d_rawk

Hahaha

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... is you. Don't let it go to your head.

New Ipsos Reid Liberals - 36% (down 2%) Conservatives - 34% (up 2%) NDP - 13% (unchanged) Bloc - 10% (down 1%) Greens - 5% (unchanged)

Blitzer interviews David Duke about his participation at the conference in Tehran

Holy fuck ... :crazy: [edit:] does Norris seem afraid of his wife, or is it just me?

Myself, I'm pretty conservative when it comes to senate reform. Uncomfortable with a EEE senate (for the reason djmelbatoast mentioned, and others) and resistant to abolishing it. Some form of change is in order, but I'd rather the reforms come out of a transparent, thorough, non-partisan committee that involved public consultation than a sudden announcement one cold Wednesday morning.

Nope. *shrug*

I'd guess nobody was concerned about Turner because Canada is a part of the British Commonwealth and our head of state is the Queen of England. I do wonder what the reactions would have been if say, Harper were a citizen of the United States ...

Close Politcal Race Developing in Quebec The article is a bit fucked up, though, as in the introductary paragraph it suggests that the Liberals are trailing the PQ, but it the breakdown, it suggests that the PQ are trailing the Libs. Leger Marketing hasn't updated their website to see which is which. 1% difference, though, so either way it is shaping up to be a tight race. Liberal Party of Quebec 36% (or is it 35%?) Parti Québécois 35% (or is it 36%?) Action démocratique du Québec 20% Québec solidaire 7% "Quebec should not be afraid and I think Quebec is on the threshold of taking the beau risque [beautiful risk] of autonomy." - Boisclair I guess this doesn't really belong in this thread, come to think of it. Just didn't want to start another poll thread.

I'm disapointed in Layton's public stance on this issue. FWIW, here is the NDP's position on dual citizenship in general, from October of this year: Dual Citizenship a Bonus for Canada. Somehow Jack's personal position has landed him on the same side as Levant and the National Post crowd. I think he's gotten himself confused and fallen into the trap of thinking that the office of the Prime Minister (it's clearly the potential that Dion may become Prime Minister that has made an issue of all of this) is something that it isn't. The PM is an MP who is also leader of the governing party. It doesn't make sense to add extra criteria to hold that office over and above what is required to sit as a general member of Parliament. It made a certain amount of sense for Michaëlle Jean to give up her French citizenship as there is an expectation that the Governor General be above political conflict, and a niggling question of whether there is something inappropriate from a technical perspective for the commander in chief of the armed forces having pledged loyalty to another country. But a leader of the opposition or the Prime Minister aren't that, and even in Jean's case, Layton and the NDP never once (to my recollection) suggested that it was something she needed to do. I could see this being an issue in the US, where the president is actually the head of state, and where the political culture favours isolationism. But our own head of state is already the sovereign Queen of like ... what ... 10, maybe 15 other countries? Layton needs to remember who he is supposed to be speaking for.

I was bit late on the draw, but -- happy bday Shredder!

Which funding do you mean? (I'm assuming you aren't referring to religious schooling) That does sound rather nice initially, but I'd think it difficult to defend at the actual policy level. It seems that any direct funding that took into account the type of organization and allocated funds accordingly, rather than based on a per-project, per-proposal level in any way would be subject to all sorts of criticism. (officially, I mean ... it obviously does happen unofficially) Hence my curiousity as to what sort of programs you were referring to in your second paragraph. I'm sure that I'm just overlooking something obvious, and probably need a nap.

MasterShake -- levity! Thanks. Hamilton -- marry me Two weeks-ish from now, I'm going to party like its the New York Christmas riot of 1828 all over again. In Calgary with my sisters. And for better or for worse, the ADF's website is back online. Sign up to receive a free "The Truth about Religious Expression at Christmastime" pamphlet by calling 1-877-TELL-ADF. That's one, eight, seven, seven, TELL as in TATTLETALE, A-D-F. Spreading the Truth with a capital-T since 1994. Work is over. I'm drunk. Heck yeah.

Would take good care of it, if you've still got it.

*sigh* I don't think there is an easy answer to that, actually. It's funny, y'know, because I read some of your posts above and as is often the case, we actually seem to picture something of the same ideal destination. We just - as usual - disagree on how to get there. If I had to distill my position into a soundbite, it would be this: Systemic favouritism is toxic, and makes quick enemies of the favoured. What's more, it isn't self-correcting, but rather self-perpetuating until identified and deliberately corrected for. We probably don't share that position, though, and that's where all sorts of disagreements come in. In fact I won't be surprised if you see in it the same seeds from which affirmative action grew. And you'd be right. And I'm too worn out from this thread already to continue the debate down that road. For me, the sooner people are ready to give up their sense of entitlement that all things should be their way and that others should be doing it their way too, the sooner we'll be able to get on with all doing our things in peace and not getting our backs up about it all. O'Reilly and Falwell and all the other sensationalists are going to have to shut the fuck up (not going to happen) or be taken a whole lot less seriously (one can hope) before people feel safe enough to let down their guard. Like I said somewhere earlier in the thread, I think that we tend to over-react to "the other side's" over-reactions, and on and on it goes. I know that I am certainly guilty of that. And I know that my patience was thoroughly exhausted on the whole "war on Christmas" thing last year, and that has probably affected my attitude about this whole discussion. I don't think anyone or anything is being attacked, really, I guess. But in that we differ, too. We keep all trying to stake out more and more ground in defense of what we see as each other's aggressiveness. I suppose that rather than trying to jealously guard our territory, we might instead do better to concede it when we can. We might get further along, more quickly, by making concessions to each other that way. (not you and I personally ... although probably there too ... but I mean this more broadly). But then I run into the problem: the "defenders of Christmas" don't want to get further along, they want to dig in their heels and keep me stuck there with them. And in this perception, I'm sure that we differ again. It seems intractable. But you're fun to argue with. Even when you make my blood boil.

Yes, I know ... I was teasing about the book bit Books were burnt because they were heretical, were anti-traditional, or expressed ideas contrary to the ideas held by the mob. From my perspective you are apologizing for the mob, so I was turning your analogy on its head. Me too. But I think that this is entirely the wrong way to redress that. People are anxious to marginalize it because it has been so pervasively dominant in all sorts of forms for so long. Desperately trying to maintain and entrench that dominance is not going to inspire tolerance or sympathy. Shit, Birdy, I forgot to answer your question. The bit quoted a few posts back came from here More from Boston:

Erm, I'm not offended by the word Christmas at all. I rather like it and I'll enjoy my Christmas, thanks. I simply have no illusion that it should be thrust on anyone else. I'm totally perplexed as to how you have managed to miss the entire context of the conversation (if evangelical/preacher men, fox news types screaming at the general public can be considered a conversation) over the years. We clearly live in seperate worlds. The Alliance Defense Fund's website is down at the moment, which is a shame as I was going to suggest that they could use someone with your tireless passion for the cause. No doubt their server succumbed to the impossible demands of correct-thinking, God-fearing citizens everywhere desperate to know who to boycott next, or which liberal politicians are making angels cry this year. Enjoy the warm glow of your burning books. And Merry Christmas

(I don't know why I'm wading back into this ... I suppose because I'm bored at work ...) This bothers me. Have you not noticed that both sides are playing at word cop? The frustration for those who want to use a word like 'holiday' when it seems more appropriately accurate to do so, is that all of a sudden all of these (nominally) Christian white males start screaming from their TV and radio pulpits that we can't do that, because it just has to be Christmas. And god damn it, first they took the prayers out the schools, and now they want to be inclusive at city hall! (I've put up ornamental lights at city hall, by the way. Such things are fine there ... and you are quite welcome to call them Christmas lights, as you see fit) Not to mention that often the people arguing why it has to has just GOT TO BE "Christmas" from one side of the mouth are lamenting the secularization of the holiday and how it just isn't about Jesus enough these days from the other. If it is just a word, why get so worked up when someone says holiday? I think we are all being reactionary in the face of what we see as each others over the top reactions. And on and on it goes. Why get worked up over a "holiday tree" at Home Depot? Vote with your wallet and go buy a Christmas Tree somewhere else. I think it's stupid, too. They'll get the point. But I have no sympathy for these people who have enjoyed positions of complete priveledge their entire lives by being the right colour, and of the right religion, and the right orientation, from the right traditions having total meltdowns and screaming bloody murder every time they get a whiff that that position of priveledge might be threatened in some tiny way. Boo fucking hoo. City hall is supposed to represent everyone, equally. As are the schools. It's just a word, after all, right?

New EKOS Research national poll: LPC - 40.1% CPC - 33.5% NDP - 10.2% Bloc - 8.2% GPC - 7.6% link

KevO: - Open the Control Panel. - Double click on Administrative Tools. - Double click on Computer Management. - In the left column, click on Disk Management. - Locate the mp3 player and right click on it, then click Change Drive Letter and Paths. - Click the Change button. - Use the drop-down menu to select a new drive letter. (make sure it isn't thats already used) - Click OK If that doesn't work, remove any mapped network drives that may not be connected. I had a helluva time with an iPod recently, but the above worked.

Hamilton for prez.