Wild Bill

Just for the record I would like to say that I'm just "pleased as punch" to see a political scandal in Canada that involves a sexy biker babe! As a country our scandals always seem to be so flippin' BORING! The sort of thing that gets Ned Flanders from The Simpsons all upset. Clinton had his Monica and the Brits routinely have sexcapades in their Parliaments. Sometimes I feel like my country is the "brown shoes" of the world...

Most of my career was spent selling electronic parts like resistors, capacitors, microprocessor chips and the like. I have first hand knowledge of why many things cost more in Canada. "Costs associated with inventory" is code for another level of markup. What we are not being told is that many American companies market in Canada by means of a manufacturer's rep who usually provides a warehouse for products on the Canadian side of the border. You see, despite the fact that we have NAFTA they reduced or eliminated the duties and tariffs but kept all the paperwork! This adds delays in getting product to consumers in Canada. It is also not unusual for a California company to ship to a rep warehouse in Quebec to supply customers who may be in British Columbia! The shipping costs are far from efficient. It would be much more efficient to have American producers just treat Canadian customers the same as their American ones. California could ship into British Columbia and Maine could ship to Nova Scotia. The trouble is that from the American point of view its a PITA to process what are usually smaller orders with the extra paperwork to get it into Canada. Many just can't be bothered so they prefer to just ship everything to their stocking rep in "big lumps". The only thing that seems to have been streamlined is huge money industries, like car making plants. For most consumer stuff the individual orders are too small. I regularly order parts for my home business of building and repairing guitar amplifiers. Most of these are still vacuum tube based and mainstream industrial parts suppliers long ago stopped carrying parts suitable for these circuits. Fortunately, there are a number of InterNet based distributors who service this niche market. My orders are very modest, just a couple of hundred dollars every month or so. If I wanted next day delivery UPS or whoever would be glad to do it, with about $50 in extra costs! That's 25-35% of my order! So I turn to the cheapest method, Canada Post. A supplier ships from Phoenix Arizona and it reaches the border the next day. Then it's 2-3 weeks to reach my home! The systems used by Canada Post and Canada Customs eat up the rest of the time. Still, it's only $5-$10 dollars extra which makes more sense for my needs. Somebody is probably thinking right now that I should be setting up my own Net store on this side of the border. Bad idea! The Canadian market is so small in comparison that few or no manufacturers stateside would give me a franchise. Besides, the Canadian market for these type of products is so small that I couldn't buy in high enough quantities to get a cost low enough to make me competitive as a re-seller. Even if I could, I couldn't pay the electricity bill on Canadian orders, let alone the rent. I'd have to target American customers! The Wal-Marts and Costcos are big enough to swamp out these problems. They also don't have to keep their prices as low as stateside, just low enough to outcompete the other Canadian stores. There's also business taxes and costs that are higher in Canada and have to get rolled into the price. So yes, some of it is just price gouging but a lot is extra costs that a Canadian supplier just can't evade. I don't know if there's any solution, short of a wide open border with zero paperwork or Customs delays.

How many is "all"? Two? Three? So what if there's more? There has to be some reasonable basis before the Crown will accept a charge. Are you saying that if there are a large number of charges against the Liberals they should all be dropped because it's a large number? Or that any party that transgresses against the law should not be charged because they're a political party? You're still confusing me here!

Let me see if I understand all this. The Liberals have appeared to have broken the law, by forgetting they were outside the House and mouthing off without the protection of privilege and also there is reason to suspect they doctored a tape in as false evidence against the Tories, to involve them in a scandal and to support an investigation. Some are arguing that Harper should not sue them for these actions, in order to clear both the Tory and his own name and more simply, so that those who break the law are charged and if found guilty, punished. Where is it written that the Liberals should be able to do these things, or in the case of the tape, face reasonable suspicion enough to lay a charge, with impunity? Is it because they are somehow special? If the situations were reversed you can bet your bottom dollar they'd be all over the Tories faster than George Smitherman dodging questions on the C. Difficile file! Talk about blind partisanship! If that's the way they want the country to be run, we might as well become a dictatorship and give up elections altogether. Or perhaps imitate the old Stalinist system, where all candidates belong to the same party.

Not at all! I do not consider myself a layman in such matters. I'm neither an expert nor accredited but I have worked and studied in scientific fields all my life and feel that I'm at least more qualified than the average social baseline. After all, the majority of citizens could not explain how a light bulb works, which is a simple device more than a hundred years old. Explaining a telegraph sounding unit would be out of the question. I'm willing to bet at least 3 beer that of any 10 people that YOU chose at random from off the street to explain how a florescent lamp works you'd be damn lucky to get a majority who could do it. I'll even let you chose the brand! As for the "fearful scientists", I direct you to an excellent series that ran in the National Post called "The Deniers". You can read all the many articles at their website. You might also read up on the Nobel Prize Winner Kary Mullis. Or do you define layman as anyone who happens to disagree with you? If so then by your definition I guess I'm guilty. However, surely you'll understand if I don't support your views if they happen to imply taxing me more excessively. I'd like to "save the planet" as much as anyone else but I need considerably more than David Suzuki and Al Gore to convince me.

Where did I say boo about "lazy workers"? I wouldn't blame the workers at all! General Motors is in trouble and closing plants because it stopped paying attention to the world of its customers and became introverted. While it may be true that Buzz Hargrove took it for granted that GM could afford his workers' wages and benefits it really doesn't matter. GM never started to produce products that the market wanted and just kept rolling the same old stuff. We've all been watching gasoline get pricier and pricier for years. Now people are turning to alternative types of vehicles in droves and GM is scrambling to catch up. Why wasn't GM the first to introduce a Prius type hybrid? Or Ford or Chrysler, for that matter. No, what happened is that a management team spent all its time impressing each other while the world was passing them by. If they don't get their act together fast there will be more and more plant closings. The union could offer to match Mexican or even Chinese wage scales and it wouldn't matter. Who cares? The market wants gas misers, not gas guzzlers, period!

Interesting! The last 5 posters illustrate perfectly the difference between the scientific and the layman approach to such issues. It centres around the value one places on "consensus" as a tool to deal with such problems. To a layman with everyday problems consensus can be a useful tool. Odds are that most people have had similar problems and a consensus of opinion likely will deliver workable solutions. Not so with scientific issues. While a consensus of opinion might inspire a certain confidence in a theory or belief, true scientists understand that the universe works on its own terms and a new fact could be discovered that blows a widely held theory out of the water! Scientific issues require a certain amount of scientific education to make one capable of forming a worthwhile opinion. Without such, any consensus falls apart, since relatively few of those casting an opinion understand the issue well enough to cast an informed vote. With GW we seem to be looking at a "consensus" actually made up of a few thousand scientists, with strong arguments about how many are actually in an associated scientific field and not something unrelated and millions of laymen, who seem caught up in the drama of "saving the planet!" From the perspective of a political movement this is impressive. From a scientific perspective it is at best silly and at worse rather frightening. Meanwhile there are thousands if not hundreds of thousands of other scientists who DON't agree with GW who either are afraid for their jobs and thus keep quiet or who simply are not in a public enough position to be heard! Whatever we choose to believe, perhaps it would be worthwhile if we at least understood the difference that makes consensus inappropriate in a scientific setting before we committed vast sums of money and resources at a problem. As a country we are NOT infinitely rich and we could perhaps better use some of that money for medical or social assistance budgets.

Is that a rhetorical question? Or are you asking me as an individual to campaign against GM and the auto corporations? If it's rhetorical then hey, I'll cheer you on. If it's a request of me and my time then I'll have to politely beg off. I'm too old and fat and busy to become a crusader for someone ELSE's cause! I have a large number of rock and roll tube amps that need to be fixed and returned, so that their owners can keep the dreaded rap and ABBA goblins at bay.

That's all very nice. I hope you feel better. Now, I still won't buy a truck! I can't afford the gas. Those autoworkers make more money than I ever have. I'm not jealous, I'm just saying it's a bit much to expect me to go in the poorhouse by buying one of their products to support them. If they offer a product that fits MY needs then I may re-consider.

I realize that we're talking provincial parties here but wouldn't the tarnishing of the Liberal brand with Trudeau's NEP be even a TINY factor? When you hurt so many people so deeply it can take generations before they forget. I don't think those of us who live outside of Alberta can understand beyond an abstract intellectual level how they feel towards the Liberal name. It will take another 20-25 years before enough old folks die off to change the demographics. Assuming the aversion to Liberals has not become entrenched as a matter of self-sustaining culture.

There's a bit more to the negative response from the public. You're quite right that police may deserve "punishment" but that's a separate issue. Has not a law-breaker transgressed against society as a whole? To give him a free pass because SOMEONE ELSE broke the rules seems a non sequitur! Does it serve justice to throw out the wrongfully obtained evidence? Would it not make more sense to let it stand and reprimand the officers as a separate issue? To us laymen, a fact IS a fact, a crime IS a crime and evidence IS evidence. A subsequent crime doesn't pardon the original, especially when committed by another party! Where does this concept stop? If an improper search of a vehicle turns up a severed head, should the evidence be thrown out to punish the POLICEMAN for not following the rules?! Surely there could be a better way to correct erring policemen.

Actually, it would appear that GM HAS violated its contract! At least in spirit but perhaps in actuality. You see, they just signed their contract only a couple of weeks ago. No mention was made that the entire contract was moot since the plant was being closed. As for union brotherhood being cross-border, that's also a good topic for discussion. While I am far from a union supporter myself my father was a steelworker for most of his working life. I vividly remember how they were a branch of the American Steelworkers Union for generations until they broke away to be independent. The AutoWorkers did the same around the same time. You see, the problem was that the union executives were solely American based and thought it good strategy to use their Canadian "brothers" as test cases, sending them out on strike with extravagant demands to see how much they could push for settlements at home. As you can imagine this was a perpetual hardship on Canadian "brothers" and eventually they grew tired of it and decided on independence. I always viewed the idea of union brotherhood as a total myth anyway. Union leaders are just another form of politician. I still laugh when I think of how the local steelworkers union hall in my town has been blacklisted by the Federation of Musicians Union since the 1960's, for hiring non-union bands and paying them under scale!

Christopher Andersen, touted as a New York Times bestselling author, wrote a book in 2004 on Hillary titled "American Evita". It was a real eye-opener and quite prophetic as to this last campaign. The incident that struck me the hardest was when Hillary took the podium at a ceremony for those rescue workers who lost their lives in the fall of the Trade Towers. The police, firemen and such booed her and turned their backs on her! They knew when they were being used for a photo-op. The booing went out on the initial live telecast but in subsequent clips the audio was covered up with canned crowd noise. If I were cast adrift in a lifeboat with Hillary and surrounded by sharks I would feel safer jumping in with Great Whites than being in the boat with Hillary!

Well, I think most folks already knew that point! Kind of a thin response, don't you think? I'm overwhelmed with your specific suggestions! Actually, when I made that post asking what could Harper do I was really agreeing with the idea of market forces being stronger than government policies. Everybody expects politicians to have some kind of magic wand. They rail at them like scolding a cripple for not riverdancing. I just thought that if someone was going to make criticisms for wrong actions or lack of action it would be more positive if they threw out some specific alternatives. Then we could all chew on them and decide if they were practical and positive in the real world. A variation on the idea of how anyone can criticize but few have useful alternatives. Or more simply: "Lead, follow or get the hell out of the way!" Someone had pushed my "utilitarian button", that's all.

Now you're starting to confuse me. Did you actually read Steyn's book? Or are you just regurgitating criticisms from others who have not read his book?

I for one don't really care! I don't expect one factor to explain EVERYTHING! It's enough that it explains what happened with Chretien and Shawinigate, at least for me. There have been so many Liberal scandals over the years that I'm still a bit behind unraveling them...

Well, I might and you might but I can appreciate a prime minister's position. He may not feel it to be good politics to open up such a can of worms right now. Besides, if he can fix the problem from behind the scenes, perhaps with a new appointment he can preserve the "good name" of the Mounties. It would be a shame to drag the Mounties through the mud, especially if the charges are true!

Threads like these remind me of how I felt when I married into a family of Liberals. Being first generation Canadians I could understand their choice but when they tried to argue me into agreeing with them they often made me laugh! This was the era of all the Chretien scandals and there were so many blatant ones that my father-in-law and brother-in-law gave up and conceded that "bad things had happened." They then promptly switched and tried to inundate me with supposed transgressions on behalf of the Reform Party. These accusations were always an obvious stretch but I was curious about their reasoning. One family dinner I asked my father-in-law how even if his accusations were true why would that be a reason for me to switch to their side? He replied: "Don't you see? They all have dirty laundry!" "Well," I asked. "That being said, why then should 'tie go to the Liberals'? If they're both tainted choices why should I go with YOUR choice?" I got some pretty strange arguments from them but of course never anything that made sense. It just reinforces what I've come to sadly believe, that we Canadians will rarely get a choice we can in the main approve. We just get to pick the one who smells the least! These days, the Tories have got a long way to go to equal the stench around the past decade of Liberals. Montreal restaurant smells can't overcome the reek of tainted MILLIONS of dollars! Give it another term of government or two and that can change. Not soon enough for Dion, however.

I'll say it! Cheerfully! After all the Shawinigate stuff my faith in the impartiality of the RCMP was totally shattered. It had already been seriously shaken years earlier when the RCMP raided the offices of the Toronto Sun and it was pretty obvious that Trudeau had sent them. Does anyone know if the head dude of the RCMP is a Prime Minister appointment? It would explain a lot.

+1!+1! Finally someone spoke the obvious! I was beginning to think that no one in this thread had any shred of logical thinking at all! You can't plot a curve from only one point of data. That is to say, only one instance doesn't prove anything. Hillary was the first female candidate. All that we have seen is that the American registered Democrats like Obama better than her! The idea that she was rejected for being a woman implies that simply being a woman should have been enough reason to choose her! And that is not logical at all. It's mere crap and unworthy of debate. When Hillary attended the ceremonies for the emergency workers who died in the Twin Towers disaster, the police, fire and other rescue crews booed her when she took the microphone and turned their backs on her. They knew a phony exploiting their tragedy for a photo-op when they saw one. The boos went out on live feed TV but subsequently news video clips were doctored with crowd noise to cover it up. Perhaps all those rescue workers were Republican woman haters...NOT!

Depends on where you live! Here in the Niagara Peninsula it's dirt cheap, if you'll pardon the pun! That's because the "system" is such that you can't sell farmland except to someone who will keep farming it. No other use is allowed. Meanwhile the last fruit processor has closed down so there's no where to sell your fruit crop except in dribs and drabs at roadside stands. So the farmers have been ripping out virtually all the trees. It's cheaper just to rake off the hay from empty fields. The land is cheap 'cuz you no longer can make a profit from farming it and you're not allowed to sell it for any other purpose. Just another Dilbert approach that makes city folk in Toronto all warm and fuzzy about "saving farmland".

Am I understanding you correctly? You are attacking the Tory policy of legally demanding an actual cut in carbon emissions because we don't know for sure if the government will actually follow through. Meanwhile, you are championing a system of carbon trading that doesn't actually cut any carbon emissions at all! It just allows rich countries to buy credits from poor ones. If I've misunderstood you please explain.

I'm curious, what do you mean by "What Harper's government decided to ignore our will"? By "our will" do you mean the will of the majority of the Canadian people? Perhaps you could cite a poll showing how the majority of Canadians agree with you, remembering that the question is NOT how many Canadians wanted Canada to stay out of Iraq but rather how many Canadians approve of granting refugee status to American deserters.

No, of course I can't say for sure. Neither can you. How can anyone defend a "what if"? All we have is party track record. One one hand we have a few broken Tory promises. On the other we have a hand that falls down and breaks under the weight of a ZILLION broken Liberal promises! Nothing in life is a certainty but if you're going to place a bet you should look closely at the odds rather than just picking "the horse with the nice nose".

I'm surprised no one has mentioned how during WWII many objectors still served as medics and such in combat zones. They did not want to take a life but they were brave enough to risk their own to save lives. Why haven't any of those who want refugee status today chosen that path? As for honour trumping "whatever", the NDP and the left in Canada has never grasped the concept of honour. They practice "situational ethics" instead. If Canada were ever attacked, they would be the LAST people capable of defending ourselves and our children. We would end up conquered and/or dead. Their ideas simply are wishes and not practical in the real world.