segnosaur

Legally they may not need a referendum. However, given the fact that this is such a major change to the way our leaders are selected (and ultimately our country is run) then morally they should hold a referendum. As for the constitution act... perhaps it should have been put to a vote. And as for Harper's legislation... Nothing he did had anywhere near the scale to affect Canada into the future as changing the election system. It also doesn't mean "rig the system to be self serving and give your party an electoral advantage for generations to come based on the thin veneer of "the subject was mentioned in the Liberal Platform". No they weren't. But that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be used here. They also didn't specify that they wouldn't use a referendum, so its not like using a referendum would be breaking a promise. Because the conservative changes were relatively minor compared to what the Liberals are proposing.. There may have been flaws in things like the Fair Elections act", but they don't seem to have the ability to change election results for generations to come, as would a change to ranked ballots or proportional representation would. Actually a referendum would actually be pretty easy... "Do you want to change our current election system to X. Yes or No". And if your argument is "Understanding the options is too complex", then what does that say about how people can handle the elections in the future? If the options are too complex for people to understand during a referendum, then we may end up saddled with a voting system that people can't understand come election time.

No, but it does make it more accurate. I think your biggest mistake is thinking that might actually be true. Governments love to spend money... Liberals, conservatives, federal, provincial, municipal... (Some parties and politicians more than others, but all seem to like their social programs to some degree.) If you don't fill at least the short form census out, the government is unlikely to reduce the amount of spending. It will however change the way the spending is allocated... less money for your province or city (so you have fewer doctors, less money for roads, etc.) and more spending for others. Granted, one census form isn't going to make a difference in the grand scheme of things. (And there are probably people who avoid filling out the form all across the country, so the problem evens itself out.) Still, you are better off to fill out at least the short form.

Not my problem. They should fix that. As other poster have pointed out, that sort of cross-government communication might result in a potential security risk. (I for one would rather not have the chance of someone in stats Canada accidentally having access to my tax returns.) Actually, the last "census" was correctly labeled a "survey". A census implies that responses are mandatory (even if the government does not always enforce that). Since the last long form was voluntary, it probably shouldn't be called a 'census'.

Lying on the census is a crime. Admitting it to them in writing is just stupid. Expect to be charged. . Except of course I specifically said to fill out the form honestly. The only thing that would be a lie is the statement "Everything here is a lie", which of course could refer to just the statement itself, and it would be a lie that its a lie. I always found the whole legality of this rather strange. On one hand, you have people claiming "Its no big deal. Nobody ever went to jail for it. You don't get punished". Then you read all the possible repercussions... jail time, hundreds of dollars in fines, etc. Kind of like people supporting the census want to have it both ways.

Well, if its anyone who knows about IQs, its the person who goes into a thread discussing the Long form and brags about how easy it is to answer the short form census. Just out of curiosity, why did you think your experience with answering the short form was really relevant when discussing the long form census? And do you honestly think that the only thing preventing a 70+ question census form from being filled out as quickly as a 10 question census form is the intelligence of the person answering?

Sometimes the state requires our time.... taxes... census... filling out permits... jail time.... Usually when the government requires me to spend time doing something, the reasons are pretty clear... Taxes are necessary to provide basic infrastructure and social services, jail time is often given if someone is engaging in activity that is considered harmful to others. When it comes to the census, not one person has given me an example of why the long form is needed, or what benefit it provides to the average citizen. I've asked that question both on this forum and others, and it usually comes down to one of 2 answers: 1) "experts" say they need it, ignoring the possibility that those experts could just be engaged in busy work 2) They will give some example (like "need it for schools"), but they never seem to justify why things like the Short form census, in combination with things like city zoning bylaws, don't provide adequate information. I'm not saying that a valid example about why the long form is needed isn't out there... it just seems strange that nobody seems to be able to justify it. Thank you for telling me what is and isn't a loss. Nice of you to set my priorities for me.

Interesting... So what you're saying is that we as a society have no reason to complain at all about anything the government does, as long as it does not involve sending us to war. If they want to double our taxes? Hey, in WW1 people had to put up with more than just taxes! Health care wait times getting longer? Hey, in WW1 people had more to worry about than health care wait times!

Keep in mind that while you may be in multiple government databases, usually such databases are not connected, and when they draw out certain information, they may only be drawing from one source (the census). In fact, many of the government databases are actually forbidden from "sharing" information. For example, if they are trying to determine whether you need a new school in the area, they may use information in your census form to determine how many children in your house may need school in a few years. They won't necessarily cross-reference census data with (for example) the Revenue Canada databases, or your provincial health databases just to catch anyone they might have missed from the census. Here's my suggestion... fill out the entire thing honestly... then, if there is a 'comments' section at the end, put "Everything here is a lie"... see if whomever is filling out the form takes your comment seriously or not.

Last time I got the long for it took my closer to half an hour. You willing to pay for my time to fill it out?

Would you happen to notice anything in your posting that might show that your experience is irrelevant? Anything at all? I'll take a short time for you to think about it.

Probably not. Wasn't sure of the particular details, but it looks like the Harpoon has multiple configurations (depending on whether it is used for air or sea use). If we're buying them for ship-borne use, they may not necessarily be re-configured for air use, so we'd have to buy additional missiles anyways if we wanted to fire them from the air.

Unless of course Trudeau Jr. decides to pull a Cormorant and buy something else just because it looks better politically. (Recall that Chretien decided to buy the Cyclone to replace part of our sea king fleet, despite the fact that it was a new, untested plane that had no other users at the time.) The Liberals put quite a bit of political capital into opposing the F35. Remember that some of the "contempt" charges stem indirectly from the conservative plans to buy the F35. Plus there was the whole "We'll rebuild the navy by buying something other than the F35". (At least the NDP suggested an open competition, whereas many of the Liberal campaign promises totally dismissed the F35.) Then of course there are a significant number of Liberal fans who have been slamming the F35 for a long time. For the Liberals to turn around and buy the same plane that they had spent so much time railing against would be a minor embarrassment (and at least a partial vindication for the conservatives). Because of that, there is a very good chance they may try to rig the competition in such a way that the F35 becomes ineligible.

A couple of points: - As D2.0 said, it largely comes down to geometry... We've got a big country with many cities/potential targets, and only a small handful of air bases. If you want to go with a cheaper/slower plane, you will need to buy more of them, and station them at more air bases. This makes the overall cost higher than it might be otherwise. (And you still end up with worse protection, since many of those subsonic fighters wouldn't be able to track/trail an airliner for any length of time. After all, you likely wouldn't want to go in and shoot at first sight.) - Back in the 60s, we had Hundreds of fighters. We have far fewer now, and we're likely going to be purchasing even fewer than we currently have.) - The nature of threats has changed over the decades. Back in the 60s, the main risk was hijacking-for-profit, not the "crash and hope to kill many people" that seems to be the main scenario now.

Uhh... no. I already pointed out that such interceptions could be done with alternatives. Its just that the F35 could probably do the job better, based on its ability to carry weapons internally (which would reduce drag and give the plane greater range and speed than the alternatives.) And in the long term, it can probably do the job cheaper, since any of the alternatives will likely be an orphan aircraft within a decade (making the planes harder to maintain), while the F35 will be produced for decades to come (making spare parts and replacements easier to obtain). Heck, why even bother with jets? Dust off plans for the Spitfire or Mustang, and there you go! An air defense!

Why use a military aircraft at all to intercept an airliner? Because it is not outside the realm of possibility that it may be necessary to actually shoot down a civilian plane. 9/11 was a fairly successful terrorist attack, and although airport security has supposedly been improved, there is still the risk of a similar hijacking. When Payne Stewart's plane malfunctioned, it may have been necessary to shoot it down in the situation where it might have strayed into urban areas. (Fortunately its flight path meant it wasn't an issue.) Plus, do we really want some idiot with a cessna having the ability to crash their plane into 24 Sussex? Mattias Rust was for the most part harmless, but it illustrated what could happen if you don't have proper response mechanisms in place.

I think we could do that with anything we may choose. Yes, we could intercept civilian planes with other potential jet fighters. But, they might not do the job as well. So, instead of intercepting an off-course airliner 500 km out with an F35, we intercept it 100km out with an F18/Gripen/etc.... Would the airliner be intercepted? Yes. But, with less time for us deal with it.

Actually, there are other possible situations that might need to be dealt with apart from Russia... It may be necessary for our air force to intercept civilian planes, for example in the case of a hijacking (similar to 9/11), or in the case of a malfunction (e.g. the Payne Stewart situation), or even in the case of a pilot being a dumbass (e.g. Mathias Rust). Many routes pass through Canadian arctic territory. For those situations, I personally think we would be better off to have an air force that is able to respond quickly from Canadian territory, using our own jets, rather than relying on an American response. The ability of the F35 to carry some weapons internally would give it the ability to respond to the above situations quicker (and at a much further distance) than an alternative plane (like the F18, where all weapons are carried externally, which increases drag and reduces speed and range).

Why choose Canada then? You want to give up your health care? Social justice warriors got that for you. Actually no, they didn't. Not sure if this was what Hydraboss was arguing. But, the term "social justice warrior" (a.k.a. SJW) is not the same as "socialist" or "social democrat". Generally, SJW is used more as an insult; it is typically used to refer to people who, more or less, go "over the top" with ideas that are typically not well thought out. It is possible for someone to be both in favor of some basic regulations yet be opposed to "social justice warriors". On the other hand, there is the concept of "tyranny of the masses"... the idea that unbridled democracy can lead to a curtailing of basic freedoms. Canada can be classified as a "democracy", but we also we also have certain constitutional/legal protections (freedom of speech, freedom of religion, etc.) that cannot be taken away even if such actions are favored by the democratic majority. I'm sure most Canadians would want a certain amount of our economic freedom to be included in the list of things that cannot be removed through democratic means.

As TimG said, its a phishing scam... call hundreds of numbers randomly in the hopes that one person will respond, and then attempt to get personal information on the person, and/or get them to send money in some fashion. I've received that sort of call myself on my answering machine, complete with statements about how I was going to be proscecuted if I didn't call them back. I've got friends that work for CRA, if there are any problems you will be contacted by mail long before they try calling you.

On the other hand, there are probably hundreds/thousands of people who pull similar pranks (wasting the scammer's time, giving bad information, etc.) The chance that some scammer will remember and target any specific "victim" is probably pretty tiny. And remember, we're not exactly talking about technical gurus here... I suspect many of these scammers are working off some script, and don't really understand much of what they are saying/doing. For those people the chance that they would even be able to seek "revenge" is probably small.

I do the same sort of things (attempt to waste their time). Although usually when I get bored playing along, I start asking them questions like "I'm worried about this virus you say I have... will it affect the naked pictures I have of your mother?" Sometimes good for an interesting reaction.

Actually I believe many scammers actually use an internet-to-phone gateway, which allows them to make long distance calls for free (or cheaply). So een if you trace the number to a certain location, its possible that the scammer is thousands of miles away.

Some terms tend to change over time. Decades ago, the term "socialism" was applied to a political system whereby the government was in complete control of the economy. (It was considered a step along the road to communism, where the 'government' would eventually disappear once everyone was happy.) In the modern world, the term 'socialism' is often applied to a system where the government does control certain aspects of the economy (e.g. financial regulations, and a social safety net, perhaps some industries nationalized), but a certain amount of free enterprise is still allowed. Social democrats believe in maintaining a strong free enterprise system but with things like a social safety net, income redistribution, etc. For better or worse, the terms are fairly fuzzy, with a certain amount of overlap, and some people who label themselves 'socialist' would probably be better to call themselves 'social democrats'. In general, the political spectrum looks like this: Communism - Socialism - Social Democrat - Moderate/Centrist - Conservative - Fascist The difference between a socialist and a social democrat is the amount of control they expect the government to have over the economy.

Uh, no, he didn't. Trump started the "downward spiral" long before Romney opened his mouth to talk about Trump, long before Rubio started making comments about Trump's penis. Trump started it by insulting Farina. (Even if later he "took it back", the fact is he still insulted her. And he started it by commenting on Hillary getting "Shlonged" by Obama. And by attacking journalists. He also started it by talking about Rubio sweating way back in September. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/09/24/donald-trump-is-attacking-marco-rubio-for-being-sweaty-why/ All these events, all of these personal attacks by Trump, happened long before Romney made his comments. Long before Rubio made jokes about Trump's penis. Fine, but you know what? Its been pointed to you that you were wrong... that it was Trump that started engaging in low-brow personal attacks, and not Romney. Now would be the appropriate time to acknowledge that you were wrong and move on. A leader of a country can and should be diplomatic; engaging in personal attacks is the opposite of that. Donald Trump said that he wants the U.S. to engage in War Crimes by killing babies. None of the other republicans have said that's a good idea. Donald Trump said that he wants to get rid of trade deals like NAFTA. As far as I know, none of the other Republicans have called for ending NAFTA. There may also be some similarities, but given the fact that its a republican primary, you would expect all members to have at least some similarity in policies. The trouble is, where the policies differ, Trump would be a complete disaster.

He took that back Ummm... so? He still insulted her. Long before the comments made by Rubio. Some people would rather have a president that doesn't make fun of physical attributes at all, rather than make an insult and have to apologize later. And the thing is, that's not the only time Trump has taken the "low road". For example: - He made references to Clinton's bathroom break during a democratic debate as "disgusting" - He said that Clinton was "schlonged" (slang term referring to a penis) by Obama when they were competing for the democratic nomination - Attacked a reporter with a statement that many thought was a reference to her menstruating. (Trump denies it of course, but the fact that he would make a comment that was vague enough to be interpreted that way doesn't look good.) https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2015/12/21/donald-trump-calls-hillary-clinton-disgusting-for-using-the-restroom-during-a-debate/