Thursday, February 03, 2011

Jim Wilson Is Starting To Look Cold

Tory MPP Jim Wilson has been hauling that cryptic sign of his through the snow since last month, and if you examine the pictures of him in various media accounts, you can see his mood gradually souring, until you get to this one, which fairly screams "I've had it with this bullshit!" He's in Oakville today, so there probably isn't a Starbucks around where he can warm his hands on a decent cup of coffee. It also doesn't help that he's been wearing the same coat for a week, which now really looks like it could use a trip to the dry-cleaners.

11 comments:

Kyle H. said...

Gotta point out, there's about 6 Starbucks in Oakville. ;D

Terence said...

And a very good one called the Green Bean in the town square


Libs hang out there though.

bigcitylib said...

As a Tory, would he be allowed to drink anywhere but Tim's? Or does that only apply to MPs?

CuJoYYC said...

Starbuck's makes decent coffee? I think not. Besides, shouldn't we all making a much greater effort to support local and independent business? (Vote daily with your coffee budget folks. Support local and/or independent businesses - not just local coffee shops but computer dealers, grocers, bookstores et cetera. "Un-chain" yourselves) At the very least we should swap the Canadian chain Second Cup for the default Starbuck's chain. I'm sure that our elites and the chattering classes can be just as happy at Second Cup while undermining the long gun registry and other stellar initiatives of our 'Dear Leader', Stevie and other "luminaries" of the Canadian neo-con cabal.

bigcitylib said...

Coffee Crime are my guys. You can get free samples. Or at least they never clean up the half eaten muffins.

Actually, I am a tea drinker.

CuJoYYC said...

I figured that you and your readers would be a receptive audience to "my support local/independent business" mini rant. I really do believe that politics is a daily practice of putting your money where your mouth is. For more than thirty years now (I'm 53) I've made, and encouraged others to follow, daily choices with my purchasing power. I follow a funnel approach. Local/independent, local-chains, provincial companies, regional and national before international. This applies to all goods and services. whether it's coffee, bread, Macs (never WinTel PCs), books or gasoline I ALWAYS seek local dealers or suppliers first. Whatever profits, slim though they sometimes are, predominantly stay in my community. So no Walmart EVER. No Esso or Shell etc. No Safeway. No Apple Store - I support my local Mac dealer. No Starbucks. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I think if it as 'living politics'.

Möbius said...

Not sure who you're spanking by buying only Macs, other than yourself.

CuJoYYC said...

Möbius said...
"Not sure who you're spanking by buying only Macs, other than yourself."

A seven day a week user for 24 years and counting with no hardware failures, no virii (or if you prefer viruses), no security hacks, no problems whatsoever, no data loss, excellent productivity, seamless syncing between my iMac, MacBook Pro, iPad & iPhone and a Canadian spell checker by default system-wide. If that's spanking myself, then I'll take it.

It all comes down to personal choice and what works for you, or in this case, me.

Other than that little advertisement, what do you think of the rest of the comments in my little rant?

Möbius said...

Well, I'm not sure how buying Macs is supporting local businesses. My PC was built by a local business. Macs are no more Canadian than Jim Carrey. Decent virus-scanners prevent infections for most. If more people bought Macs, they'd have viruses too.

Not buying Esso gas? Safeway? Walmart? All pay salaries to local Canadians. If you buy your gas from Petro-Canada, you may wish to note that they seem to be the leader in jacking up prices first during any price war.

Supporting local businesses is a lot harder than it seems.

CuJoYYC said...

Möbius said...
"Well, I'm not sure how buying Macs is supporting local businesses. My PC was built by a local business. Macs are no more Canadian than Jim Carrey. Decent virus-scanners prevent infections for most."
If a LOCAL business sells it to you, then it helps the local economy. How many of your parts in your locally ASSEMBLED PC were made in Canada? None I suppose.

"If more people bought Macs, they'd have viruses too."
Spurious argument at best. A weak defence that fails under scrutiny.

"Not buying Esso gas? Safeway? Walmart? All pay salaries to local Canadians."
Oh yeah. Minimum wage helps a lot. Low wage, low support, low taxes for these profitable companies while small and medium local independent business bust their tails and more often than not, pay higher wages than their corporate competitors. Safe to assume that you missed or didn't understand my previous comment—"Whatever profits, slim though they sometimes are, predominantly stay in my community." This is supported statistically. In round numbers, $0.70 of every dollar of profit generated by a local business, STAYS in that LOCAL MARKET. About $0.70 of every dollar of profit in a CHAIN LEAVES the LOCAL MARKET, often crossing international borders.

"If you buy your gas from Petro-Canada, you may wish to note that they seem to be the leader in jacking up prices first during any price war."
I rarely do but my experience is that gasoline prices all rise and fall in unison. Just a coincidence I'm sure. Not a reason to ignore the funnel approach I outlined earlier.

"Supporting local businesses is a lot harder than it seems."
That's your opinion. I disagree but then again, I have 30+ years of experience and I'm happy with my results and the knowledge that I practice what I preach daily. Besides, no one has to follow in my footsteps, although we'd all be better off if more did.

Möbius said...

"How many of your parts in your locally ASSEMBLED PC were made in Canada? None I suppose."

My point exactly. Was your Mac assembled locally, or were any part obtained in this country? Not likely, at all.

Net gain for Canada = zero.

"Oh yeah. Minimum wage helps a lot. Low wage, low support, low taxes for these profitable companies while small and medium local independent business bust their tails and more often than not, pay higher wages than their corporate competitors."

So, now you can tell me, where are you getting the locally-refined fuel for your car. You know, where they pay better than minimum wage for gas-store-jockeys?

Esso/Imperial (the bad guys) refine gas in Sarnia, and pay for R&D workers there as well.

"That's your opinion. I disagree but then again, I have 30+ years of experience and I'm happy with my results and the knowledge that I practice what I preach daily."

Perhaps we could also encourage Americans/Europeans/Asians to stop buying Canadian goods? This would put a serious crimp in my income, as I tend to work across borders (for a Canadian company).