Shwa

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Does a 5 year veteran of the NFL get invited to the NFL combine Shady? How about a 15 year veteran? Or how about a guy that has just finished his rookie year, does he get an invite? Seems to me that athletes invited to the combines are not NFL players now are they Shady? Sorry Shady, but your "proof" just went out the window and makes you out to be someone who seriously does not know what they are talking about. Would you like to try again Shady?

Really? Do you have proof of that? No?

I am liking the way you are going with this. Especially the super-laser part. But if we could build personal shielding cheap enough, we wouldn't need expensive robots, just regular people. And from all the studies out there, we could really use the exercise. So if we had soldiers with power boots, personal shields, firing super-laser guns we would be the envy. We could probably make quite a tidy profit on that by selling the technology for the right price. Then once everyone has spent their wad on the *new* Canadarms (get it??) we could take the profit and come up with something even more powerful and cool. Maybe then we start producing the robots...

LOFL! I was thinking the same thing!

This is an interesting thought against the research from John Ralston Saul in 'The Metis Nation' that show most of the attitudes we experience towards aboriginal people today were developed in the mid-19th century. Prior to that, public perspectives and dealings with First Nations were much different. I'm not so sure. There was definitely clashes of cultural values, but I think there was a genuine interest to understand one another and some of these understandings can be found in the language of the various treaties. I don't doubt that the religious element of European culture saw opportunity, but plenty of aboriginal religious and spiritual systems remain in practice today. No, it is probably the other way around. Plants and foodstuffs from the Americas were taken elsewhere, corn, beans, squashes, potatoes, tomatoes. Etc. Most of the flora and fauna in North America is native to the continent. If you think about the everyday food you eat, chances are that there is some food in there that originated in the Americas. There has been more modification of the landscape in modern times, the past 150 years or so, than at any other time. But by and large, the aboriginal people had modified the landscapes with their agriculture long before the Europeans had arrives. This is the complexity, for sure. But how much of your understanding of their lifestyles is based on a eurocentric view or views formulated of a result of it? There has been much acculturation from both perspectives over the past centuries and I believe some of that continues today. To a degree, yes. But you have to be careful not to paint all aboriginal people & cultures the same, which is the biggest 'wrong' of them all. Experiences varied greatly from one to another as they do today.

Yep, them too! Photon torpedoes would be awesome, especially if they make that cool sound when they are fired off. But even a small hand held directed energy weapon would be good enough for me. Something that instantly deconstructed atomic bonds to reduce the target to dust. That would be a good start I think. And for marketing purposes it should look like this.

or circus.

Absolutely! By making such a declaration we know that Rue is manifestly nuts!

$240 billion... that's a lot of coin. I think we should take half of it and send it over to the Defence R&D Board. Why? To develop phaser weapons, disrupters, etc. Yes, I mean ray guns, directed energy weapons. Handheld ones, rifles, etc. That would be so cool! Conventional weapons are so boring and damned messy. We would gain instant savings on not having to clean up the messes that bullets and bombs cause. Can you imagine? We would be the envy of the militariverse. And while we are at it, we could develop some sort of electromagnetic shielding technology to go along with it. So very, very cool. Hey, if some Japanese guy can make meat from poop, surely we can make rayguns.

Well, according to your logic: yes?

Of course that is it right there. Heck, I have even been known to watch a little UFL now and then.

"argument?" I must say, I am greatly impressed that you actually read his entire rambling, incoherent manifesto and still maintained even a modicum of interest to sustain enough pity to reply. Kudos to you sir, kudos.

LOFL!! Too much Rue. When your intelligence fails you make balloon animals. Your inner "pride" is showing.

Oooo, more marvelous shape shifting from the Marvelous Mr. Shapeshifter. I bet the only shapes you shift are balloons at a children's party. Like any other sad clown of no reknown. More weaseling drivel from the the snivelling Mr. Shapeshifter. LOFL! You should come out of the closet Mr. Shapeshifter, your phobias are out here waiting for you.

Well said and right on the money Jack. And let us know how the team did.

Let's see if you weasel Mr. Shape Shifter: Yep, you weasel, since your reply was directly to me. So you've been outted now. Not that there is anything wrong with that. Blah-blah-blah dodge. More meaningless weaseling. As IF you are somehow in control. LOFL! Now you've simply gone off your rocker, which is what I suspected from the very beginning. Maybe you should read some more poetry by Allen Ginsberg. You know, to get your orientation corrected.

No, the "crock" is the audacity of suggesting that I had indirectly called you a 'Faux Hag.' Provide my words where I said that - or even implied. Go ahead. Let's use your own criteria to make a determination as to whether I directly or indirectly called you a "Faux Hag." You can't? Didn't think so. Cause I didn't son, which is evident by all my posts to you in this thread. Sounds like you are a little phobic Rue, of someone mistaking you for a homosexual. Do you often get that confused because of your sexual orientation? By the way, the mocking tone is deliberate.

Well someone has made a decision to fund this dancer,her foundation and productions. Not only that, but they have made this decision over decades based on the citeria they were given to make such decisions. And not only one person, but likely a committee. And Gillis has been bestowed with the Order of Canada, is internationally known. Etc. Like opera and ballet, this particular art form doesn't really appeal to me, but using my personal taste in art as the reason for something being "debatable" for public funding doesn't quite cut it as opposed to something like publically funding bombs to drop on Libyans heads. Some of those bombs likely cause more than 100k each. Where's the 'public utility' in that? Make dance not war.

(Pssst. Cymbercoma. Shhhh. Come here for a second) (for gawdsakes please don't mention the National Film Board of Canada or any of their productions, especially those animated shorts they do. If the SunTV bunch get a hold of that, we'll never hear the end of it...)

Now why would you go and write something like that? Is the 401 untouchable or something? The 401 can be tolled like the I-90 in New York. It works since as far as I can see...

Since you are new here... Provide a source to whatever you are talking about if it isn't one of those major news items. I am fairly cognizant of most news items on a daily basis and I have no idea what the hell you are talking about. And what religion is "Zekes??" If you mean Sikh, then get your spelling in order. Is that a Canadian law or a provincial one? What province are you talking about? Except where those rules and regulations provide for exceptions. Right? If you moved to a different country, why would you try and change my rules? Unless you are addressing a specific part of the population, i.e. the "Zekes." Are you sure about this? Are the following all national laws, rules or regulations? Not a bad thing where warranted. The RCMP uniform was modified to accomodate people of different religious faiths. A sanctioned modification in the uniform is a "full RCMP uniform." This appears to be a personal opinion and it certainly is no law or regulation that I am aware of. Can you back up this claim with some citation or evidence? Citation? A fair idea, but it has to be applied equally across the board. Then, should someone that wears a cheaper helmet have to pay the same price as someone who wears a more expensive, more protective helment? How about the cost of skin grafts for those that refuse to wear tough leathers and get road rash? Should they have to pay "plain and simple?" But change is going to happen. It always has, it always will. Is there some point in time that defines what "Canadian" means and we should revert to that time as a baseline to what the "rules" should be? That is, was Canada more "Canadian" when you were in school, prior to the Lord's Prayer being removed?

Are you in possession of some secret information - that not even the City Budget Committee has - that says that the nursing contracts are "forever" and that after a period of time the City must bear the costs "forever?" Or are you making the same irrational assumption that has even baffled some of Mayor Ford's allies? I am betting on the irrational assumption, but will take a cite or some evidence that the City will have to bear the costs - if you can produce it. No one else has "solved the ...deficit problem" either. And what "long term" is that? An assumption that public nursing contracts are "forever?"

What "services" did Paul Martin cut compared to Mike Harris? What EI or pension program did Harris use to declare surpluses? Did Harris even declare budget surpluses with the Common Sense Revolution? When the Tories were thrown out of power in Ontario, did they have a deficit or a surplus? Etc. The problem being one of scope. I will agree that there are similarities with some policies and some of the approaches. But a direct one-to-one comparison to justify the acts of another is a iffy proposition and a bit of a cheap argument. But you say above that both Martin and Harris benfitted from a robust economy and, while I am not economist, I think I can safely say that today we do not benefit from a robust economy. I think our approaches need to a little different. I tend towards fiscal conservatism myself, even though I think the population can stand a significant tax hike at this point in time. The sheer volume of garbage that fills houses as an indication of a high 'standard' of living is out of whack with what we can truly 'afford' as does the level of inefficiency in government organization and private corporations. I prefer incentives over force. I'm not telling you that you are dumb.

"...in 1914...when the National Gallery of Canada purchased one of his paintings..."