while relying on "the music, man" to help them cope. One can bet that they're social activists in only the most superficial of ways, in that they spend more time getting ready for the protest than they do protesting.

I'm tired of the Beatles being appropriated in this manner. It irritates me.

Anyway, check out the trailer.

Stolen away from Canadian glory

It seems Stephen Harper's AIDS vaccine iniative may not be as beneficial for Canada as once thought. The well-meaning merger with Bill Gates appears to have come a little too late.

According to reports coming from Atlanta's scientific community, a university there is only a few years away from developing an effective AIDS vaccine. Perhaps the Canadian front will help in speeding the process along, thereby allowing our country a tiny slice of the medical kudos.

Click here for full story.