Wild Bill

Remiel, you make some good points but it is important to remember, the problem here is not academic examples. In the real world, there are far too many people who deliberately use anonymity as a shield and a tool to get away with unpleasant behaviour. If left unopposed, any forum board will degenerate into a disgusting mess, a la "rubble.com". It will become one long, profane screech of ad hominem insults, where the loudest and most profane will claim to be the victor of any debate!

There is old wiring and there is OLD wiring! It's not so much the age that makes it dangerous as the era it was installed. 50 year old wiring is essentially no different than wiring that is 5 years old. The materials were designed to last a LONG time and the wiring standards are the same. 50 years ago we had 3-prong grounded wiring, the same as today. There's no reason why wiring installed 50 years ago shouldn't be perfectly safe today. Wiring pre-1960 lacked the extra ground prong but was still good and lasting quality. As we get back into the 40's and older we can see problems. In those days we used a technique called "knob and tube" which actually is safer than modern wiring! The problem is not with the wires but with the wood and materials within the walls, which can become tinder dry. If a wire was to be disturbed off a mount you could have a short and cause a fire. So stop harping about the 50 year old wiring in Harper's residence! You obviously have never done any wiring yourself and are just once again dragging up any old thing to disparage Harper. I don't think he's that great either but for Pete's sake Topaz, stay within reason, won't you? You make yourself sound like a kook and people will be less likely to listen to you at all.

I HAVE noticed that a few newer posters have very foul mouths and persist in personal attacks if they appear to be losing an argument! Their debating style seems more in keeping with what we'd find on "rubble.com". Perhaps they're refugees from that board, I don't know. I do know that I don't enjoy their presence. Ah well, at least there's an "ignore" button.

Perhaps the genesis of all over-played songs was "Nights in White Satin", by the Moody Blues. It pre-dated "Stairway To Heaven" by being first released in 1967. It came back in 1972 and then once again in 1979! Each time it hit well up in the charts and by 1979 it seemed to be everywhere. You could tune several different stations and often hear it being played on all of them at the same time! It IS a very beautiful song and I've never forgiven those who overplayed it and ruined it for so many of us.

So where's the non-native equivalent to Lasagna? Your obfuscation is what's altogether believable.

The only thing I will admit to is that you are a foul-mouthed partisan who sees people only in terms of their race. Do you kiss your mother with that mouth? You have all the objectivity of a David Duke! If you think you're the cure for racism, then you're worse than the disease! You conceal your bigotry under the guise of being a native champion. Well, bigotry is bigotry, no matter what the race of the bigot in question! It's a waste of time talking to you. Just because you stick a few feathers on the pillow case you wear over your head doesn't change your biased premises.

I dunno, Molly. Only a true sociopath would consistently act with no thought to the consequences. It makes more sense to me that if the expectation of being caught is very low, and if you are caught you can expect hearings over a couple years, with the potential punishment being reduced at every such step, finally ending up with "time served" while waiting counted at some multiplier of regular time...wouldn't it only be logical for someone inclined to crime to think it's worth the risk? Fear of retribution is a basic and natural fear. However, there is a difference between sucker-punching someone bigger than you and a retribution that can drag on for months if not years before it's enacted. Psychologists have long proven that part of the development of the human brain deals with the ability to envision long-term consequences. That's why kids and adolescents repeatedly break rules and also what generated the old expression that "crime is a young man's game". I'm not saying its the whole picture but I don't think we can just blow the whole idea away either.

Bray all you want. The fact remains, you are still dodging coming up with an equivalent to Lasagna. The reason is obvious. You can't! Whenever you get backed into a corner you seem to consistently go all "ad hominem". You and CR make a pretty pair. The world is divided into devils and saints. All natives are saints and all non-natives are devils. There is no inbetween. In all the months if not years now I have been reading the posts from the two of you I cannot think of ONE time when you have ever admitted that a native action was wrong, even in the slightest way. Must be nice to live in such a world of perfection! I say again, why do you have to put some folks on a pedestal and not accept them as just ordinary, fallible human beings?

duplicate

There's arguments either way, Smallc. A number of people think judges should be more directly answerable to the people. Many folks also consider our present system of appointing so many key positions in our government and institutions to be elitist. I guess it all boils down to how much trust you place in those doing the appointing! If you trust the people and the system then you are confident that appointees will all be people of good character. If you aren't as trusting then its a different story. All in your POV, I guess.

Once again, a huge stretch of illogic. You might also cite that since Louis Riel murdered someone we shouldn't go to Winnipeg. How about dragging in Cain and Abel, to keep us from visiting orchards? There is a huge difference with your examples. It's one thing to be fearful when such things are fresh, as when Ipperwash happened only a short time after Oka. Caledonia and Mr. Brant have proven that in the case of native protests things have NOT quieted down! The FLQ were apprehended and under a strange deal, deported to Cuba. Eventually, they were allowed to return, for reasons I've never understood. Still, we have not seen any such violent and murderous action in Quebec since. If there was a wolf around last year it is only logical to watch out for one this year. If the last sighting was 40 years ago then no, it doesn't warrant a lot of attention Caledonians know full well that there is still violence with native protests. Just how long after an incident should we wait before we are no longer cautious> From your words, I would assume you'd suggest a weekend or two...unless it happened to natives, of course! Why can't you just accept people as people, instead of putting one group or another on some kind of pedestal?

Br fair, Jack! Yes, there are lots of engineers as you describe. In the electronics field, I've also met many technicians who couldn't run a maze with their shoes off! Rats were smarter than them! BTW, those types tended to come from the Devry Institute...JMHO.

It would only be fair to point out that Hudak CAN"T drop as much of the HST as some would want! The McGuinty/Flaherty deal came with a "poison pill". If Hudak opts out of the deal then Ontario has to pay a HUGE penalty back to the Feds! Somehow, I don't think most Ontarioans would like that option, either. Thanks for nothing, Dalton!

Because of what they eat. They are carrion eaters, feeding mostly on whatever has died and drifted down.

You and I have very different ideas of "equivalent". How about a cite of a non-native protester in camo holding an AK-47 or some such assault rifle, standing face to face with a Canadian soldier? Being armed, loud and mouthy while making it perfectly obvious that you're prepared to "rock and roll" is the image of native protesters Lasagna gave to the nation, if not the world. I still believe that image contributed in at least some small part in the tragedy at Ipperwash. It caused fear in the minds of OPP officers, standing guard in the dark. That fear might well have triggered an over-reaction. Lasagna established the precedent. Fear that natives in any future protest might well be similarly armed is therefore only logical. Past deeds set a pattern, making future actions likely. It's as logical as expecting McGuinty to find something else to tax us on.

Well said! I'm reminded of a situation back in the late 70's. I was working at an electronics parts store and in those days they still had counter sales. I got to know a lot of the pinball and video game techs around town that serviced the arcades. This was a brand new thing back then and every variety store and bowling alley also wanted a machine or two in their place, both for the money and for the customer attraction. They told me that the local organized crime gangs supplied all the locations, for a small monthly fee. Very few operators were foolish enough to try to install a machine on their own. However, nobody seemed to mind! The feeling was that the gang's fees were reasonable and came with insurance that no competitor would "horn in" on your location. Meanwhile, the governments were trying to force everyone to install coin counters, so that they could rake off some taxes. The gang was respected and the governments were not, since the gang gave a worthwhile service for their money while the government merely took and gave nothing back.

Hey, I'm still here! All alone, maybe. The world's only classic liberal hippy! The fact that so many posters call me a conservative proves your point about drift.

How do you feel about lobster?

Nice evasion! Where is the white (or non-native, if you prefer) equivalent to Lasagna?

There IS a grain of truth in there, Jack. I worked at a lot of different jobs in my life. Seemed I was really good at picking those companies that couldn't handle the changing times and downsized or outright died. Now I'm self-employed and from time to time I get a phone call or a letter from some government type wanting to know if I would be willing to take on an employee. Now I'm in a pretty specialized profession. I build and repair guitar amplifiers and music equipment. Most of it is still vacuum tube based, for reasons of sound quality. Since its an old technology, electronic schools haven't taught about vacuum tubes since about 1962. Except for my niche, they are considered obsolete. Since there is so little competition I've become a middlin' sized frog in a small pond. There are times when I get a bit backlogged but adding help is just not practical. I would have to use up my own time training someone for at least a year before he was useful. Meanwhile I would also lose income by paying him. I have had people offer to work for free just to learn how but again, I can't spare the time. Besides, essentially I might be training my own competitor! Lots of people offer me their labour but so far none of them has had labour to offer that's worth it to me! So I always politely tell these government types no, that there's just not enough work at the present time. However, that's not the real reason. I just don't want the hassle of all that paperwork! If I add an employee I have to keep books for him and pay his CPP,EI, take off the taxes and all that crap! Screw it! At this stage of my life I just want to earn my own (meager) living with the least amount of fuss and hassle. Why should I provide a job for someone else? There is a cost to it and unless the cost is worth it for my own personal goals and needs then why on earth should I bother? Why should any employer bother? Most do it because they want to expand their company into a larger one. I think more should ask themselves if its really worth it.

Well, it's been obvious all along that the cardinal premise in the eco-warriors' catechism has been that it is all Man's fault. However, if it's happened 5 times over more than 500 million years, do we have to reset the clock of evolution to show that man has been around far longer than any evidence has shown? Did we lose an advanced human civilization at the time of each extinction? Has Man been repeatedly making the same mistakes? 500 million years, eh? Geez, perhaps one or more of those civilizations survived by living down that Antarctic hole that leads to the Centre of the Earth! You know, the one that Rebus Kenebus was going to jump with his motorcycle...

So where is the white example of a protesting armed warrior like Lasagna?

Well CC, you started off with one belief but then veered right and qualified it. You're right, there are some good Canadian productions. However, they seem to come from a private broadcaster, CTV! What does CBC provide, other than Hockey Night in Canada, where they ineptly lost the theme song? Please don't cite Little Mosque on the Prairie! I'd rather watch paint dry!

Tim, there's one perq at big union factories that is not generally known. When layoffs come, the guys with the MOST seniority are laid off! I first heard about this 30 years ago at Massey Ferguson, later Varity Corp, in Brantford. I had it confirmed last summer that it is still the practice at General Motors in St. Catherines. There are many more such places. You see, there are two classes of citizens as far as the EI office is concerned. If you are a non-unionized claimant, if you make a few dollars on the side while collecting EI you must claim it on your report cards. If the amount exceeds some rather low limit then the extra is deducted from your EI cheque. However, if you are lucky enough to be a union worker at a company such as Ford Motors or whatever the company you work for will give you what is called a "sub" to bring your weekly earnings up from the EI level to 90% of your normal takehome pay! The unions fought and won the right to have the older guys with the most seniority to take the layoffs. With the "sub" in effect they go on a paid holiday! The benefit to the newer workers is that they get to accumulate more time for their own seniority. I can remember as a young lad having to watch how much money I made cutting lawns while on pogey, for fear of exceeding the limit. I never knew at the time that I did not have the same rights as a union worker with my government. Once again, it shows that "some pigs are more equal than others."

Kimmy, here in Hamilton we instituted a recycling scheme with our garbage pickup some years ago. Many American cities did the same. The differences between their approaches relates to your idea. In Hamilton, it was decided to do "separation at source". This means all of us Hamiltonians are supposed to separate our recyclables. Initially the parameters made sense. We bagged the stuff according to glass, metal, paper and plastic. That evolved the past few years. Metal, glass and paper no longer matter. It's containers of all material, plastics and paper. So tin cans go in with plastic pop bottles. The idea was that the program would involve us all, giving us each a warm and fuzzy feeling for saving the planet. Of course, if we made a mistake in how we separated our recyclables they would refuse to pick them up, leaving them at the end of your driveway with a note explaining your error. If you persisted you could be fined! I kid you not! The program was supposed to not only pay for itself but make the city a pile of money. Of course, the way the city went about it ensured that could never happen! Consider all the scrap paper and newsprint. The city collected it all up and then phoned up the big customers for the stuff and said "Come and buy it!" The customers weren't stupid. They said "How much?" The City replied "Oh, $70/ton, that's the going rate, we understand. (The figure isn't at all accurate. I pulled it out of my butt just for an example.) The customers all said "Too much! Thanks anyway!". Suddenly, the City had a problem. They only had a finite amount of storage space for all that paper. After a couple of weeks they were drowning in the stuff! They HAD to get rid of it! So they called up those customers again and said "At what price would you buy it?" The customers said "Oh, how about $20/ton?" The City was over a barrel so they had to take it. So they successfully drove the prices down and all hope of a profitable operation was gone. Meanwhile, in America cities in many states used a different approach. They let private companies handle the recycling, separating the products at "destination", meaning an actual recycling plant. They took all the garbage with no sorting at all into their plant, where machines separated most metals and some other materials and there were conveyor belts manned with human workers who separated the rest. The private recycling companies made so much money that they ended up bidding against each other for the garbage! They provided jobs for workers - low end jobs to be sure but you didn't need a degree to get the job! Even better, they handle ALL of a city's garbage stream! Here in Hamilton we only recycle residential products. Businesses, restaurants and such are not included, due to the complexities of getting them to also separate reliably at their source. They just now are starting to include apartment buildings. Their own estimates say that they are only recycling a third of our garbage. When they try to achieve higher percentages so far they haven't gone after the excluded areas at all. They just lower the garbage bag limit on homeowners to force them to fill more recycling bags. It's been said many times that if you want something done in the most inefficient and screwed up way let government and the public sector handle it. I would think that the way Hamilton has gone about its recycling programs is a good example of this concept.