Wilber

Immoral? Let us be careful: the words immoral or moral have never been mentioned in this thread nor does this thread in the Moral & Religious Issues category. Is that a mistake or is it bait? The words "taking away the consumer's choice" and "supporting our local economy" and "geneticly modified" and "dumped and subsidized" have been mentioned, to name a few. Identify exactly what you mean by immoral. Don't get your knickers in a knot, I wasn't being devious. How about "less ethical" or "more serious". I don't see the difference between subsidies and tariffs. They both have the same objectives. The question is do you believe in the objective? Personally, I believe a country's ability to provide food for it's citizens is pretty darn important. The idea that another government's subsidies can threaten that ability is serious business.

Why is a tariff that protects producers from a subsidy more immoral than the subsidy that made the tariff necessary in the first place? Subsidies that drive some producers out of business in favor of other producers does not increase consumer choice. Any nation that intentionally increases its reliance on other countries for something as basic as food, is a nation of fools IMO.

At least he had the largest percentage of the popular vote. The last NDP government won a majority with a smaller percentage of the popular vote than the Liberals. That was more obscene. Why then did he commit himself to another referendum based specifically on the fact that the last one was so close and that he feels the electorate should be better informed regarding the options before the next one? I don't know what he wants personally but I think it is one of the gutsier things I have seen a Canadian politician do for some time. A leader with a large majority and a 17 point lead in the polls allowing two votes on a system that would probably restrict his and successive Premier's powers forever if it passed.

We look forward to the local sweet corn crop every year. Buy it fresh picked from a local farmer daily. No day old crap for us. If you are a farmer I guess it depends where you sit. My daughter and her husband have a dairy farm in the Fraser Valley and grow a lot of feed corn for their own use. If the US government wants to sell them the stuff cheaper than they can grow it themselves, I don't think they would be unhappy to put their land to another use.

The 60% threshold in BC may be a little undemocratic depending on your point of view, however the government realizes that 58% was very close to the required threshold and an overwhelming number of regions voted in favor of the proposal. The result is, the government has said there will be another vote and that a lot more effort will go into informing people about the proposed changes. Running up to the previous vote, the government just let the opposing positions go at it and did not get involved. Maybe democracy is not quite so dead in BC.

Perhaps it's a similar thing to the idea now being expressed that todays children have more allergies because they live in too sanitary an environment. They need to eat more dirt when they are little. I quit smoking in the house and car when my kids were little. The amount of grief they gave me whenever they saw me smoking was a big factor when it came to quiting for good. Neither of them has asthma.

Satire works a lot better if it is funny. Maybe that's the problem.

I wonder. Americans get to vote on all kinds of things other than just electing politicians, including electing prosecutors and some judges. Give them things to vote on that directly effect their lives instead of just a party politician who is going to vote the party line and maybe they might take more interest. On the other hand, maybe Canadians are just to apathetic. In which case, they get exactly what they deserve.

Awesome. Rant of the week at least.

Whenever Christian wing nut bigots start spewing their garbage it does get in the media and it is quite rightly condemned. I don't see why they always get brought up whenever Muslim wing nut bigots start spewing their garbage. It's like some people think that Muslim wing nut bigots should get some kind of free pass because they aren't the only wing nut bigots out there. I say greet tolerance with tolerance and intolerance with intolerance. As a citizen of one of the most tolerant countries in the world I won't tolerate intolerance whomever it comes from.

To play the devil's advocate, Fred Phelps, a supposedly "Christian" minister in the U.S.A. spews out dreadful hate against specific individuals and homosexuals: http://www.godhatesamerica.com/ His twisted sense of what God wants is just as horrifying. You can't justify either one so what is your point?

Get rid of the video games, unplug the computer and get the kid a library card.

Who knows what it means in the great scheme of things but the guy was a homicidal scumbag. Even his own mob was getting sick of him. Good riddance

Bob Dole, George Bush Sr, John McLain, etc. I personally know quite few real ones too. Why do you think the USA needs a good war every 30 years or so? One of the reasons I'm sure is to keep good inventory of bona-fide heros. There are a ton of kickass Canadians out there too. We just don't treat them with the same rah-rah-the flag mentality and they don't advertise as much. True but unfortunately few if any ex Canadian military are successful in politics, if they go into it at all. The only PM that I can think of who actually served in a war or even in the military was Pearson. I think even he was injured in a flying accident and didn't see action. Probably says a lot about the way our politicians treat our military.

Great post. Those are hilarious. This one is the best. But don't forget about asking if any of their relatives are fighting in the war. Especially any sons. And if not, then why not? This much has changed. All four of Roosevelt's sons served in WWII as did Churchill's only son. Churchill was a Sandhurst graduate and saw action in four wars himself. They don't make them like they used to.

If the rest of the team doesn't get its act back together they won't win with God in goal. Even then you have to score at least once.

I don't know FTA. After all it is the duty of the opposition to oppose. The budget should have been debated even if everyone knows it will pass. It should have to stand up under some kind of scrutiny from Parliament. If it doesn't matter that there is no debate because everyone knows it will pass as Layton said, why bother to hold Parliament at all when there is a majority government and we know all legislation will pass? I think Layton's comment is a cop out, he just didn't want to be put in a position where he had to make a decision between for, against or abstain. Minority governments can be hard on opposition parties to. It forces them to take some responsibility for legislation that gets passed rather than just bitching about it. If we let our representatives just phone it in, they will look more and more like the Senate. You're right, they all should be embarrassed. no doubt about it.

Just pointing out that if you want to know the route a missile will travel or the great circle track from anywhere to anywhere, you have to put away your old Mercator map and get a globe.

Then why is it the same people we are fighting in Afghanistan, Al Queda and the Taliban. Terrorist organizations don't just get bored and go away on their own. Someone has to put them away and keep them there. True, Canada is not at war with Afganistan but our troops in Afghanistan are definately engaged in a war with the same organizations who plotted and carried out 9/11.

The situation in the Middle East has always been complex. As well as the Jews, many other ancient civilizations dominated Palestine at one time or another. In more recent history it has been the Arabs, the Mongols, Christians during the Crusades, the Arabs again, Ottoman Turks, The Brits for a few years, and the Jews again. How far do you want to go back? The area is screwed up. Always has been. Probably will be long after we are all gone. Many of the ideologues do hate what we stand for and they use those who have a real personal grievances for their own ends. That's what ideologues everywhere tend to do. What is the difference between Palestine and the former Yugoslavia when it broke up? Not much that I can see other than certain ideologues and surrounding countries have a vested interest in keeping Palestinians and Israelis at each others throats.

Why should we? They are small groups of criminals who have the capacity to cause sporadic damage to public infrastructure and kill a small number of people. They are not an army nor do they represent a sovereign state that can defeated with a military force. Calling it a war is a ssilly as anything monty python could come up with. The only reason they are not an army is because the US, Britain and other countries went into Afghanistan and took a way their base of operations. The only reason they do not have a sovereign state backing them and giving them a base of operations is because the US, Britain and other countries went into Afghanistan and got rid of the regime that supported them. I believe they did with military force. Some people would call that at war. If the US, Britain and other countries had not done this they would still be there recruiting and training in camps that were supplied, aided and abetted by a sovereign country. To do that we, the West needed an army, an air force, guns and a bunch of other stuff that goes boom. Like in a war. We still do. Like in a war. If the terrorists of today are just a bunch of small groups that are relatively isolated, it is because of the above. A war.

Actually it is Iraq and Afghanistan combined. You say that the US is pretending to be at war. I say they are very much at war. Whether it is against terror in the case of Iraq is debatable I admit. You're confused again, I did not say the US is pretending to be at war. I say a war on terror is a bad idea. Confused you with someone else. As the terrorists are at war with us, I find it difficult to see how we cannot reciprocate. "We declare war on you" No you don't. "Yes we do" You can't. "Yes we can" Can not. "Can to". Well then, we just won't call it a war. Sounds like something out of a Monty Python skit.

Approximately 200,000 military personnel committed, approaching 400 billion spent, approximately 18,000 official casualties (could be much higher). It may not be a winning strategy but it doesn't sound like a virtual war to me. You're confused. You included statistics from Iraq. That was a war on Iraq, not terror. Actually it is Iraq and Afghanistan combined. You say that the US is pretending to be at war. I say they are very much at war. Whether it is against terror in the case of Iraq is debatable I admit.

History is full of examples of exactly that. Mankind has killed off millions of its own over which region or view of the world will dominate.

Approximately 200,000 military personnel committed, approaching 400 billion spent, approximately 18,000 official casualties (could be much higher). It may not be a winning strategy but it doesn't sound like a virtual war to me.