kimmy

25,000 doesn't sound so bad, I guess. Will they be spread out across the country, or will they all gravitate to a handful of neighborhoods in the GTA, GVA, and a couple of other major centers? The idea of bringing in a bunch of religious conservatives straight out of the third world doesn't sit well with me regardless of the circumstances. It seems pretty much counterproductive to the ideas of social progress that I support. If it's just 25000 and they're sufficiently diluted I guess we can handle it. If I was in Germany the idea of 800,000 of these people suddenly landing in my midst would scare the crap out of me. -k

I think the distinction between putting the money into general revenue or into addiction treatment is actually pretty artificial. If this money is targeted for addiction treatment, then other government money would be channeled elsewhere accordingly; there won't be an increase in budgets for treatment unless there's a political decision to do so. I'm in favor of legalization. Pot prohibition really only benefits organized crime. -k

While western nations are being browbeaten for not doing enough to help, the Arab world's richest countries are doing nothing at all. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/09/04/the-arab-worlds-wealthiest-nations-are-doing-next-to-nothing-for-syrias-refugees/ -k

huh. Flip Charles' avatar upside down and it kind of looks like Osama Bin Laden. -k

It's better than that! She's been married 4 times! She got pregnant with her twins from husband #3 while she was still married to husband #1. Husband #2 adopted the kids who were fathered by husband #3. If she really believes the Bible is to be taken 100% literally, she should go to town square and beat herself over the head with a brick. I don't know if Argus was literally claiming that this guy was a Muslim, or if he was proposing that were that the case, lefties would change their tune on this issue. If it's the latter, he might be right. However, as you point out, righties also tend to be a lot less concerned about the "religious liberty" thing when it's being argued by non-Christians. -k

Mark Dice? Really, e^pi*i? You want to associate yourself with a kook like that? Or perhaps I'm just being microaggressive towards Mr Dice because he's a white male. -k

Well, I am sure it would create lots of jobs. I assume Scott Walker must have a friend who is a chain link magnate or something of that nature. -k

A couple of Turkish soccer fans posted pictures of themselves brandishing knives as a threat to Scottish soccer fans considering visiting Instanbul for the upcoming Celtics-vs-Fenerbahce match. Celtics fans responded... by posting images of themselves holding ...things that aren't knives: This has spiraled completely out of control, and the #ThatsNotAKnife hashtag on has exploded into a worldwide phenomenon, with masked Scots and Turks posting pictures of themselves brandishing all kinds of non-weapons at each other. If you want to see menacing-looking people intimidating each other with all manner of flatware, stuffed toys, vegetables, small appliances, beverages, shish-kebabs, condoms, balloon-animals, sex-toys, foodstuffs, musical instruments, toothbrushes, footwear, cooking utensils, and any number of other non-threatening objects, this is your big chance. http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/thats-not-knife-celtic-fenerbahce-6350011 This is both silly and delightful. -k

I also believe that Freddy is a sinner. Let's get 'im!! -k

I don't think that's true. One of my cousins took his own life. It was devastating for everyone, but the family endured. The parents stayed together; the surviving siblings built lives for themselves and raised children of their own... everything turned out ok. "Recover" isn't the right word to use. Things never go back to being the way they were... but they do go on. People survive. Their lives are changed, but not destroyed. Adversity happens. Suicide, accidental death, murder, incurable disease... unexpected death touches many families. It happens. People survive. -k

Sometimes being selfish is ok. If someone is in such pain or fear that they feel continuing their life is an unbearable burden, then maybe they should just do it. Their family and loved ones-- if they even have any-- will be hurt, but they'll recover. If you'd prefer someone continue to live with unbearable misery than cause you to feel some temporary grief, aren't *you* the one being selfish? -k

You might not understand this, but as a long-time Albertan, I can tell you that the right time to increase oil patch taxes is NEVER, and the right time to increase royalties is also NEVER. Right now, it's "times are tough, the industry is fragile, making any changes right now could be devastating! This is NOT the time to adjust royalties or taxes!" When times are good, it's "our economy is the envy of the nation, if not the world! Our budget is balanced! We are enjoying tremendous prosperity! Why on earth would we jeopardize our success by burdening industry with more taxes and royalties?? Why, it would be greedy of us to take more taxes from these companies when our budget is balanced! This is NOT the time to adjust royalties or taxes!" It's never the right time to adjust royalties or taxes, according to the Calgary oilmen and their owned men in the Alberta Progressive Conservatives. Also, isn't this really just the biggest industry downturn since 2008? The industry somehow survived that. I think they'll survive this too. -k

I think the real news here is that a single company had so much deferred income carried forward that a change in rate from 10% to 12% cost them $579 million dollars. That's astounding! MSJ assures us that some of that would get recaptured later, except that of course there will be even bigger depreciation write-downs later on. -k

I'm sure that if Albertans had just voted for Jim Prentice in the last election, the world price of oil would already be in triple digits again. -k

Here in Canada our conservative and Conservative prime minister justified the long election campaign by saying that since we were already in a defacto election campaign, making it official to bring campaign finance rules into effect and limit third-party spending was important to ensure a fair election. Despite what you'd like us to think, many conservatives support campaign spending reform. Spending limits don't restrict free speech. You're still free to say what you wish, you just don't get to carpet-bomb your opponents into submission by promoting your side 20 times per hour on every station. You gripe about CNN but neglect to mention Fox News; you gripe about the New York Times but neglect to mention the Wall Street Journal; you gripe about Huffington Post, but neglect to mention Breitbart and WorldNetDaily and NewsMax and Daily Caller and TheBlaze and Townhall and others. -k

Yvonne Craig was also the original Green Chick from Star Trek! -k

When Muslim students direct anti-Jewish slurs towards Jewish students on campus, would it be disturbing to you if the Jewish kid called the "campus climate response line"? -k

I maintain that Josh Duggar is a public figure and that his presence on this list is open for public discussion. Duggar has used his celebrity and his position at a major political lobby group to promote a "pro-family" (ie, anti-feminist, anti-gay) agenda. As such I feel that his "pro-family" credentials are very much a fair matter for discussion, and I don't feel ashamed in the least. -k

If by "error" you mean a deliberate attempt to mislead their readers and misrepresent what they're criticizing, then yeah, I guess it's a pretty ridiculous error. So, hypothetically, when that dentistry professor at Dalhousie decided to "wake up" the students with a bikini model video, the students should have just kept their mouths shut? It's disturbing to you that they complained? -k

Pretty sure that the difference between calling the "Campus Climate Response Team" and calling 9-1-1 is more than semantics, Tim. -k

With all this horse manure, there has to be a pony in here somewhere! The redoubtable Free Speech Heroes know that freedom of expression is being destroyed by the social justice warriors, and they won't stop inventing evidence until they can prove it to the rest of us! -k

I read all of that as "accounting hijinx". From your explanation it seems that the decision to write down their capital depreciation early is entirely discretionary, contrary to what Bob is saying. Now, what I'm curious about is how far down the road can they kick the can? Can they keep creating early depreciation on capital expenses in perpetuity? Does the tax on the deferred income ever actually get paid? Let me know if I'm doing this right, but it looks to me that for an increase in the tax rate from 10% to 12% to cost them $579 million, the value of the deferred income must be in the range of $29 billion dollars. Have I got that right? To me that's an astonishing figure. -k

There's certainly a concern, Big Guy. I have heard that Saudi Arabia may be using data obtained through the Ashley Madison leak to identify gay people. Since homosexuality is punishable by death in Saudi Arabia, this data leak could potentially result in peoples' death (unlike the imaginary spies allegedly put at risk by Edward Snowden...) MSJ wrote earlier about the gay businessman who was outed by Gawker after an escort tried to blackmail him. That was appalling journalism. There was no public interest served by that story. That news story served to further the ends of a blackmailer. (The only matter of public interest that came out of the story was the discovery that Ted Cruz's office was helping the gay escort find legal resources to fight his eviction. That's right... a story involving anti-gay bigotry where Ted Cruz turned out to be the only decent person involved. How weird is that?) But I maintain that Josh Duggar's misadventures *are* a matter of public interest. He's both a celebrity and (until recently) a political figure. In other Ashley Madison news, the leak turns out to be the result of a disgruntled employee. -k

Quick reality check: On July 1 the NDP raised the corporate tax rate from 10% to 12%. And if you're wondering how a 2% change in the tax rate that came into effect on July 1 cost CNR Ltd $579 million in the financial quarter that ended June 30, you're not alone. I found this baffling as heck. Well, it turns out that this $579 million is actually a "deferred income tax liability". This is basically accounting hijinx... for whatever reasons they' have used accounting techniques to kick some of their income down the road to future fiscal quarters. And now the tax on income that they could have paid tax on earlier but decided to put into the future will be paid at a rate of 12% instead of 10%. Oops. The claim of 4100 jobs is, likewise, hijinx. While dumb-guys might look at that statement and think "wow, this tax hike killed 4100 jobs!" that's not the case. It's a speculative figure based on the premise that if they had an extra $579 million they could hire up to 4100 people with it. Well, hypothetically with $579 million in free cash they could hire that many people, but they wouldn't, unless the oil market improves to the point that it would be profitable for them to do so. To make a long story short, this is just corporate grandstanding. -k