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SpankyMcFarland

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Everything posted by SpankyMcFarland

  1. SpankyMcFarland
    Ah, Jaysus. How many reporters has JT murdered so far? The Toronto Sun might be a bit miffed to hear it takes its marching orders from him. Anyway, off-topic.
  2. SpankyMcFarland
    Stalin is an awfully low bar for comparison. No, Putin is not Mao or Stalin but he’s still awful, imprisoning and killing reporters and dissidents at will. After so many years of failure, he can be unequivocally labelled as an obstacle to Russian advancement. The country is still a basket case because of his policies. There’s no intrinsic reason why ordinary Russians shouldn’t enjoy the same standard of living as Canadians. Their country’s achievements in science, technology and the arts far outstrip ours. It’s also inaccurate to compare him to Nixon who faced a free press and Congress. Even Erdogan has just lost political control of Istanbul. Can you imagine Putin allowing that in Moscow?
  3. SpankyMcFarland
    I suspect Ukrainians would not agree. The Baltic states and Scandinavia are rightly concerned as well. Russia is not a normal country. Instead of trying to better the lot of ordinary citizens, Putin spends his time oppressing the people, enriching oligarch buddies and destabilizing neighbouring states.
  4. SpankyMcFarland
    Here’s a tweet from a conservative Danish politician, Rasmus Jarlov, representative of what Danes are saying: As a Dane (and a conservative) it is very hard to believe. For no reason Trump assumes that (an autonomous) part of our country is for sale. Then insultingly cancels visit that everybody was preparing for. Are parts of the US for sale? Alaska? Please show more respect.
  5. SpankyMcFarland
    Yes. A few tiny islands more than a hundred years ago versus the world’s largest island now. He didn’t even consider the role Greenlanders would have to play in any decision on this. It is grotesque idiocy on his part.
  6. SpankyMcFarland
    The Greenland affair stands out even by Trump’s standards. He has created a completely unnecessary problem with an ally and made himself look like an arrogant fool. The tweets have become a major cause of Trump Fatigue Syndrome among his more cognitively intact supporters.
  7. SpankyMcFarland
    Meng’s extradition may yet be blocked by the courts:
  8. SpankyMcFarland
    Now Measles is making a comeback in the UK: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2213764-the-uk-has-lost-its-world-health-organization-measles-free-status/
  9. SpankyMcFarland
    Ontario really falls down on the mountain front. A few hills here and there is not enough for me.
  10. SpankyMcFarland
    But I thought we were all happy subjects of the same monarch?
  11. SpankyMcFarland
    That would make sense and it's what the Europeans say. However, the SDF are an irregular army facing possible annihilation by Erdogan. They are in no position to conduct these trials themselves. If they handed these people over to Assad, it's quite possible he could release them to fight the Kurds again. The obvious candidate govt would be Iraq and I think the French have managed to get some of their citizens tried there.
  12. SpankyMcFarland
    The British are supposed to be our friends but they just unloaded a person on us who has far closer links to their country than ours for a bit of cheap publicity. We shouldn't have to deal with him and the Kurds certainly should not.
  13. SpankyMcFarland
    Perhaps you can explain what is going on with your energy leader at the moment? There appears to have been a nuclear accident that the state is attempting to cover-up. http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/08/it-appears-russia-is-covering-up-a-nuclear-accident-again.html
  14. SpankyMcFarland
    I’m tempted to sign it myself but I would advise younger people to be cautious. China’s influence is spreading across the world. Years down the road, you could find yourself in trouble in some developing country that has signed itself over to the PRC. Lord knows what even Canada will look like by then
  15. SpankyMcFarland
    Looks the Brits are letting the Iranian tanker leave Gibraltar: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-49389592
  16. SpankyMcFarland
    It is rather disturbing to think that somebody who wrote that has access to guns.
  17. SpankyMcFarland
    If they became. Which they won’t.
  18. SpankyMcFarland
    It’s certainly close to that. There’s still so much controversy among academics as to what fascism means https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism and whether it can be applied beyond a twentieth century European context, but if we accept the basic recipe above of authoritianism, corporatism and ethnonationalism, its there or thereabouts and should be a deeply alarming prospect for the rest of us, far more than Mao’s China. Chinese ethnonationalism and authoritarianism were unusually strong even before the communists arrived; now capitalism has given that country the potential to dominate the world and bring her values to our doorstep.
  19. SpankyMcFarland
    One good thing about a US takeover would be that, as US citizens, Greenlanders could then sue the US government for all the toxic waste it has dumped on their island over the decades.
  20. SpankyMcFarland
    One major problem some outfit run by a few rich countries would have is credibility and access. WHO works in many remote locations of the developing world. The co-operation of local societies and governments for such projects is vital.
  21. SpankyMcFarland
    It’s depressing to see so many parliamentary committee votes cast on strictly party lines, and we all know MPs are not expressing their own opinions. Everybody wants to avoid trouble with the PMO.
  22. SpankyMcFarland
    Without humans, slowly. With humans, well, take a look.
  23. SpankyMcFarland
    Why not if the system allows it? How is this advice going to help the Liberals? Even if Scheer gets more seats, small ‘c’ conservatives will remain a minority in Canada. It’s time for more coalitions.
  24. SpankyMcFarland
    Violent protests play into the hands of the Xi and his gang who wish to suppress any call for liberty among their citizens. Although the outside world is powerless to stop such a clampdown, we should not stay quiet. Trump was wrong to dismiss this as an internal Chinese matter. The West must stand for a set of universal values or it will wither and die. Regarding the handover, I don’t think the British had much choice. One way or another the Chinese were going to take Hong Kong, something they made very clear to Thatcher.
  25. SpankyMcFarland
    The World Health Organization is fairly useful.
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