Minimus Maximus

Theloniousfleabag (Monk fan I presume?), I would have to say that the posturing started last year after the Liberal's won there minority, the problem with a CPC minority is that you can bet the ND's and the Liberal's will beat them with a no confidence as soon as they can resulting in yet another election (presuming they have enough combined seats to do so). They will claim this as a moral victory for the electorate and we will be back where we started, a Liberal minority. Just my prediction.

It seems to me that I have also heard of eliminating this kind of discrimination (postal code), as of yet have not seen proof though. I remember this guy showing me the letter and I was laughing as I believed he was trying to set me up for some kind of punch line, it was no joke. What bothered me the most is that this guy had served his country (ex-military) and yet because of his postal code was not eligable to apply for this particular job.

I would like to relate an incedent which happened to a good friend of mine a couple of years ago. My buddy is from Nova Scocia but had moved to Calgary to find work. This guy is fully bilingual and has served his country as a member of the military. During his time in the west his wife filed for a divorce and moved to Ottawa to start a new life, my buddy is a good father and chose to try to find work in Ottawa in order to be close to his daughter. He found out that a position was available for a person with his skills and happened to be a gov't position. He sent off his resume and made sure that the reader (of the resume) understood that he was willing to pay all costs attributed to moving to Ottawa. He got a letter back which stated that applicants from outside of Eastern Ontario or Western Quebec would not be accepted. A few months ago I came across this article and everything suddenly made perfect sense. http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Columnists...07/1204899.html Our federal gov't discriminates not only based on language, but also discriminates based on postal codes. I've always hated the mantra "the west wants in" but faced with the realities of our anti-western pro-Quebec federal gov't I think I am starting to understand it.

Double post, sorry.

Is there a precedent which the opposition parties could draw upon concerning Layton's proposal? I'm asking, I have searched but have not found anything yet. I have to laugh at Martin's stance as he claims that the Liberals will not play politics on this issue yet at the same time Goodale rolls out tax cuts for all of us (economic update my ass). Funny how Liberal priorities change in the midst of an election (ok...impending election). Regardless of weather Layton's proposal can be dismissed via parlimentary procedure, I am hoping most Canadian voters see this as a breach of ethical and moral procedure by the Liberal party which may chose to ignore the wishes of all opposition parties who together form a majority.

I have been following this thread for a bit but have not had time to post an opinion until now. I think Shoop is correct in stating that a Consevative gov't will not result in "dire consequenses" which will make Canada resemble some south american country with two classes, extremely rich and extremely poor. The "sky is falling" spin which Eureka is attempting to put on the CPCs' is just that, spin. The Canadian electorate is just not that stupid as to accept a party that will create these extremes. Harper lost my vote along time ago over the comments made about Martin supporting kiddie porn. However, the acountability legislation which the CPC's have proposed have won me back over to the blue side of the political spectrum. This coupled with the Liberals proposed whistleblower legislation which will result in... well a lack of people willing to blow the whistle have put me on the decided list as far as the next election goes. I guess I will never understand extreme partisanship in any political direction as I usually vote based on policies which I support, not political stripes. The last time I voted for the Liberals in a federal election it was a vote for the elimination of child poverty. I would like to recind my vote now please and thankyou. What people like Eureka don't seem to understand is that this country is succesful because of its mixture of conservative and liberal values. The elimination of one will ultimately result in the elimination of the other. After all fiscal conservative values pay for the social liberal values we all want (maybe not all, but most of us). Eureka, Chicken Little was a fairy tale. Nothing more, nothing less. I don't advocate the elimination of social programs, but have seen too many people abuse welfare and UI. Stricter regulation and controls are definitely reqiured in these areas to ensure that people who are healthy enough to work but to lazy to get off their collective asses and do it don't recieve any of my tax dollars.

I'll admit , I laughed , I cried and wrote bad cheques after reading this. This has to be some kind of a joke, I just cannot see the federal Liberal party foregoing revenue and giving rebates at the same time. Who does Goodale think he is, Ralph Klien?

Eureka, great response! While you and I may be walking on the same side of the road, we are veering off in slightly different directions. You were pretty much bang on concerning the SCC ruling, it was not against the NEP as policy but did rule that, "the federal gov't has no right to tax provincially owned oil/gas wells". http://archives.cbc.ca/IDC-1-73-378-2141/p...berta_oil/clip7 I could not find the ruling on SCC's website but this should suffice as proof that there was a ruling concerning provincial rights vs. federal rights in respect to taxation of provincially owned resources. Hence the illegality of NEP. I agree with your take on the fact that all political entities in Canada have to shoulder some blame in the problems with increased regionalization. I see the de-centralization of federal responsibility as a positive direction to follow to quell these issues, so I do accept that the Charter must be opened and reworked to reflect the regional differences which always seem to be threatening to tear us apart as a country. BTW, I would like to address a previous comment concerning the fact that during the recession in the 80's it was not only Alberta which suffered economic hardships. I don't, in any way, mean to diminish the pain and suffering which occured in other provinces. It was a world wide recession and NEP was definitely not the cause of the economic issues faced by all regions in Canada, it was just bad policy which continues to affect federalism in the west today. I currently work along side many who were the individauls that made decisions to halt projects which were currently underway in Alberta in the 80's. The recession and falling oil prices had a great deal to do with their decisions (this is something that many Albertan's are loathe to admit, I can only shake my head in confusion at this fact), although there is a general concensus that the radical change in Canadian policy made many skittish to forge ahead with projects which would have went ahead regardless of the economic woes the recession had created, and in fact many stayed away until the dissollution of the NEP was complete.

Eureka, Thank you for your reply, you have made some exellent points but are also everybit as miguided about NEP and its intent as most Albertan's. First, Marc Lalonde admitted himself in David Kigour's book "Uneasy Patriots" that the purpose of NEP was not as you have mentioned above, but that it was an attempt to eliminate what the feds saw as a fiscal imbalance between Alberta and the federal gov't. I would call this a cash grab, plain and simple. No mentions of doing what is best for Canada as a whole, just the greed of Ottawa rearing its ugly head. Next, I would like to point out that the Supreme Court of Canada ruled against the legality of the NEP in 1982. Resouces are owned by the provinces, not the federal gov't. This has resulted in a backlash against the Liberal's and the federal gov't which still exists today here in Alberta. Lastly, the Liberal party of Canada has done more to destroy national unity than any other party in Canadian political history. NEP in the west and Adscam in Quebec have been dismal failures in all ways. This country is becoming more and more divided along geographical lines and Liberals can find the nearest mirror if they wish to point fingers in the general direction of blame. With that said I find that based on pure party platform the Liberals are my party, yet come election day they will not get my vote due to their collective history of destroying Canadianism in my backyard and their failed attempts at bringing Quebec into full partnership in confederation.

The release of this report to the PMO is just that, a release to the PMO. Any possible spin the Liberal party can put on these findings will be negated within 24hrs of the report being released to the rest of the politcal spectrum. Was this not fully expected by all of us? A week from now the findings will be a mear footnote and the spins put on the report by Canada's political entities will be all Canadian's remember anyway.

OPEC may have been the entity which put the noose around Alberta's collective neck, but NEP was the one which kick the chair out from our collective feet. If lady luck would have resulted in the oil deposits being found in Quebec or Ontairio instead of Alberta then we never would have had NEP to begin with.

As a Calgarian I feel obligated to through my two cents worth in. I agree with the more sensible posts here that either city is great if you are simply looking at working conditions. This is very true if you have an engineering or business background, if you are a tradesperson any nook or cranny of the province will suffice depending on your preferences. With regards to Calgary being brown all year round, I tend to disagree. The north east and south east .... ya I will give you that, but the south west and north west have some beautiful communties as this marks the boundries between prairie and foothills. Where culture and social events are concerned, Edmonton is definitely king in Alberta. Although I just saw BB King at the Jube the other night and he was awsome (one of my absolute faves) and the Stones were here last night. Both fantastic cities in their own rights.

Geoffrey, The problem isn't a "lack of gas", it is a lack of refining capability. Refining capacities are kept artificially low to keep prices artificially high. Refining capability has not changed a great deal over the past 10-15 years and China and India are increasing consumption hourly, thats 2 billion more consumers coming on line wanting a piece of the action. I said this in another thread, but aill say it again. You have 10 potatoes and a thousand Irishman with a million dollars each. Do you think that the potatoes will be sold for what we would veiw as a fair market price?

Eureka, High energy costs will continue to reek havoc in industry all over this country. I have more of a problem with the high cost of natural gas, after all we do live in a climate where heat is not an option. Many of the working poor will be adversly affected by the price of natural gas this winter, more so than the price of petroleum. Meanwhile the federal gov't sits on a surplus in the neighborhood of 50 billion quid in the EI fund, continues to bring in surplus budgets due to energy royalties, yet no tax relief for the lowest income Canadian's who are most affected by these cost of living increases. Even if Alberta gave its entire surplus to the federal gov't nothing would change for Canadian's who are most in need for some type of relief due to the high cost of energy. I can live without the dividend cheque my provincial gov't is sending out (we are a family of 4, so total is $1600.00 for my household). This money is going to family members who need it more than we do. I would rather see larger cheques go out to low income earners in Alberta instead of the blanket policy of $400.00/man, woman, child. Not my choice though. These refunds are not unearned. There was a study done a little while ago concerning the amount of hours worked by Canadian's in various provinces, Albertan's by far work many more hours than all other Canadian's (will look around some more for proof, couldn't find what I was looking for this morning). I have had paycheques with as much as 120 hours of OT in a 2 week period, the amount of federal tax I have paid makes my bowels twist and contort. I see this refund as more payback for the sacrifices made and sacrifices which continue to be made in the name of our overall economy. In closing, I don't like the direction this entire country is heading in. Alberta is mearly a symptom of larger problems. I don't like the Klien gov't and am looking forward to his retirement, too much power for far too long.

Have to agree with Argus on this. The feds should be honest with prospective immigrants and tell them up front that what they really want is increased membership for the liberal party and cheap labor for industry.

Just a couple of points I would like to raise here Eureka. First, myself and many of my fellow Albertan's would like some of the surplus's our economy is amassing shared with the "have not' provinces. Read some of the letters to the ed. from the Calgary and Edmonton Suns from the last few weeks. There is still infrastructure deficits to correct. This came about when Alberta tightened its collective belt in order to balance the budget and pay down debt, otherwise we would still be running a deficit and would still have debt. Also, your implicaton that Albertan's are not affected by the same high energy costs as other Canadian's is untrue and inflammatory. We also have a manufacturing sector and a transportation sector that suffer every time the price of energy is increased. These costs are then spread to the public in the form of increased costs...and so on. Some Albertan's are making out like bandits right now, but there are still many that are seeing their cost of living increase while their wages remain relatively unchanged from where they have been for the last few years. There are many here that suffer the same consequence as all Canadians. Eureka, don't mistake corporate greed for Albertan greed. We hear about this money on the news, we read about it in the newspapersbut only a few will every place their sweaty dirt stained hands on any of it. To say that Canadians outside of Alberta are not sharing in this good fortune is also a fallacy. The feds are ammasing quite a surplus of their own based on the increase in gasoline prices, and natural gas prices. Unemployment is extremely low here as well, there are alot of workers putting in very long hours and paying a huge amount of federal tax. All of this benifits Canada as a whole.

August touched on a very important point in a previous post. Refining capacity. The refining capacity is basically where it was 10 years ago. We have China and India to compete with for our share of the petroleum products, thats around 2 billion new consumers coming onto the market. You have 10 potatoes and 1000 Irishmen with a million dollars each. Do you think that the potatoes will go for what we would view a fair market price? No offence to the Irish.

People on EI, AISH and welfare recieving dividend cheques can become a sticky issue for many Albertan's. I find it hard to believe that anyone in this province can't find employment so I personally would not like to see any of this cash going to long term EI recipients. People in transitional phases of employment yes, EI abusers no. Anyone who has been on EI for 3 or more months in the last 2 or 3 years should be exempt from dividend cheques. My family consists of myself, my wife and 2 children. We do not need the $1600.00 as our combined income is well into the six figure range, so after a family vote we have chosen to give the money to a niece who is presently studying at the U of A. I agree with M.B. that the Alberta personal exemption amount could be raised to help lower income families. PS, I would like to continue, but really have to get to work now. Have a great day y'all.

PET himself back in 1977. http://www.winnipegsun.com/News/Columnists...22/1229662.html What gets me about this is that the Liberal's claim that Coffin paid back all of the money. 1 million - 1.5 million= complete pay back. I guess this is the type of mathematics that brought us Adscam in the first place so why be surprised.

I think we first have to realize that Canada has no official definition of poverty, Statistics Canada uses "low cut off income" to measure trends in low income households, but this should not be confused with poverty or poverty lines. http://www.statcan.ca/english/research/13F.../13F0027XIE.htm I disagree with Mirror's statement that we should increase taxation in order to combat poverty, in fact we need to decrease taxation for the "working poor" of this country in order to combat rising energy costs. I worked with an elderly fellow a while back who showed up for work everyday, worked hard and yet could barely afford food after paying for heat and electricity. I eventually goaded his boss into giving him a raise of $2.50/hr, which resulted in a net increase of less than $20.00 a pay period. I caculated how much more he would have received with a 8 to 10% tax reduction and it came out to aprox. $180.00/month net increase. I do not advocate tax cuts to the rich, but tax cuts for the poor would reduce the number of working poor in this country. Problem is defining what is "poor". When it comes to people living "under cardboard boxes" in cities such as Toronto or Vancover this is extreme poverty which our current social programs do not directly address. After all 10 out of 10 people living in cardboard boxes don't vote for any of the major parties. There are many in this country who are healthy enough to work yet still require social programs in order to obtain sustinance for themselves and their families, I prefer to not aid these people in being lazy, but know where they can find a job.

Eureka, this is something we can both agree on. I don't pretend to know everything about PR but have been doing a fare amount of research about it. There is good and bad, but think that the List Voting system(or possibly Mixed Member) would do something to settle "the children". What I have read so far has been positive with few drawbacks. Many Europeans have turned to Pr to represent them and are living quite happily with the knowledge that there vote "counts". These countries that have turned to PR are old enough not only to be our mothers, they are in fact so old that Canada was not even spermatazoa and egg yet when they were much older than we are now. Countries like Australia and South Korea have growing economies, although there are many countries in the third world who use PR voting systems that are stuggling right now we cannot discount PR or some form of it( which may be created by us), without doing something we run the risk of increased civil unrest which will only end in the dissolution of Canada. When 2.2 million voters in in Ontario elect 3 non-Liberal MP's, and 2.3 million voters in another part of Ontario( not saying where...hint hint) elect 100 Liberal MP's, I just gotta say WTF???. My argument against our currently biased system is not just about western unrest its about fairness for all Canadians, rubber stamp senates and intentionaly biased judicial systems don't serve me, they serve the 2.3 million Liberals in Ontario who voted for the man/woman who appointed them. If you have some links to PR which conflict with my rudimentery understanding on the subject I would like to browse them and learn more about it. BTW, we should really carry this topic over to a more appropriate thread. The Gomery folk may be getting restless. If you post a reply about western sep. in one of the other threads, I will find it and respond back.

First off check out this site it should help clear up some of your confusion on western alienation. http://www.abheritage.ca/albertans/perspec...alienation.html Second, my maternal great grandparents were here when Alberta became a province, my great grandfather stayed in a tent along side the Bow River where the stampede grounds now stand while working in a butcher shop in town. During this time he tells me of unrest in the newly formed province of Alberta due to the feeling of being no more that a colony of Canada rather that an active participant. This sentiment was also shared by my Great Aunt's and Uncles as well as my maternal grandparents, I know this to be true because they told me. I didnt read it in an editorial. It was also a widely held view of the early settlers. Your own rhetoric of when this came about seems to based on listening to too many Eastern demagogues. This is something that the feds have been pounding into your brain for far too long. There has been western discontent for 100 years and I doubt we have another 100 to keep talking about it. Your usage of words like "radical" when discussing Alberta's desires for equality is exactly what they want to hear. Here's another post which may help explain this complicated issue to you(it may be useful in some of your research). http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Columnists...07/1204899.html I do agree with you on the fact that this grassroots movement has been hijacked by political forces which mean to use it to their own ends. This is nothing new and I dont feel a kinship to these people, so they dont speak for me. On the issue of the PMO, get real. The PM can appoint anyone he wishes to the senate or the Supreme Court of Canada. Yes he has advisors, and yes there are law societies and such that can contribute their opinions to the PM, but in the end one man choses who is appointed to these positions. So as far as alienation and disconent in the west are concerned, there are many Albertan's who have roots here and our collective pots have been simmering for years. One day Ottawa will wake up to find the pot has boiled over and claim that the stove was'nt even on, it will make no difference as damage will have been done and turning back will not be an option. Sad but true. Changing a system which gives 39% of the popular vote a majority gov't(see Chretien) into something that all Canadians can participate in hardly seems radical to me, more along the lines of rational and inclusive. Your defending a system which will evantually destroy us all. The proof is in the pudding, look how its worked so far. PS. I would like to read these article you have mentioned. If you are a writer(which I wont dispute), I would find it interesting to see which way you lean. I think I already know, but am willing to read your articles with an open mind.

I respect your view about what western alienation is, but sorry this is a stereotype. I dont think for a second that the intent of the present unrest in Alberta is to " wag the dog", this shows your own bias (based on geography) toward the west. The power of the PMO and the regional concentration of that power is at the heart of western greivences. I'm not sure who you came into contact with in Alberta when you were here, but the root causes of western alienation go deeper that you may think, these feelings have existed since Alberta became a province. Since there are very few Albertans with roots here it may be difficult to get the gist of this merely working here. Regardless the feds have never had to sell Canada to Albertans. This dog dont wag my tail. If things are as bad as you say they are then something a hell of alot more radical than flag waving is in need. You can't fix a hemmoraging aorta with a bandaide.

Aint that the truth. Was particulairly impressed with Mr. Leblanc's reporting on this issue. I Google my news in the morning and the first bits of knowledge I gained on Sponsorship were from him(The Gazette I believe?) and I found that I would read his articles first every morning after that. Also the BQ did prove to be very tenatious in the House to force the entire affair into the public spotlight on a nation wide level.

100% agree with you on this one. Point taken. But my point about not understanding the need to sell Canada to Quebecois(if you so prefer) is that we have been doing this forever and gotten nowhere. Sponsorship programs are not the answer, from your comments it would seem that the feds have failed miserably in regards to making Quebec federalists feel included rather than part of the family but separate. As far as the "wants in" bit, sorry but I never said it, you must have me confused with someone else. My personal thoughts are less "wants in" and more "unity among the provices". Concerning my"swallowing propoganda by my regional demagogues", I dont read the editorials in the Calgary Sun in the morning and say "now I know the truth, I am now a well informed Canadian who knows it all". Google searches are wonderful things. I have re-read my posts and cannot see where your final comments originate, this looks like you are stereotyping me as just another dumb hick Albertan with blinders on, so I will take that with a grain of salt(sel if you so prefer). Eureka, you are obviously an intelligent person who feels strongly about the issues you have brought forth in your rebuttal to my statements, as a fellow Canadian I appologize if the word "Quebecers" insults you(or maybe it was "fat kid", just kidding), but the truth is that forums like this can provide more understanding between people like you and I if we accept the fact that we are separated by great distances and the attitudes we have formed are in part due to our geography. This country, as a whole, needs something to unite us toward a common goal, this goal should be that it is un-neccessary to pay anybody who lives within our borders to wave the flag that we exist under. This is a separate issue not related to the subject of this thread, but I would like to discuss them with you at another time and on another thread.