Drug warrior marijuana Talking Points: Quick Rebuttals

The Black Market will live on

It is one thing to illegally sell a legally produced product and make a profit, e.g., black market cigarettes. It is quite another thing to illegally produce and sell a product (e.g., moonshine) in market where there is legal competitors. The reason is simple. People want to know that what they buying and consuming. So when given the choice of buying an illegally produced product versus a legally produced product they are going to go with the later. (There is one notable exception and that is when an illegally produced product is successfully passed off as a legal one, e.g., fake brand name goods). That is why no matter how much Canadians drank during the time of American prohibition, I am sure that it never crossed the RCMP’s mind that American moonshine might become a competitor of Molson’s.

The gangs can not walk and chew gum at the same time.

One of the arguments that I have repeatedly come across recently is that should marijuana be legalized then the gangs will move onto other things. I prefer to call this the gangs can not walk and chew gum at the same time argument.

The problem with this argument is that the gangs are already into other things and it is profits from marijuana that are helping them do that. In the context of Canada, marijuana profits and sometimes even marijuana itself are providing the seed capital the gangs need to expand operations into the States, for example, and to diversify operations (e.g., cocaine, heroin, human trafficking and guns). This is one of the main reasons why we need to nip this in the bud.


Gateway Drug

Researchers have rightly noted that people who have try marijuana are statistically more likely try other illicit drugs. This gave raise to the theory that there was something about marijuana that encouraged drug experimentation. Marijuana, it was alleged, is a gateway drug. This, in turn, was given as one more reason to keep the drug illegal.However, the gateway drug theory has until recently fallen on hard times for lack of an intelligible mechanism. The problem was that there was no coherent explanation for why marijuana would lead people to experiment with other drugs. Without this explanation doubt was cast relationship being more than mere correlation.That said, in recent years researchers have breathed new life into the theory, albeit with a sociological twist. According to the new version, it is not marijuana's pharmacological properties that serve as a gateway, but rather marijuana's illegal status. Specifically in the process of illegally procuring marijuana, users are introduced to the criminal elements with access to other illicit drugs and hence it is the forged blackmarket relationship between dealer and buyer that serves as gateway. Ironically the gateway drug theory has been turned on its head and used as reason for legalizing the drug. The Canadian Senate employed the new and improved version of the gateway argument as a reason for legalizing the drug.

In this context it should be noted that when the Dutch partially legalized the sale of marijuana, heroin and cocaine use went down despite an initial increase in marijuana use. Dutch use of hard drugs remains well below the European average.

Potent Pot

Potent pot is more is more myth than reality.

However, even if one assumes that potent pot is a reality it is certainly nothing to be concerned about. Indeed, saying that potent pot is reason for keeping marijuana illegal is akin to saying that alcohol should be banned because gin has higher alcohol content than beer. It makes no sense. The pharmacological affects of consuming 1 "chemically supercharged" joint, as various US attorneys like to say, versus x number of "dad's joints" would be no different if the amount of THC consumed is the same. As for consumption, just as people do not drink the same volume of gin as beer, the higher the THC level in pot the less people consume. Hence, ironically more potent pot may be a welcome development. After all, one of the most prominent health effect related to marijuana, if not the most, is that it is usually smoked. The more potent the pot, the less people have to smoke to achieve the same high. Lester Grinspoon of Harvard Medical School concurs, so does Mitch Earleywine of the University of Southern California and so does UCLA's Mark Kleiman.

That said, if potency is the concern, then it should be legalized. After all, the only way to regulate the potency of pot is to legalize it. Moreover, so long as the drug is illegal, producers will seek to increase potency. The higher the potency the smaller the package the smaller the package the less likely they will get caught.

Finally, the attempt to scare parents that have grown up on marijuana by distinguishing between potent pot and “your dad's marijuana” is too clever by half. After all, it begs the following question. If today's marijuana is truly different in kind from "dads marijuana", would it be ok to legalize "dad's marijuana", i.e., low potency pot?

Schizophrenia Marijuana

Epidemiological studies have consistently failed to show a positive correlation between marijuana use and schizophrenia and there is no causation without correlation. Specifically, should there be a causal link between marijuana and schizophrenia, there should be a positive correlation between marijuana consumption and schizophrenia, but such a correlation is conspicuous by its absence. Despite a massive increase in the number of Australians consuming the drug since the 1960s, Wayne Hall of the University of Queensland found no increase in the number of cases of schizophrenia in Australia. Mitch Earleywine of the University of Southern California similarly found the same with regard to the US population and Oxford's Leslie Iversen found the same regard to the population in the UK. According to Dr. Alan Brown, a professor of psychiatry and epidemiology at Columbia University,

"If anything, the studies seem to show a possible decline in schizophrenia from the '40s and the ‘ 50,"

Much of the evidence linking marijuana to schizophrenia suggests not that it causes schizophrenia but rather that it may cause the earlier onset of symptoms in people who would sooner or later develop schizophrenia. Much to Gordan Brown's dismay, this is opinion of Dr Iddon.

Dr Iddon, the chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on drugs misuse [Britain], said the study did not convince him it was time to return cannabis to class B. "I don't think the causal link has been proved. I think cannabis might - possibly for genetic reasons - trigger psychosis at an earlier age." The MP, who is also a member of the science and technology select committee, said there was a danger of criminalising "hundreds of thousands of young people" if the status of the drug was changed. "If Gordon Brown changes the class of the drug, it won't be evidence-based but for political reasons," he said.

Treatment Numbers

Most people in drug treatment in Ontario are there because they abuse hard drugs. Only a small percentage, 13% in 2005, are there because of marijuana. Furthermore, those that are there for marijuana differ from other people in treatment, in so far as they are much more likely to be there because of outside pressure. Not surprisingly the typical person in "treatment" for marijuana use in Ontario is a single teenage male who is still in high school.

Ontario is not unique. Despite the fact that number of marijuana users in Western world positively dwarfs of the number of people using hard drugs, in most Western countries the vast majority of people in drug treatment are there because they abuse hard drugs. The notable exception is the US. The vast majority of people in drug treatment in the US are there because they purportedly abuse marijuana. Why the difference? Well, the majority (70%) of those in treatment for marijuana, including many casual users and even some first to users, are there because they have been given a choice, "treatment" or jail. In fact, the rise in the number of admissions for treatment correlates perfectly with a rise in the number of arrests for possession. In true Orwellian fashion, the former Drug Czar cited these figures as evidence that other countries need to get tough on drugs.

Obama's Troubles: A lesson for Liberals

Let Obama troubles be a lesson to the Liberals and indeed the country. The American political system is an unmediated disaster. The Democrats control both houses, the sitting president is a Democrat and until recently they had filibuster proof lead in the Senate. Still they could not pass a watered down Health care bill. US presidents should stop ending their speeches with "God Bless America" and instead sign off by saying "God help America".

The next time someone says that Canada too needs a triple E senate and free votes, smack them up side the head.

Of course a bad political system only goes so far. Obama deserves a lot of the blame. The most straightforward way of bailing out the banks was to nationalize them. Instead, Obama decided to go with a plan to buy and then resell toxic assets. That always meant that if the value of these toxic assets went up, the investors would profit, but if they went down, the investors could always walk away from their debt. Tails the investors win, heads the tax payers lose. What Obama did not foresee was that not nationalizing the banks also meant that the very people responsible for accumulating those toxic assets in the first place were then free were free to hand out politically toxic bonuses. He should have listened to Krugman Stiglitz and others. He then would have been able to say to those troublesome bankers. "You screwed up. We own you. No bonus for you. Your fired."

Obama's health care strategy was equally misguided. In many parts of the world haggling over a price is a art form. One starts high and the person on the other side counters such a high price with an equally low one. Despite having been born in a far away land -- Hawaii -- Obama seems unaware of such a game. His idea is to start low and let an overmatched oppenent bid him even lower. That is what happened with the Health care bill. Instead of trying to sell the merits of single payer option, the thing that works for the rest of the developed world, he tried to sell the public on complicated government option and when that did not work the status quo plus a subsidy to the uninsured.

It is a lot easier to sell a straightward good idea, then it is to dress up a less contentious, but fatally compromised bad idea. Compromised policy is not a starting point and certainly not something one should aspire to. It is a failure of nerve.

Childcare

I am glad to hear childcare by another name is the Liberals "No. 1 social priority". It should be. However, Ignatieff is in dreamland if he can sell the same confused mess that the Liberals have tired to sell before.

It always unclear as to what the Liberals are offering. The goal of the program was ostensibly to work with the provinces to set up an early childhood education program for children under 6. However, to the average voter this amounted to little more than a vague promise to provide more daycare -- which the Liberals said early childhood education was not --- at sometime in the future; they could not figure out what this would mean for their lives. To add insult to injury, Liberals willingness to consider different deals for different provinces has muddied things all the more.

If the Liberals reintroduce such a program in the future, they need to present it in a form in which voters can understand. This is what they should do. They should promise to provide all day preschool and kindergarten for every 4 and 5 year old in Canada.

Of course, it will be said that the Liberals can not do this; education is under provincial control. It is and so is health care, but never stopped Pearson from introducing Medical Care Act. It is high time this group of Liberals grow some. No one is ever going to vote for a party that is scared of the Conservatives, scared of the provinces and just plain scared period.

Household Debt, Jim Flaherty and Early Childhood Education

The biggest threat to the Canadian economy is private debt. It is now over 150% of income and growing at an astounding pace.

Many would contribute much of private debt problem is the availability of cheap credit. Interest rates are at all time low and many of the regulative barriers to getting credit have been lowered or eliminated. The problem though is not chiefly one of supply. Even if the fed could raise interest rates, and a rate hike right now would kill a recovery and make the aforementioned debt situation much worse, would not eliminate the problem. This is not a moral hazard problem.

No the root cause of the problem is that household debt is going through the roof. Indeed, even though it is much more common for both couples to work than it was 30 or 40 years ago, a much larger portion of what a family makes now goes towards housing, child care, transportation and yes taxes than before. The financial gain of having both parents work has been whipped out by a decline in real wages, paying taxes on two incomes and not one and increased costs associated with having both parents working, particularly transportation and child care costs. Factor in sky rocking housing costs and you have a recipe for annual debt to income rise of 7%.

The Conservatives, Jim Flaherty, have made things much worse. One of the first things the Conservatives did upon coming to power was to extend the mortgage amortization period from 25 to 30 years then 4 months later to extend it to 40 years. To top it off the Conservatives reduced the needed down payment on second properties from 20% to 5% and for a time allowed for 0 down home loans. Conservatives actions resulted in the creation of housing bubbles in some of Canada's largest cities.

Since the crash the government has reduced the amortization period by a token amount to 35 years and mandated a 5% down payment. However, much of the damage is already done, and the government has to find of a way of cooling off the market while all the while not setting off a real estate crash that could kill the recovery. This is something that needs to done. After all, in the long term, interest rates are going to go up and no matter how good the recovery there are going to be a lot of people under water when that happens. Prices in Vancouver, in particular, are too high. A 2 to 3% hike in interest rates will hurt a lot of people.

One way of chushing the blow of the inevitable interest rate hike is to address some of the other costs mentioned above. A Conservative would say cutting taxes, but targeting the high cost of childcare is a far more effective way of dealing with the problem. It is not uncommon for families to pay $1000 plus per month per child. If the Liberals were to be truely bold and provide all day kindergarten and preshool to every 3, 4 and 5 year old in country, the savings for young familes, arguably the most vunerable home owners, would be huge. Some familes would stand to save up $20,000 a year in childcare costs.

Can not Score Canada: More emphasis on Speed and Scoring was needed

Canada was shut out by the Swiss, by the Fins and by the Russians in 2006. Scoring was a problem, the powerplay was problem and a lack of speed on the blueline was a problem.

Things have not changed that much up front. The pool of forwards Canada has to draw on is not that much better than in 2006. So it was vital that hockey toss aside its fascination with "role players" with "chemistry" with "grit" and "leadership". 2006 team had all those things in spades and it sucked. Kris Drapper selection in 2006 represents everything that is wrong with Hockey Canada. Kris Draper was a good role player. He was gritty, he provided leadership and it was absurd that he made the team and Crosby, and E. Staal did not.

Yzerman should know better than to repeat Gretzky's idiocy. After all, he was left off the 1991 Canada Cup team for no good reason. Mike Keenen said that Yzerman was "too young", but he was 25! and whatever his age he scored 51 goals and could skate like the wind. Besides, Keenen is the guy that still thinks that Greg Gilbert and Stephene Matteau for Tony Amonte was great trade for the Rangers.

Canada might still win in 2010, but as in 2002 it will be despite management and not because of it. In 2002 Gretzky left Bertuzzi Thornton off the team and despite the gold Canada was far from flawless.

Team Canada: are you kidding me

Morrow 25 points, Seabrook 16 points and Bergeron 29 points make the team and Mike Green 38 points, St. Louis 43 points, J. Carter 46 goals last year, Stamkos 37 points, LeCaviler do not. Hockey Canada can no longer afford to hand the reins over to ex superstars without them first have proved themselves at the GM level. Crosby might have the makings of a great GM. I do not know. However, good numbers do not mean that he should be the GM in 2024, say.

Mike Green Should Make the Team

If Green is left off the team, Yzerman will prove himself to be as bad as Gretzky. Green has 38 points, was nominated for Norris last year, and is plus 15. People say his Defense is lacking, put he is every bit as good in his own end as Dan Boyle and is better offensively. Oh yeah and Niedermayer is -13.

The pundits are biased towards older players -- particularly the grind it out type. Unfortunately, in the past so was management. This has to change if Canada is avoid another 2006 debacle. Ryan Smyth, for example, does not deserve to be on the team. It is that simple. When you compare his skill level to emerging players such as Stamkos, and Toews and his stats over the last few years to more established players such E. Staal and Lecavailer you see clearly that he does not measure up. Team Canada managment can not afford to be nostalgic.

Team Canada: This who should make the cut

G: Fleury, Brodeur, Luongo

D: Boyle, Weber, Pronger, Niedermayer, Keith, Bouwmeester, Green

F: Getzlaf, E. Staal, Nash, Thorton, Heatley, Crosby, Lecavalier, St. Louis, Ignalia, Carter, M Richards, Marleau, Perry

Canada's Afghan boondoggle

So what does the 18 billion get us.


1) Over 2 thirds of Afghans in Kandahar province want us gone.

2) Whether it be by Al Qaeda (see there warnings related to the Afghan mission) or by homegrown terrorists (see the Toronto 18), Canada is more likely to be attacked.

3) The misssion poises a threat to national unity. Indeed, a terrorist attack, inspired by Canada 's presence in Afghanistan, might revitalize the Quebec’s separatist movement, especially if Quebec is the victim. Currently the Afghan mission is opposed by 70% of Quebecers. If Quebecers die as a result of us being there, the separatists will use it as a reason why Quebecers need their own country with its own foreign policy.

4) An attack would set back race relations in Canada and hamper our ability to sustain the high levels of immigration needed to combat an aging population.

Olympic Hockey Roster

Here is rough break down of who I would have as the final 25 back in the summer.

G: Mason, Brodeur, Luongo

D: Burns, Weber, Pronger, Niedermayer, Keith, Bouwmeester, Phaneuff, Green

F: Getzlaf (C), E. Staal (W), Nash (W), Thorton (C), Heatley (W), Crosby (C), Lecavalier (C), St. Louis (W), Doan (W), Ignalia (W) Carter (C), Richards (C) Marleau (W) Toews (W)

Move Carter and E. Staal to the wings. Staal moved to the rightwing to play with Getzlaf and Nash in the world Championships.

Since then, Burns and Mason have played themselves off the team and Fleury and Boyle have played themselves on. Perry and Stamkos deserve to be ahead of Doan and Toews and Phaneuff, Staal, Lecavalier, have not set the world on fire and B Richards has been hot.

This is who I would go with now.

G: Fleury, Brodeur, Luongo

D: Boyle, Weber, Pronger, Niedermayer, Keith, Bouwmeester, Phaneuff, Green

F: Getzlaf (C), E. Staal (W), Nash (W), Thorton (C), Heatley (W), Crosby (C), Lecavalier (C), St. Louis (W), Stamkos (W), Ignalia (W) Carter (W), M Richards (C) Marleau (W) Perry (W)

Immigration: Canada needs to Get it Right

An aging population and not climate change is the biggest threat we face as a nation. In fact it is not even close.

The average Canadian in 2004 was 39.7; that makes Canada one of the oldest nations on earth. However bad things are now things promise to get a lot worse. The percentage of Canadians over 65 is set to go from 14.7 now to 27.6 in 2050. If the situation was ever allowed to get this bad, the economy would at best be stagnet, the federal government would surely be in deficit, and virtually every public entitlement program would be under enormous pressure or would have already collapsed. Most notably our health care system would be in serious trouble.

The problem is this. People in their 60s cost the health care system more than twice as much on a per capita basis than any of the younger demographics. People in their 70s cost the health care system more twice that as people in their 60s on per capita basis. People in their 80s cost the system twice as much per capita basis and on it goes. In US, since 1975 half of every health care dollar spent has been spent on the last year of life. It is not without reason that some commentors recast the health care crisis in the US in Canada is really being a demographic one.

The notion that this problem can be addressed by encouraging Canadians to have more kids is unrealistic. There is not one Western nation with a fertility rate above the replacement rate yet alone one with a fertility rate high enough to withstand the aforementioned increase in the number of seniors as percentage of the total population.

http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&met=sp_dyn_tfrt_in&idim=country:CAN&q=fertility+rate+canada


To think that Canada has chance of nearly doubling its current fertility rate of 1.6 -- and that is what it would take -- is pie in the sky nonsense. Moreover, far from making things better a massive baby boom would only increase an already mushrooming dependency rate for a good number of years. There is something perverse about wanting Canada to become a country of the very old and very young supported by taxes on a rapidly shrinking working population.

Canada has no option but to continue with a high rate of immigration.

Immigration is allowing us to make some headway. 2001 study found that based on 1996 census if Canada did not allow any immigrants, then the number of seniors as percentage of the population in 2050 would be 29. 8. If on the other hand Canada let in 225,000 annually, then that number would drop to 25.4. Finally, if Canada let in 450,000 annually that number would drop further still to 22.9. http://sociology.uwo.ca/popstudies/dp/dp03-03.pdf Of course, if 450,000 annually is good, somewhere between 500,000 and million is even better. Finally, latter number and more of an emphasis on youth would be best of all.

That is the good news. The bad news is that Canada's immigration system needs to be reformed.

Take family reunification. There is no reason why an immigrant should be able to bring in anyone other than his spouse and dependents. After all, if the main point of a high rate of immigration is to lessen the effects of an aging population, what sense does it make to allow immigrants to sponsor their parents and grandparents?

Eliminting the ability of immigrants to sponsor their parents and grandparents is obvious place to start, but there are other less obvious reforms that need to be taken. One of the biggest concerns is that the ratio of skilled principle applicants as percentage of the over number of immigrants to Canada is way too small. Currently less than one in 5 immigrants is a skilled principle applicant. And however much I am loath to admit it, the Mark Steyn's of the world are right about one thing. Allowing someone to immigrant to Canada has a huge potential cost associated with it. This espeically so with regard to any other category of immigrant other the skilled principle applicants. After all, it is only skilled principle applicants that earning anywhere close to what their Canadian peers are earning and skilled principle applicants are the only category of immigrants that are working in numbers that even approach the Canadian average.

"At 26 weeks after their arrival, 50% of all immigrants aged 25 to 44 were employed. This was 30 percentage points below the employment rate of about 80% among all individuals aged 25 to 44 in the Canadian population. ... At 52 weeks after arrival, the employment rate among prime working-age immigrants was 58%. This narrowed the gap to 23 percentage points. At 104 weeks, or two years after arrival, the employment rate among prime working-age immigrants was 63%, 18 percentage points below the national rate of 81%. ... Immigrants admitted as principal applicants in the skilled worker category had an even better record for employment. At 26 weeks after arrival, the gap in the employment rate between them and the Canadian population was 20 percentage points. By 52 weeks, this had narrowed to 12 points, and by two years, it was down to 8 points."

http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/051013/d051013b.htm

If you tease out the numbers, 55% of non principal skilled applicants in the 25 to 44 age group are working after 2 years! Canada needs to do a better job of ensuring that immigrants are able to succeed and while some bleeding hearts will no doubt claim that a complete turn around is possible, an approach that is far more likely to bare fruit is eliminating or greatly limitiing those categories of immigrants that are not likely to succeed economically. To say that Canada needs immigrants is only half right. We need young well educated immigrants who are proficient in English. Indeed, we need a lot more than what we are allowing in now. We do not, however, need their parents and grandparents. We also do not need refugees. Most of all what Canada does not need is cheap unskilled guest workers.

Given Jason Kenney's stated desire to avoid “the kind of ethnic enclaves or parallel communities that exist in some European countries” and Mark Steyn's rantings about second generation Islamic exterminism in Europe you would think that Kenney and Steyn would reel back before the subject of guest workers like vampires before garlic. Instead, Steyn's musings reduce to an infintile and bigoted ethnic essentialism and Kenney seems hell bent on allowing more guest works than Germany, Netherlands and Austria did in the 1960s and 1970s combined.

Indeed, whereas the typical guest worker was once an American transferred to a branch office in Canada, the fastest growing category of guest worker is now the unskilled type with poor language skills. Under the Conservatives, Canada has allowed in some two hunderd thousand plus unskilled workers a year. In other words, the average Canadian tax payer now pays through the noise to have cheap labour sent in from other countries for the sole purpose of cutting his wages. Forget Conservative talk about such provincial programs bringing in much needed skilled workers, this was the kind of positions Alberta was hoping to fill through its guest worker programs this summer: Front desk clerk, short order cook, baker, maid, assembly line worker, server, buser, bellhop, valet, and cafeteria worker, laundry attendant, pet groomer, general labourer, and hair dresser. All that is required of such would be immigrants is that they score 4 or 24 on the language assessment. In other words, they can still be functionally illiterate and still get it in.

Pace Mark Steyn, Integrating immigrants is really quite simple. If you bring in young well educated immigrants that are fluent in English, they will integrate. It will not matter a lick what their background or skin colour is. On the other hand, if you bring in non English speaking uneducated immigrants to clean toilets and serve donuts at Tim Hortons, you have recipe for what happened in Europe, viz, poor race relations, xenophobia and illegal immigration. It is really that clear cut and Kenney should know this. Every expert on immigration does.

It takes a great deal of chutzpah to Kenney to talk about wanting to avoid “the kind of ethnic enclaves or parallel communities that exist in some European countries” and then go about encouraging the very thing that led to the creation of these communities in Europe, viz., importing gobs of unskilled guest labour.

In addition to letting in more skilled immigrants and less of everyone else, Canada needs to refine what it means to be skilled applicant.

The point system is a mess. It is weighted, accidently I am sure, in such a way as to favour older applicants over younger ones. A premium is placed on experience, being married is advantageous and age is not penalized much at all. For example, a 49 year old is given the same number of points for age as a 21 year old! Not only is all this is completely at odds with the stated aim of using immigration to mediate some of the stresses of having a low birth rate, a shrinking supply of labour and a graying population, the very kind of skilled worker most likely to fail, viz., older workers is the one most likely to qualify.

Indeed, while everyone agrees that Canada needs to be a better job of recognizing foreign credentials, what has gotten less attention is just how hard it is establish oneself in a particular field without any contacts in that field and work contacts are what many new immigrants lack. As various studies have shown, for immigrants outside of the Western world, work experience counts for virtually nothing as at all. For this reason alone, Canada needs to redo its point system such that it looks to attract younger skilled workers who are not at such a disadvantage contact wise as their peers.

Above all else though Canada need put more of an emphasis on language proficiency. After all, although Jason Kenney may let in hundreds of thousands of unskilled guest workers with little or no English, he is right to say that language proficiency is best predictor of economic success.

It should be noted that by language proficiency I mean ones ability to converse in either French or English. Currently, moderate proficiency across the board in both English and French is amounts to the same thing high proficiency in one! This is akin to thinking an average switch hitter is not the equal to all star who bats only right handed.

All that being said, in order to get at appreciation for some of the short comings of the current points system consider this. Under the current formula, a single 26 year old who has just completed a PHD in Canada, and who speaks perfect English, but who lacks relevant work experience and is not proficient in French would likely not qualify. Indeed, assuming no family ties and no relevant work experience, they would score 56 out of 100. In other words, if they were not able to quickly secure a job in one of the relevant fields, they would be heading back to their country of origin in short order. Even, if that same applicant spoke perfect French and English they would still not qualify. They would score 64 out of 100.

By contrast a 49 year old who has never set foot in the country and speaks no French but has a BA, 3 years experience, moderate English skills a spouse with a 1 year diploma, and a cousin in distant Canadian city would score 67! This is absurd.

Gift Cards: Like Cash, but less useful

Why do people buy gift cards? There is something that does the very same thing and it is redemable everywhere. It is called CASH. I will only ever buy a gift card if the amount on the gift card is greater than the amount it costs to buy that gift card. But given the number of suckers out there, I am going to be waiting a very long time.

Janine Krieber

This is what Janine Krieber got right

1) Igantieff has been an unmediated disaster.

2) The rot goes well beyond Ignatieff.

3) Paul Martin was a cancer.


Now this is what she got wrong.

1) Love is blind. It is obvious to all but the two of them that Stephen Dion does not have the ability to rebuild the party. His English is not good enough. He never had the support of the caucus or even the party base. He is not engaging speaker, he is not charismatic and he comes off as a wimp. Moreover, the notion that the green shift would win the election for the Liberals was pie in sky nonsense. The Liberals actually did a nice job boiling down what the tax shift was. "Less on what you earn more on what you burn." However, the Liberals were never going to be able to explain to the public just what is "burnt" and as a result how such a shift would effect the cost of any number of goods and services. The Conservatives gave them an answer. It would be a "tax on everything". Naturally some Canadians were convinced that this was simply a tax increase in disguise. But the kicker was this. I do not care what Canadians told polling companies about climate change. No one I mean no is ever going to be excited over a tax shift. Making the central plank of his platform something that did not offer a single tangible benefit Canadians just went to show how hopeless Dion was as a politician and why he needed to be ushered out the door as soon as possible.

2) Listening to some Liberals you would think that the gun registry, NEP and SSM lost the Liberals Western Canada. Such suggestions are of course ridiculous. West of Winnipeg the Liberals were only ever strong in BC and the reason they dropped off the map in BC after the 1974 election was because of Trudeau's pandering to Quebec. Of course, pandering to Quebec was the same reason why "the West" rejected the PC party in 1993. For Janine Krieber, to suggest that the coalition with the Bloc was a good idea just goes to show how removed she is from understanding political realities in Western Canada.

3) The rot did not begin with Martin taking over. Under Martin and Chrétien the Liberals abandoned universality, the heart of the Liberal brand, and favored instead means tested programs. Means tested social programs do not win elections; the populace is not going to get excited about paying for a service that only a small percentage of the public can use. By turning every social program on offer into a form of welfare, the ability of the Liberals to offer anything other than tax cuts is very limited. Sure enough the Liberals, despite their vacuous rhetoric to contrary, have become virtually indistinguishable from the Conservatives on most issues.

Dion did nothing to reverse the trend. The Green shift only goes to prove that this is true. The same party that had once promised to replace the GST was now planning to reduce income taxes and introduce a regressive tax.

Worse, Dion was the first to take steps to rob the Liberals of their only remaining redeeming feature, viz., a luke warm social liberalism. People should not be confused by Dion's commitment to affirmative action and other forms of degenerate liberalism. Whether it be marijuana, euthanasia or prostitution, Dion did nothing and said next to nothing. What Dion started Ignatieff finished. Under the guise of making the Liberals competitive again in rural Canada,Ignatieff Liberals have made it clear that the Liberal party will never again to say or doing anything that might anger social conservatives.

Conservatives enabling Criminals to Keep their Guns

Gun nuts love to drone on about how law abiding gun owners are being targeted by registry. Leaving aside the fact that given that it is a crime not to register a gun, only gun owners that register their guns are law abiding. Of course the registry targets --- a odd choice of words given the subject matter really--- , law abiding gun owners. If you take any large group of people, and the number of law abiding gun owners is large, you can predict with fairly good accuracy that a certain number will develop heart disease, a certain number will get cancer, and certain numbers will be convicted of a crime. By not having Canadians register long guns, the Conservatives are enabling criminals to have guns. After all, the registry, and remember we are talking about former law abiding gun owners who dutifully registered all their guns, gives the authorities enough ammunition to ensure these criminals surrender their registered guns.

The Gun Registry: Some thoughts

1)The cost of registry is about a billion dollars. The 2 billion dollar figure bantered around by the Conservatives is a lie. Whatever the cost though, saying these cost overruns justify disbanding the registry now is akin to saying that if a bridge goes over budget than it should be blown up upon completion. By the way, it costs around 3 million a year to register long guns and if the Conservatives had of continued to collect monies for these guns, then there would be no cost to tax paper whatsoever.

2) People still get murdered by long guns in this country. Indeed, 88% of women killed with gun were killed with a shotgun or rifle.

3) The sharp distinction between "law abiding" firearm owners and criminals is a false distinction. From 2005 to Sep 2009 there have been 9,340 firearm licences have been revoked. Some developed a mental illness. Others committed crimes of various sorts. In other words, over time a sizable number of "law abiding" firearm owners become statistically much more likely to poise a danger to others, particularly their spouses. Little wonder than that while the vast majority of gun owners want the registry gone, 77% of those living with a gun owner want it kept. As another blogger, Luke, identified the crux of the matter. "If person had their firearm licence revoked and their firearms are not registered how would the authorities ensure proper disposal of the firearms?"

4) There is also the issue of suicide to consider. For every homicide in Canada there are 6 or more suicides. The likelihood that one will commit suicide goes up significantly if there is a firearm in the home.

5) All the evidence is consistent with the gun registry having worked. To wit:

The suicide rate in Canada peaked at 15.2 in 1978, dipped below 12 for the first time in 32 years in 2000 and reached a post 1970 low of 11.3 in 2004.

The average suicide rate per year between 1970 and 1976 was 13.35, between 1977 and 1983 it was 14.5, between 1984 and 1990 it was 13.1, between 1991 and 1997 it was 13 and between 1998 to 2004 it was 12.

The number of suicides by firearm in Canada dropped from a high of 1287 in 1978 to a low of 568 in 2004. There was an average of 1033 fire arm suicides per year between 1970 and 1976, 1197 between 1977 and 1983, 1084 between 1984 and 1990, 970 between 1991 and 1997 and 682 between 1998 and 2004.

The number of accidental shooting deaths in Canada stood at 143 in 1971 and has generally declined since then; a low of 20 was reached in 2000. There was an average of 117 accidental shooting deaths per year between 1970 and 1976, 70 between 1977 and 1983, 62.3 between 1984 and 1990, 50.1 between 1991 and 1997 and 28.1 between 1998 and 2004.

The rate of homicide in Canada peaked in 1975 at 3.03 per 100,000 and has dropped since then, reaching lower peaks in 1985 (2.72 per 100,000) and 1991 (2.69 per 100,000) while declining to 1.73 per 100,000 in 2003. The average murder rate between 1970 and 1976 was 2.52, between 1977 and 1983 it was 2.67, between 1984 and 1990 it was 2.41, between 1991 and 1997 it was 2.23 and between 1998 and 2004 it was 1.82.

Liberal Bloggers Need to Say What they Stand For

Many Liberal bloggers are content to argue the party line, talk inside baseball and daily goings on. This is too bad. The Liberals do not stand for anything. They are no role model. Moreover, the Liberal party needs to be regularly kicked in the balls least it become to comfortable with its own mediocrity. The Liberal bloggers, big and small, need to articulate what concrete programs and changes they want. So let us hear it Calgary Grit, BCer in Toronto, et al.

Here again is my list. Of course, not all of them are terribly realistic, but so what

Things that need to be legalized

1) marijuana,

2) prostitution

3) euthanasia.


Needed Federal Programs

1) Dental care

2) Full day Kindergarten and Playschool

3) Natonal Drug plan


Upgrading of national standards

1) $10 hour National minimum wage indexed to inflation

2) Miniumum 4 weeks vacation a year. This is the European minimum.

3) Massive increase the number of ridings. The hinterlands have way too much electoral clout.


Things that need to be abolished

1) Native Rights If someone was to suggest that land should be reserved for, say, Chinese Canadians and that Chinese Canadians should have rights that other Canadians do not have, you would first ask them to lie down; you would then call 911 and tell the person at the other end of the line that you believe that the person before you had suffered a stroke and that paramedics should come quick. Whether it be billions lost to illegal cigarette sales, or setting up school food programs for kids who live on land that if divided equally would net them tens of millions on the open market, it hard to think of anything quite so daft.

A commitment to native rights and reserves condemns future generations to be born into a communities that are completely economically unviable. Without hope for a better future, these children will be plagued by the same problems that plagued their parents. Lamenting high infant mortality rates, teen pregnancy rates, teen drop out rates, crime rates and rapid substance abuse, means nota if you are setting in motion the very things you lament.

The same goes for racism. People can lament that racism still exists in Canada all they want. However,supporting a policy that defines native in the same manner that Nazis defined Jew and giving one particular group rights that no other groups enjoys, is preventing things from getting better. The bleeders should not kid themselves.

2) The Senate.

3) Family Unification If the main point of a high rate of immigration is to lessen the effects of an aging population, what sense does it make to allow immigrants to sponsor their parents and grandparents? The average immigrant to Canada is only a bit younger than the average Canadian. Now do not get me wrong. Canada needs more immigrants -- alot more. Canada needs to at least triple the number of economic immigrants to Canada each year. However at the same time as it needs to do that, it needs to all but eliminate every other category of immigrant. Also, there needs to be a greater emphasis and youth, and language skills.

4) The ability of employers to bring in unskilled temporary workers. The Canadian tax payer should not be paying to have temporary unskilled workers brought in just so the Tim Horton's and company can undercut wages of Canadians. If they want workers, they can pay the piper.

Integrating immigrants is really quite simple. If you bring in well educated immigrants that are fluent in English, they will integrate. It will not matter a lick what their background or skin colour is. On the other hand, if you bring in non English speaking uneducated immigrants to clean toilets and serve donuts at Tim Hortons, you have recipe for what happened in Europe, viz, poor race relations, xenophobia and illegal immigration. It is really that clear cut and Kenney should know this. Every expert on immigration does.

5) The Monarchy

The Liberals need to forget Chrétien majorities and build a movement

The Liberal's problem in nutshell is this. The Conservative party is part of larger conservative movement and very notion of liberal movement sounds well odd. Conservative party draws strength from the movement and movement in turn draws strength from having a party that reflects their values. There is no liberal movement in Canada and the Liberal party, especially under Ignatieff, has done nothing to foster one.

Without a core set of policy goals to work towards, it at little wonder why the Liberal party is purely reactive and dominated by short term thinking. Other than returning to power, the party has set itself no goals. This is marked contrast to Harper. Harper has a long term vision and long term strategy for how to accomplish it.

Chrétien's successes provide the Liberals with no template. The seas parted for Chrétien in 1993. The constitutional wars sidelined two two major federal parties (NDP and PCs) for a decade and gave birth to two new parties (Reform and Bloc). The Liberals were the only established party left standing after the 1993 election. His subsequent majorities were based on taking a 100 seats in Ontario. The Liberals would do well to pretend that they never happened.

Jason Kenney Thinks Canadians are Morons

Jason Kenney must think that Canadians are morons. The notion that Canada will be able to better ingrate immigrants into Canadian society by teaching them about the beaver and Vimy Ridge is ridiculous.

Integrating immigrants is really quite simple. If you bring in well educated immigrants that are fluent in English, they will integrate. It will not matter a lick what their background or skin colour is. On the other hand, if you bring in non English speaking uneducated immigrants to clean toilets and serve donuts at Tim Hortons, you have recipe for what happened in Europe, viz, poor race relations, xenophobia and illegal immigration. It is really that clear cut and Kenney should know this. Every expert on immigration does.

The thing is though the number of guest workers allowed in has exploded since the Conservatives came to power and whereas the typical guest worker was once an American transferred to a branch office in Canada, the fastest growing category of guest worker is now the unskilled type with poor language skills. The Conservatives have not done this directly. They have turned over a greater percentage of the immigration file to the provinces and Western provinces in particular have used the program to undercut labour. The Canadian tax payer has paid through the noise to have cheap labour sent in from other countries for the sole purpose of cutting wages of the Canadian tax payer. Forget Conservative talk about such provincial programs bringing in much needed skilled workers, this was the kind of positions Alberta was hoping to fill through its guest worker programs this summer: Front desk clerk, short order cook, baker, maid, assembly line worker, server, buser, bellhop, valet, and cafeteria worker, laundry attendant, pet groomer, general labourer, and hair dresser. All that is required of such would be immigrants is that they score 4 or 24 on the language assessment. In other words, they can still be functionally illiterate and still get it in.

It takes a great deal of chutzpah to Kenney to talk about wanting to avoid “the kind of ethnic enclaves or parallel communities that exist in some European countries” and then go about encouraging the very thing that led to the creation of these communities in Europe, viz., importing gobs of unskilled guest labour.

Do not take my word for it. Take Sheila Fraser's word for it. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/auditor-general-sounds-alarm-on-immigration-policy/article1349837/

Liberal Fund Raising Plea

When we were flush with cash, it was easy to poll for policy. Now that times are tight, we still poll --- more than anyone else I might add-- , but we do poll nearly enough. As result, we are essentially flying blind!!!!!!!! We do not have enough information to see which way the wind is blowing and tailor our policies to whims of public opinion. The policy cupboard is bare. Only more polling will change that.

Remember what separates us from the Conservatives is not policy. Not being able to poll for policy we have had to adopt their platform as our own well all the while voting against them in the house. No, what separates us is that they have opinions and we have none They shape opinion and events and we react to them -- well at least some of time. We have not bothered to say anything about Senate reform and the gun registry for years. Being significantly older than than those whipper snapper Conservatives MPs, we just do not have the energy. We old, tired and stuck in our ways. Help us.

Liberalism Is Dead

Small l liberalism in Canada is all but dead. The Chrétien and Martin fatally wounded it. Under Martin and Chrétien the Liberals abandoned universality, the heart of the Liberal brand, and favored instead means tested programs. Means tested social programs do not win elections; the populace is not going to get excited about paying for a service that only a small percentage of the public can use. By turning every social program on offer into a form of welfare, the ability of the Liberals to offer anything other than tax cuts is very limited. Sure enough the Liberals, despite their vacuous rhetoric to contrary, have become virtually indistinguishable from the Conservatives on most issues. Indeed, so in lock step are the Liberal and Conservative parties that a tax shift is considered a bold departure.

Having already insured that Conservatives and Liberals are of a piece when it comes to foreign policy, and pandering to Quebec nationalists, Ignatieff is poised to delivery the coup de grace. Under the guise of making the Liberals competitive again in rural Canada, the Ignatieff Liberals have made it clear that the Liberal party will never again to say or doing anything that might anger social conservatives. Small l liberalism is dead and with it the Liberal brand. It should also be said that this bolds ill for the Liberals electoral fortunes. If conservatism is what the public wants, they are going to prefer the real thing to some ill named Johnny come lately.