overthere

The main purpose of the EU is purported to be trade, but let us not forget the other one, which is less talked about. The Euros spent many, many centuries klilling each other for fun, culminating in a giant Euro war in WWI, then unbelievably escalating into the global reach of WWII. The second world war was ,more or less unthinkable in 1919, within 20 years it set the world afire. The EU is itself the ultimate treaty, instead of exchanging harsh words and settling old debts, the new apporach is to integrate economies so thoroughly it gets much harder to start shooting, the cost overall is prohibitive. In the last 67 years there have been some big dustups in Europe: the Balkans(inevitable). German integration, collapse of the Soviet Union and changes to all those former Commie countries..... But they have not had a big shooting war amongst themselves. Has there EVER been a period that long in Europes history as relatively calm as this one? Kudos to the big brains in Brussels for getting this far.

This is what immediately preceded the atomic bombs being dropped, the Battle for Okinawa. The purpose for the battle from the America viewpoint was using the islands as a base to carpet bomb Japan for many months, to enable a land invasion. This is what happened: It was the final realization by the US of what they faced with Japan- an implacable enemy that would not hesitate to throw every man woman and child into certain death. They knew that many Okinawans killed themselves before being captured or forced to surrender. It was another sobering moment for the American leaders. Any onvasion of the Japanse homeland would take the numbers from Okinawa and increase them dramatically.. By then, they knew they had another option. They took it, and IMO redcued the body count of dead humans by in the process. Proof of the Japanese nature was that they refused to surrender after Hiroshima occurred. They knew with absolute certainty that they were going to lose the war, they were warned of the consequences, and still they would not surrender. Hiroshima is partly on the American soul, but Nagasaki has to be charged to the Japanese leaders.

WE are going to see a lot of this in the next decades. It is much harder/more expensive to plan a group attack with weapons than it is to get in a car and look for a bunch of people on a sidewalk. ISIL is in an irreversible process of getting their nuts sawn off in their Caliphate. Everybody will be going home soon to start killing the infidels where they live.

Muslims have had their own versions of Luther, it is very far from 'impossible'. Several of them Sorry, wrong tense, their bloodbath version of the Reformation has never abated. Sunnis, Shiites, and countless devout offshoots all intent on killing each other, killing infidels, or both. Its as if they saw the Inquisition and thought it was an excellent strategy for the next several hundred years. Apsotasy is just another word for 'death penalty', then and now. Repeat for a millenium or two.

Please put down the bong. Tell me, how many books are there in the average madrassa school library? Answer: one. The Holy Koran. How many computers on site with full Internet access? Answer: none. How do you think even a shitty US school would compare to those numbers?

If you are going to move the goalposts, you have to do it much more skilfully. That was really clumsy. Maybe start the post with 'look there is a squirrel!!!'

It is very weak argument given the actual electoral evidence. Nope, gotta be a white guy from Quebec: 20% of the population, 75% of the control. We have had the occasional brief, humorous oddity like Campbell, Turner, Clark.... but the numbers don't lie. That means Bernier will be the candidate. Appeasing Quebec is never optional. Except for that one time...... Harper had La Belle Province filling their pants, gibbering in fear... but those days are in the past. It is all back to normal now.

Edmonton Public.

My mundane public school education failed utterly at turning out Warriors for Jesus. The Saudis have done much, much better at turning out Warriors for Allah. I hate to tell you this, but even the girls at the Catholic schools were naughty sometimes. And nobody stoned them to death.

The threats to Trudeaus longevity are not policies or actions. The threats to him are perceptions of the centrist voters who left the Cons and NDP -and the other threat is himself.. Trudeaus ran a masterful campaign in social media, more accuratey his team did a great job. Now his challenge is to sustain his youthful appearance, convince people again that promises mean something, continue to come up with catchy new memes to repeat in all circumstances, diminish via social media whomever the Cons and NDP elect as leaders, and above all stay on script. All of those things are doable. One of the biggest threats for Trudeau is of course himself. Prior to 2015, far too often he came across as a semi-moron when he went off script. His excellent handlers reminded him of his true calling as a dramatist. Since then he stays in costume(rolled up sleeves, a hint of chest showing) and stays in character in public and in Commons.

The budget tells me that Trudeau intends to copy Chretien. 1. cut military spending while bleating about our contribution to world peace. 2. Send Canadian men and women of the armed forces into harms way while poorly equipped. Canada is back all right, back to borderline insanity at best, criminal and wanton negligence at worst.

No, not really. There are just too many adults at mosques, not to ention prying eyes and ears. Madrassas are the preferred route for the Saudis. They have built literally thousands of these religious schools all over the Muslim world. And, surprise, they teach boys and young men a strict , extreme Wahabi version of Islam and a predictably 9th century perspective on the world. It's a great recruiting ground for guys that would settle for one virgin, and here they are going to get access to 72. "My suicide vest size is a 40 regular".

Am I to believe that Ghana is a wartorn dictatorship? Ever been there? I have. Oh wait, by wartorn you meant the guy from Ghana fleeing his illegal status in NYC, replacing it with the warm, enduring bosom of the Canadian refugees system. And you did it again, shifting the goalposts by pretending theat if they want to come to Canada, they must all be legit refugees AND WILL SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!!.

Stop making sense! Eyeball wants to shift the goalposts, a favorite tactic. Bad USA! Bad bad bad USA!!!! I was reading of the story of one Ghanain gentleman who crossed our border with his family. He had been living and working illegally in NYC for about 10 years. For the record, Ghana is not war-torn, not a dictatorship , and he is no jeopardy whatsoever if he returned to Ghana. But he would be poorer. He left NYC because he feared that with his illegal status, he would be deported with the new direction taken by Trump to illegals. But not to worry, he is safe in the bosom of the abyss that is the refugee evaluation system of Canada. He is virtually guaranteed that one way or another, his status here will be formalized in the next few years or decades of hearings. Soon enough we may learn that he is gay, or there is some tribal beef that threatens him, or that he is part of some vague anti-Ghana government group....

No, I have not noticed that. I know of at least major school board that I would assess as being very, very good. Good enough that there are very few private schools, they cannot compete on quality or price with the public board offering.

His appeal was to far more than just disgruntled old white men, much broader than that. This was not a Canadian style election, where 39% gets you a large majority. The most interesting wrinkle of the Trump election is that he is widely feared and loathed within his own party, while many purported Democrats also voted for him. I do not believe the meme that his election was anti Hilary, it was much more profooud/deeper than that.

Trolling is a violation of site rules.

Military forces in a democracy such as ours are not permitted to have goals. Their goals and actions are determined and directed by politicians. Because power is very concentrated in Canada it is ultimately the PM who decides.. Thoise decisions and actions in Afghanistan, which resulted in the deaths of 167 Canadian men and women came about from hard decisions made by Chretien, Martin and Harper. I am not saying those choices were right or wrong. They must have been very difficult, but they were made. I don't think our current PM is up for the challenge of these or other hard choices.

Even the most strident Quebecois knows that bilingual culture is an increasingly expensive conceit. So far, that does not extend to electing anybody other than white men from Quebec. That will change, and I hope Quebec survives it, since their relevance on the national scene just continues to steadily dwindle every generation. I'm just trying to let you down easily in the reality that nobody else outside Canada gives a shit, and our increasingly diverse domestic population is ehaded that way and pronto. I hope my frank manner does not distress you unduly, but that is simple reality..

Kennedyy never existed. He was also a hologram. An early hologram, all the film of him is quite grainy.

The World Trade Towers were both holograms. There was nothing there to blow up. They just turned off the projectors, and replaced the images with different images of fire, smoke and a big carter..

Oh, I understand how it works! Being Englais does not necessarily mean rank ignorance. In the last half century, these are the white men from Quebec who have been PM: Trudeau the Elder(a few times), Mulroney, Chretien, Martin, Trudeau the Younger. With about 20% of the population, Quebec has had about 75% of the PM time in the last half century. Did you want to interrupt that grand tradition by not electing another white guy from Quebec? There has been only one politcian in the last half century that has dared to insult La Belle Province by being elected elected without support from Quebec, and dare we invoke the name of the Goat Faced Devil Himself, Harper?

We urgently need to increase aid to Afirica because the vote for that UN Security Council seat is not far off. But $119 million isn't even close to what it will cost for the seat.

Choice? Vote for the white guy from Quebec, that is the only one with any hope of getting elected as PM eventually. Since Blaney is a loon, that leaves Bernier.

They wo0n't have a choice. If the Court finds for Subway and awards them $200 million, CBC will have to pay. If they cannot, then money can come from the govt, or from the sale of CBC assets. If they had to pay the award themselves, it would bankrupt the CBC. Since the CBC really has nothing worth anywhere near that much except perhaps a few buildings....... A successful lawsuits might be ultimately a win-win: for Subway and for taxpayers by getting rid of this massive turkey.