Fortunata

Don't let your buddy Argus see this or he will think you are uneducated and mentally challenged. LOL

Argus wrote: And when those of you, meaning you Argus, realize I don't support any government at all because I think they are hopeless ineptitudes that will do what they do for the next vote and not the betterment of the country, then I will stop thinking of your lack of awareness, of knowledge, of political sophistication - or basic stupidity. Not everybody supports a Party. Because, guess what? No party is all the answer. There is NO PERFECT. You couch your comments with, I had hope for the Liberals, they disappointed me etc. but it is clear to me that it easy to type comments without feeling them.

Argus, a couple of things: 1. I do not think that the majority of Canadians support the death penalty. Many Canadians can't even figure out that capital punishment means the death penalty. Sounds weird but it's true. 2. I don't care when that speech of Harper's was given. Did he not mean it? Has he changed his mind since Bush, if you think that, I would like you to back it up. By all accounts he is as staunchly behind Bush and his doctrines as ever.

Not a hate-on. I find him pretentious and phony. He doesn't come across to me as honest or sincere.

The whole thing about him being hung now is that the others upon whom atrocities were committed against, now haave no day in court. I'm thinking mostly about the Kurds. It's fine to say that he got his but there has to be something very satisfactory and, maybe, closure to having your say to a monster.

Is this any surprise? Don't forget the speech in which Harper denounced Canada as a “Northern European welfare state in the worst sense of the term” and described the US neo-conservative movement “as a light and an inspiration to people” in Canada and “across the world.” Guess what? Most Northern European states (welfare or not) don't believe in capital punishment and Steve's light and inspiration i.e. the Republican Party of the USA does indeed believe in capital punishment (as does I daresay many in the US not of the republican persuasion). Harper did at one time say he wanted to hold a binding referendum on capital punishment, which indicates he favours it. That he doesn't speak out now could mean that he's afraid he'll loose votes if he voices that. And, being a typical politician, he would do anything for a vote.

Do you speak English? No, he speaks Canadian. Different spelling and grammar rules apply. If you don't like speaking Canadian on a Canadian forum please feel free to join an American speaking forum.

I would say more concern with the common man, less with the entities receiving corporate welfare, such as well-connected advertising agencies. jbg, what the h do you know about it? More concern with the common man? Like cancelling literacy programs, women's programs, childcare program funding, increasing taxes (oh yeah, he did cut the GST by 1% which helps whom the most?), half a billion from post secondary education funding, the way they handled the income trusts which depleted many a senior's income? You mean that concern? They are no better than was the government before them for the well-being of Mr. Everyday-Joe-On-the-Street. And corporate welfare?.. such as maybe not cancelling the billions in subsidies to the oil companies who are making record profits? Different from the Liberals you say? Sure jbg, keep it coming.

Argus, that's just Fortunata's self-fulfilling fabrication. She feels if she repeats the same falsehood time after time after time people will simply accept it as fact. Good on you for calling her on the fib. Oh Ricki Bobbi, you all knower of all things. My opinion is no more fib than your opinions and downright untruths. You say you research everything and you may, but with such a jaundiced eye you could not see truth in many instances if it smacked you upside the face. Argus, you conservative types criticized the Liberals over all things just because they were Liberals. It is not a huge leap to say that the Steve bandwagon would have declared (as if they didn't; maybe not you specifically) on the Liberals just what the non-cons declared here. In this seemingly increasing partisan country that's the way of it. Are you saying you don't?

I'm not intelligent enough to work my way through your last post. Can you try simpler sentence structure? I'm going to type real slow so you get it jbg - if the US has more information than what Canada gave them it would be prudent of them to share with us - especially if that "real" information says Arar could pose a threat to our or your national security. That's what information sharing is there for - protection for all. It's my feeling the USA has nothing more than what we gave them, which proved to be false. Governments have a real hard time saying they may have been wrong.

Everything that Steve and his merry band do is justifiable to the apologists by the excuse "the Liberals." If the Liberals were doing the same thing they would scream their heads off. Doing wrong to a lesser degree is still doing wrong. You will always find worse if you look for it; people use that as an excuse in all things instead of being accountable for their own behaviours. What's wrong, what's excess, what's hypocrisy is still all those things no matter to what degree the actions are perpetrated.

Medicare should be used for non-emergencies; in fact one of the biggest downfalls of our system is it is not proactive enough. We don't prevent disease and conditions we treat the symptoms after the fact. Then the costs, of course, are higher than they would have been, never mind the patient is worse off.

After 17 years as head of Elections Canada, Jean-Pierre Kingsley announced today that he will step down from the post in the new year. http://news.sympatico.msn.ctv.ca/TopStorie...showbyline=True Coincidence you say?

Well, well. Argus and I agree on something, who'd a thunk it? Heath care? Absolutely needs to be something done. I'm not an expert so I don't know what. Revamp completely the one we have to need less beauocracy; let's don't have to go back to our GP to get follow-up ok's to see the specialists. One referral should be enough at the outset, yes? Let's have enough doctors so people don't have to use emergency rooms for anything other than emergencies. Let's have proactive care before a problem gets serious versus expensive reactive care. There's tons that could be done and is frustratingly not done. I am furious about my MP giving me the party line in email responses. I don't care about the party line - ok, so I didn't vote for you but dam it all, you're my elected MP. You should be doing what your constituents need doing. As far as voting, yes, secret ballot. At the end of the term (election time) the MP's votes become public so I can tell whether my MP is representing me. The problem is that what is necessary to you may not be necessary to me and vice versa. You can't stop crime by harsher sentences. The only way to ensure a more lawful and orderly society is put the societal framework in place to reduce the need to commit crimes; this is something Conservatives choose not to understand. This happens more often than you'd like to believe. The whole immigration paragraph I agree with wholeheartedly and unreservedly. This paragraph ..... well the Conservatives won't do any more than they have to to get votes JUST LIKE THE LIBERALS. I know you are partisan but the Liberals have done good stuff over the years which anybody could see if they got over the fact that it was the Liberals, just like Steve will do some good things even though he is Conservative. You see how that works?

No, I'm using the worst example I could think of for what apologists would justify for Steve and his merry band of conservatives. Tories sneak friendly appointments under holiday radar http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.h...06a16b6&k=28765 We'll see if that happens. How much crow will you have to eat if he doesn't? Bwah ha ha ha

Not publically declare their intelligence but it would be nice, given their rhetoric over information sharing, if they shared with our (un)intelligence services what they have that we don't have that keeps Arar on the terrorist list. By all that has been said and done, it must be more than the rumour and innuendo we tossed over. If there is more to it that truly points Arar out as a terrorist then we should be apprised since it could compromise our national security. Isn't that what all this "sharing" is supposed to be for?

Ain't it funny that to the Stevie gang any wrongdoing is ok, is overlookable, is an honest mistake but if it were a Liberal, look out!!! That's the way you can tell a partisan. If Steve raised taxes to build himself a Berchtesgaden in the Alberta Rockies, that would be ok; he works hard, he deserves a mountain retreat. And that's not the only news that the Conservatives tried to hide under the Christmas radar, what about all those patronage appointments hmmmmm? Wasn't there a committee struck to review appointments 'cause Steve wanted to do it different than the Liberals? Oh me oh my, what little difference a change in government really makes.

I wear a maple leaf when I travel. It's a great conversation starter and, right off, people know what language I speak. The one time we did not, not only didn't we get pegged as Americans, we also blended in I guess because we didn't get the people coming up to talk as much. So, from then on a maple leaf went on the backpacks, the sleeves, the luggage. It's great.

For example, they won't share the supposed super double secret information that keeps Arar on the US terrorist list. Oh my, that's silly even for you. Get over yourself already. What about places like Syria that doesn't recognize a foreign citizenship at all to a person that was born in Syria?

This is more than about Arar. He is just an example of how the US wants others to share their information and yet not reciprocate in kind. And as far as Arar dismantling the workings of Canada national security system, it doesn't sound like we had a good one to start with. I mean, sharing meanderings of imagination without any kind of proof to another country to have a man interred and tortured isn't an effective national security system. It's the system itself that has made a joke out of Canada internationally. There was a kid in elementary school who never backed down, you could say he had balls as well. He ended up with no real friends, only self-seeking suck up friends who were afraid of his fists. If I were Arar, I would be suing as well. It's the only option when governments do what they did.

No, like you I have a reading incomprehension. Not an obsession at all, I have never heard of it before. It's not as though it has been explained why you would even want to. And if you don't want to explain it, DUDE, why even bring it up?

Wilkins is just the mouthpiece for the government, which all ambassadors are. But it would be nice to have information sharing for real, not just one sided. The US government talks about information sharing but, from what we see in the Arar deal, is just talk and no action. I think what they want is for countries to give them information and not reciprocate. That way they can talk about all this "confidential info" for manipulation purposes. It makes them feel important. ANd they use it for an excuse to do what they want. AND, if there is no real info, they won't have to say they are wrong.

How dysfunctional does one have to be to not be dysfunctional? Surely you would agree that there are varying degrees of dysfunction and those degrees will have an impact no matter that "their" dysfunction is percieved by some as "lesser".

You call that a personal attack? Better re-read boyo. I called you on co-opting threads that had nothing to do with Canada/US or just USA to talk about the US. I was just on the Canada/US thread and that's where you should be talking about the US. Not under "Liberals Hidden Agenda" which actually has nothing to do with Harry Truman nor Canadian (mis)spelling, which was totally inappropriate since you are on a Canadian forum, and of course we use Canadian spelling. And I still find it strange that someone of a different nationality not even living in this country would attend a Canadian political convention.

I'm weighing in to say I don't want to merge with any other country, whether they be rich or not; whether it could benefit us financially or not. There IS more to life than pots of money and we're doing rather well for ourselves right now. We would get swallowed up and there would be little of what is us left. Those of you who can't see our culture either don't want to or fail to recognize it as it stares you in the face. I like having the US as our neighbour, it's fun to go down there to visit and to holiday but not to live. The US has more problems facing it than we do albeit of a different kind. The people are no more unified on issues than we are. We may have a dysfunctional family here but it's my family.