Hal 9000

No, seriously! What do you think the cost of updating (to our city standards) even one reserve would cost the taxpayer?

Oh, now we should clean their land too. WoW, your generosity know now bounds - of course, neither does your common sense. Let's look at Attawapasat for a minute. They were given $90 Million + jobs, houses and business revenue based on expected earnings (6.7 $b) , not earnings - expected earnings. They were given the cash pretty much upfront. Now, forget that they "lost" the money, when they went back and demanded more, the mine packed up and left - essentially killing the golden goose. You won't get it, but the point is this; just because a company expects a certain amount of return, there are tremendous expenses to are attached to that project, if DeBeers was willing to drop the investment and leave that product in the ground over a money dispute with the FN's, just how much net income do you think these companies make?

It's called math. How much do you think it would cost per band?

Oh, I get it; you'd rather see them starve and commit suicide with their culture intact, rather than save the individuals.

This is that same stupid argument that if the politicians can give themselves a $5000 raise, why can't they give (insert victimized union worker) a 20% raise? Ok, let me put it this way; in order to bring every reserve up to date as far as medical, housing, education, social services and all the other things that would be needed, each and every (from newborn on up to 100 YO's) Canadian would owe $30,000. A young family of 5 would owe $150,000. That's before yearly upkeep of those reserves. Yearly upkeep to those standards would add a couple thousand more to the bill.

Yeah, I really don't think you understand the enormity of what you want.

Of course they're underfunded - our entire medical and social system is underfunded, that's the Fkg point. Where is the money ($1 Trillion) gonna come from to bring the Indian Bands up to an acceptable level? Do you know? Do you care?

TheFN's engage in their fair share of extortion too, lets be honest here.

Maybe instead of the charade we all play -- the charade that you play a major role in, maybe the government and the FN's should have a grown-up discussion about their/and our futures.

You mean physically or from a moral standpoint?

You're really overestimating your value!

You wanna know what Jacee? I've been to FN ceremonies..and actually participated in them too. They were in larger areas, cities. They were on reserves that were adjacent to cities and they were great events. I've also been on many reserves that were remote, upwards of Bella Bella, and on up to Prince Rupert and the Metacatla reserve. They had nothing, nothing that even remotely resembles culture. If you think the people of Attawapaskat and such are enjoying or expressing their culture more than the FN's in Tsawassen, Osoyoos or near some other actual city you're dead wrong - and of course you are. I've seen more FN's culture near cities where they can actually survive...no thrive. What do you envision happening on these remote reserves? Do you envision daily ceremonies, the medicine man, hunting parties, traditional bone fishing, women sewing animal hyde shoes, "Dances with wolves" style Buffalo Hunt, stories of how grandfather is now a great bear or whale? Yeah, I've watched the CBC too. Reality is; these people have lost nearly all culture already. They live in construction trailers (portables like we complain the schools sometimes get) and if they have a wooden house, chances are, they've removed the walls for firewood, then junked the insulation. Their food is either frozen or in a can, their water sucks. They can't fish or hunt their traditional way, they can barely do it the modern way. These people would not survive a winter in the northern provinces or on the prairie without government help. I wont get into the drugs, alcohol, abuse, corruption, rape, molestation etc again. My point is simply that bringing them into society, might be the best thing for them and their "culture".

Maybe someday you can be involved in one.

You being in agreeance with him must surely give some pause.

You're starting to make about as much sense as Omni. Of course I don't like Islam, I've never made any bones about that. What i'm saying is that judging a situation based on nothing more than your bias toward a group is different...and sometimes wrong. If I hear of a bombing I don't wait to hear who did the bombing before knowing that's a bad situation. If I hear of a disturbance at a rally, I wait for the details before choosing who is right or wrong, whereas you people say "white guys involved, they must be racists beating up on the noble indian", "disturbance at Trump rally, it must be those violent righties again". It's fine that you have you designated victim list...Muslims, blacks, indians, gays, women....., but not every conflict or protest (as we've seen from Bernie people) follows this guide. Sometimes - sit down now, it's muslims or even BLM causing problems.

There is no correlation. In the first case, yes I can look at Islam as a whole and determine what I believe it is - and that is in fact prehistoric. Stating that Islam is a prehistoric religion, is not even close to assuming that "there are white guys involved, therefore the white people are wrong. That is different than deciding my thoughts about a situation based on the parties involved. In the second case, we are looking at a case and you are determining the side you choose to support based not on who is doing or saying the what, but which group appears to be the group that you don't like. IOW, like a true liberal, you don't care about the facts, you'll always choose the the side of your perceived victim group.

So, If Trump has to take preemptive military action against NK, is the left going to support this or are they gonna play the old "see, Trump is starting WW3" game?

I hope you're not basing your whole argument on the actions of one forum member...are you?

I guess i'm just tired of people basing their conclusions on group identity, rather than the issue at hand. It reminds me of the Trump rallies, Bernie people would show up, start fights and the media would talk about Trump having violent rallies. It's so thinly veiled, but if some people buy into it...I guess it works.

That's a good read - long, but good. The big "take away", i suppose, is that this successful chief doesn't seem to buy into the helpless "Indians are victims...and should remain that way" mentality. It makes me think of "what could've been" for the Attawapaskat people if they had better leadership and foresight. I hope Jacee gets something from this article.

And, what would you say if it gays, women or BLM interrupting some straight white folks?

I think Jacee is trying to argue that FN's are too lazy for fend for themselves, too far back that they can't function in society, too dumb to use their money for the betterment of the band or even account for it. I think her idea is treat them like children and instead of letting them grow up, give them their allowance and when they pretend they lost it, just give them more. Jacee will be the parent who has a 35YO son working at McDonalds and living in her basement.

That's a ridiculous premise, one used to simply shut down conversation - don't bother even if you do have a cite. I'm sure that it may be the case for some, but I seriously doubt "many". I'm sure there are "in the closet" gays that overcompensate with an "I don't like gays" mantra, but to try to argue that- "If you like gays, you're a real man if you don't like gays, then you're probably gay" is preposterous.

You're starting to make about as much sense as Omni and Hot Enough.