blueblood

Now the tories are back up to 41% according to leger marketing. It was shown on MDL. But the polls are showing volatility 30-40% is getting ridiculous.

Britain does have a right to get its sailors back, and makes a good case. The most force required for a situation like this is a deployment of the navy in Iranian waters, if the sailors are returned then the Brits can be on their way. If Iran wants a war, they can fire the first shot. The use of a navy has proven successful in getting stubborn governments to cooperate.

I was talking about the practice of drunk driving as a whole, the whole practice is illegal and the number of occurences of that is going down. I don't think booze should have been made legal in the first place, like you said it causes lots of problems. Pot causes problems in itself. What if booze was illegal, would the problems be just as numerous?

Not looking good for Iran cbc Providing 2 different locations doesn't look good for proving a point. Map on CNN.com lays it out nicely

If you don't think we already have a problem from drugs, that's even more naive. We have a third, and a fourth, a fifth...already. Criminalization has simply been a massive failure, and arguments like yours are based on an assumption that it is actually working. Criminalization of drunk driving isn't a massive failure. Lots of people I know used to drive drunk, (it's a rural thing). Criminaliztion is working due to the fact that those who don't want to break the law are staying away from the stuff, granted that's not many people, but it's some nonetheless. The only thing that will stop the drug thing is attitudes towards it. Looking at it this way, booze is legal and look at the amount of people who use it and all the problems it causes, same thing would happen with pot. We don't need more problems than there already is.

Harper is trying to get a majority, Williams knows this. I'll venture a guess that it will be a razor thin majority if everything falls into place. In other words Harper needs all the seats he can get, Harper has to walk a fine line as to how many people he can piss off without losing seats. Pissing off Williams like that might upset that balance, which is another reason why Harper might want a later election, give time for the premier to cool down. If Harper gets another minority, all this pandering and all that might have been for nothing and he has to go about it again. Williams isn't an idiot, he knows what he's doing he has some of the highest approval ratings of any politician out there, it would be wise for Harper to fix this little problem before it gets out of hand. Quebec is still too volatile and a wildcard IMO.

Buddy, you said that people that don't agree with military action hate our own society. Are you nuts? Once again, we should allow diplomacy to do it's work here. From what I understand the British had boarded a ship, and that is when they were taken prisoner. I realize some people want to see a war, but at the same time I don't see the point in sacrificing numerous lives when we can just as easily use diplomacy, and get these guys out safely with no lives being lost. A show of force is necessary, we cannot let them get away with kidnapping scott free. An armada of British warships off the coast of Iran doing a naval blockade is one method of diplomacy, no lives have to be lost using this. Also the fact that those waters are disputed makes it wrong, it's not like the sailors were in undisputed Iranian waters.

I'd bet more doctors and nurses would move here too if they lived a tax free existence, but that doesn't make dropping the tax on specific people the right thing to do. Is their good to society really that good? People aren't chucking their kids to the curb on garbage day yet. They are coping. People are dying because of a lack of doctors though. Something to consider. If it's that big of a problem, I'd say go for it, at least they contribute to society. People are wanting to fund state run daycare which would cost taxpayers a fortune. I thought one way of encouraging growth was to slash taxes, maybe then slash taxes to a ridiculously low rate. This would only help, With more daycares popping up due to attractive tax rates, the price to the parents would go down due to competition, plus all the money accumulated would be pumped into the economy. People do want daycares though, that might be a price we'd have to pay in the short term.

That would be good. Should also completely drop the tax on daycares operating in Canada, I bet a lot of private daycares would pop up if they didn't have to pay tax.

Geoffrey, the smokes one can get from the reserves, ilegally or not, are cheaper than Fed regulated smokes and no one is claiming smoking is up. Under your theory, and you are an accountant not I , you assume the sellers will remain in the game. When the price drops too low , even they wont work for a minimum wage , which it surely will come from the feds being involved. We see it in brew your own wine and beer, and sales at LCBO are improving in spite of your assertion. Now if the govt sells crap....all bets are off. Booze is a little more easily regulated, its a way more difficult process to produce booze, the bottling vast amounts serves a problem in itself. Plus a lot of big booze companies were around for a couple hundred years, all they needed to do was to fire the plants back up. If there wasn't the booze companies lobbying the gov't, I wouldn't be surprised if booze would still be illegal. Booze and Pot are like comparing apples and oranges. When drinking was made legal a whole lot more people started drinking, look at bar lineups. Booze and smokes cause enough problems, we don't need a third, and if you don't believe weed causes problems, then that's just naive. Should the gov't start making ecstasy while we're at it?

So should Canada and Denmark start arresting each other's sailor's and make things worse? Countries do not have the right to kidnap sailors in disputed waters. what would you say if Britain tossed 15 Iranian sailors into the brig because they were in disputed waters? Iran could have let the Brits go and not caused an international incident. Do the Brits have warships in Iran's harbors? Iran has the right to do something, just not kidnapping. Why do you keep going on about Canada and Denmark? They are less aggressive, if you think peace is a good policy then you'll prefer our approach, yes. But look, this is a very simple fact -- states have the right to enforce their sovereignty in their own territorial waters. That includes taking foreign military personel into custody when they are engaging civilian shipping. Those are disputed waters though, a whole new ball game, I would think one should tread lightly there. You can enforce sovereignty without kidnapping. Why couldn't Iran just send a warship out there and shoo them away? that's what civilized countries do. What's even worse is that Iran won't immediately send them back to Britain. Yah that incident, they had arrested the sailors for comitting a crime in Canadian waters, much different than the brits for doing a UN mandated ship inspection in disputed waters. Also to note, did Canada deny the Spanish sailors access to the ambassador, keep their location a secret, etc. like the Iranians are doing? The Estai incident is more and more proof that what the Iranians are doing is wrong. cbc wiki

It might have, this story has been around for a while.

So should Canada and Denmark start arresting each other's sailor's and make things worse? Countries do not have the right to kidnap sailors in disputed waters. what would you say if Britain tossed 15 Iranian sailors into the brig because they were in disputed waters? Iran could have let the Brits go and not caused an international incident. Do the Brits have warships in Iran's harbors? Iran has the right to do something, just not kidnapping.

Wow. So the Liberals support international emission carbon trading now as well? What a disaster it would be if they ever get elected. They always supported it, they're trying to sell us on it even.

Actually, once the land owner requests them to leave, you've got to go, sign or not. Landowners in Canada need to have the right to force to defend their property from such hooligans, unfortunately we rely on the police which won't touch a 'FN' protestor no matter what law they are breaking (we saw it in Caldonia, and the police let things get out of hand in Ipperwash too, unfortunately a trespasser got shot there). The only safe solution is to arrest all such protestors immediately. Before they force things out of control. The band council that supports these idiots needs to be compensating the quarry for any lost revenue. Then they bitch about the rights to free speech, assembly, etc. they even come back. They won't even care if it's on private property, a landowner has a stronger point if his land is posted.

With the right spin, this would be great for the gov't to fall on.

Some did if the first polls are indication. This poll also was able to take it Harper's comments on the Taliban as well. Could it had an effect? Possibly. Something did. Harper was a poor performer in Opposition. So was Chretien. The effect was more likely the same honeymoon scenario as what happened to the Libs around the leadership race time, wall to wall coverage of the budget. You forgot about Day being a poor performer.

We are two countries in a border dispute, much like Iran and Iraq. My point is that do we go and arrest Danish sailors when they wander in our claimed waters of Hans Island, and do they arrest our sailors for the same thing? I'm saying that no country has the right to up and capture sailors for being in disputed waters, Canada and Denmark don't do it, what makes Iran so special?

You initially thought a budget would convince Canadians to switch to the Tories, why not an off the cuff remark? Some say that off the cuff remarks in the Quebec election caused little shifts back and forth. Charest's talk of partition, Boisclair's on referendum and Dumont's on autonomy all caused shifts. I think that when Harper acts more diplomatically, more prime ministerial, it calms the waters and his numbers float up. When he says something like Taliban or pedophiles in reference to another party, it seems to hurt. You might think it is great theatre but the pedophile remark in an earlier election seemed to have an overnight effect on the polls. If voters who sit on the fence agree with the tory budget then why wouldn't they switch? Dumont's autonomy and reasonable accomodation remarks got him 41 seats, Danny Williams being himself gets him a rating of 86% at one point in time and we know he says the first thing off the top of his head. Anyhow, some people do like that sort of disiciveness and wit and charisma from leaders. Dion has none of that as he gets eaten alive at Question Period. wiki

I don't see any problem You took the time to level a personal attack, now take the time and answer my question about canada and denmark in a similar dispute and how we handle it like civilized people and not like the barbarians out in Iran. the questions are earlier in the thread, other posters would like to see your response concerning this.

I'm wondering if the Taliban comment had any effect on this poll. Doubt it. Canadians who like a snappy leader would have gravitated, and Canadians who want a PC leader would have switched, most likely would have cancelled each other out. It's hard for me to realize that there are on the fence voters, it would take a complete disaster for me to abandon the Tories. I find it odd that people are that fickle to switch voting intentions back and forth over the course of a few weeks. Well I guess I'm a hack then. Ha Ha.

Maybe Harper was making the smart choice all along in stating he didn't want an election. Maybe he wants to be in office long enough for people to truly get warmed up to him. He's polled 30-40% for the last however long and maybe Harper thinks the polls are too volatile to call an election.

You clearly haven't given this much thought if you don't even recognize the "market" rate is totally a result of the fact that it's an illegal product. Therefore, government interference has determined the current price, which has been established based on the level of risk the seller incurs. What??? It's 10 bucks a gram because people are willing to pay that price. Illegal DVD's sell stupid cheap, shouldn't they cost more since they are illegal? The illegal DVD guy and the pot dealer run the same risk IMO. That's one of the most ridiculous things I've heard. It's straight up supply and demand.

:lol: This is priceless. FYI, oh-one-who-mouths-off-in-absense-of-knowledge, the Shatt al-Arab IS the Arvand River. You think that Canada enforcing it's territorial sovereignty would lead to a war with the United States? What a terrible thing to think of our wonderful allies! If you want to nickel and dime then you can call it the Arvandrud. That's the first i've heard it referred to as Arvand. Bravo, do you want a medal? What about Soviet/Russian subs under the ice, we have claim all the way up to the North Pole. What about Denmark and Hans Island, that's a similar situation as what's going on out there concerning disputed boundaries? Why haven't we arrested Danish sailors from Danish warships concerning this? Denmark and Canada have both popped up flags on the island, and both nations have sent warships out there. We can enforce our sovereignty without kidnapping, that is why Canada is superior to Iran. That is why we in Canada can say without conviction that Iran is dead wrong concerning this. Come on lets here your opinion concerning us and Denmark or is there a double standard?

cnn this says that they were no where near your river you stated and in Iraqi waters. That little map they give is most helpful. They were operating in the mouth of the Shatt al-Arab, not the Arvand river. Borders are also defined too. You seem to dictate at how the West should or shouldn't act, I thought I'd try it on for size. It's interesting that you would risk war with a superpower just because of a few boats operating in our waters, it happens and we can't do much about it. All Canada has done concerning this is sent out some warships to Hans Island like the Danish have in return because it's disputed, no shots fired no prisoners detained. Why can't Iran do the same? Should Canada and Denmark start taking each other's sailors as prisoners?