What do you guys think of the Star Wars system?

[idealisttotheend]

I wonder if teamed with the Tories, what the number of male voters within the Grits would be?

If the Liberals have any brains they won't be teaming with the Tories very often nor the Tories with them.

How thick is that limb?

Not very actually. I failed to consider that there doesn't need to be any vote or even debate in the House. Martin can just push it through but if he does he does so at his own peril though I have this funny feeling that he might do just that. He promised to be more democratic and there looks like there's a lot of opposition.

[Big Blue Machine]

I think it's 55/45 in favour of missle defence in parliament. Martin is probably in favour of it. Although he says he's isn't. The liberals are slowly going to missles. If Harper was in government, we would have signed the deal now.

[Black Dog]

So could the case be made that perhaps additional funding for NMD is coming at the expense of certain conventional weapons systems and opposed to counter terrorism?

Perhaps, but we've already seen at least one case wher cash has gone from counterterroism into missile defense. As well, it's stil an awful lot of cheddar to spend on a system that doesn't work.

[Big Blue Machine]

Maybe missle defence is the answer to counterterrorism?

[Stoker]

Defence minister backs missile plan

Perhaps the Liberal leadership is not as ignorant as I first thought..........the wonders never cease

[Big Blue Machine]

Flips-Flops are always popular.

[cgarrett]

more money for weapons + less money for education = easy CONTROL

[Enuf]

Thoughts, opinions?

If it is as good as they are hyping up Why not.

[Black Dog]

Maybe missle defence is the answer to counterterrorism?

How? When was the last time a terrorist used an ICBM?

If it is as good as they are hyping up Why not.

Because it's not any good.

Why spend billions on a system that may never work? (essential article on this issue)

In the past six years of flight tests, here is what the Pentagon's missile-defense agency has demonstrated: A missile can hit another missile in mid-air as long as a) the operators know exactly where the target missile has come from and where it's going; the target missile is flying at a slower-than-normal speed; c) it's transmitting a special beam that exaggerates its radar signature, thus making it easier to track; d) only one target missile has been launched; and e) the "attack" happens in daylight.

Beyond that, the program's managers know nothing—in part because they have never run a test that goes beyond this heavily scripted (it would not be too strong to call it "rigged") scenario.

It's as if some kid were to hit a baseball thrown by a pitching machine straight down the middle at 30 mph and, on the basis of that feat, claimed he could hit whatever Mark Prior might throw him from a real mound, pitch after pitch after pitch, without fail.

There is, in other words, a vast distance between the Pentagon's current level of testing and the level that would need to be done before anyone could begin to claim that a missile-defense system might shoot down real enemy missiles in a real nuclear attack.

The latest annual report by Thomas Christie, the Pentagon's director of operational testing and evaluation, reveals just how incalculably vast this distance is. (The report was published with no fanfare at the end of last year and has appeared on private Web sites—but not the Pentagon's—in the past two weeks.)

[Newfie Canadian]

If it could be proven to be effective, I wouldn't object to it. That appears to be a long, long way off. I would have liked for Canada to have been involved from day one on this.

The Soviets didn't just target the US during the Cold War, they targeted North America. I suspect the same would hold true for other nuclear states that have ICBMs (and even if they don't, if they have nukes, ICBMs won't be far behind).

In regards to terrorism, I can't see a use for it, unless it is some sort of state sponsored terrorism, if any state would go to that kind of partnership on that scale.

[Big Blue Machine]

But remember when America and the Soviet Union linked up in space with Apollo-Soyuz? That proved that two competitive nations can work together co-operatively.

[caesar]

The Soviets didn't just target the US during the Cold War, they targeted North America. I suspect the same would hold true for other nuclear states that have ICBMs (and even if they don't, if they have nukes, ICBMs won't be far behind).

I wasn't worried about the Soviets and I am not too worried now unless the USA re-elects Bush and unless Canada joins in on their aggression in the middle east.

[Newfie Canadian]

unless Canada joins in on their aggression in the middle east.

Unless we elect a Conservative majority in the next federal election, I don't see that happening caesar. (I don't see a Conservative majority either. Maybe a minority.)

[Big Blue Machine]

You never know Newfie, anything can happen in politics and it usually does.

[caesar]

Not usually. But if the conservatives replace Harper with someone more rational; perhaps.

[Newfie Canadian]

Harper didn't cost the Conservatives the election caesar, it was brain cramps by certain candidates apparently attacking bilingualism, the legal system and the Charter, the Hate Crimes bill and mouthing off about abortion being comparable to beheadings.

After all that stupidity, Harper didn't stand a chance.

They need a convention to iron out a platform so that everyone, especially certain people within their own party, know what the party is about.

Still like being involved with Missle Defence.

[caesar]

Well it was definitely Harper, in my books. Going to the USA and apologizing for Canada not joining the USA in the Iraq fiasco. The rest was just icing on the cake.

Harper has taken the party too far right for many of us.

[Newfie Canadian]

That's where we differ caesar.

I believe that the Reform/Alliance/Conservative party was born too right for most people, and needs to move towards the center to get eelcted.

Remember, the Reform was borm because many Westerners felt the PC party strayed from their right wing principles.

[caesar]

Not westerners; Albertans. This present government is more right wing than we have ever seen in BC and I and many others will be glad to see them gone. It has meant a larger gap between rich and poor; a sell off of our assets to foreign interests; even selling off our flu vaccine for foreign interests and we do pay medicare premium as well as our usual taxes. We have new and increased taxes and licenses and we have still got deeper in debt. We have higher tuitions, less money being spent on children's ministries union contracts trashed. Senior's benefits trashed. For what????? To make rich employers richer and the rest of us make 3rd world employment rates and standard including child labour.

[Newfie Canadian]

OK, perhaps the original ideas were from Albertans, but they have caught on.

My idea of Westerners is people from provinces west of Ontario.

If I counted correctly, out of the 4 western provinces the CPC has 68 seats.

AB 26

BC 22

SA 13

MA 7

There is one Independent in BC who was a CPC MP.

I agree with you about Campbell. From what I've seen a country away, it hasn't been a great ride.

[HybridConservative]

Bush: You have failed me for the last TIME Admiral... :angry:

Martin: *WEEZE*

(hehehe)