Wild Bill

Once again your sense of history and mine are totally different, Topaz. And Chuck happened to be one of my personal heroes back then. He made his living fixing guitar amplifiers, the same as I do. So, could you please provide some proof for what you said? Google up some reports or references? All you have done is repeated the Opposition's side of the story at the time of the affair as if it was gospel or proven. Please back up what you claim! Just this once?

Is it fraud, GH? As more and more comes out, it appears less and less likely there was any real fraud. Frankly, I think both you and MadMax are just so blinded by hate for Harper and the Tories that in your minds the evidence is solid gospel from Mt. Sinai of their guilt and you have already tried and convicted them! You already believed what you believe. You just want to pin SOMETHING on the Tories because you want them OUT! If we have an inquiry and it finds there is nothing to the charges you would simply look on it as an opportunity for SOMETHING ELSE to be uncovered in the process, because in your minds the Tories HAVE to be guilty! I'm really starting to think that many folks on the left are starting to lose it.

It's not that simple, GH. There is a real belief that the mullahs ruling Iran want to kill Jews. Others would rather see the mullahs killed first! It is human nature to take satisfaction from seeing a bully get punished. In the circles supporting action against Iran, Iran is seen as a bully and also a religious fanatic. You are never going to get those people to have any sympathy for Iran unless you can show that impression is wrong. Your task is continually made more difficult by Iran itself.

GH, inquiries such as you suggest cost money. Do we investigate EVERYTHING? If you suspect there's a $10 error with your VISA account, do you think $10million dollars should be spent to investigate it, just to be sure? We have to have some sense of perspective! This is the sort of "zero tolerance" thinking that gets a Dad strip searched over a picture of a gun drawn by his four year old!

Nobody says it has to be compulsory in all cases, CC! Do you really think Paul Bernardo is actually innocent? With modern DNA forensics the chances of a mistake are much less. If the death penalty was only to be applied in extreme cases where evidence of guilt is overwhelming it would go a long way to restoring faith in the system to those who have lost it. Of course, the idea of a mistake is really just a red herring. Those who say that really just don't want a death penalty at all, even when there's no possibility of a mistake. Or we could have consecutive sentences and a life term meaning exactly that, instead of the relatively short terms given today. However, the same people against the death penalty seem to be the ones against true life sentences. They are entitled to their opinion, the same as anyone else. My problem is that when they are in the minority yet their view prevails to me it is not democratic! It is elitism! It breeds a lack of confidence in the "system" and a festering resentment, precisely the situation we are in today. The people who are losing confidence in the system will NEVER agree with the "doves" and I suspect will ALWAYS be in the majority. This means we will always have a growing majority of citizens cynical of the justice system and continually becoming more and more pissed off! Not good! Something has to be worked out.

No Jack, you can stop building your straw men! It's just that it seems the NDP believes today that you can pass a law and force a company to stay in business! The real world just doesn't work like that. They forget that Caterpillar was for sale because it was no longer profitable! Stelco was sold because it was in bankruptcy protection! If a company is no longer profitable then it is toast! It's a simple as that. All the politicians in the country can get in front of the parade to save jobs but its all a cruel joke. The only way to save the jobs is to nationalize the company and fund it at a loss from tax money - basically, corporate welfare! I never hear the NDP admit to this. To hear them tell it, companies close up just to be pricks! Mind you, I'm not supporting those who take government money only to use it to fund a move to China. That's not just wrong, it's an expression of how stupid our politicians often are. I know how it feels to lose your job because your company goes under. It's happened to me, more than once! However, I never would have supported the government forcing it to stay open! If you're broke, you're broke! I don't expect my fellow taxpayers to pay me, especially if I was making more than most of them did. (Actually, it was always the reverse!) In all my years I have never heard the federal NDP talk real world when it comes to business. To hear them tell it, businessmen start up factories so they can fill their swimming pool with dollar bills and dive into it! When they close a plant its only so that they can cackle with glee as they hear the cries of starving widows and orphans! Jack, no poor man has ever given me a job! I have never heard squat from the NDP as far as helping business grow and become more healthy. They always seem to expect business to operate at a loss, or at least barely breakeven, so that the government can get the maximum taxes for what they deem to be positive social ends. They just don't seem to be practical! That's why I have never supported them! Tony Blair changed the Labour Party in Britain in a very simple fashion. He made them recognize that businesses cannot run at a loss, they cannot stick around if they are broke and a country cannot prosper by drafting everyone into the postal service and having them mail letters to each other! I've asked you yourself many times how we could stimulate business and thus the economy and you've never given me a good answer. All you ever seem to say are words to the effect that all businessmen are evil! Surely there's more to it than that! Frankly, if I worked for a company run by someone with your methods I would be dusting off my resume, hoping to get another job before the business went under.

Topaz, you just don't ever make any sense at all! Why on earth should problems with the Liberals and Tories mean people should then switch to the NDP? If you went through two bad mayors in a row should everyone then vote for the village idiot? Why not? Nobody's given him a chance! Besides, I have personal knowledge of an NDP leader who was of such bad character he made Vic Toews peccadilloes look like those of a monk! I'm afraid that soured me badly. As I've said before, if the NDP actually came into the 21st century and became more of a modern Labour Party instead of a 1965 union goon squad I might then find myself voting for them. As for your statement that "I see nothing wrong as yet with the Liberal party" - Topaz, you NEVER see anything wrong with the Liberal Party!

You are entitled to your opinion as to the legalities and the actions of Elections Canada concerning the "in and out" affair. Forgive me if I don't believe it to be gospel just because YOU say so! Who the hell are you, anyhow? Who appointed you Moses on the Mount? You remind me more and more of some evangelical preacher, like Charles McVeety!

You miss my point, Star! I wasn't trying to make a comparison with witch act was more right or wrong. I was pointing out the hypocrisy of giving approval to one wrong thing based on it riding your own favourite hobbyhorse, while condemning a wrong done by someone not on your own political side. It doesn't matter which act is more right or wrong. Situational ethics are ALWAYS wrong! As Captain Kirk told Cloud William in the episode "The Omega Glory", when the Yangs had won their freedom over the Comms and Kirk had realized that their Holy Words were actually the American Declaration of Independence "these words and the words that follow ... must apply to everyone or they mean nothing! Do you understand, Cloud William?" Both Occupy with their "squatting" and Anonymous with their blackmail broke the law. Olp1fan appears to have no problem with that. A Tory staffer tries to stop people using a ballot box because he believes the box to be in an illegal location and somehow, that's NOT alright, because Olp1fan doesn't like Tories! My point was simply that wrong is wrong and right is right. When you start to pick and chose you only show you have no fixed values or ethics of any kind at all.

I get it! It's always ok if it's against someone YOU don't like!

Frankly, there's so much monkeypoo flying in all directions that I'm losing track! Excuse me, I have to get some more popcorn.

I see. Stopping people from voting is wrong. Well, we agree on that! Blackmailing someone and through him a nation's government is not, because YOU agree with the reason why. Okay! I understand you now!

I thought Sona was fired for messing with a disputed ballot box location. Carroll was fired for an invasion of privacy. Is it your position that the two are morally equivalent? Or is it enough that the two names contained some of the same letters?

Once again, you rewrite history to suit your own bias. You make it sound like he was trying to steal a box to rig an election. In actual fact, there was a dispute about the legality of THE BALLOT BOX ITSELF! Sona was trying to prevent the ballot box from being used. Now, that in itself was wrong. He and the riding association had a right to dispute the validity of the box being used at that location but they had no right to take the law into their own hands. However, that being said, I would have thought you would approve! Sona acted precisely and in the same spirit as Anonymous and Occupy, taking the Law into their own hands because of what THEY believed! I don't expect you to agree, since your postings have consistently shown how biased you are. I just thought I'd point it out for the rest of the posters here on MLW. For the record, I DON"T approve of what Sona had done! Or Anonymous or Occupy either. In that I at least am consistent!

Waldo, how can he apologize if he doesn't know if he or his party actually did something wrong? True, he may know and just be faking it but either way, what is he supposed to say? "I don't believe we've done anything wrong but if we did I'm sorry!" I mean really, doesn't that sound more like a cliche modern liberal? Or your typical polite and apologetic Canadian!

Perhaps, but not in the way you mean, GH. This is not some moral contest, where there is some judge somewhere who says if one side committed a foul then the other side gets a free one. This is realpolitik. Some countries perform military actions because they want to and others because they feel they have to. There is a very real difference! Despite the constant carping from the anti-American "peanut gallery", Uncle Sam has rarely been the military aggressor in the last 100 years. A business aggressor, perhaps but not a military one. Rather, America usually has become involved either because some ally was attacked or in the case of Europe, the incumbent countries wanted Uncle Sam to foot the tab. Iran simply does not have the equivalent moral stature on the world stage as the USA. Not even most of its Arab neighbours think Iran is a Boy Scout! They know better than we do what the ruling mullahs in Irah are capable of doing and many are quietly assisting America and its allies behind the scenes. The last thing those other Arab countries want is for Iran to have the Bomb! Remember, Iran is not developing nuclear weapons so that it can serve as a counterbalance for all Arab and Muslim nations! It wants them so that Iran will become the greatest power in that part of the world! Kuwait, Bahrain, Jordan and even the Saudis will have to dance to Iran's tune. So this is not some tit for tat morality play, GH. Iran has very few friends and is considered a threat by almost all other countries except China and Russia, who want money! You make it sound like America or Israel performing a first strike on Iran is some sort of bullying recreational exercise. It is nothing of the kind! Iran is considered a serious threat and a first strike is simply another option to remove it.

I don't agree, mentalfloss! Having watched this sort of thing for over 45 years it seems to be that there IS a double standard in much of the media! Tories ALWAYS get hammered worse than Liberals or NDP! However, there is also an even stronger factor. It makes better news to attack the guys in charge rather than the Opposition. Really, most of the time who CARES about the Opposition? Even sadder for the Liberals, their brand is so tarnished the public has come to EXPECT sin and corruption from them! It is no longer news and so is less strongly reported. I still remember years ago there was a time when the Chretien Liberals were in the middle of a mess of scandals. I don't specifically recall which one was ahead at that time - it may have been Chretien's forcing a bank loans officer to give a loan to a man with poor credit so that he could take a piece of property off Chretien's hands. Anyhow, the pertinent point was not a particular scandal. All the media could talk about was that someone had come across some receipts for Preston Manning's dry cleaning, where some articles of clothing may have been personal and not for use at party functions or business! I doubt if the bill could have been over $10 at the time yet the media was putting this not just equal but above the Chretien scandal!

I wasn't aware that these scripts would have been legal documents, obliged to be kept for years! Do YOU keep every piece of paper you scrawl on, no matter if you thought it was trivial?

I believed I predicted earlier in another thread that the monkeys throwing poo were due for some splashback! I even said it would likely happen in the next day or two! If anyone is looking for lottery numbers or psychic predictions just PM me!

That is your opinion, not a fact. Would it not depend on the type of government that is hated? Supposed somehow we had wound up with a totalitarian government? Or a religious one? Suppose some Stockwell Day had used some parliamentary tricks to get a party of evangelical social engineers into power? Wouldn't it also depend on which foreign force was doing the invading? In the scenario I mentioned, if America, Britain or some other freedom loving country that better reflected my own values were to be the invader I would support them in an instant! If you really think everyone would automatically support a government they consider oppressive, nay - if not actually evil! - then I think you give the individual man short shrift for his sense of morality. Hell, we have posters right here on MLW who would cheerfully support a foreign invader if they came here to oust Harper!

While we focus on the likes of a Paul Bernardo, perhaps we could all think a moment about Karla Homolka? Yep! Life means life! We give harsh sentences here in Canada! Justice is always served! No doubt the families and loved ones of her victims are well and truly impressed!

Maybe. So far we still don't have any hard evidence, just reports from workers who refuse to be named. Who knows who they're REALLY working for? I'm having a lot of fun watching the show! It's just about at the point where we move to the next level. That's where we start getting reports of similar dirty tricks done by the OTHER parties! For make no mistake, it's happened! No party is blameless in these things. When monkeys throw poo they often get some splashback. I'll bet a beer something of this nature will break in the next few days.

Great idea! Considering China is the country that gave us poisoned pet food, lead paint on children's toys, executed a baby food factory manager because babies died... Plus, they really aren't likely to clear any military security lists...

That being said, please note that I have never said never! I certainly could see myself voting for the NDP if it ever became what I perceive as "modern". Jack moved mountains towards that end. Now things could go either way. Given a choice between a Tory party that has lost its way and a modern Labour type party I could find myself switching my vote in an instant. We'll just have to wait and see what the next election brings. I don't think it likely that the Liberals will have gotten their act together enough by that time to make them appealing to me. More likely, they are going to just fade away! There's too much ego in that crew to allow change. It's all about power struggles within the Liberal party, with zero attention seeming to be paid to make them an attractive choice to the voters.

Socrates had the last laugh. The Greek people would have been far better off if they had not executed him. Judging by the state of Greece today, I'm not sure if even yet they have learned their lesson.