Saturn

What's a troll?

Sorry - my mistake. I read in another post that she had won her seat - she actually lost. However, it appears she is currently employed as a Professor of Finance, at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops, British Columbia. Her career does not appear to over. Why? I have hired engineers in the past and I would have no qualms about hiring the guy if his technical experience and work related references were good. However, I could see him having problems if he was a mediocre engineer. If that is the case then his career might have taken a dive anyways given the blood letting in the Ottawa high tech sector over the last 5 years. I don't buy this you have to ask for 10 times what you want crap. The court is supposed to award amounts based on what is justified given the loss and the precedents. His 'opening bid' should have zero impact on the final award. If it does then that means there are even bigger problems with the system. Good for her - she was able to get back to work. As for Arar himself, something tells me that after a year in prison and a couple of years in and out of courts and inquiries, his skills may be a bit rusty. Of course many people would still hire him but then you'd have to deal with all the nutcases in the company - every company has at least a few and they will be convinced that their lives are in danger with him being around and there will be just no end to it. On top of that the guy looks so depressed and scared that he probably needs a psychiatrist right now more than a job. Anyway, his compensation is less of a concern to me than the fact that the RCMP/CSIS send off Canadians to be tortured overseas. Changing this is worth more than $37 million.

Reported!

Ruined careers - hardly. His wife rode the coat-tails of this tragedy right into parliament. If she is half-way competent she should be able to hold on long enough to qualify for the MP pension plan after 6 years. She has no further claim on the public purse. As far as Arar goes his career is hardly ruined if has the technical skills to go with the title then he should have no problems finding an equivalent job now that he has been exonerated. That said, I did not say he should get nothing - I said $1-2 million would ensure that he and his wife never has to work another day in his life. Early retirement should be more than enough to compensate for any pain and suffering - especially considering the fact that they are still capable of working. The idea that people should be entitled to lottery ticket style payouts because of 'pain and suffering' is absurd. I don't know what MP pension plan you are talking about. I didn't realize people other than MPs qualified for MP pensions. And Arar's career in Canada is over -probably the same goes for everywhere else. $37 million is too much but you have to sue for 10 times as much, so that you get one-tenth of what you asked for. Ya, you sit in a Syrian jail for a year and then tell me that you are not entitled to anything for "pain and suffering".

I don't know much about the issue but handing out cash left and right is not the best way of doing it. I'm thinking more along the lines of forking some money over to the provinces and to employers to create enough daycare spaces and then using some sort of an income based approach to distribute the goods. Something along the lines of a refundable tax credit with a clawback for families with working parents - in other words, if mom and dad make $200K each, they don't need financial help and if mom works while dad sits at home watching sports, then they don't need support either. In other words, only parents who have to work to make ends meet should get support. On the other hand, the supply of daycare spaces is insufficient and often the quality is very low - the provinces will have to get their hands dirty in order to change that.

You beat Harper for this instantaneous flip-flop. It's not ok for the teachers' unions to negotiate a $50K salary for their members but it's ok of the medical associations to negotiate $300K salaries for their members. The only conclusion here is that you've either had a change of heart or the teachers are asking too little.

Geoffery, I know this will sound condescending, but it is not intended to be. You are young, and are not yet a parent. When you are, you will see that as a parent, you see your kid differently than any one else. People who work in child care develop strong relationships with the children in their care, but they are not the same as the relationship between a parent and their child, nor should they be. Parents choose the way they raise their children, and influence them in ways their caregivers can't and shouldn't. Working parents are just trying to provide for their families, which is not an abdication of responsibilities, but rather an acceptance of them. If I was a woman I would want a man to be an investment banker so he could provide for me and my family and I wouldn't have to work so I can raise the kids. But we are Canadians. We are poor and working poor. We have to work. Daycare is not a choice, but a must for most people. I notice that stay at home mom thing is still super big in the US. Seeing that you are not a woman, you should hope that you marry and investment banker so that she could provide for you and you wouldn't have to work and raise the kids. I hope this works out for you because with all the whining I've heard from you, you are not going to do that well in the workplace.

Even if they spend less time with their child than their favourite local government employee? In case you aren't aware there are 168 hours in a week. If a child spends 40hrs/wk in daycare, that still leaves 128hrs to be spent with the parents. Even if you take out 8hr/day for sleep, this still leaves 72hrs with the parents. That doesn't include vacations which parents usually spend with their kids. Enough of this bull about the government employee. Or are you saying that kids shouldn't go to school because teachers are government employees? That's nonsense.

Pff, you expect that under Harper

He did some reforms in the senate by appointing an unelected friend a senator and a minister responible for over $10 BILLION of our tax dollars. That was just 2 weeks after he got elected on a promise of an elected senate. His promises for fixed election dates are worth just as much - 0. Hmm, I seem to remember ministers participating in scrums and answering questions, MPs having blogs without being thrown out of caucus and occasional free votes. Even this small display of democracy is now gone with Canada looking more like a banana republic whose dictator makes all decisions single handedly than a democracy. It's funny that Canadians are so proud of living in a democracy, yet when the party of their choice gets into government, all their democratic values fly out the window and all that's left is the desire to impose their minority views on everyone else. Pathetic!

Harper promissed he would do things differently. And he is! He's taken even more power away from our representatives - they can't even sneeze without his permission. I've never seen such clampdown on free speech and free thought. I think that voters believed that Harper meant a move in the other direction when he said he'd do things differently.

Just one more example how Harper's undemocratic tactics are stalling the work of parliament. MPs are elected by voters and they have to work out their differences and do their jobs. Instead, Harper has decided to run the country like a king, causing a complete stalemate in parliament. All policies are designed by the PMO and our democratically elected representatives are shown the door. Read it and weep. http://www.garth.ca/weblog/2006/12/09/committee-interruptus/

I'm not a cheerleader for any political party, I actually want to have an actual debate on issues instead of always dealing with people who refer to party policies in order to formulate their own beliefs. I'm actually considering getting a Liberal membership, I just hope that all Liberal's aren't so naive as yourself and think they are holier than thou. They did think that they are holier than thou because of an oposition made up of incompetent nuts. Now Harper is giving them the opportunity to feel holier than thou again because he is a fruitcake and it doesn't take much to be better than him. He is setting awfully low standards.

Yes, the NDP electorate is so pleased with Harper's undemocratic and sleazy tactics that they would rather vote for a party they don't like than a party they hate. My guess was a liberal minority due to NDPers voting liberal but now it's starting to look like a liberal majority. Thank Harper for that.

I would like to see some penalties put into the system to discourage people from asking for absurd amounts of money in damages. According to my calculations $1-2 million dollars would allow the guy to retire and never have to work again provided he continued to live the middle class existence that he lived before the incident. Any amount above that is simply greed - most likely because some lawyer is working on contingency.I was thinking about a formula where the amount demanded is divided by the amount eventually awarded. If this ratio is greater than 2 then the gov't should charge the lawyer representing the claimant a penalty equal to 1/2 of whatever fees they charged for the case. His reputation was tarnished, his wife also ended up jobless as a result. Now everyone knows both of them and neither of them has any good job prospects. Given that he is an engineer with a Master's degree and she has a Ph.D. in finance, your estimate of $400-$500K is a pathetic underestimate for how much two ruined careers are worth. Add to that compensation for the pain and suffering they both endured and you are looking at many millions of dollars of damage caused. I'd like to see all of it come out the RCMP/CSIS budgets and the pockets of the particular idiots involved in this. No country hands out false "information" about its citizens to foreign governments like Canada does. Our own government is acting as an enemy of its own citizens when its job is to protect us. This is outrageous and I want everyone who had anything to do with it fined and fired so that their idiocy cannot harm other Canadians.

Systematic genocide has nothing in comparison to a friend of al-Qaeda operatives. Example? google.ca

Yes, he should be very surprised because Canada was his place of residence for a long, long time and because he had Canadian citizenship and that's where he was going. He couldn't have known that the RCMP had given the americans a pile of bullshit about him. On top of that, it's the Canadian government's responsibility to defend Canadian citizens, not to assume they are guilty and send them off to torture overseas. We don't torture even convicted murderers. If you got in trouble overseas, you'd expect help from Canada, no?

When 6 million jews were murdered by the nazis, there must have been some reason for it - no way they were innocent. The amercans have deported plenty of people to plenty of places whether they had dual citizenship or not. Ther Arar case became better known because he was tortured. The conclusion here is not that you should renounce your previous citizenship, but that you should not go to the US. As far as the amercans are concerned, every foreigner is a terrorist. Just like every muslim is an al-qaeda operative according to you.

Oh so basically a fundamentalist with dual citiizenship plays with heat, gets him self accidently on fire, and now $37,000,000 of our tax dollars is going to make him and his family rich so Harper can by votes from the Islamic community. Sometiems things make me angry but it's rare. This makes me real angry. We should have got him, his brothers, his sister, his mother, his father, his grandparents, and his children, wife, other wife, and distant cousins and GET THEM THE HELL OUT OF OUR COUNTRY. Man you should take some sort of anger management program/treatment.

And so is OJ simpson. I don't think this was all just some accidental coincidence. I just wish we would send him and all his distant relatvis out of Canada. Just Please Arar leave the country. Please. I feel like taking a sign outise Parlement with 5 foot high letters saying "Arar Go Home!" You know, you should really do that. Then you should eat your sign.

That can go for longtime immigrants as well. Jewish Americans continue to fundraise for the state of Israel. Based on helping others of the same religion. My ancestry is Ukrainian, Polish and Czech, not Israeli. So you are a damn commie who is here to destroy us all

Are they refugees or immigrants? If they are immigrants, they are required to speak English or French. They also require to have a doctor's examination. If an immigrant sponsors a relative in, they have to pay the government to do so. They are also on the hook for three to ten years for their financial needs. Nice try. Seniors being sponsored in are now no longer required to take English testing. Volpe did this to grasp for votres nearing the end of the election so that rule has been changed. If you are marrying or common low then you don't need to speak english at all. Lol.. I mean your being rediculous.. Have you been a china town? And there are exceptionsto the rules about the 3-10 years. And don't you dare tell me that they pay the gov't to do so becasue at the end of the day we spend 2.5 billion on immigration. They DO PAY fees yes, but we pay 2.5B to fund the dept. And Harper and Dion will keep lifting fees to get votes. You know, you don't really understand the demographics of your own country. You don't understand why the Liberals are even sitting in Parlement. You don't understand the real reasons why the Liberals are ahead in the polls. You really have your head in the sand when it comes to your own country. You are so fixated on immigration, you should sit down, write a letter to the PM and tell him to kick out those foreign-born evils from his caucus and the country, starting with: Rahim Jaffer, Alberta Conservative - came to Canada as a refugee from Uganda Diane Ablonczy, Alberta Conservative Tony Clement, Ontario Conservative and Minister of Health Steven Fletcher, Manitoba Conservative Nina Grewal, British Columbia Conservative Inky Mark, Manitoba Conservative Deepak Obhrai, Alberta Conservative Daniel Petit, Quebec Conservative Myron Thompson, Alberta Conservative Vic Toews, Manitoba Conservative John Williams, Alberta Conservative Then sit down and write a letter to Tony Clement demanding that foreign-born people not be eligible for health-care. http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/parliame...ml#foreign-born

There are many dimensions to everything and in the real world people do whatever they believe is best for them and whatever they think they can get away with. In this case, the medical associations have positioned themselves well to get away with quite a bit. I just find it rediculous when people are so inconsistent on similar issues and will argue on different sides simply for ideological reasons. haha unreal. If you have a grad degree in Economics then it's high time you got out of school and experienced some reality. It is obvious you are up to your eyeballs in theory! Those damn medical associations running a conspiracy! I mean if only the Dr's WANTED to help us then the system would work! Holy cow! That's freaking awesome! The internet is awesome! You are awesome! In the real world getting a 10% increase in heath-care for a 60% increase in cost is bad value for money. In your world it's a good deal. Something's wrong with your reality.

What's the occurance of this theft of GST/PST? I can't imagine how one would get away with it for long. When a business files it's return, the tax people would be all over it. There is say, 100 invoices that charged GST, and the company reported only 30 GST sales? Busted. I don't see that happening much. . I studied this very issue a while ago and I all I can definitively tell you that it happens a lot more than you would think. Especially in smaller businesses and especially with the PST (which has more rates, more exemptions and is generally more complicated than the GST). Enforcement is generally more lax provincially than federally too. But in both cases a lot of people get away with it even if they get caught.

Yes, but there is also more than one side to the same story. Generally, productivity benefits from having as many people working as much as possible. Investment is very important, but so are workers and you want to have the right combination of capital and labour. Furthermore, there are a lot of negative side effects from having a lot of people being poor and sitting around (they can make themselves a real nuisance) but that's a whole other topic. And you may want to let people avoid taxes sometimes (just one example was the early 90s when the NDP gov't in Ontario cut sales tax audits down to almost zero - businesses were having a hell of a time with the recession and letting them evade some tax was a way of helping them get through it without changing the tax rates which are generally hard to change), yet another topic. So as usual the short answer is "It depends." You have to take a lot of other factors into consideration to get the whole picture.