mikedavid00

Bingo. That was my point. The 3rd world has their reasons for having many kids. But in the first world it's a bit different. Eastern Europe have very low birth rates with some countries actually shrinking in population. Have you seen how these people have been living? How many kids do you expect people to raise in a 800 sq. ft. flat and no car? And those here saying they only want 1-2 kids.. do you really think you would want that if you lived in a house like this? http://www.exotictravelplans.com/images/mansion_logo_new.jpg I'm not sayign any of you can't afford kids. You all can. I'm suggesting that you can't raise them they way YOU WANT or in COMFORT. We're a Canadian couple who are trying to survive in the private sector, non unionized. We cant' spend 4 years out of work. We have no parental help here. We don't know who is going to help us. We're planning on getting a Filipino NANNY when we have kids if the price is right. Why? Because we can't afford to be away from work that long and daycare is wild expensive.

No they shouldn't. But seriously no one is better than anyone else. All Canadians should have a decent life no matter where they work. The lowest of minimum wage jobs should be for students and teens. Adults should still be able to purchase good sized homes if working at WalMart. And they do. I would put this to you: An American family with both husband and wife working at WalMart probably have more sq. ft. and property in their home than a Canadian couple with a degree who are working in the non-union private sector. If you want to have kids, you need to have the room. You need a home to house everyone comfortably. When you don't have money, you don't have the space to raise kids. Canada's policy of creatign housing bubbles, over saturating our education, over saturating our job markets, and over taxing leaves the people with a small home, no money, and not in a position to have more kids. You guys have got to let go of the Canadian mentality that we need to look to the gov't to socially engineer us. I know.. it's hard.. you've grown up with it. When there's a problem, lets look at Daddy Gov't to fix it for us. A credit here, a program there.. do you really think a daycare program with massive gov't unions and billions in more civil servants and even higher taxes are going to make us have more kids? But this is beyond that. The fact that we're not having more kids is a sign of how poor we've become. How lowly our lives really are. When a company has tons of money, it doesn't hire immigrant labor and part time contracts. When we live in 3700 sq. ft homes, we don't fill it with 1 child. When we have lots of money and cheap gas, we don't buy little 4 cylinder cars. Again, I would wager that in parts of the US, Americans workign at WalMart have a larger home and property to raise children than University education Canadians. Immigration is simply destroying our country and the lives of Canadians. Tommorow, 500 people will wander out of Pearson Airport with no jobs, no goals, no English, and no benefit to Canada. They will indeed have their life savings and down payment money for a home while they collect tax payer benefits to support their mortgage. The agreement is, they support Liberal. And that is the ONLY reason these people are here. SOMETHING NEEDS TO BE DONE NOW TO STOP THIS SLOW KILLING OF THE CANADIAN DREAM.

No they shouldn't. But seriously no one is better than anyone else. All Canadians should have a decent life no matter where they work. The lowest of minimum wage jobs should be for students and teens. Adults should still be able to purchase good sized homes if working at WalMart. And they do. I would put this to you: An American family with both husband and wife working at WalMart probably have more sq. ft. and property in their home than a Canadian couple with a degree who are working in the non-union private sector. If you want to have kids, you need to have the room. You need a home to house everyone comfortably. When you don't have money, you don't have the space to raise kids. Canada's policy of creatign housing bubbles, over saturating our education, over saturating our job markets, and over taxing leaves the people with a small home, no money, and not in a position to have more kids. You guys have got to let go of the Canadian mentality that we need to look to the gov't to socially engineer us. I know.. it's hard.. you've grown up with it. When there's a problem, lets look at Daddy Gov't to fix it for us. A credit here, a program there.. do you really think a daycare program with massive gov't unions and billions in more civil servants and even higher taxes are going to make us have more kids? But this is beyond that. The fact that we're not having more kids is a sign of how poor we've become. How lowly our lives really are. When a company has tons of money, it doesn't hire immigrant labor and part time contracts. When we live in 3700 sq. ft homes, we don't fill it with 1 child. When we have lots of money and cheap gas, we don't buy little 4 cylinder cars. Again, I would wager that in parts of the US, Americans workign at WalMart have a larger home and property to raise children than University education Canadians. Immigration is simply destroying our country and the lives of Canadians. Tommorow, 500 people will wander out of Pearson Airport with no jobs, no goals, no English, and no benefit to Canada. They will indeed have their life savings and down payment money for a home while they collect tax payer benefits to support their mortgage. The agreement is, they support Liberal. And that is the ONLY reason these people are here. SOMETHING NEEDS TO BE DONE NOW TO STOP THIS SLOW KILLING OF THE CANADIAN DREAM.

Why don't we have more kids? Well.. I'm a tax paying newly married Canadian who works in the private sector and who is not part of a union. Neither is me wife. We both have to work full time. We plan on having 2 kids max. I would be happy with 1 child. But why don't we have more kids? Lets talk about the REAL reasons. The reasons that do NOT incude the gov't. Lets sit back and immagine. To have 3 kids we need... - A big house. Not a 1250 sq. ft. semi that costs $400,000 all because immigrants come here, buy homes, and drive up housing prices. The house should have a huge, massive yard, large inside, huge kitchen and lots of space for the whole family. Something like this: http://www.move2raleigh.com/images/779471%20copy.jpg This home is 3700 sq. ft. and sold for $274,900 in NC. Ah yes.. maybe that's one of the reason why North Carolin'ins have more kids. Think that could be? - Good pay. A degree should garuntee you an above average, white collar job. Same with diploma. Hey that house above was $274k. That is for the laborers and factory workers. The people that went through the expense of education should be living in: http://www.usaens.com/images/dbwanner.com/...ages/266785.jpg You think I'm joking but I'm serious. This is the quality of lives that we SHOULD be living. Now. Suppose we had access to these home prices, and our pay was increased and TAXES LOWERED. How many kids would you have? Be honest. You would have at least 3. I know I would. When you allow +300,000 people into your country a year with free education and no jobs, when there is high unemployement rate, when there is too much education, and when every family buys a home (while not working), it does nothing but drives up the housing prices. The more people that buy houses in a specific area - The higher the prices. The more people that apply for a single job: 1) The lower the pay. 2) The more credentials are required. The more people come in, the more houses are going to get smaller, the prices going up, and the jobs paying less. Read that again. If you don't get it take your time to see what immigration really does in Canada: The more people come in, the more houses are going to get smaller, the prices going up, and the jobs paying less. When you live in a shoebox, paying a premium price, the LAST thing you are going to do is have three kids. Take more time off work, etc. etc because you are having trouble making ends meet. And so is your company. I ask you this: suppose you had a great job with benefits, a *huge* home (by our standards), an easy, high pay work environment with low unemployment, and no worries because your country passed laws that protected you. You were 'safe'. Your country didn't allow in 300,000 people a year to saturate the job market and create a housing bubble and higher taxes. How many kids would you have?

This issue's root cause is our family sponsorship immigration program. (70% of our immigrants) Nothing less, nothing more. It's a fact.

First, we really need a 'say anything' of 'off topic' forum. Anyhow, I work for a Canadian owned business with about 50 emplyoees with offices in Vancouver, Montreal, and our main office in Toronto. Like all Canadian businesses, we are struggling and have trouble making ends meet. After 8 years in business, I am sad to announce, that they have resorted to hiring on a contract basis. One girl for 3 months, another for 6 weeks. Both low paid, and visible minorities who are immigrants. They looked for cheaper labor and they found it. Lower wages, people taking jobs from Canadians. Enough said. Our dept posted a position for simple administration and got over 80 resumes. We were looking for people to simply put papers in folders and fwd emails, and got over half of the resumes of people applying with more than 1 degree. It's sad and pathetic just how diluted our labor market has become. The guy before me got paid $65k. I am doing probably twice the work and am getting much less than him. If they fire me and employ someone else, he will get paid even less. The difference between us is he entered in the work place sooner than me, and so goes the story. We let in too many immigrants people, too fast, and we allowed too much easy education which dilutes the degree. If everyone had a degree, it would be worth nothing in the market place. What makes it special is that not everyone has it. But if 98% of people had one, it would be required even to work at Tim Hortons. As a Canadian I'm ashamed that our company for the first time has gone this route. I will protest this when necessary to anyone management that I feel is interested. For the position on our team, I pleaded to just give the young uneducated Canadian girl in the warehouse a chance to wear some dress clothes and give her an 'office' job where she can file and such. As a Canadian it's the right thing to do. It's such a big thing to her, such a small thing to us.. But no.. they want to play resumes like sports and try to rate potential employees on degrees work experience when all the job is, is taking papers and filing them. See this is the Liberal mindset. Self hatred. Self destructive. And that girl in the warehouse, well.. she'll be packing boxes and getting low wages as we attempt to look for some 'highly educated' immigrant who has no clue what's going on, cannot proficiatnly type emails, needs constand direction, misses work, and is a general pain in the *ss. But oh my!! She has 2 degrees! One from Mumbai and one from UofT!!! Wow!

I feel the way to fix that problem is to simply allow tax payers to vote. You would also have to have paid taxes for 65% of the last 5 years. Evaid taxes, collect social benefits, are a civil servant and make a living off our tax dollars, then you get no right to vote becuase why the hell should you have a say on how our money is spent? Problem solved. Loud university snots and lame professors who never worked a day in the private sector do nothing for Canada except push agenda's down our throat and try to decide for us how our money should be spent when they have contributed NOTHING to do the bucket. We all chip in money for lotto tickets at work (we dont but it's an example). If a ticket wins, only the people who chipped in decide if we will keep the money or buy more lotto tickets. Sure, we can listen to ideas from those who did not chip in, but they get no official say. We decide how the money is spent. Look at it that way. Immigrants do not contribute, thus, they're vote is lost. All proportional reperesentation does is ensure an Islamic party of Canada and decorate our house of commons with 20 parties based down racial and religious lines. Is that what you want?

Lol! Goes to show your track record. Did you think people really care about the environment and want hire gas prices? That's what happens when you become a political hack. You lose sight of the simple things. I hold firm what I said about Rae.

Rae was much younger and voters are forgiving. Voters have a short memory. Because of ethnic voting, I believe Iggy will win the leadership race. He wants to have immigration applications online and increase people to 500,000 a year and have the non contributing family members here within a year. Rae is not liked in the Sikh communities and bus loads of Sikhs will sway the outcome away from Rae. All because Rae made comments to the Air India Bombings and the families. The Sikh's didn't like that. Rae will get fed up and possible join the Conservatives. The CPC will want Rae to run in his riding because he's a shoe-in and the first break into the city ridings they are looking for. Rae wone by a landslide a couple days back. A landslide. The guy just wins elections. The leadership was ethnically hijacked. If not, he would have one. He had almost everyone running standing behind him. Who can forget the crowed around him at the leadership race.

Yes I heard the very same thing also. Of course, you forgot the last thing he mentioned which was manditory voting. Look. In life, in Canada, in the world... well again, IN LIFE, we have to do things that we don't want to do. Voting is the most important thing (more important than paying taxes almost). Yes almost the MOST important thing is being given as an option? We have to fill out a census. We have to attend jurry duty. We cannot speed over 15km/h. The most OBVIOUS thing to enforce is voting. This ensures democracy. If 100% of people aren't voting, then special intrest are controlling the outcomes. Left or Right. (in Canada, as we all know, it's the left). I never realized this until.. Ok.. at work there were these two guys in accounting that were around 28 years old and thinking (nievely) that they could persway the outcome of ridings. So they made their way around work and spoke to people. Many to my suprise weren't voting! I'm talking the owners of the companies daughter and other white collars. They just don't care. Don't listen to the news. But when questioned about 'do you want higher GST' = No. Do you want higher gas prices = No. They were tax paying conservatives but since they knew before hand they were NOT going to vote, they didn't CARE to EDUCATE themselves on the issues. Also, the ads were not geared towards them... they were too "Harpers doesn't have it right.. he doesn't get it' sort of ads. That does not resonate with them. I hate to say, cutting $42 million from the 'arts' didn't resonate with anyone except some Quebec welfare cases who call themselves muscisions. Unfortunately, a Quebec music awards show was aired, 2,000,000 households tuned in, and almost EVERY muscisian on stage ripped Harper saying he was a boogy man and out to destroy Quebec. You have to realize. Our party platforms or so complicated that mainstreme voters do not get it and do not care. Ok.. i'm only saying this because I'm tipsy right now.. wow.. this is hard for me to say. The night before our election.. I was in the kitchen and my wife was making dinner.. I told her we were going to go out and vote and we discusses the ID and stuff (she's from MTL we just got married and doesn't have all her Ontario ID). So anyhow.. I was like 'who are you voting for'.... she pauses... and says 'whoever you want me to'. I'm thinking what the hell is this? I've spent the last 5 years bitching about Martin, Dion, the GST, immigration, etc. etc.! Even her Dad has many articles published in the Montreal Gazette, National Post, and McLeans being anti Liberal etc. So then I'm like.. "Who's the leader of the opposition!!" AND SHE COULDN'T ANSWER! And then I'm like 'WHO'S THE CURRENT PRIMINISTER!' And then she grinned and then walked out of the kitchen all emberassed and such. She was just kidding but still! But she came back in later and said it was a 'Harper Minority'. Then I said "Well who's the leader of the oposition". AND SHE COULDN'T ANSWER FOR REAL! She had no idea what either party stood for. Now of course she knew the face when she was it. But she knew she wasn't going to vote so didn't care. As a women, she just doesn't care. I just called out her now and aksed her what she's watching in the living room and she's watching survivor. That's her intrest. But I said look... "Vote for who you want to. It's your choice. " "The Liberals, we will have to pay more on gas. " "The Conservatives, gas prices will stay the same and he might stop immigration." It really is all this really comes down to. Not minority, majority, etc. etc. What do you think her choice was? A private tax payer who works hard each day like myself. But we both didn't bother voting. There was no point. Our rididng has been hijacked. We fealt alienated and like our vote didn't make a difference. There was an alien group of people from overseas who speak foriegn languages who banded together in their groups.. they vote one way together to pass the 50% mark that we have no control over. We knew it already and there was no point....... And so did the house down the street, and the other, and the other... etc. etc. We all did't vote. But we support these groups financialy to come here.. all through no choice of our own. What would happen if *ALL* the people came out and voted? All the 5 ppl at work that the conservatives lost votes. Right now Canada is being controlled by special polticial interest and should no longer be. Lets start manditory voting. If the gov't forces us to buy a licence to go fishing or we'll get a fine, they can SURELY do the same for something so important as voting. Mrs. Struggling Tax Payer: Do you want higher GST and gas prices? Yes or No. That's all this election really came down to. If everyone voted, I'm sure you know who the majority would have been. I'm sorry if people in Quebec don't pay taxes. In the rest of Canada we mostly do. And we support their sorry *sses.

That's idealistic. Ultimatly you are right. But in a realistic context, our 2 votes didn't help the Libearl landslide victory which we all knew was going to happen. I feel there are a lot of tax payers like us who know the same and don't even bother. I feel that you do not have democracy unless 100% of the people vote. Think about it. If half of that vote, it's not democracy, but rather people with special political intrests voting. For the mainstreme non voter who probably dosn't even know who stephan Dion is (yes that exists.. i whitnessed it at work yesterday. They watch CSI, Dancing with the Stars, etc. and do not listen to talk radio so honestly they have no clue who Dion is and sometimes even Harper), those mainstreme voters know these things: 1 - They do not want a raise in gas prices. 2 - They do not want a raise in the GST. 3 - They don't care about the environment (because they don't watch the news) 4 - They don't want to lose their jobs. 5 - They get no help for the gov't and do not use their programs. 6 - They dislike the social effects of immigrants and question why there are so many here. 7 - They struggle to make ends meet and get buy. Now. This is not going to be the average person on this forum. There probably isn't one person posting on this forum that first the above. Think of when you were 10 years old and had no clue about anything. That's how they are right now. Does dancing with the stars or Americas Got Talent interest you? No? So what makes you think watching CPAC or CBC intrests them? See, when you FORCE voting on people, there becomes yes and no campaigns that spell things out in plain English. Here's the grade 7 reading level 90 IQ questions and asnwers: Do you want higher gas prices? No. Do you want an increase in the GST? No. If we lost 500,000 jobs, do you think 300,000 should be coming in each year? No. Do you want Canada to set goals to reduce C02 emissions despite the fact we are responsible for 1.9% of world emissions? This will come at raised gas prices, and people losing jobs? .. ummmm.. NOPE! So it's not rocket science. When people are forced to vote, the mainstreme tax payer will understand things pretty easily. WE ON THE FORUM can over complicate the above for 100 posts, but it's really not needed. Here is the sort of mainstreme ads would we see during election. We can over complicate it, but See? Very easy and simple. Grade 7 comprehension level. Apply the same to GST, Immigration, etc. and the choice is obvious. (although the above youtube video was a bad example because that is actually debatable.. raising the GST isn't!)

My wife and I didn't bother voting again this time around. We live in a Liberal ethnic riding and there simply isn't a *realistic* point in voting. At work, 3 people we spoke to didn't vote becuase the don't listen to the news and don't care that much. However, after speaking to them, the didn't want higher gas prices and really didn't care about the environment becuase they are tax payers (not tax receivers like the CBC and civil servants). So there was 5 Conservative votes gone. It's very simple: Do you want higher gas prices and an increase in the GST? No? Then don't vote Liberal or NDP. Pretty simple for the tax payer struggling to get by.

Your Official Bob Rae Predictions. Will be referenced in future time to see who was right. Well anyone who knows how to read between the lines can see what's shaping up. Last night on CTV the split screen between Rae and Ignatieff. Iggy claiming that he wont 'entertain' or 'go near' the question while Rae faces the question. Rae also said that the Liberals will need to rebuild and is being more of a maverick. Iggy is being a loyalist to Dion. Saying things like 'how could you be so insensative' when being asked about Dion getting boot. Rae and Iggy are not seing eye to eye. Iggy seems to be strategisng and alligning himself with the Dion establishment. Rae is speaking how he feels and is acting more of a Maverick and making his position now. I immagine Rae was not happy about getting the plagerism bit. Rae seems like the type to hold grudges. Sikh's will racially hijack leadership in Iggy's favor (again). Rae will have had enough and seek other options. Harper will want to continue to lead. Harper knows that Rae will be a threat to him if with the Liberals *or* the Conservatives and will not take kindly to that. What is your prediction for the record?

That would be too balsey.. i dont see him doing something so extreme although I do agree with it. You want to see low voter turn out? Lol.. Who knows.. Libearl might get a majority because on the extremists will vote.

He's too stuborn to resign IMO. He doesn't 'get it'.. I could be wrong though. Did anyone see Bob Rae and Ignatieff on CTV? That was hillarious.

Yes how could I forget. He was the perfect one for the job. It fit his nitch very well. I'm amazed they stuck that with Rae. I'm sure there was a message in that.

You mean how fortunate I am to wait 42 days to get an MRI scan? Or how fortunate I am to get 52% of my money taken away to fund immigrants and civil servants who do nothing all day (except vote Liberal).

Remember that right before parliment was disolved there was heavy infighting to oust Dion from party insiders. Rae had to have the task of doing that whole speech plagerism bit and I'm sure he's not happy with the Liberals for that. You can tell he wasn't happy about having to do it. I heard him on the radio on the CBC and he just wasn't that into it. They should have stuck that with someone like.. darn.. forget his name.. the detective young guy who always paints some conspiracy theory against the Conservatives. Or Ruby would have been a much better choice. Sticking Rae with that bit was emberassing. There's a message behind everything

Supposedly polls show talks to join the US rather than full seperation. The oil revenues could make it a tax fee zone. The problem with that, is there would be TONS of businesses moving there and job creation so I'd have to move there myself

No I want Bob Rae as leader of CPC before he gets too old. Bob Rae isn't a finance minister, he's a leader. I would consider him to be the most saavy active politician in Canada today.

Bob Rae.

You're not going to make me spend a bunch of time to go and prove to you how the majority of recent immigrants simply aren't paying taxes are you?

Then welcome to the Islamic party of Canada taking 10% of the seats. Then the Asian Alliance Party Of Canada taking %15 of the seats. This is the reality of PR in Canada.

That's the problem.. we aren't given a chance. I've seen Canadian after Canadian lose jobs to immigrants. We had to take them on board and these people did not have a grasp on English and were nightmare employees. Very, very lazy btw. Not hard working at all. That was just my experience though. And heck, those are the minorities of them that are actually working jobs - most of them are not. THe first thing Harper needs to do is fix our immigration system. If an employer can PROVE he could not hire a Canadian, then he will be allowed to sponsor who he likes. They can work here for 4 years with 1 extension and then goodbye. He'll also need to buy health insurance at $150 a month. No kids, not allowed to buy property (yeah we'll be even stricter than the Americans).

Can you please prove numbers proving that false?