Birdy

Momack, you're thinking Martin Luther King Jr. and saying it's all St. Stephen. St. Stephen sang about the times. As Bob said, the times they are a'changin. And they are.

This very comment tells me you're not getting much out of the music as the rest of us. How fucking hypocritical. God forbid different opinions in this world.

Hehehe... no problem! Yes, his amendment was 'meant' to apply to majority governments, which is in response to the question you asked. The amendment's purpose was to ensure an election is held every four years. While I agree there's no law dictating how Opposition would act, you would think that when they speak publically against the Conservative government and then in parliament vote in favour of that same government, one would question. Or when they vote in favour in parliament and stalemate committees, one would question. I preferably would like to see a government that is able to make significant change, rather than sit idly for four years bickering back and forth. If the Opposition did not have confidence in this government to do that, they should have done something about it. Instead they used the system to suit their own party's goals of needing to rebuild support after the Sponsorship scandal, all the while knowing full well what they were doing to make Harper's minority government {defacto majority government) take teeny weeny steps towards nothing. Yes, Harper had the longest running minority government ever, but that had nothing to do with his own party's credibility and everything to do with what the Liberals did not do. Are you referring to the 'niche issue' comment about the arts cuts? If so, it's bloody true. Not that I agree with those who consider these things a niche issue, but a lot of people do. And they're simply not rich fat cats, but a lot of ordinary, working-class, joe shmoes living across rural Canada outside of major cities. Never has the simple truth come back to bite a man in the ass more than this comment has. I admit it was ill-timed, but it shouldn't be used to create a theory about his whole stance on arts and culture. Gilles Ducceppe certainly is a veteran at what he does. I don't think Harper implies he's beating Kyoto by any means, I think what he's trying to tell Canadians is that we are in a tough place to simply say fuck it and go green. I want us to go green, there's no doubt about it, but we live in a country that is huge and vast and heavily, heavily reliant on oil and manufacturing. Times are definitely a'changin', but we need to ensure that when we think about the environment, we do it in a way that isn't going to screw all those who work in manufacturing, drive tractor-trailers down the 401 and across the trans-Canada, work in the tarsands and pipelines aren't going to be up shits creek when we make the switch. I think he's trying to approach it in a conservative manner and ensure we're not going to be faced with even more job loss than the extreme job loss we're already facing. We've got a lot of things to change in this country and we need to make sure people are going to be able to bring home a wage at the end of the day. Like I said somewhere else, if a government wanted to use tax payer money to give to industry to adapt green technologies, they'd get my vote in a heartbeat. But when a government takes the opinion that polluters are evil and pollutants are their problem, I'm against it. Pollutants are OUR problem. We are the ones who rely on them. We are the ones who need to change. What is reported in bourque.org is simply a reporting of what was said by Liberal officials. Sure it may be speculation, but it's an outright reporting of what was said in the least. And considering the continued amount of speculation that has been coming up repeatedly, I'd venture to say something's abrew. If say, you wrote you had heard that Harper is incestuous with his children from his uncle Bob, then yes, that would be journalistic integrity. Ok, again, you win on the attack ads. I hate them all, fair and unfair advantages they give.

It was meant to keep "majority" governments from calling elections to suit their popularity. The fact is, the Opposition wasn't acting as the Opposition in this last minority government, continuously voting in favour with the Conservatives. But when it came to committees where all progress is truly made, Liberals were stifling any kind of progression the Cons could make. Which in turn makes it extremely difficult to function as a minority gov't. Hence, the election. http://www.bourque.org/notes.html There's many others that google would turn up. Until reporters change, abso-friggin-lutely. I hasteningly connect journalism today with the Walmart Corporation. It's too much about looking to sell their thoughts than it is to report the truth. You can argue this with me up and down and all around, but the media is a very, very evil entity as it exists. http://www.bourque.org/notes.html Please link me to actual fact-based articles and not opinion pieces in the Toronto Star that claim Harper called artists "rich fat-cats". 45 million cut in a 300 million dollar program has more people outraged then if the same were to happen to the welfare system. Is that right? Don't get me wrong, I truly think the CP's fucked up royally when they did this, and I'm glad to see they have seemingly realized this too over bill C-10. I personally wish they hadn't touched the arts, but I cannot sit here and keep my mouth shut when lefty propaganda puts words into people's mouths. Please link me to very mis-leading numbers concering the environment. I don't think it's even possible considering the true impact of carbon foot prints cannot even be measured. However, that being said, I'm a huge supporter of the environment and have taken stance on this very issue many, many times over in the politics forum. I'll say it again, but I would prefer a government who supports industry to change and adapt to greener technologies before we start taxing them and possibly driving their business and our jobs out the door. If the Cons tripled their environmental plan budget, it'd be the best plan out there. All countries who have seen success in reducing ghgs and carbon pollutants have seen this because of what they did prior to a carbon tax. And there's countless articles online to show this. What campaign rules did he ignore? You win on the attack ads. I hate them all. Especially those produced by the NDP with subliminal Hitler references. A new all-time low in campaigning politics... even agreed by staunch lefty politicos such as Warren Kinsella himself. Not suprisingly, your post reminds me a bit of the stuff I speak of when I talk of biased journalism. To each their own though!

You should dismiss pretty much every party then. Harper by no means broke any rules when he called an election. The fixed-election law was an amendment to the Parliament of Canada Act which declares parliament can be dissolved at anytime. The Liberals (through their continued support of the Conservatives on voting issues) brought all committee initiatives to a stand still, thus making it pretty much impossible to accomplish anything and so Harper called the election, which is entirely within his rights and the law. All four of our potential PMs are being cry-babies. Even Gilles f'ing Duceppe is being a cry baby. Margaret Atwood is being a crybaby. The NDPs are talking coalitions, the Liberals are talking strategic voting, Lizzie May is taking bribes from the Liberals, the Bloc is appealing separatist votes from outside of Quebec. It's all a shit show. Noone is better than the next in this regard. Good riddance to the daily media scrums. Journalists need a huge wake up call to the amount of tripe they feed an unexpecting public. If journalists took it upon themselves to report the truth, the world would be a much better place. But these dudes have bigger political agendas than those running for office themselves and unfortunately for us all, the Canadian electorate is generally not politically savvy enough to wade through all the bullshit. Stephane Dion offered Elizabeth May a cabinet position and Senate seat to get her to encourage Greenies everywhere to vote Liberal. I love how our politicans encourage diversity except when such diversity threatens their popularity. Vive le Canada! I could go on too, but I'm tired.

Yay! It's like Christmas for political nerds everywhere.

Jesus, this was printed in the Star?!? hahaha.. Thanks for posting this d_jango! Something i've long thought but didn't have the words/research to express. Whoever this journalist is, I might be in love. It's about fucking time someone in the media told things straight up.

Happy Thanksgiving! Even though I think you're all wrong and frequently consider strangling you all from time to time , I'm thankful you all exist. Real life provides no outlets for the kind of things we talk about in here. If it does, you're either paid to do it, or you're the luckiest politico out there. Imagine the politics forum sitting down for Thanksgiving dinner together? Jesus, that'd be interesting.

Spoken like a true Canadian.

Nor wlll they ever, if those who would support them don't. Sucka!

Ding!

Ding!

More of the Harper already had a majority, liberal inaction stuff. Phishtaper, if you have multiple parties that you would vote for, and choose to vote for say, the Liberals as one of them, I wouldn't say you're strategically voting. Strategically voting is choosing a party who you don't necessarily want to vote for, but do it anyway to prevent something you consider worse. There's a difference.

What wonders it did keeping him from a majority in 2006.

Aside from this, of course:

That's not what he's saying at all. He's saying the act of strategically voting is for suckers. He's not telling you how to vote or whom to vote for. He's saying that if your ideals align to the Fascist party of Canada, by all means vote for them. And he's right. The cost to all of these parties that do represent people more wholly are HUGE because of this kind of behaviour. Some of the same people who whined and complained Elizabeth May wasn't in the debates, are some of the same who would cast a vote for the Libs instead of their Green candidate to keep someone else out of power. Yet if they just voted for the Greens in the first place, they would be voting for the legitimization of that party on the federal front and we wouldn't have had to be in that position come election time. If you're under the inclination to vote for one of these parties, you're not advancing yourself or any of your ideas by strategically voting. And that is the most common definition of a sucker.

I hear you... I said I support socialist ideas to "varying degrees", just like I support the private sector to a varying degree. The CP is not leaving innovation or direction solely to the private sector at all. I thought their platform was pretty moderate myself.

Please tell me this isn't the approach you take to all those who claim to vote for the CP. Honestly, i don't think if we continue this is going to go anywhere pretty, anytime soon. I'm not going to convince you and you're not going to convince me. Debate is fun, and we should leave it at that. You're a nice, intelligent person and it's been entertaining... but i have no desire to get in some kind of online fight, so i'm tossing in the towel. Differences of opinion make the world go round or in the least, make things a little more interesting. I'd say without them we wouldn't be where we are today. I'm super tired and got a long day tomorrow so adios! I really liked the Ely pic though. A++ for that.

Didn't I already say that everyone is guilty of viscious things? If you wanna go there, which apparently you do, there's a whole whack load of nastier than nasty things socialism has done in this world. A whole whack load. So yeah, i'm a bit paranoid too a vote for the NDP would leave us all in utter ruins while people are denied an individual voice and instead must nod their heads with the majority. Funny you say 'nothing like advocating the inprisonment of thousands based on sound economics'. I feel the same way about the left. I guess though the difference between you and I goes back to me believing we're good. If you think honestly and truly that a vote for the conservatives is going to lead to people being imprisoned, than i'm done too. This is retarded. I won't subscribe to that level of paranoia.

Paranoid?

Thing about us is that we only move as fast as the whole.

Yah, i totally agree. Precisely why I'm voting Conservative. Nice work, yet again, on the plantation owners comment.

Not so much... aren't they Christian? I just checked out their website, aside from defending rights, they're pretty not-so-much libertarian... pro lifers, defend marriages, prevent euthanasia, the list goes on. Not so much. hahaha I think we'd probably disagree on how to harness human intention anyway. I think human intention pretty much harnesses itself.

I'm not frustrated at all. I don't think there's a true way of telling what the nature of man at time of birth is or at least no way of measuring it to make it into fact. I wholeheartedly agree that our cultures shape us into the beings were are today, but I also wholeheartedly believe we are born good. You apparently don't... or don't believe we are born good or bad?? I don't know. My argument for how to approach the today exists based on this second belief. That if man, left entirely up to his own demise will somehow take care of one another. This seems scary to some due to everything preceeding - war, famine, money, exploitation, tyranny, the list goes on. But it shouldn't be scary, because it is we as individuals who did this to each other and we as individuals who came together to fix it in the end. We are a forever evolving species and are constantly learning and striving to do better and to fix what is broken, yes, based on our cultural beliefs and proven throughout our entire history. I think this is pretty good grounds to assume that we are inherently good. It doesn't mean we won't do bad, we will, but we will learn from it. Socialism in my eyes is a method to the madness for those who don't believe we can do it on our own. It's major fault is not realizing we have done it on our own. It implants a fear of the free-will of man that I find despicable and propels an unnatural progression of time itself. It aims to help those who cannot help themselves, but keeps them forever suspended in that same realm. It does not advance us but rather stifles us. It creates an unnatural fear of making things better based primarily on the false idea that man is corrupt. I cannot support it as a philosophy, but as an agent, I will, to varying degrees. It is a part of the equation, just as much as everything else is.

I totally agree; however, I don't think you or I or anyone will ever have an answer to the equation. Yours, like theirs is only a guess and is entirely subjective. You're not right, neither am I, neither are they. We all believe what we want in the end and there is nothing to move beyond because of it. And no, doesn't upset me so much based on the above.