TDot Grit Returns (again)

My month without updates probably lost me the few readers I had, but I'll keep at it anyway.

The NDP never stops amusing me. Their latest: Affirmative Action ridings! I'll keep saying it: just stick to picking good candidates. I myself like seeing more women and minorities in legislatures, but it's not necessary and it's nutty to try and engineer it. A legislature's purpose is to make good policy/law and carry out the wishes of the people it represents. It doesn't have to proportionally represent the gender or racial mix of its constituents.

Barack Obama is my favourite US presidential candidate. Andrew Sullivan has a great piece (subscribers only) on him in the Atlantic.

Those crazy kids in France are rioting again. It started when two kids on a motorcycle (no helmets) collided with a police car and died. I have four problems with this. One: regardless of whether the cops were at fault, how does rioting in response make any sense? These rioters seem to look for excuses to start acting violently. Two: law enforcement was unable to stop the rioting immediately. "Over two nights of violence, they torched scores of cars and rubbish bins, a police station, a nursery school, a library, shops, a car dealer and a McDonald's." This thing should have been shut down as soon as the first car was burnt, but it was allowed to continue. Three: The rioters had the balls to shoot at cops. This should have triggered an overwhelming show of force, but no such thing seems to have happened (I could be wrong, but I've been following this story and have yet to come across anything). Four: Sarkozy, who is supposedly tough on crime, "vowed that anybody who fired at the police would end up in a criminal court, calling it “attempted murder”." Really? That's it? So the other guys who destroyed public and private property won't also end up in criminal court? The police won't defend themselves with their weapons if they're being shot at? What an underwhelming response.