cannuck

The assembly work, no. BUT: we don't build the automation that we have, we buy it offshore - just as we do the products of same.

You are quite right: I don't understand it. Not a matter of liking or disliking, it is simply a mystery to me how people can have so little in their lives they can get off watching someone else have all of the fun. I think I have figured out the media side: it is selling "sports" as entertainment (which is really what pro sport is) that puts the butter on their bread, so they have to make news out of everything related. But: how dribbling a basketball or passing a puck makes someone worthy of being interviewed and quoted on social issues, that really leaves me wondering.

Even the GWN media is full of reports of every stick and ball league in the US deciding to not play in some kind of protest statement. Really? Since playing children's games for big money is hardly the most important thing that Americans do, why does anyone (especially the media) give a damn? I was hoping that the Wuhan Virus experience would have pulled a few million heads out of a few million asses to look around and see that the very things we as a society have come to embrace are the least productive and least important things we can do.

I think you have it all backwards. Success in managing your economy should be measured by raising the income of "poor" people by giving them useful and productive work at a fair price to buy things we make - not raising the fortunes of China by selling pure crap to poor folk over here. You are assuming we never could have become competitively productive given access to capital, technology and markets - and framed in the total incompetence in managing the economies of Canada and the USA, you might be right. You are also ignoring that one player in the smartphone evolution was indeed Canadian. Another thing: "poor" people don't have $700 iphones and $100 contracts.

I wasn't around for MacDonald, but both Dief the Thief and Joe Klutz were Red Torries, not Conservatives. Nothing to betray. I certainly DO agree with you about Bennet, Bible Bill and Manning, though. Practical politics makes for many strange bedfellows indeed.

Sorry, that isn't going to work. After WWII, Canada produced a lot of manufactured goods and Bay Street was kept in its place by limitiing what banks/finance could do - mostly by convention. Today, we add very little value and are back to raping resources to try to sustain our unsustainable lifestyle. The world of finance has displaced the world of business, so we no longer create wealth by adding value. Instead we redistribute wealth through Casino Capitalism into the pockets of a handfull of those who benefit from speculative gain. The last time that got out of control, we called it "The Great Depression" and this time I have no idea what we will call it, but it will be a damned mess. We also trade our finite resources at a rate of pennies on the dollar for manufactured goods mostly from China - goods that are built to US consumerist quality levels and will need to be replaced over and over and over. Until we put investment money into Main Street and remove it from Bay/Wall Street, we are fooked big time. Before that can happen, we must learn the difference between creating wealth vs. redistributing wealth.

Uh....NO! That is well beyond preposterous. I (and anyone else who bothers to think about it) could write a very large book on how the East used its political clout to screw over the West for the last century. As to O'Toole being "the man" to do the job, I will have to wait and see. He is ex-military (a big plus) but only a junior officer so didn't really get far in that career. He is culturally much closer to the middle of the Conservative road (another big plus). BUT: to become a lawyer?>???? Geez, not another one of those animals. IMHO a very big minus. Even so, his former claim to want to privatize CBC, dump the carbon tax BS and back of on gun law silliness might mean there is still a bit of human being under the corporate bloodsucker career he left for politics.

Thank you very much for digging that all out. Bennet I could see, but I am shocked that Trudeau - a genuine card carrying communist - would ever stoop to recognizing that the people of Canada might want to have some rights and privileges not exactly in line with his "Just Society" (which generally meant once he was finished with Canada, there would be nothing left, just society).

Not the way I remember it but I really only saw results. Had no knowledge of the process - just the political beliefs of the big tur.. er... uh. TRUdeau. The damage he did ended any chance of Canada becoming a significant economy.

The whole political isms thing largely missed the point. First of all EVERY national government has social policies and programs. That doesn't make them socialists just socialistic. The line gets crossed when one goes communist and there is either no personal property rights or what such rights do exist are second to the state. You might remember that the big tur..uh Trudeau made damm sure that property rights were not in our "constitution"(now there's a laugh) true to the communist party card he so proudly held and aided and abetted by romanow clutching the regina manifesto tightly as he helped big t fuck the country over.

I would add lawyers to the very top of the list of those not qualified to be in politics. Followed closely by property developers. Both has chosen professions where the truth is extremely flexible and ethics are highly questionable.

As long as the Greenback maintains hegemony, too many governments hold instruments denominated in USD to allow it to be destroyed. The debt of the US is so large, the banks that own Wall Street and the Fed will not let interest rates rise as it would kill the US. Once again,we get to take a free ride on Uncle Sam's coat tails.

If the looney left media could bury the mega BILLION$$ scandals of SNC and Bombardier so easily, WE is a walk in the park.

As I said: competently manufactured masks have to meet an airflow value. They use a specific material that is NOT found in knockoffs or DIYs. You missed the point of my comment about medicos: they will do their job often with little regard to their personal safety. Not true of all, but sadly out of proportion and out of character with their profession.

Cougar has it right: the truth is somewhere in the middle. I can't watch the video, but masks are NOT a simple question/topic. I normally use an 3M N95 in the shop, and full face, rubber sealed with higher performance cartridges for toxic tasks, but most of all, did a lot of research on request of one of my good friends who owns hospitals and medical supply network. There are home-made masks, there are consumer masks, there are medical masks and there are counterfeit masks (a LOT of the latter). Masks that really have to fit have silicone rubber seals and must be fit tested to the user. They are the only ones that actually provide the rated protection of their filtration medium. Lesser masks leak like a seive...a very large seive. The "benchmark" N95 standard is based upon a NIOSH standard and test in USA, and means that the filtration medium of such a mask will block 95% of particles 0.3 microns or larger. The Wuhan Virus particle is much smaller than that, but we count on it being airborne in a water droplet that just about any mask will catch. So: what's the bottom line? Even the best of disposable masks or cloth masks leak a great deal. Yes, they WILL catch a projecting water droplet effectively, but unless they are washed after a very short period of use, you now risk said water evaporating and leaving a virus particle far smaller than ANY mask you can easily buy is going to stop. Most people don't do that, they simply put the mask aside until next use. The re-breathing suggestion is valid for many masks as they are not all made of the appropriate spun polypropylene filtration medium that NIOSH and medical masks use. There is an airflow value in the standard used for masks, but the vast majority of what is available are NOT either rated and tested masks or worse yet, legitimate masks using the appropriate labelling. Those will indeed increase CO2 rebreathing and be very hot and wet. My worry is that people believe that masks are either the ultimate answer or totally BS and each group will behave accordingly. Again as Cougar said, the truth lies somewhere in between. IF you are buying medical grade, rated and tested disposable masks from a reputable manufacturer, you are clean shaven, manage to squeeze the nose bridge fully closed and you throw them away at the end of each short period of use, they are probably pretty good. Any less is providing a very false sense of security...and IMHO THAT is the big deal. BTW: mentioning that medical people wear masks with no ill effects is not too encouraging. The level of alcoholism and other drug abuse as well as sefl-induced stress in that profession is testament to what often amounts to total disregard for their own health. Of course, being in the sick care business that is mostly a drug pushing mechanism is also not so great.

That has been exactly the opposite of what I have experienced. The vast majority of people from any party seem to start their political lives with altruistic or at least dogmatic idealistic aspirations and intentions. However, there IS a small faction of people who are not seeking power, but acting on the mechanism that is already there for them to carry out the power that the back rooms have always had. THOSE people start their political life usually in cabinet, while the rest are stuck on the back benches - until that they learn the game. Once they cave in to representing very powerful special interests, they become the animals that do the bidding of those who actually run this (and any other) country.

What seems to be missing from your twisted logic is any importance being placed on the people who will have to PAY all of that money and the interest bills that go with it.

I don't think BIden can even hold his wizzer in the right part of the urinal, never mind hold his own in politics (although a great deal of political life seems to focus upon who and where your wizzer is being..uh..HELD.)

I said rationing fossil fuels???? Geez, my reading comprehension seems to be slipping...I can't find that. I know this concept has been totally lost, but the business of government should be nothing but to GOVERN. That means legislate, regulate and enforce. If government wants to see something happen, it just needs to set rules that will let industry and people solve the "how to" of compliance. When government starts to try to make things happen by paying their way, you immediately find out why people who are competent and capable are snapped up by industry to do their business, and those who can't possibly measure up go to work as bureaucrats in government. Let me give you a good, simple and succesful example in personal transportation. There was a time when LA sky was constantly brown, and it was largely due to the number of NOx spewing cars on the road. Rather than picking up the phone and getting Boeing to build a car to government specs, they simply mandated that by such-and-such a time, cars could only have specified emissions. Same for fuel consumption (CAFE standard in USA). Now, the car industry bitched and moaned like hell about being told what to do,, but look at the sky in LA (you can sometimes even SEE it now!!) and check the mileage on a new vehicle. VERY successful because to solve that regulatory need, automakers had to learn far better how to burn fuel cleanly and efficiently - leading to mass adoption of very sophisticated digital engine management systems and aftertreatment. The way to "fix"emissions from coal fired or any other hydrocarbon source is to do exactly as we have done with cars: legislate and regulate their emissions. Let government try to choose HOW this is done, and we end up with another NASA doing things for 100x the cost that industry can do cheaper, better, faster. North America's economy was built by entrepreneurs, not governments - but it sure can (and WILL) be destroyed by them.

Joseph R. Biden Jr. announced on Tuesday a new plan to spend $2 trillion over four years to significantly escalate the use of clean energy in the transportation, electricity and building sectors, part of a suite of sweeping proposals designed to create economic opportunities and strengthen infrastructure while also tackling climate change. In a speech in Wilmington, Del., Mr. Biden built on his plans, released last week, for reviving the economy in the wake of the coronavirus crisis, with a new focus on enhancing the nation’s infrastructure and emphasizing the importance of significantly cutting fossil fuel emissions. As he denounced President Trump’s stewardship of the virus and climate change, he drew criticism from Republicans — but he also faced a key test from progressives who have long been skeptical of the scope of his climate ambitions. “These are the most critical investments we can make for the long-term health and vitality of both the American economy and the physical health and safety of the American people,” he said. “When Donald Trump thinks about climate change, the only word he can muster is ‘hoax.’ When I think about climate change, the word I think of is ‘jobs.’” https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/us/politics/biden-climate-plan.html?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20200715&instance_id=20323&nl=the-morning&regi_id=100982531&segment_id=33439&te=1&user_id=2a3e757b2285568cc6aee5465e9acea4 I once considered that both sides of the Uniparty had some kind of underlying common sense, but when I see this kind of absolute BS, I guess we can write the Dummy....er...uh...DEMOcrats off completely. This all goes back to worshiping the "New Deal" that mindlessness credits with bringing the US out of the Great Depression. Now, don't get me wrong: public spending on NECESSARY infrastructure during a depression is a very good thing to do. People are available, need the work, and are cheap. But when you are $30Tn++ in debt, pissing away another $2T ON TOP OF the deficit spending that will surely be in place is so far beyond totally irresponsible, it is clearly a symptom of insanity and/or senility on behalf of Biden. This is all for the purposes of political porkbarelling as the name of the game when government is doing the spending is to choose the winners and losers along political lines. IF (and this is a big "if") the American people have any idea what this means, Biden just handed another term to Trump. Oh: on the "environmental" side: once again, if something can only happen with government driving the bus, you can bet the whole thing will stink to the high heavens with dispensing of privilege - for returns to be paid back in other ways. Problem is: when trying to tackle an environmental problem in this way, the US will spend its trillions to try to keep doing the same things that put it in this position (of planet's largest polluter) in the first place. The solution is not to beggar the nation to keep wasting at an unsustainable rate, but to put in place a plan to reduce the amount of resources wasted to live a lifestyle that is no longer sustainable.

Bingo. You win the interwebs today. Finance in the USA has been controlled exclusively by Golman Sucks for many administrations, and Morneau is very much Bay Street personified. The foxes are running the chicken coop.

You can't "unspend" yourself from nearly $30Tn of debt. You can stop the growth - all it takes is one simple constitutional amendment to forever prevent ANY government from deficits without a corresponding one time only plebecite for very, very special circumstances. It is one of my absolute best scenario visions for some day when actual intelligence begins to wake up and become government (in other words...NEVER gonna happen). The reasons it is so important is #1 constant debt growth and this scale of debt is not sustainable and most of all, making politicians pay the bills for their promises makes them accountable in real time for their spending. The revenue from the Casino is miniscule relative to what they plunder freely. To put things into perspective, the exposure to derivatives alone on the Street is something like 20 to 30 times WORLD GDP. The "money for nothing" from the speculative gain on these sythetic instruments is purely inflationary and becomes a liability to the taxpayer - all the while maybe collecting a few per cent on a good year of the action, but not likely ever that much. Since each and every speculative gain creates no wealth at all, but DOES pose an inflationary liability against the currency of the US, it is perfectly logical to tax ALL of that gain back to the benefit of those who are liable to satiate the pure greed that drives speculative transactions. The big side benefit is that the only way of "investing" to earn a return would be to actually invest in wealth creating activities (i.e. Main Street) to receive tax free benefits by sharing dividends.

The numbers that diverge from the GDP defined "average" were the 1% of 0.01% - who seldom have significant amount of their income derived from wages. When it comes to those two portions, the speculative/finance world in Canada/US sees no borders. I can agree with NYT that the 10% line follows GDP, but to defend that group against tax increases in a country that has $24 Trillion federal and another $5 or so state and muni accumulated debt and counting very rapidly is insane. The US government debt now far eclipses the value of the economy. Canada is quite different in this matter - but hardly "better". Our federal debt around $1.2T (https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1010000201) according to how Statscan is reporting, but others estimate the combined fed/prov/muni debt load to be about $3.2 Cdn =$2.4 US, given the usual 10:1 ratio about the same as the US but our GDP is something like $2T, so we are WAY beyond the sad state of affairs in the USA. Meanwhile, both countries simply watch all of the investment capital shift over to the Casino Capitalist courtyard of Wall Street and Bay Street, fleecing the real economy of the investment capital needed to create wealth. Worse yet: we let them (the 1% but far more to the point the 0.01%) do so with a free ride on the real taxpayers' backs.

Came across this at NYT today: Since 1980, the incomes of the very rich have grown faster than the economy. The upper middle class has kept pace with the economy, while the middle class and poor have fallen behind. sorry the graph doesn't scale, but this is not the actual values, but the amount of INCREASE. The top lie is the 0.01%, the second the 1% the dark line in the middle with a second line following is the top 10% of after tax earners and the GDP of the USA. Those below are the "middle class" income and the bottom line is "lower class" income. not sure if you can read this link without subscription: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/24/opinion/income-inequality-upper-middle-class.html?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20200710&instance_id=20197&nl=the-morning&regi_id=100982531&segment_id=33074&te=1&user_id=2a3e757b2285568cc6aee5465e9acea4 What would be far more interesting to me is not this comparative rate of growth, but a clear depection of the ACTUAL dollars involved. By some logic, the top line would be something like three orders of magnitude greater in difference - clearly pointing out just how poorly the North American (assume safely that Canada would look very much like the US in this respect) economy distributes wealth. What never fails to amaze me is that everyone can clearly see these values, but NOBODY seems to understand what drives it: speculative gain. This is what crashed the economy of the world in 1929 and SHOULD have corrected once more in 2008, but those with the power to steer the economic ship simply declared themselves "too big to fail" and went right along wildly disproportionally redistributing wealth without the bother of having to create any wealth in the process.

Except of course it is not Tin Lizzie's tit, it yours and mine.