Black Dog

That would be the regions where there are a lot of Muslims. Would you expect a lot of Muslim-violence in an area dominated by Presbyterians?

Thanks for the valuable cointribution. Whatever. I'm sure you'll be talking next about how some of your best friends are queer.

I don't think so. The manpower and resources used in the course of the investigation, bust, detention, and legal wrangling will all be on our tab. If the law mandated, say, slavery, or complleld Jews to wear yellow stars of David at all times, or gave police the right to use deadly force to stop traffic violations, would you agree with that because, hey: it's the law? Probably not. Laws are tools to ensure the smooth operation of society. Some of them work. Others do not. The point of the law is to serve society, not the other way around. And when a law does more harm than good, creates more problems than it solves, and simply doesn't make sense, citizens have a moral obligation to stand up in protest and, if neccesary, disobey unjust laws. Marijuana prohibition is a prime example. And, in my opinion, blanket acceptance of the law is a recipe for totalitarianism.

No doubt that would be somewhat of a surprise to the US troops in Afghanistan. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I didn't say they abandoned it completely, did I? Nonetheless, resources were siphoned away from Afghanistan to Iraq. Sure. Just like the Soviets. And the British before them. And so on and so forth back to Alexander the Great. How did that work out?

Trial-and-Error: after that post, you can bogart the bong any time.

can_con: given your concern for Canadian soveriegnty, it may interest you to know that the Canadan contingent in Afghanistan answers to U.S. brass. While the operation is being conducted under the NATO banner, the NATO contingent answers to the Supreme Commander in Europe, who is always an American general. What's most disturbing is the fact this whole operation was signed off with no public debate as to the role of the Canadian Forces, what level of effective operational control the U.S. military will have over Canadian Forces, what the protocol is with regards to prisioners of war (I for one don't feel comfortable with Canadians handing folks over to Uncle Sam for shipment to Gitmo) and so on. The U.S. cleared out of Afghanistan to pave the way for their Iraq invasion. Why are we fighting the Yanks' war?

Here's my idea: Hawk should try calling a black person a "nigger" and then see if he can explain it was not his "intent" to be demeaning before his head hits the concrete. I think its pretty clear from Hawk's posts that he's not using "queer" in the same way a gay person would, but he is intending to be demeaning. It's not uncommon for traditionally marginalized groups to co-opt the terminology of opporession as means of "re-claiming" the word for themselves. That's not to say such reclamation removes all associations from the word. In other words, it's not a license for use of the word.

I think the more likely scenario is the report in question will be carefully reviewed by the Vice President's people and vetted so that it indicates Iran is 10 minutes away from launching a nuclear strike on Branson, MO. That would be consistency.

Iran 10 years from nukes: report

Because the differences are so superficial. If Alberta's culture is so distinct, it shopuld be easy to define. But i don't see a distinct language, religion, or other customs here that other Canadians (with the exception of Quebec) don't share.

Again: it's Marc Emery. And yeah, sure. Who did he hurt? As near as I can tell Emery is an entrepeneur. Blanket support for "The Law" is great in fascist dictatorships (as an aside, I find the law and order fetish among conservatives to be distinctly at odds with their suppossed belief in personal freedom and limited government), but it's important to question why the law is the way it is. If there's no rational reason for maintaining cannabis prohibition (something the cops and governmenet tacitly acknowledge by selectively enforcing the laws), then the law itself should be reconsidered. Especially a law is as fatally flawed and demonstratably ineffective as prohibition.

I think what he did was highly relevant. If what he did was not against Canadian law, then the U.S. can't extradite him. That's the question. Why "scumbags"?

Woops. O'Neill was seceretary during Bush's first two years. That's were that came from. O'Neill In any case, I have no doubt Iraq was on the agenda before 9-11 (The PNAC also laid out schemes for regime change before 9-11). But the fact that the invasion was fait accompli regardless of the results of any negotiating nullifies any diplomatic efforts. Diplomacy was clearly a dead end from the word go, so to accuse France of being obstructionist is to ignore the basic facts and to stretch the definition of diplomacy beyond its breaking point.

Most of the countried involved depend on the U.S. for aid and financial assistance. Would they bite the hand that feeds them? Twist my arm If some poor bastard gets shipped to Iraq and subsequently gets killed, what does that have to do with whethe rhis country was a key contributer? I look at it like this: the countries in the CoW have about 10 per cent of the world's population. What's more, in all but a few of those copuntries, public opinion was solidly opposed to unilateral and even UN action. No your analogy is bogus. The reason the contribution of such powerhouses as panama are overlooked is because they make no differenc eto the success or failure of the operation. This was an American show from the start. And again: I've already showed that France, Russia and China had serious misgivings about the quality of the U.S. intelligence. There was no consensus on Iraq's WMD capability. In other words: you're wrong. I'll take hatred over being consistently wrong. Um..simply stating something with an air of certainty does not make it the truth. The testimony of former administration officials (including Paul O'neill and Richard clarke) stating that Bush planned to invade Iraq almost two years before 9-11 would invalidate your conclusion. As for Chirac, well, okay. however: this: is only correct if the intent of diplomacy was to ensure a war and not to disarm Iraq. This would indicate that the sole objective of the U.S. in going to the UN was to give their attack a measure of credibility. Therefore, the invasion was a unilateral fait accompli before the U.S. even went to the UN. the facts,a s revealed in the Downing Street Memo for example, would indicate that was the case.

Can we also lay the myriad failures of conservative governments at the doorstep of Klein? No, it's nt a reasonable comparison to make. You claime dthe alternatives here were worse. I say there's no basis to this claim, given that neither the NDs or the Liberals have formed the government in over 80 years. BSE baiolouts that went priomarily to big U.S-meat packing corporations and agribusiness instead of independant and struggling farmers and cattlemen. An example of Klein corporate welfare. ATB: in 1994, the ATB granted West Edmonton Mall millions in loan guarantees, financing that was arranged under the direction of Klein and his cabinet and resulted in taxpayers taking at least a $155 million hit. We're talking political meddling, bribes and mismanagement and, ultimately, a lack of accountability. This isn't hard to figure out: Alberta has a population of 3 million people. 1 million live in Calgary, 1 million live in the Capital region. That's 2/3 of the population in urban areas. The plural of anecdote is not data. How can one prove such a thing as culture? You'll note, at no time did I indicate Canada was culturally rich: only that Alberta is as culturally barren as the RoC. Alberta is not a distinct society. Yet you support Ralph Klein? What makes you think an Alberta giovernment would be any less "socialist"? You clearly don't know what you're talking about. Global oil production is expected to peak within the next 5 to 10 years: that means supply will diminish. The tar sands won't matter for a number of reasons: first, tar sands extraction requires over five times more petroleum products than regular heavy crude What's mor eis that the tar sands have about 300 billion barrels of oil in them: more than Saudi Arabia's reserves (which are diminishing), but only enough for about 10 years at current global consumption rates (which are increasing). And that's assuming that all 300 billion barrels are extractable. So it seems to me, you're whistiling past the graveyard.

Except Emery wasn't traffiking weed: he was selling seeds, which contain no THC. That would be like the Yanks busting the local greenhouse for carrying poppys.

GostHacked: True, but evolution is both a theory and a fact. The fact and theory of evolution are two different things. The former describes the process which states all living things are derived from common ancestors and have developed over time to form new species. The latter speaks to the process by which this occurs. Whle there is debate over HOW evolution occurrs (be it through puncuated equilibrium or Drawinian "trial and error", or some other mechanism), there is no debate over the fact of evolution. Uh uh: you claimed: Which is patently false in that there is no "science" that disproves evolution. The onus is on you to show otherwise. Carbon-dating is still used to estimate the age of organisms and objects (but not the earth, as there's many different lines of evidence that can demonstrate the age of the earth as being 4.55 billion years old). Since the half life of carbon is known (5,730 years), by estimating the amount of carbon within an object or organism (the proportion of carbon-14 in any living organism being constant) and counting how many carbon-14 atoms in any object with carbon in it, we can work out how old the object is within about 50,000 years. Bollocks. Scientists have established the fact of evolution with thousands of lines of evidence and the work of hundreds of thousands of researchers. This idea is based on material evidence and repeated experiment, extensively documented in the scientific literature. Science classrooms are no place for religious instruction, especially given the paucity of scientific data and support for "intelligent design" or other such creationist pseudoscientific folderol. Which is why carbon dating is not used for determine the age of things older than 50,000 - 60,000 years. Other methods (stratigraphy, radioisotope dating) are used to produce reliable ages.

Bring what on? You're claiming there's more scientific evidence gainst evolution than for. I call bullshit. So it's your job to step up. And evolution is proven, inasmuch as the weight of evidence for it is so immense and so thoroughly documented. In any meaningful sense, evolution is a fact.

I really doubt that. But let's have it anyway. Given your inability to distinguish scientific theory from hocus-pocus, this should be good for a chuckle. Again:

But since neither the ND or Liberals have formed the government, you can't prove that statement. Sure: BSE bailouts, ATB loan guarantees, lost gas royalties, Gary Mar's "consultants", Rod Love's juicy consulting contracts, auto insurance consultations with the insurance indiustry, the game farm fiasco and so on and so forth. Most of ALberta is rural? Alberta is far more urbanized than both Saskatchewan and Manitoba. More than 2/3 of the population lives in urban areas. Rural ridings have populations that are on average 25 per cent smaller than their urban counterparts, yet they have the same representation in the Legislature. That's skewed. Well I'll be: 12 per cent and one seat at the height of the NEP backlash. But you claim separation is growing, yet the seperatist party garnered just .5 per cent support in the last election. How does that fit your thesis? I have had more hazardous encounters with hayseeds on Whyte than I ever had in my infrequent trips to Woody's for a beer. You're sterotyping Albertans as being Conservative lovin', gay bashin', God-fearin', rural folk. I'm an Albertan and I am none of those things. Nor do I know anyone who is. And I grew up in small town Alberta. As for culture: Canada is almost 140 years old. Alberta is just 100, so there goes that argument. Culturally, Alberta is no different from Saskatchewan, BC or Manitoba. First: you profile says you were born in 1985, which makes you 20 years old: how the hell would you know what Canada was like before Pearson? You're not even old enough to remeber Trudeau! How do you attribute the crime rate to the Liberals? The crime rate peaked in the late '80s during the Mulroney years. So one can't really pin such things on the government of the day. As for the last bit: are you suggesting that the Republic of Alberta will discriminate against it scitizens based on their political beliefs? In any case, I'd be willing to place a bet that the bottom will fall out on Alberta's oil-based economy long before seperation becomes a reality.

Sure, but at the end of the day, negotiations won out. If the two superpowers can negotiate over something that serious, surely we can negotiate with Denmark over something as small as a barren island in the middle of nowhere. I too am a strong believer in Canadian Soverigntry. But I'm afraid we have more to worry about from deep integration than we do from maurauding Danes.

Yeah: by intercepting them and turning them back, not blowing them out of the water, as you said. In the end, the crisis was resolved when the U.S. agreed to pull it's missiles out of Turkey in exchange for the Soviet withdrawl from Cuba. Wikipedia is your friend. Where?

No. Because that would have led to a nuclear war. Do your homework.: No Soviet ships were attacked during the crisis. Remember "Freedom fries"...? Aw forget it. Invade Greenland with what troops? This is a first. Me, "pro American". Gotta save that one.

Let's keep terms like the War on Terror and the invasion of Iraq seperate, shall we? In any case, you are incorrect vis a vis France's intentions: French President Jacques Chirac said he was willing to accept a one-month or two-month deadline for Iraq to disarm, provided the move was endorsed by the chief U.N. weapons inspectors, while Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin did not rule out the use of force. His position, diplomats said, reflected apprehension among a number of council members that the Bush administration wanted support for war next week, choosing a timetable based on when the weather was best for the US military. So France did not say it would veto any resolution on Iraq, only those mandadting the immediate use of force: their stated view was that weapons inspections needed more time. But the U.S. wanted its war right away.

By who? And do what? Bomb Greenland? Change the name of Copenhagen chewing tobacco to "Freedom Chaw"? Please. There were no Russian ships destroyed during the missile crisis. Sorry, you don't know what you're talking about.