Moonlight Graham

The news has to be reported, yes. But yours is the typical narrative, where each side sees themselves as the "victim" and the other side as the evil monster. Plenty of evil monsters on either side.

Because you always seem to blame & criticize the other "side" without doing the same for your own "side". Bud is to Palestinians as Shady is to Republicans.

No my fault since i never made that clear before.

I think the world should start taking a blind eye to both Israelis and Palestinians until they both start to grow up and act like civil human beings instead of babies fighting over a sandbox. That region isn't even worth our time. I'm tired of reading about this problem in the news and everywhere else because parts of each group has hateful, vengeful narratives against the other. Bud, you're part of the problem, not part of the solution. Grow up.

I want him dancing in that parade with his top off and a coconut-bikini on, flapping his gonads around in crotchless chaps with gay men rubbing oil all over his body...AND LOVING IT!!!

Let me be clear that I'm not advocating what I've been saying, I'm just pointing out how to grow our economy and that it is exactly what has been happening, and what will continue to happen unless there is some kind of change in our attitudes. What we are doing raises our standard of living, but at the expense of exploiting people in developing countries and letting them work in conditions and wages that we in Canada would consider immoral and disgusting and a violation of human rights and certainly laws we already have, such as health/safety laws and minimum wage. We exploit labour and resources all over the world from developing countries because we can, and it's disgusting, and Canadians clearly have a double-standard about human rights (those we secure for us, those we crap on for "them"). We should ALL greatly thank those in developing countries because we owe our high standard of living in great part to them & the price they pay.

What's "corporate" about it? Who do you think employed those now unemployed former manufacturing workers? Corporations did. I don't even know what's "right wing" about what I said either, frankly. It's reality. I'm not dreaming of creating anything. It's been happening increasingly over the last 30+ years. It's here, get used to it. Let me ask you, how much do you think you would pay for most of the things you buy if they were all manufactured in Canada/US, or any other western industrialized country? Workers here make around $10/hour at least, plus any benefits (and auto workers make MUCH more). The average Chinese manufacturing worker makes about 50 cents per hour. That difference is included in the price of what we pay for manufactured goods. As for the unemployed, well, maybe some of them can start their own businesses, while creating some jobs for others. My uncle did it with a grade 10 education & was very successful.

I didn't say it is good right now, i said it will be in the long-term. There is going to be a period of tough transition when the old manufacturing jobs are lost (which were completely unsustainable the way they were, given the ridiculous union demands) and new job opportunities that must be created. Jobs that can utilize the value of the human intellect rather than the less valuable "elbow-grease". If we want to grow our economy and raise our standard of living, let the Chinese/Indians etc. be our worker bees, while we design & own the hive.

That's not the fault of the Chinese etc., they make what we tell them to. It's the fault of rich countries who wish to make products with inferior materials in order to make prices cheaper and make more profit. The quicker products break, also the quicker the consumer has to buy a new one, increasing profits even more.

I never said anything about us going to be better off because we are less diverse. Diversity in a country's economy is very important, i agree. In the long run, we can make up those manufacturing jobs in other areas. It's much better for us economically if we have more people helping to run businesses that design these products (using their intellectual capacity), and let developing countries like China manufacture the products we design for cheap.

I would make an educated guess that it's the meltdown of the North American auto companies and super-cheap manufacturing in China and elsewhere. Blame globalization and greedy auto unions. Longterm, North Americans are better off for the loss of manufacturing jobs in North America, despite the real short-term pain of the unemployed. It means better and/or cheaper North American autos and cheaper goods overall.

If someone gave that to me, I'd put it up in my home. It's funny IMO.

I'm thinking this should be handled like any other piece of private property that could be searched, like your wallet or car or a briefcase you might be carrying. I don't know the laws in Canada exactly, but wouldn't you need a warrant to search these things? As for my Facebook account, I would never let an employer or anyone else have my password. If they asked for my password I'd only let them maybe if they let me search through their drawers at home haha.

Well good for Ford. Surprising move indeed! Is it just for PR & votes or does he really mean it though?

Sounds like a good book worth picking up. I still haven't even read Decision Points yet.

I think MacKay is skating on thin ice. Leaving politics is way too harsh, but I think he's getting near the point of needing to switch ministerial positions with a fellow cabinet member.

I'm with him too, I hope they get the message. Iraq should prove to them that the US doesn't bluff on these kinds of matters. I think they'll get the message, but they may be willing to ignore it and keep going with the nuclear program, who knows. It's probably up to Iran now to either stand down or prepare for war. I didn't read the articles of congress Derek L posted, but this could be just a preparation for the US in case something happens (like Israel starts a war, or Iran ups the stakes), not necessary a foregone conclusion the US attacks if Iran continues its program. Ahh who am I kidding...

Yes. If they don't, they lose their jobs to someone who does spend, spend spend! Ultimately the voters caused this problem. Many people have no idea how to manage a credit card, let alone a country's balance books.

"Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice, without constraint." - Alexander Hamilton

I think they must have known some kind of al-Qaeda-linked activity and personnel were inside the compound. They didn't have hard evidence like a photo/video/piece of mail that showed OBL living there, but probably a good deal of evidence came together to point to him highly likely being there. Maybe they knew of some of his wives living there, and/or they intercepted communications going to the building that would point to a high-level al-Qaeda living there. It's like having a photo of your friends and someone is cut out of it. You obviously can't see the identity of the missing person, but based on the other people in the photo, the location, the activity, and date etc. you can make a solid educated guess of who that missing person is.

But would anyone believe them (besides the conspiracy theorists) once the government spin-machine tries to legitimize them? They would have to have proof to show, but even then...

This. There are just a lot more men in engineering, computer science etc.

Really interesting story. Thanks for the link. I think the "courage" comment comes from the fact that it was a tough call, therefore it took balls to go ahead on it based on how it could have blown up in his face. Gates seems like a good Sec. of Defense. He is calm, logical, and doesn't seem ideological but more fact-based. A big contrast to Rumsfeld for Bush. I think it would be a bit hard to hide it if they didn't kill OBL, since if OBL was still alive he could put out a video saying "uh, hi there, i'm still alive!".

But are they any happier? Are they as fulfilled in their longer lives? I don't know the answer, but that's something technological/industrial advancement doesn't bring automatically. Western countries have seen so many advancements ie: rights, tech, standard of living - but there's so many people on anti-depressants it's ridiculous.

So if I work in the US for 3 years I'm no longer a citizen? That's not going to work. Just ban dual citizenship, be forced to choose one country and be done with it.