RNG

In London, and much of the UK, as well as much of Europe, mass transit is great. Given their population densities, the service is great because the demand is great. It's all a matter of population density, as RS said.

What is wrong with admitting that no matter what "English Canada" does, it won't be enough for Quebec, and just let them go?

After he gets his majority and send the armed black-shirts into the streets, you will be well protected, as long as you aren't a pinko, commie leftist, or someone thinks you are a pinko, commie leftist. Sin, Libs and NDP

And another hard reality is that even with our evil oilsands going full blast, Canada contributes 2% of the world's CO2. Admittedly we are less than 2% of the world's population but see above.

Yeah, can't even hurl insults or scorn for post like that - so quit it!

And the left always loses sight of the fact that corporate profits are not hoarded under their beds, nor are they sent offshore all that often. Most western countries, including Canada have all kinds of means of keeping Canadian cash in Canada. Usually they use these profits to expand or invest in other business etc, creating more jobs and more wealth. And even if they do stash it in the bank, the banks then lend it out to build more businesses and more jobs.

And that is exactly why I want publicly paid, but privately run hospitals. They are so inefficient, largely because of bloated bureaucracies and union stuff. Get rid of the bureaucrats and the unions and health care could be much cheaper. And the bloody personal injury lawyers will keep it in check.

I am assuming you are typing with your tongue planted firmly in your cheek, but there is an element of truth, at least qualitatively if not quantitatively in what you said. Which is why I do like the concept of the US Senate, in that each political sub-unit has the same number of delegates. Of course that would require them to be elected rather than political patronage appointments, and the regs would have to change to give them some actual power, beyond slowing bills down.

Well, it was close to the comma.

With that post I would have bet you were from Winnepeg.

This has been debated and will be debated forever, figuratively speaking. Both Trudeau and Harper suffered world-wide economic bad times. How much of the Canada result was due to the world situation and how much to the policies of the Canadian government? Good question with no easy answer. But another complaint I have of Harper, is that he sold out his economic principles and jumped on the stimulus bandwagon as a vote getter, rather than believing it was any great help to the economy. Again, the analysis of results in Canada are hard to find, but in the US, each job saved (they gave up saying jobs created long ago) cost something like $350,000/yr. Pretty poor return on investment as far as I can tell.

But so many on the OTHER side can't or won't realize that private health care and privately delivered health care are not he same thing. And this is definitely not a slippery slope situation.

They fight vociferously that their system is just fine the way it is, and as proof, they use things like that Ontario baby that our doctors wouldn't treat anymore so the parents took him to the states, and that certain Canadian political leaders recently went to the states for treatment and they manage to find every whiney story about waiting times here. And they won't even shut up enough to allow some debate. And I agree that our system isn't as bad as theirs, but it could still use a lot of improvement.

But what I see again and again is, anytime someone has a suggestion for improving our health care, there is an immediate reaction along the lines of "privatization - bad, end of the world as we know it and booga, booga". Without listening to the ideas and rationally evaluating them. Completely analogously, on a US politics forum I visit, any time a change to their system is suggested there is an immediate reaction along the lines of "socialism - bad, end of the world as we know it and booga, booga".

Hey, no good westerner would ever think that Ontario suffers in any way.

To the best of my knowledge, there are a (very) few such clinics in Ontario and Quebec. Alberta has none, the provincial government won't license them. And I haven't heard of any in BC but haven't been here that long. I recall seeing a news show a few years ago where it was being argued that they do violate our health act, but that the government was afraid to crack down on them for fear that if it went to the SCC and they lost, the whole system would be jeopardized.

So we could split all non-Quebec ridings into 4 ridings and make the Bloc insignificant?

Very few people are proposing that type of system. The proposals are that a private firm establishes a clinic to do knee surgeries as paid for by the province. Same price, then the choice would just be which one was faster or better. Single payer, multiple suppliers.

B.Sc.(Hons), Ph.D. Why doesn't education surprise me?

So how come the Republicans won in the end?

Which makes me quiver in fear every time I realize the can vote.

The protesters were obstructing the legislative process. As were the Democrat representatives.

The campagning don't cost me, just the contributers. It's the setting up voter lists, renting voting rooms, printing ballots etc, etc. And that ain't cheap. Want to compare degrees earned?

You may be that rich but I'm not.

The point he and I try to make time and again is that it isn't so much a revenue problem the US and Canada have, it is a spending problem.