ReeferMadness

Terrorism is a crime. If you want to reduce crime, you need to understand the root causes.You wouldn't use the same strategy to lower the rate of murders committed by organized crime as you would to eliminate murder arising from domestic violence. Terrorism is used by a whole bunch of different groups with different motivations so there is no one size fits all model. With respect to Al Qaeda and ISIS, our governments and media are feeding us sh*t. We're being presented with facts without context. Who is supporting and funding ISIS? Who is selling them weapons and ammunition? Why are they so successful at recruiting people? And what are the interests of the various regional and global powers? Iran,Turkey, Russia, Saudi Arabia, China, USA. They all have their own interests and it's rare to find anyone who can dig beneath the official statements to determine what is really going on. International politics is a cesspool of hypocrisy. Finally, we do have some data on what actually works to fight organizations that use terrorism as a tactic. So, until someone in the government stands up and says something about terrorism that has the ring of truth, I would prefer that we not made things worse by dropping bombs on a situation I don't understand.

In fairness, you also lamented Obama pulling out of Iraq too early (how many decades would have been enough?) so it seemed like you were a "boots on the ground" aficionado. No matter. Bombs or boots - they both work - as long as your objective is to keep people fearful and keep the "security industry" filled up with citizen's funds. That's Dr. Dyer to you. Sadly, super-power nation state military alliances are not so easy to create. It must have caused a real panic on the part of the security industry when communism collapsed - all those people living under totalitarianism didn't want to play anymore. Suddenly, crazy peacniks were running around talking about 'peace dividends'. Can't have that. But hey. It turns out that a ragtag bunch of extremists with stolen weapons can fight a multi-trillion-dollar military alliance to a stand-off so clearly the answer is more money of the security industry. I think what you mean to say is that the military-industrial complex has been around a lot longer than the term (coined by President Eisenhower in his farewell address).

I don't know how Ontario is doing and I don't really care to learn. One example means nothing. And there are plenty of counter-examples. Unless you can show me a long term study that shows a clear trend, I have to assume that your views are based on nothing more than a commonly held stereotype. You can have low taxes and you can have high program spending - but you can't have both. Deficits happen when a government only pays attention to one side of the equation. Conservatives like to blame the huge Harper era deficits on the recession and the opposition that "made" embark on stimulative spending but they conveniently forget the ill-considered, populist GST tax cut and the corporate tax cuts. I've seen zero evidence that either of these measures had any marked effect on lessening the recession but they clearly affected the deficits. Harper has to own his deficits - the same as every other PM.

Welcome to the internet age, where everyone is an expert. You don't need to know anything about the science because you can always find an "expert" who agrees with you. Or not. Even if you know nothing about the matter at hand, you can just make up some "logical" objection and not even bother learning about it. Don't want vaccinations? That's OK because they're just a plot concocted by evil pharmaceutical companies. Don't want to stop driving your big-ass SUV with heated seats? No problem because climate change is just a scam invented by scientists who otherwise couldn't get a real job. Don't like the long form census? Well, it's just a plot by a bunch of pinkos who want to control he universe. If the science doesn't correspond with your world view, just feel free to ignore it. Revel in your ignorance. Welcome to the 21st century.

Even after he dumped the NEP, Mulroney could have kept Petro-Canada. Instead, we wound up being an anomaly. A petroleum exporting country without a national oil company.

Harper ran some of the largest deficits in history. And because he also ran some of the most secretive governments in history, we really don't know what the impact of the cuts was. Did you know that Kevin Page is still fighting for access to information on the effects of Harper budget cuts? He filed dozens of access to information requests from the "shadow PBO" he is now running at the University of Ottawa. I hope that Trudeau runs a more transparent government. Regardless, you can't point to one government and generalize that Canada will go to hell in a handbasket under PR.

So, let's summarize. NATO, the most powerful military alliance in human history can't pacify one primitive country in a decade. Apparently, your solution to solving the worlds problems is to simply occupy countries indefinitely. And you think Trudeau is wrong-headed. Did I get that about right? The only commentator on this subject that has made any sense at all to me is Gwynne Dyer. And what he's pointed out is this: the benefactors of security spending in the western world (arms suppliers, generals, spy organizations, right wing politicians, private army corporations) and the extremist Islamic leaders need each other. The security industry needs an enemy to keep the population fearful so nobody will question enormous spending and repressive legislation. And the extremist Islamic leaders need the west to keep killing Muslims because that's what keeps recruitment going. That may seem paranoid but it's the only lens through which any of this madness actually makes logical sense.

Canada is going to turn into Greece? Because left wingers under PR can't resist spending? Is that what's happened in Germany? Sweden? Norway? You know what's really funny. People keep trotting out this old canard about how lefties can't manage to balance budgets. Meanwhile, the most conservative country in the western world is spending itself into oblivion. The US has neither left wing government nor proportional representation and they haven't had a balanced budget since 2001.

You mean like staying in Afghanistan ended the Taliban and Al Qaeda? How many decades does it take? What shameless revisionism. The problem wasn't the Americans left Iraq - the problem was that they invaded in the first place. And then made an unholy mess of the place by handing all of the power to one of the factions. Neither ISIS nor Al Qaeda were there before they invaded.

lol It was the creepy smile. Blue eyes would have made it worse.

That's very impressive. The combined might of some of the biggest military forces in the can fight a ragtag group of fanatics, who rely on stealing weapons from forces the west supplied, to a draw. At least temporarily. Just have to keep it up for a few decades. Only ISIS keeps on popping up in more countries. So I guess we need to occupy all of them.

And so you think we can end radical Islam by dropping bombs. How's that working for us?

I think it's good that they know the myths have no power - whether or not they admit it.

Does it matter? It's a meaningless ceremony anyway.

You could see anything but I doubt that combination would last long.

cold dead hands.

Because our war on "radical Islam" has been so marvelously effective so far?

Changing demographics is only part of the story. One of the driving factors behind Alberta separatism was the idea that. because Alberta has oil wealth, it would be better off on its own. Since the bottom fell out of the price of oil, the notion that Albertans will be forever rich has been punctured. The longer the price of oil stays low and the more the world focuses on low-carbon energy, the more likely it is that this won't change.

I doubt you could reasonably infer the long term results of any voting system change. Parties would split and evolve; and voter behavior would change as well.

I think the first obligation should be having a strategy that provides some level of assurance we're going to stop creating new problems. Let's look at the history. Supporting the Mujahideen in Afghanistan allowed the Taliban to gain power and that provided a base for Al Qaeda to flourish. Deposing Saddam allowed Al Qaeda to set up shop in Iraq. Then in the ensuing years of civil war in Iraq produced ISIS. So, until somebody can come up with a convincing narrative about how all of this will have a happy ending, it seems like we should stop bombing people.

So, I find some of the cabinet chair appointments a bit odd. The Cabinet Committee on Inclusive Growth, Opportunities and Innovation is chaired by the Minister of Health. The Cabinet Committee on Open and Transparent Government (the first line of whose mandate is "Considers issues concerning the reform of democratic institutions and processes) is chaired by the Minister of Public Services and Procurement. And the Cabinet Committee on Environment, Climate Change and Energy is chaired by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and co-chaired by the Minister of International Trade. Is this a way of ensuring that rookie cabinet ministers in some key portfolios stay on track?

Not everyone looks at politics left to right. Different people have different reasons. Look here and flip to page 7 of the slide deck. It shows second voting preferences. There is certainly a tendency for people to switch as you indicated but it's not absolute. And there is a large tendency for people to have no second choice. If you change the voting to a ranked ballot, it remains to be seen how they wlll vote. I didn't say I thought they would bother to get informed. I said that if they did get informed and involved, it will make it much more difficult for the Liberals just to do what they want. So, anyone who wants to see an honest process should get involved.

If you're going to insist on a Finance Minister who has no outside interests, the talent pool will get pretty shallow. I think this is for the Ethics Commissioner to ensure that the blind trust is truly blind and that Morneau can't influence decisions with respect to the company. And you can't just look at Morneau, how about all of the other ministers who will have financial interests in all sorts of things?

Ahhh. Dog whistle forum post.

Technically, it's half plus 1 when you include Trudeau. Or is one of the guys missing his equipment?