Slavik44

I would rather people be able to make decisions on their own behalf. You are missing one key ingredient, everyone is focusing on the worker, as if the worker is the only one who wants something. While th eworker wants employment, we cannot forget that the employer also wants an employee. That is why very few people earn minimium wage in the first place, that is why 98% of American Labourers earn more then minimium wage, not because managers are a bunch of fools, but because they need to attract employees. They have a need, and if someone cannot live off $5 an hour, if someone can't work for $5 and hour then then the company that is looking for an employee will also be forfieting potential profits. And if that company can find someone to fill that position for $5 an hour, then you need to go back to kindergarten and learn how to read and write to expand your marketable skillset. Besides that, if you suddenly set minimium wage at $10 an hour, you cannot forget that you would most likely be forcing that same person on to welfare anyways, becuase you are still pricing them out of the labour force.

I believe you are right, but hope you are wrong. I think that Rae is their best choice for them. But if I had to put money on it I would guess that Dion wins on the third ballot. So that means you don't give that naked Fridge Magnet Brison a chance on attracting some of the negative votes from the others Hell, I would take Brison over Rae or Ignatief. I never really even liked Dion, but the more he keeps his mouth shut, the more I like him over his competition.

This whole minimium wage thing is meerley another one of those feel good vote buying strategies that the NDP is renowned for. The problem is that ciggarettes also are supposed to make you feel good, personally the possibility of a longterm negative impact is just to high, especially considering the little to no short term gain, the same can be said for minimium wage. Lets face it when the economy is really hot, you can't even attract a patient from a mental asylum to work for minimium wage, cause across the street someone will be offering 50% more. Even when the economy is just doing good, there are plenty of jobs available, almost all of them paying more then minimium wage. If my current employer threatened to cut my pay to minimium wage, I would walk away, I have the luxury to do so, because there are so many jobs out there paying more then minimium it would be stupid for me to work for the minimium at a such a physically challanging job. Your average burger flipper at Mcdonalds earns more then minimium wage. Companies are not beign stupid when they pay people more then minimium. They are simply responding to the facts of the Labour Market, that if you want an employee, you are going to have to offer something that is in line with everyone else, or your not going to get an employee. When companies make wanted adds in the newspaper, they actually do want something, go figure. And they are going to do every reasonable thing to ensure they get what they want. A wanted add that says, Wanted hard working, reliable, expirenced shipper reciever, will pay $4/hour, isn't going to cut it. I think the problem becomes the fact that people see the "wanted" as the same thing as a five year olds Christmas wish list. The truth is, wanted could just as easily be replaced by needed. They don't want a shipper reciever, they need one. And they are not going to offer $4 an hour, because no sane shipper reciever is going to work for that. The company has a need, and they will do everything they can to get that need filled, that most likely means changing the $4 to a $14. Companies are not insane for offering more then minimium wage, with the current economic state it is almost a neccesity, in order to promplty fill open positions. But what about when things take a down turn, is that when minimium wage has a benifiet? Not really. Minimium wage primarily affects students. I am a student so I will take me as an example. I currently work for $10.50/hour +bonuses ($20-30/day). Now this is great I can pay for school in about two months, and then have money left over for other things. Now if the economy suddenly took a turn for the worse and my employer said I need to cut your bonuses, I would say sure. Maybe it goes even worse, and he needs to take away my .5 sure....maybe it gets even worse....in fact maybe the economy really goes down the shitter, I would still probabley work for $4.50 an hour. Am I insane? No, my primary goal is to be able to pay my tuition, if the economy starts going down, I would be willing to re-adjust my earnings based on this in order to stay in school. If forced to I would take any wage that allows me to do that, over un-employment. There are some people that would choose un-employment. That should be their choice as an individual. I have different priorities and I would make a different choice. Unfortunately with minimium wage at $8 an hour I wouldn't be able to make that choice, let alone with moving it to ten. The choice would be made for me, and all I could do is hope I am one of the lucky ones who gets to keep their job. But I would rather be put in the position where I have control over keeping myself in the workforce. It is my labour, and when it comees down to it, I want to set the price of my labour...it is mine. Minimium is almost a suggestion that we don't believe people have the ability to think for themselves, that somehow we can make better choices on their behalf. If thats the case then fine, let me go down to hastings and get a wife for one of peggy Nash's children.

OMG OMG!!! HARPER CHANGING TO US STYLE COMPUTERS!!! OMG OMG!!! Give me a break. Election's Canada decides the methods, the government has nothing to do with it really. Well if you look he actually didn't say that Harper is trying to make us more like America (maybe it was implied, I don't know) as well who is doing the implementation is also largely irrelavent. As whenever change is being made to something as important as counting the ballots, it is generally a wise Idea to look and see if there are any problems happening, or the possiblity of problems that could be exploited. If this is the case it might be advisiable to take extra pre-cautions or rethink the change. http://itpolicy.princeton.edu/voting/ For instance watching that video might indicate that these machines are far from fail safe. Now I don't know about you, but I like the idea of taking extra precautions with electoral security. Is there a reason why you are opposed to taking precautions? ----------------------------------------------------------- As for the original poster The NDP in British Columbia have been a bit of a disaster as far as most are concerned, it is party that extended special voting privledges to unions. Whenever an inordinate amount of power is extended to an individual or a united group of individuals it must be expected to be abused. I mean what your dong is reviving a very poor NDP policy of extending extra power to certain groups. You are absolutely right that you cannot use the same level of thinking that got you into the problem to get you out. So why would you want to copy a bad policy from a bad party and apply it to the whole country? Anyways I like Minority governments, I feel better represented when we are in such situations. Why? Well no party specifically matches my beliefs or ideals. For a minority government to work it does require some compromise. And even though the lifespan is shorter, we do get the compromise. We also get a check on the excersize of power. Again think Einstien; Majority governments got us into a situation where political power was abused and the average Canadian was hurt. Don't you think maybe it would be counter productive to try and put us back in that same situation? I like minority goverments, I like knowing that one party can't simply run wild though the government. I don't like having to wait for a government to be found of stealing from the taxpayers to change the politicians in power. Politicians like diapers need to be checked and changed regularly, or they get real dirty. It is interesting that for so long supporters of the CPC complained about all the power Liberals had, and for how long they had it, and how that was hurting this country. But now when the tables are turned I notice alot of conservatives are thinking, hey how can we get ourselves into the same situation as the Liberal dictatorship. It is time to stop thinking as a supporter of a political party and time to start thinking as a Canadian and a concerned citizen. Who values acountability over abuse.

Okay so I was worried for a second, but after looking at my driver's license, passport, birth certificate, social Insurance number, and every other official document I could find, I found no reference to me living in a country called Religion.

You now it is tough to gauge how positive the influence of western nations has been on other countries up to this point. I do believe that within western society there is a standard of living and an excellence of life that cannot be parralleled anywhere and has not been parralleled at any time pervious. Unfortunately in our actions to spread the good news, we have certainly caused alot of pain and suffering, and ignited may conflicts we have at this point certainly helped them kill each other at an alarming rate. Not that they were not doing it before, but an AK-47 is a fair sized improvement over a spear. so I guess the question is, Great question. I chopped off the end for a reason though. Because we can help, and we should help, when we are wanted. In almost anything I have ever done with other individuals, I have always needed their permission before I involved them. I believe Sex with out permission is called rape. As much fun as it may be, sometimes you just have to sit back play the field and wait for a willing partner. Such a scenario presents the best case for success and enjoyment. If they want our help, and our willing to work with us, then we can help them and we stand a far better chance for success and a smaller chance for backlash. Rue made an interesting post, a post that claimed that Africans were not responsible for the situation they are currently in. I will take that at face value and not debate it. But I have a question, If I poinsoned you, assaulted you, robbed you, enslaved you, harrased you, and murdered your friends and family, how receptive would you be for me to return to help you all the while treating you like a second class citizen? A number of our current offers of help have a poor track record, and I believe they will continue to have a poor track record. What we need to do, is start equiping Africans, Arabs, and everyone else with the ability to help themselves, when they ask for it. It has been said that if you give a man a fish he has food for a day, if you teach a man to fish he has food for a lifetime, or the ability to collect welfare in Newfoundland. Anyways I believe the same applies for help. If we help a person then they have help only so long as we our helping them, but if we assist them in assisting themselves, then I would hope that they gain the neccasary ability to deal with problems that arise in the future on their own. We tried helping Africans in the 1800's, Joseph Chamberlain said that in carrying out this work of civilisation we are fullfilling what I believe to be our national mission. Unfortunately when it came to Africa this was an abysmal failure. I believe it is only fair to ask, to what extent are we making the creation of a civilised Africa/middle east the mission of western society, the White mans burden part two. I have no problem with helping third world countries, when they ask, but when they ask. we must ask ourselves a few questions. We must ask if we are going to be helpers or generals, we must ask if we are going to be teachers or commanders, we must ask wether we are going to be bankers or loan sharks, we must ask wether we are going to be friends or foes. Because handcuffs and a whip have no place in a helping hand. I notice the topic of AIDS was brought up and it reminded me of an article I saw in a newspaper recently, this artcile basicaly implied that we should force circumsicion on African males because it appears to decrease susceptability to being infected by HIV. It is not a matter of not being concerned about the third world, it is a matter of finding the best way to help the third world, and the best way is to have willing parties on both sides, working towards the same goal, working with each other, and working towards the benifiet of hundreds and millions of suffering people. I believe forcing and imposing this help are only justified when our own security is threatened and at risk.

Personally I would say the line should be drawn when inherrent to the purchasing or sale of a good the freedom and liberty of other individuals is put at risk. I don't think there is much debate concerning a child sex slave...slave isn't exactly a word that we associate with freedom. Explosives? probabley depends on the explosive, but generally speaking if you are storing nitroglycerin in the back of your car while driving through city traffic, you are posing a serious threat to other people. Pathogens-disease causing agents- yep I would consider that a threat to my safety, security, freedom, and well life. Pot???? uhmm, nope. It is somewhat debatable as to the affects of marijauna on the individual but in and of its self the smoking of marijauna posses very little if any threat to my security or your security. If you disagree with smoking Marijuana don't smoke it, I don't smoke pot and don't plan on it. Like most other Humans I have a brain and am capable of using it every now and then. I would say it is even more morally reprehinsible when you suggest you have the right to take ownership over my brain and my body, and make personal decisions on my behalf about what goes into my body. Unless inherrent to my actions is a threat against your safety and security I cannot see why you have any right to take ownership over my body. Should I be asking you wether I should eat Cherios or Corn flakes in the morning aswell?

It wouldn't really be paying people to vote, it would be returning their money, where do you think the government gets the money in the first place? Sounds like bottle return payments, maybe people who don't want to vote could just leave voter cards laying on the street and then I could walk around and collect other people's right to vote.

What worries me is that evolution is not really taught in schools. When I graduated, which wasn't long ago, I knew very little about evolution. In Highschool it really wasn't a topic that was discussed, infact I had never recieved any lessons on evolution/formation of the earth until I took geology in grade 12. But, even that was just a small lesson and provided just a small amount of information on the many processes that had helped shape and form both the earth and life on earth. This lack of knowledge and understanding made me susceptable to believe what is basically bullshit. The fact is most of the arguements against evolution border on lunacy far away from the world of logic and science. I would read plenty of article that "disproved evolution" and at the end of it you would be left questioning how people could retain a belief in something so blatantly false. The thing is, I was wrong, and the articles I read? They were wrong full of lies and when they did not present lies, they ommited the truth and misconstrued quotes. Why? The inherrent goal behind ID is not the discovery of the truth, it is not the promotion of education, in fact it is the opposite, it is the protection of a dogma. It has no desire to find truth, it has no desire to find alternatives. All the ID movement desires is to promote its world view often this promotion is done through lies and trickery. I see no reason to include this bullshit in grade school no more then I see reason to force med students to learn that babies come from storks. What we need to start doing is teaching. It was never done, no one sat back and said this is what evolution is, this is how it comes about, these are the processes by which it operates, this is the evidence we have, this is how we know this, this is how we come to understand that. Unfotunately in our schools teachers do not do this or they never did this in any of my classes. There is a serious problem with teaching ID in schools because it is not a theory backed by evidence. But when I look at the arguements in favour of ID they fit into two groups. One group, is very small, its the evidence in favour of ID and it goes like this. The world is a really big and scary place that we cannot understand.....God did it. And the other group, is a list of factual errors, outdated information, and misconstrued quotes used in order to "disprove" evolution. Niether group is something we should allow in our schools because it teaches students and sets a precedent that evidence can be sacrificed to personal beliefs.

Honestly it disgusts me to here people critisizing the conditions of the rescue, I recently saw this on the news. A lady said she could say only one thing about being evacuated. And it wasn't I am alive thank you, it was just complaints, everybody had complaints, about how hot it was and crowded and the conditions of the bathrooms. Great, Here is what I'll do, I will get together with some friends, charter you a private jet to Lebanon and just sit you in a nice clean bathroom with some terrorists surrounding you. Then we will wait for a couple bombs to drop. After that you can describe to me the tempature, and conditiosn of the bathroom. Its very simple, what is a succesfull evacuation?...quick test...are you alive? If yes, it was a success. There are times when higher standards are neccasary but in situations of life and death, the only thing that is important is life. If the boat was too crowded get off and stay behind.

Depending on your standards Bush could be doing a great Job, but then I think the problem is that you are setting your standards far to low. Its a bit like leaving a teen at home and upoun returning you find that half the house is burnt down. From there you go on to proclaim your child was very responsible because only half the house burnt down. I think the standards need to be raised slightly higher. But at the very least I can explain to you why I crisize bush on all fronts, not just Iraq and why you should begin to realise that Bush is not above critiscim and is not doing a wonderfull job. Seeing as how Iraw is the topic de jour I will start with it. Iraq was made out to be a splendid little war for America, they coulld go in, collect some rose petals, set up a government and walk out. The unfortunate thing is that seems to be the attitude the planners had for Iraq. It has been shown that America invaded Iraq with out a comprehensive plan in place for the establishment of peace and democracy in the country. That is irresponsible policy of the highest order, it is tough to make the invasion of Iraq look responsible when there was no comprehensive plan for peace, only war and the truth is you reap what you sow and if you only plan for war, you will be stuck fighting a war. Furthermore in Bush's declaration of War against Iraq he said "Now that conflict has come, the only way to limit its duration is to apply decisive force. And I assure you, this will not be a campaign of half measures, and we will accept no outcome but victory." However, he started on the wrong foot by not planing for true victory, that being the establishment of peace. He further fowled by declaring victory much to soon. If this was a war against terror and tyranny in Iraq it was simply absurd to declare victory as soon as you pulled down the statue of one tyrant. There is still terror and tyrrany present in Iraq and victory is not yet upoun us. Beyond that Bush said the only way to limit the duration of this war is to apply decisive force. I believe now we will find that troop numbers in Iraq are declining from their peak numbers. True decisive force would not stop, slow down, or lessen itself, especially as the danger rises and the need gets higher. On September 11th we didn't actually see fire fighters running away from New York because it looked a little dangerous, there was a job to be done. As far as the economy is concerned Bush has made Trudeau look like a fiscally responsible leader. He has spent money like it grows on trees and is going out of style. Its not small government, its stupid government. He has excessive spending habbits and poor priorities, he is like a fat person at Mcdonalds. The money increases in spending under Bush's watch far outweight those of recent longterm presidents, and that Includes Clinton and this is a verified fact. All the while Republicans and Bush claim to be a party about small government and fiscal responsibility. Yet actions speak louder then words, and bush's actions are in clear contradiction to his own words and the words of his party. That in and of itself is reprehensible. The democrats under clinton were able to show some fiscal restraint, Bush seems meerley content to preach it. Bush is far from being above critiscim almost anyone living in America no matter what their political leanings should easily able to find something bush has done that is worth critisizing. To suggest that Bush is doing a wonderfull job and is above all Critiscim is an insult to the intelligence of a two year old. Wether you are a Democrat, Republican, Green, Communist, or Libertarian. His leadership, planing and decision making has failed all stripes of the political rainbow. And if you cannot find something Bush has done that is worthy of critiscim, I can only ask you to take your blind fold off, you are not even looking.

Listen apparently we are both arguing the same thing. I brought up China as an example of a country that in its history has done a poor job living up to the ideal of the united nations. To say China is held hostage and is changing doesn't even affect my point. Being that if we were going to base who belongs on the permanent council based on past deeds then historicaly it would be pretty laughable not to consider other countries, particularly China. Now as you have said China is changing. Well thats nice, if someone were arguing that Japan should be barred from permanent security council membership because of past actions despite the enormous change it would be highly hipocritical. my point regarding China was not to bring up where they are going but to look at where they have been/are. You post never really even contested that point, simply pointing out they had little choice and were changing. Which may be true but that really doesn't apply to what I am saying when I argue that we should not be judging nations based on their past actions because everyone has a skeleton in their closet. Now I recognize that my original reply to your post may have been a little harsh and for that I appologize.

You're the one who brought it up in the first place.as a reason to question their suitability ... :rolleyes Funny how is someone responds to a comment made by you that person is "off topic". I brought up China's record on human rights and the environment in a way that fits with both my post and this thread, that is wether or not Japan deserves a seat on the U.N security council. On the otherhand you never actually argued agaisnt my claim that Japan deserves a seat on the U.N security council. You never even used your rebuttal in a manner to show why Japan shouldn't be allowed to join the U.N security council. also I never said we were off topic, I said that if we started a debate about China's environmental record, with no concern for wether Japan deserves a seat in the U.N security council, we would be going a bit to far off topic. If you looked at the sentence below that you would understand that it was raised to point out that we are holding Japan to a standard no country can fully meet. If you looked at my post previous to that you would see it was focused on why Japan should be a member of the U.N security council and why we shouldn't focus solely on actions many years int eh past. your "rebuttal" to my post never once even mentioned Japan, never once attempted to bring Japan into the debate. It attempted to take Japan out of the debate.

China is held hostage by its dependence on fossil fuel, namely coal for power production and heat. They are attempting to develop alternatives, recently dammed the Yahngtze River to produce hydro power that created a great deal of contraversy in its own country and abroad. Many people felt it was wrong to dam this amazing river - but they have so few alterntives. Listen I am not here to start a debate about China's environmental record, that would be getting a little to far off topic, I simply asking why hold a country like Japan to a standard that no other country can meet. Japan has more then prooven themselves as a respectable member of the world community.

IMO Japan has been needlesly suffering from the legacy of WW2 for far too long, and because Japan has been suffering the rest of the world has also suffered. It is an unfortunate fact that the Japanese Emporer never appologized for the Actions of Japan in WW2, but in recent times the Japanese Prime Minister has appologized for the legacy of war crimes left behind by his country. What is a comforting fact is that since WW2 Japan has emerged as a bankroller of International missions of Peace, they currently are the second largest funder of the United Nations. It may infact be wise to ask ourselves if we would prefer to have members on the security council who put their money where their mouths are. As Japan provides more funding to the United Nations then Britain, China, Russia, and France combined. Japan may have a poor record sixty years ago, but the question has to be asked what are you doing now? And when it comes to crimes against Humanity it is laughable not to bring up China. The United Nations has been attempting to push the philosophy of sustianable devlopment and environmental stewardship, again it is a laughable concept to not questions China's position in such an organization, China is a country fairly well known for crimes against humanity and as a country it possess 17(?) of the words 20 most polluted cities. Japan is in a position now where they should be taking on a larger role in world affairs and I would be more then happy to welcome them into the fold of "international policemen". I would like to see Japan remove article nine from its constitution and start to play a bigger role in the affairs of this world and become more then just a stock broker for peace, a part of this should include permanent membership ont eh U.N security council. We can all have reservations about Japanese History texts books and the lack of appologies from the Japanese politicians in the past. I would agree that it would be nice to see more activism on the front of correcting past wrongs, tragedies, and war crimes. But I believe we must look to the present, we are living in an increasingly volatile world and Japan is more then Capable of becoming an "unsinkable aircraft carrier" of peace. I see no reason why we should be limiting the involvement of such a country in world affairs . A country that is perhaps one of the worlds greater humanitarian nations. Yes many years ago they made alot of mistakes, but I do not believe it is neccasary that we shoot ourselves in the foot at the present because of past wrongs. Especially considering the fact that at the present there are wrongs, atrocities, and human rights violations being commited all over the world. There is no need to get hung up on the past, especially if it means hanging ourselves in the present. And Japan is an ally I would be happy to see take a bigger role in world affairs.

I hate you??? Now hold on a second I think maybe you are putting words in my mouth and taking things a bit to far. It would be very tough for me to get through a day if I walked around hating everyone who believed int eh bible, because ahtred by definition is such an intense feeling that it requires action to be taken. If I hated people who believed the bible I would probabley be in jail by now. I simply have a problem, when people attempt to use the bible to justify discrimination, especially considering this discrimination is downright hipocritical according to the very book you are using as your defense to make these claims. Yes I am opposed to that, but you are strongly sensationalising things when you suggest I hate over a billion people.

I do have a problem with that, I have a very big problem with that. You see the bible tells us all have sinned. And what you are doing is claiming that one group of sinners canot get married while allowing other sinners to get married. The bible is clear on the fact that God makes no differentiation in sins. God apparently sees one sin just as bad as the other, and if you commit one, you commit them all. You infact admit that you are not a good Christian, perhaps you should not be allowed to be married. Every time you sin according to God you commit homosexuality so becarefull. When you attack homosexuals ability to get married based on the so called immorality of Homosexuality you become a hypocrit, who founds his beliefs on a double standard. I will attack such things and campaign against such things, because actions like those are intolerable. It is extending the powers of evil and tyrany to a level they should not be extended to, it is trampling on the liberty of your fellow Canadians. And this is nothing short of Immoral. I do not believe you can stand behind the bible and say it gives you the justification to be an imoral, hypocrit, who lives a life of double standards and helps perpetuate injustice and discrimination, that is intolerable. And If I don't like it? No, not tough I will campaign against it, I will argue against it, and I will not stand for it. The bible gives you no justification to ruin other peoples lives, the bible has said that God wants humankind to choose to follow god. But when you get the government to force people to follow Gods morals, your are not only robbing people of their political liberties, but you are robbing people of their God given liberties. Who else do you want to steal Liberties from, who else do you want to persecute in the name of your religous text, Persecution in the name of religion needs to be removed from our society, I do not see a reason to reward such actions. You say homosexuality is wrong, I say you are in the wrong and I believe that anyone with an ounce of compassion or logic would understand that you do not have a religous or political leg to stand on when you deny gays the right to marry.

Except, er, it hasn't failed. It's done very well, all things (size of release, budget) considered. BTW: have you seen it? er, um, $6.5 mm is terrible! 6.5 million is not an incredible success like past movies we have seen released in previous years, but it was 12th out of over 120 movies in theatres this weekend. At 6.5 million it is the fourth highest grossing political documentary/commentary ever made most likely to become the third within a few days, third being 6.7 million. It is also the 11th highest grossing documentary ever produced. So it is tough to call it a disaster or terrible. All I can say is please evaluate a movie based on its peers, evaluate a Political commentary in comparison to other political commentaries, and when you do you realise that as far as political commentaries go this movie has done fairly well sitting as the fourth highest grossing, most likely soon to be third. thats not to shaby.

You know it has been along time since I have felt this Irrate, but it has been a long time since I have read such hatred as is found in your post. Your post is perhaps the perfect example of all that is wrong with Religion. You talk about a loving god but you preach hatred. Is it not true that in Romans chapter 12 the word of God insturcts you to live peaceable with mankind? Yet you propose beating and bashing gays if the law of Canada didn;t restrict it. Is it not true that in Romans chapter 12 you are told to not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with Good. Yet whne I read your posts, I do nto see any attempts made to overcoem "evil" with Good, instead I am witnessing a man attempting to overcome good with evil. did Romans 12 not say if oyur enemy is hungry feed him and if he is thirsty let him drink. I do nto see that love in you, instead I see you calling someone ----ing stupid. Does the bible not tell you to be kindly and affectionate one to another. Where is the kindness in dressing up in the garment of the KKK? Does the bible not say not to think of yourself more highly then you ought to think. Yet you are tainted with the poison of conciet and ruled by the thrown of hatred. Does the bible not say to bless them that persecute you and curse them not? But instead you have told us that you loathe someone who is in a debate with you. You have called the defenders of Human rights Pussies. You are hurling insults aganst those that stand up to injustice, when the bible tells you to love your nieghbor. If you read the bible you will fidn that it says all have sinned, it will tell us that if you break on commandment you are guilty of breaking them all. Whne you persecute and attack gays because they have broken one commandment, you should likewise persecute yourself, because you canot say you ahve lived a perfect life. But the bible does not instruct you to persecute those that don;t believe the bible it tells you to avenge not, it tells you to turn the other cheek, show them kindness. You have done none of this, instead you ahve conintued to preach a message of hatred trying to point out a speck of saw dust in our society. But why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.

Why is it that we bring up best for the child???? Do we know what that is? Do we provide that? Look around we have murderers getting married, Alcoholics getting married, abusive parents, hell Osama bin laden has been married. You know what? I would rather have had Osama's children raised by a gay nudist colony. Frankly, I think it is absurd that we say Gay parents are not what is best for children, so we shouldn't allow them to be married. Especially considering the fact that so many other downright evil people have been married. Why is it that we require perfection from a group of people that go against the social norm but accept imperfection and creulty from people as long as they go along with what the church says? Is that truly best for society? You know what the ideal situation for children to be brought up in is? It is an environment of love. I am almost offended when someone goes as far to suggest that the best situation is for a child to be raised by their biological parents, because no matter how you slice it, such a statement demeans the role that adopted parents and gurdians play in our society, it suggest that their love is not good enough. If you believe that Children need a male or Female influence in their lives then I can tell you what to do. Stop raising a fuss over Gay relationships and put your time to better use, http://www.bigbrothersbigsisters.ca/en/Hom...isterMonth.aspx Maybe it isn't as much fun as bitching and complaining, maybe it is. But if you honestly believe that both a male and female influence are neccasary in the upbringing of children, then what you should do is stop shunning certian groups from society and raise a helping hand. Our society is full of different families that take different forms, but every family will have a way to provide children with both male and female influences. Wether it is through relatives, friends, or teachers and other administrative figures the role can be filled. And if such a family lacts an ability then I would encourage you to do something productive about it, ostracizing such families is far from the most productive method.

It is an unfortunate fact that the bible tends to be both the foundation and the weapon of choice for those opposing hompsexuality and gay marriage.

It is interesting that the primary reason many people, not all but many, oppose homosexuality is because homosexuality is considered a sin in the bible and goes agaisnt the word of God. However, how many people today in Canada follow this verse? In most western societies were are not so blindly absurd as to go around killing people in the name of some religous text, in fact now-a-days we declare such people as un-compatible for life in western society, we often label these people as terrorists or psychos. At present we live in a society where we attempt to erase certain parts of such verses because they do not neccesarily fit with our vision of western society or a compassionate God. Instead more or less we are now left with a verse that says. I however see no reason to stop there, we have cut, copied, and pasted the bible to death, most of us don't live by a quater of the rules laid out in the book let alone all of them as God requires, -------------------------- Some in the Christian community would make the arguement that marriage is supposed to be representative of the relationship between God and the Church, The church is the bride of Christ. Based on this they would suggest that Homosexuals cannot get married because very clearly, homosexuality is an abomination to God and it defiles his picture of marriage, it defiles Gods plan. However we must then make an important point. Our State recognizes muslim's as being married not civil Unioned, the state does not recognize that marriage any differently then a Christian Marriage. However, muslims are commiting an abomination before God, and they also defile God's marriage plan, and they are not a part of Gods Church according to the bible, the same applies to many religions in the world today. The state has long recognized marriages that are an abomiation to the Christian God, that state has long married people who are not a part of Gods Marriage plan, the state has defiled God's marriage plan for a long time. ----------------------- Of course the religous claim that Homosexual's cannot get married is further compounded by the biblical definition of who a homosexual is. The bible goes so far as to suggest that if you think about commiting one sin you have commited them all. The religous folks then must ask themselves if they have commited one sin? The bible again is clear on this. The fact is in a modern, western, and secular society such as Canada, there is no reason to prevent Gay's from being married. Any reason offered up by the Christian right should be seen for what it is, hipocrisy. A sinner is seen as a sinner no matter what sin they commit, an abomination is an abomination no matter what the abomination is, and unless you are a very fundementalist Christian, your marriage most likely also defiles Gods Marriage plan. Should we now make your marriage void? Should we void the marriage of all those who have sinned? Perhaps it would be a better plan, then to continue this archaic discrimination which we have in place at this present time. ------------------------ As well I do not believe we can define marriage as an institute for procreation. Clearly people make babies outside of marriage, and not everyone who is married can or will make babies. It is irrelivant, it is your own personal definition, what purpose you see for marriage can very well be how you define your marriage, but leave it at that. Your marriage is worth what you make it, as an individual. I thought individualism and liberty were supposed to be the founding cornerstones of western society. Then why to this day do we continue to refuse to grant people the liberty to pursue happiness in their own way? We should stand to the principle of Liberty and a freedom that allows us to do all which injurs no one else. Some may say it is immoral to trample on the traditional definition of marriage, but I would say it is much worse when we trample on Liberty, when we justify robbing another person of thier Liberty in the name of morals. But then how moral can you be when you rob another person of their liberty, to me that seems immoral. The morals themselves in denying a person the right to marry appear to be downright hipocritical. Isn't it about time that the Conservatives stand strong to their promise of a smaller government, more moral, more accountable, and more in line with the principles of this country, of which liberty undoubtedly must rank the highest?

Well I am not guranteeing it will get 50 million dollars, I am saying based on my observations and past trends this movie could very likely pull in 50 million dollars. It may not, it is meerley an educated guess. For an early indication this weekend will probabley be usefull when it is open in 420 theatres, if it can stay in the $10,000-12,000/theatre range then I believe it is a very good indication that it has the momentum to go the distance. I will admit it is to soon to gurantee 50 million, but it is also far to premature to label the movie as a flop, being that it is already the fith highest grosing political commentary ever made.

okay a few points, Brokeback mountain was an incredible success, it had a production budget of 14 million dollars and grossed 83 million dollars domestically. Basically for every million dollars spent on the production of this movie it earned 6 million in return. Other movies that year such as Tom Cruise's War of the World's grossed 234 million domestically but on a production budget of 132 million dollars. In other words for every 1 million dollars spent on production two million dollars were grossed. Or take the Fantastic four 100 Million dollar budget and 154 million dollars grossed. Or perhaps kingdom of Heaven with a 130 million dollar budget it grossed a huge 47 million dollars. In fact look at the budget for any movie, very rarely will you find a movie that ever earns $6 (domestically) for every dollar spent on production. Next point is that a number of movies that fit in the designation of having political, philisophical or Shock value tend to open on limited release. Limited Release is not done on the designation of movie theatres, it is done by decision of those who control the movie. In 2005 Broke back mountain started as a limited release grossing only 500K in its first weekend. Other movies like that include March of the penguins (77 million earned, opening weekend of 137K), Memoires of Geisha (57 million earned opend to 682K), Syriana (50 million earned opened to 374K). Inconvenient Truth opened in only four theatres, I believe that is less then any of the other movies mentioned above, although I cannot confirm this. During that time it grossed 300k, which should put it in an a position to push past 50 million dollars domestically when all is said in done. 50 million dollars may not seem like a lot of money when compared to X-men Three. However X-Men Three had a production budget of over 200 million dollars. As well X-men three is a movie that is designed purely for your entertainment, it is not an hour plus long political campaign add. The Day After Tomoorrow is more of a global warming thriller type movie, and it did fairly respectible grossing 186 million domestically and 542 million world wide. As well the Harry potter series of movies is the third most financialy succesfull franchise of movies in the history of mankind, behind only James Bond and Star Wars, making it an absurdly high benchmark for comparison. What I do find interesting is that every time someone on the left makes a movie that has political connotations the right loves to critisize its success, why don't you guys up and release a movie??? Oh thats right you did Celsius 41.11 it grossed a whoping $93,000 and it on the otherhand wasn't on limited release nobody wanted to show it and likewise nobody wanted to see it, Congradulations guys $93,000 give yourself a nice big pat on the back.

Here is the thing, If you told someone you had a disease, the first thing they would probabley ask would be if it can be cured, by cured they mean disposed of, can you get rid of the disease? Nobody wants a disease around. When we talk about Ahenakew we are talking about a man who called the Jews a disease, not only is that dispicable but the implications are far reaching, because the only option in dealing with a disease is to fight it, to get rid of it. In fact he further implied this when he applauded Hitler for trying to clean up the world. How did hitler try to clean up the world you may ask? By killing six million jews. A disease demands action to be taken agaisnt it, and Ahenakew praised Hitlers actions against the disease known as Jews. I think his intentions and desires are fairly clear. This man does not deserve any sympathy and any banishment from public office is well deserved for making such dispicable comments. The only question in my mind is wether we deem a conversation with a newspaper reporter as public or private.