I Miss Trudeau

That's bullshit. Colorado and Edmonton did. In 2001 and 2006 respectively. The '42 Leafs are the only team in history to have come back from a 3-1 deficit in the cup finals.... yet.

So these stupid soldiers aren't bright enough to know that raping and murdering a 7 year old girl is illegal? I mean sure, they may think it is illegal, but they're just to stupid to know.

The cons have done quite a bit of long term damage within the first week of forming the government. Just today, Emerson's staff outright lied to reporters today. Reporters were told that he was in his office preparing to make an announcement, and he somehow sneaked past them all and got himself into a traffic jam. The Cons will have successfully turned all of the media against them in the first week. I'm loving it.

Sorry, I don't see the difference. Both situations involve the soldier interpreting the EXACT same law.

How so? Both involve the very same international agreements, and a debate on whether or not they do in fact transgress those agreements.

How is the relevance any different in those two cases?

So what you're saying is that if he was ordered to deploy for an illegal war, it would be his responsibility to disobey?

Its really quite simple. Hinzman signed on to serve in the military of a nation that is a signatory to several internation conventions. Ergo, his commitment to that miltary is predicated on the belief that that miltary will adhere to the commitments made by that nation. If in fact that military does not adhere to the commitments understood to be in effect at the time of his enlisting, it is the military, and not Hinzman, that has failed to meet its commitments. Once the US military ceased meeting its commitments from international agreements, all agreements that individuals made with the military predicated on those commitments ought to be null and void.

I'm not sure that you appreciate the real irony of the situation: Shoop commenting on the hurling of blanket accusations.

If I'm not mistaken, you were the one that lectured at great length earlier about how power is more important than ethics or principle. Given that, I'm kind of wondering why you don't idolize this imaginary Trudeau that you love to hate so much.

If you cared to read the forum rules, you'd see that insulting entire groups of people based on your narrow stereotypes is explicitly prohibited. But more to the point, I don't see why you insist on throwing out these pointless and inflammatory comments constantly.

The way that Trudeau in general, and the NEP in particular, was taught in Alberta high schools was a farce. There are threads on this issue if you care to dig them up.

You're right.. he isn't wrong. He is completely and inexplicably wrong. But its forgiveable.. I went through the same indoctrination in high school here in Edmonton in my day.

Hey now. If a tree can vote in the PQ leadership race, surely its entitled to a rebate cheque.

I sense someone majored in historical revisionism and minored in ad hominem attacks.

Of course. Because your side is always acting on principle, while the other side are just a bunch of whores.

So basically, Conservative MP's and candidates saying what they feel has been the problem? You're right though, muzzling the candidates did seem to work this time around. Many Conservative supporters backed Harper and his gang because they believed Harper when he advertised that he would clean up Ottawa and make government more accountable. That was the primary reason for their support. Harper, on his first day of school, managed to demonstrate to those people that nothing has changed. Some people, believe it or not, value principle more than power. From this post, it is evident that you're not one of them. Henceforth, any post from you that includes the words "ethics" or "principle" will recieve nothing but a " " from me.

Jeez, us folks without kids have to pay school taxes and now welfare for you people with kids?! I'm outraged! Outraged!

Wow, Harper's moving pretty quick to get those welfare cheques out.

Apparently not. Women are whores, and men seem to be, at worst, ethically ambiguous.

Yes and no. Investment in companies with legal rights to proven oil deposits are pretty safe investments. Invest in companies that claim to have massive but unproven deposits are extremely risky (and usually fraudulent, to boot). No, not really. See above for why I think you're wrong. Far less than you think. Calculate the compound interest on $16 billion at 10% interest over 30 years. Its actually $279,190,436,302.18 over 30 years.

Currently, Alberta's annual operating budget is roughly $26 billion. So, at an interest rate of 10% (not unreasonable with a well managed fund) that would require roughly $260 billion in the fund. If we could have put $16B into the fund 30 years ago, we'd be there now. If we had $8B in the fund 30 years ago, we'd be there in about 6-7 years. If we had $4B in the fund 30 years ago, we'd be there within 15 years. Though we'll likely require a budget larger than $26B in 15 years. If, over the last few years, we had invested large sums of money in oil patch companies instead of paying down our debt, we would have seen absolutely massive returns (some individual companies on the order of 3000%) and may be at that point now. All with minimal risk.

Excuse me? You've taken every oppurtunity to level attacks at former prime ministers and "Liberals" that you could in this thread, neither of which is relevant to this topic. And when I ask you to try to stay on topic and avoid inflammatory material that contributes nothing, you accuse me of arrogance? Furthermore, I've already pointed out that what you think "refuted me" was almost exactly what I claimed. You then proceeded to gloat (arrogantly, I might add) about my ignorance, never having figured out that your data supported what I had said from the start. Commenting on the irony of you arrogantly berating me for being correct doesn't seem unreasonable. Again, you didn't read what I said. Here it is again: Right now, at this point in time, during a period or record sales and near record prices, the fund IS barely treading water, and thats a generous assessment. Sure, it has grown by about 8x in that time. But consider that the original $1.5B would be worth roughly $26B today had it been left alone to grow at a 10% interest rate with no more additions to the fund. Contrast that with the $13billion its currently worth.

Are you absolutely incapable of staying on topic? It seems so. How so? Looking back, what I said was: So basically, the statement that I said was the more likely scenario is the one that you explicitly agree with when you say: Next.... Did you read a single post in this thread before banging out this reply? No where did I claim that it was only growing by 2-3%. What I said was that either: A. the fund was growing at less than the rate of inflation and thus needed to be topped up or "more likely", B. Klein is pulling out all of the interest then putting just enough back in so that it doesn't shrink when adjusted for inflation. Which, again, means that the scenario that I outlined as most likely is precisely the one that you are claiming "disproves" my facts and assumptions. Ironically, you didn't even realize that you were posting information that supported my claim all the while gloating about how wrong I was. Oil prices are extremely high when compared to historical averages, and the best we can do for a legacy is making sure that the trust fund doesn't shrink? Notice, we're not growing it, just making sure that it doesn't get smaller. Think about it....our Heritage Trust fund is merely treading water while we sell record amounts of oil at near record prices. Any claim that we're doing something meaningful for future generations with this fund is absurd. Indeed.