Moonlight Graham

I agree.

I just don't agree with this, because the humans who interpret what other previous humans translated from portions of a book that was written by other humans who tried to remember oral stories as told to them by other humans about what other humans interpreted from what God "said" say that gay marriage is wrong.

I see the argument for free speech over spending limits, i just don't agree with it. Democracy > free political speech for large corporations The U.S. is a plutocracy 1-2-3 hurray!

Wow didn't know Lesnar married Sable. I love her she's mad hot! Yeah Lesnar is entitled to his opinion. Never heard of "malfunctioning equipment" complaints in our hospitals before. But a few years ago when i went to the ER & wait-times were GARBAGE, like 4-5 hours for me, then when i finally saw a doctor he literally told me to take a couple of tylenol and go home. The next day i had to go back and was admitted for over a week. Our healthcare system isn't perfect for sure, but some of our problems have to be looked at through the lens that we are next to the U.S. which has a private system and rakes in the dough. So many of our doctors/nurses have left for the U.S. for more money, and this certainly has contributed to the some of the wait time and quality of care problems, as well as the ability for anyone to find a GP here. If you want to look at universal healthcare & its effectiveness, go look at the different European countries instead for a better comparison than Canada as we are in quite a unique situation. I'm certainly rooting for gov't-run universal healthcare in the U.S. because it would mean the Canadian system would imrpove. woo-hoo!

Before the proroguing, Harper polled 10 points higher at around 38%. That's about the same % of Canadians who voted for him/his party last election. The CPC is polling at about 29% right now, which is about the same as Harper's ratings now. So that's about consistent all the way around.

Good lord man, a generation??? No way, things can change very quickly in politics. I'm not a "Liberal", i don't affiliate myself with any party - actually i think they all mostly suck, but i think the ideology of most Canadians falls into left-of-center, which is Liberal Party territory. I think the Liberals are therefore the natural governing party of Canada federally (as much as i hate to say that), unless another left-of-center party comes along. It took a huge sponsorship scandal to knock out the Liberals from their decade+ reign. I sense a lot of people want to vote Liberal again, but the leaders since Martin have just been garbage and people seem somewhat content with a Conservative minority right now. But get a decent leader for the Liberal Party and there's a good chance to see a Liberal majority within 2 elections.

Overall, yes. There are many instances in some places where development work over the decades in the global south has done more harm than good. However, overall we in the West have improved the quality of life for those in the global south since development became an official project of the U.N. and many contributing countries post-WWII following Europe's decolonization of the global south. Some statistics, according to the United Nations Development Programme: 1960 to 1987: Life expectancy in the global South increased by a third 1970 to 1985: literacy rates up from 43% to 60% in the global South 1965 to 1980: Per capita income increased on average 3% per annum 1960 to 1988: Under 5 mortality rate reduced by 50% There are still many horrible problems facing most of the world's population, but the situation is significantly better than it was. Damn those dogooders!

I have to saw that i agree with you somewhat. On one hand I am proud of Canadians and seemingly all these people in the West who are donating money to Haiti and seem genuinely concerned about the situation and want to help. I'm a bit surprised how strong people's reaction to help has been. The last time one a big natural disaster hit a developing country, i believe it was a tsunami somewhere in south Asia several years ago, and people donated to the Red Cross and it was a big deal in the media, but it didn't seem quite this big of a deal. Maybe it's because Haiti is closer and hits closer to home? On the flip side, i'm wondering where these people have been? As my signature refers to, about 9 million children under the age of 5 die every year of preventable causes (mostly from malnutrition, disease, and lack of clean water/proper sanitation). A billion people in the world live on less than a dollar a day. Why does it take a flashy disaster to get people to care, when horrors are happening to a tragic amount of people every day? I wish more of the worlds' brilliant minds were concentrating on helping solve the many problems of development rather than how to make themselves more money or how to build the next deadliest killing technology.

What a ridiculous thing to say!! First of all, anything anyone ever does can be called "self-interested". Name me one act a human can do that isn't self-interested, and i will gladly spin your same logic back at you. The majority of people who help the poor do so because....they want to help the poor. Does it make them feel good to help a another person? Yes, it's supposed to. It's called being a decent human being. If there were a lot more "dogooders" in this world, instead of people driven by money/greed, power, intolerance, revenge etc. then this world would be a much better place. You are lost.

A weekend, a season, a year of hot or cold weather doesn't suggest an overall global warming or cooling trend. You need years of accurate data to see a trend, and even then current science and lousy computer models can't predict the future 10 years from now. Let alone 50-100 years!

I can't even begin to imagine the horrors that the people of Haiti are experiencing right now. My thoughts go out to them.

How exactly does Insite "enable" drug users??? The logic is very simple for this facility. The drug users bring their own drugs to the facility. Insite provides clean needles to prevent the spread of disease, and medical supervision so they don't OD etc. If Insite did not exist, these drug users would still do the drugs, only with dirty needles they get from other homeless people, or simply find a dirty needle on the ground. Many dirty needles litter the sidewalks of that drug-infested area, and Insite regularly cleans/sweeps up the dirty needles that are in front of their facility so drug users don't use them while waiting for the sight to open in the morning. Does anyone really think these drug users would not be using these drugs if Insite didn't exist? Insite also has people the users can talk to for rehab if they voluntarily decide they want to try to quit.

I spit venom at Harper all the time? When? I can say that to me it seems Harper can do no wrong for you in this case. Question your government, friend.

I believe the people of Afghanistan need help too. A lot of help. The UN ranks Afghanistan the 2nd least-developed country in the world in 2009. It's basically a horrible place to live (though no doubt the war has really brought them down in ranking). I just don't think the way we are trying to help them is the right way to go about things.

I think the gov't should pick up a some of the bill in airport security. It is a matter of national security, and the Canadian gov't also owns all major airports to my knowledge so has a responsibility there as well. If the gov keeps upping the security measures eventually more airlines are going to have trouble staying in business.

Some good points. The question isn't "why do Muslims hate us?". A lot of people don't like us, Americans most of all, including many countries the U.S./West has mucked around with but which has not resulted in the militant blowback Islamists have resorted to in recent decades. The question is rather then "Why do they hate us and attack us?" Certainly, U.S./West fudging in the affairs in Muslim countries has fueled the fire. The Iran coup. The U.S. military occupying holy Muslim land in Saudi Arabia near Mecca and Medina during the 1991 Gulf War. But underlying all of this, as you mentioned, is fundamentalist Muslim ideology. The Muslim fundamentalist beliefs of Qutbism has been a massive inspiration to Islamists. The violent, intolerant, and anti-American fundamentalist writings and beliefs of Sayyid Qubt is the most prominent factor in inciting jihad among modern Muslim radicals since the 1970's, including al-Qaeda leaders bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri. It is clear that fundamental/radical Muslim beliefs is the difference in why Muslims have gone on such a violent terror assault on the West compared to the many other people/countries across the globe that have been similarly occupied and mucked with by West/U.S. foreign policy but haven't resorted to such persistent and violent retribution. To all, here's a fantastic peer-reviewed academic journal article on the subject(even though i hate the term "Islamic-Fascism"/"Islamofascism"), from the journal "Parameters": Qutbism: an ideology of Islamic-Fascism

It might get on the news, as the page has already. It delivers a message of protest. That's the function it serves. It's basically an online petition.

You just said Harper had a good reason for doing it, then you fire back that you have no idea why he did it. You want the reason? The Afghan torture investigation. If Harper was so valid for proroguing parliament this time, why did he do it on a day where the public and the media would be extremely pre-occupied with holiday celebrations? Many Canadian journalists don't even work on Dec. 31st, and many newspapers such as the Ottawa Citizen do not release a newspaper on Jan. 1. How convenient. This is the political behaviour of someone who has something to hide. Proroguing Parliament is fine, but doing so for selfish political gain is B.S.

Muslim rage is my favorite kind of rage.

Adults, say early 20's+ who get into the workforce buy highend TV. I agree many can't afford it, but that's what credit card debt is for. Huh? It's dark for everybody. Nothing to do with eye weakness What gets me is...why don't they just make the picture brighter to compensate?

We get some of those commercials in Canada too. They want you to ask your doctor about it! If your doc prescribes a drug, whether you, private insurance companies, or gov't drug plans pay for it they don't care. it's money in their pocket.

Obama got elected didn't he? As for Cheney, in many ways he's very intelligent, in others he's a complete moron, and overall he lives up to his first name.

If anyone would like to see something technologically amazing, especially if you're a fan of videogames and the Wii especially, check this out. 3D is may be coming to you're TV faster than you think. This has been on youtube for awhile so who knows how far they've come with it now:

You're right. Obama, Mr. Nice Guy, would definately benefit from a "bad cop" type figure high in the admin, preferebly VP. Cheney is a corrupt and heartless SOB, but i'll give him big credit for playing that role well. He had no Presidential asperations, so he could afford to get the electorate (and others) PO'd with him.

I, for one, can't wait to see my front package displayed in all its glory on a scanner screen. i hope to smash a hole right through the damn screen, 3D-style. YAH!!! But seriously, yes i see the concern for women. How about women only being scanned/analyzed by women security workers? They need to implement proper security precautions before these terror incidents happen/are attempted. Right now airports/gov'ts are reacting after the fact. It was "take off your shoes, potential shoebomber", then is was "no liquids!", now it's "i need to scan your underwear". Why are we reacting to, and not preventing, these terrorist airplane incidents?