I jokingly told him that while the “American Way” now seems to be a tendency to sue, the quintessential ‘Canadian Way,’ now seems to be a kneejerk reaction that “the government needs to do something.”
Governments can only act with money extorted from the economies that support them; any and all government actions bear a cost to their supporting economies. This is not only the direct monetary price, but also the wider de-energizing effect on everyone else who must continue to function in the economy that has been stripped of those dollars. Since I became a taxpayer I’ve had a selfish interest in curbing government spending. You and I bear the cost EVERY time an elected lawmaker feels the need to justify his or her existence to the electorate by the questionable accomplishment of passing some new law or regulation. Each time this happens I am quite personally offended and you should be too.
This ‘Canadian way’ has given us bloated government ministries that consume ridiculous portions of the funds they’ve been entrusted to administer. I give you as an example the fact that size and cost of the civilian civil service that supports the Canadian Armed Forces rivals the size and cost of the military itself. Our military infrastructure is nearly half a century obsolete, our Navy is virtually nonexistent, and our Jet fighters thirty years old. Or how about Indian and Northern Affairs (or whatever the hell Politically Correct designation it’s called by this year) which has a budget that is nearly the equal to Canada’s military? My parents have chosen to live in a ‘First Nations’ community and I’ve seen the squalor in which many people there must live. Yet the department’s salaries, pensions, and other benefits are the envy of the private sector. A third example is the relatively new bureaucracy which was created to consum- I mean, administer the GST. Yes, it does in fact consume a ridiculously large portion of the tax that it administers.
One major factor that has saved the North American nations from collapsing under suffocating levels of taxation to support their growing welfare states is the lucky geographical accident that blessed both Canada and the United States with unbelievably abundant natural wealth. Naturally our society’s various Green organizations, (themselves philosophically huge supporters of government intervention and regulation) have been perversely acting against their own self-interest by working to bar access to those natural resources for most of the last 40 years.
I've said all this to point out that I fear the cost of Government action. It's a stretch for me to be willing to consider it, so that's why I feel odd directing attention at something Financial Post editor Diane Francis wrote today.
I’ve been reading Diane’s columns on and off ever since 1990, when I had to suffer through a two-year involuntary subscription to McLeans magazine, (no- don’t ask). She’s about as good an example of common-sense, fiscal conservative thought that Eastern Canada can provide, and I think her idea is worth consideration. It certainly seems better than NDP leader Jack Layton’s vague plan to engage in a huge nation-wide Rooseveltesque road and bridges make-work program and the no-doubt additional new bureaucracy to support it.
I never voted for this. Neither did you.
The last federal election campaign was run by all three major federal parties on their individual party platforms, none of which included forming a coalition of the losers to steal power from the winner. As I recall, The Conservatives and Liberals were both hoping to form the government, and the NDP wanted to become the official opposition.
No, we didn’t vote for this. Small wonder that so many Canadians are incensed by this undemocratic attempt to seize power.
Yesterday a radio station poll by talk-radio station 630 CHED showed virtually no support for the Liberal/NDP/Bloc Quebecois troika of usurpers. Small wonder, CHED broadcasts in the Conservative western province of Alberta; but the brand new Nationwide facebook group, “Canadians Against A Coalition Government" has gathered 50,000 members in only a few days.
Nope. No mention of a coalition, nor are such staggering ‘frankensteins’ a part of Canadian Parliamentary tradition. Nor does Canadian Parliamentary tradition include the seizure of power from a minority government without an election. In fact, past governments have been soundly punished by the electorate at the polls for ‘exceeding their mandates’ when they chose to sharply deviate from the campaign platforms which won them their elections.
Today I listened to an NDP MP claim his Liberal/NDP/Bloc troika has the support of over 60% of the voters. Lies! The voters they claim as theirs did not vote for a coalition.
Yes, a majority of voters did not vote for the Conservatives. But by that same logic, AN EVEN LARGER MAJORITY DID NOT VOTE LIBERAL, and a larger yet majority did not vote for the NDP or Bloc Quebecois. By comparison, the largest block of voters voted for the Conservatives to lead the country. If they are defeated in a non-confidence vote in Parliament there should be an election. That’s the Canadian way.
I sincerely hope our Liberal-appointed Governor General, Monique Jean, does the right thing when Prime Minister Stephen Harper asks her to dissolve parliament and announce a new election. Let the last election's loser run on platform of Coalition government. Then we voters can punish the Liberals and NDP for this attempt to bypass the democratic process, as they so obviously deserve.
Looking back on the four years of his first administration, President Obama can be proud: He made the US welcome among the family of nations again; he reduced our reliance on military force; and he gave us peace by reaching sensible accommodations with our enemies.
The lies told about him in the 2008 election were exposed as sheer bigotry. Far from being "soft on radical Islam," President Obama was the first world leader to welcome Jewish refugees after Iran's nuclear destruction of Israel's major cities (his only caveat - a fair one - was the refusal to accept Zionist military officers and their families, in light of Israel's excessive retaliation).
He also demonstrated his resolve in the face of extremism when he overruled the obstructionist advice of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and ordered our military to cross the border into Pakistan in force. The subsequent debacle, as Pakistan cut off supply routes to Afghanistan and threatened a nuclear response, was entirely the fault of our generals on the ground, not of the administration. Fortunately, President Obama's willingness to talk to our enemies rescued the situation. After laying down their arms, our troops were allowed to evacuate Pakistan and Afghanistan in peace. The Taliban's return to power in Kabul did not...
| “ | k From Dreams of My Father:'I ceased to advertise my mother's race at the age of 12 or 13, when I began to suspect that by doing so I was ingratiating myself to whites.' From Dreams of My Father : 'I found a solace in nursing a pervasive sense of grievance and animosity against my mother's race.' From Dreams of My Father:'There was something about him that made me wary, a little too sure of himself, maybe. And white.' From Dreams of My Father: 'It remained necessary to prove which side you were on, to show your loyalty to the black masses, to strike out and name names.' From Dreams of My Father:'I never emulate white men and brown men whose fates didn't speak to my own. It was into my father's image, the black man, son of Africa , that I'd packed all the attributes I sought in myself, the attributes of Martin and Malcolm, DuBois and Mandela.' From Audacity of Hope:'I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.'j | ” |
“First-level measurement arrangement!
“After this order, signal lights were all switched on. Various data show up on rows of screens, hundreds of technicians staring at the screens, without missing any slightest changes . . .
“One minute to go! . . .
“The firm voice of the controller broke the silence of the whole ship. Now, the target is captured 12 seconds ahead of the predicted time . . .
Of course this is all in keeping with China's preoccupation with putting on a good false front for the world to see. Most recently, we remember some of the fast ones they tried to pull in the Olympics.
Somebody in Xinhua is going to be sent to the slave labor factory for this boner.
Btw, the actual mission was apparently a success, with the astronauts returning safely, earlier today.
