The Terrible Sweal

People who attempt to equate the situation of same-sex marriage with polygamy are simply ignorant of important aspects of civics.

Yours? How about your neice?

No, they would never be obtainable with minimum wage laws. Ford's wage raises were brought about by market measures and, as such, were sustainable and beneficial. Minimum wage laws are a non-market measure, because the wage increases are not necessitated or even justified by any market measure. You are simply resorting to kapitalystic dogma again: 'Non-market things (as conveneintly defined from time to time) are Evil.' But you fail to explain why the minimum wage cannot function exactly as I suggested.

I'm afraid you seem to misunderstand my argument. Ford's raising of wages brought results which are desireable and possibly obtainable by minimum wage laws. It was being sustained by other factors.

What about a market that comes into existence after an unfair act, but with the participants strating positions nevertheless coming from that prior time?

Oh please. You can't seriously cite the Mises institute as probative of anything in economic matters. Obviously Ford saw a range of reasons for raising wages, but the level targetted was related to the price of the commodity and the effect of manufacturing wage increases was to raise demand to the point that economies of scale were realised. Using the same reductionist analysis as you did earlier, obviously they would come to the same conclusion. You have added nothing further by quoting this source, which merely re-iterates the same flawed beliefs. Note that you can be reasonably sure they did use flawed analysis because they paint their prejudices ("icon of the political left") right into their analysis. This demonstrates something exactly different than what you propose. If it were indeed due to the economic effect oyou suggest for minimum wages, all teens (and other low-wage workers) would affected similarly. No, it is not. It is the theory you subscribe to. Saying it is a fact won't make it a fact. Where then is this proof? Then why would we need a minimum wage law? To avoid the problem of a race to the bottom wherein a substantial proportion of wages become uneconomical (thus hindering liquidity, purchasing, accumulation and ultimately growth). Yes, unfortunately, they are misguided. Most leftists have their hearts in the right place but are woefully ignorant on the matters of which they preach, Your wild attributions of what leftists are all about are entirely irrelevant in a serious discussion, particularly with a counterpart such as myself who is not leftist. Perhaps you could deal with the points presented in an intelligent fashion rather than with political rhetoric. Again with the vapid and repetitive assertions. How dreary.

Is is possible for a market to be unfair, but still free? Or IOW, is an unfair market by definition not free.

But there must be an explanation for their behaviour. Are they bad businesses, poorly led? Or is the perceived demand (and thus price) for players real?

Actually, a large number of products, particularly those manufactured in large volumes vary substantially in cost from market to market around the world. This is due to logistical, marketting, local preferences, and volume/margin imperatives affecting businesses. An example is the difference in the price of drugs between Canada and the U.S.

A central banknote is not a marker for a certain amount of gold or any other commodity. It is a representative of legal tender whose spot value depends on the willingness of the marketplace to trade for it. In fact, my BMW dealer will take paper I create if he believes it will be honoured at the value he expects. A common example is a cheque. But I'll bet you $10 that if Bill Gates pulled up to a BMW dealer and offered his personal promisory note for a car, that would be acceptable too. Ah Hugo, always ready to substitute a simple theory for the complexities of reality. As for the first sentence there, consider the case of Ford Motors in the early days when they raised wages to the point the employee could afford a car. Guess what ... they all bought cars and the company got rich. Minimum wages do not 'cause unemployement', they establish a labor floor price which can have either a stimulative or depressive effect depending on the economy overall. As for the 'market wage' argument, you need to recognize two things: first, below a certain level a wage will not be accepted no matter how poor someone is, and second, there are perfectly sensible reasons why a society may want to affect the market with a minimum wage.

Money has existed for about 6000 years or so. Power has existed for much, much longer. Your equation is wrong, Bakunin. It oversimplifies but contains an essential element of truth. Money measures wealth, and wealth is power. There are other types of power, but wealth is certainly an important one.

Another highly suspect assertion in need of support.

Prove it.

You may have seen Rick Mercer babbling about the one tonne challenge on TV. The guvmint is challenging citizens to each reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by one tonne to help acheive out objectives under the Kyotocol. Well wait a second ... Kyoto establishes a system of exchange for pollution 'credits' wherein those who don't pollute much can sell their 'right to pollute' to those who do pollute. So ... there is something missing with the one tonne challenge, if I reduce by a tonne do I get paid for it? If not, who's absconding with my pollution credit in this system? Methinks I smell a moneygrab.

If I recall correctly, a very small proportion of offenders who serve a life sentence go on to re-offend in terms of serious crime anyway.

It doesn't work. It will be brutally expensive to develop and deploy. It defends against a very low chance, but very high consequence attack. The way it is deployed can serve to decrease or increase risk to Canada. We share an important alliance with the world's superpower respecting shared defense. Based on these considerations, in my opinion, Canada should agree to the idea with some provisos: our contribution will be to assist in operations (including providing stations on Canadian territory) beginning at the time of deployment. And, the system should deploy no weapons in space, and there should be a covenant that it never will, nor will it ever be made interoperational with space weapons systems.

That's a rather imprecise description of the situation. That's also something of a distortion, and probably amounts to an appeal to bigotry. By the same logic, some might say the same about our laws, only the ancient geography is different. This suggests that you misunderstand the legal situation. let me clarify for you ... The Arbitration act allows disputing parties to choose to have the dispute heard in a private forum under ANY rules they like. You want the Legislature to act to change that rule. My question is, what change, specifically, do you want the legislature to make to the Arbitration Act? For example, should it exclude family law issues?

Someday perhaps women will stop infantilizing themselves (or worse) with this kind of nonsense. Consider the hypothetical woman represented in your comment here: You posit that her central preoccupation is to struggle for superhuman beauty. Stop there for a second ... that's not a reasonably attainable objective i.e. it's futile, e.g. either it is irrational behavior OR some reward is obtained for the behavior short of attaining the stated objective of superhuman beauty. In either case, the answer to your social question changes substantially. Then you say that the product of this impossible quest is then offered to a subhumanly ugly mate. Now there's a gobsmacking logical challenge if ever there was! Why on Earth does she do that? one might ask. But first notice that since she does not ever attain the objective of superhuman beauty, it must be something less she offers in trade -- you have a contradiction in your position. But back to 'Why?' Could you explain more clearly what the motivation/incentive elements are in this inexplicable behaviour, as you see it? So far I understand that you say there are certain identified social 'pressures', but I don't understand how you mean that they take effect on the behaviour of an individual woman making individual choices.

In Plato's Republic, Socrates deals with the issue of eye-for-an-eye style 'justice'. Basically, he suggests that it is wasteful.

Swiss Army God.

Not absurd. Perfectly sensible. The resolutions are clear, and they are passed by the member nations because they make sense to them. If Israel desisted from the breaking of international law, the UN would have no further basis for making the resolutions and the member states would reject them. The situation is rather plain and clear to everyone but Likudnik apologists. The majority of member states of the UN think Israel is occupying Palestinian territory illegally.

Allow me to explain. The United Nations was founded with the sponsorship of the victorious Allies after WWII. It comprises, theoretically, all the sovereign states of the world who wish to be members. Among the member states, by the terms of the Charter they all accede to, the UN, acting in body becomes an authoritative voice on certain questions under international law. States who refuse to acknowledge their treaty obligations are, of course, free to withdraw. We may presume that member states therefore acknowledge the authority, in principle, of the UN. It is a condemnation of Israel -- a valid and effective one. It is valid because. Israel has no business breaching international law. If it were not effective you wouldn't be moved to launch specious attacks on the UN. Israel could end that problem by obeying international law. The UN is merely the tool of its members. For you to say that the UN is biased is to say the whole world is biased. Or, 'everyone is wrong'. Because it doesn't have enough support among member states. There are a lot of countries that don't. The solution, if Israel wants it, is to obey international law and make more friends. What is so terrible about that? Why did you choose that phasing "not permitted"???

Oh come now. There are many other ways GWB can yet be bashed. A grossly reductionist characterization of events. He'd have done that anyway, Canada or no Canada, right? Y'know where horseshit comes from, Freedom? Canada is well aware of the advantage of being within the U.S. defensive umbrella. Thanks for protecting yourselves so well. We really do enjoy the convenience. Consider what you said here... you say American's may be [lacking what it takes to make wise choices] but they [will act anyway based on their feelings]. My friend, surely you can see that's folly. BLECH. Sorry. Profound ignorance makes a toxic mix with overweening self-satisfaction.

But that's a fallacy of assumption, begging-the-question. You appear to equate the Christian framework with the will of God ... you voted 'perfectly sensible', I suppose? Sez who though?

Votes stand at 8-0 for implausible and presumptuous. I'm surprised. I know that there are people here who advocate adoption of policies based on the idea that God requires certain things. Did none of those people vote??