Charles Anthony

Oh! Sheeshh! PNooB! Can I retract my previous post?!?!?Ironically, I object to water fluoridation but not because I think the state wants to poison us!

I am going to come to the defense of PolyNewBie here -- partly -- because your attacks are non-objective. A few years ago, I was curious and got mixed up with their "Canadian" branch. (I put Canadian in quotations because they just seemed Canadian until their schpeels and plees and platforms and requests for money came out. They seemed like a farm team for the Americans.) To sum up, I do not respect their politics mainly because they are exceedingly autarkist. The Lyndon LaRouche group is a political movement or party. Calling them conspiracy theorists today would be analogous to going back in time and attacking labor union movements or the CCF or the NDP as "communists" because they condemn the "capitalists" who are in control.

If my question is indeed silly, that means the original statement: "Morality is social consensus and the legal systems reflect that social consensus." from post #71 is nonsense. By the way, I had to look this one up: The serpent is held up on a pole to cure people who look upon it -- forshadowing Christ being held up as a cure for modern man -- or at least for those who look upon Him. Now, after spending a month trying to figure out its relevance, I give up. Please tell me the answer to this riddle.

Guys, on the off-topic of democracy, I would encourage you to tap into the following thread: Democracy, ... why bother? Your current discussion would lend itself well to it.

Guys, no need to be impolite. The irony: a thread warning us against trolling degrades into insults.

Throughout history, the "protect religious values" line has always been used as a pretext to justify violence. The tables have turned. That is new. Now, we are seeing violence being used AGAINST religious values -- as your cut-short-but-now-complete quote demonstrates. Did you cut it short deliberately? Without that last part, it is easy for people to say "Aaah! The religious people are violent! The religious people are bad!" after reading the opening post. Whereas after reading that last part, it is obvious that their freedom of religion is being subverted and they are victims of violence.

....and, WarWickG, what do YOU think of that? I will tell you what I think: those "senior church and political figures" have little faith. In fact, ANY religious group who violently defends their religion against non-violent (even if in their minds, they believe it is violent) "policies" is foul. However, your last quote was cut short. I will include the rest: Disallowing a person from wearing a religious symbol is a direct act of violence against that person.

Is that hard to believe? Apparently I'm missing out on something back East. 35 sounds really lazy to me. I work that on top of full time university right now and still have time to post here so it must not be much a burden.Reducing the work week..... The raging socialists want to eat their cake and they want to keep their cake... I love it! Froncois Mitterand: the authority! If people are unemployed, raise miminum wage to increase wages -- and create unemployment. If people are working, outlaw working --- and create unemployment. Great! Just great!

Attributing responsibility to the whole population for the actions of "elected" people who supposedly "represent" the population is ridiculous. You may as well blame me for killing a butterfly whose wings could have diverted a deadly hurricane on the other end of the globe. That attitude is irresponsible. Should YOU be responsible for AdScam?

Uh.... what do you mean by "intangible social values rather than pure economics." ? It is the interest of people to burn as much cheap fuel as possible. The purpose of a carbon tax is to make it cost effective for people to choose alternatives that emit less carbon.Not really. The purpose of a carbon tax is to place a cost upon the environment which is currently used for free. A lot less partronizing than telling those people that they should only be paid what the 'market' decides even if that is 0.50/hour.The "market" does not decide anything. People decide for themselves. The "market" is just a statistical summary of aggregate individual behavior. Minimum wage leads to unwilling and preventable unemployment. No. We need to eliminate minimum wage.

A 50-year old male prostitute with a boring name like "Mike Jones" does not seem like a candidate for anything more than 15 minutes worth of fame. Maybe he is just growing haggard of Haggard's hypocrisy. I would give Jones the benefit of the doubt about wanting to make the world a better place.

In the case of Bob Rae, the answer is NOT leading the country.

I think political careers depend on a lot more things. I would say it is also reflects who: - has nothing better to do - needs to feel important - is more entertaining - is willing to spend more time away from their family among many other things.

No it does not. That is your bias.

Everything you say is unreasonable because the U.S.A. is a country. Only people can be arrogant (or power freak or keep their word or whatever), not a whole country. Therefore, who exactly are you identifying as being arrogant (or power freak or keep their word or whatever) in your blame-game?

Not good enough. You said that "one killed people" and now I am asking you a simple question: How did Mike Harris kill people? You are twisting things around. You can not attribute any "government conspiracy theories" to me. If you think you can, please provide a quote. The findings do not identify Mike Harris as having killed people. Rather, YOU identified Mike Harris as having killed people. If I am wrong, provide a quote (I repeat: a quote, not a link to a multi-page wild-goose chase) that proves me wrong. I have a question for you: now that you find yourself resorting to the lame government-conspiracy-blame-game shtick, how does it feel? Ths is sad The Walkerton deal is a perfect example of how our personification of "governement" gets the best of you without you even knowing it. The raging socialists can not admit that the problem with Walkerton's water was the direct result of civil servants not doing their jobs properly. That would be like blaming Ronald MacDonald because of budget cuts when someone working at the grill sprinkled arsenic on the burgers.

I oppose capital punishment but I completely understand the sentiment: equating the crime of child molestation with murder. I am calling you on that "throw them to the prisons" statement. If you truly believe that would be appropriate, I have a better solution: publish their names and addresses and release them to the public.

from blueblood's Crack House Torched thread I agree. It might set a dangerous precedent and dis-incentive for crack-dealers to do business. It will be very interesting to see how the courts rule on the local vigilante's claim that they acted in self-defense. From the reports, this is my attitude: 1) Foremost, this event demonstrates what happens when the "government" monopoly on security and policing is inactive despite its illusion of being reliable. 2) The concept of "self-defense" is unclear at best and generally, meaningless in practice. 3) The crack-dealers should have known better. Who is right and who is wrong? In my opinion, the local vigilantes are in the wrong. Is this event democratic? In my opinion, yes. I want to know: why did the RCMP not intervene to prevent the crime?

Indeed! My original thread: Vigilante justice -- drug house burned by local residents

I just noticed this: I like it. It eliminates both a lot of discrimination and TONS of red-tape tax filing confusion. More importantly, it eliminates the dis-incentive to work more. A transition could be simple: gradually reduce income taxes and raise GST, user fees and enviro charges every few years. Politically, it might even be easier to sell the platform too. Now, comes the question: how stable or predictable would such a tax revenue be?

Come on. Do you expect the Premier to go down into Walkerton and do a civil servant's job??? The problem in Walkerton was the direct fault of civil servants. Other than holding the civil servant's hand, there is nothing the Premier could have done to be responsible for what happened. Or, is there an evil government conspiracy theory that I am missing?

Well, now, let us start with the first one: FigLeaf's clear definition of "society" So?? Which one do you want? or do you want the circular argumentative flexibility of having them all? The poll still gets 0 out of 3 until there is clarity.

No, it is not simple. It is ambiguous. I give it a 0 out of 3 until there is clarity. define: "society" "equal opportunity" define: "poor" and "wealthy" "ignorant" and educated" "isolated" and "influential" "opportunities" define: "success"

Why, of course! Next, we will have stay-at-home parents forced out of the home because they can not afford to work under-the-table for free. Exempt from taxation??? If you hire a maid to do your housework, she would have to pay income tax on her earnings. If you then marry the maid and she continues to do the same housework and you continue to give her money, all that money is exempt from income tax.The two situations are essentially identical except in the tax treatment. Family tax splitting will excerbate this problem. Those two situations are not the same as your original example. Your first example ("spouse at home and performs tasks") is not the same as your second (still-paid-newlywed-maid) example. Family tax splitting is unfair, but not because spouses work under the table. Yeah, you are right. My objection to taxation is solely reactionary. I doubt Satan himself could pull off a better trick than what we have now: everybody convinced they have a moral obligation to owe taxes. Are you ready to teach the entire voting population how taxes foul up and distort an economy? I am not. What would that salary be? Who is going to determine that it is fair? If I make $1,000,000 a year, should I be able to pay my spouse $500,000 for taking care of my home? No, it would not be a disaster. However, it is clearly a voting-buying scheme and it would not be fair.

Exempt from taxation??? That is ridiculous. The housework earns ZERO in pay and therefore, the tax owed is --- surprise, surprise: ZERO! No. It is like working under the table for nothing. According to that logic, maybe we should create fictitious markets and attribute dollar values to transactions that do not occur.