overthere

Yeah, that will have investors flocking to our shores. You guys sound like the English Department of Finance and Bad Ideas, circa 1963.

Speaking of taxes, I'm thinking that Alberta will have a sales tax within 12 months. David Dodge will come up with a long shopping list of capital projects that Alberta 'must have'. Notley 'acting responsibly' won't want to borrow all that loot. Sales tax. After all, Dodge was big on implementing the GST with Mulroney, and bemoaned the reduction of GST to 5%. He luuuurrrvves the sales taxes. Tax (Dodge)and spend(Notley). It is an irresisitble lure for Notley, she wants to spend and arrived at the wrong time for that in AB. Fixed!

Having raised teenagers, perhaps my expectations are less than yours....

Yep, the league has Cecil figured out. His best pitch is the curve, but he cannot regularly throw it for strikes. Big league hitters brains process a pitch like this:" spin on ball or no spin?"- thats what they have time for ..... If it has spin, don't swing and they walk. If there is no spin, its a poor fastball and Cecil gets crushed. The closers on other teams mostly just come out and fire heat. All is not lost for the Jays though, they have some offensive trade bait. Even getting some average fresh meat for the bullpen would be an improvement.

I'm still not sure what Kimmy expects of Sansa given her circumstances from day 1. Littlefinger has enough command of the Vale to invade somebody, anybody? When did that happen? I thought he was regarded as some kind usurper pimp by the locals. Tossing his wife down a hole would not change that perception much. We are and will be seeing some of Book 6 storylines now and in the early parts of next season, since Geo Martin is part and parcel of the production team.

The Saudis did not cut the price in half. They control only their production, and influence others within OPEC. What scares the crap out of the Saudis is their lack of control over supply. This is not 1973, when OPEC had no worries about new oil. The world price would have gone down in any case as all that new oil comes to market. Demand has not kept up with supply. And the Saudis do not control OPEC, any agreement to continue to produce at high levels will be temporary.

Rubbish. Companies eg=headquarter in many places, but Botswana and Kazhakstan are backwaters and don't have any HQs. HQs are in traditional business centers like London, Kong Kong, New York etc, or in newer tax/business havens like Caymans, Shanghai, Netherlands, Pananma etc etc. Major supplies -like pipe- for a pipeline are more likely to come from Korea or India or China than from the US. You might have noticed their steel industry is a giant dessicated turd, for decades now.

he was talking about corps moving because of corporate tax increases, you shifted the goalposts into another time zone . Compnaies can and do move operations to reduce costs, and taxes are certainly part of that equation.

It has been slower to happen in Alberta, oil/bitumen exports are still rising. But not for long, we have already seen some major oilsands projects cancelled(pre-election, to be fair). Does it have to happen? Refineries spring up near demand. Refineries in Texas/ Gulf Coast have been expanded to handle new US oil, and were inetended to handle Keystone XL product which will likely never arrive. You think we need more capacity in North America for..... what? Is there some new demand in Canada that requires supply of finsihed products? If so , where? There is a new diesel refinery going up right now near Redwater, AB. Refineries in Montreal and NB will be upgraded to handle AB bitumen, in the unlikely event we can pull our collective heads out of our colons and buit the pipleine infrastructure to get our products across the Atlantic and Pacific. North America is a future wasteland for Canadian products in the future. Our former major consumer, and still our only customer for our hydrocarbons is now a major competitor.

Yep. And Alberta has a AAA credit rating and little debt, two things not available to Ontario. The party is just starting. Now she has recruited David Dodge to lend some 'outside credibility' to a massive bout of spending. You heard it here: his report is already written. God help us.

C'mon, don't be so hard on Sansa- she is still a teenager and learning how to change from being a wimpy coddled princess into a leader. It's tough to accomplish much when you're a captive sex toy in the hands of a complete psycho. Before that she was a pawn in Littlefingers plans, before that a hostage to Cersei, before that a child. She has managed to stay alive, no small feat when you are a Stark. Her leap from the wall may be more than symbolic. She is moving on. Her companion is a dickless coward, but long journeys start with a single step....

Not worried about corps moving their HQ from Canada, there are not many to begin with. I'd be more worried about them moving production and manufacturing elsewhere. Ontario has already has a dose of that. Alberta next I reckon. Anybody planning on retiring in this country in the next 20-30 years better do some hard thinking and planning now. That generous social contract we have now is going to get much, much tougher to fund soon.

the AL East is weak enough that 85 might win the division. It won't get a wild card spot though, which might take 90 to 95 wins. It's curious year, only the Cardinals have a dominant lead, all the other divisions are pretty tight so far.

Let us not forget the ease with which many billions can be borrowed as well.......

You're from B.C., so you can explain 'tax and spend' better than me through your vast experience.. The new govt won't explain, they are now going to stay relatively quiet until the federal campaign starts. The very best way they can help Mulcair now is to not pop their heads above the parapet. There is no need yet for them to prove what we all know: the $624 million this is only the beginning. They can also pretend for a while that they didn't know that the 2% increase in corporation tax and dropping flat taxes for a few people won't make much in the way of new bucks. Luckily , the AB credit rating is really strong, so there is ample room to borrow.

George Martin has been involved in the production of GOT from the beginning and still is involved. I doubt that the story line in the TV series deviates or will deviate in any material way from the written material. Where it does deviate or seem to take a new direction with fresh material or characters, perhaps we are just getting an advance copy of Book 6. I think Book 6 will come out just before SEason 6. After all, the people involved have a profit motive and this is not their first rodeo!

They never promised to run up debt in the first couple of weeks. They did not admit to having a few hundred thousand people to buy off in the first weeks. Some people wonder why they'd undertake this when the province is in an economic slide, and the NDP have no grasp of the economy yet. It would be impossible for them to have any idea of what is going on, since they have not have any time and have no expertise yet in any case. So why commit to this new spending now, in advance of having a clue?. The answer of course is that they have political bills to pay to a number of groups, and this is a really expensive but by no means competed progress payment. Others are comfortable with their govt running up bills that they certainly cannot pay in the near term. Of course, there was no need to employ a psychic to know that they will spend our future. It's their way. Perhaps you'd like to choose some other examples. Saskatchewan was not well served by the NDP. Don't confuse popularity with good management. Mr Blakeney was a really nice man, but failed to diversify the SK economy despite a long run in charge. He was foiled by himself and his insistence/ policy that every industrial project required the SK government as major partner. That crushed many possibilities of jobs and development. Policy. Romanow wasn't much better, another nice guy who got little done. Manitoba is an embarassment, a province with a lot going for it that still depends heavily on equalization payments to balance a budget. The main reason their unemployment rate has dipped in recent years is they export their workforce to SK and MB, hence a lower rate locally.

That is better than usual performance for the Jays, who have had numerous numerous pitching prospects fizzle and die. Not necessarily, because he and Goins would make a decent middle infield- I do not have any faith that Reyes can sustain at SS. He'll be on the DL soon enouggh....Reyes has also had some real problems at shortstop- his range is subpar now already.... yes, definitely. The Jays have a playoff level offence- AA has to act now, he won't keep this group together beyond a year or so... Bautista is getting old, so is EE, Reyes is flaming out...Buehrle and Dickey cannot have much left in the tank... But sports radio is full of trades that never happen.....

Mean, back in Alberta, pretty much the first acts of the new NDP govt have been to increase personal and corporate taxes, rolled back planned revenue increases, rolled back civil service cuts and spent an additional $624 million on health care and education. Tax and spend. No time wasted. And Notley had to pay some political debts.......teachers, nurses, public servants.... They'll be quiet now until around the federal election in the fall. It's an absolute certainty that Notley, Topp and Mulcair will be running up some big long distance bills and have each other on speed dial.

Pilar has played himself into a major league career this season. I did a rough count of the hitting pattern last night. The first four hitters(considered the big boppers usually) were one for fourteen. The five through nine hitters were a collective nine for fourteen. Opposing managers cannot combat that kind of production..... when they produce. The guy that is really making it happen for himsef is Goins. He has always been a fine defensive player, and he too is hitting his way into a MLB career. The Jays have had a hole at second base for a long time, and it is now Goins job to lose. It is actually kind of fortunate for Izturis that he is on long term DL now- he has lost his job. One thing the Jays may really benefit from with the recent run of wins- they have far more trade bait when shopping for pitching. They can afford to lose a bat- Colabello, Valencia, Smoak, and even guys like Pompey, Bautista, Navarro and Encarnacion get a bit more expendable when we have some depth at the plate. The Mets are a team with more pitching than hitting, the Giants another........

Ray Donovan should be starting again soon

Goins and Encarnacion in recent, close games that they lost too. Screwed up double steal, the guy on third did not seem aware it was happening.

Is it because anybody who is socially and/or fiscally conservative is automatically a racist? How would you classify somebody who is socially liberal but fiscally conservative? Does it mean that there is no progessive that is a racist? I'm just curious as to how you arrive at these sweeping conclusions.

He has a face like a smacked arse.

They could probably make the playoffs if their pitching improved to 'below average'. They also need to stop having baserunning brain cramps. Here's hoping.