Toro

Though I'm sure your father is a wise man, he is incorrect on that point. Demand is substantially outstripping supply. Plus, the price of crude is in a very persistant uptrend. We are no where near a top.

No.

For those who think that the WTO can replace NAFTA, the WTO just ruled against Canada in the softwood case. Thus, if we scrap NAFTA, Canada would have zero recourse in this dispute. Under NAFTA, Canada has leverage. http://www.mytelus.com/news/article.do?pag...ticleID=2017583

That's a different argument mirror. You would punish a narrow group of shareholders in an action that would have broad ramifications for the market, and thus for people's savings, with an action that would not alter the administration's stance one iota.

I am a shareholder of Teresen and I don't like the deal. The fact is this deal only benefits some of the shareholders (the short term speculator types) and the management who get big bonuses. Long term holders of the stock end up with a considerably less reliable company. Well, vote against the deal then. But if the government kills the deal for political reasons, the message its sends to investors, both private and public, is that the government will interfere for political reasons. That increases risk and shaves multiples off stocks, all stocks, not just Terrasen.

Its one thing to argue that the government takes too much taxes. Its quite another that the government has ignored a legal ruling for 55 years.

Why punish the shareholders of Terrasen? This would do no good. All it would do would be to depress the Canadian stock market. Not a good idea.

In all due respect, I don't believe. It sounds along the lines of those people who say the Bank Act was amended in the early 1990s so that banks no longer had to carry reserves. That, of course, is nonsense.

According to Morgan Stanley, between 1995 and 2002, the United States accounted for 98% of global growth at market exchange rates. In 1995, the combined GDP of Japan and Germany equaled the global share of GDP of the United States at 25%. Today, the US is 28% while Japan and Germany combined are 17%. Shady I'll get to that eventually...

The other thing is that by walking away from NAFTA, not only does it not solve softwood lumber, it invites other disputes in the future.

This is from McQuaig's article With the exception of energy resources (which is wrong), the criticisms she has of NAFTA are the same criticisms the anti-globalization crowd has of the WTO. Yet McQuiag is articulating that we should scrap NAFTA for the WTO.

This is true economically, but Canadians may be at a point that national pride and a sense of justice are at stake and are willing to pay a higher price for certain goods such as California wines.

I wish this were true but its not. The WTO has ruled against America on softwood lumber as well, but that hasn't changed America's behavior.

The reason why fees and interest exist is because it separates the costs of business and allocates those costs to their appropriate lines of business. Banks used to have no fees because the costs of going to the teller and putting your money into an account, which was free, cost the bank money. That money had been made up overcharging interest on its loans. However, as capital markets have moved away from raising capital primarily from the banks, lending has become a much more competitive and cutthroat business. To compete, the banks had to lower interest rates to be more competitive and allocate costs more efficiently. Thus, fees went up. And, to be fair, banks often prefer a fee-based business because its more consistent and less risky than the spread business of borrowing at a lower interest rate and lending at a higher interest rate.

Germany didn't industrialize because the government owned and operated all the banks because all banking wasn't done through the goverment. Private banking in Germany has been around for centuries. There's a difference between government "involvement" and "doing all our banking through the government" as mirror suggested. I'm all for government "involvement." Government involvement in the financial system has been a boon because laws have been enacted to increase the strength and soundness of the system, which has mitigated the cycles of the economy. But government ownership of the entire banking system is a very, very bad idea. And regarding this lawsuit, if these plaintiffs - who know nothing about finance - won, I would take every single dime of mine and my family's savings out of Canada and recommend to the institution I work for to sell every last Canadian bond. So to those who are following this lawsuit and hoping for a victory by the plaintiffs, please keep posting the developments here. It would be much appreciated.

No, because a functioning economy needs an efficient and healthy financial system. Without it, Canada would be much poorer. You can argue about which system is better - the American or the Canadian system - if that's what you mean by "chartered banks". There are about 8,000 banks in America. There are more deposit taking banks registered in my county than there are chartered banks in Canada. But that's a different argument. A modern economy needs an efficient conduit in which to channel capital between savers and borrowers. Because that would be a disaster. Government controlled banks around the world continuously get involved in political projects to boost the politicians own prestige, and the resulting graft and corruption that surely follows. Banks are highly levered institutions and a handful of bad economic decisions can wipe out a bank's capital. Giving politicians and principals that aren't responsive to market signals increases the risk to the banks, which is the lynchpin in the entire financial system. I'd take that bet. Banking and "business" are two very different businesses with far different risk characteristics. You would collapse the economy if you did. There's a legitimate argument about what's the appropriate level of consumer installment debt, and the level of debt worries me. But the freeing of capital to the middle and lower classes over the past 100 years has been one of the greatest "democratic" developments in finance over the past century. One of the biggest arguments used against the banks a long time ago was that it didn't supply credit to anyone who wasn't wealthy. It used to be that only the rich could borrow from the banks. Now, virtually anyone can get credit. The argument that its "destroying people" is a fallacious one as about 2% of consumer debt is written off every year. The highest level of debt write-off was in the early 90s at around 5-6%. So this belief that people are being hurt by too much credit is simply false.

The Bank Act, on capital adequacy http://laws.justice.gc.ca/en/B-1.01/4283.html#rid-4372 The Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions overseas deposit taking institutions (DTI), i.e. banks, in Canada. From OSFI http://www.osfi-bsif.gc.ca/app/DocReposito...nes/car01_e.pdf Canada is a member of the Bank of International Settlements. The Basel Committee of the BIS in 1988 set forth the reserves deemed adequate for institutions engaged in international banking. Reserves are to be 8% of total capital. Here's the exact wording Here's the document http://www.bis.org/publ/bcbsc111.pdf And here's the link to the website http://www.bis.org/publ/bcbsc111.htm

And the banks don't lend out money that they do not have in reserve? THey don't lend out money that exists only on paper? In a book I read written by former Finance Minister Paul Helyer, he states that is exactly what the Charter Banks have been allowed to do by governments. At one time the banks used to have a reserve, but the amount of that reserve has been allowed to go down to the point that it either doesn't exist at all anymore, or it is only a pittance of what would be needed if there was a run on the banks. The banks have virtually moved us to a virtually cashless society where paycheques often consist of nothing more that a piece of paper with virtual numbers on it. If everyone decided to withdrawn their supposed on-deposit funds from their banking institutions at the same time the whole system would come crashing down. Banks would have to close their doors or risk riots when the peole actually realized that these banks do not have most of this money to pay-out. This virtual money when deposited is virtually lent out numerous times in the form of mortgages, bank loans, lines of credit, and credit card debt. The reality is that these banks are making obscene profits on money that they do not actually possess, and our governments have allowed this to happen. Do you know how to read a balance sheet? Do you know what a bank's assets are? Do you know what a bank's liabilities are? Do you know what reserves are?

Such as?

I'm not sure why you think this August. Both are independent of the government by law. Dodge may have been Martin's number two, but Greenspan was an advisor of Nixon. Its been a tradition of late that the Federal Reserve Chairman has served in some capacity as an economic advisor to the President. That is why Ben Bernanke recently resigned his position on the Federal Reserve to sit on one of the President's economic advisory councils as he is a candidate to be the Chairman of the Federal Reserve when Greenspan resigns next year. But I digress. (Don't want to be chastened by Argus! )

You have got to be kidding. These people have no idea whatsoever how banking, economics and monetary policy works. I mean, none at all.

Noooo, that wasn't said at all. Just to refresh your memory. As Argus astutely points out, The UK has taken to expelling religious kooks who call for death sentences, but I'm not sure where Robertson could be deported to except the looney bin. If you go back and read what I posted, I have criticized Robertson because what he said was an asinine, not to mention un-Christian thing to say. However, I point out that Chavez is sounding like a looney himself, and you don't say, "yes, that's an undignified thing for a man representing an entire nation to say". Instead, you go after Bush's supporters. Chavez is the President of a country. If Bush had said his detractors were "mad dogs with rabbies", we would hear that from the Left forever. And rightfully so because its a stupid thing for a President to say. The fact that there are people supporting the President who say bad things about Chavez on Fox News or wherever is completely irrelevant to how Chavez rhetorically responds. The President of a country does not crawl into the gutter. And, unsurprisingly, when he does, a Bush critic (and I'll assume you are one) retorts. "Well, what about Anne Coulter!" Do you not see the difference between a President and a pundit?

Bush doesn't have to: he's got whole battalions of pundits and an entire "news" network to do that for him. Or have you not read anything by Malkin, Coulter, Horowitz, et al? Let me get this straight. What you are telling me is that there is no one else in Venezuela criticizing Bush besides Chavez? Chavez doesn't have any hatchet men doing the exact same thing in Venezuela? Thank you for proving my point.

I've never liked Axworthy much either. He wrote an open letter to the Winnipeg Free-Press to Bush about six months ago and mentioned that he went to California "to speak at a University" and discovered there were people who "disagreed with you, Mr. President," - shocking eh, at a California university - and how Bush should listen to them. Could you imagine if the tables were turned? If a high-profile ex-minister of the United States wrote and open letter to Paul Martin, ol' Lloyd would have been on his high-horse telling the US to butt out. I like his brother though.