Canuckistani

Yes, which is why very few people able to get work at 10,25 an hour are sitting on welfare at 599 a month. Certainly not for extended periods of time.

You couldn't pay me to live in Israel. Pakistan neither.

Are you saying any sort of conspiracy here? To me it makes sense that the cops would be looking for anybody else involved. They sure don't want to miss one, and in the confusion they don't really know how many there are. Basically when they burst on the scene, anybody is seen as a potential shooter. Except the 6 yr old kids, maybe.

What about it? Confusion reigns during times like this. I seem to recall initially there was mention of a possible second shooter. Doesn't mean there was one.

It doesn't matter. They're already damned 'cause they don't believe in Jeebus. You have to believe in him to be saved.

I have to admit that I think this Sandyhook conspiracy theory is a whole other level of crazy compared to Barry being a Muslim. Barry's dad was a Muslim and many people think of Muslim as a race. Barak went to a madrasa, so I can sorta kinda see how the idea gains traction, especially if you don't like the man. But to think that these kid shootings were faked, well, holy cow.

I forgot to mention, I would also clone Tommy Douglas and put him in charge of govt spending. Cheapskate with a heart.

Well, we were back to the OP.

Aaaaaand we're back to the OP.

So at least 40% of Republicans think Obama is a Muslim? And they're allowed to vote? OMG.

buh bye. Ps. Be good, be strong!

No they wouldn't. The Swiss have legislated premium equality - young pay same as old. Ie young subsidize the old. They don't really have remote locations - everything is connected by roads and larger centers are close by. Transportation costs would be nothing like in Canada.

I missed that, can you post it again?

I was watching a DaVinci's Inequest the other day, and they talked about cross training the police and firefighters. Ie firefighters would be trained as police, not sure if the reverse was also true. I'd never heard of this before, but DaVinci stories are usually based on real events in Vancouver. Sounds like a good idea to me.

http://ca.news.yahoo...-184323398.html Insanity seems to run deep in that country. To harass the man who took in those 6 children is just nuts. What can you say but sad? How deep seated is this love of guns to buy into the idea that this is a staged event? How does America hang together with people this distrustful of their government and each other? It's getting scarier day by day to be their neighbor.

You make good points. I would like to see our doctors put on salary, have our med schools charge doctors the true cost of training them, which is reduced the longer they stay in our system, with incentives to move north. I'd like to see us use way more nurse practitioners, and spend way more on prevention, which down the road pays for itself and then some.

You mean like all the government contracts that are let now and are so highly efficient and cost savings? It seems to just add a layer of profit taking to the whole deal. Workers are paid less, but the savings go into the pocket of the companies. I'd rather stick with the swivel service, but (I believe this is your bugbear) make govt spending much much more transparent.

Our system can definitely be improved. And it's not just our rural people who have to deal with wait times. But if we adopted the Swiss system holus bolus, I doubt we would see the same success as they've had. We need a made in Canada solution. And we may have to accept that we have a more expensive system because of geography in part. And because we have much more poverty than Switzerland does - poverty breeds ill health and costs us all money.

Did a quick google of swiss health care. It does sound good. The question is how well it would work in Canada. The problem is that if we get it wrong, open up Canada to private insurers, then under NAFTA we'd be stuck with it. And the push from the US insurers would be huge to replicate the mess in the US, because the profits for them are huge. Add to that the Harper administration, that would love nothing less than turning our healthcare system into a free market one a la US, and I'm very leery about opening up our system that way. Put the NDP in power, and I'd be quite willing to have the discussion.

I meant for profit. I have no problem with for profit delivery of health services, our doctors already are, as are the labs we use and who knows what else. But IMO we should keep the single payer system. It seems to be much more efficient. And of course we should keep universal healthcare.

How is that so different than here? Our system also is based on you paying for it depending on your tax bracket. Health insurance in BC is mandatory. Doctors in our system are private, and they are a very large part of the system. They do have co-pays for treatment. That can reduce costs by making people more careful about seeking it. It can also raise costs by people deferring treatment until it becomes much more serious and expensive. Healthcare is Switzerland costs 10,8% of GDP, we're at 11.4%. I think you may have a bit of grass is greener here. We can learn from the European systems. Most seem to use non-profit insurers instead of government, with mandatory insurance. I'm not sure how that's better than what we do. They have a much denser population that we do - our stats are dragged down by the people living in remote areas. Single payer is a much more efficient system. We could allow private hospitals, we could look at what else the Europeans do better than us. But we have unique challenges compared to them.

So no restriction on guns for you, huh?

I believe they would. Just like the Israelis are trying to do to them. Neither side comes off looking good here.

He used a Glock with a 33 round magazine. As I said, he was overpowered when he stopped to change magazines. How old are you to dismiss 5 dead instead of 10? Most of the measures we take in society to keep people safe are imperfect. That's not a reason not to do them. Nobody is talking about taking all guns away, the question is what are reasonable restrictions. Banning semi-auto rifles and large capacity magazines for both long and short guns seems reasonable to me. You want to go deeper and address the reasons people do this, be my guest. Of course we should. But nobody really knows why, and the US would have to undergo a much deeper transformation than just further restricting guns to accomplish anything. Since they're not even ready to restrict guns, they certainly don't seem ready to go for the deeper causes either.

Better background checks are not mutually exclusive with restricting magazine size, and there's no reason to only restrict magazine size on long arms. The shooter who shot Cathy Gifford didn't need a 33 round magazine for his Glock. 18 people were shot. He was overpowered when he stopped to reload. How many less would have been shot/killed if he had only a 10 round mag? Restricting semi-automatic rifles won't cause hardship to hunters or target shooters, but could save some lives. Hand guns should be restricted to the degree they are in Canada. None of this will prevent all killing. But that's just the strawman of perfection - most things we do don't achieve perfect results. Doesn't mean we should do nothing.