ScottSA

It happens often these days too Frankie. Just not in your sheltered world.

Yes, I'm aware that there's a sub-culture. It makes me laugh, because when a group of people get together to celebrate their emotional escapism as a virtue, they've got more serious problems than they think. I've smoked dope too...many many times for years in my youth. I even used to think it helped me write, until I discovered that it doesn't make much difference either way, really. What it does do is remove you from the world of reality, for a while, depending on how good the smoke is. But when that becomes a lifestyle unto itself, and then twisted to become a "culture," there are real problems afoot. I'm also aware that you're overstating the case of a weed that makes you feel funny. First, we never had a "right" to smoke dope...we just weren't constrained from it prior to the twenties. Don't confuse, as so many do, "rights" with priveleges...or with irrelevancies. Pot was irrelevant prior to the 20s; not a "right." Second, look, dude...pot is not a wonder drug. It just isn't. The Marijuana Party sunk itself with that argument...it should have stuck to the "relatively harmless" argument, because once it hung its hat on the medical marijuana argument, it was called upon to prove it, and in spite of the usual claims that "numerous studies have shown this and that," the fact is that there are not 'numerous studies', there are a few; double blind studies are almost non-existent; and such 'studies' as exist are mostly anecdotal or sloppy as hell. And don't produce some study, or second hand report on some study, and claim that I'm wrong, because a single exception is meaningless, and in any event the conclusions are probably not what you think they are.

You can't "show what [i'm] asking," because I'll be surprised if you can find one...never mind hordes.

Remind me...what's the death toll at Christmas from rushes for Polly Pockets, Cabbage Patch Kids, and Harry Potter Books? Please, fill me in on the equivalence of annual riots, massacres and stampedes by Muslims, to unseemly consumerist Christmas presses.

I swear...the apologists crawling out of the woodwork to defend the most egregiously anti-liberal scourge since Attila the Hun are bending over backwards in conceptual contortions.

The technique at play here is interesting. It's one thing to call for legalization...hell, I'm probably luke warm in favor of decriminalization myself...but it's another to threaten to go to the barricades over it like some here. Shavluk aside, because...well...just because he's clearly insane and no one takes him very seriously...but there seems to be a great deal of weight thrown behind this wonderdrug thesis by people who ought to know better. Pot is a weed that makes you feel funny. It's not a rain forest cure for all disease or even some disease, and probably not even one disease. It's not some "right" that "the people" have that's being taken away by the man. And for God's sake, if you view it as a "culture," you need professional help.

I always agree that a person should have the right to do what they want, as long as they pay their own way. I'm all for smokers rights, for two reasons:n One, they live shorter lives as a rule and don't burden the HC system for decades of declining years, and two, sin taxes more than pay the HC costs of their ailments before kicking. Thus it becomes a matter of personal choice. Fat related deseases mean shorter lives, but there is no sin tax to pay for the related medical costs. I'm all for people's right to lumber around looking like creamed cottage cheese in cellophane if that's what they care to do, but there's an issue of HC to consider too. The seedier side of socialized medicine is that if the state is asked to pay for HC, it has a moral right to regulate health to some extent too.

Tripe. I see more pizza deliveries and Mcdonalds denizens from the lower economic strata than the upper, and I have a hard time justiying dropping $30 to $40 on pizza deliveries myself, so lets not trot out the old catfood and potato mantra here.

You'd enjoy seeing this at a 911 memorial?

Hey, guess what? They outlawed spitting in public places around 1900, and pretty much made it an aberration today. Maybe its about time we outlawed washing stinky bits in public bathrooms. What do you think? I mean, if I suddenly created a cult that felt a pious need to crap in the sinks of public washrooms prior to prayer, I'll bet you'd be all about banning it the first minute you found a lump while washing your hands.

Lawsuits against Muslims who can't mop up after themselves is a great option too.

You are so offbase on every single point that this is almost not worth replying to. The US could tapdance Iran's head, destroy it's army and airforce, and occupy Tehran within 3 weeks. China and India MIGHT "catch up" to the US in 150 - 200 years, but certainly not even come close in 15 - 20 years, and Russia will probably never be in the same ballpark. I don't even know what you think about Europe, and I'm afraid to ask...

Well, given that tonight even the CBC admitted that Canada will be one of the huge winners in GW...

That is so value laden a statement that it doesn't even make sense. The truly sad thing is that you probably believe it too.

I'm not trying to time the market...I'm just securing assets. The same way I buy a few ounces of silver every month, and an ounce or two of gold if it's a good month. Nothing more secure than good old precious metals in their physical form. I also play the other end of the spectrum, with mutuals, stocks, and the odd daytrade, although I recently got myself bogged into a hurricane stock position that looks like its for the long term...at least till April or so...grrr

The more detailed analysis you submited says exactly the same thing with big shiny werds. Except of course the genetic slant, which is self evident, but I suspect very much less an issue than it appears here to be. Fat people are generally fat because they eat too much, like both statements claim...even though one calls it "behavioural."

I don't think that's the quote...

Excellent. Now if we can instill the same spirit of cultural protectionism in the rest of canada, we might end up surviving.

Queenslave has managed to unite the left and right on this board and make them of one mind as to the attributes of his...errrr...theory. Amazing.

No it's not. If I claim pixies are in my underwear, the burden of proof lies with me to prove it, or else I'm simply flapping my gums. The burden of proof lies with the positive claimant. If, on the other hand, someone submits an opinion, and names it as such, then "proof" is irrelevant and not called for.

Yes, but they're not nice experiences, and don't fit well with the wish-upon-a-star mentality of the left.

The "democratic west," or at least Europe, is becoming less democratic and less western by the moment, and it's highly unlikely to partner with Russia at this juncture of history. The tidbit about "self-centeredness" can only be another self-flagellating anti-western slogan, since all countries everywhere and always are self-centered, and they'd be foolish not to be. I really don't know where this silly notion came from that the US is somehow the only country around with its own interests front and center...is it because it's the only country with the ability to act on them? What you call "mulilateral" is more accurately described as "mob mentality," judging by the behaviouir of the UN general assembly. Fortunately it has no power, or we'd all be in a world of hurt.

I agree with your conclusions, although the argument itself is a bit broad and imprecise, even at times wrong.

Get ready to buy Canadian stocks when they get cheap.

That's just a dumb statement.