cannuck

Uh.....have lived and worked with aboriginals for quite some time...my children are eligible for status. As usual, you make some incredibly racist and ignorant assumptions.

As usual, you have taken the liberal playbook to the extreme. Yanks set out to do the genocide thing, Brits never did. What followed North of 49 was a matter of ignorance, but you are once again judging those people by the standards of today. For the most part efforts in this country, even though often misguided were meant and believed to be helping our aboriginal population. But, reading from your playbook, we are supposed to be guilty of some horrible crime for what our ancestors did in mostly good faith.

On this one point, we can agree. I find moderately religious people almost everywhere share the same moderate points of view and levels of tolerance. The problem comes with those who are fundamentalist anything. In my travels, I have found those in most Islamic countries to be exceedingly tolerant...IF you are not challenging their beliefs and customs directly. It was always told to me that THIS was the "true Islam" and those people soundly reject fundamentalists. I was also taught by one of my closest friends (who is a Qur'anic scholar) exactly WHERE and HOW this part of interpretation of Mohammed's words led to Wahhabism and modern day KSA. BTW: he also points out that the ACTUAL words of the qur'an required to listen to ALL of the prophets equally, and that JC is mentioned far more than any other in the literature of the time. The Wahhabists consider ONLY the words of Mohammed. It is all confusing to me, as I can't tolerate ANY of these religious fairy tales. BUT: I DO condone their overall message of good faith towards others.

I could almost agree with that. I would strongly agree that there should be absolutely NO religious ANYTHING in public schools - and that includes "accommodating" any religious BS in dress, behaviour, schedules, etc. On the other hand, we allow religious schools (such as SK's Catholic system) where there are classes in religion, but the balance of the curriculum is devoid of any bias within STEM, history, language and social studies from religious beliefs. I could live with the schools going either way, but absolutely no tolerance for distorting the truth and reality from religious beliefs in the balance of eduction.

Real estate price increases are NOT an economic driver, they are simply inflationary. Economies are driven by creating wealth, and doubling the price of an existing asset or resource simply re-distributes wealth and adds an inflationary pressure from the requisite increase in money supply. The problem lies in how economists measure the economy. Just counting the dollars changing hands is a fool's game...and economists (a function far more of banking than of actual management of our economy) seems to be stuck on stupid for that reason. To correct speculation (the driver of inflation) you do NOT need to use Marxist controls on pricing, all you need to do is tax unwanted movement of money - and STOP penalizing the shit out of wealth creation.

It is not a mathematical principal, it is carved in stone in the left wing playbook. Non productive people always vote left.

You are probably right. I can say that his vaccination was over 6 weeks ago, not sure when others received the Oxford vaccine, and I doubt there is any study showing any numbers as yet, but I did say HELPED by the vaccine. The UK has delivered far more than 20 million vaccinations (in 2 - 3 weeks after first injection, effectively decreases probability of severe effects from infection) and that could well have taken the supply of severe cases down notably (as these would tend to be elderly patients who were among the first to be vaccinated).

Why would you assume just because someone has a position they are the ultimate "expert" on any given occasion? Further: why would you assume someone else is NOT an "expert" on any particular subject just because they don't work for the government and bear the title? Reality in MANY cases is that only some tiny percentage of ANY profession are actually at the top of their game most of the time. In many cases, taking a government job for a professional is something you do because you can't cut it in the more competitive private sector. Governments - especially Canadian - are famous for putting diversity, inclusivity and other viture signalling attributes far above merit from expertise in filling positions.

Yes, that is what I hear from my closest friend in UK. A month ago, 6 of his 8 wards (ped surg) were tied up with adult COVID cases, A-Z helping reduce that significantly. To the naysayers: NO vaccine or any other pharmaceutical is 100% effective or safe. There are risks and the consequences CAN be serious - but overall in the Western world, we do a decent job of measuring and communicating those risks. BUT: don't ever doubt that the dollars involved can significantly distort what you see and hear. I was told months ago that the NHS (obviously in UK) would be paying $15-16 US per dose for Pfizer but more like 2 for Astrazenica. Considering the UK came from zero to hero with this product all internally, pretty impressive accomplishment.

This is something I deal with ever day, and have for decades. While an epidemiologist may have reasonable credibility when assessing the biological and even bio-chemical aspects of their day (although that is something my bio-chemist would argue vigorously), that is in no way any endorsement that they can deal with the physics of things involved in transmission. One thing that is noteably deficient in North America (and even worse in Asia) is inter-disciplinary knowledge and exchange). Putting blind faith in someone based on their professional accreditation and far worse than that their status conferred by GOVERNMENT!!!!!!! is technically, professionally and scientifically irresponsible to put it mildly.

I am not a medical guy, but I do support some of them from a mech-tech perspective. Rather than quote all of your posts, let me first thank you for posting the BC source data. Yes, serology is a valid science for contact tracing, and how such data has been generated worldwide. At least here, the chances of the sources being credible are significant. Serology is retrocative and not nearly the kind of accuracy required for infection indentification but it is not intended to do so. PCR may be the gold standard, but CRISPR blows it out of the water - and I am extremely disappointed in governments not getting the latter technology into point-of-care status in a timely manner. That said: how our governments have managed this pandemic is laughable...or would be if it didn't cost people their lives and livelihoods. Where it comes down to reality is this idea that you can put people in a confined space (i.e. ANY room together) and that a rag over their face is somehow going to prevent them from transmitting or inhaling virus in the air. The whole mask thing is IMHO (and that would be in my professional opinion) the primary cause of the second wave. That and of course a MUCH higher number of carriers wandering around unchecked. Yes, a mask and/or a plastic face or countertop shield will prevent a massive gob of snot from landing on the other side, but the real risk is airborne water vapour that carries virus particles into the air. They can stay airborne for HOURS, and nothing short of a properly fit tested and verified seal chemical mask with the correct cartridges and NO exhalation valve will do anything at all to prevent aspration of said particles. Masks that leak around the nose not only do not protect, but provide the aerodynamic conditions to far more effectively project water vapour and micro droplets into the air, and in a closed building, they WILL cause communication - that is a 100% guarantee. Part of that is because when they do settle, they can persist on some surfaces for several days. SOME cleaning efforts can deal with the surfaces, but not the air. If you think back to the spring: most businesses were ordered or persuaded to operate by doing curbside delivery with pickup from tables. If you look around now, you have people crammed into stores with masks doing as I just explained. Staying a 2 meters apart might be somewhat effective out-of-doors, but is a total farce inside.

This is true for the most part. It occurs because we so horribly mismanage how government works. It is in the business of dispensing privilege, not being egalitarian. While these lopsided benefits are available to those your political agenda targets, they are also available on a racial preference basis to aboriginals and many other minorities. I always go back to what Sir Roger Douglas once taught me about how to do legislation properly. In his words: "We simply removed privilege". Instead of you or I choosing to rant over OUR preferential access to the privilege of screwing over the taxpayer, any good government would simply do EXACTLY as Myata is suggesting and things are either available equally to ANY citizen or NONE. No exceptions. Until then, the looney left can continue to spout the politics of envy while the radical right carries on about maintaining THEIR privileges. Joe lunchbucket will just continue to get screwed.

Management is not science, it is just management. When it was clear to the world that the center of a SERIOUS problem was in Wuhan, our Liberal government welcomed any and all flights, not even bothering to question, never mind scan for temperature thousands of travellers DAILY. It was THE FUCKING GOVERNMENT that totally ignored the science from day one. UK is a worthwhile note: they had no vaccine production capacity at the start, and have a large capacity to serve both their domestic and many international needs while our truly STUPID government made are really STUPID deal with China - completely ignoring the wisdom of ANY scientist that would have told them the standards for truth and transparency - never mind political interference - would be no where near Western standards. That is simply TOTAL mismanagement by stupid people who we were stupid enough to elect and allow to hire/appoint really inept professionals.

If you worked with ANY of those professions, you would know that the flow of immigrant professionals with degrees based on privilege rather than merit and from cultures where integrity is simply not part of the way of doing business, you would also know that in many cases, those immigrants have damaged and/or destroyed those professions. Best example is the Liberals' favourite criminal organization: SNC Lavalin. They are famous in the engineering business for hiring cheap Asian (mostly Indian) engineers to fill chairs. The result is a reputation for such horrible quality work that the only way they get business is to bribe government and corporate officials for the privilege. I hear complaints from engineers daily of how the Indian content of many disciplines has damaged the reputation of their society, depressed wages and lowered levels of skill and trust. If you go to the trucking industry, you will hear the same complaints as the bodies pile up on the roadside. Yeah, they "help" Canadians alright.

we went down that road with Eric Nielsen. He found 1100 departments and programmes that spent money. The bureaucrats showed us who was actually runnung the country and he was gone overnight. To this day unions talk about being "Nielsenized"..i.e. being found that they really serve no purpose...except their own.

agreed. It is just as you will now experience with slow Joe - time to kiss commie ass.

Things such as this actually DO happen, but through back channels and completely out of sight. Spooks tend to be camera shy.

there, fixed that for you.

The airsoft thing particularly pisses me off. These things exist because they were meant for safe play. They are toys, not weapons in ANY sense of the word. I first ran afoul of this issue about 10 or so years ago. I bought an airsoft and the heaviest BBs available in a US city to clear a birds nest from a high voltage switch without turning the power off (and blacking out a third of a major city). It took thousands of shots to remove the nest, essentially one twig at a time (we had a long time while some equipment was running to re-condition the stuff that had been off line for a year or so). I just threw it into the tool trailer without a thought. Was fine until customs decided they wanted to look through the trailer (FULL of tools and equipment). They told me I could have been charged with illegally importing a firearm - to which I was simply dumbfounded. We had two terms of so-called conservative government since then, and this kind of sheer stupidity did not go away - so not cutting any slack to either party. The lunatics (read: bureaucrats) are now running the assylum.

Now that you have leadership with no balls and the same looney left orientation and fantasies as do we, it will be interesting wo watch how many commy asses slow Joe will kiss after the Little Tur..TRUdeau has warmed them up for him. IF WE had any actual leadership, the correct way to deal with China regarding the two Michaels is to give Ms. Meng EXACTLY the same confinement, treatment and fate as China is affording our citizens.

The Big Tur....uh...TRUdeau's dissertation at Harvard was about Communism, Marxism and Christianity (he was raised by the Jesuits, so the connection is logical). He was not only a good friend to such marvellous people as Paul Pot and Fidel Castro he was committed to the left for his entire life. You may have heard the rumour of him holding a communist party card, and you will see it denied from all sorts of sources but I have heard it first hand from people who were charged with investigating him when he came to power that he DID in fact join the party while studying at the Sorbonne. I also have a military friend who witnessed his personal friendship with Russian officers while being inspected in IIRC Khasakstan. That event coresponds with the Canadian military record of "walking trips in Eastern Europe" while a student.

It is far more devastating that what is recorded as job losses. When you take people out of productive manufacturing jobs and put them into WalMart greeter status to distribute good for China - you do immense damage to your economy - but still have the same number of "jobs". I buy a lot of industrial supplies, and for a recent project, I tried my level best to buy certain once common fixtures made inside NAFTA - couldn't find a single one. Almost all China, some Thailand, some Vietnam (which you can assume are probably Chinese owned). Now, let's go into aviation: if I want to buy the latest in technology in general aviation, I would be looking for an aircraft diesel engine. Yes, some of them are made right here (there) in the good ole US of A - by China. I might want the latest and greatest airframe (and largest selling genav airplanes in the world) you would head over to Cirrus...yup, made in the USofA...belongs to China. Not just any Chinese company, but just as with the engines (Continental) belongs to AVIC - government of China. Want the second largest selling airplane also with new tech diesel engines (that they make in house) would be Diamond...and once again belongs to a Chinese company - Wanfeng Auto Group. Jobs still in Canada and Europe, but not working for Canadians or Europeans, working for Chinese masters. China has gutted our supply chain in so many ways and places - and you/we are sitting there fat, dumb and happy to welcome them in to eat your/our lunch.

First of all: don't fall into the "left wing vs. right wing" trap. Politics from the Uniparties have no direct bearing - for them it is simply a matter of granting special privilege. Bill Gates worked for his MILLIONS, not his Billions. Wealth that is created can only be found on the balance sheet of the company. When that company has a market valuation as much as 1,000x as much as its actual value - he nor anyone else is "working hard" for those billions, they are merely redistributing wealth that is rendered by increasing the money supply - and that means passing the actual bill along to ever taxpayer. Further, those billions that Bill and Linda give away were stolen from shareholders who were dilluted by ridiculous stock option plans. While I applaud your concern for entrepreneurs who make their money from their OWN work and investment, those who play the publicly traded game are a long way outside of that class. Why I mentioned the left-right thing is the some of the largest freeloaders of all are emphatically from the extremes of the looney left. People who actually work for what they earn seldom go there. The idea that we can do without social programs is simply a non-starter. EVERY government of any kind has social programs. If you want to see what does and does not work, look at sick care in the USA - the fastest way in the world for a middle class family to become bankrupt is finding out what you sick care insurance does NOT cover. Most of us can indeed care for ourselves, and I agree we have gone way overboard in some areas, but the fundamentals of medical insurance SHOULD be a social programme, never a business. Service delivery a very different thing. You are right to rail against wealth re-distribution - but you are completely wrong to state that BIll Gates and his dotcom ilk are in any way different from raping the economy with their speculative gains. Also worth noting: that in a world where anti-trust laws were being enforced, his extremely predatory manner of doing business would land him in jail.

When we were in China (mid 90s to mid naughties) it was clear that the light at the end of Chinese integration into the economy of the world tunnel was a very large locomotive that was going to crush ANYONE and ANYTHING in its path. On the other hand: outside of the really big violations of human rights: what China does understand is the environmental costs of uncontrolled growth, the damage to business reputation of low quality products (bear in mind they can and DO make many things to the world's highest standards - those things just don't come at WalMart prices) and the sensitivity of being caught with their pants down steeling IP, tech, etc. But, overriding all of that is the need to be Chinese and not steer off of the 5 year plan(s) - the published one and the UNpublished, nudge-nudge, wink-wink ones and above all to not lose face. Where we went horribly wrong was opening markets without requiring conformation to standards and laws. More than that, anti-dumping legislation. THAT is where millions of Canadian and tens of million American jobs went. It is also where our supply chain for strategic and important goods was severely compromised. China is viscious and predatory, but not stupid. They will push all that they can - and especially when the other side doesn't push back at all. BTW: glad someone remembered that it was the Big Turd...uh...TRUDeau that welcomed China into the world, tightly clutching his own Communist Party card tightly and proudly.