Charles Anthony

I do not know because I was not there.

I agree. People should say "a womanly President" or "a manly President" instead. I suppose they could say "a womanizing President" or "a manizing President" too.

You are making a very serious error in economic reasoning. By your logic, the more disposable income a person has, the more hot-dogs they will consume each day. Usually, one hot-dog is enough. Even more likely, they will move up the ladder and go to a sit-down restaurant and order a meal. The effect of a consumption tax on the hot-dog vendor is variable. The salient feature is that the hot-dog vendor relies exclusively on consumption for his income and his product is not a luxury item. Wait. Do you recommend that the hot-dog vendor charges customers based on your sense of equality?

Would you permit ANY form of household to income split? For example, husband/wife, wife/husband, husband/husband, wife/wife, mother/daughter, brother/sister, husband/mistress, wife/neighbor, friend/foe, master/slave, etc. etc. Not for everybody. Like I explained in post #177 up above, people whose income depends on consumption may conceivably see their disposable income drop. With a consumption tax, some people will win and some people will lose. Not really. Equal treatment in taxation would be: the same amount of money is extorted from each person. For example, total cost of government waste is $1,000,000,000,000,000,000.00 each year divided by $30,000,000 people = each person's tax bill. Bingo! That sounds equal to me.

Indeed, abortion is now an indicator of good health and well-being! SelfThe above is a perverted statistic. It can only be misconstrued. Are they suggesting that abortion is NOT birth control? Are they suggesting that contraceptive pills are difficult to access?

Wait a minute. You are writing like somebody who knows nothing about the history of writing. The reason cannabis was outlawed many years ago is because hemp is a cheap alternative source to making paper instead of from trees. That is the long and the short of it. The THC in cannabis just makes it a convenient scape-goat to convince people like you and to gain public support for cronyism. http://www.taima.org/en/fibre.htm

"Who to forsake?" indeed, seems to be the question. That is not the whole picture. There is a whole lot more to taxation than that. Ultimately, ANY tax chooses winners and losers. It is not enough to evaluate a tax by only looking at the people "paying" it at the cash. You have to look at the person on the other side of the cash register -- the person whose livelihood depends on people spending (or saving) money. Let me expand on your own example: "If you spend all you earn..." and consider a business-man who lives at the margin. A hot-dog vendor depends on consumption and a rise in a consumption tax will affect his revenues. [Granted, the simultaneous abolition of income tax may concievably send a lot more disposable money flowing onto the streets for the purchase of delicious hot-dogs but not likely.] If the hot-dog vendor currently makes ONLY enough money to survive and not enough to save, your consumption tax will hit him hard. Your consumption tax chooses him to be a loser. I am open to hearing some more noble purpose behind taxation that would rightfully make our poor hot-dog vendor a loser. [enter RiverWind...]

Technically, it does not rule out the possibility of a controlled demolition but for me, it is enough -- albeit, the only fact -- to tip (please accept the counter-pun) the odds of what happened. Finally, I am convinced that the Twin Towers fell solely as a result of the two planes. Thank you. Now, I am left with WTC7 which still looks too clean. Interesting... I think I might have it... PN008E, you started this whole thread with a challenge. Now, I have a challenge for you. CAVEAT: Bird-brained idea below... All of the Inside-Jobbians (myself included) should get our hands on the blueprints to all of those towers. Each of us could put our money where our mouths are and pitch into a pot. Raise enough money to buy some land in the desert, say, next to Area 51, and re-build the entire World Trade Center complex. The Outside-Jobbers could be invited to supervise and inspect and re-inspect the re-build. There would be no need to rush. We could invite every single structural engineer in the world. When everybody is satisfied with the construction, we send PN008E's remote controlled planes through the air and see what happens. If there was a conspiracy, we might even see it in whoever opposes such an experiment. Otherwise, I call The Truthers to stand down. I should give this idea a name.

Well... what is it?

I have heard of it. I do not believe it will happen.

Maybe we can get all of the anti-drug cops to change jobs. We could send them to schools and shopping malls to teach kids about how drugs make them losers. Pay them the same but get rid of the dangerous aspect of their job. I wonder if drugs or smoking cigarettes make you a loser. Could it be that losers have very little to do?

Yes, I do believe it is xenophobia. Judgement?? What judgement? I see you can not meet my challenge above. -- because the pretense was that they were consulted. That pretense was used as a justification. I would welcome it. I just would not assure him security. Where is the problem? The problem you pose is ridiculously unrealistic because a dictator would only come to Canada if there was a Canadian politician (read: person who has more civic control than you or I) licking his boots. Now, should we let 6 billion people into Canada? If I owned the ports, I would have a hard time doing that even if I wanted to do so. Airlines should not be permitted to dump people on "our" land, should they? That is the problem.

Seriously, do you not find it supremely odd that a tax-payer above the age of 18 years does NOT know what he really wants from a politician except for during the last week of an election campaign? For the life of me, I can not believe that to be true. If I am wrong, Quebec democracy needs a new fashion consultant. Anyone who can approach the campaign with an ounce of creativity -- maybe tell a joke (dare I say: tell it like it is) during the debates -- will win the election. It might just be me. However, like I said: I can not see any substance behind this election. Can you?

I will tell you Why not: small government is bad and big government is badder. I will believe that the Twin Towers will levitate back down from Mars and settle back in Manhattan before I believe this secret North American Union conspiracy.

There is a reason to kick out Charest: he is old and fat. He is competing against two young slick kids. I know that sounds stupid and shallow, but it is true. I have had just a fleeting exposure to the campaigns so far. The first thing that stood out to me is that there is absolutely no substance to this election. The parties unveiled their slogans and they all sounded stupid. [The Liberals are even making sure that their re-hashed slogan is in such small print that nobody can read it on their posters!] I believe this campaign will be based on appearances only. The only question is who is more attractive: Andre Boisclair or Mario Dumont? I say Dumont. Boisclair looks too much like he belongs in an Alfred Hitchcock movie. Dumont could pass off as a Perry Mason.

Yes, it is. Sprinkle in a little "due process" too to mask the foul taste of xenophobia. Personally, I do not give a damn what ALL Canadians would say. By the way, are you talking about 50%+1 or first-past-the-post or proportional-representation or clarity-act or.... what exactly are you talking about in this referendum? I challenge you Argus: put your pitch-fork down and come up with your own "know damned well" referendum question. I bet you could not even word it coherently. Are you up for this challenge?

Wake up call: these security certificates give power to very few Canadians and the rest of all Canadians are NEVER consulted. Keep in mind that is exactly what I am talking about. No, I would not. Unfortunately, people like you believe that everybody in Canada is one single person with the same opinion.

Great! So long as your tax rates are ZERO I think it is a great plan! [end useless sarcasm] First, I want to question some of your explicit assumptions and second, I want to question your implicit assumption. explicitly: Canada's competitiveness is affected by many things. How much of an impact do you think current taxation has? Why should government revenue be neutral? Instead of saying "I find corporate taxes very hard to morally justify" I think you should examine a moral justification of corporate status. You must provide an explanation for your hard caps and environmental regulation and green house gases. Your tobacco tax is complicated. It sounds like you want to eliminate a tax on it and put it back on -- after making some wildly convoluted assumption-laden calculations. Also, calling it a premium is comical. Dalton McGuinty would get a kick out of your proposal and the Ontario tax-payers will love you automatically. implicitly: Are you outlawing all other forms of taxation power? It seems like you are assuming there is one taxation power. What level of government is going to be your tax-man? [by the way, there is a moral level of government that can do it but we have been through that ad nauseum.] What are the provinces or the municipalities going to do? If all other levels of government still have the authority to tax willy-nilly, your whole scheme truly is meaningless. Sorry. [begin useless sarcasm again] Congratualions on re-inventing the wheel! Your taxation proposal already exists today. The only problem is that Canadians are saddled with other taxes too!

Are you talking about the Royal "we"? Who is the "we" that wants to kick them out? What do you mean by "our decision"??? I do not remember being consulted. I am sure the people who have the power to execute Security Certificates care about what you think. Admit it: this Security Certificate stuff is ugly. There are people -- we do not even know -- who have unaccountable power in Canada. Unfortunately, I believe we need to suck it up and accept that comments like this: are frighteningly valid.

That is a strong accusation. Nevertheless, judging by the way the entire Liberal party immediately shouted down (let me stress: Harper did not get a word in at all) any mention by the prime minister of the news article, I would say that the accusation should be directed at the entire Liberal party. The only difference between keeping a prisoner of war camp and keeping a person in some-other-prison-with-a-Sercurity-Certificate without charges is public knowledge that they exist. Dobbin, that's spin.Whether it is spin or not, it is certainly a worthy debate. I think you are wrong. The current events do not seem to support this dichotomy. The concept of civil liberties or Libertarian principles can not properly be applied to this Charter versus Certificate issue. Unless you want to strike down the Charter and the Certificates and the entire state, you can never to be truly faithful to liberty -- you will only be favoring liberty of some at the expense of the liberty of others. For those who support the Charter's "due process for anybody who sets foot in Canada" deal, they are forcing all of the citizens of Canada to pay for it. For those who want to detain or deport people, they making it their perogative to speak on behalf of every other Canadian and forcing them to pay for it. Bottom line: do not talk about civil liberties if you are going to hide behind the State -- unless you can rationalize why you should steal from Peter to give to Paul instead of stealing from Paul to give to Peter. Only defense?? Come on. That is lame. If the social policies and the Charter are the problem, change them. Now: which one is the bigger problem? How about we keep things simple and straight-forward. We do international trade with demonically repressive regimes. We even send our leaders to shake their leaders' hands. I have a question: what is the problem with letting "undesirable" Canadians into the country? If they have not committed crimes in Canada, leave them alone. What is the big deal? Are we sooooooo inept at maintain domestic security?

Whether the intensions of the Opening Post are as you suggest, I can not say. I believe the substance behind it can yield a valid discussion, albeit a short one: climate change is bad if you get the short end of the stick and climate change is good if you get the longer end. If there is "global warming" or "higher seawalls" or whatever, it will represent a redistribution. Period. In Antarctica, we may be able to grow sugar and bananas and coffee. In other parts of the world, coastal areas may be submerged and people will be homeless. The only room for morality is in identifying a man-made origin of climate change. Unless we are talking about anthropomorphic climate change, the concept of "good" or "bad" on a global scale is meaningless.

point of order: Condense your quotations. It is not necessary to repeat an entire post in a quotation. Check out these threads: NEW RULE! - Trim Your Posts, Please take the time to remove the bulk of the post your quoting Trim Your Posts and Quotes, Don't just hit "Reply" Using the [ Quote ] Feature:, Avoid using more too many quotes!

Like a sense of humor?

That almost sounds poetic. It also sounds like Stephen-envy to me.

point of order: Condense your quotations. It is not necessary to repeat an entire post in a quotation. Check out these threads: NEW RULE! - Trim Your Posts, Please take the time to remove the bulk of the post your quoting Trim Your Posts and Quotes, Don't just hit "Reply" Using the [ Quote ] Feature:, Avoid using more too many quotes!