Canada Ending Tax on Tampons ?

Federal 'tampon tax' to be removed July 1  

The federal government plans to remove the tax on tampons and other feminine hygiene products, effective July 1.

A notice of a motion to amend the Excise Tax Act says the move will apply to sanitary napkins, tampons, menstrual cups and other similar products.

The NDP and others have been calling on the government to get rid of the so-called “tampon tax,” saying it unfairly targeted women.

Under the Excise Tax Act, the GST is typically applied to “luxury” items not considered essential to daily life. But in trying to get the tax eliminated, NDP MPs argued that tampons and pads are essential for most women of reproductive age.

Since January, more than 74,000 people have signed an online petition calling for an end to the levy on menstrual products.

Earlier this month, the NDP introduced a motion in the House calling on the government to exempt the products from the GST – a motion that the Conservative government said it would support.

Good.  Australia next ?  For some reason, fundamental human bodily functions always seem to get short shrift when it comes to talking about human rights, especially when it's to do with women's bodies.  Politicians never tire of talking about ways to make rich white men even richer, but addressing the messy details of actual human bodies ?  Ew !  Don't want to even think about it.  Make it go away...

Emily, '16, Yeah!

Feel like I've neglected the US stuff lately, but frankly, short of the daily stories of white cop shoots black or brown guy for looking at him the wrong way, or decades-long neglect of infrastructure and/or complete disregard for the environment & human safety leads to completely needless disaster, most of the political stories in the US consist of trying to make a remotely reasonable spin on the latest bullshit to fall out of a Republican candidate's mouth.

So hey, here's this, only a few days old, and only slightly indicative of how fucked up the Supreme Court's decision on campaign-finance was that turned a run for president into a financial and promotional no-brainer for any semi-conscious Republican wanting easy easy money and free publicity.

Emily Farris Is Not Running for President

Pollsters included the name of a random woman in a survey—and 20 percent of Republican primary voters said they dislike her.

Pity Emily Farris. Republican primary voters just don’t like her very much.

In a survey released on Wednesday, Public Policy Polling found that Farris near the bottom of the GOP field. She polled well behind fellow Texans Rick Perry and Ted Cruz. Just 3 percent of voters had formed a favorable opinion of her, while 20 percent reported unfavorable views. Only embattled New Jersey Governor Chris Christie faced a wider gap.

And Farris isn’t even running. She’s a political science professor at Texas Christian University, whose name was included within the enormous field of Republican hopefuls as a statistical control. “It’s a little surreal to think that 20 percent of Republican primary voters have a negative opinion of you, when they most likely don’t know you,” she told me.

Farris’s unlikely journey from scholar to subject of political polling began with a PPP poll of Iowa voters, in April, that included Michigan Governor Rick Snyder. Paul Egan, a reporter for the Detroit Free Press, called up PPP director Tom Jensen to make sense of the results. Snyder, Jensen told him, was effectively unknown. “If I had polled you for favorability with Iowa Republicans, you would come out with the same number he did,” Jensen said.

He put that proposition to the test in PPP’s next poll, of Arizona Republicans. It turned out that Jensen had been mistaken. Snyder was viewed favorably by 5 percent of respondents; Egan, the reporter, actually outpolled him with 6 percent support.

Farris, who teaches an upper-level class on polling, was puzzled by the inclusion of an unfamiliar name. PPP explained its logic. “Well, next time throw my name in the poll as someone with no national profile,” she tweeted to PPP. “It'll amuse my Survey Research students.” And then, on Thursday, she spotted reporters trying to figure out why a quarter of Republican voters had opinions about “Emily Farris,” when they’d never heard of her.

Yep, there are so many B-list and C-list candidates on the clown-car-train for the Republican nomination in 2016 that voters don't even know who the hell they are any more, but will express an opinion anyway, even for a completely random made-up candidate.  I'll joke: Sure gives ya faith in democracy, huh ?...  But seriously, I do wonder whether the results would be the same if repeated with Democratic voters.*

Thanks Chief Justice** Roberts !


*No, really, I am completely serious as in whether this has anything to do with the ability or lack thereof to admit ignorance or failure, that seems to characterise certain types of political leadership, and how that might be reflected in the electorate.  Isn't funny, because it isn't meant to be.  And I'm genuinely interested.

**Thanks Harriet Miers !

Godda Speak Down to the 'Ard-Workin' Briddish People

So, 'parently affer Ed Miliband met wiv that Russell Brand bloke, Dave Cameron wuz all like e's a goon, inn'e ?  Makin' 'iself out like 'e's some Cockney geezer ?  It's embarassin' that when these posh politicians try-a talk down to the workin' classes like they weren't all Eton-educa'ed like:

Look at me, I ain't posh ad all.  I represent the ord'n'ry 'ard-workin' Briddish people.  I like 'avin beers down at the pub with the or'd'nry folks like youse.  I listen to Bastille.

It's embarassin', innit ?

Earth Hour

As John Oliver might say, How is this still a thing ?

If it makes you feel good about yourself for participating in this ridiculous act of tokenism, then yeah, go ahead, knock yourself out.  But if you think this will convince your right-wing climate-change-denying neighbour, then you're delusional.  And if you needed this annual event to remind yourself personally of the reality of climate change, well...

Vote out the right-wing fuckers that keep kow-towing to their/our Big Energy overlords and pushing a Globalisation agenda that is simply relocating industrial production and all its attendant problems (i.e. including pollution) to third-world nations if you really want to make a difference.

Oh and can someone put this painfully dire video in a time-capsule ?  It'll give the aliens a laugh when they come across the rotting corpse of our civilisation.