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Michael Hardner

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Posts posted by Michael Hardner

  1. Well, PP is full of shLt and turning into Trudeau 3.0 with the politicking ... but boycotting brands is getting to be ridiculous.  Bud Light can pay a trans person to drink their beer and you not drinking it won't make trans people disappear.

    WestJet is an airline.  If you don't take it you have a bargain airline or Air Canada.  Do yourself a favour and stick with WestJet.

    • Haha 1
  2. 1 hour ago, CdnFox said:

    1. most of our problems can be solved just by normal vision, if trudeau would ever stop to clean his woke glasses he'd see that  :)

    2. Now obviously he's not going to talk about what his plans are at this stage. 

    3. But he's already laid out the broad strokes remove bureaucracy and red tape which hinders our development and productivity cut taxes strategically to encourage Investment and productivity gains, push the provinces and lead the country when it comes to new housing builds, reduce and target immigration to make sure that we don't bring in more people than we can support and the people that we bring in are useful. And obviously work towards a balanced budget again in time.

    4. There's nothing radical there. Terribly fancy. Wasteful spending and manage your budget. Don't follow ideology over facts

    5. He'll do fine. People are already turning to him. Happy hard once he gets in to make positive changes. He will look good if he just doesn't screw up every other day compared to Trudeau.

     

     

    1.  Ok.  So how would PP solve inflation, disunity, climate issues, growth & trade challenges for example ?
    2. Agreed.
    3. "red tape" is a kind of buzzword that pure wool politicians use.  Yes, maybe there is something that can be done here but the devil is in the details.  I have heard that word used before, I want to know more.  Also tax cuts require service and/or program cuts - what is going to be cut?  And Immigration cuts is something I could support but that will bring other problems for the economy.
    4. Ideology is just public-image-building - on both sides of the coin.
    5. Your assessment is very high-level.  It sounds like business as usual back to Chretien: small changes, and mostly manage perceptions and politics.  

    Edited to add: If Canada is SO screwed up why do we only need minor changes ?

    • Thanks 1
  3. 51 minutes ago, myata said:

    1. Economy and politics cycles are common in complex modern societies. Still both internal and global challenges are pointing at a new period of uncertainty ahead of us. Trying to outline the possible causes short of trying to make any predictions.

    2. The humankind (and West as its most prosperous collective faction) appears to be failing in a) renewing and b) advancing the prospects and working social and economic models for shared, universal prosperity. Much data in the West over the past decades on the contrary, indicates the reversal of the trend with increasing concentration of wealth and stagnating, if not falling general standard of living. A contributing factor is the apparent failure to renew and modify the economic model, eliminating job security as the basis of general prosperity in many sectors and for large part of the population.

    3. West, as an exemplar of democratic organization of the society failed to live up to its clear declared principles, over many, many unholy actions and compromises. Examples just too many: a company brutally clears up a patch for mining employing thugs to "convince" the population that it's good for them. Well, guess what, the story that will propagate throughout is the face of the collective West, as much and probably more, than all the wise thoughtful words. The little innocent trick, it's not us, they are "private" doesn't make a dent in it. Still your face - and the impression on the people. That fact can be of course used against it, creating uncertainty and mistrust in the world, influencing stability in many ways.

    4. World, with collective West as its leader over the last generation, failed to establish functional and working international mechanism(s) of security. So the first time it was tested in a serious way, a failure. So back to square one. More uncertainty. Over many, many examples over centuries we can clearly observe that basic security is a necessary foundation for all forms of progress. No solution yet, in the third millennium.

    5. West, but probably a general trait of humanity to avoid, actively and stubbornly any proactive thinking and action is failing to renew and update the democracy, constantly making it more responsive, effective and closer to the citizens contributing to creation of universal prosperity. Once the governments are far enough from the population, it's back to the old us and them pattern and the ritual may not matter anymore. We are short of new ideas, and prospects. And it cannot be hidden from the world.

    Probably more.

    1. I like the idea of looking at causes, as it removes morality and looks only at cause and effect.  But you should lose the premise that there are 'cycles' because it's not exactly like the seasons: long periods of peace followed by periods of war of varying lengths don't constitute a cycle.  But let's see what you've got here.

    2. Good start.  I would say that employment security is seen as a 'cost' to investors.

    3. It sounds like you are talking about mining in countries outside the corporate HQ, eg. Canadian companies in S. America.

    4. First time ?  Gulf War I ?  9/11 ?  Russia invasion of Afghanistan/Ukraine I/Ukraine II?

    5. The ideas come from the investor class, with the assumption that wealth will trickle down and that the folks working double shifts and sleeping in their cars in the parking lot will wake up gleeful when they hear about Stock Market gains.

    This is pretty good, but it's a lament.  But ... really can we expect much more ?  The conservatives and NDP will soon fuse, I fear, and make some kind of Liberal anti-matter behemoth.  If they care about the environment it might be ok though.

    Thanks for an original and thoughtful post myata.

    • Like 1
  4. 31 minutes ago, Nexii said:

    1. ... it could definitely get there.

    2. It's a shame that parties don't set their own term limits on leaders. 10 years or something, it's very hard to win after that long in office anyways.

    1. I don't see how.  Maybe the hormones question but 'segregated areas' ... bathrooms and changerooms ... we have more important things to discuss than that.  Municipalities can deal with it.

    2. 5/23 PMs have been in office more than ten years.  Only Chretien this century.

  5. 6 hours ago, Nexii said:

     

    Going down the social issue path will be their ruin. 

    I find it hard to imagine that with the scale of challenges facing the country, the issue of informing parents about pronouns with be a leading issue in an election.

    People are sick of Trudeau's face and voice, so it's time to rotate the chairs again.

    That's good for Poilievre.  What's bad is that his snappy insults won't help with Canadians' expectations once he gets in.  And unless he's hiding some huge new vision from us, or maybe the wars, economic, environmental, trade, demographic, and health challenges will just disappear the honeymoon will be short.

    • Thanks 1
  6. 3 minutes ago, Queenmandy85 said:

    The CBC resolution was voted down so the CBC is safe for now.  

    Wait what ?  Why didn't that get more coverage ?  That's a big deal...

    Of course that was also a major idea of his so it leaves the question of what is he offering other than "not Trudeau"...

    • Thanks 1
  7. 39 minutes ago, BeaverFever said:

    The info in your OP is misleading. France has a universal public system. On the service delivery side not unlike Canadas where service is mostly privately delivered but publicly managed

    There is a cultural difference, which needs to be pointed out.  Management is focused on delivery and management, I would say in continental Europe.  Canada's system is top-down, politically driven, and unable to change.

    For a person who defends the status quo, I would say this system needs drastic reform.  If we had good management of public resources, perhaps we could trust some privatization to happen without dropping the ball for the public on the whole.

    I lived in France and the services were superior, much better than the slightly higher expense indicates.

  8. 4 hours ago, Moonlight Graham said:

    1.  Not sure what that has to do with the CBC. 

    2. The post popular news org in the country shouldn't be owned by the government, it's insane. 

    3. There is no good reason for CBC News to exist.

    4.  Canada's news media landscape is a joke, its centralized newspapers largely owned by a single owner, plus, government news plus a handful of other outlets.

    1. Because the media landscape is lacking, as you point out in #4.  One less player, with a national and not corporate foundation would not improve things.

    2. I think that you aren't reading my posts.  I already pointed out that every country does this.  If it's insane then ask yourself why.

    3. Because delivering content to a geographically dispersed nation is a service that isn't always profitable yet still necessary?  Because journalism is a necessary foundation for an informed public and corporate sources don't care about that?

    4. So you want to eliminate another large source of reporting.  That doesn't help.

    Every source is biased, the question is more about how objective they try to be.  Does the source issue retractions?  Do they abide by peer council conclusions?  Do they provide alternative perspective l, provide depth, analysis, further the cause of informing the public?

     

  9. 3 hours ago, Moonlight Graham said:

    Because they're ideologically biased, and thus propaganda.  Whataboutism is not a valid argument.  State-funded news broadcasting also inherently carries a conflict of interest.  No healthy democracy should have a state-funded news organization,  

    All of them do, all countries.  They are biased towards status quo whereas corporate media are biased towards corporate thinking.

  10. 56 minutes ago, WestCanMan said:

    Seems like it's trolling the school board, gov't, and leftists in general by exposing the fact that individuals can now put their sexual perversions on display for children and we all have to play along and act like what he's doing is normal. 

    I'm not upset with the reaction of "the right" at all: what that guy was doing wasn't done "because he just knew in his heart that he was actually a woman and he had to live that life or he'd forever live in torment", he had another reason and everyone was forced to play along with him, including children.

    People 'on the right' were correct to state that what he was doing had no place in our schools. 

    If we all saw pictures of that guy at a pub during Octoberfest most of us would say "That guy's hilarious, I hope he gets some D."

    The things that conservatives condone/expect in adult scenarios and the things that we condone in front of children are completely different. That's where we differ from leftists. 

    I guess the outrage was legitimate, but the whole thing was a sideshow in the end. And it had nothing to do with actual policy, it made no impact or changes on how these things are handled in the future. In the non-lying version I mean.

    Looking at this another way, the right actually solved the problem by bringing so much attention that he was shamed out of his ridiculous act.

    • Like 2
  11. 5 minutes ago, bcsapper said:

    1) You mean the right was trolled?  I don't know what his motive was, but I would need some convincing that he woke up that morning and thought, "I know what I'll do today.  I'll troll the right..."

    2) I don't think anyone bought his story.  (What was his story?) Many said he should have been fired, or at least sent home to rethink his accessories,  and many decided to look the other way.

    3) Think the greater part of the US congress ignoring Trump's indictments.  It's kinda like that.  You know it's there.  You wish it wasn't.  Maybe if you pretend it isn't you won't have to deal with it and it will go away.

    1) Yes but I don't think that was the teacher's aim.  He wanted to troll the system and was successful to a point.

    2) The tabloids believed him, it seems.

    3) Ok, but if a member of Congress is silent on the charges I wouldn't assume they're pretending to ignore it.  There are plenty of reasons for not commenting.  Even Democrats should be careful with commenting.

  12. 9 minutes ago, bcsapper said:

    1) Was he a fake woman teacher when he got out of his car on the first day?  I think that's my point as much as anything else.

    2)  It was what you were saying.  We differed on the reasons, remember?

    3) By pretending to ignore I mean putting up blinkers and pretending it's not happening, as opposed to just ignoring it, the way someone might do the CFL if they were an NFL fan.

    4) I do remember.  I think it was on the other site.  No matter, my points from that argument stand here too.  The systems, the bureaucracy, etc., would have had no problem firing this guy if it had not been for the politically charged nature of his actions. Fake woman.  Here's something I can agree with you on, and something I think this incident shows to be true. 

    5) A man is not a woman just because he says he is.  It ought not to be problematic to state that right away.

    1) I thought you were addressing my point about whether the left was trolled successfully or whatnot.  Pretty obvious he wasn't a woman at this point.

    2) I said that the left seemed to ignore him and the right bought his story.

    3) I still don't get how this works.  If the left ignores something, you could look at that and still say they're pretending to. You could say that they actually care, actually believe him, but unless you have evidence it's supposition.

    4) I agree that they would have no problem firing him for a different matter altogether.  How do you apply that to this kind of issue?

    5) in other words, people lie and the system has a lot of trouble figuring it out.  People also lie about sexual assault, harassment, and such.  It throws the system into a problem when these things happen.

  13. 8 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

    My impression is that UK healthcare spending is considerably lower than that of France by most measures:

    https://www.health.org.uk/news-and-comment/charts-and-infographics/how-does-uk-health-spending-compare-across-europe-over-the-past-decade


     

    Here are the 2022 numbers

     

    France just ahead of Canada, UK significantly lower.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_health_expenditure_per_capita

     

  14. 8 minutes ago, bcsapper said:

    1. I would have to see some outrage from the left to change my position. 

    2. I doubt very much that the "left" just chose to ignore him.  The left is no more a homogenous group than is the right. 

    3. I would be willing to bet there were a lot of people on the left pretending to ignore him.   

    4. I suggest he should have been fired as he was getting out of his car on the first day.  Or at least, told to go home, change, and stop being so bloody stupid or he would be fired.

    If you disagree with that, why do you disagree with that?

    1. So you don't see any outrage from the left then? That's seems to be what I was saying.

    2. Find some leftist groups, or maybe posters on here, that Express support for him other than the generic restating of policy.  Something that says they believe this story, that he was actually a woman who needed to wear those ridiculous prosthetics.

    3. What is pretending to ignore it? You either make a comment on something or you don't.

    4. I already commented on this, and now we're not talking about the latest events but rehashing posts from before.  You can go to search those out but my point I think was that systems, and layers of bureaucracy between provincial government, Ministry of education, school board, unions etc. would not have had any way to detect a troll in the situation.  I think I suspected they would either wait it out, or try to do nothing.

    They pretty much did nothing and were rewarded, thanks mostly to the right wingers who were duped by the fake woman teacher.

    • Like 1
  15. 55 minutes ago, bcsapper said:

    Yes, I was.  As I said, the school board didn't decide to hide from this guy because they thought everything was hunky dory.  Fake tits are just another accessory, like a backpack or a pencil case.  They hid because they were terrified of the backlash if they said and did the wrong things, without even knowing what the wrong things might be.

     

     

    How does that support your statement that the LEFT was scared of him?

  16. 11 minutes ago, bcsapper said:

    No, just a common sense assessment.

    Do you have any cite that says the reason nothing was done was due to them just ignoring him?  Nothing to see here?  Lets just get on with the school day?

    If you tell me you honestly believe that the school board just decided to ignore this fool because they figured it wasn't worth worrying about I'll believe you.  I just differ, is all.

    When you're talking about what was done question then you're asking about the administration. I thought you were talking about the left?

    My speculation on the school board's actions is based on what actually turned out to be true. That there was no way for the system to assess a troll.

  17. 16 minutes ago, Rebound said:

    In fact, governments do not fail because of bankruptcy. 

    Bankruptcy is a specific term, so what if we asked if governments fail because of economic conditions? Such as Weimar Germany?

    The other thing I want to say is that Soviet communism collapsed, but so did American capitalism of the 1920s, and so did the New deal, and so did neoliberalism.  Humans tend to try things and then to improve on things that have problems.

    If you compare the governments of today with those of 50 or 60 years ago across the globe, you'll see some similarities including Less direct state ownership, more personal Liberty but at the same time more monitoring and a different kind of control. Consumer culture has grown by leaps and bounds, and the bi- polar Global political structure has broken down.

    Look at china, russia, the us and the west.

    We are evolving towards a kind of centralist consensus.

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