Charles Anthony

You sound like you have studied a lot of economics.

All of this sounds ridiculous. The military should just beef up their widows' pensions and the soldiers should demand it. By the way, I thought Canadian soldiers were on a "mission" and not at war. I would not hold the insurance company responsible either because it is usually spelled out quite clearly in the policy. It is in mine. In fact, it is the first thing that stuck out like a sore thumb. All parties (policy holders and insurance companies) seem ridiculous over the issue. How can a person who works for the military not notice the "act of war" clause? I find that a little irresponsible. A person goes to a foreign country to face deadly force and claims not to know their life insurance. I would expect making provisions for your possible death to be high on the list of responsibilities for a soldier. That is just me. How can an insurance company maintain this "act of war" clause but make exceptions "as a gesture of support for our military" after the fact and insist that they are not going to change their policy? Making things even more exciting is that now the policies include "act of terrorism" clauses too. Oh, before any of the socialists try to throw their anti-free-market rants at me: 1) I am not saying I disagree with the insurance companies' right to offer limited choice 2) we do not have a free market See the first thing I wrote in this post. ---- I just pulled out one of my life insurance policies and the first exceptions on the list are: "- Insurrection, war or armed conflict or armed aggression or an act or hazard of war or armed conflict or armed agression; or - Service in the naval, military or air force of any country, combination of countries or international organization at war, whether war be declared or not; or " This is my anecdote and I would have no excuses.

-- and they think that way because they have a reflexive sense of entitlement to coerce their neighbors. No. This is where the coercionists insist on confusing "abundance" with "freedom" to get their way. Robinson Crusoe lives free and uncoerced even though nobody can fulfull his sense of entitlement to any essential service he so desires. You are coercing the dumb people to accept it. That represents a shameful waste and we are doing ourselves harm by manipulating the education business. Why only 20%? Why not more? Bad example. I am grateful for had been randomly born in Canada but if I have the choice, I would actually rather have the entitlements of the Queen of England or of Pu Yi or of a Moghul Emperor. How about you? In fact, why should I not seek an entitlement if I had the coercive ability to attain them? You are only addressing the two parties who benefit and you are not addressing everybody else. In your argument, university grads and the people to whom they "sell their services" should be the ones paying for the university education themselves. The people who do NOT go to university should not pay for it. Trust me, it is not worth much. In general, do you think people should have to work for a living?

This is just an other guess: Go to the top right corner and click on the "Options" box. This should generate a dro-down menu. (Javascript is turned on with your browser.) There should be a bunch of choices: Options > Track this topic. > Email this topic. > Print this topic. > Download this topic. > Subscribe this topic. Display Modes > Outline > Standard > Linear+ Try a different display mode.

This is just a guess: it sounds like you might have accidentally clicked on the Lo-fi version button at the bottom. Click on the Hi-Fi?Version? to get it back to normal.

Disturbing? I find it exciting and worthy of praise. It is a small light in a political darkness. What I find disturbing is an outsider making it a one-sided issue. I am sure there is more than one Muslim school in the UK. As an outsider, it sounds like you are generalizing and the first thing I think is: there must be more to the story. Also, I think your question is irrelevent. I will explain. Let us say the answer to your question is: Muslim schools can NOT be as welcoming to Jewish or Christion pupils because X. The next thing I wonder is: What the hell can X possibly be if the example in the opening post (Muslims attending Jewish school in the same country) exists?? Surely X can only be a ridiculous reason. I do not care what the reason happens to be. The Jewish school that permits Muslim students is enough to convince me that ANY ANIMOSITY between the two peoples throughtout the ENTIRE WORLD is non-religious crap.

I will not blame you. Believe it or not, I am becoming open to the idea that if a government crowds out all of the private sector services, you as a consumer should not be blamed for participating in the resulting government monopolized market. In my town, the local PUBLIC library went from lending books to lending audio cassettes to lending VHS to lending those huge Laserdisks and Laserdisk players and lending CDs and lending DVDs and guess what? All of the media are scratched. One by one, I have seen local used book stores and video rental stores gradually go out of business. We frantically subsidize ourselves left, right and center into oblivion. The socialists will tell you that it is a chicken-before-the-egg issue: the government is pre-emptively fulfilling a demand that the private entrepreneurs could not successfully on their own. Of course it is a bad example of people getting something for nothing. I am not claiming that the free-market can solve the "problems" of all people. My claim is that a free-market is justice. If a transaction requires a coerced-market to occur, that transaction is wrong similar to how theft and murder are both wrong. As a result, we presently have dumb people who are out of school subsidizing smart people in school. That is an injustice. Two things: 1) Why are government subsidies essential for your goal? 2) What is so great about your goal? Three things: 1) I said scholarships. Scholarships do not get paid back. They are a private subsidy that seems to scare people away from discussion. 2) Who cares about your "likely to default" comparison? What is the point of that comparison? 3) (Let us assume there is a good reason for your "likely to default" comparison.) Please explain the logic or prove your comparison. Your ability to read and combine your logic is illuminating.

Furthermore, a free market would not FORCE you to pay for somebody else's provider. The current system forces you through taxation to pay for other people's services. Yup sorry, it does NOT apply. Look it up. If you are going to use economic terms while presenting a pseudo-economic argument, learn basic economics or at least basic universal definitions. Part of the definition of a free-market includes that each agent carries their own costs. Look it up. You are connected to the internet, so you have no excuse other than the deliberate intention to deceive. What you are talking about is the Marxist definition of Kapitalism or modern-day cronyism. Once a business (or a consumer) gets the help of government to strike a deal that would not otherwise be freely made, it is not a free-market. You are misusing the term. Go learn economics.

Poor analogy. Banks lend money secured by an asset (the vehicle). That means the bank's risk is a lot less because it can always seize the asset if the loan is not paid. Students have no assets and no income and would be unable to get financing unless someone (i.e. the govt) is willing to guarantee the loans.Two things: 1) Some creative variation on disability insurance (we could call it "career" insurance) might fill that gap but unfortunately the government has crowded that market out. 2) More importantly, I would say that is proof-positive of Aug1991's previous assertion that there is very little justification for subsidizing post-secondary education. So, we are more productive but nobody wants to freely front the money to the smart people? I just got a bright idea! Do you think maybe private post-secondary schools would give out scholarships to attract smart students? Just a thought. [Maybe I should patent it before anybody tries to steal it. Just an other thought.] A fair way to have stupid people subsidize smart people is through scholarships. The dumb rich kids will see their tuition fees rise to pay for the smart poor kids. If there are still smart poor kids out of school because they can not afford it, too luck. Somehow, part of me finds forcing poor dumb kids to subsidize poor smart kids a little unfair and a little worse than tough luck.

The term "free-market" is something you do not understand and you are misusing the term. Find a different word. Your understanding of my position is completely accurate. Do you really want to know more about my vision? Nobody can say what will happen under a free-market. My best guess is that that women who can not pay for their abortions (or any other health care) themselves would receive them for free from abortionists (or any other health care provider) who want to volunteer their services. [There is value to doing pro bono work. However, today, since the government forces things to be free, being privately charitable does not stand-out much at all.] Nevertheless, if I am wrong, I do not care. You asked about private insurance. My vision does not involve forcing people one way or an other way. I do not endorse stopping people from getting any type of insurance they want. Furthermore, I do not endorse forcing insurance companies to provide every type of insurance imaginable. It sounds like you would find yourself with the conundrum we face now.

You conveniently omit the pay for it themselves part. You do not know what a free market happens to be.

Leave it to the free market. Those who want it are free to get it (and pay for it themselves) from those who want to provide it.

Canadians pool their money to support things we all want.Can you give me one example where ALL Canadians can agree to such a funding scheme? Simple: the state should get out of it and leave it to a free market -- but freedom is not what we want. We want abundance.

You take other people's money to pay for what YOU want.

What do you think, CA?My response is incredibly simple because I treat abortion in the same way as I treat ALL public services: they should all be privatized. My thoughts on abortion are the same as my thoughts for our universal health waiting-in-line care and our education system and all of our public services: I do not think we should be forced to pay for them. We should each have the choice to opt out. So, in a discussion of abortion, you can only say it is the women's choice that matters if the women is the only one who pays for her abortion. As it is now, abortions are funded from taxes. If your pregnant women had cancer and needed cancer treatment, I would say the same about the cancer treatment. That is convenient. Let me know when it is open because I can not wait for the ride! I do not think we should have tax-payers pay for universal access to waiting lines. What a joke. If that is the case, I suggest that all of the women who desire abortions pay for them out of their own pocket and then claim the deduction on their income taxes. If your joke of a statement was true, my proposal should be accepted.

Social conservatives? What is that? Anyway, you are all to the wrong left on the freedom scale. I can get along -- so long as you do not force me to pay for somebody else's abortion. Can socialists accept a deal where people are not forced to pay for things they do not want?

-- et si on se compare avec le reste du monde, on verra qu'a la grande echelle internationale, le Canada est franchement pauvre en culture. Neanmoins, au Canada, chaque province a sans doute sa propre culture. Parcontre, au nivau politique, je ne percoive aucune difference profonde parmi les provinces. Je ne doute pas les differences regionales au nivau culturel mais j'examine le desir de l'autodetermination. It etait un fois, j'avais de l'espoir. J'avais de l'espoir a cause du mouvement independentiste au Quebec. La separation du Quebec, creera certainement une decentralization totale de notre fameux gouvernement federal. Mais au fond, je voit maintenant que la majorite des Quebecois veulent un Etat plutot qu'un pays. Les Canadiens de chaque province en veulent aussi. Les liberaux, les conservateurs, les souverainistes, les je-ne-sais-quis et les je-ne-sais-quois ne sont que des couleurs d'automobile. Le monde veut toujours une automobile, mais on en change de temps en temps. Il faut comprendre que je ne suis pas patriotique et je ne m'allie pas avec le Canada pour des raisons culturelles. Dire que je suis "Canadien" vous dit seulement mon lieu de naissance et rien de plus. [Honnetement, j'aime le Canada parce que sa geographie est tres belle et sa population est assez gentille.] Je vous demande: qu'est-ce qu'y nous retiens ensemble comme Canadiens? La folie de M. sansFeuille nous laisserait a croire aux grands reves ideologiques yadda yadda yadda heritage chretien yadda yadda yadda loyaute a la reine yadda yadda yadda mais moi, je dirait plutot qu'il n'y a rien que l'hazard de l'histoire. Nous restons ensemble parce qu'on se permet de voler de Pierre pour donner a Paul. Au fond, c'est ca notre identite et pour le preserver nous nous soumettons a l'etat Canadien.

Maybe they shouldn't be. Or rather, maybe they can't be.I believe they can. No, it is very different. My view holds freedom to be sacrosanct -- a concept that reflexive socialists have trouble accepting. The answer is YES and only the aborted people need to die. I have a better way: let pregnant women choose and pay for it themselves.

I agree. Given that everybody is free to have a difference of opinion on it, the next responsible question is how should the different opinions be balanced?

Geof, Have you ever heard of "cronyism" before? Politicians are not oblivious of their supporters and how they ascended to power.

Why not subsidize BOTH parties (educated and uneducated) equally??? Ponder that. You are suggesting that since the higher educated people will go out and stimulate the economy by spending more with their higher incomes, the waitress and the bank-teller benefit. That is an excuse and not a justification for why uneducated people should subsidize the academic class. Stealing from the poor to give to the rich. Shame.

Yes, life is very funny but our joke is on us. No. There is a big difference. You neglect to mention that the cops hold a violent monopoly on their employment. Furthermore, their employment is a monopoly on violence. Say what you want about whites or blacks or arabs or asians or whatevers, but we are not forced by Our Divine Edict to do business with them.

Je perd mon espoir... nous sommes prises dans cette federation. Ca me deplaise de le dire mais les Quebecois se distinguent de moins en moins des resto-Canadiens. Oui, ils sont certainement une societe distincte mais ca ne durera pas longtemps. On ne veut pas un "juste society" mais l'illusion d'une etat securitaire derriere laquelle on peut se cacher et c'est cela qu'offre le Canada aux Quebecois. Ca me degoute. Qu'on s'en fout des differences qui separent les Quebecovillageois et les Montrealais et les restoQuebecois.

In that case, maybe we should all stay in school for the rest of our lives! We would all become soooooo wealthy!

Nothing is obvious. Chances are that she was confused but it is not wise to make too many assumptions. From the news accounts, she clearly made an effort to increase the chances of her newborn kid surviving -- compared to being aborted. Canoe NewsA post-secondary student away from home? What more freedom does she need???