# re Justin Trudeau



## jargey3000

What's with this "hand over the heart" move he's doing lately? I dunno... it just bugs me.... It's so...so... what's the word I'm looking for? pretentious?


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## HaroldCrump

He is going to *govern from the heart out*, haven't you heard?


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## fraser

Perhaps.

But it will be a good change from the heartless way that Harper has treated our injured war veterans or Syrian immigrants.


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## Eder

Ya...other immigrants are worthless compared to blue chip Syrian kind...the kind that get votes.


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## jargey3000

soooo..... has anyone else noticed him doing the "hand over the heart" thing....?


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## gibor365

> Syrian immigrants


 All immigrants are treated and should be treated the same way. Or in your opinion Syrian immigrants should be treated better?!


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## gibor365

jargey3000 said:


> soooo..... has anyone else noticed him doing the "hand over the heart" thing....?


Yeap, it's show off ... he's just an idiot ... without his papa, nobody will even know him


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## humble_pie

lol this is the kindergarten corner where the hate-mongers come to whine & wail?

actually i think our politicians are looking good. Much better than that very first debate on the economy where they all blathered & shouted on top of each other. It was amazing how they all straightened up after that, lickety split. Even had some intelligent things to say.


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## sags

Too bad for Harper he doesn't get a chance to see it. He is looking at Justin Trudeau's backside now as JT passes by.


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## Sampson

humble_pie said:


> lol this is the kindergarten corner where the hate-mongers come to whine & wail?


Interesting how the conversations in this forum have changed in anticipation of the election and all the discourse around.

New post count will certainly slow after the election is over. Forum owners better cash in on forum traffic now.


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## Emjay85

sags said:


> Too bad for Harper he doesn't get a chance to see it. He is looking at Justin Trudeau's backside now as JT passes by.


That will change with the wind.


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## sags

True enough...........it is a horse race now heading for a photo finish.

As they round the turn and come down the front stretch........Trudeau is leading by a nose, Harper is on the outside keeping pace, and Mulcair is one length back on the rail.

As they come to the wire..........Trudeau and Harper are neck and neck........this is going to be close folks.............and the winner is..............

Elizabeth May ?...................where the heck did she come from ?


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## fraser

Who knows what will transpire. A lot can happen to public opinion over the next 10 days or so.

I am voting today. For change.

My vote may not count for much in the riding where I live but I am very much aware of how fortunate I am to be able to be able to vote in a free election. The majority of people in the world either do not get to vote or do not get to vote in a truly democratic election. We should never take it for granted even though it does not guarantee us good Government.


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## jargey3000

here`s a question: what immediate impact on the stock market might the potential election outcomes (conservative win;liberal win; con. minority etc.) have?


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## gibor365

jargey3000 said:


> here`s a question: what immediate impact on the stock market might the potential election outcomes (conservative win;liberal win; con. minority etc.) have?


I've heard one analyst opinion that if Conservative lose, TSX will crash


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## Eder

No truer words...get out & vote, and no matter who wins lets realize that Canadians will have made their choice and we need to accept that.


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## jargey3000

gibor: aha! buying opportunity?


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## gibor365

jargey3000 said:


> gibor: aha! buying opportunity?


or maybe selling opportunity just before elections


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## sags

jargey3000 said:


> here`s a question: what immediate impact on the stock market might the potential election outcomes (conservative win;liberal win; con. minority etc.) have?


Absolutely none..........why would companies be worth more or less than the day before ?


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## Eder

NDP win = companies less profitable due to higher taxation until they can eventually pass the costs back onto consumers.


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## fatcat

sags said:


> Absolutely none..........why would companies be worth more or less than the day before ?


i do not think the stock market will celebrate an ndp victory by any stretch

it will put an immediate dark cloud over every single resource extraction project in the country


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## gibor365

sags said:


> Absolutely none..........why would companies be worth more or less than the day before ?


Really?! And how do you explain 300+ points down or up in 1 day?! What, " companies be worth more or less than the day before "?!


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## Userkare

WRT Hand over heart ( is that still the topic? ). It's a subliminal psychological maneuver to convey honesty and sincerity. A far cry better than his old man's 'half a peace sign' hand gesture!

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart...ar-and-behave-more-honestly-180950233/?no-ist

http://www.nicolasfradet.com/hand-body-language/


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## jargey3000

userkare - thanks for steering us back on topic. I still find it a bit affected & pretentious


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## Userkare

jargey3000 said:


> I still find it a bit affected & pretentious


I call your attention to the last sentence in the Smithsonian article I linked...

_But at the same time, *skilled liars* could use this simple cue to manipulate others into believing that what they say is the hand-over-their-heart truth. _

** Skilled Liars = Any politician, not just Mr. Trudeau.


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## sags

Kind of like........."trust me", "read my lips........no new taxes", or "there will be no changes to income trusts" ...................

The standard after elected line goes..........."the books are worse than the previous government said they were".


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## OhGreatGuru

Have you seen Harper's latest ad: "It's not about me. It's about (the economy, programs, policies, etc) ..."

Well, Mr. Harper, it is about you, because you and your flunkies in the PMO are the ones who have been running things (badly) pretty much single-handedly for 10 years.


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## GoldStone

OhGreatGuru said:


> Well, Mr. Harper, it is about you, because you and your flunkies in the PMO are the ones who have been running things (badly) pretty much single-handedly for 10 years.


Concentration of power in the PMO office started long before Harper. I heard the exact same complaints about Chretien.


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## sags

My dad used to say Chretien was the best Prime Minister because he showed up every 4 years, people voted for him, and then he disappeared again.


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## gibor365

sags said:


> My dad used to say Chretien was the best Prime Minister because he showed up every 4 years, people voted for him, and then he disappeared again.


Also he looked like handicapped and Canadians love such kind of people


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## mrPPincer

sags said:


> My dad used to say Chretien was the best Prime Minister because he showed up every 4 years, people voted for him, and then he disappeared again.


Haha I like that. 
Plus he doubled as his own bodyguard, talk about frugal.. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvjfJ6bAi0U


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## agent99

gibor said:


> Also he looked like handicapped and Canadians love such kind of people


Perhaps more accurately, Canadians hate a party that would stoop so low as to use a facial deformity in an attack ad.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Chrétien_attack_ad


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## humble_pie

gibor said:


> Also he looked like handicapped and Canadians love such kind of people



so we're stooping to attacking injured children now?

jean chrétien had severe Bell's palsy as a child. It left him with certain muscles in one side of his face that were paralyzed.

surprisingly, the normal side of chrétien's face was the side where the mouth was drawn up. Even his nose appeared to tilt to that side. Because that was the side where the muscles worked normally. Over time, the normally working muscles tended to pull tissue from the drooping, paralyzed side of the face. 

the disability never stopped le ti-gars du shawinigan. I don't believe he ever even thought about it. Exactly as there are people in this forum who are disabled, yet they never talk or even think about it. They just carry on with their incredibly successful lives.

i for one think it's beyond despicable to pick on injured or handicapped persons, especialy injured children.


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## Userkare

Chretien was my least favourite politician, to put it mildly. Two reasons...

First, I had just become self employed at the time he became Trudeau's finance minister. I quickly realized that I no longer would have paid vacations, subsidized health insurance, UI, pension, etc. etc. I clearly remember Mr Chretien standing up in Parliament and saying "Madam Speaker, these people are robbing the Canadian taxpayer". Meaning me - self employed business people who could 'write-off' certain expenses. Sure, there were people who stretched the rules, but he painted everyone who was self employed as crooks. Talk about the kettle calling the tea-pot - Gomery inquiry comes to mind! After that, the rules were tightened, and Revenue Canada was a lot more tough on scrutinizing every expense claimed. Did I not just hear similar rhetoric from young Mr. Trudeau recently about self employed/small business just being a way for rich people to evade taxes? I wonder who he's been talking to, and if maybe the puppet strings from Justin lead to Shawinigan.

Second, I respectfully disagree with sags dad. During the hi-tech boom, Chretien had his face in every photo-op where a Canadian company had won a foreign contract, as if somehow he was responsible for the business' ( the ones he had called crooks ) success. When the hi-tech bubble burst, he was asked how the government would help businesses that were heading into bankruptcy. His reply was that the government was not responsible for the failure of businesses. What a hypocrite!


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## OnlyMyOpinion

Userkare said:


> Chretien ... painted everyone who was self employed as crooks... Did I not just hear similar rhetoric from young *Mr. Trudeau recently about self employed/small business just being a way for rich people to evade taxes*? I wonder who he's been talking to, and if maybe the puppet strings from Justin lead to Shawinigan.


^+1


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## humble_pie

Userkare said:


> ... self employed business people who could 'write-off' certain expenses. Sure, there were people who stretched the rules, but he painted everyone who was self employed as crooks. Talk about the kettle calling the tea-pot - Gomery inquiry comes to mind! After that, the rules were tightened, and Revenue Canada was a lot more tough on scrutinizing every expense claimed



userkare i don't mean you or anyone else specifically. But padded business expense account writeoffs were the wild west years ago. 

it was comical. Most people i knew were writing off lunch every day as entertaining clients. What's worse is that the waiters were all collaborating, giving regular customers phony high bills. Thus lunch for 2 that might have been $35 in those days, would suddenly become lunch for 8 for $766!

i distinctly recall one law firm where the partners got together for lunch every friday to divide up the under-the-table cash. Then they wrote off an inflated bill for lunch as entertaining new clients.

liberal or conservative, the pols had no choice. They had to shut all that down.


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## fraser

The challenge I have is that in the past I have voted for the Conservative Party.

But this is not longer the Conservative Party. This is the Reform Party. They merged with the Conservatives and then managed to drive most of those Conservatives, including me, away from the Party. What is left is a bunch of right wing and far right wing Reform Party members who are aiming their policies at a specific group of conservative religious core block of voters in Canada. IMHO, and as someone who once supported them.


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## humble_pie

i like a voter who changes his loyalties now & then, after careful & thoughtful review. Keeps a country on its toes.


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## sags

humble_pie said:


> userkare i don't mean you or anyone else specifically. But padded business expense account writeoffs were the wild west years ago.
> 
> it was comical. Most people i knew were writing off lunch every day as entertaining clients. What's worse is that the waiters were all collaborating, giving regular customers phony high bills. Thus lunch for 2 that might have been $35 in those days, would suddenly become lunch for 8 for $766!
> 
> i distinctly recall one law firm where the partners got together for lunch every friday to divide up the under-the-table cash. Then they wrote off an inflated bill for lunch as entertaining new clients.
> 
> liberal or conservative, the pols had no choice. They had to shut all that down.


That is so true.......

I remember fellow employees in our warehouse who ran "businesses" out of their homes and enjoyed big tax writeoffs. Every couple of years they "went out of business" and into a new business to avoid the rules on the business making a profit.

They used to sit around and talk about it. It was comical...............what they came up as "businesses." I couldn't believe they were getting away with it.

There is probably remnants of that today. I saw a website where the person called themselves a "spiritual advisor".


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## GoldStone

fraser, I couldn't disagree more. Put emotions aside and look at the balance of evidence. Look at the actual government policies under Harper. I don's see anything extreme. Harper moved the party much closer to the centre. Conservatives are still a right-of-centre party, but they are definetely not the Reform Party of old. Ironically, Reform base is accusing Harper of being a Liberal-lite.

The idea that Conservatives are extreme is a political meme used by the Liberals and NDP. They repeat it over and over again to implant the idea in people's minds. I think they used the technique really well. Harper hatred is bordering on mass hysteria. I think it's quite irrational, to put it mildly.


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## sags

As for Jean Chretien, I really enjoyed the way he talked. It made him an interesting person to listen to...........with his turns of phrases and his French accent.


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## gibor365

> As for Jean Chretien, I really enjoyed the way he talked


 and I wanted to sleep when he was talking... so tried never listen to him while driving.... somehow he reminded me Leonid Brezhnev


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## gibor365

> Conservatives are still a right-of-centre party


 True. They are too much centrist for my liking and NDP/Libs definitely extreme leftist parties..

Reform Party is the best party ever existed in Canada


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## agent99

sags said:


> As for Jean Chretien, I really enjoyed the way he talked. It made him an interesting person to listen to...........with his turns of phrases and his French accent.


And he at least had a sense of humour. More than you can say for our current bunch. Maybe not really what many would consider PM material, but at least he didn't run a one man show dictatorship. He had the personality that allowed him to work with a team. Well, at least until Martin's ambition got in the way.


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## agent99

gibor said:


> and I wanted to sleep when he was talking... so tried never listen to him while driving.... somehow he reminded me Leonid Brezhnev


As you say - you were not paying attention


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## livewell

gibor said:


> True. They are too much centrist for my liking and NDP/Libs definitely extreme leftist parties..


LOL really!!! IMHO Jeremy Corbyn and current UK Labour party are left wing, Tsipras and party in Greece are left wing. In Canada there really is no left wing, it is centrist Liberal/NDP or right wing conservative.


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## GoldStone

agent99 said:


> And he at least had a sense of humour. More than you can say for our current bunch. Maybe not really what many would consider PM material, but at least he didn't run a one man show dictatorship. He had the personality that allowed him to work with a team. Well, at least until Martin's ambition got in the way.


Didn't run a dictatorship?? That's not how I remember it.

But don't take my word for it. Here's Wikipedia:

On November 4, 1993, Chrétien was appointed by Governor General Ray Hnatyshyn as prime minister. While Trudeau, Joe Clark and Mulroney had been relative political outsiders prior to becoming prime minister, Chrétien had served in every Liberal cabinet since 1965. This experience gave him knowledge of the Canadian parliamentary system, and allowed Chrétien to *establish a very centralized government* that, although highly efficient, was also lambasted by critics such as Jeffrey Simpson and the media as being *a "friendly dictatorship"* and *intolerant of internal dissent.*[93] The political scientist Donald Savoie wrote that under Chrétien's *authoritarian style of leadership* that "Cabinet has now joined Parliament as an institution being by-passed" while Simpson wrote that Chrétien possessed " *a streak of terrible pettiness and vengeance directed against those who have crossed him*".[94] Reflecting *the relative impotence of Parliament*, the most powerful advisors to Chrétien were a triumvirate comprising his wife Aline, his Chief of Staff Jean Pelletier and his right-hand man Eddie Goldenberg, none of whom held a seat in the House of Commons.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Chrétien


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## nathan79

livewell said:


> LOL really!!! IMHO Jeremy Corbyn and current UK Labour party are left wing, Tsipras and party in Greece are left wing. In Canada there really is no left wing, it is centrist Liberal/NDP or right wing conservative.


Exactly.

http://www.politicalcompass.org/canada2015


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## GoldStone

livewell said:


> LOL really!!! IMHO Jeremy Corbyn and current UK Labour party are left wing, Tsipras and party in Greece are left wing. In Canada there really is no left wing, it is centrist Liberal/NDP or right wing conservative.


LOL to your LOL.

Forget the myths. Look at the balance of evidence. Look at the actual government policies under Harper. Conservatives are a fairly centrist party. They may be right of centre, but they are not that far to the right.


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## scorpion_ca

I have decided that I am going to vote for liberal party tomorrow......this will be my first vote in the federal election.......any thought why I shouldn't vote for liberal party?


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## GoldStone

nathan79 said:


> http://www.politicalcompass.org/canada2015


This is a totally anonymous web site. It doesn't reveal who is behind it. Why is that? 

Could it be that folks behind the web site have a strong political agenda, but they want to keep their biases secret?

Their chart of Canadian parties is laughable. The placement defies common sense.


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## gibor365

GoldStone said:


> LOL to your LOL.


Agreed! Right party used to be Reform party. Our Conservative is even more left that Obama


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## agent99

scorpion_ca said:


> I have decided that I am going to vote for liberal party tomorrow......this will be my first vote in the federal election.......any thought why I shouldn't vote for liberal party?


Hope you did it! As Danny Williams said - voting is simple as ABC.


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## agent99

GoldStone said:


> Didn't run a dictatorship?? That's not how I remember it.


If Simpson thought Chretien ran a dictatorship, at least he called it a FRIENDLY dictatorship  Harper has surpassed what may have been thought of as a dictatorship back then by several orders of magnitude. Just look at how many of his key people have left.

By the way, Simpson writes that gobbledegook in order to sell papers. Just one persons view, not fact. Another view of present PM by a former Conservative Premier:

http://www.thestar.com/opinion/comm...me-minister-we-cant-trust-danny-williams.html


> Having dealt with other former prime minsters, I was accustomed to disagreements and differing viewpoints. But I was also accustomed to working with leaders from all parties who demonstrated integrity, concern for the country and genuine intentions. Stephen Harper, by direct contrast, represents none of these things. Rather he is divisive and untrustworthy.


Ain't politics fun? We won't change each other political stripes, but maybe some undecided voters may enjoy our differing views.


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## GoldStone

agent99 said:


> Harper has surpassed what may have been thought of as a dictatorship back then by several orders of magnitude.


You forgot that he eats kittens for breakfast. 

Your partisan rhetoric is way over the top. I grew up under a real totalitarian regime, where you could go to prison for a fairly innocent comment about the ruling party. When Canadian lefties like you call Harper a dictator, all I can do is roll my eyes. :rolleyes2:


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## GoldStone

agent99 said:


> Another view of present PM by a former Conservative Premier:
> 
> http://www.thestar.com/opinion/comm...me-minister-we-cant-trust-danny-williams.html


Danny Williams Harper Attack - Hello Kettle


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## Bobbyjohn

That's hella overthought. It's just a simple gesture.


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## gibor365

GoldStone said:


> You forgot that he eats kittens for breakfast.
> 
> Your partisan rhetoric is way over the top. I grew up under a real totalitarian regime, where you could go to prison for a fairly innocent comment about the ruling party. When Canadian lefties like you call Harper a dictator, all I can do is roll my eyes. :rolleyes2:


Good point  Do you care to share where did you grow up? Poland?


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## Rusty O'Toole

Is it just me or does every statement he make sound like someone in a dorm after a couple of bong hits?


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## 1980z28

Cannabis for dorm rooms

Some do not inhale


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## agent99

GoldStone said:


> You forgot that he eats kittens for breakfast.
> 
> Your partisan rhetoric is way over the top. I grew up under a real totalitarian regime, where you could go to prison for a fairly innocent comment about the ruling party. When Canadian lefties like you call Harper a dictator, all I can do is roll my eyes. :rolleyes2:


Hey who is over the top? Partisan? Sure - and you are not?? Lefty? Anyone that does not agree with your views is a Lefty? And deserves a personal attack? You have shown your true colours.


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## andrewf

I guess by 'lefty' he means 'voters that will determine this election'. The 30% wedge on the right of the spectrum can't expect to have the ball all the time.


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## GoldStone

^ Nope, that's not what I meant. Most regular voters who vote Libs or NDP are not extreme partisans. So no, I wouldn't label them 'lefties'.


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## HaroldCrump

GoldStone said:


> Ironically, Reform base is accusing Harper of being a Liberal-lite.
> 
> The idea that Conservatives are extreme is a political meme used by the Liberals and NDP. They repeat it over and over again to implant the idea in people's minds. I think they used the technique really well. Harper hatred is bordering on mass hysteria. I think it's quite irrational, to put it mildly.


Harper has been more centrist than anyone could have expected.
Let's keep in mind the facts - this administration has closed more tax loopholes than any recent past govt, such as income trusts, deposit boxes, Labor Sponsored Funds, ETFs financial engineering, just to name a few.
This is also the govt. that blocked the foreign buyout of Potash Corp. and (preemptively) Blackberry.
This is also the govt that brought in RDSP.

For the leftists, Harper being accused of being centrist should be a good thing.


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## andrewf

Even more interesting is that under any scenario where we get a more proportional electoral system, Harper is unelectably right wing. I'm not sure they could make CPC broad enough to capture 40+% of the vote and still satisfy the hard right.


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## HaroldCrump

There is no hard right in Canada - at least not in the US sense.
If Harper is the hardest right we have, the leftists have nothing to worry about.


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## andrewf

No, he's not. He has a sizable contingent that are not happy with him for being too centrist (I would say likely a majority of the party). 

It's silly to say there is no hard right in Canada because there are more conservative countries. It's like saying there is no hard left compared to USSR/North Korea.

I think the only thing the left has to worry about in Canada is that our electoral system results in fairly perverse outcomes like a right-wing party with 30% support controlling the government without any need for consultation or input from the rest of the political spectrum.


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## OnlyMyOpinion

Or:


andrewf said:


> I think the only thing the right has to worry about in Canada is that our electoral system results in fairly perverse outcomes like a left-wing party with 30% support controlling the government without any need for consultation or input from the rest of the political spectrum.


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## RBull

^LOL


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## nathan79

HaroldCrump said:


> Harper has been more centrist than anyone could have expected.
> Let's keep in mind the facts - this administration has closed more tax loopholes than any recent past govt, such as income trusts, deposit boxes, Labor Sponsored Funds, ETFs financial engineering, just to name a few.
> This is also the govt. that blocked the foreign buyout of Potash Corp. and (preemptively) Blackberry.
> This is also the govt that brought in RDSP.
> 
> For the leftists, Harper being accused of being centrist should be a good thing.


I don't think it's Harper's economic policies that make him right wing in the eyes of many, though that would be the natural focus on a money forum. I think most Canadians would be open to a more socially progressive conservative.

It's Harper's authoritarian social and foreign policy that people seem to loathe... Bill C-51, war on drugs, mandatory minimum sentences, building more prisons, aggressive military actions, revoking citizenship, muzzling scientists... just to name a few things.


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## HaroldCrump

humble_pie said:


> padded business expense account writeoffs were the wild west years ago.
> it was comical. Most people i knew were writing off lunch every day as entertaining clients. What's worse is that the waiters were all collaborating, giving regular customers phony high bills. Thus lunch for 2 that might have been $35 in those days, would suddenly become lunch for 8 for $766!
> i distinctly recall one law firm where the partners got together for lunch every friday to divide up the under-the-table cash. Then they wrote off an inflated bill for lunch as entertaining new clients.


Similar scams are ongoing these days in the under-reporting of "family" income where one spouse (almost always the male husband) is working overseas, usually somewhere in the middle east.
Scam works as follows:

- Family secures Canadian Permanent Residency (PR) via one of the eligible categories
- Family arrives in Canada to complete PR paperwork/formalities (known as "landing")
- Husband immediately turns around and goes back to where his job is, usually in the tax havens of Saudi Arabia, Dubai, or the Emirates
- Wife and kids stay behind and start life here in Canada
- Wife & any teenage kids take up part-time, low wage jobs such as food service, etc. and report low income
- Hubby keeps working overseas
- Reported family income year after year stays below the LICO level
- Family qualifies for full amounts under all welfare schemes, such as CCTB, CLB, GST credit, Trillium Benefit, etc.

These scams are identifiable by such families living in relatively large houses, typically purchased for all-cash or near-cash, with a couple of luxury cars in the garage, frequent lavish parties for friends/family, and other conspicuous lifestyles.
Their annual tax returns keep showing amounts at or below the level needed to qualify for max benefits.

These folks will benefit handsomely from the $6,500 per child subsidy being proposed by the Liberal plan.
Some of these families with 4 or more kids could be making over $25K per year in child subsidies alone - why bother working?


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## andrewf

OnlyMyOpinion said:


> Or:


Same applies. If we get a more proportional system, the game will be forever changed. It won't be possible to govern without support from the centre. Currently it is.


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## humble_pie

HaroldCrump said:


> Similar scams are ongoing these days in the under-reporting of "family" income where one spouse (almost always the male husband) is working overseas, usually somewhere in the middle east.
> Scam works as follows:
> 
> - Family secures Canadian Permanent Residency (PR) via one of the eligible categories
> - Family arrives in Canada to complete PR paperwork/formalities (known as "landing")
> - Husband immediately turns around and goes back to where his job is, usually in the tax havens of Saudi Arabia, Dubai, or the Emirates
> - Wife and kids stay behind and start life here in Canada
> - Wife & any teenage kids take up part-time, low wage jobs such as food service, etc. and report low income
> - Hubby keeps working overseas
> - Reported family income year after year stays below the LICO level
> - Family qualifies for full amounts under all welfare schemes, such as CCTB, CLB, GST credit, Trillium Benefit, etc.
> 
> These scams are identifiable by such families living in relatively large houses, typically purchased for all-cash or near-cash, with a couple of luxury cars in the garage, frequent lavish parties for friends/family, and other conspicuous lifestyles.
> Their annual tax returns keep showing amounts at or below the level needed to qualify for max benefits.
> 
> These folks will benefit handsomely from the $6,500 per child subsidy being proposed by the Liberal plan.
> Some of these families with 4 or more kids could be making over $25K per year in child subsidies alone - why bother working?



cmf had what may have been one of these cases recently. The fact that the OP - a father in Dubai, with non-disclosed offshore assets, with family already residing in canada - disappeared as soon as questions were raised did not bode well.

http://canadianmoneyforum.com/showt...ney-to-Canada)?p=833697&viewfull=1#post833697

however, i believe that au fond, these are immigration issues. Only superficially are they tax issues, no?


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## gibor365

> . If we get a more proportional system,


 I always supported proportional system. Thus we can have more small parties in Parlament and I can vote for party that really represents my interests


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## none

gibor said:


> I always supported proportional system. Thus we can have more small parties in Parlament and I can vote for party that really represents my interests


If that's the case then you shouldn't be voting for the conservatives. Libs and NDP have said they will institute electoral reform to a more proportional system.


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## mrPPincer

^but weren't the reform party going on about that too before they absorbed the PCs?


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## gibor365

none said:


> If that's the case then you shouldn't be voting for the conservatives. Libs and NDP have said they will institute electoral reform to a more proportional system.


This is not my top priority for current elections  and


> ^but weren't the reform party going on about that too before they absorbed the PCs?


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## andrewf

none said:


> If that's the case then you shouldn't be voting for the conservatives. Libs and NDP have said they will institute electoral reform to a more proportional system.


To be fair, every opposition party has said that before gaining power, then changed their mind. It is sadly predictable.


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## none

andrewf said:


> To be fair, every opposition party has said that before gaining power, then changed their mind. It is sadly predictable.


I don't actually think that's true. Have a reference?


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## andrewf

Electoral reform was promised by Martin, by McGuinty, by governments in PEI and BC. Every time they failed to get it done. In Ontario, the government got cold feet and mobilized the party apparatus to defeat the referendum.


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## HaroldCrump

humble_pie said:


> however, i believe that au fond, these are immigration issues. Only superficially are they tax issues, no?


IMHO, it's the other way around i.e. these are primarily tax evasion issues.
They are superficially (if at all) immigration issues.

From immigration perspective, all this is totally legal and fair.
The rule for retaining PR is 2 yrs presence out of every 5 years' rolling window.
Spend a summer every other year, and it is entirely possible to maintain PR.
Workers in the Middle East, esp. oil/services workers, easily get several weeks of vacation, unlike the norms in North America.

Secondly, it is rather rare for CBSA at a POE to revoke PR based on prolonged absence.
If anything, the matter will get referred to the immigration board, it will take several months for the hearing, and our rich oil Sheikh can easily afford to hire a couple of hotshot lawyers.
But that seldom happens.

On the other hand, there is clear tax evasion here.
Not just the under-reporting or non-reporting of foreign income.
Not just the hiding of assets and investments overseas.
But leveraging the low domestic income in order to qualify for thousands of $$ of tax benefits in Canada - all funded by Canadian taxpayers.

Do some quick napkin math on max CCTB + CLB + Trillium etc. and you can appreciate the magnitude of the tax evasion.

I have personally seen some of these tax returns...this scam is very common (and increasing) in the S/ON & GTA region - one of the factors fueling the property bubble here.

I don't care as much about the borderline violation of immigration rules, but the tax evasion is egregious to say the least.


----------



## gibor365

> Do some quick napkin math on max CCTB + CLB + Trillium etc. and you can appreciate the magnitude of the tax evasion.
> 
> I have personally seen some of these tax returns...this scam is very common (and increasing) in the S/ON & GTA region - one of the factors fueling the property bubble here.
> 
> I don't care as much about the borderline violation of immigration rules, but the tax evasion is egregious to say the least.


My mom is going to ESL school and she is always telling that there are many "immigrants" who is more than 10-15 years lives in Canada, not seniors yet , have luxury cars and condos and still going to ESL school ... 
Probably to get certain tax breaks they need official paper that they are students?!



> The rule for retaining PR is 2 yrs presence out of every 5 years' rolling window.
> Spend a summer every other year, and it is entirely possible to maintain PR.


Several Indian guys who was working in our company on long-term business trips, got already PR .... right after they obviously quit company


----------



## kcowan

HaroldCrump said:


> On the other hand, there is clear tax evasion here.
> Not just the under-reporting or non-reporting of foreign income.
> Not just the hiding of assets and investments overseas.
> But leveraging the low domestic income in order to qualify for thousands of $$ of tax benefits in Canada - all funded by Canadian taxpayers.


This has been going on since the early 80s. We had a neighbour in Toronto (Chinese) who was doing it. Grandma stayed with the kids and their Mercedes cars. Mom and Dad would visit every couple of months. And our government encouraged it by explaining all the rules.

This is a major reason why principal residence cannot be ignored when applying for assistance.


----------



## gibor365

> This is a major reason why principal residence cannot be ignored when applying for assistance.


But it wasn't grandma's principal residence  Most likely she was "renting" it from your neigbour and declared it as expense


----------



## HaroldCrump

kcowan said:


> This has been going on since the early 80s. We had a neighbour in Toronto (Chinese) who was doing it. Grandma stayed with the kids and their Mercedes cars. Mom and Dad would visit every couple of months. And our government encouraged it by explaining all the rules.
> 
> This is a major reason why principal residence cannot be ignored when applying for assistance.


I agree that governments past and present are complicit.
The residency requirements were relaxed in the early 2000s (by the Chrétien administration) to further facilitate his scam.

The most likely explanation is that this type of immigration is yet another "revenue tool" for our welfare obsessed governments.
They need the $$$ that PR process brings in, and all the follow on spending, such as houses, cars, etc.
And they are willing to trade in some welfare $$ in order to "earn back" the immigration $$


----------



## Mechanic

All the ads on TV must be having an effect. I was making my coffee on my Cuisinart just now and the little window said "Not Ready" lol. Made me think of Justin.


----------



## gibor365

> the little window said "Not Ready" lol. Made me think of Justin.


 
I asked my daughter if she is ready..... She said "No" ... Automatically I said, "you are like Justin"


----------



## HaroldCrump

I didn't like the whole "Not ready" messaging by the CPC.
It has backfired to a large extent.
I personally don't care whether a leader is new to the role or a seasoned hand - in some ways, a fresh, outsider could be a welcome change.

To me, the issues lie with the Liberal fiscal plan, which is welfare-heavy, financed by tax-the-rich rhetoric and deficits.

I think the CPC would have done better to focus exclusively on the Liberal platform.


----------



## Userkare

HaroldCrump said:


> I didn't like the whole "Not ready" messaging by the CPC.
> It has backfired to a large extent.
> I personally don't care whether a leader is new to the role or a seasoned hand - in some ways, a fresh, outsider could be a welcome change.
> 
> To me, the issues lie with the Liberal fiscal plan, which is welfare-heavy, financed by tax-the-rich rhetoric and deficits.
> 
> I think the CPC would have done better to focus exclusively on the Liberal platform.


Trudeau has been in Parliament about 7 years now, so the "Not Ready" message by the CPC might have been overplayed and backfired.

But... During the tough economic times that we just passed through, or are still passing through, I would prefer a leader with a background in economics; not so much to make all the decisions, but to at least understand the principles at play. A "fresh, outsider" sounds good, and can probably work some of the time, but I fear Mr Trudeau has too many ties to the old guard of his father's days. Just look who he dug up to endorse him! How heavily will he depend on that advice if he's in the PM seat? 

I personally dislike when people are propelled forward, not by their own merit, but by an association with their lineage. Greatness is not genetic! As soon as Mr Trudeau won his first Parliamentary seat, he was cast as a future PM. Why? Was he any more qualified than any of the other rookie MPs that started with him, or might his last name be more marketable?


Born into privilege, and advanced by birthright, he now champions the cause of the middle class. God save us from our savior.


----------



## OnlyMyOpinion

Userkare said:


> I personally dislike when people are propelled forward, not by their own merit, but by an association with their lineage. Greatness is not genetic! As soon as Mr Trudeau won his first Parliamentary seat, he was cast as a future PM. Why? Was he any more qualified than any of the other rookie MPs that started with him, or might his last name be more marketable?
> *Born into privilege, and advanced by birthright, he now champions the cause of the middle class.* God save us from our savior.


^+1 Brilliant


----------



## andrewf

So what about the leg-up children of well-off families receive in various ways as compared to the children of less well-off parents? 

I think Trudeau was helped by his name to get into politics and gain the leadership. However, it is a tough sell to say that people are voting for him today because he is PET's son.


----------



## agent99

andrewf said:


> I think Trudeau was helped by his name to get into politics and gain the leadership. However, it is a tough sell to say that people are voting for him today because he is PET's son.


Liberals have not had much luck finding a leader that connects with the people since the days of Chretien/Martin. Trudeau's name no doubt helped him initially, but he has been party leader for over two years now and has had to prove himself. 

After a few missteps early on as leader, he seems like he is doing quite well in current campaign. I like to think of him as a potentially effective team leader rather that a one-man show. I think he will do well in that role.


----------



## sags

Let's not get ahead of ourselves yet.

The polls indicate Trudeau will win a minority and has a shot at a majority..........but until people mark their ballots anything is possible.

How many people thought the Blue Jays would bounce back and win 3 games in a row ?


----------



## agent99

sags said:


> Let's not get ahead of ourselves yet.
> 
> The polls indicate Trudeau will win a minority and has a shot at a majority..........but until people mark their ballots anything is possible.
> 
> How many people thought the Blue Jays would bounce back and win 3 games in a row ?


You are right. Difference may be that going into playoffs, we* expected* the Jays to win! 6 weeks ago, even die-hard Liberals probably didn't think they would be leading in the polls this close to election day. 

What will happen will happen. 

Regardless of who wins, I would just like to see Canada regain some of the International respect that we once enjoyed. This is an article published in January this year espousing the same feelings.


----------



## Userkare

andrewf said:


> So what about the leg-up children of well-off families receive in various ways as compared to the children of less well-off parents?


I didn't say that. I have no problem with respect to children of well-off parents. Trudeau is not filthy rich; his inheritance is worth ~$1.2M now. I think he led a somewhat normal life as his chosen professions go; but I suspect that in the back of his mind he realized that his name would always open doors wide that most other people would have to do extraordinary things just to get a foot in.



> I think Trudeau was helped by his name to get into politics and gain the leadership.


That's all that I said. He supplemented his inheritance income by public speaking - at which he earned from about $300K to $450K annually. What snowboard instructor, doorman, or teacher would be paid that kind of money just to speak? The Trudeau name moved him to the head of the line.



> However, it is a tough sell to say that people are voting for him today because he is PET's son.


Your previous statement negates this one. What choice to Liberal voters have? He's the leader of the Liberal party - helped there by his parentage. Ipso facto they're voting for him b/c he's PET's son.


----------



## GoldStone

agent99 said:


> Regardless of who wins, I would just like to see Canada regain some of the International respect that we once enjoyed.


LOL. How can we regain something that we haven't lost?

*Canada's reputation takes top spot in international survey - CBC News*

"For the fourth time in six years, Canada has come out on top in a survey that tries to determine which country has the best reputation"


----------



## GoldStone

> "For the fourth time in six years, Canada has come out on top in a survey that tries to determine which country has the best reputation"


How is it possible with Harper at the helm?? Stupid foreigners. :biggrin:


----------



## andrewf

GoldStone said:


> LOL. How can we regain something that we haven't lost?
> 
> *Canada's reputation takes top spot in international survey - CBC News*
> 
> "For the fourth time in six years, Canada has come out on top in a survey that tries to determine which country has the best reputation"


This the general country's reputation among average people, I think what agent99 was referring to is the country's diplomatic reputation and influence.


----------



## GoldStone

andrewf said:


> This the general country's reputation among average people, I think what agent99 was referring to is the country's diplomatic reputation and influence.


He said international respect. I don't know how you infer diplomatic reputation and influence from that.

But even if you are right, agent99 has to prove that we lost diplomatic reputation and influence that we once enjoyed. This is a highly subjective thing.


----------



## Userkare

agent99 said:


> This is an article published in January this year espousing the same feelings.
> 
> [/URL]


I have to laugh at how that article states that "we lost our seat on the UN Security Council" b/c of Harper's policies - as if we were kicked out. How ignorant! We are not a permanent member of that council. There are only 5 permanent members, each of whom possesses enough nuclear weapons to annihilate the planet. I think that's the requirement to become a permanent member - do we want Canada to join *that* club? The 10 remaining members are chosen for 2 year terms, and the positions are rotated. So we didn't get selected this time around; big deal.

The rest of that article pretty much talks about how wearing a Canadian flag pin got attention while traveling. Maybe it was true while that maple leaf flag was a rarity outside of Canada; now that it's more commonplace, perhaps people in other countries aren't as curious.


----------



## andrewf

^Canada failed to secure one of the rotating seats on the security council.


----------



## GoldStone

andrewf said:


> ^Canada failed to secure one of the rotating seats on the security council.


Who cares? UN is a mikey mouse organization. Saudi Arabia is the chair of the UN Human Rights Council. Nuff said.


----------



## andrewf

Right.... UN is not perfect, but it is not irrelevant. It is one of the ways a middle power country like Canada can exert influence.


----------



## gibor365

andrewf said:


> ^Canada failed to secure one of the rotating seats on the security council.


Yeah, because once in lifetime Canada supported Israel , so Muslim-world of UN "punished" Canada .



> It is one of the ways a middle power country like Canada can exert influence.


 and to betray friends because some fictionable "influence"?! 

I'm actually was proud of Canada .... Sacrifice BS security council, but not to "sell" Israel. Bravo Harper!


----------



## andrewf

I understand where you are coming from, gibor, but Harper is PM of Canada, not PM of Israel, and his job is to be looking out for Canada's interests. And Canada lost support of traditional European allies, not just Arab countries.

Canada's 'support' for Israel is just political posturing for home, since no one cares what Canada's position is, including me. I would rather Canada steered clear of Israel/Palestine as an issue and left it to countries with political capital to burn on an interminable problem.


----------



## GoldStone

^ You are speaking of the both sides of your mouth.

On one hand, you say that no one cares what Canada's position on Israel is. On the other hand, you claim that having a rotating seat on the security council is very important to exert Canada's influence. Both statements can't be true at the same time. We either have influence, or we don't. I think it's the latter.

Rotating seat is a petty issue. People who obsess about it are engaged in - ahem - political posturing at home.


----------



## 1980z28

https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=...271175&usg=AFQjCNGkI8TWaY9JAeCJ1uCeyXjWq96qng


----------



## HaroldCrump

Userkare said:


> But... During the tough economic times that we just passed through, or are still passing through, I would prefer a leader with a background in economics; not so much to make all the decisions, but to at least understand the principles at play.


Yeah, I agree completely.
All I am saying is that the CPC miscalculated the whole "just not ready" messaging.
IMHO, they should have focused on attacking his welfare & tax heavy platform, not his (real or perceived) inexperience/youth.


----------



## andrewf

Losing the UN seat is not the issue per se, but a symptom of Canada's reduced influence.


----------



## HaroldCrump

The solution being proposed so far to that "problem" is to "buy" influence i.e. allow in more refugees, significantly increase foreign aid, etc.
Exactly like buying domestic votes with more welfare, subsidized day care, etc.


----------



## kcowan

agent99 said:


> effective team leader rather that a one-man show.


THAT is what we desperately need!



sags said:


> How many people thought the Blue Jays would bounce back and win 3 games in a row?


Yes we need to anticipate the unexpected!


----------



## gibor365

HaroldCrump said:


> The solution being proposed so far to that "problem" is to "buy" influence i.e. allow in more refugees, significantly increase foreign aid, etc.
> Exactly like buying domestic votes with more welfare, subsidized day care, etc.


Very true!



> Losing the UN seat is not the issue per se, but a symptom of Canada's reduced influence.


 Do we really need this influence?! Switzerland doesn't have it, and they're fine with it 



> And Canada lost support of traditional European allies, not just Arab countries.


 I didn't notice it (European allies).



> I would rather Canada steered clear of Israel/Palestine as an issue


 I'm OK with it, but Liberals always were taking anti-Israel stance. probably in order to buy Arab's votes


----------



## agent99

gibor said:


> I'm OK with it, but Liberals always were taking anti-Israel stance. probably in order to buy Arab's votes


Attempting to support both sides of the conflict doesn't mean Liberals were anti-Israel. 

Outsiders should stay clear of siding with one side or another in these regional conflicts. It can only lead to bigger problems as we are now starting to see in Syria.


----------



## fatcat

agent99 said:


> Attempting to support both sides of the conflict doesn't mean Liberals were anti-Israel.
> 
> Outsiders should stay clear of siding with one side or another in these regional conflicts. It can only lead to bigger problems as we are now starting to see in Syria.


tell that to the postal workers union and their cupe brothers who insist on going well behind job safety and overtime pay and need to publicy announce their thinly disguised hostility to the state of israel

wtf should public sector union take positions on this issue which has nothing to with labor issues ?

f### them


----------



## agent99

kcowan said:


> THAT is what we desperately need!


One think that parties don't seem to do at election time, is lets us know who will be their core team. It is all about the leader. Maybe I am wrong. If this information exists, please advise. Even if party has little depth in capable candidates for ministerial positions, a party could win regardless, if leader is good at electioneering and we are not informed of just who the team will be. 

Potential ministers will of course have to first win their ridings, but knowing who the party has in mind for key positions ahead of time would be of interest.


----------



## HaroldCrump

fatcat said:


> wtf should public sector union take positions on this issue which has nothing to with labor issues ?


This is the _pension fund socialism _issue i.e. public sector union pension funds with massive amounts of capital to deploy are in a position to exercise a lot of influence on global corporations, governments, and dictate socio-economic policy.
This is completely the opposite of shareholder democracy ideals espoused by free market Libertarians like Margaret Thatcher.
Public sector unions, via their pension funds, are interfering and dictating govt. policy on climate change, geo-politics, tax policy, and many other socio-economic issues.


----------



## gibor365

> Attempting to support both sides of the conflict doesn't mean Liberals were anti-Israel.


 Part that supporting Israel during Liberals was something like " you are ###, *** and &&&&, but we think you are allowed to exist" :biggrin:

In 2002 I got fired from 50% government owned company after 3 months because "In last 5 years I lived in one of the listed countries", HR even gave me copy of this laetter from screening department in Ottawa... When I went to complain to Bnei Brit who did inquiry, they gave this "list of countries"... There only 5 or 6 : North Korea, Afganistan, Iran, Iraq and .... Israel! So, please don't give me a sh^^ that Liberals supported both sides


----------



## humble_pie

agent99 said:


> One think that parties don't seem to do at election time, is lets us know who will be their core team. It is all about the leader. Maybe I am wrong. If this information exists, please advise. Even if party has little depth in capable candidates for ministerial positions, a party could win regardless, if leader is good at electioneering and we are not informed of just who the team will be.
> 
> Potential ministers will of course have to first win their ridings, but knowing who the party has in mind for key positions ahead of time would be of interest.




every party has "shadow critics" for each cabinet position identified on its website, so it's easy to see who will form the cabinet if said party were elected.

i'm interested in foreign policy so i've noticed that trudeau, for one candidate, has assembled a heavyweight team of advisors headed up by Marc Garneau & recently retired lt-gen Andrew Leslie. 

this article treats the liberal party foreign policy think tank. If you scan through the list of former ambassadors, lawyers, business persons & an ex-fighter pilot, you'll notice a tilt towards increasing a global peacekeeping role while lowering costs. 

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...-to-advise-on-foreign-policy/article22107500/


----------



## andrewf

gibor, is that around the time Israel got caught using Canadian passports for their spies?


----------



## gibor365

andrewf said:


> gibor, is that around the time Israel got caught using Canadian passports for their spies?


No, it was much later . _In 1997, two Mossad agents were caught with phoney Canadian passports after a bungled assassination attempt of a Hamas leader in Jordan. _ 
I was living in Canada more than 3 years already and had citizenship ... also it wasn't some security job, it was Edulinx (loans for students).....
Another interesting fact, even though Iraq was also on this list, Iraqi girl with whom I worked -> continued working.....
P.S. Andrew, to be clear, do you imply that everyone who lived some time in Israel should be held responsible for actions of Mossad 5 years earlier?! Same way like everyone who lived in US should be responsible for CIA actions?!
In this case Bill C51 is a complete joke


----------



## andrewf

Depending on the nature of the work, I don't necessarily blame the government for excluding certain foreign-born workers. If you feel you were unfairly discriminated against, you should have pursued legal remedies.


----------



## agent99

humble_pie said:


> every party has "shadow critics" for each cabinet position identified on its website, so it's easy to see who will form the cabinet if said party were elected.


I must be looking in the wrong places. Conservative site had the previous cabinet, some of whom are no longer running. Liberal site had nothing. I realize that opposition parties appoint shadow critics, but I could not find a list for each party of who they expect to either be in the cabinet or shadow cabinets after current election. If you have links, it would help. Thanks


----------



## andrewf

LPC:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Party_Shadow_Cabinet_of_the_41st_Parliament_of_Canada

NDP:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Official_Opposition_Shadow_Cabinet_(Canada)

No guarantee that these will be the ministers in a new government. LPC, in particular, was limited to a small caucus in the last parliament. If they elect 100 new MPs, surely some of them will be members of cabinet.


----------



## humble_pie

wikipedia lists look out of date. Liberal irwin cotler is stepping down, obviously general leslie would be fitted into any new liberal cabinet, it's not a stretch to guess that aboriginal BC lawyer jody wilson raybould could join as well, if she's elected ...

how many times has post-election news on cabinet selection carried big surprises! it seems to be de rigeur that parties make no commitments during an election campaign.

even when an incumbent party retains power - which doesn't look likely at the moment - we citizens normally expect a cabinet shakeup after an election, do we not.


----------



## agent99

humble_pie said:


> ..
> 
> how many times has post-election news on cabinet selection carried big surprises! it seems to be de rigeur that parties make no commitments during an election campaign.
> 
> even when an incumbent party retains power - which doesn't look likely at the moment - we citizens normally expect a cabinet shakeup after an election, do we not.


I know it's wishful thinking, but I would like to vote for a TEAM with capability of running country, not an individual. At election time, each party leader should put forward a slate of potential cabinet ministers as his team. At least for key posts like Defence, Finance, Foreign Affairs etc. We could then judge if the party has sufficient depth of talent to govern. From the present emphasis on the 3 leaders, you would think we were voting for a president, US style.


----------



## gibor365

andrewf said:


> Depending on the nature of the work, I don't necessarily blame the government for excluding certain foreign-born workers. If you feel you were unfairly discriminated against, you should have pursued legal remedies.


Nature of the work was kinda data entry  Very sensitive 
I talked to couple of lawyers, they said that they don't want to deal with government .... hence it's not important issue , not like niqab 
Bnai brith said that they gonna try to do something on government level via Canada - Israel Committee , but it gonna take several years ... Soon I found another job and just didn't have time to follow up , but "Je me souviens"


----------



## fatcat

HaroldCrump said:


> This is the _pension fund socialism _issue i.e. public sector union pension funds with massive amounts of capital to deploy are in a position to exercise a lot of influence on global corporations, governments, and dictate socio-economic policy.
> This is completely the opposite of shareholder democracy ideals espoused by free market Libertarians like Margaret Thatcher.
> Public sector unions, via their pension funds, are interfering and dictating govt. policy on climate change, geo-politics, tax policy, and many other socio-economic issues.


of course, and we get the Leap Manifesto which is the culminating wet-dream of the unholy alliance of the environmental left, the social justice warriors and the public sector unions ... these people scare the shite out of me ... 

you want people to run every aspect of your life ? ... put naomi klein in charge ... 

in fairness to labour harold, corporations have their baggage when it comes to trying to exert influence over tax policy, environmental policy and so on 

they are far from blameless ... 

at least they lack the sickening self-righteousness of the left, they just want to plainly make an extra buck


----------



## humble_pie

agent99 said:


> I know it's wishful thinking, but I would like to vote for a TEAM with capability of running country, not an individual. At election time, each party leader should put forward a slate of potential cabinet ministers as his team. At least for key posts like Defence, Finance, Foreign Affairs etc. We could then judge if the party has sufficient depth of talent to govern. From the present emphasis on the 3 leaders, you would think we were voting for a president, US style.




i know what you mean. But to a certain extent i think we as voters can piece together some or even a significant amount of the information ourselves. I do mean "piece" together, it's a homemade job.

i certainly get an impresson that trudeau would lead in council. There's been sniping against his alleged wealth & his late father's lingering influence, but i've never seen a vain or overly ambitious person, certainly never a megalomaniac one.

when i heard that andrew leslie had joined the liberals, i looked to see what would happen to marc garneau & to joyce murray, the liberal defence critic. It turned out that garneau & leslie have been stumping together for a long time, therefore i assume they'd both make it to cabinet in powerful positions. I'm not so sure about mme murray, it would be a situation to be stickhandled.

i'm imagining that if i looked at each & every prominent liberal politician i'd find a similar story. I also think the emphasis the liberals have given to their first nation candidates - none of whom are young, all of whom have experience in politics, NGOs or eduation - this emphasis is sending the message that, if elected, these MPs will be fast-tracked into positions of power.

as a matter of fact, what surprised & pleased me about the 2015 liberal aboriginal candidates is that so many had volunteered for the Grits. I mean, they didn't sign up with some radical first nations fight-****** party. Instead, they threw in their lot with a mainstream senior party, one that's been grinding away in the conventional middle ever since wilfrid laurier & confederation.


----------



## fatcat

andrewf said:


> gibor, is that around the time Israel got caught using Canadian passports for their spies?


oh come on andrew, everyone uses canadian passorts :hopelessness:

though, if i am to believe what i hear about how mr. harper has destroyed our good reputation overseas, perhaps this will change


----------



## HaroldCrump

fatcat said:


> oh come on andrew, everyone uses canadian passorts


And why not..it is pretty much a convenient get-out-of-jail-free card.

Got caught spying in a subversive foreign country - have the Canadian Prime Minister call the dictator and bail you out.
Stranded in a foreign country working in oil sector making big $$ - have the Canadian taxpayer fly you out in charter plane
Got sick sunbathing in the Mediterranean - come home to Canada's "free" health care

Who wouldn't want such a passport?


----------



## fraser

I think this comment referred to FORGED/non issued Canadian passports, not genuine ones.

Several years ago it was reported that the Israeli secret service used forged Canadian passports regularly. So did a number of other organizations-Gov't sponsored or otherwise.

Not certain why...ease of making them or ease of surreptitiously obtaining passport blanks from someone in the Passport office with access.


----------



## HaroldCrump

fraser said:


> Not certain why...ease of making them or ease of surreptitiously obtaining passport blanks from someone in the Passport office with access.


No, the reason is that the Canadian passport is one of the strongest for ease of international travel and access.
It is *rated # 5th as per the Passport Index*, behind the US, UK and Germany.

Look at Hollywood spy movies...the spies are often using Canadian passports...Bourne Identity, Mission Impossible, etc.


----------



## fatcat

fraser said:


> I think this comment referred to FORGED/non issued Canadian passports, not genuine ones.
> 
> Several years ago it was reported that the Israeli secret service used forged Canadian passports regularly. So did a number of other organizations-Gov't sponsored or otherwise.
> 
> Not certain why...ease of making them or ease of surreptitiously obtaining passport blanks from someone in the Passport office with access.


yes, and we are saying that all kinds of other countries forge canadian passports because canada is seen as a benign and mostly neutral and well behaved country and canadians are well liked and might get a pass from eagle-eyed border guards

until harper came on the scene and completely ruined our countries reputation in a single half-generation of power, now we are universally despised and pur passports will never be copied :cower::livid:


----------



## gibor365

> until harper came on the scene and completely ruined our countries reputation


Ruined where?! In muslim-world countries?! Who cares?!



> now we are universally despised and pur passports will never be copied


last thing I'd be worried about


----------



## fraser

A false Canadian passport is very easy to get. You simply have to visit a graveyard or look up some old obit notices and look for some infants or young children who have died.

Canada is country that records births, not deaths. Apart from the ease of getting blanks, it is very straightforward to get one under false pretences.


----------



## lost in space

Someone has way too much time on their hands

Election Ads

http://www.vice.com/en_ca/read/here...you-didnt-know-you-wanted?utm_source=vicefbca


----------



## jargey3000

oohhh......NOW I get it....he's waiting for the pre-game start of the U.S. national anthem.... "Ladies & gentlemen, please place your right hand over your heart..." etc.


----------



## Userkare

The Liberal Party of Canada.... It's all about choices. Where's the "NO" button?


----------



## lost in space

If FB is any indication to go by most of Trudeau’s support is coming from the under 40 crowd. I think the reason for this is two fold. One they’ve only known Harper as prime minister and like all long serving parties he’s grown long in the tooth, the electorate is getting restless. Secondly Trudeau connects much better with the millennials than Harper. I think Harper is seen as too old fashsion.


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## sags

It may be more broad spread than the under 40 crowd.

CARP (Canadian Association of Retired Persons), Raging Grannies and military veterans aren't too pleased with Harper either.

Older Canadians are often wiser Canadians, and aren't too old to remember past governments who accomplished more with less acrimony.

Canadians really don't like to fight with each other, and they don't want a government that encourages it.

They want a government that leads............so they can follow.


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## jargey3000

does it really matter who wins? Canada is such a tiny spec in the world-wide scheme of things....


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## fatcat

gibor said:


> Ruined where?! In muslim-world countries?! Who cares?!
> 
> last thing I'd be worried about


i was kidding gibor ... yet another excellent example of why to never use sarcasm on forums


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## gibor365

fatcat said:


> i was kidding gibor ... yet another excellent example of why to never use sarcasm on forums


just insert  next time


----------



## jargey3000

fatcat: " i was kidding gibor ... yet another excellent example of why to never use sarcasm on forums"
(I've also learned that the hard way!)


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## Jaberwock

Beware - A few years ago, our neighbours to the south elected a spoiled rich kid who had never had a real job, and whose dad had been the head honcho. The whole world is still paying for that mistake.


----------



## agent99

Jaberwock said:


> Beware - A few years ago, our neighbours to the south elected a spoiled rich kid who had never had a real job, and whose dad had been the head honcho. The whole world is still paying for that mistake.


I too though that the Trudeaus were rolling in money, but it seems as though Justin isn't really a rich kid. Not poor either, by any means, but his $1.2Million inheritance isn't that much these days. He did have a real job as a teacher and later as a successful public speaker. I am kind of impressed with what he has done in his life so far. Just hope his energy and work ethic rubs off on the rest of the governing party.

http://o.canada.com/news/justin-tru...-inheritance-and-successful-speaking-business


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## gibor365

> He did have a real job as a teacher and later as a successful public speaker.


 Not a big success considering that witout his "papa" I doubt he would be a successful public speaker


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## Rusty O'Toole

Out of the millions of potential candidates in Canada, hard to believe he is the smartest best qualified. Or that he would be in his present position if not for his family's name and money.

O well he's in charge now. No doubt already planning what presents to buy for himself and his friends, and how to charge them to your credit card.


----------



## gibor365

> Out of the millions of potential candidates in Canada, hard to believe he is the smartest best qualified. Or that he would be in his present position if not for his family's name and money.


 I doubt that anybody can seriously think that JT could've be PM if not his last name


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## GoldStone

agent99 said:


> He did have a real job as a teacher and later as a successful public speaker.


You call it "a successful public speaker". I call it "cashing in on his last name". He made $1.6 million, and he hid it in a holding company to avoid paying taxes.


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## mrPPincer

wow, maybe do a self-analysis as to why you specifically are still underestimating him..
There is no way in hell some monied daddies boy could pull off what he just did.

He got an inheritance yes but it wasn't that big.
He has a last name but that wasn't the determinating factor.

This is a case of grit and determination and heart and a positive vision, winning over years and years of taxpayer-funded attack ads & taxpayer-funded pro-harper-gov't ads.

Justin has access to plethora of highly intelligent and experienced minds that as of right now, I have faith that he will not bully, ignore, and throw under the bus as a certain other leader we all know of has done.


----------



## GoldStone

^ I don't underestimate him. I agree with the points you made.

My only quibble is, let's not pretend that he is a regular middle class guy like you and me. He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. This is just a statement of fact. I don't mean to diminish his accomplishment.


----------



## mrPPincer

Thanks Goldstone,
my post was not directed at you specifically, but as well, to Rusty and gibor, just seemed like there was some piling on happening & I may have got riled up a little


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## mrPPincer

(started responding to Rusty's post initially but I tend to type slow as i process my thoughts and correct spelling/syntax)


----------



## gibor365

> He got an inheritance yes but it wasn't that big.


 Yes , it was


> He has a last name but that wasn't the determinating factor.


 yes, it was... without it you wouldn't hear about this guy


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## andrewf

Rusty O'Toole said:


> Out of the millions of potential candidates in Canada, hard to believe he is the smartest best qualified. Or that he would be in his present position if not for his family's name and money.
> 
> O well he's in charge now. No doubt already planning what presents to buy for himself and his friends, and how to charge them to your credit card.


Nor was Harper. The trick is finding someone willing to eat the sh!t sandwich that is being a politician. Normal people run screaming in the other direction.


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## gibor365

Jaberwock said:


> Beware - A few years ago, our neighbours to the south elected a spoiled rich kid who had never had a real job, and whose dad had been the head honcho. The whole world is still paying for that mistake.


Not whole world, but our kids will be paying for it for sure


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## fatcat

andrewf said:


> Nor was Harper. The trick is finding someone willing to eat the sh!t sandwich that is being a politician. Normal people run screaming in the other direction.


it does take a weird combination of psychopathy and narcissism to want to be a political leader ... fortunately, some of these people also posses hearts and souls as well

i think trudeau ran the best campaign ... lets see how he leads which is another game altogther


----------



## gibor365

andrewf said:


> Nor was Harper. The trick is finding someone willing to eat the sh!t sandwich that is being a politician. Normal people run screaming in the other direction.


At least he didn't have so famous daddy


----------



## mrPPincer

gibor said:


> Yes , it was
> yes, it was... without it you wouldn't hear about this guy


Ok he inherited more than I might save in a lifetime (which ain't a lot at my rate)

as to the name, yes, ofc it helped, agreed maybe we wouldn't hear about this guy if he was born in different circumstances, but still, I stand by what i said earlier


> He has a last name but that wasn't the determinating factor.
> 
> *This is a case of grit and determination and heart and a positive vision, winning over years and years of taxpayer-funded attack ads & taxpayer-funded pro-harper-gov't ads*.


----------



## sags

One immediate change in government that will be noticeable, is a Justin Trudeau government won't be putting forth legislation that contravenes or challenges the Charter or Rights and Freedoms.

Justin Trudeau respects his father's legacy far too much to tolerate such legislation. No more acrimony with Supreme Court Justices, will be a refreshing change.

It will translate into more thoroughly examined legislation. There will be amendments to parts of the Bill C-51 Privacy Act, and much of the Conservative legislation agenda will simply never be re-introduced. Perhaps the Senate will be allowed to do it's job once again and their input will actually have some legislative weight.

There is going to be lots for the Liberal government to do, repealing, amending and introducing new legislation......but they are deep in experience and talent.

There could also be Supreme Court and Senate appointments to make that could change the direction of Canada for generations.

It is going to be an exciting time of change for Canadians.


----------



## agent99

mrPPincer said:


> wow, maybe do a self-analysis as to why you specifically are still underestimating him..
> There is no way in hell some monied daddies boy could pull off what he just did.
> 
> He got an inheritance yes but it wasn't that big.
> He has a last name but that wasn't the determinating factor.
> 
> This is a case of grit and determination and heart and a positive vision, winning over years and years of taxpayer-funded attack ads & taxpayer-funded pro-harper-gov't ads.
> 
> Justin has access to plethora of highly intelligent and experienced minds that as of right now, I have faith that he will not bully, ignore, and throw under the bus as a certain other leader we all know of has done.


Well said:biggrin: 

Maybe time for us all to move on and stop this partisan stuff. The Liberals won by a landslide and WILL form our new government. JT has just proven he is a great campaigner. Now give him a chance to be a great PM. Heaven knows, we need one.


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## GoldStone

On a lighter note:

Justin Trudeau: PILF


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## andrewf

Is this a matter of winning the tallest midget prize?

Last three being:


----------



## dogcom

I am sure the forum buddies are happy with the idea that the Federal government could run a deficit as high as 150 billion over the next 5 years. Of course we are happy because our debt to GDP ratio will still be good. I think this is all crap and we should be doing everything we can to bring down this deficit. I lived through the 70's, 80's and the 90's and remember all that same stupid GDP ratio talk and it didn't turn out so great then.

http://business.financialpost.com/n...billion-in-deficits-over-next-5-years-td-bank


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## sags

150 Billion spent in the next 5 years, to build infrastructure that will last for 50 years.

The cost amortized over 50 years is a paltry 3 Billion a year.


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## MyCatMittens

sags said:


> 150 Billion spent in the next 5 years, to build infrastructure that will last for 50 years.
> 
> The cost amortized over 50 years is a paltry 3 Billion a year.


Unfortunately that is the same rationale always used. At some point, it adds up.... Let's face it.. Governments are addicted to spending because the taxpayer always believes someone else will pay for it. Pretty hard (although not completely impossible) to get elected on a platform of cutting. Much easier to promise promise promise, under the guise of billing someone else.


----------



## MyCatMittens

Perhaps we should force governments (similar to Ontario's Hydro Bills) to put a "Debt reduction surcharge". "Your share this month is $100.00 - At this rate, it will take you approximately 4,350 months to pay off the debt." ... I sometimes wonder if this would encourage people to pay more attention at both election and budget times.


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## GoldStone

sags said:


> 150 Billion spent in the next 5 years, to build infrastructure that will last for 50 years.
> 
> The cost amortized over 50 years is a paltry 3 Billion a year.


"amortized" = weasel word meaning that children/grandchildren are supposed to pay the debt.

BTW, you forgot annual maintenance. More infrastructure = more annual operating costs = more government deficits = more debt.

BTW2, infrastructure doesn't last 50 years. Before "amortized" debts are paid, we will have to borrow more to rebuild the same stuff.


----------



## andrewf

Good thing our forebears thought that way and didn't bother building highways, bridges, schools, universities and hospitals with borrowed money.


----------



## sags

Most of the $150 Billion will wind it's way back to the government treasury, one way or the other, because almost all income and transactions in Canada are taxed.

If I am a worker constructing a bridge and earning $1000 a week in pay, I pay employment taxes and spend most of the rest at retailers and other taxable transactions.

Where the cycle breaks down is when people or businesses (see banks in 2008) hoard the stimulus capital and it doesn't enter the economy where it will flow back to the government.

Also, the costs associated with delaying infrastructure projects to the future means higher cost, unknown interest rates and more valuable dollars.

Delaying infrastructure and refusing to raise revenues to pay for infrastructure spending in order to artificially balance budgets leads to a great deficit in infrastructure future generations will have to deal with.

There is no free lunch. We pay now or somebody pays later..........either way.


----------



## Userkare

sags said:


> 150 Billion spent in the next 5 years, to build infrastructure that will last for 50 years.
> 
> The cost amortized over 50 years is a paltry 3 Billion a year.



Does that amortization include interest on a $150 B debt?

http://www.debtclock.ca/

Enjoy.... watch your grandchildren's future circle the bowl.


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## Woz

Only $25B of that $150B is due to infrastructure. $95B is due to decreased GDP growth. If lower GDP growth is indeed the new normal in Canada than this is a much bigger long term issue as it means we'll have a structural $19B annual deficit even before any increased spending. If it was just infrastructure spending it'd be easy to cut and get back to a balanced budget. With decreased GDP growth I don't see anyway to balance the budget without tax increases.

Even though I like the reduced EI premiums, I think given the circumstances they should've held off with the EI premiums cut and reforming EI. No point in giving what is essentially a tax cut if they'll be forced to raise taxes later.


----------



## sags

When we owned a home, my wife's pay was designated to pay the mortgage.

In the first years it required 80% of her pay to make the payment. As the years went and her wages slowly increased, the % of her pay required to pay the mortgage payment fell every year.

The same holds true for infrastructure spending. The % cost of financing the $150 Billion as part of the overall budget will decline over time.

The % of debt to GDP is a more accurate measurement than the raw numbers, and it shows Canada is in an enviable position among countries to spend now for the future.


----------



## sags

Userkare said:


> Does that amortization include interest on a $150 B debt?
> 
> http://www.debtclock.ca/
> 
> Enjoy.... watch your grandchildren's future circle the bowl.


Will there be a better time for the government to lock in long term interest rates than today's record level low rates ?


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## GoldStone

sags said:


> The % of debt to GDP is a more accurate measurement than the raw numbers, and it shows Canada is in an enviable position among countries to spend now for the future.


Not if you include provincial debt.


----------



## sags

Woz said:


> Only $25B of that $150B is due to infrastructure. $95B is due to decreased GDP growth. If lower GDP growth is indeed the new normal in Canada than this is a much bigger long term issue as it means we'll have a structural $19B annual deficit even before any increased spending. If it was just infrastructure spending it'd be easy to cut and get back to a balanced budget. With decreased GDP growth I don't see anyway to balance the budget without tax increases.
> 
> Even though I like the reduced EI premiums, I think given the circumstances they should've held off with the EI premiums cut and reforming EI. No point in giving what is essentially a tax cut if they'll be forced to raise taxes later.


I agree that tax cuts and deficit spending are not the best plan. Canada is projected to have low GDP growth in the near future, but it will grow at a slow pace as the population increases and business expands to meet the demand.

The good news is that a 1% increase..............from 1% to 2% has a huge impact on government revenues, so hopefully a slight increase over time will provide more revenue to the government.

If not....and the world comes completely unglued........I think we will have lots to worry about.


----------



## The_Tosser

Economic geniuses at work, deficit-burning wood and wasting time, rofl.

Hey geniuses, explain to me how you get your money in your pocket, your pensions, your TFSA's your RRSP's?

I don't believe for a second you fools will ever figure it out so let me just once again point it out.

The Fed Gov of Canada does not need revenue to 'spend'. - at least as far as you can understand it until we get you out of the IQ ditch.

The Fed Gov is not 'borrowing' anything when they 'deficit' spend. What they are doing, exactly, is putting reserves into the system so you, your neighbor, your province and your town are ABLE to spend and/or save anything. Without Federal 'deficit' spending everyone would have ****, in no time. That means you, your neighbor, your province and your town. Think about it you clowns!

Can you guys not do basic math to run a balance sheet and also understand what sovereign money is?

How tough is this concept?



> watch your grandchildren's future circle the bowl.


 WRONG.


> There is no free lunch. We pay now or somebody pays later..........either way.


 WRONG. The 'free lunch' is called sovereign money - at least as far as you can understand it until we get you out of the IQ ditch.



> Delaying infrastructure and refusing to raise revenues to pay for infrastructure spending in order to artificially balance budgets leads to a great deficit in infrastructure future generations will have to deal with.


 WRONG again, and again and again.



> Will there be a better time for the government to lock in long term interest rates than today's record level low rates ?


 They set the rates first of all, secondly they have no issues 'paying' whatever they need to anyway, at any rate. It adds reserves to the system - at least as far as you can understand it until we get you out of the IQ ditch.


> I think this is all crap and we should be doing everything we can to bring down this deficit.


 Yep, WRONG again. If you want to see a country implode needlessly in no time, just have the sovereign issuer STOP doing it in all forms, rofl. Goddamn math and sovereign money must be tougher than it used to be, rofl.



> Unfortunately that is the same rationale always used. At some point, it adds up.... Let's face it.. Governments are addicted to spending because the taxpayer always believes someone else will pay for it..


 WRONG. Let me say it again. The Fed Gov is not 'borrowing' anything when they 'deficit' spend. What they are doing, exactly, is putting reserves into the system so you, your neighbor, your province and your town are ABLE to spend and/or save anything. Without Federal 'deficit' spending everyone would have ****, in no time. That means you, your neighbor, your province and your town. No sales, No jobs, No provincial services, no-nothin'.

Look, i don't mind a little misunderstanding of some things here or there, but you people are like 2 year olds explaining how marathons are run. You have absolutely no clue. Like zero. 

Pathetic, and i get who you fools vote for! rofl. Where's the justice in that? lol Idiots for voters, idiots for politicians - oh yes, most of them have no clue how a sovereign money system works either! lmao.

Education sure ain't what it never used to be.... lmao. It's time to get your own heads out of your *** if you expect to have more intelligent leaders and conversations that don't look to me exactly like Lonewolf's rofl.

EDIT: Look, the fed gov is the currency issuer, they don't need to borrow what they can freely issue. "Interest" is reserves added to the system, they want to give it to you most of the time. It's 'free' - at least as far as you can understand it until we get you all out of the IQ ditch.


----------



## olivaw

I doubt that the Conservatives or the NDP would have been able to deliver a balanced budget in the current economy.



The_Tosser said:


> EDIT: Look, the fed gov is the currency issuer, they don't need to borrow what they can freely issue. "Interest" is reserves added to the system, they want to give it to you most of the time. It's 'free' - at least as far as you can understand it until we get you all out of the IQ ditch.


 If the Bank of Canada were to throw open the flood gates and issue CAD without underlying economic activity or debt the Canadian dollar would lose its status as a reserve currency.


----------



## The_Tosser

olivaw said:


> I doubt that the Conservatives or the NDP would have been able to deliver a balanced budget in the current economy.
> 
> If the Bank of Canada were to throw open the flood gates and issue CAD without underlying economic activity or debt the Canadian dollar would lose its status as a reserve currency.


You have no idea what you're talking about. File in with the rest of them. 

Your first sentence was all that was needed to tell me what i already knew anyway, lol. Who said anything about no economic activity anyway? btw if you get no 'deficit spending' you get no economic activity real quick. It's called tightening and puts a serious halt on activity. That's why there's no way we don't 'spend' here. - at least as far as you can understand it until we get you all out of the IQ ditch. 

Sorry, back to school for you - no wait, they don't teach it there either so that will be of no help.

Here's another helper then, until our education system gets up to some level that doesn't resemble a Lonewolf Elliot wave conversation.

The Sovereign Federal issuer of a currency is not a user of the currency. They do not have the constraints that users of a currency do, IE balancing a fed budget is a no-no - at least as far as you can understand it until we get you all out of the IQ ditch.


----------



## The_Tosser

Here.

I don't care how you want to look at Federal spending, it all amounts to the same thing. I'll use the US numbers because they are the big dogs.

I'm also dumbing this down enough for people to get the basic idea. If i over-simplify it's not because i don't know it, it's because others do not know it. If i am overly simplifying I'll let you know by telling you that this is all you need to know until you can get your heads around the very basic concept of Sovereign issuers of their own currency.

https://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/FYFSGDA188S

So let's look @ Debt-GDP. Note 1940 So much for a government needing revenue huh? 25 time higher debt-gdp than we have now. Did the USA go bankrupt? The grey lines are recessions - please note what preceded every recession - yes, less 'deficit spending'. Now maybe you want to inject less reserves into a system to cool it down (and yes foreign trade is either a benefit or a drag on top), but inject too little and see what happens?... and you people are asking for this right here and now? lol - Lonewolf bring your Ouija board back out, we need some help here rofl.


Here is straight $ spent. Slide away from current times to detail in 80 years ago so you can see what's lost given the last decade of USD deficit spending.

https://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/FYFSD

Notice spending was getting cut way back in the US over the past few years. That's OK, but too much cutting and we head into the ditch again. They are going to spend more in 2016 than they did in 2015. I mentioned this in my thread a week ago where i also said it was certainly not a bearish indicator. 

http://canadianmoneyforum.com/showt...ture-Spreads?p=1031762&viewfull=1#post1031762

February's numbers are due out in a week or so, for US spending.

Back in 2006 USA had a 'debt' of somewhere around $6T. Back then everyone was going nuts and losing their ****. USA is going broke - it's been said for ages. Ya well it's 10 years later and it's up to $18T and headed > $19T by end of 2016.

At what point are people going to realize their nonsense is just that? How big does it have to get before America goes broke? Tell me now, so when we hit it and it doesn't happen you'll be out of excuses and we can finally put this to bed. 

Canada is the same thing. Tell me when we can't 'handle any more debt' as a Sovereign nation, lol What's the magic number?

"Debt Ceilings" "Sovereign Debt downgrades"? rofl give me a break.

Why is Europe in the shitter? Yeah that's what happens with austerity. Need i bother to give you more evidence? Europe just spent a decade giving themselves a blood transfusion. Right arm to left arm, wtf it's not working? :stupid: rofl. The Euro countries have given up their right to 'print' their own currency - they are not Sovereign issuers, they are users of the Euro. Bad idea, as you shouldn't need me to tell you.


----------



## olivaw

Notwithstanding The_Tosser's hypothesis, I believe that government debt is a real thing. The budget crisis in the 90s was real. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-crisis-timeline-idUSTRE7AK0FF20111121

If we don't increase the debt to GDP ratio then we aren't mortgaging our grandkids future. As Sags (and others) have said, this is as good a time as any to run a deficit. The economy is stagnant, interest rates are low and we have something of an infrastructure deficit. My own preference would be to invest in hard infrastructure.


----------



## agent99

olivaw said:


> My own preference would be to invest in hard infrastructure.


Mine too! That is why I added to my Russel Metals - It did very wel for me during the last phase of infrastructure spending. Thing an engineering stock like Aeco might also do well. But need to be patient - could be a while before performance shows up.


----------



## peterk

^ +2

It's pretty hard to argue against spending on hard infrastructure. Roads, dams, rails, sewers, water treatment plants, hospitals, schools, parks (arguable). This is the good stuff that tax money should be funding.

Is Trudeau proposing more of this? That would be swell in my books. I have no idea what he's spending money on because all I see in the newspapers is crap about carbon, refugees, pipelines, Quebec, and reassurances that "Canada is back". Why can't I open a newspaper and easily find out what my government is spending my money on, and its detailed (not just headline rhetoric "because it's 2015") plan for the future?

I am hopefully optimistic for the Liberals. Not from any evidence I've seen yet, but from a mindset that if we express the desire to hold our leaders to a high standard of good and thoughtful governance, they might just rise to the occasion. If we denigrate them at every chance we get and call them foolish/stupid, they'll probably sink to that level of expectation...


----------



## sags

The budget is coming and we will know more precisely where the money is allocated.

As in another thread, there are great problems in Alberta and we can spend some of that money paying people to clean up the environment (something that has been ignored until now) of abandoned oil wells etc.

Other "good" spending is offering help moving people to Ontario where there are some jobs, spending money on retraining for jobs where there are labor shortages etc.

How we spend this time of trouble.........while we await the inevitable rebound in oil prices, can either be an anchor or an opportunity to do some "catch up" on other things.

I don't believe this is the time to abandon fellow Canadians and tell them........"sorry, you are on your own. We have to balance the budget now."


----------



## peterk

sags said:


> As in another thread, there are great problems in Alberta and we can spend some of that money paying people to clean up the environment (something that has been ignored until now) of abandoned oil wells etc.


Yup, great idea in my opinion. Acute and tangible environmental degradation, and measurable contamination and pollutions issues is a great place for the government to focus its energy and money to help our planet and environment. Climate change, harmless carbon emissions, and global temperature targets... not so much.


----------



## sags

Recently in the news, the government is going ahead with doctor assisted end of life legislation. A majority of Canadians support the change.

On the same topic is that Catholic hospitals and other hospitals are opposed to implementing any such legislation.

The clash of rights is inevitable, and instead of going to court trying to trample one right while enforcing another.......maybe we could expand funding to hospices that would support the legislation so they can renovate to provide the needed spaces.

We know it is coming and we can plan and prepare for it properly, without a clash of rights. It just costs some money to do so.


----------



## sags

One doesn't have to look very far to see all kinds of opportunities to clean up the environment, while providing meaningful employment for people.

The dumping of raw sewage in the St. Lawrence by Montreal................what is that about ? Build a bigger treatment plant for goodness sakes.

A blob of unknown substance discovered in Lake Erie ? Beaches closed down each summer due to pollution ? Ewwwww.............We can do better.

We have the Thames River flowing through our city and my dad used to swim in it as a kid. They had an awesome swimming hole with a tire and rope swing out into the lake.

Today I get "itchy" just looking at the river.

We could employ people for years and not get everything done.


----------



## tygrus

Spending on infrastructure doesn't lead to renewed economic growth, its a place holder until the real economy can take over again just like QE. Sure some people will get work and spend it into the economy but tell me how fixing the sewer system of some dying town leads to renewed long term prosperity?

I think it might be better spent luring 1000 companies to set up shop permanently in Canada and create an investment bond to do it so people can buy into it.

Its probably even a better idea to give everyone in the country a $5000 gift card to spend.


----------



## peterk

sags said:


> One doesn't have to look very far to see all kinds of opportunities to clean up the environment, while providing meaningful employment for people.
> ...
> We could employ people for years and not get everything done.


Nah, too practical, sounds like real work!

The government prefers to hire and pay salaries to university and college graduates who took "public policy writing" to write and review studies nobody cares about and make very important spreadsheets...


----------



## peterk

tygrus said:


> Spending on infrastructure doesn't lead to renewed economic growth, its a place holder until the real economy can take over again just like QE. Sure some people will get work and spend it into the economy but tell me how fixing the sewer system of some dying town leads to renewed long term prosperity?
> 
> I think it might be better spent luring 1000 companies to set up shop permanently in Canada and create an investment bond to do it so people can buy into it.
> 
> Its probably even a better idea to give everyone in the country a $5000 gift card to spend.


Woa, I don't think so! Efficient access to markets, transportation routes, and essential services is a major hurdle to overcome for a business. Most business ideas wouldn't even begin to form in the mind's eye of a young entrepreneur if he had to buy an expensive 4x4 truck and spend 3 hours driving down a pot-hole riddled private gravel road (which cost $20/trip) just to get from Toronto to Hamilton. Or his business didn't have access to a reliable municipal sewer system, or firefighting services to save his factory in case of emergency, or you could only get water in certain areas of a city.

Having modern and ample infrastructure that doesn't suck and makes people's lives easy is a very fundamental core driver for an expanding and prosperous economy. It spurs creativity and discovery as the mind is freed up and grows to think of all the possibilities that access to this infrastructure could bring. It inspires an abundance mentality and positive hope for the future to see all the new wealth and growth happening around you.

It's one of the primary differences between a 1st world country and a 3rd world country...


----------



## bgc_fan

tygrus said:


> Spending on infrastructure doesn't lead to renewed economic growth, its a place holder until the real economy can take over again just like QE. Sure some people will get work and spend it into the economy but tell me how fixing the sewer system of some dying town leads to renewed long term prosperity?


Everything physical deteriorates over time. Eventually that sewer system will need to be replaced. You say why bother if it is a dying town? Let's put it this way, if we are trying to grow it, you are going to have trouble attracting business if there is no sewer system. Who would locate industry where the basic needs like the sewer system doesn't exist? Unless you plan on just packing up the town and shipping everyone off, that work has to be done. Not too mention what happens if you let the system go to rot. In Ottawa, a few years ago, a sinkhole developed on the 174 which caused closure of part of the road for days, not too mention the costs for a bandaid solution to a 50 year old sewer pipe. Preventative maintenance and anticipating failure is a lot better than just repairing things after the fact.

You can take a look at the report by C.D. Howe Institute regarding the costs of gridlock in the GTA. Approximately $7.5B-$11B is wasted due to gridlock. If we can provide the infrastructure to reduce that waste, I would say that would mean more money in the long run.



tygrus said:


> Its probably even a better idea to give everyone in the country a $5000 gift card to spend.


So, how did that go with the GST cuts? I don't see the prosperity coming out of that one. Or how about the Bush tax rebates in the early 2000s? Apparently they didn't help out that much.


----------



## dogcom

I have to agree spending on infrastructure or on things that are going to produce future productivity is fine. Otherwise I can't see how debt and money printing can be such a good thing. Of course I am not calling for European austerity which doesn't work.

You have to say we are the envy of the world because of how we stepped up after the 90's fiasco. To say we should go nuts spending and put us in danger of inflation and rising interest rates putting us in a not so good situation is nuts in my opinion.


----------



## sags

True enough Peterk.......My niece is a Walmart store manager and I asked her what her business degree did for her. Nothing but a foot in the door and power point presentations, she said.


----------



## sags

The TD bank report says there will be $150 Billion in deficit spending.

It will raise Canada's debt to GDP from 32% to 36%. The safe zone is below 60%, according to those who study such things.

It would be foolish to continue to deficit spend for decades, but I doubt that is the overall plan.

Canada is in an enviable position in the world, with the capacity to borrow for a few years without major problems.

If the plan has to change in a few years, we can do that as well.


----------



## tygrus

How about windmills and solar panels?


----------



## tygrus

peterk said:


> Woa, I don't think so! Efficient access to markets, transportation routes, and essential services is a major hurdle to overcome for a business. Most business ideas wouldn't even begin to form in the mind's eye of a young entrepreneur if he had to buy an expensive 4x4 truck and spend 3 hours driving down a pot-hole riddled private gravel road (which cost $20/trip) just to get from Toronto to Hamilton.


Just for clarification, most of canada major exports go out on rail and pipeline and container ship. The 'trucks" you are seeing driving around are delivering cheap chinese junk back to local walmarts.


----------



## tygrus

Canada may already be carbon neutral, so why are we keeping it a secret?


----------



## andrewf

tygrus said:


> Just for clarification, most of canada major exports go out on rail and pipeline and container ship. The 'trucks" you are seeing driving around are delivering cheap chinese junk back to local walmarts.


This is not a very accurate representation. Canada is part of an integrated North American supply chain, and many intermediate goods cross the border by truck. Think of the automotive industry.


----------



## andrewf

tygrus said:


> Canada may already be carbon neutral, so why are we keeping it a secret?


This is spin. To call Alberta bitumen carbon neutral because of some trees in Quebec is to stretch the meaning of the term. Those trees absorb CO2 whether or not the bitumen is produced.

I also question the analysis is done correctly. 



> The answer comes from the most recent report (2014) of the Global Carbon Project, which states that global human-induced CO2 emissions were 36 billion tonnes. Of that, 36 per cent stayed in the atmosphere, 27 per cent was absorbed by water, and 37 per cent was absorbed by land.
> 
> That’s right — absorbed by land! Not all CO2 emitted by people stays in the atmosphere. Much of it returns to the earth, mainly through the carbon absorption and sequestration power of plants, soil, and trees.


37% reabsorbed by land... how much of that 37% was released from non-fossil sources. There is a natural carbon cycle, of plant material breaking down/burning to create CO2, then being reabsorbed during Northern summer. I suspect that this cycle is being included in the overall figures, to obscure the impact of releasing fossilized carbon into the atmosphere.


----------



## tygrus

andrewf said:


> This is not a very accurate representation. Canada is part of an integrated North American supply chain, and many intermediate goods cross the border by truck. Think of the automotive industry.


Forgive my skepticism that making alternators in Oshawa and shipping them to mexico counts as an integrated supply chain. Its more like a low wage NAFTA scam.

All those parts and the final assembly used to be done right here creating thousands of jobs. We are still paying 30% more for a vehicle than the US so there is no reason all this couldn't be repatriated.

People are not going to buy anything no matter how cheap it is if there are no jobs. The economists are about to find that out big time.


----------



## gibor365

Trudeau has a very simple program. Undo everything that Harper did (include a lot of excellent Harper's programs, as UCCB, 10K TFSA, Income split etc) and that's it :stupid:
JT is just an idiot!


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## olivaw

Much of what Harper did needs undoing.


----------



## sags

David Dodge, former head of the BOC and Deputy Finance Minister, advocates for exactly what Justin Trudeau and Finance Minister Bill Morneau are planning for the budget.

_“I don’t think one should focus on whether we’re going to run a deficit of $20-billion or $30-billion, it’s not the size,” he said. “It’s what are we doing with that money to ensure growth down the line.”

Dodge said Finance Minister Bill Morneau should focus on long-life projects to boost economic productivity, which may not be shovel-ready when the spending plan is initially unveiled.

“Generally speaking, the projects that are really going to produce something over a period of time, in terms of productivity growth, actually take quite a while to build,” he said. “So it’s important to have a program that stretches over several years so that you can do the really important stuff rather than patching or repairing the old infrastructure.”
_
http://www.bnn.ca/News/2016/3/3/David-Dodge-Stimulus-targets-trump-deficit-size.aspx


----------



## fraser

I am very happy to see the Trudeau Government overturn some of the Harper Gov't legislation and policies. For a start it means about four less Supreme Court rulings against Harper legislation that was clearly in violation of our Charter.

Extremely pleased to see Trudeau do an about face on taking care of our injured vets and increasing services and funding for them. Very pleased that Trudeau is eliminating income splitting that had the vast majority of the benefit going to high income earners in favour of reducing the tax rate for all lower income folks.


----------



## humble_pie

i'm also impressed with the minister of defence. Bold new contributions to the anti-ISIL coalition that help, at the same time, to lead canada towards her role as a peacekeeper nation.


----------



## Userkare

humble_pie said:


> i'm also impressed with the minister of defence. Bold new contributions to the anti-ISIL coalition that help, at the same time, to lead canada towards her role as a peacekeeper nation.


I'm sure that if, God forbid, our soldiers are ever captured by ISIL because there was no air support available to protect them in our bold new role, ISIL will be very impressed that Canada is a "peacekeeper" and return them unharmed.


----------



## bgc_fan

Userkare said:


> I'm sure that if, God forbid, our soldiers are ever captured by ISIL because there was no air support available to protect them in our bold new role, ISIL will be very impressed that Canada is a "peacekeeper" and return them unharmed.


You realize that there is still air support in the area. The CF-18s that we pulled were only a portion of what is available and coordinated at a multi-national level. What that means is that coalition aircraft would provide support as needed by ongoing operations. You seem to think that the CF-18s were there solely to provide support to our forces.


----------



## Userkare

bgc_fan said:


> You realize that there is still air support in the area. The CF-18s that we pulled were only a portion of what is available and coordinated at a multi-national level. What that means is that coalition aircraft would provide support as needed by ongoing operations. You seem to think that the CF-18s were there solely to provide support to our forces.


Of course I know that air support is provided by a multi-national coalition. The last time our forces came under attack it was Canadian CF-18s that responded; that may just have been a coincidence. I have no insight into the tactical operations of the coalition air support; but I have to wonder if the occasion should arise that there's not enough aircraft to handle all the requirements at a given time - like a major ISIL offensive on several fronts, if priority would be given to the country's forces that pulled out its fighter jets.


----------



## bgc_fan

Userkare said:


> Of course I know that air support is provided by a multi-national coalition. The last time our forces came under attack it was Canadian CF-18s that responded; that may just have been a coincidence. I have no insight into the tactical operations of the coalition air support; but I have to wonder if the occasion should arise that there's not enough aircraft to handle all the requirements at a given time - like a major ISIL offensive on several fronts, if priority would be given to the country's forces that pulled out its fighter jets.


Last time could have been a coincidence. As for allocation of resources, unless you have a very petty commanding officer, they go to where the greatest need exists.

Regarding the ISIL attack, if you read the article you'll see that US, British and French aircraft were also involved.


----------



## fraser

What I like best about Trudeau? He is not an insecure, controlling one man band. Asa result he has attracted and assembled a highly competent team. Not a bunch of boot licking toadies who would not say boo to a goose without asking PMO permission. Could be one of the most qualified able Cabinets in the last 50 years.

Rather than putting duct tape over their mouthes and relying only on non elected PMO types Trudeau is letting these talented people run their own ministries. something that was unheard of for the last 10 years. Nice to eclectic people back in charge rather than smarmy unelected PMO staffer types. A very refreshing change.


----------



## bgc_fan

fraser said:


> What I like best about Trudeau? He is not an insecure, controlling one man band. Asa result he has attracted and assembled a highly competent team. Not a bunch of boot licking toadies who would not say boo to a goose without asking PMO permission. Could be one of the most qualified able Cabinets in the last 50 years.
> 
> Rather than putting duct tape over their mouthes and relying only on non elected PMO types Trudeau is letting these talented people run their own ministries. something that was unheard of for the last 10 years. Nice to eclectic people back in charge rather than smarmy unelected PMO staffer types. A very refreshing change.


I think that this was overlooked during the election. Everyone was concentrating on Trudeau without thinking of the fact that the Liberal team as a whole offered more competent people than the Conservatives under Harper. I think the current opposition party shows how effective it is without Harper being front and centre and the fact there was no succession plan in place.


----------



## fraser

Yes. I still tend to snicker when I hear Rona Ambrose speak. Where was she for the past ten years? Firmly muzzled with a double layer of duct tape. 

Only one Minister had the guts to speak rather than read that PMO created rubbish speech. That was the late Minister Flaherty. The rest were high paid lap dogs.


----------



## humble_pie

Userkare said:


> Of course I know that air support is provided by a multi-national coalition. The last time our forces came under attack it was Canadian CF-18s that responded; that may just have been a coincidence. I have no insight into the tactical operations of the coalition air support




folks are talking about the december/15 battle near mosul? as bgc_fan says, there was air support from the US & other nations. The support consisted of buzzing the field all night long. No bombs or other weapons were used from the air. It appears that the successful defence of the camps - no canadian mortalities, i believe only 2 or 3 kurds lost, more than 70 ISIL fighters killed - was due to the canadian special forces sharpshooters & the kurds they had trained on the ground.

now that the russians have added themselves to the anti-ISIL initiative, one could say that the entire iraq/syria region is currently lopsided & top-heavy with bombing aircraft.

we are told that the last canadian CF-18 that dropped ordnance was way back last july 2015. It appears that the canadians have been super-careful not to bomb civilians. We are told that the Hornets flew more than 5,000 sorties but only carried munitions on more than 2,000 of them. What was it costing canada to keep those planes in the field?

at the same time, the canadian soldiers posted to iraq are not ordinary soldiers. They are the super special forces, said to be recognized as among the world's best elite military units. Now canada is sending another 138 special soldiers to join the original 69, for a total of 207. One reads that the US has begun landing elite ground forces in iraq as well.

meanwhile, a big change in canadian military strategy seems to be underway. We lay civilians can only read about it here & there. What i did read, when Stephen Harper was prime minister, is that the change had commenced under the previous conservative government; the liberals are carrying on & optimizing the change in defence profile.

as we are given to understand, peacekeeping forces will be emphasized more, there will be a slight orientation away from attack weapons including fewer or no F-35 purchases. Here's a citation to articles that would have more information, if one cares to buy the magazine (ps that's canada's Harjit Sajjan on the cover.)

if cannot find the magazine or the $$, wait for ace military journo david pugliese to write about all these developments in the ottawa citizen.

this forum is also fortunate to be able to host member bgc_fan, who appears to be far better informed than most canadians. 

http://espritdecorps.ca/edec-online/pyr5lhaq748xxh4dxff2err9ddoztm


----------



## peterk

fraser said:


> Could be one of the most qualified able Cabinets in the last 50 years.





bgc_fan said:


> I think that this was overlooked during the election. Everyone was concentrating on Trudeau without thinking of the fact that the Liberal team as a whole offered more competent people than the Conservatives under Harper.


I would love to see what detailed information you guys have reviewed to come to such firm and bold conclusions. Obviously you must have read copies of each new cabinet member's and senior advisor's biographies and CVs, and already seen some pretty extensive and complete work coming from them in these short few months since quitting their day jobs...

And I'm sure you refreshed your memory of the credentials and accomplishments (or lack thereof) from previous Harper senior staff during the past 10 years to be reminded of their individual qualities, and perhaps even the past 50 years worth of cabinets as well...

I would not except that you would have come to this conclusion like most of my 20 something Facebook friends would have, by thinking: "That Harper sure was a control freak" "I remember that Tony Clement guy was a scheming, money wasting weasel" and "Look at this smiling, diverse, young, group of new people so full of energy who haven't done anything yet, they exude competence just from their appearance alone, though"...

I'm teasing, of course, but if you in fact have read any good quality, unbiased, and varying material that backs up what you're saying, I would be very interested in reading it myself. I want to give this JT guy a chance . Everything I've read to-date, in your standard front page articles in Canada's papers over the past 6 months, hasn't gone much past the Facebook analogy I've posted above...


----------



## GoldStone

fraser and bgc_fan: I am giving you a _trigger warning_. Don't read this post or your head may explode. 

CBC Neil Macdonald:

*Liberals sunny on the surface, much fudgier underneath*

Quote:

================

It's probably time to dispense with the notion that the Trudeau government is really much different from its predecessors.

Granted, it's done a good job of portraying itself as sunny, transparent, inclusive, optimistic, diverse, affectionate, decent and just fundamentally different.

It may even believe it is all those things.

But on matters of policy, and governance, it appears just as capable of blithely making promises it knows it can't keep, and then blithely breaking them.

It is capable of speaking out of both sides of its mouth — it can voice concern about the Saudi human rights record, then proceed with sending the Saudis billions more in military equipment.

*And pretty clearly, it is capable of running a tightly-controlled, centralized, non-transparent operation.*

Thin-skinned?

You don't need to speak to many of the people in the Trudeau government orbit, for example, to realize that he knew very well his economic agenda, and his promises, didn't square with national finances.

*(Some of those people have asked me not just to keep them anonymous, but to avoid using any phrasing that those closest to the prime minister might recognize. Those aides are apparently just as capable as the Harper crew was of punishing those perceived of disloyalty or dissent. Thin-skinned, one Liberal told me, does not begin to describe them.*

================


----------



## GoldStone

Liberal openness and transparency is on full display here 

*No vacancies for media at Liberals’ cabinet retreat | Toronto Star*

Quote:

========================

No room at the inn? Well, there’s room, but the welcome mat is not out.

The Liberals have block-booked a swish New Brunswick resort hotel for a cabinet retreat and dispatched reporters to two other places in town so Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his ministers can meet and mingle in private.

From Sunday to Tuesday Trudeau will meet with 30 cabinet members at St. Andrews-by-the-Sea, about an hour and a half from Saint John. Along with RCMP security staff and other aides in tow, they will occupy only about 70 of 233 rooms at the Algonquin Resort, a newly refurbished Marriott group hotel.

However, media are barred from booking any of the other vacant rooms at the request of the Privy Council Office, the Star has learned.

*It’s a strange move by a government that promised relations with reporters would be different from the restricted access and tight message control of the Conservative government of Stephen Harper.*

========================


----------



## humble_pie

GoldStone said:


> CBC Neil Macdonald:
> 
> *Liberals sunny on the surface, much fudgier underneath*
> 
> Quote:
> 
> ================
> 
> It's probably time to dispense with the notion that the Trudeau government is really much different from its predecessors.
> 
> Granted, it's done a good job of portraying itself as sunny, transparent, inclusive, optimistic, diverse, affectionate, decent and just fundamentally different.
> 
> It may even believe it is all those things.
> 
> But on matters of policy, and governance, it appears just as capable of blithely making promises it knows it can't keep, and then blithely breaking them.
> 
> It is capable of speaking out of both sides of its mouth — it can voice concern about the Saudi human rights record, then proceed with sending the Saudis billions more in military equipment.
> 
> *And pretty clearly, it is capable of running a tightly-controlled, centralized, non-transparent operation.*
> 
> Thin-skinned?
> 
> You don't need to speak to many of the people in the Trudeau government orbit, for example, to realize that he knew very well his economic agenda, and his promises, didn't square with national finances.
> 
> *(Some of those people have asked me not just to keep them anonymous, but to avoid using any phrasing that those closest to the prime minister might recognize. Those aides are apparently just as capable as the Harper crew was of punishing those perceived of disloyalty or dissent. Thin-skinned, one Liberal told me, does not begin to describe them.*
> 
> ================



my goodness. What has happened to Neil Macdonald in his old age? he's reduced to trading gossip with fearful liberal outsiders? the above reads like a tabloid


----------



## humble_pie

GoldStone said:


> Liberal openness and transparency is on full display here
> 
> *No vacancies for media at Liberals’ cabinet retreat | Toronto Star*
> 
> Quote:
> 
> ========================
> 
> No room at the inn? Well, there’s room, but the welcome mat is not out.
> 
> The Liberals have block-booked a swish New Brunswick resort hotel for a cabinet retreat and dispatched reporters to two other places in town so Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his ministers can meet and mingle in private.
> 
> From Sunday to Tuesday Trudeau will meet with 30 cabinet members at St. Andrews-by-the-Sea, about an hour and a half from Saint John. Along with RCMP security staff and other aides in tow, they will occupy only about 70 of 233 rooms at the Algonquin Resort, a newly refurbished Marriott group hotel.
> 
> However, media are barred from booking any of the other vacant rooms at the request of the Privy Council Office, the Star has learned.
> 
> *It’s a strange move by a government that promised relations with reporters would be different from the restricted access and tight message control of the Conservative government of Stephen Harper.*
> 
> ========================




the Algonquin is a lovely grande olde dame, have you been there?

of course the cabinet is entitled to 48 hours without being pestered by unruly scribes. We should ask m3s, though, if the AF is setting up another ring of mobile radar stations around venerable st-andrews-by-the-sea.

not to worry, the journos will have all possible stories by nightfall.


----------



## GoldStone

> of course the cabinet is entitled to 48 hours without being pestered by unruly scribes.


Yeah, but when Conservatives did the exact same thing, they were called all kind of unpleasant names. "Controlling", "secretive", "non-transparent", yada, yada, yada.

Maybe just maybe old Neil Macdonald is right?

_"It's probably time to dispense with the notion that the Trudeau government is really much different from its predecessors."_


----------



## andrewf

Grasping at straws, I think. There has been ample media availability. That doesn't mean that the government has to invite the media into cabinet meetings.


----------



## bgc_fan

peterk said:


> I would love to see what detailed information you guys have reviewed to come to such firm and bold conclusions. Obviously you must have read copies of each new cabinet member's and senior advisor's biographies and CVs, and already seen some pretty extensive and complete work coming from them in these short few months since quitting their day jobs...


Not really detailed, but I would say I am a victim of confirmation bias based on the choices for the Ministers of National Defence, Health, Finance, and Justice. But doing a quick Wikipedia look through we can take a quick summary of current minister backgrounds, who they replaced, and the shadow cabinet. I'll add the fact that I'm more interested in their background (education and job experience) previous to serving in the government as it relates to their position. I won't go through them all, but just a sample (you can argue it is biased, but feel free to do the exercise for those who I don't discuss). Info is from Wikipedia and their official Parliament of Canada profile.

Public Safety:
Ralph Goodale: Lawyer and career politician, aside from 5 years working for some insurance companies.
Steven Blarney: Worked in the engineering sector, including starting up some environmental companies.
Erin O'Toole: Lawyer and Air Navigator in RCAF.

Agriculture:
Lawrence MacAulay: Farmer
Gerry Ritz: Farmer
Chris Warkentin: Building contractor

Foreign Affairs:
Stephane Dion: Political Science Professor
Rob Nicholson: Lawyer
Tony Clement: Lawyer

Immigration:
John McCallum: Economist
Chris Alexander: Diplomat 
Michelle Rempel: (a little confusing) studied economics, listed as a university administrator on Wikipedia, but management consultant, Parliamentarian, research administrator on the parliament info site.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs:
Carolyn Bennett: Doctor
Bernard Valcourt: Lawyer
Cathy Mcleod: Nurse

President of Treasury Board:
Scott Brison: Businessman, Investment Banker
Tony Clement: Lawyer
Pierre Poilievre: Political staffer (his government site lists businessman, communication consultant, and policy analyst, but let's face it, the guy is a career politician with no real real world experience)

Finance:
Bill Morneau: CEO of Morneau-Shepell
Joe Oliver: Investment Banker
Lisa Raitt: Lawyer, Toronto Port Authority CEO

Justice:
Jody Wilson-Raybould: Lawyer, Regional chief of BC Assembly of First Nations
Peter McKay: Lawyer
Rob Nicholson: Lawyer

National Defence:
Harjit Sajjan: Police officer, Reservist LCol
Jason Kenney: CEO of Canadian Taxpayers Association
James Bezan: Farmer

Science:
Kirsty Duncan: Geographer
Ed Holder: Insurance benefits consultant, insurance broker, insurance executive
Marilyn Gladu: Suncor Director of Engineering, Chemical Engineer

Health:
Jane Philpott: Doctor
Rona Ambrose: Political Science
Kellie Leitch: Surgeon

International Trade:
Chrystia Freeland: Writer/Journalist, with some international studies
Ed Fast: Lawyer
Gerry Ritz: Farmer

So, maybe on the whole it is a toss-up. However, my biased view would still tend towards the current offerings.


----------



## bgc_fan

GoldStone said:


> fraser and bgc_fan: I am giving you a _trigger warning_. Don't read this post or your head may explode.
> 
> CBC Neil Macdonald:
> 
> *Liberals sunny on the surface, much fudgier underneath*


Not really, I had already seen that article. Though I am shocked that you would quote a CBC article. I thought CBC was a left-leaning organization and biased against the Conservatives. How dare they publish an article complaining about the Liberals. ;-) All kidding aside.

But is the point of the article? Liberals breaking their promises and that makes them more like the Conservatives? During the election they were already on the record saying that they would allow the Saudi deal go through. As for the deficit promises, there has been some manipulation of the figures, but the slow GDP growth and falling loonie and oil prices contributed greatly to most of that. The F-35? That was obviously hot air as you can't prevent a company from submitting a bid during the tender process. They may lose out if it is too expensive, but that's another matter.



GoldStone said:


> Liberal openness and transparency is on full display here
> 
> *No vacancies for media at Liberals’ cabinet retreat | Toronto Star*


Maybe quoting where they actually did demonstrate openness and transparency outside of this one instance would help:

Quote:
Trudeau held news conferences at the National Press Theatre in Ottawa whereas Harper rarely took questions from reporters in Ottawa.
His office announces cabinet meetings (although there are still discussions over access to ministers after those meetings).
It began to release Trudeau’s daily itinerary (although details of meetings marked “private” are scant).
And Trudeau released mandate letters to his cabinet ministers where he wrote: “Members of the Parliamentary Press Gallery, indeed all journalists in Canada and abroad, are professionals who, by asking necessary questions, contribute in an important way to the democratic process. Your professionalism and engagement with them is essential,” the letters stated.


So they aren't perfect and that shouldn't be expected, but Rome wasn't built in a day.


----------



## GoldStone

bgc_fan said:


> Not really, I had already seen that article. Though I am shocked that you would quote a CBC article. I thought CBC was a left-leaning organization and biased against the Conservatives. How dare they publish an article complaining about the Liberals. ;-)


It's not just CBC. Toronto Star as well. Rats are leaving the sinking ship. :biggrin:


----------



## bgc_fan

GoldStone said:


> It's not just CBC. Toronto Star as well. Rats are leaving the sinking ship. :biggrin:


Honestly speaking though, it is natural that the government gets criticised. The problem is that Conservatives had been in power for 10 years and took criticism personally as bias. Let's forget the fact that just about every paper endorsed the Conservatives, and Joe Oliver is now a regular columnist on the National Post, apparently there is still some big liberal media conspiracy.


----------



## fraser

I am actually a typical Conservative supporter. From Alberta no less. I just got tired of the poor performance and the strangling of democracy under Harper. Heck, I I lived in his riding for 12 years. Albeit a red Tory.


----------



## olivaw

*One half of Canadians would vote for Liberals * 



> *One half of Canadians would vote for Liberals *
> TORONTO February 18th, 2016
> In a random sampling of public opinion taken by the Forum Poll™ among 1406 Canadian voters, fully one half would vote Liberal if an election were held today (49%), and this is up slightly from the last time we polled (December, 2015 - 46%). In comparison, one third will vote Conservative (32%, stable from December), and as few as one tenth will vote for the NDP (10% now, 13% in December). Very few would vote Green (5%) or for the Bloc Quebecois (3%).
> 
> <snip>
> 
> *Liberal super-supermajority if election held today *
> If the results shown above are projected up to seats in the House of Commons, the Liberals would capture more than 7-in 10 seats (240) to just 91 for the Conservatives, no more than 6 for the New Democrats and one seat for the Greens. “The Liberal honeymoon shows no signs of abating, and we have to stop calling it that, as it has gone on far too long to be a brief post electoral crush. It has now been 100 days since the Trudeau government took power, and the Prime Minister has the kind of electoral support and approval that would make a despot blush,” said Forum Research
> 
> Read more at: http://poll.forumresearch.com/post/2460/trudeaus-popularity-stays-high/
> Copyright ©Forum Research Inc.


----------



## tygrus

Conservatism seems to be breathing its last in a lot of places. In the US the party is about to blow itself apart and usher in another 8 yrs of democrats. 

For T2 though, he is a pretty charismatic guy, seems to connect in a lot of unexpected places and doesn't have that shady demeanor about him that harper and chretian had. Thats great, but a few of his policies dip very far left for some and thats something he will have to find a way to sell. (i.e. please dont emulate europe)


----------



## humble_pie

GoldStone said:


> It's not just CBC. Toronto Star as well. Rats are leaving the sinking ship. :biggrin:



this is false. Polls are showing that trudeau's popularity with canadians is rising, not the reverse. 

latest poll says 57% of canadians are positive on justin trudeau now, only 27% favour stephen harper.

http://abacusdata.ca/popularity-prime-ministers/

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ians-approve-of-trudeau-poll/article28210076/


as for the Star, it's a longtime liberal support engine. Of course journos are going to criticize politicians. This isn't rats leaving a sinking ship or any other worn-out old platitude.

i'm from quebec, so i'm focusing 100% on what the beauteous Sophie will be wearing in washington later this week. They're saying the PM couple is going to electrify america.


----------



## GoldStone

you missed this :biggrin:


----------



## humble_pie

i missed the clothes? they already showed what she'll be wearing at the state dinner? i missed that?

omg & to think that brian mulroney's daughter-in-law jessica - she's ben mulroney's wife - is sophie's numero uno fashion advisor. it's enough to make a patriote weep.


----------



## olivaw

Sophie Gregoire will look smashing in her new gown. Canadians are as proud of Sophie as we are of Justin. Men want to be Justin Trudeau. Women want to be with him. Important men also want to be with him. He can dance. Justin Trudeau has exceeded the expectations of conservatives and liberals alike. No wonder Trudeau's Liberals would easily win a super-super-duper majority if another election were held. We're the envy of the world.
:biggrin::biggrin::biggrin::biggrin:


----------



## sags

Sunny ways.............


----------



## Rusty O'Toole

Here is a trick to help understand Justin Trudeau. Whenever he says anything that makes you go WTF??? just imagine him saying it after a couple of bong hits and it will all become clear.


----------



## Articuno

Making Canada proud!

www DOT youtube DOT com/watch?v=HbMXYgYxRaY


----------



## andrewf

www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbMXYgYxRaY


----------



## jargey3000

good lord! how..how....embarrassing? what's SHE smoking???
(let's hope she doesn't break out in a rendition of "Michelle" at the White House this week!)


----------



## olivaw

Obama sings too.


----------



## Mechanic

I can't help but wonder how much of a mess he will be allowed to make of Canada for the next Government to fix.


----------



## lonewolf

Kind of wonder if Trudeau & Obama really think they can change the weather or if they are meeting because it is political correct thing to do regardless of how stupid it is.


----------



## sags

The Federal budget will be announced on March 22 and it would be surprising if it wasn't targeted at providing more support for the middle class, which will be observed as a good thing by voters.

_Trudeau suggested changes would only be made if they help the middle class. “I am also fairly ruthless whenever it comes to discussing different measures, okay. What is the real impact on the economy and how does this create benefit for the middle class? How does this create long-term growth opportunities for everyone?”_


----------



## gibor365

> The Federal budget will be announced on March 22 and it would be surprising if it wasn't targeted at providing more support for the middle class


and whom Liberal Hunta considering middle class?!


----------



## RUSH2112

jargey3000 said:


> What's with this "hand over the heart" move he's doing lately? I dunno... it just bugs me.... It's so...so... what's the word I'm looking for? pretentious?


He's just a little paranoid and checking to make sure his bag of giggle weed, rolling papers and roach clip are still in his shirt pocket.


----------



## agent99

Is this thread reserved for those who still have sour grapes over the way Canadians as a whole voted during the last election? 

Being down in the USA at present, it is an eye opener to see how bad politics can get.


----------



## bass player

There sure is a lot of gushing over Trudeau...I wonder how those people will feel when his carbon tax kicks in and the price of absolutely EVERYTHING goes up. All of his promised tax breaks for the middle class will magically disappear.


----------



## RUSH2112

agent99 said:


> Is this thread reserved for those who still have sour grapes over the way Canadians as a whole voted during the last election?
> 
> Being down in the USA at present, it is an eye opener to see how bad politics can get.


No, it's about a former high school grammar teacher who forced military men and women to move to make way for non-Canadians.

As for the homeless who been waiting years for low income housing, you been moved to the bottom of the list.


----------



## bgc_fan

RUSH2112 said:


> No, it's about a former high school grammar teacher who forced military men and women to move to make way for non-Canadians.
> 
> As for the homeless who been waiting years for low income housing, you been moved to the bottom of the list.


Just to be clear, only CFB Kingston was mentioned about moving soldiers around. And none of them were permanent residents on the base. Those that were affected were most likely those on course. http://cnews.canoe.com/CNEWS/Canada/2015/11/23/22576443.html

Before you complain about moving military around on course, it is quite a normal occurrence.

The plan to house refugees on military bases revolved around winterizing the cadet camps.


----------



## RUSH2112

The story is pretty basic to comprehend.

No need to spin the facts to support a twisted Liberal agenda.


----------



## bgc_fan

RUSH2112 said:


> The story is pretty basic to comprehend.
> 
> No need to spin the facts to support a twisted Liberal agenda.


I am not spinning facts. The story that people were spreading was that military members were being kicked out of their quarters and left on the street which was far from the truth.


----------



## jargey3000

.... what's with the pretentious "hand-over-the-heart" thingy anyway ....?
(at least he could clench his fist & say "Right On, Brother!")


----------



## humble_pie

RUSH2112 said:


> The story is pretty basic to comprehend.
> 
> No need to spin the facts to support a twisted Liberal agenda.




bgc is not spinning facts. Some young unmarried soldiers were ordered to move out of single rooms & into shared rooms in other buildings in order to free up one or two buildings with smaller bedrooms for refugees, that's all.

as the linked article makes clear, their costs were paid. Their dorm fees were adjusted down. Soldiers are routinely kept on the move, all of the time, anyhow.

RUSH2112 by any chance have you been imagining that canadian soldiers working behind sandbags in combat zones walk around saying Eeeuw i waaant a deluxe single ensuite with whirlpool bath?


----------



## sags

Canada will host a Three Amigos (US, Canada, Mexico) conference in the summer.

From the US media reports, the Trudeau family are creating some interest in Canada, which is a good thing.

Already an announcement on changes to ease US/Canada border crossing congestion.

Quite a change from the Harper government who talked about changes but most often deferred them to sometime in the future. Trudeau seems more interested in getting things done now.

Although some Canadians are dismissive of climate change initiatives, it has become a big issue in places like Florida where the impact on cities like Miami will be huge.

Climate change has become part of the debate in US presidential campaigns.


----------



## bass player

sags said:


> Although some Canadians are dismissive of climate change initiatives, it has become a big issue in places like Florida where the impact on cities like Miami will be huge.
> 
> Climate change has become part of the debate in US presidential campaigns.


People are dismissive of climate change for a reason...altered data, outrageous claims, the hockey stick graph fraud, the total failure of climate models, just to name a few things. The Arctic ice was supposed to be gone by last summer, children would grow up not knowing what snow was. And, then when the planet refused to cooperate and the temps plateaued for the last 18 years, a whole new list of excuses were trotted out.

By the way, the sea continues to rise at 1.5 - 3 mm per year...exactly at the same rate it has done for the last several hundred years.


----------



## none

Actually you are totally off base and have no clue what you are talking about. Climate change models, if anything, have been underestimating the level of change. Human caused climate change is not more debatable than the theory of evolution.

Nice try though.


----------



## bass player

none said:


> Actually you are totally off base and have no clue what you are talking about. Climate change models, if anything, have been underestimating the level of change. Human caused climate change is not more debatable than the theory of evolution.
> 
> Nice try though.


Are you serious? Please show us just one model that has underestimated the warming...especially the current 18-year plateau.


----------



## olivaw

As an aside to the global warming denying and racism defending .... 

*Justin Trudeau's Canada is having a moment*

http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/10/travel/justin-trudeau-canada-having-a-moment-feat/


----------



## steve41

bass player said:


> Are you serious? Please show us just one model that has underestimated the warming...especially the current 18-year plateau.


Once the Warmistas haul out the heavy earth moving equipment, that 'Plateau' turns into a major hill. (upwards hill, that is)


----------



## none

Nope - I've tried taking to morons like you - all the info is out there. Go to the god damn NASA website for christ sakes.


----------



## andrewf

bass player said:


> Are you serious? Please show us just one model that has underestimated the warming...especially the current 18-year plateau.


18 year plateau? Such a suspiciously specific time frame. Almost as if people are deliberately using 1998 as a base year, because it was an exceptionally hot year in its own right (due to a massive El Nino). And next year, we may talk about how there has been no warming in 19 years. Not 20 and not 18, but exactly 19 years. Of course, 2015 was still the hottest year on record, and before than 2014, and before that 2010. If fact, 5 of the past 11 years have broken new all-time records as hottest years.

https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/201513

As a good general tip. If your analysis is very sensitive to the time frame you are evaluating, there is a good chance your analysis/conclusion is incorrect. You do yourself no favours by cherry picking data using a very specific time frame to confirm your preconceived notion.


----------



## jargey3000

bump


----------



## jargey3000

ahhh,,,there we go


----------



## jargey3000

how did they measure "climate change" back in 1916? or 1816? 1166?
hasn't the climate ALWAYS been changing? when was it stagnant?
what killed the dinosaurs? wasn't there an "ice age" back there somewhere? who / what caused that?
i predict the "climate" will continue to warm for oh, the next billion years or so .... then, it might cool a bit, for the next billion years.
mother nature will take care of herself. like she did long before we came along. and like she will long after we're gone.
(ps - put me in the "unconvinced" camp)


----------



## tygrus

jargey3000 said:


> (ps - put me in the "unconvinced" camp)


Have you ever seen a warmer winter than this in your life in Canada? Mid feb and we had no snow on the ground here in sk and plus temps for half the month. And its not a chinook, nor just el nino. There is some other influence that is ramping those things up. 

Anyway, doesnt matter because we need to be efficient and mindful of our actions. Pumping anything onto the air or throwing anything into the oceans or food supply is wrong.


----------



## andrewf

jargey3000 said:


> how did they measure "climate change" back in 1916? or 1816? 1166?
> hasn't the climate ALWAYS been changing? when was it stagnant?
> what killed the dinosaurs? wasn't there an "ice age" back there somewhere? who / what caused that?
> i predict the "climate" will continue to warm for oh, the next billion years or so .... then, it might cool a bit, for the next billion years.
> mother nature will take care of herself. like she did long before we came along. and like she will long after we're gone.
> (ps - put me in the "unconvinced" camp)


The planet will be fine. The 7 billion humans that live on it. Maybe.

You argue that climate has changed in the past, such as when the dinosaurs went extinct. Not sure you are buttressing your point about how we can ignore our effect on the climate today. We're going through another mass extinction event today (this time caused by humans).


----------



## bass player

none said:


> Nope - I've tried taking to morons like you - all the info is out there. Go to the god damn NASA website for christ sakes.


Why has NASA found it necessary to alter the data? Why is NASA being investigated for altering the data? Why is NASA refusing to provide internal information regarding the altered data?


----------



## jargey3000

tygrus said:


> Have you ever seen a warmer winter than this in your life in Canada? Mid feb and we had no snow on the ground here in sk and plus temps for half the month. And its not a chinook, nor just el nino. There is some other influence that is ramping those things up.
> 
> Anyway, doesnt matter because we need to be efficient and mindful of our actions. Pumping anything onto the air or throwing anything into the oceans or food supply is wrong.


"Canada" is a big country... not sure where you are (ontario maybe?). we're in the middle of one of our coldest march month ever up here. '76 was a mild winter.... '81 was brutally cold i think .... etc. etc.etc. etc....up & down... changes!
we had our coldest july EVER in 2015, and our WARMEST august ever in 2014 .... go figure..
My thought is that it is only in the relatively last few decades that we've had the desire & means to measure the climate so precisely..
Before that, we had other things to worry about , like ...survival.
Personally, i think somewhat naive to think that "we" can "stop climate change!"
Might be wrong -time'll tell- but I'm entitled to my opinion.


----------



## brad

jargey3000 said:


> "Canada" is a big country... not sure where you are (ontario maybe?). we're in the middle of one of our coldest march month ever up here. '76 was a mild winter.... '81 was brutally cold i think .... etc. etc.etc. etc....up & down... changes!
> we had our coldest july EVER in 2015, and our WARMEST august ever in 2014 .... go figure..


Interesting. So to use this same logic, if a school class scores an average of 81 percent on its first exam, and then on a later exam it scores 87 percent, that means every single person in the class scored better on the second exam, right? Or do you think it's possible that the class as a whole did better but some individual people did worse or got the same score?

It amazes me that people who understand the concept of averages in other contexts can't seem to understand it when it applies to something they don't want to believe in.

The last month in which the global average temperature was below the 20th century mean was February 1985. Does that mean that the temperature everywhere on the planet is rising? Of course not. Does it mean that temperatures in every location must be rising every year? Of course not.


----------



## Userkare

O.K. since this thread has morphed from the topic of our 'boy wonder' to climate change ( one of his favourite causes ), I would provide the following links to articles that I've bookmarked. I don't remember where I found them, perhaps in another thread here? But, as I wish to remain open to all arguments pro and con on the topic of human contribution to climate change, I would be interested in any comments related to these two articles...

http://www.therebel.media/defeat_global_warming_alarmists_with_these_handy_c02_talking_points

Check out Figure 2 in the above article. boggles the mind if true!

http://business.financialpost.com/f...bon-neutral-so-why-are-we-keeping-it-a-secret


----------



## brad

Userkare said:


> O.K. since this thread has morphed from the topic of our 'boy wonder' to climate change ( one of his favourite causes ), I would provide the following links to articles that I've bookmarked. I don't remember where I found them, perhaps in another thread here? But, as I wish to remain open to all arguments pro and con on the topic of human contribution to climate change, I would be interested in any comments related to these two articles...
> 
> http://www.therebel.media/defeat_global_warming_alarmists_with_these_handy_c02_talking_points
> 
> Check out Figure 2 in the above article. boggles the mind if true!


Oh my, not Tim Ball again! That guy would fail a climatology 101 course. All of his talking points come from the most basic misunderstandings of the facts, probably deliberate on his part.

He says that CO2 is only a minor greenhouse gas and that water vapor has the biggest impact on climate. In fact every climatologist will tell you that water vapor has a bigger impact on climate than CO2 does. This is not news, nor has anyone been hiding it: it's stated explicitly in every IPCC report that has ever been published. But climatologists will also tell you that CO2 is important precisely because of its impact on water vapor. Every molecule of CO2 traps heat in the atmosphere. How the climate responds to that heat depends crucially on what happens to water vapor, and we all know that evaporation increases as temperature rises. So more CO2 leads to more water vapor, and that's where the biggest impact on climate comes from. Water vapor isn't normally considered a "greenhouse gas" and it doesn't come from fossil fuels, but it plays a huge role in global temperature and climate. Differences in future projections of climate change mainly boil down to assumptions about how water vapor will respond to increasing levels of CO2 and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

The other stuff he says in there is hyperbole, none of it stands up to scientific scrutiny.

There are legitimate uncertainties about climate change and legitimate topics to debate, but this guy hasn't done his homework.


----------



## none

The debate lies in what are (if there are any) effective strategies that can be done to actually stop or reverse the effects of climate change. To debate over whether it is occurring on not is just ridiculous. Jesus, even George Bush eventually was convinced..


----------



## andrewf

Userkare said:


> O.K. since this thread has morphed from the topic of our 'boy wonder' to climate change ( one of his favourite causes ), I would provide the following links to articles that I've bookmarked. I don't remember where I found them, perhaps in another thread here? But, as I wish to remain open to all arguments pro and con on the topic of human contribution to climate change, I would be interested in any comments related to these two articles...
> 
> http://www.therebel.media/defeat_global_warming_alarmists_with_these_handy_c02_talking_points
> 
> Check out Figure 2 in the above article. boggles the mind if true!
> 
> http://business.financialpost.com/f...bon-neutral-so-why-are-we-keeping-it-a-secret




So CO2 is not a greenhouse gas. What model does the rebel (a propaganda site) provide to explain why Venus is hot enough to melt lead while Earth is relatively temperate? The difference in solar insolation is not sufficient to explain it.

There are a bunch of assertions in that article, few of them are supported by evidence/studies. Where are the footnotes?


----------



## brad

andrewf said:


> There are a bunch of assertions in that article, few of them are supported by evidence/studies. Where are the footnotes?


He's scared to put in footnotes because most of his information is at least 20 years old and long discredited. The argument that CO2 has reached a saturation point (i.e., that the absorption spectrum is saturated so increasing concentrations of CO2 won't trap any more heat) was investigated and discredited in the late 1980s/early 1990s, if not earlier.


----------



## none

Of course it is - for example, the ocean is one massive carbon sink. Hence we can actually detect drops in pH in the entire god damn ocean. it's so eye-rolly brain dead I can't believe that we are having this conversation.

What's next? evolution isn't real because the eye is too complex? The hand is perfectly adapted to eat a banana?? seriously you guys. This is why education is important. Whenever I see posts here about 'don't bother staying in school you don't make more money that way" THIS is why you need an educated population...


----------



## bass player

none said:


> The debate lies in what are (if there are any) effective strategies that can be done to actually stop or reverse the effects of climate change. To debate over whether it is occurring on not is just ridiculous. Jesus, even George Bush eventually was convinced..


Actually, the debate IS whether or not it is happening, and if it is happening, if anything bad will happen if a slight warming occurs. In all of history, a warmer planet has always supported more life. But suddenly and conveniently, today any warming can only be bad.


----------



## andrewf

That is the bucket defense. ie, throw a bunch of contradictory arguments at the wall in the hope that something sticks.

ie
-I didn't kill John Doe
-I killed John Doe in self defense
-John Doe is not dead
-John Doe was asking for it
-I am not criminally responsible for killing John Doe due to temporary insansity


----------



## brad

bass player said:


> Actually, the debate IS whether or not it is happening, and if it is happening, if anything bad will happen if a slight warming occurs. In all of history, a warmer planet has always supported more life. But suddenly and conveniently, today any warming can only be bad.


No, there is no debate over whether the earth is warming or the climate is changing. You'd have to deliberately ignore an enormous weight of data and multiple lines of evidence in order for that to be true. I'm not sure where you're getting this idea that there's a debate about whether the climate is changing or that humans are the leading cause for the warming of the past 50 years or so. There is no debate, the evidence is too strong. You can argue about plateaus or a hiatus or whatever, but there is incontrovertible evidence that the planet today is consistently warmer than it was 50 years ago, and it's impossible to explain all of that warming by natural causes alone. All climatologists recognize that the climate changes naturally: this year's weird weather is due mainly to natural causes (El Nino), although it's the strongest El Nino on record which may have something to do with human-induced climate change. We don't know.

The real debate is about the future. Will it be a "slight warming" as you assume, or will it be more catastrophic? Nobody knows for sure. You seem to think that "a little warming is good, so more must be better." If you had spent more time learning about the topic, I guarantee you would not be so sanguine.


----------



## bass player

Yes Brad, there is debate. Plenty of it. There is also altered data that NASA refused to explain.

Since you claim that warming is bad, can you point to an example at any time in history when warming was bad for the planet?


----------



## steve41

bass player said:


> Since you claim that warming is bad, can you point to an example at any time in history when warming was bad for the planet?


 Well.... Greenland was originally called Vinland because it became warm enough to grow grapes. Result?.... alcoholism, liver disease....


----------



## brad

bass player said:


> Yes Brad, there is debate. Plenty of it. There is also altered data that NASA refused to explain.
> 
> Since you claim that warming is bad, can you point to an example at any time in history when warming was bad for the planet?


Sure, we don't have to look very far back to find that. Here's some light reading for you with hundreds of examples of negative impacts:

http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg2/WGIIAR5-TS_FINAL.pdf

And if you want more, there's the full report at http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg2/

This isn't speculative stuff about the future, this is evidence, from peer-reviewed studies, of impacts that are happening right now.


----------



## Userkare

none said:


> What's next? evolution isn't real because the eye is too complex? The hand is perfectly adapted to eat a banana?? seriously you guys. This is why education is important. Whenever I see posts here about 'don't bother staying in school you don't make more money that way" THIS is why you need an educated population...


O.K. when I went to school, we were burning leaded gasoline and using clorofluorocarbons in air conditioners. I don't recall any teacher saying anything bad about those practices at the time. Oh yeah, we also smoked and didn't use seat belts. We know now what the adverse effects of lead and fluorocarbons are, and have taken steps to eliminate these pollutants. And I say "pollutants" because they don't belong in our environment by any natural processes. CO2, on the other hand, is essential to life on Earth; yes perhaps in the right ratio, and potentially harmful if not. Are we so convinced we fully understand the exact balance, and how we can achieve it?

An educated population gets educated by reading and discussing information found in published articles whether in print or on-line. Sure, some articles have more credibility than others, but it's narrow minded of either side of any argument to simply dismiss the other as "propaganda". I agree there should be footnotes to attribute sources, but it's not exactly Scientific American here. The source of the graphs are given, but then we can proceed to debunk that as well - down the line. The other article in the F.P. that I linked was written by a deputy minister to the premier of Saskatchewan, so I guess we can dismiss him because he's probably 'connected' to the petro industry in some way?

I do not deny climate change; I simply fear that because it's such a 'cause ju jour' for our politicians,who are not scientists, they're going to go off half-baked and make decisions that will affect us for many decades to come. I want to be assured that whatever hardship we must endure economically, that it will truly have the desired effect - as was the case with lead and CFCs. So far I've not been convinced that simply adding a tax to everything that even remotely causes an additional molecule of CO2 will somehow fix the problem. What I see happening is the price of everything just goes up, and unions extort higher wages to offset the increase. Rinse and repeat.


----------



## bass player

Hundreds of negative impacts? How many positive impacts did they find?

The IPCC also used the proven fraudulent hockey stick draft in several of their reports...which was also "peer reviewed". Once the fraud was revealed they quietly removed it from future reports without explanation, apology, or by removing any of the people that peer reviewed it.

So, pardon my skepticism of anything produced by the IPCC since their entire financial existence depends on there being global warming.


----------



## brad

Userkare said:


> I do not deny climate change, I simply fear that because it's such a 'cause ju jour' for our politicians, they're going to go off half-baked and make decisions that will affect us for many decades to come. I want to be assured that whatever hardship we must endure economically, that it will truly have the desired effect - as was the case with lead and FCs. So far I've not been convinced that simply adding a tax to everything that even remotely causes an additional molecule of CO2 will somehow fix the problem. What I see happening is the price of everything just goes up, and unions extort higher wages to offset the increase. Rinse and repeat.


I've been looking for about 25 years now for a single example of a business whose bottom line suffered because it cut its greenhouse gas emissions. I haven't found one yet; on the contrary I've found hundreds of examples of businesses that have saved anywhere from thousands to millions of dollars per year by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Read this from DuPont for an example:

What DuPont is doing: DuPont has a long track record of growing our business while reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Between 1990 and 2004, DuPont set progressively challenging corporate goals and established global systems to manage our emissions, actions that resulted in a 72% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions even as we grew. By 2015, DuPont will further reduce our GHG emissions at least an additional 15% from an updated base year of 2004. Our updated baseline year is adjusted from our original baseline year of 1990 to reflect changes in our business portfolio, ensuring that we are accounting only for actual reductions and not portfolio changes. These voluntary actions have had a real impact on emissions. 

Effectively addressing climate change will require changes in the way the world produces and uses energy and other natural resources. This is why DuPont has created corporate sustainability goals that focus on achieving more efficient use of resources in our own operations and by producing products that help others do so as well.

DuPont’s longstanding energy efficiency program has delivered major energy and cost savings over the years. From 1990 to 2010 DuPont reduced overall energy use by 6% while growing the company by 40%. The resulting energy savings enabled us to avoid over $6 billion in cumulative energy purchases since 1990 and contributed to our greenhouse gas reductions. In 2011 we announced our new energy goal to further reduce our energy intensity by 10% by 2020. With our new energy goal, we aim to reduce non-renewable energy use by 10 percent per dollar price adjusted revenue by 2020 compared to a 2010 baseline. To make sure that we keep our momentum going, we have set a milestone of a 3 percent reduction by 2015. Projects that drive progress toward our energy goal include: the replacement of non-renewable energy with renewable sources; continued improvements to our energy-using systems; optimization of energy generation and distribution at our facilities; the use of improved process controls; new technologies with lower energy consumption, and; importantly, improved productivity from DuPont’s manufacturing processes.

Full text at http://www.dupont.com/corporate-fun...ition-statements/articles/climate-change.html


----------



## brad

bass player said:


> Hundreds of negative impacts? How many positive impacts did they find?


I'm not going to do your homework for you, read the report. 

IPCC isn't a company, it doesn't have any financial incentive to twist the facts. It's a bunch of government scientists from many countries who gather and evaluate published studies on climate change. But there's no point arguing with you about any of this as your mind is clearly made up.


----------



## bass player

brad said:


> I'm not going to do your homework for you, read the report.
> 
> IPCC isn't a company, it doesn't have any financial incentive to twist the facts. It's a bunch of government scientists from many countries who gather and evaluate published studies on climate change. But there's no point arguing with you about any of this as your mind is clearly made up.


Your mind is made up, too. The IPCC is not a bunch of government scientists. They are an organization of unelected bureaucrats who hire some scientists that support their agenda. They release a "policy statement" based on cherry picked and flawed data. Remember the hockey stick that the IPCC trumpeted as their "proof"?

Of course they have an agenda...how much money would they receive if they said there was no man-made climate change? The sole reason for their existence depends on their being a man-made problem. No problem, no funding.


----------



## brad

bass player said:


> Your mind is made up, too. The IPCC is not a bunch of government scientists. They are an organization of unelected bureaucrats who hire some scientists that support their agenda. They release a "policy statement" based on cherry picked and flawed data. Remember the hockey stick that the IPCC trumpeted as their "proof"?


I've been to IPCC meetings, I know something about it.

I'm not sure why you think the "hockey stick" graph was "fraudulent." There was some controversy about it I know, but its basic conclusions have been supported by more than 20 subsequent reconstructions of climate data by independent researchers not associated with IPCC. Sure, IPCC has had its problems and controversies, but it has taken steps to become more transparent and open; quite a few climate change skeptics participate in the IPCC process. But like I said, no point arguing, we can just agree to disagree.


----------



## jargey3000

I don't deny that the climate's changing ...(what it has to do with school class averages , or means or medians for that matter, I don't know). My point is the climate's always been changing, & will continue to change forever. Maybe it will "warm" for the next 10,000 years or so... then it'll start to "cool". What I have a hard time wrapping my brain around is the naive notion that somehow the feeble intervention of something as insignificant a "the human race" can somehow alter or "stop" the climate from changing. It's like saying "let's stop the sun from coming up each day".

_ There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, 
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. _


----------



## Userkare

brad said:


> I've been looking for about 25 years now for a single example of a business whose bottom line suffered because it cut its greenhouse gas emissions. I haven't found one yet; on the contrary I've found hundreds of examples of businesses that have saved anywhere from thousands to millions of dollars per year by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Read this from DuPont for an example:


Funny you should mention DuPont. The very folks that brought you the CFCs that practically destroyed our ozone layer and baked everyone on the planet. I guess they have 'image' issues - sort of like the Germans being so refugee friendly these days. From the DuPont statement that you linked, it appears that they are making money off the sale of products perceived to be more environmentally friendly; this just proves there's money to be made. Just like they though merging with Conoco in the 80's would make money, and today creating genetically modified seeds will make them money. If, in the unlikely event, anthropogenic climate change is definitively debunked, they'll go broke. They say they are also saving money by reducing their own 'carbon footprint', but not precisely how. Did they move a factory to nearby a waterfall? That might reduce energy costs when the price of fossil fuels is high, but what about the CO2 caused by shipping their products? Is this waterfall location closer to their markets?

Yes, I'm just being argumentative to prove the point that you can look at a small slice of something, but not see the bigger picture.

I still am skeptical that our government leaders will make the right decisions to truly address the issue of climate change, if indeed it can be reversed. I think they'll just milk the situation to generate more tax revenue, and the sheeple will go along with it because they want to feel that they did 'their part'. I'm especially skeptical that Canada, by itself, can make even the slightest difference that could warrant the financial hardship we are about to endure. So far, I haven't heard any counter-argument to the Financial Post article that claims we're net CO2 negative. 

If I were an editorial cartoonist, I would draw a picture of a river with two huge toxic waste pipes pumping sludge into the river; one with a US flag, and one Chinese. Downstream is a small boy with a Canadian flag shirt peeing into the river. His parents, K Wynne and J Trudeau, are looking horrified by his actions; pointing at a dead fish floating on the surface and saying "look what you've done".


----------



## brad

jargey3000 said:


> What I have a hard time wrapping my brain around is the naive notion that somehow the feeble intervention of something as insignificant a "the human race" can somehow alter or "stop" the climate from changing. It's like saying "let's stop the sun from coming up each day".


It's pretty simple, actually.

The climate does change naturally over time, due in part to changes in solar radiation, natural cycles, large volcanic eruptions, and other factors. All of that has happened forever and will continue to happen.

The other thing to understand is that there's a natural carbon cycle: carbon dioxide has always been in the atmosphere, where carbon cycles around between the oceans, the land, and the air. Normally that carbon cycle is in balance: the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere stays relatively constant because oceans and plants absorb about as much as is emitted each year.

Now here's the human factor: by burning fossil fuels, we're introducing a new source of carbon dioxide -- and introducing it really fast -- that has been kept out of the natural carbon cycle for millions of years. That causes an imbalance: if you imagine a bathtub where the water going in from the faucet is matched by the water going out through the drain, the water level stays the same, but if you turn up the faucet the level in the tub will rise because the drain isn't big enough to keep up. That's what's going on in the atmosphere, in simplified terms.

So by burning fossil fuels we're causing an increase in CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere -- this is easy to observe, and because fossil fuels have an isotopic fingerprint it's easy to identify the source of that increasing CO2. And because CO2 traps heat, it's leading to warming, which is further amplified by changes in water vapor: a warmer climate has more energy in the atmosphere and also more water vapor, which also affects things like storms, precipitation patterns, floods, droughts, etc.

We can't and don't want to stop natural changes in climate. But we can at least slow the rate of change due to our own activities.


----------



## jargey3000

brad - appreciate your comments, explanation & example. I think i grasp a little of the concept.
I guess i just believe that the concept of "climate change", or the universe, or "infinity" are just somehow beyond the scope our comprehension... and therefore, the idea that "we" can alter these things is -I hate to over-use the term, but- naive at best.
The universe will continue to unfold as it should - regardless of our actions here on this little grain of sand...


----------



## brad

jargey3000 said:


> brad - appreciate your comments, explanation & example. I think i grasp a little of the concept.
> I guess i just believe that the concept of "climate change", or the universe, or "infinity" are just somehow beyond the scope our comprehension... and therefore, the idea that "we" can alter these things is -I hate to over-use the term, but- naive at best.
> The universe will continue to unfold as it should - regardless of our actions here on this little grain of sand...


Yep, it is indeed hard to imagine that we could have an influence on something like the climate, but it's true -- when you generate carbon dioxide by burning fossil fuels, the molecules have a particular isotopic fingerprint that provide the smoking gun: we know that the CO2 increases in the atmosphere are coming from fossil fuels. The uncertainties are about how the climate system responds to that CO2, but so far things are playing out generally as predicted. The climate models predict a lot of year-to-year variation, with a general upward trend in global average temperature. It's a lot like the stock market actually: ups and downs from year to year, but a general trend of up.

Yes, the universe will continue to unfold regardless of our actions. But it's kind of like species extinctions: species have been going extinct for as long as there has been life on earth: trilobites and dinosaurs have come and gone, many species went extinct before humans came along, and many species will go extinct in the future for natural reasons. But humans are also directly causing lots of species to go extinct that otherwise would still exist. That's different. Similarly, there's natural climate change, which we can't do anything about, and the human-caused portion, which we can do something about. When you start looking at the potential impacts (and the impacts that have already happened) due to human-caused climate change, you start feeling like we should do something about it. If we caused the problem, we should be able to fix it.


----------



## Eclectic12

jargey3000 said:


> ... we had our coldest july EVER in 2015, and our WARMEST august ever in 2014 ....


Hopefully the sources confirming this are better than the article that headlined how a new record was set at Pearson airport in Toronto for how warm it was in Feb. Trouble was they then quoted a meteorologist who said the temperature was about six degrees less than the record. :biggrin:


Cheers


----------



## jargey3000

Meteorologist Eddie Sheerr
Like This Page · July 31, 2015 · Edited · 


=COLDEST JULY ON RECORD AT ST. JOHN'S=

According to Rodney Barney, a Meteorologist with Environment Canada (@rcbmstormpost on twitter), this past July has been the COLDEST ever at St. John's International Airport. The average high temperature was just 15.8° (60.4°F), which breaks the old record for the month of 16.1°(61°F) set back in 1962. The normal high for the month fluctuates between 20° and 21° (68°F to 70°F)

Barney also says that the averages were especially low on the weekends, when maximum temperatures averaged just 13.2° (55.8°F). 

I don't know about you, but I'm very happy to say goodbye to July. August will almost certainly be warmer... I hope! 

You should also know that after Saturday I've got no rain in the forecast for St. John's, and highs each day in the low to mid 20s!


----------



## bgc_fan

July was Earth's hottest month on record, NOAA says

Quote:
July was the hottest month on Earth since records began, averaging 16.6 C (61.9 F), according to US scientists.

That is 0.08 degrees higher than the previous record, set in July 1998 - a significant margin in weather records.

Scientists at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said in a report that they expect 2015 to be the hottest year on record.

Nine of the 10 hottest months since records began in 1880 have occurred since 2005, they NOAA report said.

Scientists say global climate change and the impacts of the El Nino weather phenomenon are behind the record temperatures.
======

So one place may have had the coldest on record, but the average overall was the hottest July on record.

Remember that grade and average analogy? Just because you had one grade that was below the historical average, it doesn't mean that the average of the class was below the historical average.


----------



## jargey3000

no argument on that.
this year ...or next... may be hotter again! who knows?


----------



## bass player

If a person can be threatened with prosecution for not believing in climate change, then it's no longer science, it's just another form of political or religious thuggary. 

You can walk around all day with a sign that says the Earth is flat or that gravity doesn't exist and no one will demand that you be prosecuted, but if you dare suggest that the there is no danger of man-made warming that require billions to "fix", then the gloves come off and you will be viciously attacked with no remorse.

Who are the real deniers?


----------



## bass player

jargey3000 said:


> no argument on that.
> this year ...or next... may be hotter again! who knows?


We all know...it will be hotter. Even if it isn't. In fact, I'm surprised that 2016 hasn't yet been called the "HOTTEST YEAR EVER!!"


----------



## none

Here you go: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/17/2016-set-to-be-hottest-year-on-record-globally


----------



## none

bass player said:


> If a person can be threatened with prosecution for not believing in climate change, then it's no longer science, it's just another form of political or religious thuggary.
> 
> You can walk around all day with a sign that says the Earth is flat or that gravity doesn't exist and no one will demand that you be prosecuted, but if you dare suggest that the there is no danger of man-made warming that require billions to "fix", then the gloves come off and you will be viciously attacked with no remorse.
> 
> Who are the real deniers?


No. we just think you're stupid.


----------



## jargey3000

_Hey, how about those Blue Jays, eh? they gonna go all the way this year, or what?_


----------



## jargey3000

none said:


> No. we just think you're stupid.


Well. we just think, you're naive & misguided....who's right & who's wrong?


----------



## andrewf

jargey3000 said:


> I don't deny that the climate's changing ...(what it has to do with school class averages , or means or medians for that matter, I don't know). My point is the climate's always been changing, & will continue to change forever. Maybe it will "warm" for the next 10,000 years or so... then it'll start to "cool". What I have a hard time wrapping my brain around is the naive notion that somehow the feeble intervention of something as insignificant a "the human race" can somehow alter or "stop" the climate from changing. It's like saying "let's stop the sun from coming up each day".
> 
> _ There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
> Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. _


Akin to saying "people die eventually anyway, what's the big deal if I kill them?"

The precautionary principle applies here... when we are not completely certain of the effect or lack thereof of higher than usual (usual being the time frame over which humanity has existed on earth) CO2 concentration in the atmosphere, we should err on the side of not causing potentially massive disruption to the climate.


----------



## none

jargey3000 said:


> Well. we just think, you're naive & misguided....who's right & who's wrong?


Well seeing that I have a PhD is ecology/statistics I'm willing to bet I likely have better developed critical thinking skills.


----------



## bass player

andrewf said:


> Akin to saying "people die eventually anyway, what's the big deal if I kill them?"
> 
> The precautionary principle applies here... when we are not completely certain of the effect or lack thereof of higher than usual (usual being the time frame over which humanity has existed on earth) CO2 concentration in the atmosphere, we should err on the side of not causing potentially massive disruption to the climate.


The precautionary principle is often used by those who have no evidence to back up their claims. "It doesn't matter if I'm wrong if I think I'm saving the planet."

One of the main problems with precautionary principles is that they always require everyone else's money.


----------



## bass player

none said:


> Well seeing that I have a PhD is ecology/statistics I'm willing to bet I likely have better developed critical thinking skills.


People with well developed critical thinking skills don't get their information from The Guardian.


----------



## andrewf

bass player said:


> The precautionary principle is often used by those who have no evidence to back up their claims. "It doesn't matter if I'm wrong if I think I'm saving the planet."
> 
> One of the main problems with precautionary principles is that they always require everyone else's money.


If there are reasonable grounds to suspect that fossil fuel related CO2 emissions are increasing CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere beyond historically normal levels and that CO2 has an impact on the climate, I think it is not unreasonable to use some precautions. Assuming it is safe when there are reasonable grounds for doubt is reckless.


----------



## LBCfan

On a slightly different note, has anyone found what he had to say to the Center for American Progress. Since he got out alive, I doubt it was in Canada's best interest.


----------



## jargey3000

none said:


> Well seeing that I have a PhD is ecology/statistics I'm willing to bet I likely have better developed critical thinking skills.


hahahahahahahahahahahahahaahah.......willing to bet? how much? hahahahahahahahahahaaaa...
phd in ecology/ statistics ....hahahahahahahahahah.....must be a lotta call for that? ....hahahahahahahahahahaahaha
oh dear....best one i heard all week...........
I sir, have a Master's Degree in B.S., I'll have you know!


----------



## RUSH2112

none said:


> Well seeing that I have a PhD is ecology/statistics I'm willing to bet I likely have better developed critical thinking skills.


I can see that grade five grammar class was a struggle.


----------



## jargey3000

(pssst..rush - I didn't want to rub that in! didn't want to come across as condescending...):biggrin:


----------



## agent99

none said:


> Well seeing that I have a PhD is ecology/statistics I'm willing to bet I likely have better developed critical thinking skills.


Do they really teach critical thinking when doing a PhD? All I can recall, is a lot of research drudgery followed by a period or trying to assemble the results in a form that would get by the examiners. I learned critical thinking in the workplace.


----------



## jargey3000

none said:


> Well seeing that I have a PhD is ecology/statistics I'm willing to bet I likely have better developed critical thinking skills.


I LOVE the sentence structure. Critical thinking at its BEST!


----------



## LBCfan

none said:


> Well seeing that I have a PhD is ecology/statistics I'm willing to bet I likely have better developed critical thinking skills.


It seems everyone or noone on the net has at least one PhD. When I need advice about particle physics, I usually seek someone with a PhD in Gender Studies since they have "better developed critical thinking skills". When I need advice about gender, I usually seek someone with a PhD in ecology/statistics since they have "better developed critical thinking skills".

How, pray tell, does an advanced degree in ecology/statistics give you a better understanding of climate and computer modeling than an undergrad degree in physics or computer science?


----------



## none

LBCfan said:


> How, pray tell, does an advanced degree in ecology/statistics give you a better understanding of climate and computer modeling than an undergrad degree in physics or computer science?


Because fitting models to data is exactly what a quantitative ecologist does. Computer scientists do not fit models to data but rather write code. Writing code <can be> relatively easy - understanding what the results actually mean in the context of necessary assumptions, data context and what is mathematically possible vs what is ecologically plausible is something else altogether.

You could read Nate Silver's Signal and the noise as a primer if you are interested with the challenges of modelling environmental data (and weather prediction in general although we are discussing changes in climate which is something quite different.)

I'm not going to debate the merits of climate change with you people. It's been decided (finally), it's done, consensus has been reached with the exception of some crazzies. This is the same with the theory of evolution, flat earth theory, whether vaccines cause autism etc. Just because you believe something doesn't mean it's true. I'll stick with what the data say thank you very much.


----------



## jargey3000

none said:


> Well seeing that I have a PhD is ecology/statistics I'm willing to bet I likely have better developed critical thinking skills.


Hallmarks of individuals with highly-developed critical thinking skills: When others disagree with their position, they call them "morons", and say they are "stupid". (this can be verified up-thread). How creative, reasoned and constructive!


----------



## LBCfan

none said:


> Because fitting models to data is exactly what a quantitative ecologist does.


Therefore I can model anything from climates to Kim Kardashians's boobs? 

Actually, the model represents the functions of a system. The data is fed into the system to see what the model predicts, whether it is right or wrong is irrelevant to this. Fitting models to data is a way of cheating, changing how you think the system being model should work until the model produces the result you want. Highly scientific.


----------



## sags

Sometimes I wonder if the human race will last long enough to perish from climate change.

We can disregard the environment in which we live, in lieu of supporting profits for corporations and hope for the best.

While we do, the Fukishima nuclear plant continuing to spew radiation is a daily reminder of how stupid the human race actually is and how close we are to making ourselves extinct.

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/w...ve-into-fukushimas-core-they-die-in-ten-hours


----------



## none

LBCfan said:


> Therefore I can model anything from climates to Kim Kardashians's boobs?
> 
> Actually, the model represents the functions of a system. The data is fed into the system to see what the model predicts, whether it is right or wrong is irrelevant to this. Fitting models to data is a way of cheating, changing how you think the system being model should work until the model produces the result you want. Highly scientific.


Yeah - these statements make no sense. I'm not even going to bother. All I'll say is that models are competing hypotheses to explain patterns in data - not even close to what you are suggesting. No surprising really.


----------



## bass player

none said:


> I'm not going to debate the merits of climate change with you people. It's been decided (finally), it's done, consensus has been reached with the exception of some crazzies.


No, it hasn't been decided. That is a fact. Someone with your highly developed critical thinking skills surely knows the difference between an unproven theory and a proven fact??

Another fact...science doesn't work on consensus, but politics does. Science deals with facts, and only facts.


----------



## Pluto

none said:


> Because fitting models to data is exactly what a quantitative ecologist does. Computer scientists do not fit models to data but rather write code. Writing code <can be> relatively easy - understanding what the results actually mean in the context of necessary assumptions, data context and what is mathematically possible vs what is ecologically plausible is something else altogether.
> 
> I'll stick with what the data say thank you very much.
> View attachment 8865


It is good you acknowledge "assumptions". That is a step in the direction of critical thinking. What if some others don't accept your assumptions? Why should one accept your assumptions? 

What is the margin of error in global temperature measurements? Isn't one assumption that the 1880 thermometer data is representative of the entire globe? even though the thermometers were not evenly distributed? Lots of people talk about data this and data that as if there are no assumptions or margin of error. 

"Consensus" is another concept that is supposed to convince people. The only thing consensus does is cement a paradigm, but it doest''t mean the paradigm is true.


----------



## bass player

Pluto said:


> What is the margin of error in global temperature measurements? Isn't one assumption that the 1880 thermometer data is representative of the entire globe? even though the thermometers were not evenly distributed? Lots of people talk about data this and data that as if there are no assumptions or margin of error.


Not only that, but what is the "correct" temperature and how was that determined? How do we know that 2 degrees warmer isn't the "right" temperature? 

The reality is that a large percentage of land mass on the planet could do with a little warming. The growing season where I live is 119 days....extending that to 200 days would create massive benefits, and little to no negatives.


----------



## agent99

Seeing this is a Money Forum, why don't PhD forum members model the masses of financial data available, and predict the future performance of the markets for the rest of us dummies who don't have the superior critical thinking skills (that none feels a PhD provided him with) ??


----------



## Pluto

bass player said:


> Not only that, but what is the "correct" temperature and how was that determined? How do we know that 2 degrees warmer isn't the "right" temperature?
> 
> The reality is that a large percentage of land mass on the planet could do with a little warming. The growing season where I live is 119 days....extending that to 200 days would create massive benefits, and little to no negatives.


I have no reason to disagree. The "right" temperature seems to be arbitrarily decided upon by the mysterious human "consensus" on climate change. Apparently there have been times when there was no ice at either pole. I wonder why the temperature warm enough to melt both poles isn't the "right" temperature.


----------



## olivaw

bass player said:


> No, it hasn't been decided. That is a fact. Someone with your highly developed critical thinking skills surely knows the difference between an unproven theory and a proven fact??
> 
> Another fact...science doesn't work on consensus, but politics does. Science deals with facts, and only facts.


In science, a _theory_ has been tested and confirmed as a general principle helping to explain and predict natural phenomena. For all intents-and-purposes it has been proven to be true. The climate change theory has been accepted by the scientific community and reasonable people throughout the world.


----------



## jargey3000

agent99 said:


> Seeing this is a Money Forum, why don't PhD forum members model the masses of financial data available, and predict the future performance of the markets for the rest of us dummies who don't have the superior critical thinking skills (that none feels a PhD provided him with) ??


good point 99!

The fact that this 'none' person resorts to calling others "morons" & "stupid", and automatically assumes that his?/her? "critical thinking" skills are superior to mine (& prob. most others), while having absolutely NO knowledge of my background, education or profession.... well, it just says more about him/her, than it does about me...
(But, to be fair...and not too 'critical', it WAS a Friday night after all, maybe none had a few drinks in, or whatever, when he/she made these rude & inappropriate comments..... I'd certainly accept an apology - if offered...)


----------



## tygrus

It doesnt matter if you believe in climate change or not or if its even real or not. The simple fact that any man made process that shunts negative effects to the surrounding environment to make itself cost efficient is inherently inefficient and worth of scrutiny. This was a quote from Buckmeister Fuller. 

Therefore, the process of extraction and burning of oil is a prime candidate as are many other processes out there. Our mountains of solid waste are another example. We need to be efficient..period.


----------



## none

olivaw said:


> In science, a _theory_ has been tested and confirmed as a general principle helping to explain and predict natural phenomena. For all intents-and-purposes it has been proven to be true. The climate change theory has been accepted by the scientific community and reasonable people throughout the world.


I know - that's why discussing this topic with these members is stupid. If they haven't accepted the burden of proof at this point I'm surely not going to be able to convince them. Like I said before, it's a done deal so why bother anyway. The nutters lost (thankfully).


----------



## andrewf

none said:


> Because fitting models to data is exactly what a quantitative ecologist does. Computer scientists do not fit models to data but rather write code. Writing code <can be> relatively easy - understanding what the results actually mean in the context of necessary assumptions, data context and what is mathematically possible vs what is ecologically plausible is something else altogether.
> 
> You could read Nate Silver's Signal and the noise as a primer if you are interested with the challenges of modelling environmental data (and weather prediction in general although we are discussing changes in climate which is something quite different.)
> 
> I'm not going to debate the merits of climate change with you people. It's been decided (finally), it's done, consensus has been reached with the exception of some crazzies. This is the same with the theory of evolution, flat earth theory, whether vaccines cause autism etc. Just because you believe something doesn't mean it's true. I'll stick with what the data say thank you very much.
> View attachment 8865


As someone who has a computer science degree, I would say most involve a lot of math. CS is not just about coding. I took about 25 mathematics courses, including 6 or so statistics course (rest being algebra, calculus, logic, number theory, optimization, cryptography).


----------



## none

Sure - that was a simplistic example and you are exactly right. Computer science is a broad field with a huge spectrum of skill levels and talents. You are right, I have no doubt that there are many computer scientists that fit models to data and work on extremely complex problems. When I wrote the above I was more considering a kid making web pages as someone in computer scientist. That was dumb.


----------



## andrewf

That would be web design (a college program if anything). The closest thing I would have done to creating a website is implementing a web server (the application that serves web pages to browsers).


----------



## tygrus

none, you cant just bash people for questioning the science. There is always new information coming in. That doesn't mean denial. People observe local short term effects - thats our nature and to link it to a global system takes a leap for many. 

There is also an nutter side to the environment movement as well and these are a vocal bunch who want people living in caves and burning cow pies for fuel and then want all sorts of money for social and environmental programs while they block every development they can.


----------



## bass player

olivaw said:


> In science, a _theory_ has been tested and confirmed as a general principle helping to explain and predict natural phenomena. For all intents-and-purposes it has been proven to be true. The climate change theory has been accepted by the scientific community and reasonable people throughout the world.


Where is the proof? Please note...a computer simulation is not proof.


----------



## Userkare

Regardless of all the science, and whether or not the 'right' temperature for the planet is a few degrees warmer, and that some people may need to move uphill - I'm concerned that this is in the hands of politicians to resolve. I don't have very much faith in politicians doing anything for a long-term future benefit, but rather only what gets them re-elected in the short term 4 years or so.

If, as brad pointed out ( post #282), companies like DuPont can see an increased profit from moving to renewable energy sources, why aren't they all jumping on it? Why does the provincial government have to impose cap and trade, or a carbon tax? Governments enforcing conservation by means of a 'punishment' tax may have worked to reduce consumption, but has also led to less revenue for them, and ultimately further price increases. Ontario's Time of Use electricity billing, and Ottawa's water meter fees, for example, have achieved their goal of forcing conservation; then in doing so, created a budget shortfall that requires yet another price increase. 

The geniuses in Ottawa are now debating how to charge un-metered rural customers on private wells and septic systems some kind of 'rain' tax to allegedly pay for the maintenance of drainage ditches and culverts along the roads - which, by the way, are built at the expense of the developer, once permit and inspection fees are paid to the city, and subsequently maintained by the property owner. But the mayor promised no more than a 2% property tax increase per year, so they have to find some new creative 'environmental' reason to squeeze more cash out of us. Climate change has caused more rain, so we should all be happy to pay a little more to ease our guilt for exhaling all that CO2 "pollution".

They tell us the money raised by these carbon taxes will be used to fund innovation.

https://www.ontario.ca/page/cap-and-trade

_"Cap and trade can spur the development of new clean technologies, bringing jobs and economic benefits in the growing global market for climate-friendly products. The money collected through a price on carbon can be used help businesses and homeowners reduce their carbon footprint and foster innovation."_

Sure it can, and Unicorns can fart rainbows, Kumbaya.

More likely is - the money will be paid to companies owned by supporters of the political party, and unaccountable billions will be spent on more research that will yield nothing tangible.

If you remember back when the government wanted us to better insulate our homes, a bunch of new companies suddenly appeared that offered the installation of urea-formaldehyde insulation at exactly the price that the government would fund? Remember then a few years later, the government paying these same fly-by-night outfits to remove it once kids started getting sick? When you throw chum off the back of a boat, don't be surprised when sharks show up! Governments are not exactly famous for their ability to detect or prevent fraud.

Please, someone convince me that we are in good hands in our province and federal governments... That they will do the right things to affect real change, and in a cost-effective efficient way that doesn't just lead to bigger trouble sometime in the future.


----------



## none

Reminds me of one of my favourite songs actually.






The people who are qualified to question the science don't, simply because the evidence is overwhelming. People think that just because you have an opinion that you are right. That's stupid. The VAST majority (>99%) of climate scientists agree that human caused climate change is real. Done. Just like evolution, vaccines,=.. blah blah blah.

The comments by Usekare are actually the correct ones and where we are at now. i.e What strategies can we employ to mitigate the effects of climate change in such a way to not destroy our economies.?


----------



## jargey3000

tygrus said:


> none, you cant just bash people for questioning the science. There is always new information coming in. That doesn't mean denial. People observe local short term effects - thats our nature and to link it to a global system takes a leap for many.
> 
> There is also an nutter side to the environment movement as well and these are a vocal bunch who want people living in caves and burning cow pies for fuel and then want all sorts of money for social and environmental programs while they block every development they can.


Careful there tygrus.... you're dealing with a brilliant phd critical thinker here... your thoughtful argument will be countered with rude name-calling!
There are more hypocrites / nutters in the environmental movement than you can shake a thermometer at!


----------



## bass player

none said:


> The VAST majority (>99%) of climate scientists agree that human caused climate change is real. Done.


You are wrong again. The 97% lie was been debunked years ago. Please educate yourself...it may prevent you from appearing foolish.


----------



## agent99

none said:


> People think that just because you have an opinion that you are right. That's stupid.


You might bear that in mind yourself. You appear to be overly self-impressed with your PhD. It's just a piece of paper. Without the intellect to go with it, it is of little value.


----------



## none

bass player said:


> You are wrong again. The 97% lie was been debunked years ago. Please educate yourself...it may prevent you from appearing foolish.


Here you go: http://iopscience.iop.org/article/1...EA8C98AECBA8521C7F6.c2.iopscience.cld.iop.org

Of course, it won't make a difference.


----------



## tygrus

What is the optimum environment for the earth? For a billion years it was a cauldron of boiling goo. For a few hundred million years it was hundreds of exploding volcanoes and before there was ever any ice on our planet at all, it was a warm wet humid environment. Ice caps and snow are a relatively new phenomenon for our earth coming only in the last maybe 100 million years or so meaning there was more water in the oceans even in the past.

Is the earth designed for human life seeing we have only been here for a few million years. 

Scientist rag the average person for their short term perspective yet they make the same mistake.


----------



## bass player

none said:


> Here you go: http://iopscience.iop.org/article/1...EA8C98AECBA8521C7F6.c2.iopscience.cld.iop.org
> 
> Of course, it won't make a difference.


From that article:

"in the peer-reviewed scientific literature, examining 11 944 climate abstracts from 1991–2011 matching the topics 'global climate change' or 'global warming'. We find that 66.4% of abstracts expressed no position on AGW, 32.6% endorsed AGW, 0.7% rejected AGW and 0.3% were uncertain about the cause of global warming. Among abstracts expressing a position on AGW, 97.1% endorsed the consensus position that humans are causing global warming."

What that article conveniently left out is that the magic 97% came from just 77 papers that had a position on AGW. That means 75 out of 11,944 came to the "consensus", which is less than 1%.

But, you were right when you said their was a 99% consensus. Unfortunately, it's 99% against and 1% for.


----------



## andrewf

tygrus said:


> none, you cant just bash people for questioning the science. There is always new information coming in. That doesn't mean denial. People observe local short term effects - thats our nature and to link it to a global system takes a leap for many.
> 
> There is also an nutter side to the environment movement as well and these are a vocal bunch who want people living in caves and burning cow pies for fuel and then want all sorts of money for social and environmental programs while they block every development they can.


You can criticize people for not understanding science, though. Like the whole, "it's just a _theory_!" line. That automatically flags people who only have a superficial understanding of the debate.


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## jargey3000

oops


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## jargey3000

bump?


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## andrewf

tygrus said:


> What is the optimum environment for the earth? For a billion years it was a cauldron of boiling goo. For a few hundred million years it was hundreds of exploding volcanoes and before there was ever any ice on our planet at all, it was a warm wet humid environment. Ice caps and snow are a relatively new phenomenon for our earth coming only in the last maybe 100 million years or so meaning there was more water in the oceans even in the past.
> 
> Is the earth designed for human life seeing we have only been here for a few million years.
> 
> Scientist rag the average person for their short term perspective yet they make the same mistake.


This totally misses the point. The Earth is just a big rock. It doesn't care about temperature. Humans on the other hand are sentient beings who do care about the climate. And we evolved in a climate with CO2 concentrations of <350 ppm. Moving to a climate that is much warmer than now, even if the Earth has been as warm in the past, is not likely to be beneficial for humans. Especially when the change is happening as rapidly as it is now (decades and centuries), rather than a very gradual change (over tens or hundreds of thousands of years). And there is the economic risk of rising sea levels. A huge amount of the accumulated capital stock is within 10 feet of sea level. If sea levels rise just a little, a lot of humanity's accumulated wealth and economy is in harm's way.


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## bass player

Why is climate science the only branch of science in the entire world that works on consensus? All other branches of science deal with facts, and facts only.

Why is climate science the only branch of science where those who disagree with the party line are threatened with lawsuits?


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## jargey3000

none: " The VAST majority (>99%) of climate scientists agree that human caused climate change is real. Done. Just like evolution, vaccines,=.. blah blah blah."

Uh.... isn't it in the self-serving best interests of climate scientists to claim that it's real? Don't they continue to be employed & get funding by doing so?? just askin'.... dont bash me....


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## bass player

andrewf said:


> Moving to a climate that is much warmer than now, even if the Earth has been as warm in the past, is not likely to be beneficial for humans.


Yeah, I guess that's why so many people live closer to the poles than the equator, and that's why most of the food we eat is grown in the Antarctic. Silly me :biggrin:

The level of denial from some alarmists is truly mind boggling.


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## andrewf

Of course, making the equator even warmer will not have adverse consequences for agriculture. If you warm up North America by a few degrees, much of the American prairies turn to desert, and it's not clear to me that the Canadian shield in Ontario is going to make up for it in agricultural productivity. It takes time for soils to develop.


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## tygrus

Most of the largest food growing countries are in the northern hemisphere. US Russia Canada EU. If the frost free days are extended by just 2 months, these regions will grow two crops per season instead of one. That means twice the vegetation on the land and twice the carbon sequestration into the soil. Yup, part of the American SW may succumb to perpetual drought in the process and Australia might get hit as well. Those places may need to import food like some countries import oil. Its just a tradable commodity. Nobody is going to starve.


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## andrewf

It's not just the SW. Most of the Prairies are already very dry, and only sustained by irrigation from aquifers (unsustainable) or glacier-fed rivers. Warm things up and precipitation falls, glaciers provide less river water and most of the prairies turn to desert. Canada may stand to benefit, but net/net it's not clear that global agricultural output would increase. 

And as far as carbon emissions go, there is the risk of massive amounts of carbon being released by melting permafrost. We're playing with fire.


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## olivaw

One reason that they stopped using the term global warming and now use the term global climate change is that the original term created confusion. People were talking about balmy weather and longer growing seasons instead of very real dire consequences.. 



> The 772 scientists who wrote and edited the [IPCC] report argue that world leaders have only a few years left to reduce carbon emissions enough to avoid catastrophic warming, which would produce significant sea level rise and large-scale shifts in temperatures that would dramatically disrupt human life and natural ecosystems.


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## none

That's a very good point and I actually gave a bit of a rant about this in a meeting this week. People get far too focused on the mean response line where, although still important, the variability around the mean response line is equally or more important.

You can drown in a river with an average depth of 1 inch.


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## bass player

andrewf said:


> It's not just the SW. Most of the Prairies are already very dry, and only sustained by irrigation from aquifers (unsustainable) or glacier-fed rivers. Warm things up and precipitation falls, glaciers provide less river water and most of the prairies turn to desert. Canada may stand to benefit, but net/net it's not clear that global agricultural output would increase.
> 
> And as far as carbon emissions go, there is the risk of massive amounts of carbon being released by melting permafrost. We're playing with fire.


Again, you just made a lot of unproven claims not based on any scientific evidence. I fail to see how increased growing seasons in the 2 largest countries in the world will hurt the planet. Care to elaborate with some factual evidence??

Also, CO2 is not carbon and is not pollution. Why do the real deniers continue to ignore facts?


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## Userkare

bass player said:


> Also, CO2 is not carbon and is not pollution. Why do the real deniers continue to ignore facts?


But calling it 'carbon' pollution makes you think of sooty dirty black stuff, not what you exhale and plants need to live.


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## bass player

Userkare said:


> But calling it 'carbon' pollution makes you think of sooty dirty black stuff, not what you exhale and plants need to live.


It's like the "pollution" pics that show steam (not exhaust) coming out of a stack but are framed with the sun behind it to make the steam look dark so it looks like soot.


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## peterk

I mainly have a difficult time believing the so-called "final" word on climate change because I no longer believe in the objectivity of modern day scientists. There is nearly an infinite amount of money being thrown at climate scientists to produce the very best, most extensive explanations imaginable, and also to address and crush any conflicting information that may emerge (which happens from time to time), with new studies completed to explicitly disprove the conflicting study.

The "other side" as it were, doesn't stand a chance. A few die hard scientists who may have an interest in the field, who don't toe the line, will quickly be defunded and cast out from whatever institution represents them, or, silently begrudge being forced to relinquish their dignity and scientific integrity.

There are literally thousands of phd ecologists, biologists, geologists, meteorologists, economists etc. who spend 40 hours/week thinking about nothing but this stuff, getting paid handsomely, and their collective goal is to discover new ways in which to prove in the affirmative the reality and severity of climate change and the effects of carbon. 

Look at our forum raving lunatic "none", with the largest false sense of superiority one could possibly imagine for a human being to have, so out of control of his emotions and out of touch with reality on a number of subjects that one could not be blamed for discounting him as a crack-pot on ANY subject... He is a *senior* ecologist that works for the *Government*... Presumably he is in a position of considerable influence among other scientists, and may even have a hand in guiding public policy on the matter of environmental topics... From all his writings here, does this guy seem like a level headed, objective scientist to anyone?

How many other senior government and university "scientists" have spent their entire educational and professional lives, age 13-40 lets say, completely immersed, shrouded and obsessed with the narrow subject of "man-made pollution and man-made global warming"? These guys are surrounded at a ratio of 100:1 with like-minded, self congratulating individuals who, like themselves, are also living out their narrowly focused decades-long obsession that started as a tree-hugging teenager. Perhaps they had an early affinity for wildlife and nature subjects, or perhaps were exposed to some acute environmental degradations brought on by irresponsible industries in their communities decades ago that left a lasting impression. Ever since that early age these people have been living with a set of un-objective and un-examined beliefs that are disconnected from reality.

_These_ are the type of people who pursue careers in this subject, and are eventually called "senior ecologists" and other highly acclaimed titles. All of them purporting to be practicing *real science*, but a great majority of whom have already lost their scientific objectivity in their formative teen years a decade or two prior.


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## steve41

+1


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## olivaw

It's not just climate scientists warning us about anthropogenic climate change. 



> *American Association for the Advancement of Science*
> "The scientific evidence is clear: global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society."





> *American Chemical Society*
> "Comprehensive scientific assessments of our current and potential future climates clearly indicate that climate change is real, largely attributable to emissions from human activities, and potentially a very serious problem."





> *American Medical Association
> *"Our AMA ... supports the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s fourth assessment report and concurs with the scientific consensus that the Earth is undergoing adverse global climate change and that anthropogenic contributions are significant."





> *American Geophysical Union*
> "Human‐induced climate change requires urgent action. Humanity is the major influence on the global climate change observed over the past 50 years. Rapid societal responses can significantly lessen negative outcomes."





> *American Physical Society*
> "The evidence is incontrovertible: Global warming is occurring. If no mitigating actions are taken, significant disruptions in the Earth’s physical and ecological systems, social systems, security and human health are likely to occur. We must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases beginning now."





> *U.S. National Academy of Sciences*
> "The scientific understanding of climate change is now sufficiently clear to justify taking steps to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere."


http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/


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## peterk

So which institutional managers/bureaucrats, the bosses/employers of these scientists, directed all of these unrelated organizations to independently study the findings of a non-related scientific field, and publish a statement on the validity of that work? Which NASA senior representative thought it was his organizations role to compile and publish a layman's website titled "scientific consensus" regarding climate change?

This is just more evidence of the extreme and massive amount of funding and lengths that the environmental community, fully backed by complicit government entities (not scientists), will go to produce a favorable result for their endeavor. 

Please show me the websites and research papers where doctors have decided to study the findings of geologists just to "help them out"? or physicists have taken it upon themselves to review an archaeologist's research for its validity and integrity. And show me what organization other than the heavily funded climate sciences would even find it acceptable for non-related academics to start publishing their reviews of works they know little about?

It doesn't happen. This is not real science. This is a gigantic circle jerk by a bunch of fake scientists who have built thousands of careers and cashed billions of dollars in paycheques sent by all-too-willing governments who are looking for the answer "We need to increase taxes and grow the size of government to _fight climate change_".


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## Pluto

none said:


> Here you go: http://iopscience.iop.org/article/1...EA8C98AECBA8521C7F6.c2.iopscience.cld.iop.org
> 
> Of course, it won't make a difference.


I saw and heard a scientist explain that when applying for a grant to do research the odds of getting money go up if they portray themselves and their research as being relevant to global warming. So that's what they do to get the grant. They don't necessarily believe in the paradigm. 

And you are avoiding the question: what are your assumptions? and what is the margin of error in measuring global temperatures? 

For anyone in the field of ecology, climate and so on, I realize it is important to respect the dominant paradigm. Otherwise it could be a career ender. The history of science is littered with dominant paradigms that virtually everyone agreed on that later get abandoned. 

Besides, there is no proof that very slightly warmer temperatures due to human activity is bad. It is assumed to be bad, without any evidence that it is in fact bad.


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## Pluto

none said:


> Reminds me of one of my favourite songs actually.
> 
> 
> 
> The people who are qualified to question the science don't, simply because the evidence is overwhelming.


Nope. Many don't critique it because it would marginalize them and possibly end their career. I have seen components of the theory in question critiqued and the critique goes in one ear and out the other. 
Some years ago, perhaps even now, it was popular to believe that global warming caused more frequent and more powerful hurricanes. Then (about 10 years ago) a climatologist came on the news after a particularly nasty hurricane and stated that in the 1930's hurricanes were more frequent and on average worse than in the 2000's. Think any one vested in the global warming theory payed attention? Nope, not that I saw. 

None, it is a theory that has transformed into an ideology, and you appear to be more of an ideologue than a scientist.


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## jargey3000

Pluto said:


> None, it is a theory that has transformed into an ideology, and you appear to be more of an ideologue than a scientist.


I'll respond for None on that: "Duh, you're a stoopid moron, Pluto."


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## Pluto

olivaw said:


> One reason that they stopped using the term global warming and now use the term global climate change is that the original term created confusion. /"]dire consequences.[/URL].


Oh really. Most people thought it was because post 1998 there was no warming showing up in the "data" and some started to believe a cooling period was upon us. So the slogan became "climate change" to incorporate cooling into the political movement. Apparently both warming and cooling was now bad, and there would be a steady river of money flowing into research to achieve the impossible - no climate change at all. 

Too, the apparent pause in warming blew up faith, at least temporarily, in the predictive qualities of the "model" as well.


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## kcowan

Userkare said:


> Please, someone convince me that we are in good hands in our province and federal governments... That they will do the right things to affect real change, and in a cost-effective efficient way that doesn't just lead to bigger trouble sometime in the future.


Politicians manage symptoms at best. Symptoms seldom disclose the underlying problem.


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## bass player

Pluto said:


> Too, the apparent pause in warming blew up faith, at least temporarily, in the predictive qualities of the "model" as well.


The scramble to find excuses for the "pause" was hilarious...the ocean ate my warming, there's a hidden hot spot, the thermometers are now wrong, etc. Not once did the alarmists ever once consider that it's not a pause, but a plateau. Not once did they ever consider that it might continue for an undetermined amount of time or that temps might even drop.

The pause was the inconvenient truth.


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## Pluto

jargey3000 said:


> I'll respond for None on that: "Duh, you're a stoopid moron, Pluto."


LOL.


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## brad

Pluto said:


> Besides, there is no proof that very slightly warmer temperatures due to human activity is bad. It is assumed to be bad, without any evidence that it is in fact bad.


The global average temperature during the last ice age was only 5 degrees C cooler than it is today. Small changes in the global average temperature can have a big impact on climate.

The main concerns are the rate of change as well as the degree of change. If the climate changes slowly, ecosystems and people have plenty of time to adapt. If it changes quickly, the picture is very different. Take the climate of southern Ontario and replace it over 40-50 years with the climate of Pennsylvania or Maryland and you'll see lots of changes, some good (longer growing seasons), some bad (more floods and droughts, less snow and more ice storms in winter, the end of maple syrup production, etc.). There is plenty of evidence of negative effects: if you spent even 30 minutes looking through the literature you can find studies of areas where the climate has changed dramatically in recent history (by natural causes) over a relatively short time, where they can document the impacts. This isn't just based on modeling studies, it's based on actual data. Actually one of those places experiencing rapid change is the Experimental Lakes Area in Ontario.

It's been really interesting to me to read the arguments here: it brings home how politicized climate change has become, in part because of distrust of "big science," especially big government-funded science, and also because some prominent liberals have taken up the cause of climate change (e.g., Al Gore), and the solutions supposedly play into liberal agendas. The conspiracy theories are incredible.

You have people arguing that the world isn't actually warming, which requires us to suspend belief not only in the surface and satellite temperature record, but corroborating evidence from melting glaciers, retreating sea ice, accelerating sea level rise, changes in plant flowering dates, changes in ice-out dates on lakes, changes in bird migration patterns and nesting dates, changes in growing seasons, changes in ragweed pollen season length, changes in the geographic distribution of vector-borne diseases such as Lyme disease, and on and on.

You have people arguing that even if the world really is warming it's due to natural causes, which requires us to suspend belief in the many studies that have tried to explain recent climate change by natural causes and failed. Nobody, not even Al Gore or the IPCC, claims that humans are responsible for all climate change, just a growing portion of it. The evidence is strong, from multiple lines, so if you deny a human contribution you have to come up with an equally compelling explanation that's supported by the weight of the evidence. Nobody has been able to do that, though many have tried.

A good way to think about this is to ask yourself "what would have to be true in order for my position to be right?" Then look to see if there is actually any evidence that those things are, in fact, true. But of course if you believe that evidence is being suppressed (despite the fact that skeptical scientists get plenty of funding from fossil fuel interests), then nothing would convince you.

Bottom line: there is no point arguing about this stuff, people will believe what they need to believe.


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## bass player

And, if you don't buy into the scam, you may be prosecuted:

"Attorney General Loretta Lynch acknowledged Wednesday that there have been discussions within the Department of Justice about possibly pursuing civil action against so-called climate change deniers.

“This matter has been discussed. We have received information about it and have referred it to the FBI to consider whether or not it meets the criteria for which we could take action on,” Lynch said at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Justice Department operations."

http://cnsnews.com/print/news/artic...-whether-pursue-legal-action-against-climate?


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## bass player

brad said:


> Bottom line: there is no point arguing about this stuff, people will believe what they need to believe.


There is a point to arguing this because MY tax dollars are being used to fix a problem that hasn't been proven to be a problem. 

There is a point because alarmists want legal action taken against those who don't toe the party line, and the DOJ is investigating if "climate deniers" should be prosecuted. If that alone doesn't scare you, then you are a complete fool.

I don't care what you believe personally, but when it affects my wallet and my freedom, then it becomes my issue.


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## brad

bass player said:


> I don't care what you believe personally, but when it affects my wallet and my freedom, then it becomes my issue.


When it affects the health, safety, and livelihoods of billions of people worldwide, it becomes everyone's issue. But for you, your wallet and your freedom are all that matter. That says a lot.


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## Pluto

brad said:


> The evidence is strong, from multiple lines, so if you deny a human contribution you have to come up with an equally compelling explanation that's supported by the weight of the evidence.


All evidence for anything relies on one or more unprovable assumptions. I have asked proponents to identify the assumptions of the global warming, now climate change paradigm. I get no answer. That fits the profile of ideologues - they don't want to examine their assumptions. A possible reason for that is it may undermine their attempts to use the word "data" as if it is immutable. If one can brainwash people into believing that "data" is immutable, then the goals of the ideology are more easily achieved. 

I have also asked - what is the margin of error in measuring global temperatures? I get no response. Again that fits the profile of ideologues. Real science will examine their assumptions, and margins of error. In my experience proponents of the dominant paradigm decline to acknowledge the possibility of any error at all, and that is more like a religion, than science. 

In Stalin's Russia, science came under political control. By the early 1950's no science paper could be published unless it [passed political review. All science had to conform to the goals of the state regardless of veracity. In other words, research that did not conform to the goals and views of the state did not get published even if the research was reliable. 

Something similar is happening now with global warming theory. Climate science must be socially and politically authorized, otherwise one is a nut, or a moron. People who ask questions get excommunicated. So it isn't about science. It is about blending in with the herd, or being marginalized. 

That's why proponents use the word "consensus". It is a veiled threat: conform or be rejected. If Einstein cared about consensus, he never would have proposed his relativity theory. When he came up with his theory, he was the only one who believed it. That's how science is supposed to work, not by consensus and insults to get people to conform and to avoid talking about assumptions and margin of error.


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## bass player

brad said:


> When it affects the health, safety, and livelihoods of billions of people worldwide, it becomes everyone's issue. But for you, your wallet and your freedom are all that matter. That says a lot.


Wrong. You are making a false assumption. No one has proven that "billions of lives are at stake", or millions, or even thousands. But, why let facts get in the way?


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## agent99

bass player said:


> I don't care what you believe personally, but when it affects my wallet and my freedom, then it becomes my issue.


This is true for all of us. We then get to vote for a government that has similar views on issues to those we have. If they don't get elected, then so be it. Personally, I am quite happy to have some of my tax money go towards environmental issues.

It seems to me that with the advent of automobiles, high population growth, industrialization, etc over past 100-200 years, there must have been a large increase in emissions of greenhouse gases like C02 and NOx as well as other man made products like fluorocarbons. It was surprising to me that the cut back in CFC (fluorocarbon) use made such a significant impact on the ozone layer. So, in this smaller way, it was shown that man's actions can have an effect on global climate.

Regarding greenhouse gases, we have been consuming oil, gas and other fuels at an ever increasing rate. Eventually we will run out or they will become very expensive. What can we do about that? My simple minded view, is that we should conserve our fossil fuels for as long as possible. This at same time should reduce rate of greenhouse gas emissions and have some positive effect on global climate.

It is very doubtful that anything we do will have a _significant_ effect on climate change, but we should do what we can. It does seem that all major players have agreed to this. There are of course, to quote our PhD none, "crazzies" on each side of the issue.


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## brad

Pluto said:


> Real science will examine their assumptions, and margins of error. In my experience proponents of the dominant paradigm decline to acknowledge the possibility of any error at all, and that is more like a religion, than science.


I don't know where you're getting this stuff -- have you looked at any of the IPCC reports? They discuss uncertainties endlessly and set up an entire procedure to classify their level of confidence in each statement. Some statements can be made with high confidence, others with very little confidence. Error bars are given for all estimates. Underlying assumptions are stated transparently.

Actual scientists don't generally talk about a "consensus" on climate change because consensus is irrelevant to science: science isn't done by vote. One person who's right is worth 10,000 who are wrong. We're all hoping that one person turns out to be right and everyone can go back to their regularly scheduled programming. But so far, none of the skeptics have been able to present a credible case for why we should believe this isn't a problem.

The "consensus" matters more for policy. If you're basing public policy on a small group of skeptics who are telling a more palatable story, you have to justify why you're ignoring the overwhelming weight of evidence and scientific opinion. If you have a good reason to ignore it, that's fine, but you do have to come up with a rational justification. Most of the justifications I've seen for ignoring the majority view are not rational, they're based on conspiracy theories and political ideology.


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## Pluto

Here is an example of why some people question the global warming/climate change paradigm: -

http://www.theguardian.com/environm...a-ice-at-record-levels-despite-global-warming

One never hears of global warming proponents talk about increasing ice volumes at the south pole. the model of global warming that is allegedly proven true, and 99% of scientists agree, predicts that South pole ice should be decreasing over the last 30 years. 

But lookie here: the ice has been increasing. This is a serious anomaly that shows the model is flawed. And the resistance of the 99% to address this fits the profile of an ideology.


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## bass player

brad said:


> Most of the justifications I've seen for ignoring the majority view are not rational, they're based on conspiracy theories and political ideology.


Then why is the Department of Justice in the US considering prosecuting "climate deniers" if they are just crazy nutbars? 

Do they prosecute the guy walking down the street with a sign that says the world will end?

Do they prosecute those who say the moon landings were faked?


----------



## peterk

Pluto said:


> For anyone in the field of ecology, climate and so on, I realize it is important to respect the dominant paradigm. Otherwise it could be a career ender.


Industry anecdote for you:

We hired a PHD meteorological expert to consult with us, review weather & climate data/statistics, and develop new precipitation levels for 1:10, 1:100, 1:1000 etc, major rainfall events. This report will guide major changes to multi-billion dollar earthwork projects for decades into the future. This guy is top of the field, very successful.

When reviewing his report (over a conference call), we asked that he include an addendum that stated how the "effects of climate change" may have an impact on his results and findings. The report required this because a provincial government directive requires that we "consider the effects of climate change" in all of our long term planning.

His response, over the phone, from this top-of-the-field meteorologist, was "hehe.........<long pause>............ err, yeah... I can add some words to that effect."

I highly doubt this guy has ever made any statement or written anything publicly that would ever conflict with the affirmative findings of climate change scientists... and yet, for 5 seconds on a conference call, his opinion on the matter was clear enough to all of us at the other end of the phone to understand.


----------



## brad

bass player said:


> Then why is the Department of Justice in the US considering prosecuting "climate deniers" if they are just crazy nutbars?
> 
> Do they prosecute the guy walking down the street with a sign that says the world will end?
> 
> Do they prosecute those who say the moon landings were faked?


The Justice Department considers a lot of things but doesn't follow up on most of them. The argument was that the Justice Department succesfully pursued tobacco companies for claiming that cigarettes aren't unhealthy, despite an overwhelming amount of evidence to the contrary. By making their claims, the tobacco firms were delaying progress toward reducing the prevalence of smoking, likely resulting in additional deaths that otherwise would have been prevented. Similarly, organizations claiming that climate change is a hoax or otherwise trying to prevent action on climate change, may be contributing to delays in action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. If those delays can be shown to result in preventable deaths, illnesses, and diseases, maybe the "denialist propaganda" organizations should be held accountable.

I'm not sure that would hold up, though, because the impacts of greenhouse gas emissions go on for hundreds to thousands of years after they're emitted. Each molecule of CO2 remains in the atmosphere for roughly a century. How do you separate the impact of efforts to oppose climate change policies from the impact of things we were doing before anyone realized we were changing the climate? It doesn't seem like a strong parallel case to me.


----------



## bass player

brad said:


> The Justice Department considers a lot of things but doesn't follow up on most of them. The argument was that the Justice Department succesfully pursued tobacco companies for claiming that cigarettes aren't unhealthy, despite an overwhelming amount of evidence to the contrary. By making their claims, the tobacco firms were delaying progress toward reducing the prevalence of smoking, likely resulting in additional deaths that otherwise would have been prevented. Similarly, organizations claiming that climate change is a hoax or otherwise trying to prevent action on climate change, may be contributing to delays in action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. If those delays can be shown to result in preventable deaths, illnesses, and diseases, maybe the "denialist propaganda" organizations should be held accountable.
> 
> I'm not sure that would hold up, though, because the impacts of greenhouse gas emissions go on for hundreds to thousands of years after they're emitted. Each molecule of CO2 remains in the atmosphere for roughly a century. How do you separate the impact of efforts to oppose climate change policies from the impact of things we were doing before anyone realized we were changing the climate? It doesn't seem like a strong parallel case to me.


Doesn't the fact that the DOJ is even considering legal action against those who don't agree with an unproven theory scare you?


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## Userkare

So, if the scientists are saying that human activity is "contributing" to climate change and global warning, then is it valid to assume that there is a natural component to it as well?

Then, what's the ratio of natural to human ? 1,000,000:1? 100,000:1? ... 1:1? If climate change is inevitable, because there's a natural component outside of our control, for how long can we delay it by reducing only our human contribution? 

We built our cities alongside rivers and oceans when this was not a concern, because ships were the only method of delivering goods over great distances. Would our time, money, and efforts now better be spent in building infrastructure to prevent flooding of these cities instead of cramming windmills in peoples' backyards where they're not welcome? If vast farmland is to become arid, shouldn't we be concentrating on methods of irrigation, or starting to migrate agriculture to less affected locations?


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## humble_pie

wow the issue has gotten as heated as the pro & anti abortion debates back in the day


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## peterk

As a nature-loving young man, an optimist, I entered university to study environmental engineering. I did this for 2 years before changing my major to something more substantial, getting out of that toxic environment (heh).

My take is this:

The field attracts overall a much lower caliber of person than real, hard sciences. Mechanical and Computer Engineering, Physics and Math. These guy are at a completely different level in school regarding the amount of real learning they have to do, the quantity and quality, the expectations set upon them, their dedication to following the scientific method, and just their IQ and raw intelligence, they are smarter. 

The "type" that goes into the environmental sciences can be summarized as:

1) People that are into science and/or nature stuff, but aren't quite smart enough to cut it in real STEM subjects at school (the above subjects).
2) Smart people that are also stoners and/or lazy, who have low work ethic, but come from good families, so are forced into the sciences.
3) Young women who are being shoved against their will into STEM subjects by their schools, advisors or parents, and thus choose the easiest science/engineering as a compromise to get everyone off their backs, environmental.
4) Young men who have no real interest in anything, but know that they should at least be studying a science at school and not humanities, so pick environmental because they hear that it has the highest number girls, and that it isn't too hard.
5) Hard-core environmentalists and tree huggers. People who have been exposed to something drastic regarding the environment during their formative pre-teen and early teen years, perhaps they had a hard-core environmentalist parent, and are dedicated to perusing environmental reforms with a vengeance. They have no interest in science.

For every 10 to 20 students in the hard sciences, there is only 1 in the environmental field of the same caliber, with the same raw interest in perusing real science, with the same dedication to learning and following the scientific method.

Some of you may find it insulting the way I'm characterizing environmental people, and I don't mean to be rude, I have lots of environmental friends from school after all . But this is what I saw and is in my opinion the reality of the situation.

Many of these people can and do end up with advanced degrees, and hold high positions within the environmental field in governments, universities, and consulting firms. At the core of their selves, their level of interest in scientific integrity and knowledge is not even close to the same level as a real scientist in other fields. They all know it, nobody goes through 4 years of this at school without realizing that all the other science and engineer fields are way harder, way more substantial, and have much higher scientific integrity. Once established though, nobody would admit such a thing. They are too far down that path, their careers are set, and their livelihoods and families now rely on them to continue.

Ironically, I can highly recommend the environmental sciences/engineering to any bright young person looking to choose their path.  There are tons of reasonably good paying jobs, school is easy, you get to spend time in the great outdoors often, and you don't have to work too hard. It's a great career. All you have to be willing to do is pretend that what you're doing is objective science when it isn't, and force people and industries to waste millions and millions of dollars based on presenting your dubious findings as irrefutable fact. Personally I wasn't comfortable with that, and once I realized what was going on, I got out while I was still young.

Cheers


----------



## humble_pie

Userkare said:


> Would our time, money, and efforts now better be spent in building infrastructure to prevent flooding of these cities instead of cramming windmills in peoples' backyards where they're not welcome?


building levees, ***** & floodwalls has not worked out in New Orleans or in Venice

***** & floodwalls did help the Netherlands. But they would have started fortifying against the sea almost a thousand years ago?




> If vast farmland is to become arid, shouldn't we be concentrating on methods of irrigation, or starting to migrate agriculture to less affected locations?



another poster upthread has already pointed out that canadian prairie farming cannot be migrated further north since there is no soil further north. Instead, there are muskeg, swamp & rocky Laurentian shield. Evidently it's close to impossible to drain muskeg across huge areas such as northern manitoba, saskatchewan, alberta, think about the costs. Plus it would take centuries of warmth for soil to develop from erosion on those harsh northern terrains.

rich southern ontario & southern quebec farmlands cannot be migrated north onto Laurentian rocks. Maritime farmlands cannot be migrated north into the gulf of st-lawrence or the atlantic ocean.


----------



## brad

peterk said:


> The field attracts overall a much lower caliber of person than real, hard sciences. Mechanical and Computer Engineering, Physics and Math. These guy are at a completely different level in school regarding the amount of real learning they have to do, the quantity and quality, the expectations set upon them, their dedication to following the scientific method, and just their IQ and raw intelligence, they are smarter.


You seem to think that climate scientists are "environmental scientists." They're not. They're geophysicists.


----------



## bass player

humble_pie said:


> another poster upthread has already pointed out that canadian prairie farming cannot be migrated further north since there is no soil further north. Instead, there are muskeg, swamp & rocky Laurentian shield. Evidently it's close to impossible to drain muskeg across huge areas such as northern manitoba, saskatchewan, alberta, think about the costs. Plus it would take centuries of warmth for soil to develop from erosion on those harsh northern terrains.
> 
> rich southern ontario & southern quebec farmlands cannot be migrated north onto Laurentian rocks. Maritime farmlands cannot be migrated north into the gulf of st-lawrence or the atlantic ocean.


No problem...a longer growing season in the current farming land will increase yield. Right now the growing season in the prairies is from mid-May to mid-Sep. Change that to March to November and the increased benefit is enormous. There is no need to farm further north if the output in existing farmland can be increased.

You are cherry picking the negatives while completely ignoring the positives.


----------



## humble_pie

bass player said:


> You are cherry picking the negatives while completely ignoring the positives.



would appreciate if you would please refrain from personal attacks.

double-cropping the land is too much pesticide, herbicide, fertilizer. Will damage the soil in the long run. Do you believe double-cropping & triple-cropping via increased chemicals has worked in warmer asian countries? i believe not


----------



## humble_pie

(a minor trudeau theme) (the Vote is in) (Sophie was radiant & ravishing at the state dinner) (but totally stealing the spotlight was Michelle's stunning dark blue flower-strewn gown by canadian designer Jason Wu)


----------



## olivaw

Userkare said:


> So, if the scientists are saying that human activity is "contributing" to climate change and global warning, then is it valid to assume that there is a natural component to it as well?
> 
> Then, what's the ratio of natural to human ? 1,000,000:1? 100,000:1? ... 1:1? If climate change is inevitable, because there's a natural component outside of our control, for how long can we delay it by reducing only our human contribution?
> 
> We built our cities alongside rivers and oceans when this was not a concern, because ships were the only method of delivering goods over great distances. Would our time, money, and efforts now better be spent in building infrastructure to prevent flooding of these cities instead of cramming windmills in peoples' backyards where they're not welcome? If vast farmland is to become arid, shouldn't we be concentrating on methods of irrigation, or starting to migrate agriculture to less affected locations?



More like 0.03:1. 

CO2 concentrations have risen from 280 to nearly 380 ppm over the last 150 years. In the past it between 5,000 and 20,000 years to get 100ppm of change. Humans to natural in terms of CO2 production is 33:1 up to 133:1.


----------



## bass player

humble_pie said:


> would appreciate if you would please refrain from personal attacks.
> 
> double-cropping the land is too much pesticide, herbicide, fertilizer. Will damage the soil in the long run. Do you believe double-cropping & triple-cropping via increased chemicals has worked in warmer asian countries? i believe not


It's not a personal attack to point out that you are cherry picking data. And, you did it again by assuming only bad can come from increased crop yield.

Can you name one positive (out of the dozens) that will come from a warmer climate (if it's even warming), or will it all be bad in your world?


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## none

This is pretty hilarious to watch. What a train wreck.

Brad : I would argue that science in many ways about consensus in the sense that through peer review, citation rates etc that your conclusions/ideas/assumptions are supported by other scientists. Many people need to agree that what you did was correct and reasonable and that leads to your inference to be valid. Small point but science isn't fully objective. It can't be. Data is viewed through the lens of human experience. The more people involved ideally washes this out. That's why the very broad consensus of climate change is likely true - a tremendous amount of people agree with the methods and analysis. Thousands of people who are trained to do this work are probably not going to be all wrong. If it was 50:50 - yes there would still be a debate in the literature but at 97+:3-1, no - it's done. Anyway, small point but people (who don't know what they're talking about) yell SHOW ME THE DATA! thinking that will give them their answer. Science isn't as simple as that.

As for my employment being dependent on supporting climate change science. Nothing could be further from the truth. If I could come up with some work that would refute all climate change science I would become tremendously famous. PLUS - all the sweet speaking fees to the oil and gas industries would make me a very wealthy man. Anyway, funny to read 'flat-earth' level of conspiracy theories about scientist. Scientist are the biggest blabber mouths I know. If anyone was sitting on any data proving climate change was a hoax they would have blabbed about it LOOOOONG ago. 

Anyway, to the forum. Keep up the good work.


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## Userkare

humble_pie said:


> another poster upthread has already pointed out that canadian prairie farming cannot be migrated further north since there is no soil further north. Instead, there are muskeg, swamp & rocky Laurentian shield. Evidently it's close to impossible to drain muskeg across huge areas such as northern manitoba, saskatchewan, alberta, think about the costs. Plus it would take centuries of warmth for soil to develop from erosion on those harsh northern terrains.
> 
> rich southern ontario & southern quebec farmlands cannot be migrated north onto Laurentian rocks. Maritime farmlands cannot be migrated north into the gulf of st-lawrence or the atlantic ocean.


That's just Canada; we're talking about GLOBAL climate change.


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## sags

These kind of debates remind me of the debates about the ill effects of smoking.

As far as I know, there has never been absolute undisputable instant evidence that smoking directly causes cancer....."no puff a cigarette and see there is the cancer" direct evidence, but we have moved beyond the debate and accept there is a correlation between smoking and lung disease.

Accepting that humans have created greenhouse gases, which are negatively affecting the protective shield around the planet..........and which will have dire consequences in the future isn't much of a reach.

If people want to wait until New York is under water, and a haze of toxic pollution surrounds the globe.........it will be too late. The only option left will be to bend over and kiss your arse goodbye.


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## bass player

none said:


> If it was 50:50 - yes there would still be a debate in the literature but at 97+:3-1, no - it's done.


But, it's not 97%. That study was proven to be flawed.


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## bass player

Userkare said:


> That's just Canada; we're talking about GLOBAL climate change.


So what? Is an increased growing season in Russia, China, or northern Europe a bad thing?


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## Userkare

sags said:


> If people want to wait until New York is under water, and a haze of toxic pollution surrounds the globe.........it will be too late. The only option left will be to bend over and kiss your arse goodbye.



So now CO2 is a haze of toxic pollution? Stop breathing!


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## Userkare

bass player said:


> So what? Is an increased growing season in Russia, China, or northern Europe a bad thing?


I was responding to humble-pie who was only giving examples of how Canada can't shift its agricultural lands.


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## humble_pie

Userkare said:


> That's just Canada; we're talking about GLOBAL climate change.




you're right, the issue is GLOBAL climate change!

canada is an interesting citation because it is one of the tiny handful of countries with a very large land mass located closer to a pole, in canada's case the north pole. IE from the point of land mass alone, canada has millions of hectares of tundra, muskeg, swamp & rock to her north.

so does russia, so does china. I don't believe there are any other countries with very large land masses closer to the poles, therefore colder.

now try telling the dozens of countries in central & northern south america, in saharan & sub-saharan africa, in the middle east, in south asia, in southeast asia, in indonesia, in micronesian islands ... try telling farmers in those countries that all they have to do is simply buy land in sweden or scotland or labrador or ungava & there, once they've moved their families & learned the language, they can happily resume farming to their heart's content.

the majority of farmers in equatorial regions are native subsistence farmers. Move? not a chance. It's a million times more likely they will die of starvation on their ancestral homelands.

it's time to quash the foolish idea that productive global agriculture can easily walk itself 2000 km further north or south, because climate change is changing equatorial farm regions into deserts.


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## peterk

humble_pie said:


> it's time to quash the foolish idea that productive global agriculture can easily walk itself 2000 km further north or south, because climate change is changing equatorial farm regions into deserts.


I agree, that's a ridiculous notion. Developing new farmlands would be a monstrous task. Not to mention the giant environmental/land use/regulatory hurdle that no endeavoring enterprise would easily overcome. Obviously the solution is to develop effective irrigation strategies.


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## none

yes! Water teleportation! peterk has solved it! GENIUS!

It's a wonder how no one had thought of that......


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## brad

none said:


> yes! Water teleportation! peterk has solved it! GENIUS!
> 
> It's a wonder how no one had thought of that......


Actually water teleportion in time (not space) is one viable solution in many countries. Some of my work involves helping developing countries adapt to climate change (many developing countries are very vulnerable and are already experiencing impacts, regardless of the cause of climate change, the fact is that many crops they used to be able to grow no longer grow, cattle are dying off due to lack of food and water, and plenty of people are as well). One of the simplest solutions, which many farmers simply haven't been able to implement due to lack of technology and funds, is water storage: store water during the rainy season (assuming there is one) to use later during the dry season. We take that kind of stuff for granted here, but in sub-Saharan Africa it's not so simple.

There's a huge effort to help farmers everywhere adapt to climate change, because a certain amount of climate change is inevitable no matter what we do now. This is true even if you don't believe humans are changing the climate: natural cycles such as El Niño can be devastating to people in many developing countries.


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## humble_pie

the real issue to focus on is how to develop humanoids that would require re-fuelling with food only once a month. Maybe once a week at the most.

sewage costs would plummet. Feeding on a lunar cycle instead of a solar cycle would save the rivers & the oceans. Oh the cost cuttings.

perhaps the scientists on here could work on how to adjust human metabolism? i mean, why are we still getting hungry every few hours, when once a month, say on the day of the new moon, would be so much better.


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## bass player

humble_pie said:


> it's time to quash the foolish idea that productive global agriculture can easily walk itself 2000 km further north or south, because climate change is changing equatorial farm regions into deserts.


I see that the same unproven assumptions keep being made with no evidence to back them up...that a little warming automatically turns productive farmland into desert and everyone starves.

But, the alarmists have never needed evidence. All the doom and gloom claims are eagerly lapped up...it's all going to be bad, and nothing good will happen. End of story and how dare you question it.


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## bass player

Userkare said:


> So now CO2 is a haze of toxic pollution? Stop breathing!


Yup...CO2 is a magic gas. It can make it colder. It can make it warmer. There is nothing that CO2 can't do!!


----------



## none

humble_pie said:


> the real issue to focus on is how to develop humanoids that would require re-fuelling with food only once a month. Maybe once a week at the most.
> 
> sewage costs would plummet. Feeding on a lunar cycle instead of a solar cycle would save the rivers & the oceans. Oh the cost cuttings.
> 
> perhaps the scientists on here could work on how to adjust human metabolism? i mean, why are we still getting hungry every few hours, when once a month, say on the day of the new moon, would be so much better.


Hey - lets turn this towards something where people actually learn something. This already sort of exists and some people subscribe to it. It's quite interesting:

Check it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calorie_restriction


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## humble_pie

hildegarde of bingen. A 12th century german nun, theologian, mystic, musician, composer, herbalist, healer & saint, she founded an order of nuns & left a large body of works written in latin. Her medicinal & herbal treatises are still studied today by european naturopaths. 

hildegarde, reportedly, did not eat food. She had trained her body to sustain itself by breathing air. She wasn't exactly photo-synthesising, but close.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hildegard_of_Bingen


----------



## steve41

Breatharianism.... that's the ticket! No requirement to eat food (not sure about water though).


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## LBCfan

humble_pie said:


> Her medicinal & herbal treatises are still studied today by european naturopaths.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hildegard_of_Bingen


So? A bunch of quacks study 'ancient texts'. WTFC. How many thousands of people have died because they put their faith in Her or her 'students'?


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## none

Wow - what a nasty thread this has turned into. Ironic because Trudeau and Obama are all about respect and good feelings.


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## bass player

none said:


> Wow - what a nasty thread this has turned into. Ironic because Trudeau and Obama are all about respect and good feelings.


You need more than good feelings to lead a country.


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## jargey3000

none said:


> Wow - what a nasty thread this has turned into. Ironic because Trudeau and Obama are all about respect and good feelings.


Some of us played a bigger role than others in turning (my) thread into a nasty one, with name-calling, rudeness and very inappropriate & embarrassing examples of critical thinking skills.
'none' of us is not guilty


----------



## humble_pie

LBCfan said:


> So? A bunch of quacks study 'ancient texts'. WTFC. How many thousands of people have died because they put their faith in Her or her 'students'?




maybe try to lighten up? anyone can see that folks posting about not eating as a response to climate change are joking!


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## jargey3000

I wish the g.d. climate WOULD CHANGE, around here! (check the wind chill, just another typical march day)

Current Conditions Past 24 hours Radar Satellite Lightning
Light Snow
-8°C
Observed at:
St. John's Int'l Airport
Date:
11:30 AM NDT Monday 14 March 2016
Condition:
Light Snow
Temperature:
-7.6°C
Wind:
N 42 gust 67 km/h
Wind Chill:
-18


----------



## Pluto

brad said:


> I don't know where you're getting this stuff -- have you looked at any of the IPCC reports? They discuss uncertainties endlessly and set up an entire procedure to classify their level of confidence in each statement. Some statements can be made with high confidence, others with very little confidence. Error bars are given for all estimates. Underlying assumptions are stated transparently.
> 
> Actual scientists don't generally talk about a "consensus" on climate change because consensus is irrelevant to science: science isn't done by vote. One person who's right is worth 10,000 who are wrong. We're all hoping that one person turns out to be right and everyone can go back to their regularly scheduled programming. But so far, none of the skeptics have been able to present a credible case for why we should believe this isn't a problem.
> 
> The "consensus" matters more for policy. If you're basing public policy on a small group of skeptics who are telling a more palatable story, you have to justify why you're ignoring the overwhelming weight of evidence and scientific opinion. If you have a good reason to ignore it, that's fine, but you do have to come up with a rational justification. Most of the justifications I've seen for ignoring the majority view are not rational, they're based on conspiracy theories and political ideology.


1. That's wonderful that the IPCC identifies assumptions. But I am asking you, and None what your assumptions are. You guys are apologists for the alarmist perspective, so I want you personally to tell me what your assumptions are, not a referral so some other documents. 
2. later in your post you use the phrase "overwhelming weight of evidence". You use that phrase as if it has no connection at all to unprovable assumptions. It has overwhelming weight for you because of the personal value you place on it. You see "overwhelming weight" is your personal subjective evaluation which is reliant on your personal assumptions. There is no "evidence" free of personal valuation. 
3. What is the margin of error in measuring global temperatures over time? This question never gets an answer. What seems to be the problem? 

I am not arguing, I am asking questions that to date haven't been answered by apologists for the alarmist perspective. The margin of error question is a central one as alarmists typically talk as if "data" and "evidence" is absolutely precise, immutable and stands there all by itself free of assumptions and values, while actually it is filtered by the alarmist screen, and the alarmist screen is defined by the alarmist assumptions. So clearly, the "overwhelming weight of evidence" is shaped by alarmist assumptions.


----------



## Pluto

Userkare said:


> So, if the scientists are saying that human activity is "contributing" to climate change and global warning, then is it valid to assume that there is a natural component to it as well?
> 
> Then, what's the ratio of natural to human ? 1,000,000:1? 100,000:1? ... 1:1? If climate change is inevitable, because there's a natural component outside of our control, for how long can we delay it by reducing only our human contribution?
> 
> We built our cities alongside rivers and oceans when this was not a concern, because ships were the only method of delivering goods over great distances. Would our time, money, and efforts now better be spent in building infrastructure to prevent flooding of these cities instead of cramming windmills in peoples' backyards where they're not welcome? If vast farmland is to become arid, shouldn't we be concentrating on methods of irrigation, or starting to migrate agriculture to less affected locations?


Humans are part of nature. Humans are animals. People talk as if humans are somehow outside of nature. How so?


----------



## Pluto

bass player said:


> Doesn't the fact that the DOJ is even considering legal action against those who don't agree with an unproven theory scare you?


Yep, it scares me. Echo's of Stalinist Russia after he made it illegal to publish scientific articles and research that did not conform to the political goals of the state. Very scary. Science ought to be an institution free of interference from politics.


----------



## Pluto

none said:


> This is pretty hilarious to watch. What a train wreck.
> 
> Brad : I would argue that science in many ways about consensus in the sense that through peer review, citation rates etc that your conclusions/ideas/assumptions are supported by other scientists. Many people need to agree that what you did was correct and reasonable and that leads to your inference to be valid. Small point but science isn't fully objective. It can't be. Data is viewed through the lens of human experience.


Yep. Not only through experience but personal evaluation and personal judgment. There is no data free of personal beliefs, evaluation, and judgment. Peer review by people who share the same beliefs isn't going to be very critical. 

By he way, None, what is the margin of error in measuring global temperatures over time? This question hasn't been answered yet.


----------



## carverman

Pluto said:


> 1. That's wonderful that the IPCC identifies assumptions. But I am asking you, and None what your assumptions are. You guys are apologists for the *alarmist perspective*, so I want you personally to tell me what your assumptions are, not a referral so some other documents.
> 2. later in your post you use the phrase "overwhelming weight of evidence". You use that phrase as if it has no connection at all to unprovable assumptions. It has overwhelming weight for you because of the personal value you place on it. You see "overwhelming weight" is your personal subjective evaluation which is reliant on your personal assumptions. There is no "evidence" free of personal valuation.
> 3. What is the *margin of error in measuring global temperatures over time? This question never gets an answer. What seems to be the problem? *


*

Lots of margin for errors. FLAWED SCIENCE. Calculations are based on predictable weather data.




Each of the four global datasets, as well as the satellite measurements, have advantages and disadvantages, by virtue of their different approaches to tackling some of the main issues with taking earth’s temperature.

Click to expand...





All of the surface datasets are updated every month as new data becomes available and understanding of uncertainties improves. It’s through a combination of all available data that scientists are able to get a robust estimate of how temperatures are changing.

Click to expand...





I am not arguing, I am asking questions that to date haven't been answered by apologists for the alarmist perspective.
The margin of error question is a central one as alarmists typically talk as if "data" and "evidence" is absolutely precise, immutable and stands there all by itself free of assumptions and values,
while actually it is filtered by the alarmist screen,
and the alarmist screen  is defined by the alarmist assumptions.
So clearly, the "overwhelming weight of evidence" is shaped by alarmist assumptions.

Click to expand...





In the first step, scientists pump largely unjustifiable assumptions into simplified computer models to conjure up the most extreme predictions of manmade climate change possible. In step two of the dance, policy analysts dig out all of the same failed market-hostile policy options that have been promoted for any number of other social and environmental ills, and push them as the answer to man-made global warming.

Click to expand...

https://www.fraserinstitute.org/article/climate-alarmist-two-step




While the threat of rapid climate change is certainly one to be taken seriously, it is equally important to be sure that we understand what is really happening with the climate, and what the causes of observed changes are before we take actions that will divert scarce resources into potentially fruitless, or even harmful policies that hurt individuals by raising the costs of energy and forcing them into less-safe technologies, while hurting societies by reducing their economic freedom and ability to compete in a global environment

Click to expand...

. 

In case of ONTARIO, Wynne seeing global warming as her way to save us by raising carbon footprint taxes.
Next, increased prices on dairy and meats because too many cows result in methane cowfarts and that raises the overall global temperature...data is still be collected on this evidence.*


----------



## brad

Pluto said:


> 3. What is the margin of error in measuring global temperatures over time? This question never gets an answer. What seems to be the problem?


The globally averaged combined land and ocean surface temperature data as calculated by a linear trend show a warming of 0.85 [0.65 to 1.06] °C over the period 1880 to 2012, when multiple independently produced datasets exist. There's your margin of error: the range is between 0.65 and 1.06 degrees C.

Source: http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/syr/AR5_SYR_FINAL_SPM.pdf

As for my assumptions: my assumptions are that the IPCC report accurately represents the current state of scientific knowledge on climate change. This isn't based on "alarmist tendencies" but rather 27 years of following the iPCC's work, attending a few of its meetings, talking with some of the scientists involved in the process (including prominent skeptics such as Richard Lindzen of MIT), and reading the reports.


----------



## olivaw

Some people suspect that global warming deniers are under-educated louts. :stupid: People who would rather cling to pseudoscience and conspiracy theories than accept the overwhelming scientific evidence. It turns out that there is more to it than that. They see climate science as a threat to their security and self image. :cower:

Be patient with deniers and try not to hurt their feelings. 

Sunny ways, my friends, sunny ways. 

(/Sarcasm)


----------



## bgc_fan

olivaw said:


> They see climate science as a threat to their security and self image. :cower:


I think what is interesting in this story is the link that Exxon had in-house staff investigate climate change in 1982 and they developed a model that seems to be holding up now. Of course they buried the research and worked on denying that climate change exists.

So unless you want to make the argument that Exxon is part of the conspiracy to scare people into working against climate change, you might want to realize that they were aware of it, but they were more concerned on what affect it would have on oil sales.


----------



## bgc_fan

Pluto said:


> Here is an example of why some people question the global warming/climate change paradigm: -
> 
> But lookie here: the ice has been increasing. This is a serious anomaly that shows the model is flawed. And the resistance of the 99% to address this fits the profile of an ideology.


Did you even read the article or just the title? They offer explanations and pointed out the Arctic ice is melting. As a result, there is a NET loss of ice globally:

Quote:
But Dr Claire Parkinson, a senior scientist at Nasa’s Goddard Space Flight Centre, says increasing Antarctic ice does not contradict the general warming trend. Overall the Earth is losing sea ice at a rate of 35,000 sq km per year (13,514 sq miles).

“Not every location on the Earth is having the same responses to climate changes. The fact that ice in one part of the world is doing one thing and in another part ice is doing another is not surprising. The Earth is large and as the climate changes it is normal to see different things going on,” says Parkinson.
======

Seems like this article goes against your point.


----------



## bgc_fan

bass player said:


> Then why is the Department of Justice in the US considering prosecuting "climate deniers" if they are just crazy nutbars?
> 
> Do they prosecute the guy walking down the street with a sign that says the world will end?
> 
> Do they prosecute those who say the moon landings were faked?


You must be referring to Attorney General Loretta Lynch. You really misunderstood any of the context if that is how you are playing her comments.

The talks were in reference to the fossil fuel industry, not about the general public. She was making the comparison to the tobacco industry which had proof that cigarettes contributed to lung cancer, but would campaign against it. Similarly, I've already mentioned that Exxon was already aware of CO2 contribution to climate change, but would run a campaign denying it. It's not a question of quieting down deniers, but more the fact that if companies had proof of the problems and actively denying the issue, they should should be punished. Is it that different than GM denying ignition problems even though their engineers were aware of the problem for at least a decade?


----------



## jargey3000

olivaw said:


> Some people suspect that global warming deniers are under-educated louts. :stupid: People who would rather cling to pseudoscience and conspiracy theories than accept the overwhelming scientific evidence. It turns out that there is more to it than that. They see climate science as a threat to their security and self image. :cower:
> 
> Be patient with deniers and try not to hurt their feelings.
> 
> Sunny ways, my friends, sunny ways.
> 
> (/Sarcasm)


What camp would you put people like me in,olivaw? I don't deny the "globe" has been"warming" over the last little while ("little" being as long as we've had the means & interest to measure these things). I'm also open-minded enough to think that maybe, just maybe, it'll start to "cool" a bit in - I dunno- another 1000 or 10,000 years. Am I WRONG to have that view? If so, prove me wrong.
No, what I have a hard time accepting is the idea that something so insignificant a " human beings" can exert enough influence to "STOP CLIMATE CHANGE". As I've said before, to me, it's like saying " we're going to stop the sun from rising tomorrow". To me, the concept of climate, the universe, infinity is simply beyond the scope of the human mind to comprehend , let alone influence!
I know that won't change anyone's opinion,but at least I put in my 2 cents worth.
Time'll tell who's "right" or "wrong" on this issue.


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## gibor365

Unless countries like China and India won't start fighting with "climate change" (and imho they don't give a **** about it), nothing will help...even if Canada gonna live like Amish do


----------



## brad

jargey3000 said:


> I'm also open-minded enough to think that maybe, just maybe, it'll start to "cool" a bit in - I dunno- another 1000 or 10,000 years. Am I WRONG to have that view? If so, prove me wrong.
> No, what I have a hard time accepting is the idea that something so insignificant a " human beings" can exert enough influence to "STOP CLIMATE CHANGE".


The next ice age is coming about 35,000 years from now: the timing of ice ages can be predicted with confidence because it's caused by changes in the earth's orbit around the sun.

Between now and then, best estimates are that we're in for hundreds of years of warming, based on the greenhouse gases already emitted and heat stored in the oceans. Nobody has ever said that we can stop climate change -- we can't even stop the climate change caused by humans let along natural climate change. All we can aim to do is slow the pace of the human-caused portion of climate change and try to limit warming to levels that won't cause catastrophic impacts across the globe. That's the aim of efforts to reduce greenhouse gases -- not to "stop" climate change (impossible) but to slow it.


----------



## bass player

bgc_fan said:


> You must be referring to Attorney General Loretta Lynch. You really misunderstood any of the context if that is how you are playing her comments.
> 
> The talks were in reference to the fossil fuel industry, not about the general public. She was making the comparison to the tobacco industry which had proof that cigarettes contributed to lung cancer, but would campaign against it. Similarly, I've already mentioned that Exxon was already aware of CO2 contribution to climate change, but would run a campaign denying it. It's not a question of quieting down deniers, but more the fact that if companies had proof of the problems and actively denying the issue, they should should be punished. Is it that different than GM denying ignition problems even though their engineers were aware of the problem for at least a decade?


No one has proof that the planet is heading toward uncontrollable warming. All they have are UNPROVEN THEORIES. That is completely different than a known mechanical issue. If you can't grasp that simple concept, then perhaps you should cease further comments.

Now, let's put the shoe on the other foot...Al Gore said the Arctic ice would be gone by 2015. He was 100% wrong...why shouldn't he face charges? We have absolute proof that Al Gore was wrong, so why isn't the DOJ investigating him? Do they only want to prosecute "deniers"?


----------



## olivaw

jargey3000 said:


> What camp would you put people like me in,olivaw? I don't deny the "globe" has been"warming" over the last little while ("little" being as long as we've had the means & interest to measure these things). I'm also open-minded enough to think that maybe, just maybe, it'll start to "cool" a bit in - I dunno- another 1000 or 10,000 years. Am I WRONG to have that view? If so, prove me wrong.
> No, what I have a hard time accepting is the idea that something so insignificant a " human beings" can exert enough influence to "STOP CLIMATE CHANGE". As I've said before, to me, it's like saying " we're going to stop the sun from rising tomorrow". To me, the concept of climate, the universe, infinity is simply beyond the scope of the human mind to comprehend , let alone influence!
> I know that won't change anyone's opinion,but at least I put in my 2 cents worth.
> Time'll tell who's "right" or "wrong" on this issue.


It's easy to prove that we've increased the level of CO2 in the atmosphere because it is easy to measure historical CO2 concentrations for millions of years. There has been an abnormally sharp increase in atmospheric concentrations of CO2 since the industrial revolution began. 

At the same time, we have seen a corresponding increase in average global temperature. It is harder to prove the the temperature increase is linked to mans contribution to CO2 levels because it requires the use of models. I choose to accept the predictions because it makes good economic sense. If the models are wrong and we reduce CO2 emissions then we will have wasted some small part of our wealth on an unnecessary endeavour. If they are right and we do nothing then the cost to mankind, as Brad said, will be staggering. 

In this article, scientist tell us that natural changes alone can’t explain the temperature changes we’ve seen
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warmin...uman-contribution-to-gw-faq.html#.Vucv_BIrLyk


----------



## brad

bass player said:


> No one has proof that the planet is heading toward uncontrollable warming. All they have are UNPROVEN THEORIES. And, some of you seem just fine with DOJ charges being laid for those who don't believe an unproven theory. How badly does one's mind have to be warped to buy into such dangerous thinking?


You're forgetting that in the United States the Supreme Court determined in 2007 that greenhouse gases are pollutants covered under the Clean Air Act. That means the Justice Department has cause to consider this issue. See http://www3.epa.gov/climatechange/endangerment/ and in fact if you read the EPA responses to comments you'll find scientific explanations, backed with evidence, for why most of the skeptics' arguments are unfounded. Most of the common arguments by skeptics were brought up in the public comment period and were answered based on scientific evidence. You won't read them because you are predisposed to not believe them or to invoke some conspiracy theory about why the data are "fraudulent," but the evidence is there if you are willing to learn.


----------



## jargey3000

brad said:


> The next ice age is coming about 35,000 years from now: the timing of ice ages can be predicted with confidence because it's caused by changes in the earth's orbit around the sun.
> 
> Between now and then, best estimates are that we're in for hundreds of years of warming, based on the greenhouse gases already emitted and heat stored in the oceans. Nobody has ever said that we can stop climate change -- we can't even stop the climate change caused by humans let along natural climate change. All we can aim to do is slow the pace of the human-caused portion of climate change and try to limit warming to levels that won't cause catastrophic impacts across the globe. That's the aim of efforts to reduce greenhouse gases -- not to "stop" climate change (impossible) but to slow it.


Agree with you brad about what we can/should do. (except, in my brain, I don't buy that we can "predict with confidence" ANYTHING about Mother Nature/ the unfolding of the universe. maybe, just maybe, the earth's orbit will change a bit in the next 3500 years? who knows?)
Disagree with: "Nobody has ever said that we can stop climate change". That is patently not correct. I hear everyone using the term 'stop climate change' ad nauseum!!! 

The whole situation is: we (you, me, Stephen Hawking , every human) are simply not intelligent enough to understand that we don't understand. Can you understand that concept?


----------



## bass player

brad said:


> You're forgetting that in the United States the Supreme Court determined in 2007 that greenhouse gases are pollutants covered under the Clean Air Act. That means the Justice Department has cause to consider this issue. See http://www3.epa.gov/climatechange/endangerment/ and in fact if you read the EPA responses to comments you'll find scientific explanations, backed with evidence, for why most of the skeptics' arguments are unfounded. Most of the common arguments by skeptics were brought up in the public comment period and were answered based on scientific evidence. You won't read them because you are predisposed to not believe them or to invoke some conspiracy theory about why the data are "fraudulent," but the evidence is there if you are willing to learn.


CO2 is a trace gas essential for life on earth to exist. Mammals breathe it out every single breath. The fact that it was deemed a pollutant should outrage people. The fact that you defend such a law means that you have lost all ability to reason.


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## jargey3000

_"How 'bout those Blue Jays, eh? They going 'all the way' this year?"_


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## brad

bass player said:


> CO2 is a trace gas essential for life on earth to exist. Mammals breathe it out every single breath. The fact that it was deemed a pollutant should outrage people. The fact that you defend such a law means that you have lost all ability to reason.


But if you had read the EPA findings, you'd have seen that this very issue was discussed and clarified. Since you won't read it, you remain ignorant.


----------



## brad

jargey3000 said:


> Disagree with: "Nobody has ever said that we can stop climate change". That is patently not correct. I hear everyone using the term 'stop climate change' ad nauseum!!!


Maybe environmental groups say it, but you'd never hear a reputable scientist say it. Again, if you look at the IPCC reports, they never say it's possible to stop even human-induced climate change, only slow it to "manageable" levels.


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## none

brad said:


> But if you had read the EPA findings, you'd have seen that this very issue was discussed and clarified. Since you won't read it, you remain ignorant.


"A pollutant is a substance or energy introduced into the environment that has undesired effects, or adversely affects the usefulness of a resource."

**** comes out of every person too. So **** isn't a pollutant either? yeash - god damn Einsteins here.


----------



## bgc_fan

bass player said:


> No one has proof that the planet is heading toward uncontrollable warming. All they have are UNPROVEN THEORIES. That is completely different than a known mechanical issue. If you can't grasp that simple concept, then perhaps you should cease further comments.
> 
> Now, let's put the shoe on the other foot...Al Gore said the Arctic ice would be gone by 2015. He was 100% wrong...why shouldn't he face charges? We have absolute proof that Al Gore was wrong, so why isn't the DOJ investigating him? Do they only want to prosecute "deniers"?


If you don't like the GM analogy then just stick with the tobacco companies. There is no smoking gun that links lung cancer with smoking. You have people who smoke for decades and aren't harmed while some non-smokers may develop lung cancer. Does that mean smoking doesn't have an influence on incidents of cancer? 

And the issue isn't really about denying climate change. It is more about covering up the fact that they knew it would happen based on their own internal research.

As for climate change advocates, they work with the best available data. As with all science it may change with new info that was overlooked. If your argument is the fact that they made wrong statements, then there is nothing to debate here because you are stuck in your thinking.


----------



## bass player

bgc_fan said:


> If you don't like the GM analogy then just stick with the tobacco companies. There is no smoking gun that links lung cancer with smoking. You have people who smoke for decades and aren't harmed while some non-smokers may develop lung cancer. Does that mean smoking doesn't have an influence on incidents of cancer?
> 
> And the issue isn't really about denying climate change. It is more about covering up the fact that they knew it would happen based on their own internal research.
> 
> As for climate change advocates, they work with the best available data. As with all science it may change with new info that was overlooked. If your argument is the fact that they made wrong statements, then there is nothing to debate here because you are stuck in your thinking.


Climate is not the same as tobacco. 

I see none of the alarmists will answer the question: Should Al Gore who has been proven wrong without a doubt be charged, or just the deniers? Please answer the question.

Exxon did not hide "proof" of climate change. They made a "what if" report.


----------



## brad

bass player said:


> I see none of the alarmists will answer the question: Should Al Gore who has been proven wrong without a doubt be charged, or just the deniers? Please answer the question.


It's not a rational question. Was there any harm caused by Al Gore's mistaken prediction? Not that I can see. Was there any harm caused by the tobacco companies spreading disinformation about the health impacts of cigarette smoking? Probably.

What about all the people here on the forum who've been predicting for years that bond rates were going to climb very soon, or that interest rates were going to climb? People made financial decisions based on that information and their bottom lines suffered. Should the predictors be held accountable?

How many financial or political decisions made on "proven theories?" Not many. Most are based on the balance or strength of evidence.


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## jargey3000

This is a financial forum... right? How can I make a quick buck off this climate change mumbo-jumbo stuff??? Anyone?


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## bass player

brad said:


> It's not a rational question. Was there any harm caused by Al Gore's mistaken prediction? Not that I can see. Was there any harm caused by the tobacco companies spreading disinformation about the health impacts of cigarette smoking?


Is any harm being done by those who don't believe in global warming?

However, one can argue that much harm is being done by the alarmists. Low income people can't afford to heat their homes due to punishing energy policies based on alarmist viewpoints:

"Over the past five years, heating a home in the UK has become 63 per cent more expensive, while real wages have declined. Unsurprisingly, a greater number of poor households must spend more than 10 per cent of their income on energy, becoming what is known as energy poor. This category now covers some 17 per cent of all British households. Worse, because the elderly are typically poorer, energy poverty affects about a quarter of all households whose inhabitants are over 60. Deprived pensioners are spending their days riding heated buses to keep warm, while a third are leaving part of their homes cold."


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## bass player

jargey3000 said:


> This is a financial forum... right? How can I make a quick buck off this climate change mumbo-jumbo stuff??? Anyone?


Apply for a govt grant for some fantasy research. Make sure you use the words "with respect to climate change" to ensure the funding is granted...


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## jargey3000

bass player said:


> Apply for a govt grant for some fantasy research. Make sure you use the words "with respect to climate change" to ensure the funding is granted...


haha.... I knew I'd get an answer like that! Wonder if i'd get a few more bucks if i threw in a 
"sustainable" or 2?


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## brad

bass player said:


> Is any harm being done by those who don't believe in global warming?
> 
> However, one can argue that much harm is being done by the alarmists. Low income people can't afford to heat their homes due to punishing energy policies based on alarmist viewpoints:


Sure, but the homes of low-income people are usually very energy-inefficient: drafty, poorly insulated, old appliances, etc: even if you normalize for income the low-income households spend more on energy than regular households do. So there are huge opportunities to improve energy efficiency in low-income homes, with the result that low-income people can end up paying LESS for energy than they did before, even if energy prices increase.

There are plenty of examples; here's just one approach to give you an idea of the savings:

http://www.eesi.org/obf/coops/helpmyhouse "Participants' energy bills were cut by 34 percent, saving an average of $288 per home per year after loan payments." Under this program low-income households got loans for energy efficiency improvements, paying them off over time through their electric bills. The average participating home is expected to save a net of more than $8,500 over 15 years. 

What's the primary strategy for reducing greenhouse gas emissions? Improving energy efficiency. Guess what? Energy efficiency saves money.

The Energy Star program, which is run in the US by the Environmental Protection Agency, has saved businesses and households more than US $295 billion on utility bills and prevented more than 2.1 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions over the past two decades. Each year this one program saves US taxpayers enough money to pay for the entire operating budget of the EPA twice over.


----------



## olivaw

jargey3000 said:


> This is a financial forum... right? How can I make a quick buck off this climate change mumbo-jumbo stuff??? Anyone?


1) Create an anti-climate change website. 
2) Fill it with pseudoscientific nonsense that pretends to refute the proven science of climate change. 
3) Add in a conspiracy theory or two. 
4) Sell advertising.


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## carverman

olivaw said:


> 1) Create an anti-climate change website.
> 2) Fill it with pseudoscientific nonsense that pretends to refute the proven science of climate change.
> 3) Add in a conspiracy theory or two.
> 4) Sell advertising.


Add..flawed science
the polar ice flow is receding,the polar bears are starving and their population is down..the seals are still there, but the bears can't get to them due to open water season being longer these recent years,
save the baby whales,
methane gas directly affects the CO2 blanket surrounding the up[er layer of the earth's atmosphere,causing a gradual heating effect,
huge part Antarctica's ice field has broken away, 
The glaciers are receding year by year.

Too much cattle...methane gas they produce...adds to global warming ..flawed science maybe...save the planet..eat a cow. 



> In a 2006 United Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organization report, it claims that the livestock sector, most of which are cows, “*generates more greenhouse gas emissions as measured in CO2 equivalent – 18 percent – than transpor*t.” According to a Danish study, the average cow produces enough methane per year to do the same greenhouse damage as four tons of carbon dioxide. So is this significantly contributing to global warming?


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## Articuno




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## Spudd

carverman said:


> Too much cattle...methane gas they produce...adds to global warming ..flawed science maybe...save the planet..eat a cow.


Eating cows makes the problem worse. They only produce cows because they know they can sell them. If we eat less meat, farmers will not breed as many cows, so the methane emissions will reduce.


----------



## Pluto

brad said:


> The globally averaged combined land and ocean surface temperature data as calculated by a linear trend show a warming of 0.85 [0.65 to 1.06] °C over the period 1880 to 2012, when multiple independently produced datasets exist. There's your margin of error: the range is between 0.65 and 1.06 degrees C.
> 
> Source: http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/syr/AR5_SYR_FINAL_SPM.pdf
> 
> As for my assumptions: my assumptions are that the IPCC report accurately represents the current state of scientific knowledge on climate change. This isn't based on "alarmist tendencies" but rather 27 years of following the iPCC's work, attending a few of its meetings, talking with some of the scientists involved in the process (including prominent skeptics such as Richard Lindzen of MIT), and reading the reports.


1. OK. Your assumption(s) are your beliefs. So deniers are not denying data, they deny your beliefs about data. 
2. How is the margin of error for 1880 established? They were not even trying to establish a global mean. Why would the margin of error be the same in 1880, and is is presently? If the margin of error is the same, why not just use 1880 methods of measuring mean temperature? 

2014 was claimed to be the warmest year on record, but only 38% sure. Why make such a bold statement when certainty is so low? Because of preconceived alarmist beliefs. 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...d-2014-warmest-year-record-38-sure-right.html

How is the "average calculated? According to this article there are several ways to calculate it, and one method can show cooling, while another can show warming. Clearly, the alarmists will chose the method that shows warming. Why? Because of preconceived alarmist beliefs. 

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/aug/23/tom-harris-global-warming-deceptive-temperature-re/

The following is a fine article giving an overview of different methods: 

http://www.cfact.org/2016/01/26/measuring-global-temperatures-satellites-or-thermometers/

Apparently the alarmists chose the method that indicates the most warming, and the climate science models predicted more warming that any method of measurement. 

Doesn't that provide a sound premise for skepticism?


----------



## brad

Pluto said:


> Apparently the alarmists chose the method that indicates the most warming, and the climate science models predicted more warming that any method of measurement.


There are too many distortions in your post for me to respond to them all; my main advice to you is to look at NOAA's State of the Climate Report (most recent annual report at https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/201513 which provides a thorough description of margins of error, uncertainty, how averages are calculated, etc.

See also http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/monitoring-references/faq/global-precision.php

Key quote:

"If there is less-than-perfect certainty, how are scientists confident in global temperature values?

As more and more data builds a long-term series, there is less and less influence of single "outliers" on the overall trend, making the long-term trend even more certain than the individual points along it. Put another way, the chance of any single month's value being an "outlier" (outside its range of uncertainty) is about 5%, or one-in-twenty. The chance of two consecutive months' values being outliers is about 0.25%, or one-in-four-hundred. The chance of three consecutive months being outliers is 0.0125%, or one-in-eight-thousand. The chance of a long series of temperatures all occurring near outside the range is incredibily small. Over the long term, these individual "outliers" are few, and balance out because they are evenly distributed (a roughly equal number of points above and below)."

But the bottom line is that you seem to be questioning whether the earth has actually warmed. To deny that the earth has warmed means you have to ignore the multiple corroborating lines of evidence that I cited earlier: changes in sea ice extent, melting glaciers, changes in growing season length, changes in plant flowering dates, changes in bird migration dates, changes in lake ice-out dates, etc. etc.

See for example: https://www3.epa.gov/climatechange/science/indicators/ecosystems/leaf-bloom-dates.html

Or https://www3.epa.gov/climatechange/science/indicators/ecosystems/bird-ranges.html

Or https://www3.epa.gov/climatechange/science/indicators/health-society/growing-season.html

Or https://www3.epa.gov/climatechange/science/indicators/health-society/ragweed.html

Or https://www3.epa.gov/climatechange/science/indicators/snow-ice/snowpack.html 

And those are just a few examples, only from North America: there are hundreds of comparable examples from other parts of the world.

You can attack the temperature record all you want, but it doesn't affect the conclusion that the world is warming.


----------



## bgc_fan

Pluto said:


> 1. OK. Your assumption(s) are your beliefs. So deniers are not denying data, they deny your beliefs about data.
> 2. How is the margin of error for 1880 established? They were not even trying to establish a global mean. Why would the margin of error be the same in 1880, and is is presently? If the margin of error is the same, why not just use 1880 methods of measuring mean temperature?


Basically, what I see from your arguments is that you don't have any sort of acceptance of the data. There is always going to be some sort of uncertainty based on the method of data collection and how it is averaged. Not knowing exactly what was done in 1880, they were probably just surface thermometers and people were looking into historical documents. Maybe they used the same locations for future years in comparison and maybe not. 



Pluto said:


> 2014 was claimed to be the warmest year on record, but only 38% sure. Why make such a bold statement when certainty is so low? Because of preconceived alarmist beliefs.
> 
> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...d-2014-warmest-year-record-38-sure-right.html


So you don't agree with the idea that because of margin of error that the statement may be incorrect. I guess a more accurate statement is that 2014 seems to be the warmest, but is not statistically different than any other year?



Pluto said:


> How is the "average calculated? According to this article there are several ways to calculate it, and one method can show cooling, while another can show warming. Clearly, the alarmists will chose the method that shows warming. Why? Because of preconceived alarmist beliefs.
> 
> http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/aug/23/tom-harris-global-warming-deceptive-temperature-re/


Unless you are reading a different article, it states none of that. His premise is that a global temperature has no meaning. Sure, he makes the point that we aren't measuring every location on Earth, so we don't have a real idea of the true average temperature. But even if we did, it is a meaningless construct. He has the point that averages are like that, i.e. the average Canadian family is 2.9 persons but I doubt you'll actually see that family. BTW the International Climate Science Coalition is a PR firm for climate change deniers and not really a scientific organization.



Pluto said:


> The following is a fine article giving an overview of different methods:
> 
> http://www.cfact.org/2016/01/26/measuring-global-temperatures-satellites-or-thermometers/
> 
> Apparently the alarmists chose the method that indicates the most warming, and the climate science models predicted more warming that any method of measurement.
> 
> Doesn't that provide a sound premise for skepticism?


And the conclusion of the article is that there still is global warming, just not as much as measured by the surface temperature.


----------



## Pluto

1. Nope. Brad I do not deny the earth has warmed. It is plain as day the earth has warmed since the last ice age. I'm not convinced that human activity caused most of that warming. There is nothing in my post that denies warming (or cooling). 
Bloom dates and what not are valid observations. There is plenty of similar types of evidence that show current temperatures are about the same as in the middle ages. 

http://www.co2science.org

But that doesn't mean there was not a "little ice age" in between then and now from which we have recovered. I doubt that the recovery from the little ice age was caused by human activity. 


2. Apparently there is no such thing as "the temperature record". You are talking as if there is only one record. Differing methods of measurement give different records. So there are multiple records. Apparently the alarmists prefer surface temperature thermometers over satellites, as the former show more warming. They are exercising a personal preference that isn't consistent with seeking truth.


----------



## Pluto

bgc_fan said:


> Basically, what I see from your arguments is that you don't have any sort of acceptance of the data.


One of your assumptions is there is such a thing as "the data" free of interpretation. 
There is more than one set of "data" depending on the method used to measure. The different methods do not yield the same findings, so there is no such thing as "the data". 

There is "data" that shows current temperatures are about the same as the middle ages. 

http://www.co2science.org

Apparently, between the Middle Ages, and now, there was a little ice age, from which we have recovered back to middle age temperatures. I believe it is possible that humans contributed to some of that warming since 1980, but there is no proof that the human contribution is significant.


----------



## brad

Pluto said:


> 2. Apparently there is no such thing as "the temperature record". You are talking as if there is only one record. Differing methods of measurement give different records. So there are multiple records. Apparently the alarmists prefer surface temperature thermometers over satellites, as the former show more warming. They are exercising a personal preference that isn't consistent with seeking truth.


Collectively, everything from ice core data to tree ring data to thermometer and satellite data constitute "the temperature record." That's just standard parlance in climatology, just like saying "your medical record" even though it may include input from multiple doctors.

Satellites are problematic: they provide global coverage, but they only provide an estimate of temperatures in the middle troposphere, not direct measurements of surface temperature (satellites do not drop little probes down to the surface from space). There have been lots of studies to try to figure out why those estimates differ from surface-based thermometer readings, but they do differ. IPCC and other assessments use both satellite and surface temperature data in determining trends, although the satellite data record is shorter.


----------



## Pluto

Yes, Brad, satellites are problematic. But interestingly, thermometers are problematic as well. Historically official thermometers were often at airports. Over the decades many cities expanded closer and closer to their airports introducing increasing amounts of heat from buildings that would likely give an upward bias to the readings. Obviously thermometer placement is important. Obviously if you have a outside thermometer nailed to the side of your house, it will be biased upward by a heated house in the winter, and a over heated house from the sun in the summer. Apparently they need to be some 200 - 300 miles from any building to avoid undue influence from buildings. It could be that some or all the "trend" seen in thermometer data is expanding cities encroaching on weather stations, and not global warming. 

My underlying point is "the data" is not immutable and free of bias caused by the choices of scientists. Yet alarmists talk as if "data" is a entity that exists all by itself without any human input, interpretation, or valuation. 

The evidence from paleontology that current temperatures are close to the same as Middle Age temperatures, indicates to me that the current situation isn't as horrific as some claim. Besides, the most common greenhouse gas is H2O. No one wants to reduce that. 

http://www.co2science.org/subject/p/subject_p.php


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## olivaw

Pluto said:


> Apparently, between the Middle Ages, and now, there was a little ice age, from which we have recovered back to middle age temperatures. I believe it is possible that humans contributed to some of that warming since 1980, but there is no proof that the human contribution is significant.


Really? 

*Study provides direct evidence that human activity is causing global warming* (http://www.salon.com/2015/02/26/sci...hat_human_activity_is_causing_global_warming/)

*Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming* (https://www.skepticalscience.com/empirical-evidence-for-global-warming.htm)


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## brad

Pluto said:


> Yes, Brad, satellites are problematic. But interestingly, thermometers are problematic as well. Historically official thermometers were often at airports. Over the decades many cities expanded closer and closer to their airports introducing increasing amounts of heat from buildings that would likely give an upward bias to the readings.


Yes, but climate scientists figured this out several decades ago. If you look up David Easterling at NOAA (a former climate skeptic by the way, who was eventually convinced by the data), you'll see that he did several studies in which he and his team identified all the thermometers that could have been affected by the heat island bias, and statistically removed them from the record. Guess what: the overall warming trend was unaffected both in sign and scale.

One of the problems I have with deniers is that they keep latching on to problems like this and presenting them as unsolved mysteries or oversights, when in fact they were identified and addressed ages ago.

"The most common greenhouse gas is H2O" is a similar case in point -- I already discussed that in earlier comments and if you read the IPCC reports you see that water vapour gets a lot of discussion, along with its key role in climate.

Have you seen many claims that today's climate is "horrific?" I haven't. The concerns are 1) the pace of climate change may be too fast for many ecosystems and societies to adapt, and 2) the impacts of _future_ climate change (toward the end of this century) could plausibly be horrific.

A few years back there was a short film interviewing the guy who founded the Weather Channel; it was painful to watch because he was so clearly naive about climatology (many meteorologists don't know much about climate science, it's a related but different discipline), and at one point he shouted that none of the IPCC's predictions had come to pass. What he failed to mention was that the IPCC's "predictions" (actually projections based on emissions scenarios) are for the years 2075-2100. No wonder they haven't taken place yet!:stupid:


----------



## brad

Also worth reading:

http://www.ipcc-wg1.unibe.ch/publications/wg1-ar4/faq/wg1_faq-2.1.html

and

http://www.ipcc-wg1.unibe.ch/publications/wg1-ar4/faq/wg1_faq-9.2.html

A reading of these two pages is an important starting point for anyone trying to understand the evidence for human influence on climate and the relative contribution of human influences and natural influences in recent climate change. 

The vast majority of climate change "deniers" are hobbyists: armchair skeptics who are in many cases very smart people but who like to tackle problems from first principles. Richard Feynman the physicist was like that -- the evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould used to complain about Feynman because he wasted time puzzling things out from first principles instead of taking the time to read and find out what had already been learned. As a result, when he dabbled in evolution he "discovered" principles that scientists in the field had discovered decades previously. It didn't matter to Feynman because the puzzle was the process he enjoyed, but Gould observed that he could have made real contributions to evolutionary biology if he had stood on the shoulders of giants instead of starting at the bottom of the hill and working everything out for himself. My father was like that too: he was an engineer who dabbled in theoretical physics; he spent 15 years in retirement making an esoteric and inconsequential revision to Einstein's Theory of General Relativity. He finally got it published, to yawns from the physics community: "been there, done that."

Climate deniers are mostly like this as well: it bothers me only because there are lots of legitimate uncertainties and unknowns in climate change science, and if they focused their brainpower on that we'd be getting somewhere. Science needs skeptics, and I'm all for it: we're trying to find out the truth, not working like lawyers to build evidence for a case.

For some good debates on the nitty gritty by real working scientists, check out http://www.realclimate.org


----------



## none

brad said:


> Climate deniers are mostly like this as well: it bothers me only because there are lots of legitimate uncertainties and unknowns in climate change science, and if they focused their brainpower on that we'd be getting somewhere. Science needs skeptics, and I'm all for it: we're trying to find out the truth, not working like lawyers to build evidence for a case.
> 
> For some good debates on the nitty gritty by real working scientists, check out http://www.realclimate.org


Really? I think science is very much like building evidence for a case. Nothing is ever known with absolute certainty and there is a weight of evidence component to theories / beliefs etc. For example, that's a large component of what statistics are for (if for example we're talking about t-tests or something trivial). In laymans terms: what is the probability that the differences between the means of two populations are due to a true difference or because of sampling variation? The arbitrary cut-off of 5% is usually used (for no particularly good reason) and it is at that level that many consider the weight of evidence sufficient to identify a true difference.


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## brad

none said:


> Really? I think science is very much like building evidence for a case. Nothing is ever known with absolute certainty and there is a weight of evidence component to theories / beliefs etc. For example, that's a large component of what statistics are for (if for example we're talking about t-tests or something trivial). In laymans terms: what is the probability that the differences between the means of two populations are due to a true difference or because of sampling variation? The arbitrary cut-off of 5% is usually used (for no particularly good reason) and it is at that level that many consider the weight of evidence sufficient to identify a true difference.


Point taken, but I think there's a fundamental difference between the lawyer's approach and the scientist's approach. The scientist's stated goal is to uncover the truth: you're not supposed to try to make nature fit your paradigm, you're supposed to alter your paradigm until it fits nature. A lawyer's goal is generally to win the case, so he or she starts from a conclusion and then gathers only the evidence to support it, and works to develop plausible arguments to counteract any challenges to that evidence.

Don't you see a difference?

I see a big difference between climate change "skeptics," who are legitimate scientists and are helping the process of scientific inquiry, and climate change "deniers," who start from a position that "this can't be right and I'm going to find all the evidence I can to show that it's not right" while ignoring or dismissing (as fradulent or otherwise suspect) all the evidence trotted out to support it.

A really good related article by one of my favorite evolutionary biologists, David Barash: https://aeon.co/essays/science-needs-the-freedom-to-constantly-change-its-mind


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## none

I see what you're getting at but scientists are more than welcome to put forward biased / poor arguments if they wish to. Indeed, anyone on this forum is welcome to submit an article to Science, nature, cell or whatever journal. It can be as biased as they wish and they can even make stuff up if they want to. Every author of a scientific paper has to build a case to explain patterns in data both empirical data (hopefully) but also theory and in the case of climate science - fundamental laws of physics. 

If they 'lose their case' i.e the don't provide sufficient evidence to support their conclusions they are told that their results are not valid and to go back to the drawing board (or if you are a good reviewer (like I try to do) you give constructive feedback as to how the proponent of a study can do better). As some of the crazzies here have suggested, this can result in group think in some cases where a 'paradigm shift' is required to get out of it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradigm_shift. This is more on the way people think of the data though not really relevant to climate science (I don't think so anyway). Science is much more tooth and nail than I think most people realize. That's what is so comical about people claiming a climate conspiracy. If people could prove that climate change was a hoax - WOW - what a finding. That would be a career maker! Also, from a personal standpoint I would love it. All the conservation, carbon credits, scary future scenarios are not fun to think about. To prove that climate change was not real would be absolutely wonderful.

The saying 'Damn lies and statistics' is a pretty silly thing to say. As someone who does stats - stats can be quite difficult. The whole purpose of stats is to make lying hard(er) actually. If I'm going to go to the trouble of lying about something I would just skip the stats step and just lie and get it done already.


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## Articuno

Global Warming is a hoax. It is certainly not scientific.

Here's another fun critique: http://www.informath.org/AR5stat.pdf


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## none

The gist of the article is that 'statistics is hard'. Yeah, i agree.

nate Silver in 'the signal and the noise' does a much better job of it. I would recommend it. It's a good read.


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## bass player

none said:


> I see what you're getting at but scientists are more than welcome to put forward biased / poor arguments if they wish to.


Some scientists have done that and have been viciously attacked by the alarmists. Many of them have lost funding and some have lost their jobs. A weather man in France was recently fired after writing a book that questioned climate change.

So, don't be surprised that smart scientists are simply keeping their mouth shut instead of facing the wrath of Big Climate.

NASA has also cooled the past and warmed the present, and in spite of demands to produce relevant emails for a Senate hearing, they have refused to do so to this day. 

But, this all just a big conspiracy created by the deniers, right?


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## none

bass player said:


> Some scientists have done that and have been viciously attacked by the alarmists. Many of them have lost funding and some have lost their jobs. A weather man in France was recently fired after writing a book that questioned climate change.


As they should. If you're doing poor work that has little merit you should lose funding and your job. I don't get your point - on the contrary, that shows that the system works.


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## bass player

none said:


> As they should. If you're doing poor work that has little merit you should lose funding and your job. I don't get your point - on the contrary, that shows that the system works.


You actually agree with people being fired for having a different opinion on an unproven theory?

You are a sad and pathetic person, and you should be ashamed.


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## none

I think people should get fired for incompetence and this is what sounds like happened.


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## bass player

none said:


> I think people should get fired for incompetence and this is what sounds like happened.


Lol. What really happened is that you lack the required cognitive skills to grasp the point.

No one has to stoop to silencing the opposition if they are right.


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## none

Teachers have been fired for teaching creationism in schools and proclaiming however wrongly that the theory of evolution is wrong and a plot by scientists. This is a similar situation. If you are incompetent in your job you should lose it.

i think you (and other forum members) would benefit from reading this:

http://theconversation.com/no-youre-not-entitled-to-your-opinion-9978


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## bass player

none said:


> Teachers have been fired for teaching creationism in schools and proclaiming however wrongly that the theory of evolution is wrong and a plot by scientists. This is a similar situation. If you are incompetent in your job you should lose it.
> 
> i think you (and other forum members) would benefit from reading this:
> 
> http://theconversation.com/no-youre-not-entitled-to-your-opinion-9978


You may have read it, but you completely missed the point the article was making. The article was referring to a non-medical person making medical claims about autism. A scientist with a different opinion of an unproven theory on something as complex as climate is entirely different.

I will repeat: You have proven (more than once) that you lack the basic cognitive skills to apply reason.


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## none

"The article was referring to a <non-specialist> making ---- claims about <something they are not qualified to do>"

yeah, I get it.


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## tygrus

Maybe the scientists should now work on some solutions instead of just suggesting we all move back to caves and eat moss.


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## none

really is that what they're doing?

I thought they were promoting energy efficiency, carbon sequestration, alternate energy sources etc. I've never heard of any scientists suggesting people move into caves to eat moss. Sounds like a pretty bizarre idea - I'm sure the 'bass player' can find some nutter that is suggesting that though. LOL


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## Pluto

brad said:


> Yes, but climate scientists figured this out several decades ago. If you look up David Easterling at NOAA (a former climate skeptic by the way, who was eventually convinced by the data), you'll see that he did several studies in which he and his team identified all the thermometers that could have been affected by the heat island bias, and statistically removed them from the record. Guess what: the overall warming trend was unaffected both in sign and scale.
> 
> Have you seen many claims that today's climate is "horrific?" I haven't. The concerns are 1) the pace of climate change may be too fast for many ecosystems and societies to adapt, and 2) the impacts of _future_ climate change (toward the end of this century) could plausibly be horrific.
> 
> A few years back there was a short film interviewing the guy who founded the Weather Channel; it was painful to watch because he was so clearly naive about climatology (many meteorologists don't know much about climate science, it's a related but different discipline), and at one point he shouted that none of the IPCC's predictions had come to pass. What he failed to mention was that the IPCC's "predictions" (actually projections based on emissions scenarios) are for the years 2075-2100. No wonder they haven't taken place yet!:stupid:


One of my points was that you are evaluating. You are assigning a higher value to the method of measurement that shows more warming, (surface thermometers) and assigning a lower value to a method that shows less warming(satellites). Your evaluating is according to a conclusion you already have committed yourself to. That is your bias - dismissing satellite data because it doesn't fit you preconceived conclusion. 

1. OK, so horrific climate will be upon us by 2075 caused by co2 and other man produced greenhouse gases. Isn't most of that gas produced by coal fired power plants? And isn't there an alternative that produces no green house gases, namely, nuclear? Do you advocate nuclear power? If not, then why not? If it is really true that horrific climate will be upon us by 2075, why is Germany and China permitted to build increasing numbers of coal fired plants?


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## andrewf

I'm strongly in favour of nuclear, but I think we should be trying hard to develop molten salt reactors, as they are safer, more modular, and should be cheaper to construct once developed.


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## Pluto

yes, andrew, I'm in favour of that too. However, considering the for sure, proven true, horrific man made climate in only 59 years, caused by human produced co2, I don't think we can wait. It seems more prudent to risk current nuclear technology, and to immediately ban all fossil fuel power plants. 

I guess my point is, if runaway way global warming is an actual threat leading to a horrific climate in only a short while, why allow coal fired plants? Why not use the nuclear alternative?


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## tygrus

Again for those with short memories, nuclear was all the rage back in the 70s until 3 mile island and then the greenies shut down that industry for good. Now here we are 40 years later and we dont have a nuclear industry and its going to take more than 10 years to get one going. Environmentalists are so short sighted some times and they probably are again.


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## Pluto

Yes, tygrus, it seems like they are short sighted and political. To me the man made global warming movement is politics intertwined with science. If they really believed co2 was the primary cause of warming, they would back nuclear, and ban coal fired plants. Why doesn't the IPCC work to ban them? 

And what about all the coal deposits that are naturally burning? Why doesn't the IPCC work to put those fires out? The implication is they don't take their own theories seriously enough. And if they don't why should I?


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## agent99

Isn't it great to see that our new Prime Minister's thread generates so much interesting discussion.


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## none

agent99 said:


> .....generates so much interesting discussion.


I think you are giving this thread waaaaaaay to much credit. :/


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## Video_Frank

tygrus said:


> Now here we are 40 years later and we dont have a nuclear industry ..


What? Nuclear is 37% of Ontario's power.


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## Rusty O'Toole

I don't know why they are not using Thorium reactors. Safer than the present setup, and allows you to reuse worn out fuel rods and get more power out of them than you did the first time. When fuel rods are exhausted in the thorium process their radioactivity is almost nil.

Our CANDU reactors could use thorium rods. The Atomic Energy Commission looked into this in the 80s. They said thorium was practical to use and that we have enough thorium in Canada to run our reactors for 1000 years.


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## bgc_fan

Video_Frank said:


> What? Nuclear is 37% of Ontario's power.


Not too mention the OPG is planning on spending $12.8B to refurbish the Darlington reactors to keep them in service at least until 2024.

Or Bruce Power spending $13B to refurbish the their reactors, which apparently provide 30% of Ontario's power.


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## sags

Rusty O'Toole said:


> I don't know why they are not using Thorium reactors. Safer than the present setup, and allows you to reuse worn out fuel rods and get more power out of them than you did the first time. When fuel rods are exhausted in the thorium process their radioactivity is almost nil.
> 
> Our CANDU reactors could use thorium rods. The Atomic Energy Commission looked into this in the 80s. They said thorium was practical to use and that we have enough thorium in Canada to run our reactors for 1000 years.


So what is the hold up on that ?

The almost forgotten Fukishima is still leaking radioactivity and burning away, and they say they won't be able to fix it for 40 years or more. The robots designed to go into the carnage have their circuits fried in 10 hours of use.

Chernyobyl is still smoldering away under tons of concrete. It is the best they could do.

I wouldn't even think about nuclear energy until a better system was available and it sounds like you identified one.

They want to bury spent rods under the ground right beside Lake Huron, which is the fresh water source for millions of people. Are they nuts ?


----------



## bgc_fan

Rusty O'Toole said:


> Our CANDU reactors could use thorium rods. The Atomic Energy Commission looked into this in the 80s. They said thorium was practical to use and that we have enough thorium in Canada to run our reactors for 1000 years.


There are some reasons for it, but it looks as Canada is involved with the research based on CANDU reactors... but in China, Indonesia, and Chile.


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## brad

Pluto said:


> Yes, tygrus, it seems like they are short sighted and political. To me the man made global warming movement is politics intertwined with science. If they really believed co2 was the primary cause of warming, they would back nuclear, and ban coal fired plants. Why doesn't the IPCC work to ban them?


The IPCC is a *scientific advisory body*; its job is to assess the current state of scientific knowledge. It doesn't have any political authority. One of its working groups focuses on response strategies, and they have been recommending nuclear power for years. But they're also very aware of the barriers. Here's a key excerpt from the most recent IPCC report (sorry for the hyphens and weird spacing; this is copied from the PDF of the report):

Nuclear energy is a mature low-GHG emission source of base- load power, but its share of global electricity generation has been declining (since 1993) Nuclear energy could make an increasing contribution to low-carbon energy supply, but a vari- ety of barriers and risks exist (robust evidence, high agreement). Its speci c emissions are below 100 gCO2eq per kWh on a lifecycle basis and with more than 400 operational nuclear reactors worldwide, nuclear electricity represented 11% of the world’s electricity genera- tion in 2012, down from a high of 17 % in 1993. Pricing the externali- ties of GHG emissions (carbon pricing) could improve the competitive- ness of nuclear power plants. 

Barriers to and risks associated with an increasing use of nuclear energy include operational risks and the associated safety con- cerns, uranium mining risks, nancial and regulatory risks, unre- solved waste management issues, nuclear weapon proliferation concerns, and adverse public opinion (robust evidence, high agreement). New fuel cycles and reactor technologies addressing some of these issues are under development and progress has been made con- cerning safety and waste disposal (medium evidence, medium agreement).


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## tygrus

Video_Frank said:


> What? Nuclear is 37% of Ontario's power.


Well its 0% in the western US and Canada


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## Video_Frank

tygrus said:


> Well its 0% in the western US and Canada


Except for Diablo Canyon though, right? Oh, and Columbia in Washington State.


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## tygrus

Video_Frank said:


> Except for Diablo Canyon though, right?


Great, another nuke plant on the ocean front and on a fault line. Man these engineers should be horsewhipped.


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## tygrus

There is a proposal somewhere on the books to build a nuke plant near the oil sands. The power would serve western canada and the heat and steam used to liquify bitumen.


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## agent99

tygrus said:


> There is a proposal somewhere on the books to build a nuke plant near the oil sands. The power would serve western canada and the heat and steam used to liquify bitumen.


Nuclear plants need large amounts of water. More than coal fired plants. Wonder where they would get that from in Alberta?


----------



## Pluto

none said:


> I think you are giving this thread waaaaaaay to much credit. :/


OK None. You disappeared when I asked about margin of error in measuring global temps. You can contribute to that. 

And if horrific climate is around the corner - 59 years to be exact - due to man produced co2, why isn't current nuclear technology being promoted in lieu of coal plants to thwart the upcoming climate disaster? Why isn't the IPCC rounding up some nations to put out naturally burning coal fires? 

https://www.google.ca/search?client...era&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8#q=coal+deposits+on+fire


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## Pluto

here is a good one: Science predicted coal burning would cause an ice age

http://www.globalclimatescam.com/ju...ict-burning-coal-will-cause-the-next-ice-age/


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## Pluto

Where have all the eagles gone?

http://www.globalclimatescam.com/junk-science/where-have-all-the-eagles-gone/


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## brad

Pluto said:


> Why isn't the IPCC rounding up some nations to put out naturally burning coal fires?
> 
> https://www.google.ca/search?client...era&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8#q=coal+deposits+on+fire


You know, you really should take your signature to heart "If you don't study and know what you criticize, you have no credibility." You keep assuming the IPCC has some sort of political authority or political role, but its sole job is to report on the state of scientific knowledge. It can't "round up some nations to put out naturally burning coal fires." This demonstrates that you haven't studied the IPCC and thus you have no credibility when you criticize it.

Coal fires as well as coalbed methane leaks are accounted for in IPCC's estimates of global emissions, and there are programs in many countries to control them; see http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2009/3084/pdf/fs2009-3084.pdf for example.


----------



## andrewf

Pluto said:


> here is a good one: Science predicted coal burning would cause an ice age
> 
> http://www.globalclimatescam.com/ju...ict-burning-coal-will-cause-the-next-ice-age/


I assume you don't partake in modern western medicine (drugs & treatment), because there were times when bad decisions were made based on the information and models available at the time that turned out to be incorrect.


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## Articuno

Questions that have not been resolved yet:
* How much do humans contribute to global warming?
* Is global warming bad?
* Is it more cost effective to stop it or to adapt to it?

Alarmists don't seem to care about any of this because they don't actually care about global warming. It's just an excuse to expand government controls and regulations, to push environmentalism, to decry modernity, or to make money in areas that would otherwise not be profitable.


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## steve41

Articuno said:


> Alarmists don't seem to care about any of this because they don't actually care about global warming. It's just an excuse to expand government controls and regulations, to push environmentalism, to decry modernity, or to make money in areas that would otherwise not be profitable.


They don't call them 'Warmunists' for nothing.


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## bass player

andrewf said:


> I assume you don't partake in modern western medicine (drugs & treatment), because there were times when bad decisions were made based on the information and models available at the time that turned out to be incorrect.


Based on the past, you must also agree that today's modern technology and computer projection models can also turn out to be incorrect. Billions have being spent and will continue to be spent on unproven"what if?s". Guess where all that money comes from??

400 parts per million is only 4 molecules out of 10,000. 5 or 6 molecules out of 10,000 will not send the planet into an unreversable tailspin. CO2's effect on temperature has a logarithmic effect, meaning that any increase has a increasingly diminishing impact...kind of like when you paint a window with several coats. Each coat makes it darker, but the effect is negligible after the first 2 or 3 coats.


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## sags

Donald Trump doesn't believe in climate change either. 

He tweeted that it was a hoax created by the Chinese to negatively impact US manufacturing.

Trump's ocean side properties and what will happen as sea levels continue to rise.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/peteraldhous/trump-buildings-underwater

The City of Miami is spending $500 million to raise roads and put in pumps to alleviate flooding that already exists. There is no long term solution to future massive flooding in Florida and other low lying areas.


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## brad

bass player said:


> 400 parts per million is only 4 molecules out of 10,000. 5 or 6 molecules out of 10,000 will not send the planet into an unreversable tailspin. CO2's effect on temperature has a logarithmic effect, meaning that any increase has a increasingly diminishing impact...kind of like when you paint a window with several coats. Each coat makes it darker, but the effect is negligible after the first 2 or 3 coats.


Once again, trotting out ancient arguments that were addressed decades ago and demonstrated to be wrong. The CO2 absorption spectrum is not completely saturated; what's important is not "5 or 6 molecules out of 10,000" but the fact that every molecule of CO2 traps heat and when you consider the number of molecules that 400 parts per million represents across the entire atmosphere it amounts to an enormous quantity of heat-trapping capability. The uncertainties mostly center on how the climate system (especially water vapor) respond to that added heat, which is why future projections of climate chnage are always given in ranges rather than single estimates.


----------



## Pluto

brad said:


> You know, you really should take your signature to heart "If you don't study and know what you criticize, you have no credibility." You keep assuming the IPCC has some sort of political authority or political role, but its sole job is to report on the state of scientific knowledge. It can't "round up some nations to put out naturally burning coal fires." This demonstrates that you haven't studied the IPCC and thus you have no credibility when you criticize it.
> 
> Coal fires as well as coalbed methane leaks are accounted for in IPCC's estimates of global emissions, and there are programs in many countries to control them; see http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2009/3084/pdf/fs2009-3084.pdf for example.


Asking questions is part of studying and learning. That's why I ask questions of you and the learned None. 

And speaking of None, he acknowledged assumptions so I asked what his assumptions were. He disappeared. Apparently he has noting to offer. 

And you avoid. For example, you claim we will experience horrific warming by 2075 caused by man produced co2. So, Do you support using nuclear power in lieu of more coal plants? There has been some warming alarmists who have compromised and now support nuclear power, but not enough, apparently, to embolden politicians to back it in a big way. Anyway, the whole warming hysteria does not add up for many reasons, one of which is most warming alarmists decline to back nuclear - currently the only viable alternative that does not produce greenhouse gases. Your lack of support for that solution makes your message of horrific warming incredible. If you actually believed it, you would compromise.


----------



## Userkare

brad said:


> Once again, trotting out ancient arguments that were addressed decades ago and demonstrated to be wrong.


Thank you brad for explaining things in a rational, non-condescending, and non-confrontational manner. There is a lot of information in circulation with 'evidence' to support both sides of the climate debate; it's sometimes difficult to determine which are current and accurate, and which are not.

I wonder, though, if the current 'plan', if you could call it that, would truly result in any benefits. Would imposing a punitive tax on the CO2 emissions force conservation, or just raise prices, and result in workers striking for higher pay? Would companies simply relocate to jurisdictions where there are no restrictions or carbon taxes? 

Politicians will meet, have their photos taken, then agree to maybe do something that's not only unbinding, but without and consequences for non-compliance. Do you really believe the US congress would pass any law that might affect their industrial growth? Without both houses majority, and a democratic president, I highly doubt that anything will be done. Canada, on the other hand, will be a good world citizen and set all our thermostats to 10C during the winter while we eat our raw home-grown vegetables. That Florida vacation is out of the question, airplanes spew too much GHG.

Assume that the climate change predictions will come true. It might start with more severe storms and coastal flooding from storm surges. We've already seen that in recent years. Will New York be under water? Highly unlikely! Rich countries like the US, will build infrastructure designed to withstand it; not like the crumbling old levy systems in New Orleans. Picture a flood gate, like in the Thames, across the Verrazano Narrows at the entrance to NY harbour. Some areas along the shores of New Jersey, Long Island, and Staten Island might be affected; so once they're devastated by flooding, they'll be made into parkland and people told to rebuild inland. In poorer countries where they have nowhere to go, there might be a human migration that would make the current migrant crisis in Europe look like a Boy Scout picnic. Even then, do you think the US, and other rich, high emissions countries will do anything? Not if it affects their jobs they won't! I would have more faith that China would impose some measures; their dictatorial governments is already set-up to exert complete control of the population. I could even go so far as to imagine wars being fought to secure agricultural land and high ground.

So in addition to the study of climate science, one must also look at the anthropological record. When has any civilization, on a large scale, made significant sacrifices to assist another less affluent civilization?


----------



## brad

Pluto said:


> And you avoid. For example, you claim we will experience horrific warming by 2075 caused by man produced co2. So, Do you support using nuclear power in lieu of more coal plants? There has been some warming alarmists who have compromised and now support nuclear power, but not enough, apparently, to embolden politicians to back it in a big way. Anyway, the whole warming hysteria does not add up for many reasons, one of which is most warming alarmists decline to back nuclear - currently the only viable alternative that does not produce greenhouse gases. Your lack of support for that solution makes your message of horrific warming incredible. If you actually believed it, you would compromise.


You haven't been reading my posts very carefully. First I never said "we will experience horrific warming by 2075." I said that the IPCC projects warming toward the end of this century that could potentially be horrific. As I pointed out many times, they always give projections in ranges: at the low end of the scale the changes would be significant but likely not catastrophic. At the high end of the scale the changes could be catastrophic in many parts of the world. The key thing to understand is that the likelihood of the actual warming falling at either end of that scale is equal. So we can either hope that it won't be catastrophic and go on our merry way, or we can take steps to reduce emissions so it doesn't become catastrophic.

The other thing to keep in mind is that 2075 isn't some magical year in which the world flips a switch and suddenly we have catastrophic changes. The climate is changing now and will continue to change in the decades ahead. The reason IPCC chose the end of this century as the timeframe for its projections is that they run their models based on a doubling of preindustrial CO2 levels (from 280 ppm to about 560 ppm), and that's generally expected to happen toward the end of the century. It's also important to underestand that climate change will continue past the end of this century, too: the climate doesn't look at the calendar and say, oh, it's 2100 I can stop warming now.

Of course I support nuclear power as long as we can ensure safety of operation, safe storage of waste, and terrorism concerns. Those are big caveats, but everyone recognizes that those are the challenges. Plenty of prominent climate change scientists and politicians support nuclear power: James Hansen, the NASA scientist who first testified to Congress that climate change was happening (back in the late 1980s) is a big proponent of nuclear power. I'm pretty sure Al Gore supports it, or did before he got involved in the renewable energy industry. Plenty of so-called alarmists see nuclear power as a fantastic option, but there are huge obstacles in the way, because nobody wants to see a nuclear power plant built in their community and there is tremendous public opposition. Overcoming that opposition and changing public opinion will take decades, and we don't have decades. Solar and wind are "viable options" in many places; Texas currently is the leader in North America in terms of wind energy and the cost of solar is dropping dramatically. Are solar and wind going to solve the problem? No, we need to use all the options available: energy efficiency is the big one and the most cost-effective one because it is profitable in net terms; reducing demand through energy efficiency is a lot cheaper than building new power plants.

If you actually read any of the IPCC reports you will see that nuclear, natural gas, clean coal, carbon sequestration (capturing CO2 from power plants and storing it underground), and lots of other solutions are all recommended as options to consider: the denialists become hysterical about a "green agenda" that aims to run the world on granola and hemp with a dose of sunny-days solar power. Fine if you believe it, but there are grown-ups working on this problem who are much more practical and pragmatic, and looking for solutions that work.


----------



## lonewolf

Everyone wants to build the wrong pipelines. A pipeline to the sun needs to be built so we can use our water wisely to spray water on the sun to cool it off. 

The other planets orbiting the sun are also warming as the sun pulses like a heart beat giving off more heat @ times with less heat @ other times. We need to save the other planets also & build pipelines for spraying sun with water, Look for ways to use the frozen ice for cooling should be studied.

Reducing green house gases is the wrong approach the earth had 9- 10 times more green house gases & the earth was cooler. Volcanoes are the biggest polluters cement should be poured into them to cape.


----------



## dogcom

Your right lonewolf climate change is really about making certain entities loads of money as the next big thing. You could probably have almost free energy and so on that could benefit everyone on the planet but instead it will be the next great money maker and the utilities of the future that we all pay into.


----------



## andrewf

bass player said:


> Based on the past, you must also agree that today's modern technology and computer projection models can also turn out to be incorrect. Billions have being spent and will continue to be spent on unproven"what if?s". Guess where all that money comes from??
> 
> 400 parts per million is only 4 molecules out of 10,000. 5 or 6 molecules out of 10,000 will not send the planet into an unreversable tailspin. CO2's effect on temperature has a logarithmic effect, meaning that any increase has a increasingly diminishing impact...kind of like when you paint a window with several coats. Each coat makes it darker, but the effect is negligible after the first 2 or 3 coats.


There is always a chance.

Going from 3.5 pp10k (pre-industrial) up to 5 or 6 is not a trivial increase. Even if the effect of increasing concentration decreases logarithmically, it's a 40 - 70% increase in concentration. You're just waving your hands when you say a 150-200 ppm increase can't possibly have an impact. There are compounds that are toxic in the part per billion range, so just because concentrations are relatively small does not mean they cannot have an effect.

Sincere skeptics should be trying to steer the conversation towards minimum cost carbon reduction mechanisms. A revenue neutral carbon tax (like BC implemented) has minimal effect on economic activity, and does work to reduce carbon output. By opposing all carbon reduction efforts, skeptics are encouraging poorly thought out or inefficient approaches to be pushed through if that is what is politically feasible. Think of all the command and control industrial regulation, fuel economy standards, renewable energy subsidies, etc.


----------



## bass player

andrewf said:


> There is always a chance.
> 
> Going from 3.5 pp10k (pre-industrial) up to 5 or 6 is not a trivial increase. Even if the effect of increasing concentration decreases logarithmically, it's a 40 - 70% increase in concentration. You're just waving your hands when you say a 150-200 ppm increase can't possibly have an impact. There are compounds that are toxic in the part per billion range, so just because concentrations are relatively small does not mean they cannot have an effect.
> 
> Sincere skeptics should be trying to steer the conversation towards minimum cost carbon reduction mechanisms. A revenue neutral carbon tax (like BC implemented) has minimal effect on economic activity, and does work to reduce carbon output. By opposing all carbon reduction efforts, skeptics are encouraging poorly thought out or inefficient approaches to be pushed through if that is what is politically feasible. Think of all the command and control industrial regulation, fuel economy standards, renewable energy subsidies, etc.


Yes, there are compounds that are toxic in the parts per billion range. CO2 is not one of them, so why make the comparison unless you are just spouting the same old alarmist BS? Are you even aware that CO2 in the past was 10 times higher than to day while the planet was in an ice age? Please explain how that is possible if it has such magical warming power that even a doubling is claimed to be unsafe?

And, once again, you make the incorrect assumption that those who don't buy into the CO2 alarm don't care about the planet. Most people care about the planet and want less pollution, and most people have no problem with fuel efficiency standards and renewable energy. But, those things have absolutely nothing to do with CO2.

Another fact you choose to ignore or don't understand: CO2 is not carbon. It's also not pollution. CO2 is an essential trace gas that is required for life on Earth to exist. It also doesn't have the power to send the planet into a warming tailspin, not matter what some people claim.


----------



## brad

bass player said:


> Are you even aware that CO2 in the past was 10 times higher than to day while the planet was in an ice age? Please explain how that is possible if it has such magical warming power that even a doubling is claimed to be unsafe?


Nice assertion, where's your reference?



bass player said:


> It also doesn't have the power to send the planet into a warming tailspin, not matter what some people claim.


Nice assertion, where's your reference?


----------



## bass player

Brad:

The information is readily available. Look it up and educate yourself.


----------



## brad

bass player said:


> Brad:
> 
> The information is readily available. Look it up and educate yourself.


That's what I thought you'd say!


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## none

bass player said:


> Another fact you choose to ignore or don't understand: CO2 is not carbon. It's also not pollution. CO2 is an essential trace gas that is required for life on Earth to exist. It also doesn't have the power to send the planet into a warming tailspin, not matter what some people claim.


Someone needs to use a dictionary about what the word pollution mean. Lets call him B. player.


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## agent99

Time to call it a day?? Maybe those still interested could start a new one with a more relevant title?


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## brad

I'm done here, so I'll stop replying to any comments; that might help it die.


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## LBCfan

brad said:


> I'm done here, so I'll stop replying to any comments; that might help it die.


Can we just quit the global warming/climate change/end of the earth, and get back to M. Trudeau and his actions?


----------



## andrewf

bass player said:


> Brad:
> 
> The information is readily available. Look it up and educate yourself.


Translation: I don't care to cite my sources, for fear they will be torn to shreds.


----------



## carverman

Mr Trudeau has just announced he is rescinding the previous Conservative gov'ts move to raise the OAS qualifications to collect benefits from 67 back to 65.
Good news for any seniors in poor health or ones that can't find any jobs after 65..except for volunteering or Walmart greeters.


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## andrewf

It wasn't going to affect anyone who is currently a senior... it was going to bite people who are in their 40s or 50s now, or younger.


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## peterk

Horrible decision. This is one of those things that we _need_ to address due to changing demographics, and the changes would've been so slow and so far out in the future that there would be no excuse for anyone not to have their life prepared for this change, nor for anyone to consider this a major factor in their voting decision, nor for the Liberals to feel that they must keep their outlandish election promise on the subject to appease their constituents (it would barely move the needle if this was merely ignored).

All in all a terrible decision.


----------



## Spudd

peterk said:


> Horrible decision. This is one of those things that we _need_ to address due to changing demographics, and the changes would've been so slow and so far out in the future that there would be no excuse for anyone not to have their life prepared for this change, nor for anyone to consider this a major factor in their voting decision, nor for the Liberals to feel that they must keep their outlandish election promise on the subject to appease their constituents (it would barely move the needle if this was merely ignored).
> 
> All in all a terrible decision.


+1


----------



## humble_pie

brad said:


> I'm done here, so I'll stop replying to any comments; that might help it die.



brad you might momentarily think all your work to create your cmf posts on climate change has been in vain.

but i'd like to assure you, not in vain. Over the years you've been the cmf forum leader beyond question on environmental issues. Always the encyclopaedic source of new knowledge, always the objective journalist reporting all sides of every issue, always level-headed, always grounded, always inspired.

me i don't read threads like this one to see what kind of angry & bitter insults a few forum newbies have to say. I read to pick up brad's latest overviews.

thanking brad, as always.


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## bass player

Trudeau promised to remove financial accountability from reserves and unions, and promised left wing CBC more money in exchange for their support, and promised more money for seniors by rolling back the OAS age, and not a peep was heard from his supporters. Immediately after the election, he has paid off these groups for supporting him.

Imagine if Harper had made the same promises to oil companies and banks? The outrage would have been deafening.


----------



## peterk

humble_pie said:


> thanking brad, as always.


Me too, brad. Though I am not even remotely convinced of your references' validity in describing the outcomes and consequences of global warming, I am much more thoroughly convinced that there is a great deal of information indicating that the earth in indeed warming, thanks to your posts


----------



## GoldStone

Spudd said:


> peterk said:
> 
> 
> 
> Horrible decision. This is one of those things that we _need_ to address due to changing demographics, and the changes would've been so slow and so far out in the future that there would be no excuse for anyone not to have their life prepared for this change, nor for anyone to consider this a major factor in their voting decision, nor for the Liberals to feel that they must keep their outlandish election promise on the subject to appease their constituents (it would barely move the needle if this was merely ignored).
> 
> All in all a terrible decision.
> 
> 
> 
> +1
Click to expand...

+2

Trudeau's foolish reversal is pure ideology. Undo anything and everything that Harper did. Regardless of merit.


----------



## humble_pie

bass player said:


> Trudeau promised to remove financial accountability from reserves and unions, and promised left wing CBC more money in exchange for their support, and promised more money for seniors by rolling back the OAS age, and not a peep was heard from his supporters. Immediately after the election, he has paid off these groups for supporting him.
> 
> Imagine if Harper had made the same promises to oil companies and banks? The outrage would have been deafening.



lol u don't think the liberal party has no commitments to oil companies & banks? 
think again ...


----------



## Davis

So now that PM Trudeau has appointed seven people to the Senate, I am wondering what the nattering nabobs of negativity will say to criticize this move? Of the seven he appointed, only one has been politically active (as far as i can tell), and she was a New Democrat, not a Liberal. Even though the Conservatives have 42 seats to the 26 held by former members of the Liberal caucus and 13 are other independents, Trudeau used these seven appointments to make the Senate more independent instead of trying to gain dominance for his party. 

Criticisms?


----------



## bgc_fan

GoldStone said:


> +2
> 
> Trudeau's foolish reversal is pure ideology. Undo anything and everything that Harper did. Regardless of merit.


What I don't understand about all the negativity and surprise is the fact that this was part of the Liberal election platform. 

A lot of criticism that I see against the government seem to be based on the fact that people didn't look at what the election promises were.


----------



## bass player

Davis said:


> So now that PM Trudeau has appointed seven people to the Senate, I am wondering what the nattering nabobs of negativity will say to criticize this move? Of the seven he appointed, only one has been politically active (as far as i can tell), and she was a New Democrat, not a Liberal. Even though the Conservatives have 42 seats to the 26 held by former members of the Liberal caucus and 13 are other independents, Trudeau used these seven appointments to make the Senate more independent instead of trying to gain dominance for his party.
> 
> Criticisms?


Yes, perhaps you should do some research before making claims that they are all independent.

- Murray Sinclair, former justice
- Chantal Petitclerc, former Olympian
- Peter Harder, a former bureaucrat who led Justin Trudeau's transition team.
- Raymonde Gagné, former president of Manitoba's Université de Saint-Boniface.
- Frances Lankin, a former Ontario NDP cabinet minister and a national security expert.
- Ratna Omidvar, executive director at Ryerson University's Global Diversity Exchange.
- André Pratte, editorial writer at La Presse.

I see at least 3 left wing appointees in that group...Harder, Lankin, and Pratte (La Presse supports the Liberals). And, the chances are high that a university professor and a university director are also left leaning.


----------



## humble_pie

bass player said:


> ... I see at least 3 left wing appointees in that group...Harder, Lankin, and Pratte (La Presse supports the Liberals). And, the chances are high that a university professor and a university director are also left leaning.



thanks for the good laugh

it's appalling how those those unspeakable left-wingers keep popping up everywhere. Even paraOlympic athlete chantal petitclerc's wheelchair was specially sprung so it would oscillate more rapidly as she raced ...


----------



## bass player

humble_pie said:


> thanks for the good laugh
> 
> it's appalling how those those unspeakable left-wingers keep popping up everywhere. Even paraOlympic athlete chantal petitclerc's wheelchair was specially sprung so it would oscillate more rapidly as she raced ...


I simply pointed out the false claim that Trudeau had appointed non-partisan Senators. Of course, you chose to ignore that fact and instead attacked the messenger.

Why don't you respond to the non-partisan claim instead of resorting to childish insults?


----------



## Davis

Really. My point was that his appointments are non-partisans - they have not been involved in party politics. I didn't say that they don't have opinions. Compare this to the previous guy's appointments. I keep forgetting that anyone to the left of Ronald Reagan is aligned with the devil and communism and bad hygiene, and some people think that even Reagan was a little soft. 

Assuming that a journalist's point-of-view aligns with the newspapers is an understandable mistake for people who don't read newspapers. Those who do know that even right-wing rags like the Sun publish work by lefties if only to give their readers something to get angry at. And if you haven't been to university, I guess you wouldn't know that universities also host people with a wide range of views. If you've ever worked in the civil service, then you know it has right-wingers in it. So there is no evidence that any of these people (other than Lankin) is a left-winger.


----------



## olivaw

The appointments appear to represent a range of views and they are accomplished people. Time will tell if they are wise. 

I voted Liberal but I think Trudeau has ignored the obvious - the senate needs to be scrapped or reformed. Elected senators, term limits and more equal representation would certainly enjoy support in my province of Alberta.


----------



## humble_pie

bass player said:


> Why don't you respond to the non-partisan claim instead of resorting to childish insults?



i beg your pardon? bass player you're a brand newbie in this forum.

i can't recall you've yet managed to post anything useful in finance. What you have managed to do, in only a few short weeks, is attack & insult a number of valuable longtime members. Members who've offered significant research to others for years & years. Members who've made countless helpful suggestions in finance. Members who've been thanked hundreds of times. Members who are respected.


----------



## humble_pie

olivaw said:


> ... I voted Liberal but I think Trudeau has ignored the obvious - the senate needs to be scrapped or reformed. Elected senators, term limits and more equal representation would certainly enjoy support in my province of Alberta.



couldn't agree more. next step, we should make our views known to our MPs. As far as i can make out, senate reform is far down on the list, but if enough voters keep speaking out, something might begin to spark.


----------



## carverman

Davis said:


> Even though the Conservatives have 42 seats to the 26 held by former members of the Liberal caucus and 13 are other independents, Trudeau used these seven appointments to make the Senate more independent instead of trying to gain dominance for his party.
> 
> Criticisms?


Not from me. I see that he is doing everyrthing right so far..including a chance for Canada to get a seat on the UN Security Council,
these seats only become avalable every 10 years.


----------



## GoldStone

bgc_fan said:


> What I don't understand about all the negativity and surprise is the fact that this was part of the Liberal election platform.
> 
> A lot of criticism that I see against the government seem to be based on the fact that people didn't look at what the election promises were.


OAS reversal was a foolish promise. There is nothing wrong with breaking a dumb populist promise made in the heat of an election campaign (see Chretien/GST or McGuinty/Health Tax).

And it's not like he hasn't broken any promises since election. In fact, one of the promises he broke (keeping budget deficits under $10B) is a perfect cover not to reverse OAS age. He could have easily said... sorry, folks, OAS reversal is not possible because we inherited an empty cupboard from the evil Harper.

BTW, pretty much every developed country in the world is extending the retirement age to 67:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retirement_age#Retirement_age_by_country

Australia, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Norway, Spain, United States are all moving to 67.

Canada is the only developed country moving in the opposite direction. As far as I can tell, it's pure anti-Harper ideology.


----------



## RBull

GoldStone said:


> +2
> 
> Trudeau's foolish reversal is pure ideology. Undo anything and everything that Harper did. Regardless of merit.


I'm inclined to agree. 

I was reading his statement that the past government came up with a "simplistic solution". The previous government reviewed the program and like some other western nations saw that changes were needed to keep seniors welfare (OAS) sustainable. Changes that reflect the realities of a population that is living much longer and a program projected to cost triple by 2030 to $108 billion without making changes. We heard nothing at all meaningful from the PM about why the change back to 65- only that we need to study it. Apparently it has been studied by the past government but not by the new one. This points to the only reason to change it back again as pure political ideology, more brownie points for the current government, and stands as an example of shoddy regard for future Canadian taxpayers money. A significant amount of money. Sad. 

I would prefer to lose the approx $6000 (plus indexing) my wife and I would with the phasing in ~8 years from now if we're assured of the sustainability of the program for us and especially for future generations. 

Yes, it was part of the liberal political platform but that does not that necessarily make it a good decision.


----------



## carverman

humble_pie said:


> couldn't agree more. next step, we should make our views known to our MPs. As far as i can make out, senate reform is far down on the list, but if enough voters keep speaking out, something might begin to spark.


Why go through all the bother? Don't forget that abolishing the senate requires a plebiscite and/or majority approval from over 50% of the provinces
(not sure about the NWT), ...and jumping through some SCC hoops.

What I heard so far, is the auditor general has identified all the senators with erroneous expenses, and they have to pay back their disallowed expense (Plus interest) pay up immediately, or have it taken off their lucrative pensions.

Only Duffy's legitamate excuses to his..ah "expenses" will be determined by the courts. 

He may actually get off..but it is going to cost him big time in legal fees.


----------



## carverman

RBull said:


> .
> 
> Yes, it was part of the liberal political platform but that does not that necessarily make it a good decision.


Doesn't make one iota of difference to me..I'm collecting it now, need it, want it, and if I make it to 2030 (that's 30 years from now and I will be 100!,

I still would prefer to collect it. I guess I'm different from everyone else,as i don't really care what happens after I'm gone.


----------



## carverman

humble_pie said:


> couldn't agree more. next step, we should make our views known to our MPs. As far as i can make out, senate reform is far down on the list, *but if enough voters keep speaking out, something might begin to spark*.


If you believe in this..got some muskeg in Northern Ontario, You might be interested in buying Humble.


----------



## humble_pie

^^

i didn't mean abolish the senate. Senators like Joan Fraser do valuable research, offer wisdom & suggestions to house of commons committees culled from her years as a powerful editor-in-chief of a national newspaper, don't abuse the system.

what would be nice to see is a drastically reduced senate with short terms not exceeding, say, a maximum of 8 years. Limited pension benefits.


----------



## Davis

olivaw said:


> I voted Liberal but I think Trudeau has ignored the obvious - the senate needs to be scrapped or reformed. Elected senators, term limits and more equal representation would certainly enjoy support in my province of Alberta.


olivaw, I really hope you don't think that it is within the prime minister's power to reform or abolish the Senate. If it were, Harper the Reformer would have done it some time during his nine years. Why hasn't any PM reformed the Senate since the Constitution was patriated 34 years ago? Because reform would require agreement of seven provinces with 50% of the population. Abolition would require unanimous agreement of the provinces.

Neither requirement would be easy - if possible - to meet. For example, what I think you, as an Albertan, understand by "more equal representation" is going to be very different from what I, as an Ontarian, would understand. i don't think you mean "representation by population". Do you think it will be easy to get seven provinces to agree?

Given that the government has to appoint senators to replace those who have left, what Trudeau has done is to change the Senate for the better within the existing constitutional framework. 

This reminds me of what Robert Stanfield once said, which was that even if he could walk on water, the headlines in the paper would be "Stanfield can't swim."


----------



## humble_pie

Davis said:


> olivaw, I really hope you don't think that it is within the prime minister's power to reform or abolish the Senate. If it were, Harper the Reformer would have done it some time during his nine years. Why hasn't any PM reformed the Senate since the Constitution was patriated 34 years ago? Because reform would require agreement of seven provinces with 50% of the population. Abolition would require unanimous agreement of the provinces.
> 
> Neither requirement would be easy - if possible - to meet. For example, what I think you, as an Albertan, understand by "more equal representation" is going to be very different from what I, as an Ontarian, would understand. i don't think you mean "representation by population". Do you think it will be easy to get seven provinces to agree?
> 
> Given that the government has to appoint senators to replace those who have left, what Trudeau has done is to change the Senate for the better within the existing constitutional framework.
> 
> This reminds me of what Robert Stanfield once said, which was that even if he could walk on water, the headlines in the paper would be "Stanfield can't swim."



no kidding, senate reform is that difficult?

i never knew, thankx very much for the info. No wonder the topic of senate reform never comes up. Would it mean amending the constitution?

still, something should be done to downsize the senate, somehow, some way, some day.


----------



## bgc_fan

GoldStone said:


> OAS reversal was a foolish promise. There is nothing wrong with breaking a dumb populist promise made in the heat of an election campaign (see Chretien/GST or McGuinty/Health Tax).
> 
> And it's not like he hasn't broken any promises since election. In fact, one of the promises he broke (keeping budget deficits under $10B) is a perfect cover not to reverse OAS age. He could have easily said... sorry, folks, OAS reversal is not possible because we inherited an empty cupboard from the evil Harper.


So he decided to keep this promise. If he didn't, I'm sure you'ld be all up in arms saying that he didn't keep his promise. 

You're already complaining about the $10B deficit cap, but keep in mind that the projected deficit doesn't include infrastructure spending. In fact, as far as I can tell, the drop in GDP and oil prices contributed greatly to the increased projected deficit from what was tabled in 2015. For example, for a balanced budget, the Conservatives were banking on $67 per barrel for 2016, or the idea of nominal GDP growth of 4%. Considering that it is less than $40, and 1.7% respectively. That $10B was gone unless there were significant spending cuts.


----------



## Davis

humble_pie said:


> Would it mean amending the constitution?
> 
> still, something should be done to downsize the senate, somehow, some way, some day.


Yep. I'd be in favour of abolishing the bloody thing, but it seems we're stuck with it.


----------



## humble_pie

carverman said:


> If you believe in this..got some muskeg in Northern Ontario, You might be interested in buying Humble.



all usually depends on how the voter addresses his MP's political or media adjoint(e), some voters are good communicators each:


----------



## Davis

According to the Globe and Mail, "Peter Harder worked as a Progressive Conservative staffer in the governments of former prime ministers Joe Clark and Biran Mulroney. He later took top jobs in a number of federal government departments." But we shouldn't hold that against him.


----------



## GoldStone

bgc_fan said:


> You're already complaining about the $10B deficit cap, but keep in mind that the projected deficit doesn't include infrastructure spending. In fact, as far as I can tell, the drop in GDP and oil prices contributed greatly to the increased projected deficit from what was tabled in 2015. For example, for a balanced budget, the Conservatives were banking on $67 per barrel for 2016, or the idea of nominal GDP growth of 4%. Considering that it is less than $40, and 1.7% respectively. That $10B was gone unless there were significant spending cuts.


In other words, Trudeau had a perfect political cover to do the right thing and keep OAS age at 67.


----------



## bgc_fan

GoldStone said:


> In other words, Trudeau had a perfect political cover to do the right thing and keep OAS age at 67.


Right according to your values. Not necessarily according to those who voted Liberal.

Just like I feel the Conservatives made a mistake by reducing the GST to 5%, instead of reducing income taxes.


----------



## Userkare

carverman said:


> Not from me. I see that he is doing everyrthing right so far..including a chance for Canada to get a seat on the UN Security Council,
> these seats only become avalable every 10 years.


I'll bet that in order to get that seat, Canada will have to contribute $$$ heavily to every UN initiative. So great, 2 year terms as one of the 10 non-permanent seats on the Security Council - that if it votes 14 to 1 in favour of a motion, the 1, that's one of the 5 permanent members, kills the deal. Why? Because they have nuclear weapons. 

Now there's a club I want to belong to. Trudeau will do anything that gets himself personal attention.


----------



## GoldStone

bgc_fan said:


> Right according to your values. Not necessarily according to those who voted Liberal.


Retirment age is not a "value issue", like abortion or gay marriage.

Most developed countries are moving to retirement age of 67. When demographics changes, countries have to adjust. It's called evidence-based policy development. Whatever happened to the Liberal promise of respecting expert evidence?


----------



## RBull

carverman said:


> Doesn't make one iota of difference to me..I'm collecting it now, need it, want it, and if I make it to 2030 (that's 30 years from now and I will be 100!,
> 
> I still would prefer to collect it. I guess I'm different from everyone else,as i don't really care what happens after I'm gone.


Well actually it could make a difference even to you and others already collecting it. It is paid from general tax revenues. Just look at the reasons why the conservatives changed it and why many other sensible and responsible nations are changing it as well. As we continue to add more people to this the costs go up meaning it has to be paid somehow- through income taxes. If we were to make some adjustments over time like we were it would cost the public much less and still likely reflect the same number of years overall that people collect it since we are living longer. This would better ensure you will continue to receive 100% of it and not be asked to pay more taxes for it. 

I'm not talking only about people after I'm gone. Future generations of retirees....there will likely be a couple in my lifetime. I would prefer to collect it too, but I care more about fiscal responsibility right now to ensure we actually have a future.


----------



## bgc_fan

GoldStone said:


> Retirment age is not a "value issue", like abortion or gay marriage.
> 
> Most developed countries are moving to retirement age of 67. When demographics changes, countries have to adjust. It's called evidence-based policy development. Whatever happened to the Liberal promise of respecting expert evidence?


So some countries decide to move retirement age to 67. So what? It is a value issue in the sense that culturally in Canada, most still see 65 years as the "normal" retirement age. 

As for evidence-based policy, how exactly does that apply in this case? Are you saying that because people are living longer we should delay their retirement till later? Why stop at 67? Why not make it 70 like Australia? Did the Conservatives actually produce numbers that justified moving it to 67? Or was it another Conservative, "It is right because we feel we should". 

You throw back, "But the Liberals promised to use expert evidence for their policies"; however, you'll give a pass on the Conservatives producing policies just because? I get that expecting the Conservatives to use reason in their decisions is a far fetched idea, but the fact that they didn't seem to make any real case for the change would lead one to say that reversing the change doesn't need any extra effort.


----------



## olivaw

Davis said:


> olivaw, I really hope you don't think that it is within the prime minister's power to reform or abolish the Senate. If it were, Harper the Reformer would have done it some time during his nine years. Why hasn't any PM reformed the Senate since the Constitution was patriated 34 years ago? Because reform would require agreement of seven provinces with 50% of the population. Abolition would require unanimous agreement of the provinces.
> 
> Neither requirement would be easy - if possible - to meet. For example, what I think you, as an Albertan, understand by "more equal representation" is going to be very different from what I, as an Ontarian, would understand. i don't think you mean "representation by population". Do you think it will be easy to get seven provinces to agree?
> 
> Given that the government has to appoint senators to replace those who have left, what Trudeau has done is to change the Senate for the better within the existing constitutional framework.
> 
> This reminds me of what Robert Stanfield once said, which was that even if he could walk on water, the headlines in the paper would be "Stanfield can't swim."


I think we are all aware how difficult it will be to bring the provinces together to reach an agreement. It was a point of debate during the last election. That fact alone suggests that there is an appetite in Canada to see the Senate abolished or reformed.

To touch on equal, it is no secret that Albertans like the Triple-E Senate model based on the Australian Senate.

I voted Liberal and usually agree with their positions. On this one, I think the Prime Minister missed an opportunity. His senate appointments seem fine, but the underlying issue remains. 

Humble is right. Somehow, some way, some day.


----------



## Davis

Olivaw, I'm just not clear what you think Trudeau should have done instead of appointing a bunch of non partisans to the Senate. You don't like what he did, and proposed no alternative course of action. What opportunity did he miss?


----------



## Davis

olivaw said:


> To touch on equal, it is no secret that Albertans like the Triple-E Senate model based on the Australian Senate.


I understand why Albertans feel shortchanged by the current allocation of seats, but I am always surprised that they are so naive as to think that 14 million Ontarians would ever agree to have the same representation as 140,000 Prince Edward Islanders. Why would we ever agree to that? The opinions of one Islander are not worth those of a hundred Ontarians.


----------



## olivaw

Deleted, duplicate post.


----------



## olivaw

Davis, there is currently energy in the country to reform the Senate. The Prime Minister enjoys the goodwill of almost all Premiers and a majority of Canadians. I think he had a once-in-a-generation opportunity to invite the Premiers to Ottawa to discuss a process for Senate reform, just like he brought them together to discuss climate change and carbon initiatives. 

Senate reform was one of the few issues that I thought the Liberals got wrong in their platform. They chose to forego reform in favour of a superficial change to the selection process.



Davis said:


> I understand why Albertans feel shortchanged by the current allocation of seats, but I am always surprised that they are so naive as to think that 14 million Ontarians would ever agree to have the same representation as 140,000 Prince Edward Islanders. Why would we ever agree to that? The opinions of one Islander are not worth those of a hundred Ontarians.


Perhaps Ontario and Quebec would have steadfastly refused to consider either regional or population representation. The current model provides neither. Regardless, a change as simple as terms/term limits would have gone a long way to improving our Upper House.


----------



## Davis

The current government has a big agenda and any government can only take on so many things at once without losing focus. Settling the refugees, addressing First Nations issues, rolling out infrastructure spending, dealing with the budget, carbon pricing. I don't agree that Senate reform is light on Canadians' list of properties. It would be a good thing to do someday, but not in the first six months in office. 

I'm not going to defend the current Senate. As soon as you start reallocating seats between provinces, though, you create winners and losers. The provinces that get fewer seats will always oppose the proposed reform. Smaller provinces will oppose representation by population, and larger provinces will oppose equal representation regardless of population. That's why it would take a huge amount of a government's energy and political capital, and would likely still fail. I'm sure you recognize that. Remember the Meech Lake and Charlottetown Accords?


----------



## andrewf

GoldStone said:


> Retirment age is not a "value issue", like abortion or gay marriage.
> 
> Most developed countries are moving to retirement age of 67. When demographics changes, countries have to adjust. It's called evidence-based policy development. Whatever happened to the Liberal promise of respecting expert evidence?


I remember a PBO analysis showing that raising OAS eligibility to 67 having very marginal impact on federal finances. So there isn't exactly a burning need to make this change for fiscal reasons. 

I don't necessarily disagree with the raising of OAS eligibility to 67. I think Harper mislead Canadians about the sustainability of OAS when he implemented the change. My personal preference would be to increase CPP contributions and then gradually lower the clawback threshold on OAS with an eye to eventually phasing it out. Those that earn should be funding their own retirement. GIS/OAS should be for legitimately low income people.


----------



## andrewf

olivaw said:


> I think we are all aware how difficult it will be to bring the provinces together to reach an agreement. It was a point of debate during the last election. That fact alone suggests that there is an appetite in Canada to see the Senate abolished or reformed.
> 
> To touch on equal, it is no secret that Albertans like the Triple-E Senate model based on the Australian Senate.
> 
> I voted Liberal and usually agree with their positions. On this one, I think the Prime Minister missed an opportunity. His senate appointments seem fine, but the underlying issue remains.
> 
> Humble is right. Somehow, some way, some day.


Given Trudeau's 300 campaign promises, I am all in favour of him not wasting copious political capital fighting over a largely irrelevant facet of our government. Harper promised to do something, and utterly failed while passing multiple unconstitutional 'reforms', and stuffing it with partisan hacks, frausters, illiterates, and rapists/bike gang hangers-on.


----------



## andrewf

olivaw said:


> I think he had a once-in-a-generation opportunity to invite the Premiers to Ottawa to discuss a process for Senate reform, just like he brought them together to discuss climate change and carbon initiatives.


What an utter waste of time that would be. Canada has real problems. The Senate isn't one of them. 

I'm not interested in 4 years of rancorous negotiations about how to restructure or abolish it that would ultimately left everyone dissatisfied. And of course, opening the constitution would open a whole other can of worms for Quebec.


----------



## olivaw

I wonder how countries like Australia and the United States ever managed to achieve geographic representation in their senates. If you think the senate isn't a problem then you don't speak for all of Canada, you speak for your limited view of Canada.



andrewf said:


> I'm not interested in 4 years of rancorous negotiations about how to restructure or abolish it that would ultimately left everyone dissatisfied. And of course, opening the constitution would open a whole other can of worms for Quebec.


I'm not interest in what you are interested in. I am interested in what most Canadians are interested in.


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## andrewf

The US agreed on equal representation in the Constitutional Convention in 1787.

http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/Constitution_Senate.htm

The Australian Senate has equal representation built in as part of their constitution, passed in 1900.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Senate

So, they started off with equal representation. I am not sure that the US is well-served by their equal representation provision. California and Wyoming (50x difference in population) having equal representation is almost as bad as Ontario and PEI (100x). It's profoundly undemocratic. Democracy is rule by the people, not rule by dirt.


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## Davis

olivaw said:


> I wonder how countries like Australia and the United States ever managed to achieve geographic representation in their senates. If you think the senate isn't a problem then you don't speak for all of Canada, you speak for your limited view of Canada.
> 
> I'm not interest in what you are interested in. I am interested in what most Canadians are interested in.


The poll you quote was taken at the height of the Senate expenses scandal, so it's not surprising that most people wanted reform. But the poll did not ask people to rank the issues that were most important to them. I want reform too, but how would Senate reform rank now compared to the economy, the deficit, the war in Iraq, First Nations reconciliation, infrastructure spending? 

The American political system is allowing Donald Trump to become a nominee for president. You wanna emulate that system?

According to Wikipedia, there have been 28 major Senate reform proposals since the 1970s, and 28 of those have failed. Do you think Trudeau should squander his political honeymoon by bringing forward #29 when there is no sign that Canadians will be able to agree on how to change it?


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## humble_pie

Davis's views are presenting, if not the last word for me, at least a pausing word on senate reform for the time being (although what donald trump in the US has to do with senate reform in canada escapes me)

of course canadians can look the other way when they view the senate pigsty or hear about its antics in the news, on the grounds that cleaning the pigsty isn't on the schedule for now. I'm not being sarcastic, i seriously agree that Davis & andrewf are right, important priorities have been set forth & everybody can live with the pigsty for the time being.

i'd rather see FPTP & rep-by-pop discussions devolve to the senate arena than continue as news items affecting general elections though. I don't believe canadian voters are worked up about FPTP. It's not even an issue for the NDP any more. The new democrats got the left-leaning prime minister of their dreams in october 2015 without even having to vote for him, so they ought to be blissfully happy.


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## bgc_fan

olivaw said:


> Perhaps Ontario and Quebec would have steadfastly refused to consider either regional or population representation. The current model provides neither. Regardless, a change as simple as terms/term limits would have gone a long way to improving our Upper House.


I am curious if you understand why the Senate distribution is what it is and the rationale. It was conceived to be proportional based on regional boundaries. Basically each region was allocated 24 seats: Western provinces, Ontario, Quebec, and the Maritime provinces. Newfoundland and the Territories came later, so they kind of change the balance a bit. At any case the whole reason why seats weren't readjusted for population growth was to ensure that regional concerns would always have equal rate. The obvious concern was the idea that population growth in Ontario would outstrip other regions and impose its will throughout if there was proportional representation based on population. So the complaints that the Western provinces have are due to the fact that it was set up to protect Western interests. I imagine if there was a mass exodus from the West to the Maritimes, they would have been glad for how it is set up.


----------



## olivaw

Davis said:


> The poll you quote was taken at the height of the Senate expenses scandal, so it's not surprising that most people wanted reform. But the poll did not ask people to rank the issues that were most important to them. I want reform too, but how would Senate reform rank now compared to the economy, the deficit, the war in Iraq, First Nations reconciliation, infrastructure spending?


 Have you a more current poll to support your claim that Senate Reform can be dismissed as an unimportant regional issue? The economy, the deficit, international affairs, first nations, and infrastructure have been, and will always be there. They can't be used as excuses to avoid other national problems. Trudeau chose to side with the status quo. It was the politically expedient course of action. That's fine, but appointing a few more unelected and unaccountable senators is not reform, it's business as usual in Ottawa.


----------



## olivaw

bgc_fan said:


> I am curious if you understand why the Senate distribution is what it is and the rationale. It was conceived to be proportional based on regional boundaries. Basically each region was allocated 24 seats: Western provinces, Ontario, Quebec, and the Maritime provinces. Newfoundland and the Territories came later, so they kind of change the balance a bit. At any case the whole reason why seats weren't readjusted for population growth was to ensure that regional concerns would always have equal rate. The obvious concern was the idea that population growth in Ontario would outstrip other regions and impose its will throughout if there was proportional representation based on population. So the complaints that the Western provinces have are due to the fact that it was set up to protect Western interests. I imagine if there was a mass exodus from the West to the Maritimes, they would have been glad for how it is set up.


You may be mistaken. 

http://www.thecanadaguide.com/the-senate



> Like the House, the Senate’s seats are divided up between the various provinces, but the Senate uses a weird system to decide how many senators each province gets. It’s not based on population, but is rather broadly correlated to the length of time that province or territory has spent as part of Canada. So, the two oldest Provinces (Quebec and Ontario) have 24 senators each, while the provinces that joined later have less. Here is the actual breakdown of seats, along with party standings:
> 
> PROVINCE / TERRITORY	SEATS	Conservatives	Liberals	Other
> British Columbia	6	3	2	0
> Alberta	6	3	2	1 Ind.
> Saskatchewan	6	3	2	1 Ind.
> Manitoba	6	3	1	0
> Ontario	24	15	4	2 Ind.
> Quebec	24	14	7	2 Ind.
> Newfoundland	6	4	2	0
> New Brunswick	10	6	4	0
> Nova Scotia	10	4	4	0
> Prince Edward Island	4	0	3	1 Ind.
> Yukon	1	1	0	0
> Northwest Territories	1	0	1	0
> Nunavut	1	1	0	0
> TOTAL	105 (22 vacancies)	47	29	7
> - See more at: http://www.thecanadaguide.com/the-senate#sthash.srE6g2oM.dpuf


Another source. 

http://www.revparl.ca/english/issue.asp?param=200&art=1409



> At present, there are 105 regular seats in the Senate. One province has four seats, five provinces have six each, two have ten each, two have 24 each, and the territories have one each. These various levels of representation are purely arbitrary, and not connected to population, geographic size, cultural distinctiveness or any other factor. The Prime Minister may appoint either four or eight extra Senators to pass contentious legislation. None of those extra Senators may come from Newfoundland and Labrador or any of the territories. Many Senators represent entire provinces, but many others choose a specific area within the province as their ‘senatorial designation.’ Only Quebec has permanently delineated senatorial districts. None of those districts are in Quebec’s north, so that region is formally without any representation in the Senate.


----------



## Davis

That poll did not rank Canadians' properties then, and no reasonable person would argue that Canadians feel as strongly about it now as they did at the height of the scandal. That just isn't credible. They probably support reform in similar numbers as they did then, but it isn't as important to them as it was then. 

You still haven't given us any indication of a Senate reform plan that could achieve agreement of seven provinces or an abolition plan that would get unanimous support. It would be a big wasted effort for a noble cause, but a failure all the same. I'd rather the PM fight battles he can win than tilt at windmills.

Somebody should do something urgently! I don't know what, and they won't succeed, but they should do something!


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## olivaw

Davis said:


> That poll did not rank Canadians' properties then, and no reasonable person would argue that Canadians feel as strongly about it now as they did at the height of the scandal. That just isn't credible. They probably support reform in similar numbers as they did then, but it isn't as important to them as it was then.


So no proof then. It's your opinion about what is reasonable. Does a reasonable person consider it "less important" or entirely "unimportant"? 



> You still haven't given us any indication of a Senate reform plan that could achieve agreement of seven provinces or an abolition plan that would get unanimous support. It would be a big wasted effort for a noble cause, but a failure all the same. I'd rather the PM fight battles he can win than tilt at windmills.
> 
> Somebody should do something urgently! I don't know what, and they won't succeed, but they should do something


You still haven't read my first link. It contained a few proposals. Oh right, they don't have 100% chance of success and nothing is worth doing in Canada until there is 100% chance of success. That would be _tilting at windmills_.


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## andrewf

Your link is dead.



> Like the House, the Senate’s seats are divided up between the various provinces, but the Senate uses a weird system to decide how many senators each province gets. It’s not based on population, but is rather broadly correlated to the length of time that province or territory has spent as part of Canada. So, the two oldest Provinces (Quebec and Ontario) have 24 senators each, while the provinces that joined later have less. Here is the actual breakdown of seats, along with party standings:


That's obviously not how it works, because the original four provinces are Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, and they do not have equal share of seats. 

I'm also not sure how you expect to get Quebec and the Maritimes to agree to a dilution of their representation in the Senate, particularly if it is packaged with a proposal to make the Senate directly elected (hence giving it democratic legitimacy to thwart the House of Commons like in the US). You'd have a way better chance of getting it abolished. Any proposal that sees Ontario with 10% share of an elected Senate is going to get highly vocal opposition from me--that is untenable.

As has been said earlier--we should get around to Constitutional wrangling over the Senate once Canada's real problems have been addressed and governments run out of things to talk about.


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## bgc_fan

olivaw said:


> You may be mistaken.
> 
> http://www.thecanadaguide.com/the-senate
> 
> Another source.
> 
> http://www.revparl.ca/english/issue.asp?param=200&art=1409


Or you can go to the direct source, i.e. the Senate website:
http://www.parl.gc.ca/about/senate/legisfocus/legislative-e.htm

Where the original make up was:

8. Upper Canada shall be represented in the Legislative Council by twenty-four (24) Members, Lower Canada by twenty-four (24) Members, and the three Maritime Provinces by twenty-four (24) Members, of which Nova Scotia shall have ten (10), New Brunswick ten (10) and Prince Edward Island four (4) Members.

It doesn't go into detail about the rationale about the seats for the Western provinces, but my understanding was that it was based on 24 again.


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## humble_pie

thanks to the small handful of stalwarts in this thread, we are getting something of a look at how the pigsty was built.

how it looks is hopeless. Beyond repair. Why should a senate have unelected regional representation anyhow? I've never once even heard of anybody contacting their provincial senator regarding any issue. A voter might try his MP, but the idea of enlisting a local senator seems like a feeble joke.

why not abolish the senate? 48 senators for ontario & quebec while just over 60 for the whole rest of canada is a sendup, right?

stalwarts, now that we are being so entertaining, won't you please tell us next what kind of work they are supposed to be doing in the pigsty. 

there's no use repairing the broken-down old thing. I mean, there are a few dilapidated boards marked "O" & "Q" hanging on rusty nails by the gate, but the rest of the pigsty obviously collapsed decades ago.

i don't mind paying for governors general. In fact i like the GGs, they decorate soldiers & citizens & hand out prizes for poetry & wedding anniversaries, stuff like that. But even if i try with all my might, i can't think of a single helpful thing a single senator ever did. Other than the one who lost to justin trudeau in a prize fight for charity.


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## olivaw

andrewf said:


> Your link is dead.


It wasn't dead the first time I gave it to you and you declined to glance at it. Here you go again..


----------



## andrewf

humble_pie said:


> But even if i try with all my might, i can't think of a single helpful thing a single senator ever did. Other than the one who lost to justin trudeau in a prize fight for charity.


Maybe that is your failing. There are good senators, who have done good work. Hugh Segal is a good example, among others.

The trick to not getting duds like Duffey and Brazeau is not to appoint senators based on their willingness to shill for you in the media and act as a chief fundraiser for the party.


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## olivaw

humble_pie said:


> thanks to the small handful of stalwarts in this thread, we are getting something of a look at how the pigsty was built.
> 
> how it looks is hopeless. Beyond repair. Why should a senate have unelected regional representation anyhow? I've never once even heard of anybody contacting their provincial senator regarding any issue. A voter might try his MP, but the idea of enlisting a local senator seems like a feeble joke.


I contacted my senators once. I live in Alberta so I have six senators representing me. Do the poor folks in Ontario have to contact all 24 of their senators? I asked my senators to vote against Bill C-51. It was pointless. Conservative senators were whipped to vote along party lines and they supported the legislation. 

Abolition would be better than what we have now.


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## humble_pie

no failing on my part. Your friend mister segal might be a pleasant & industrious gentleman, but there are many thousands of canadians who are quite like him. 

the high costs of maintaining the cohort of more than 100 senators, with all the abuses over the years, makes their modest & humdrum work product just about useless imho.


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## humble_pie

olivaw said:


> Abolition would be better than what we have now.



interesting view. Thankx much for raising the topic. I shall have to learn & think more about this.


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## Davis

Olivaw, your link does not recommend equal representation by province - it recommend a hybrid. But its hybrid that relies on Quebec giving up six Senate seats, NS and NB giving up three seats each, and several provinces accepting a reduction in their share of seats. Good luck with that. 

However good the academic arguments are, they are bound to fail in the reality of Canadian politics in the 21st century.

Abolition makes the most sense to me because it avoids the power shifting. Since we have done this long without an effective upper house, I think we should follow New Zealand's lead and dispense with it. If only doing so didn't require unanimous consent.

It's kind of like revisiting the question of the head of state. There are good reasons to change, but there's no consensus on how to do so, there will be lots of opposition, and it has no impact on Canadians' daily lives or the running of the government, so it isn't worth the effort and cost to try to change it now. 

My point is that there is so little likelihood of getting an agreement, and it's well down on Canadians' list of priorities that it isn't a good use of the new government's time and energy.


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## jargey3000

a senator lives in our neighborhood. nice enough fella. seems to spend most his days driving / walking around the (new-ish) neighborhood, scanning the home construction (i'm retired, so i do much the same.... often wished i could find a job like that  )


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## humble_pie

Davis i think you're 90% right except i'd hope to tweak your argument. Because ottawa is always going to be too busy to add a difficult challenge to its menu. So the 10% tweak consists of merely ensuring that abolish-the-senate exists as an issue, that it has a name. Merely spreading the word that the senate is a costly & useless caricature is good enough for the time being imho.

i mean, when half the Senate gets appointed out of ontario & quebec, that's a caricature, right? that couldn't be serious, right?

me i don't see any reason for canada to need or want a region-based senate. Local district/riding/regional representation is best carried out by elected MPs, there's no better system than the parliamentary system for that.

marginal talk about rep-by-pop-FPTP, in a gigantic sparsely-settled unwieldy nation like canada, would produce a homogenized coast-to-coast bureaucracy imho. All the subtle colourings of local cultures would be lost. Toronto politicians would end up ruling with an iron fist over delicate communities in ungava, inuvik & moosenee.

does the finance minister want to save canada some serious $$? 1) don't buy the F-35s; 2) abolish the canadian senate, with all its crazy/expensive audits, investigations, trials, expense accounts & dual private residences for senators on the taxpayers' dime.


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## sags

Abolish the Senate and replace it with a Premiers Council.

Give each Provincial Premier one vote and the responsibility of passing or rejecting legislation passed by Parliament.

The committee hearings can be held by MPs and "sober second thought" can be provided by the Premiers among themselves.

The Premiers would have the authority to accept, reject or amend legislation.

The Premiers Council can meet, discuss and vote on legislation on a virtual platform which is private and secure. The decisions and voting record of the Council would be publicly accessible

The cost of the Senate would be eliminated, geographical differences and concerns would be addressed, and there would be protection against "runaway" governments.


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## humble_pie

sags said:


> Abolish the Senate and replace it with a Premiers Council.
> 
> Give each Provincial Premier one vote and the responsibility of passing or rejecting legislation passed by Parliament.
> 
> The Premiers would have the authority to accept, reject or amend legislation



i would strongly oppose. Unto my dying day. Sags what - in your system - would be the purpose of electing a House of Commons, then?

we need a federal government to ensure defence, border security, highways, finance, communication.

the Saguenay river flooded, ottawa sent in the army. Montreal was crippled by loss of hydroelectric power for 3 weeks during january, ottawa sent in the army.

the G20 met in toronto amid strong popular opposition & demonstrations, ottawa had the army ready.

sags under your proposal a province could require help but the other provinces will vote Nyet. We need the checks & balances of a federal system imho.



in your


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## sags

The Federal government would retain all the power of administration of current law and response to emergencies and security, but new legislation would have to be considered by the Premier Council.

The purpose of the Parliament would still be to create law. The Premier Council would replicate current Senate duties with a non patronage council responsible directly to the voters.

If a majority of Premiers accept, reject or amend a law..............there would likely be good reason for doing so.


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## humble_pie

^^

no, you said the Premiers could amend existing legislation. They would soon destroy the country with local needs.

sags under your scenario we should abolish the house of commons too. There'd be no need for ottawa in anything. Let's have 12 independent little nation statelets instead. Defence could be jointly owned as a private security service, all its operations could be contracted out.

wondering why u have suddenly gone over to the side of quebec & alberta separation? les indépendentists would luv ya.


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## andrewf

humble_pie said:


> i mean, when half the Senate gets appointed out of ontario & quebec, that's a caricature, right? that couldn't be serious, right?


Why? Those two provinces are well more than half the population of the country.



> does the finance minister want to save canada some serious $$? 1) don't buy the F-35s; 2) abolish the canadian senate, with all its crazy/expensive audits, investigations, trials, expense accounts & dual private residences for senators on the taxpayers' dime.


We have to keep scale in mind. F35s were to cost tens of billions of dollars. The Senate perhaps costs $100 - 200 million per year.


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## humble_pie

upon reflection, i think that abolishing the senate & putting a Premiers' Council in its vacant spot is the best hotdamn idea i've seen in years & years.

the premiers are meeting ad hoc anyhow, just give it a name & a bit of a structure.

i think sags' concept has gone overboard with power for the premiers, though. Needs adjustment imho. It's like every good idea, there are always a zillion adjustments along the optimization path.


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## humble_pie

andrewf said:


> he Senate perhaps costs $100 - 200 million per year.



but surely costs far more when one considers all the costs absorbed by other ministries?

the DOJ for the trials, the RCMP for the investigations, Finance for the audits & the recoveries of illegally spent funds, etc.


Edit - one could even include all the person-hours of manpower that were lost forever in the individual MPs' offices, as they dealt with the avalance of voter communications over the duffy/wallin trials.


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## andrewf

I think the premiers are busy already. And having the premiers play such an important role in federal politics would muddy the jurisdictional waters. Would you vote provincially based on what the premier would do federally?


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## humble_pie

andrewf said:


> I think the premiers are busy already


who isn't busy already. Keeping track of their clout with ottawa, working on their relationship with ottawa, are tasks that the provincial premiers are already buried in. Up to their eyeballs.




> And having the premiers play such an important role in federal politics would muddy the jurisdictional waters


my first reaction to sags' idea was that the premiers would have far too much power. I still believe that pure sagsianism would deliver far & away too much power to provinces. 

pure sagsianism is also too simplistic imho. In sags' version of federalism, nunavut would have as much power as ontario. So there would have to be caps & limits on a Premiers' Council. What these might be would take many wise heads & many years to iron out.

still, as a way to eliminate senseless duplication, sags' idea is brilliant.




> Would you vote provincially based on what the premier would do federally?


i actually am not acquainted with a single voter who doesn't (vote provincially based on what a premier would do federally, that is)


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## andrewf

I'm getting a brainwave. We should have, in every province, a Mayors' Council as an upper chamber. This new body can spend their time reviewing, amending and rejecting provincial legislation. And on top of that, they would also form the federal Mayors Council, who would act as an upper, upper chamber on top of the Premier's council.

Then we can get the school board trustee council to oversee all of that.


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## steve41

And finally, to cap it off, each school's PTA would oversee the whole enterprise.


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## Davis

And we should scrap the UN General Assembly and Security Council and have the world's leaders take on the job in their spare time. I'm sure they can give global issues the level of thought and analysis that are needed since being a prime minister or president isn't anytime more a full-time job than being premier of Ontario, Quebec or Brian Columbia. ;-)


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## humble_pie

Davis it's not surprising that stevie & andie are acting silly, but you?

the provincial premiers are already doing all the serious federal-relationship work that the senators might be expected to do & then some. The provincial premiers are already meeting ad hoc with each other, from time to time en bloc with the PM.

why not abolish the useless senate & formalize the provincial premiers' input since this is already abundantly available. Then the task of advising cabinet would be good to go.

constitutionally, does the canadian senate have any *real* power? the GG has the power to call a government in the rare case of a non-confidence stand-down, but i believe the senate is not formally called upon to do anything more than sit on its prats in the plush red room now & then (even compulsory attendance is a recent innovation, one hears)


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## LBCfan

Of course, a triple E Senate can't be an option. How would the east continue to screw the west?


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## Davis

Sorry humble, but I don't think this is a viable idea. Provincial premiers would not have the time to provide the sort of review that the Senate provides on government bills. They really are too busy running their own governments to become experts in issues facing the federal government. Furthermore, it would be unrealistic to think that they would act as members of this rather separately from their roles as provincial premiers. Passage of each federal bill would then become a federal-provincial negotiation, and the feds would have to buy off provinces to get each bill passed. I think it would be a recipe for disaster. Leave the premiers to act in the interests of their provinces, and if we need an upper house, let its members act in the national interest.


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## andrewf

HP, silly ideas beget silly reactions.


----------



## tygrus

Right now the senate is supposed to be a sober second look at legislation. By the time they get it, its been tabled and voted on in the house so they cant really send it back because of the optics. So they rubber stamp it and go home.

Why not get them involved before it gets tabled. Stack it with independents and then let them see it before it gets tabled. They can then spot flaws or suggest improvements and send it quietly back to the govt. Maybe it goes back and forth a couple times until its well polished. Then they can really add value to the process and we dont have to open an messy constitution change to get rid of them.


----------



## olivaw

Another idea on the Senate. 

*Opinion: Senate reform and partnership with indigenous peoples, all in one*
_Montreal Gazette March 13, 2016 _



> The Liberal government’s reform of the Senate appointment process is a missed opportunity.
> 
> The problem it tackles — patronage appointments by the prime minister — is a non-issue compared to our broken covenant of friendship with First Nations. The Senate’s role should be to uphold this friendship, as a shared assembly for aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples.
> 
> A disclaimer: I am not aboriginal, and I do not speak for them. I especially do not intend aboriginal representation in the Senate to cost First Nations the autonomy the Crown owes them. My intent is instead for this representation to support existing Nations’ rights to self-governance by placing politicians in a relationship of sustained commitment, accountability and partnership with aboriginal people.
> 
> This approach is not new. In 1995, Chief Elijah Harper gathered a Sacred Assembly of aboriginals and non-aboriginals in a spirit of healing and reconciliation. In 1996, the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples recommended an aboriginal Parliament. New Zealand instituted Māori-only electorates (seats) in 1867.
> 
> Older still is the constitution we share with aboriginals: the Royal Proclamation 1763 and Treaty of Niagara 1764 formed a nation-to-nation relationship between First Nations and Canadians and bound both as family in a shared covenant. Neither was ever repealed and Canada’s obligations continue to stand as law.
> 
> Past governments failed to maintain this shared constitution, let alone a nation-to-nation relationship. After equivocating on his election pledge to respect First Nations’ right to a veto over what happens on their lands, the Trudeau government’s roadmap is no more promising.
> 
> A recurring reason for this failure is accountability. By definition, a nation-to-nation relationship takes equal political rights not as an end, but as its starting point. Yet few First Nations and bands can operate without funding or recognition from a government accountable not to them, but to a mercurial, overwhelmingly non-aboriginal electorate.


----------



## humble_pie

olivaw said:


> Another idea on the Senate.
> 
> *Opinion: Senate reform and partnership with indigenous peoples, all in one*
> _Montreal Gazette March 13, 2016 _




but this isn't a Montreal Gazette editorial! it's an op-ed piece submitted by a private outside party, the kind of op-ed piece that all newspapers routinely publish in order to offer a broad spectrum of points of view.

Gaith El-Mohtar is a first-year law student at mcGill university. He writes well & does excellent research, but like all lawyers everywhere he's kind of blabby, sometimes about nothing.

filling the senate with first nations is a recipe for disaster. They would not have any power. Being buried alive in the red plush room on parliament hill, with nothing to do except talktalktalktalktalk while nobody listens, is the opposite of the action that first nations are seeking. I'm fairly sure that, if the idea were put to them, not one single aboriginal person in canada would accept. The senator brazeau soap opera was bad enough.

btw here is your young friend gaith. Looks to be an exceptionally gifted student, green party activist, pro-palestinian lobbyist, musician, member of the refugee lawyers association of canada. Me i think this legal laddie is barking up the wrong tree when it comes to knowing what first nations want, but otherwise i'm predicting a brilliant career for gaith in canada.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=r9MFMZBVInY


----------



## andrewf

tygrus said:


> Right now the senate is supposed to be a sober second look at legislation. By the time they get it, its been tabled and voted on in the house so they cant really send it back because of the optics. So they rubber stamp it and go home.
> 
> Why not get them involved before it gets tabled. Stack it with independents and then let them see it before it gets tabled. They can then spot flaws or suggest improvements and send it quietly back to the govt. Maybe it goes back and forth a couple times until its well polished. Then they can really add value to the process and we dont have to open an messy constitution change to get rid of them.


The Senate can and does propose amendments, which are then sent back to the House of Commons. We have seen it more and more where there is plainly badly drafted legislation written by the PMO (kids in short pants brigade), and forced through the House with minimal debate or scrutiny, whereupon the Senate receives it and catches basic errors in drafting. One of the failings of the previous government is that they would often refuse even these basic amendments tidying up their legislation.


----------



## andrewf

I, for one, am not interested in any racial tests for public office. I think it should be obvious why that is a bad idea.


----------



## humble_pie

tygrus said:


> Right now the senate is supposed to be a sober second look at legislation. By the time they get it, its been tabled and voted on in the house so they cant really send it back because of the optics. So they rubber stamp it and go home.
> 
> Why not get them involved before it gets tabled. Stack it with independents and then let them see it before it gets tabled. They can then spot flaws or suggest improvements and send it quietly back to the govt. Maybe it goes back and forth a couple times until its well polished. Then they can really add value to the process and we dont have to open an messy constitution change to get rid of them.



tyg why would we pay a bunch of folks called Senators to come up with opinions when the media plus their interactive publics are doing a spectacular job?

speedy, too, the media & the interactive forums. The merest leak of news & ZIPPP you have your opinion. None of this waiting 10 months while a senate committee coughs & stews in a committee room.


----------



## olivaw

humble_pie said:


> filling the senate with first nations is a recipe for disaster. They would not have any power. Being buried alive in the red plush room on parliament hill, with nothing to do except talktalktalktalktalk while nobody listens, is the opposite of the action that first nations are seeking. I'm fairly sure that, if the idea were put to them, not one single aboriginal person in canada would accept. The senator brazeau soap opera was bad enough


You might be right, but it's an opinion - one of dozens of published opinions that are out there. Here's another. 

*Trudeau's Senate Picks Are A 'Partisan Façade': Democracy Watch*



> A non-profit advocacy group says the Liberal government has conjured up a “partisan façade” after the prime minister recommended seven new senators on Friday.
> 
> Duff Conacher, co-founder of Democracy Watch and visiting professor at the University of Ottawa, said that despite Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s pledge to only name independent senators, the “systemic” nature of the upper chamber curdles that ambition.
> 
> “Anyone who is appointed to the Senate by a Liberal prime minister — who also chose the advisory board that nominates them — is a Liberal appointee, not an independent senator,” he told The Huffington Post Canada in an interview.
> 
> Conacher pointed to the example of Peter Harder, a longtime civil servant who led the Liberals’ transition team and has now been named government representative in the Senate.
> 
> “I don’t think he’s very independent from the prime minister, which is probably why he’s the government representative,” he said.
> 
> Trudeau confirmed in a statement that while he has tasked Harder to steer government legislation through the Senate, the senator will sit as an independent — something he said will help guide the institution towards being “less partisan.”
> 
> But Conacher says Harder’s appointment, among the six others, only underscores the need to abolish the red chamber all together.
> 
> “We live in a democracy and to have an unappointed part of Parliament as the Senate that can stop what the elected MPs in the House of Commons propose is just fundamentally undemocratic.”


The piece also references gender parity.


----------



## humble_pie

andrewf said:


> The Senate can and does propose amendments, which are then sent back to the House of Commons. We have seen it more and more where there is plainly badly drafted legislation written by the PMO (kids in short pants brigade), and forced through the House with minimal debate or scrutiny, whereupon the Senate receives it and catches basic errors in drafting. One of the failings of the previous government is that they would often refuse even these basic amendments tidying up their legislation.



i'm not against spell checkers & grammar sticklers but surely there are cheaper language critics to hire

why pay for a senator's keep to "tidy up" a few paragraphs


----------



## andrewf

I'm sympathetic to Conacher's perspective (and I'm with him on electoral reform). However, I don't think Trudeau could have done anything that would not have attracted criticism from Conacher--a no-win situation.

The government is trying to make a change in how the Senate operates. There is going to be some learning along the way. One big issue that has come up is the logistics of not having a government representative in the Senate, hence why one of the newly appointed Senators was asked to act as one to help with the functioning of the Senate. Maybe there will be a better solution in future. The other problem that has arisen is how to handle Question period in the Senate, given that there are no longer government representatives in the Senate. One proposal has been to have a member of cabinet be given standing to speak in the Senate, but I guess this is procedurally clunky.

I think the key thing with managing an unelected Senate is to ensure that it never challenges the supremacy of the House of Commons. It generally has done this with few exceptions, but the key thing is that its lack of democratic legitimacy leads to its deference to the House. This is why Harper's half-hearted attempt to introduce elections to the Senate as presently formed was so dangerous. It would be granting democratic legitimacy to the Senate as currently formed, with its currently problematic distribution of seats. And once it wields real power, the chances of any province agreeing to changes in seat distribution that disadvantage would be very slim. He would have been cementing a powerful Senate that underrepresents Western provinces. Stupid and dangerous.


----------



## andrewf

humble_pie said:


> i'm not against spell checkers & grammar sticklers but surely there are cheaper language critics to hire
> 
> why pay for a senator's keep to "tidy up" a few paragraphs


It's not all they do. And we're not talking about mere grammar and spelling, but legally problematic phrasing. We could hire a law firm to draft and enact legislation, but I'm not entirely sure that would still be democracy.


----------



## tygrus

HP, the government wont govern by small plebiscites from media or public forums. They believe we elected them for a mandate to govern and that means they dont need to talk to us for another 4 years. Thats how politics is done here. If they had town halls about every little thing we would stall out and nothing would get done.

However, the senate could be that bridge under the radar. Reviewing early legislation, interfacing with constituencies as independents, not like partisan MPS and even serving as neutral arbitrators in some of our more protracted disputes like sovereignty etc.


----------



## andrewf

I'm puzzled why people are so hostile to a de-politicized appointed Senate. I see the Senate as a potential pre-vetting of legislation, making suggestions of how they could be improved prior to being enacted by the democratically elected representatives of the people. Maybe give the Supreme Court less to do (shooting down bad and/or unconstitutional legislation passed by a cynical executive).


----------



## humble_pie

andrewf said:


> I see the Senate as a potential pre-vetting of legislation, making suggestions of how they could be improved prior to being enacted by the democratically elected representatives of the people. Maybe give the Supreme Court less to do (shooting down bad and/or unconstitutional legislation passed by a cynical executive).





tygrus said:


> However, the senate could be that bridge under the radar. Reviewing early legislation, interfacing with constituencies as independents, not like partisan MPS and even serving as neutral arbitrators in some of our more protracted disputes like sovereignty etc.




it all sounds so wonderful, the way you 2 are describing it. A phalanx of wise solons, brows wreathed in laurel leaves, working to inspect each new proposed law in draft form, before the very clay tablets on which the majestic words were chiselled have even hardened.

noble, heroic, spartan in their physical needs, unpaid save by honour & distinction, patriotic to their dying breaths, dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. 

the problem for canada is how the above fairytale turned into a real-life pigsty in the red plush room. As a canadian, i worry it will happen again. 

there isn't enough work for 105 senators to do. Pre-vetting proposed legislation could be carried out by 12 senators, easy. One for each province. There are boutique law firms with fewer than 12 lawyers who handle case loads that are 10 times the size of pending federal legislation.


----------



## sags

I still think it would be simpler just to hand the responsibility of oversight to the Provincial Premiers. They can make use of the plethora of Provincial advisory committees they have to make recommendations.

The Premiers can assign the responsibility of shepherding the legislation to the Provincial cabinet ministers affected by the legislation.

The Premiers can discuss the legislation among themselves if need be, or simply provide the specific recommendations of their advisory boards to the Provincial Council.

The Premier Council should be restricted to providing only recommendations, with an exception that legislation considered by the Premier Council to be unduly onerous to Canadians could be automatically referred to the Supreme Court for their oversight.

The government could accept or reject the recommendations, which would be made public when the legislation was enacted so Canadians would know what the recommendations were and if they were enacted.


----------



## olivaw

humble_pie said:


> it all sounds so wonderful, the way you 2 are describing it. A phalanx of wise solons, brows wreathed in laurel leaves, working to inspect each new proposed law in draft form, before the very clay tablets on which the majestic words were chiselled have even hardened.
> 
> noble, heroic, spartan in their physical needs, unpaid save by honour & distinction, patriotic to their dying breaths, dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.
> 
> the problem for canada is how the above fairytale turned into a real-life pigsty in the red plush room. As a canadian, i worry it will happen again.
> 
> there isn't enough work for 105 senators to do. Pre-vetting proposed legislation could be carried out by 12 senators, easy. One for each province. There are boutique law firms with fewer than 12 lawyers who handle case loads that are 10 times the size of pending federal legislation.


 BC refused to participate in the Prime Minister's selection process because eliminating partisanship does nothing to resolve BC's under-representation. Brad Wall's Saskatchewan Party believes in outright abolition. Alberta has been electing senate nominees since 1989 and calling for equal representation for far longer. Aaron Wudrick, the federal director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, referred to Trudeau's senate reforms as "the proverbial lipstick on a pig." 

The Prime Ministers changes are well intentioned but they are not reforms. Provincial equity, described above, is meaningful and it might even work if the senators were accountable. Unfortunately the Supreme Court has told us that such a compromise is going to be all but impossible to achieve. Abolition is technically more difficult but practically more achievable.



Sags said:


> I still think it would be simpler just to hand the responsibility of oversight to the Provincial Premiers. They can make use of the plethora of Provincial advisory committees they have to make recommendations.


Do you believe that the Premiers can come together to work in the best interests of the country? They certainly haven't demonstrated a willingness to do that in the past.


----------



## andrewf

Abolition is definitely more realistic than making the Senate triple E. There is nothing inherently fair about the triple E Senate proposal. Even though abolition is more realistic, I still see it as being pretty remote in likelihood.


----------



## GoldStone

Prime Minister Peacock failed to impress North Korea. :biggrin:


----------



## humble_pie

GoldStone said:


> Prime Minister Peacock failed to impress North Korea




i hope you realize that your website is a fake. One never knows the way you do go on & on about the prime minister.

https://twitter.com/dprk_news?lang=en


----------



## sags

Thanks for the heads up Humble.........that twitter account is both hilarious and a brilliant use of satire.

Many "gems" on there.......one example here.


_Workers at Pyongyang Chewing Gum Factory receive cans of chipped beef as reward for increasing productivity 279%_


----------



## olivaw

+1, Thanks Humble for pointing that out. Newsweek and other respectable news organization also fell for the DPRK news parody account.


----------



## GoldStone

humble_pie said:


> i hope you realize that your website is a fake. One never knows the way you do go on & on about the prime minister.
> 
> https://twitter.com/dprk_news?lang=en


Of course it's a fake twitter feed, and it's hilarious. Including the tweet about "piteous weakling president Justin Trudeau". 

Next time I decide to mock your beloved playboy, I'm going to include a disclaimer:

*THIS IS A HUMOROUS POST - DO NOT TAKE IT TOO SERIOUSLY*


----------



## humble_pie

in the DPRK tweets today: american pornography starring - are u ready for this - brain worms.

_"US foreign minister John Kerry flailed as political dunce, distinguished only for lies and addiction to pornography."

"Respected US National Inquirer newspaper reports Hillary Clinton to be stricken by 'brain worms,' casting presidential succession in doubt."_


----------



## humble_pie

GoldStone said:


> Next time I decide to mock your beloved playboy, I'm going to include a disclaimer



wouldn't it be better to just get over it?

after all, he's going to be PM until 2019. Most of the country supports him.

all this retro looking back at the past & kvetching about his hair & his pictures becomes tiresome after a while.


----------



## GoldStone

humble_pie said:


> wouldn't it be better to just get over it?


Get over what? I'm thoroughly enjoying the new political show. 

Me thinks you need to grow a sense of humour. It's hilarious that my throw-away posts get under your skin. :biggrin:


----------



## humble_pie

^^

i have a fine sense of humour thank you 

i think i'll get a twitter account DPRCMForum

_"Homely, aging male forummers vent their jealousy of the luxuriant prime ministerial tonsure"_


----------



## GoldStone

^^ Great idea! :biggrin:


----------



## MyCatMittens

humble_pie said:


> Most of the country supports him.


Let's be honest though. 80% of Canadians wouldn't be able to tell you 1 thing that was in the budget - and even if they could, it would probably be how the government is going to give them something (and take it from someone else).

I'm pretty sure anyone on this forum would be well liked if they spent billions and didn't have to balance (or even commit to) the budget. The real question is "will they still support him?" when he starts taking away... (unless you believe GDP growth is going to be so strong over the next 5 years that the magic revenue fairy is going to solve all of the problems).

And don't take this as necessarily a slam against JT... I'm starting to think that no politician of any badge has any respect for the taxpayer


----------



## andrewf

^ It was always thus. Most Canadians are blissfully ignorant of what is going on in government, only rousing to pay attention to what is going on perhaps the week or two before an election.


----------



## olivaw

While it is true that many Canadians do not pay attention to politics or the budget, the Prime Minister is polling well. *Justin Trudeau rates highly on economy and approval in new polls*



> The ARI poll pegged Trudeau's approval at 61 per cent, with 23 per cent strongly approving and 38 per cent somewhat approving of him. The poll from Forum put his approval rating at 57 per cent.
> 
> The two surveys found Trudeau's disapproval rating at between 33 and 34 per cent of Canadians.


----------



## sags

The great thing about that DPR News site is that it almost a true to life parody.


----------



## GoldStone

olivaw said:


> While it is true that many Canadians do not pay attention to politics or the budget, the Prime Minister is polling well. *Justin Trudeau rates highly on economy and approval in new polls*


Yeah but, Kim Kardashian has 42.6M twitter followers. How many does he have? :biggrin:


----------



## humble_pie

latest tweet from DPRK goes

_"Alt-right" political movement in west, composed of fascists marginally less imbecilic than "skinheads," is alleged to pose threat to DPRK."_


yea we have a few marginally-less-imbecilic around here ourselves


----------



## LBCfan

GoldStone said:


> Yeah but, Kim Kardashian has 42.6M twitter followers. How many does he have? :biggrin:


But KK has two bigger B's (boobs and brain).


----------



## olivaw

GoldStone said:


> Yeah but, Kim Kardashian has 42.6M twitter followers. How many does he have? :biggrin:





LBCfan said:


> But KK has two bigger B's (boobs and brain).


To be fair though, he hasn't posted the underwear pictures ... yet.each:


----------



## MyCatMittens

olivaw said:


> While it is true that many Canadians do not pay attention to politics or the budget, the Prime Minister is polling well. *Justin Trudeau rates highly on economy and approval in new polls*


So, for all of the people who don't pay attention to what's going on, they fully support the PM. Glad to know 

IMHO, The PM is polling well because:

1. He is charismatic
2. He has a found a message ("improve the middle class") that resonates with the large base of liberal supporters (similar to Rob Ford, Trump, etc. have done)

Let's not pretend that the poll is anything more than that. 

This is the honeymoon period. We all love Christmas when we are opening the presents, but eventually the VISA bill shows up.... When the current government has to start cutting government jobs and/or raising taxes (as OPM just won't cover that size gap), we'll re-examine the level of support. If they truly support his agenda, and the polls stay high despite this, then I will come back to this thread, and admit my error.


----------



## olivaw

It might be the honeymoon but our Prime Minister is the envy of the world. He doesn't need Harper's hair bonnet and Mulcair's facial tribute to hipsterism to keep female voters on his side. Please cast all sadness from your hearts, dear Conservatives. Goldstone and LBCfan assure us that your party has an equally charming new leader on the way.


----------



## GoldStone

My niece lives in a country far far away, knows little about Canada, much less about Canadian politics. Last time I talked to her, she told me unprompted that we got a new prime minister and that he is "pretty hot" (her words). That's all she knows about him.

Apparently that's enough to make liberal Canadians proud. Our PM is famous world-wide for being "pretty hot". Just like Kim. Rejoice!! :biggrin:


----------



## olivaw

He's not just a pretty face.


----------



## GoldStone

^ "peacock pose"

very apt! :biggrin:


----------



## gibor365

> NDP Leader Tom Mulcair condemned Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump as a "fascist" and criticized Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for not denouncing the billionaire business mogul.


http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/tom-mulcair-donald-trump-fascist-1.3513166

And I'd call Tom commi and antisemite :stupid:


----------



## sags

PM............strong like bull.


----------



## olivaw

Boy, that Tom Mulcair sure knows how to choose his battles, doesn't he?


----------



## sags

The economy has taken off and is "rip roaring" along at at annualized 5% GDP growth pace.

It seems that Justin Trudeau benefits once again from perfect timing.

http://www.bnn.ca/News/2016/3/31/Canadas-economy-perks-up-after-a-dismal-end-to-2015-.aspx


----------



## GoldStone

sags said:


> The economy has taken off and is "rip roaring" along at at annualized 5% GDP growth pace.


So why do we need to run budget deficits? The economy is doing just fine without reckless Liberal spending. Low Canadian dollar stimulates the economy on its own. This is the time to balance the budgets. Save deficits for when we really need them.... recession.


----------



## MyCatMittens

olivaw said:


> It might be the honeymoon but our Prime Minister is the envy of the world. He doesn't need Harper's hair bonnet and Mulcair's facial tribute to hipsterism to keep female voters on his side. Please cast all sadness from your hearts, dear Conservatives. Goldstone and LBCfan assure us that your party has an equally charming new leader on the way.


Sorry. I'm not clear what your point is?

1. Women cast their vote based on looks (as most of your post is related to Harper's hair, Mulcair's beard, and how every woman in some café loves him?)?
2. Our PM is the envy because he is spending money like crazy, is good looking, and hasn't had to make any difficult decisions yet (unlike the others referenced in the article)?

We are just going to have to agree to disagree. I don't pick my investments based on the looks of the CEO, and I certainly won't vote that way either. 

When you say "your party" - assuming you are referring to me being included... I don't "have a party". I'm a taxpayer, and I want the person who is going to responsibly look after "my part ownership" of the government.


----------



## humble_pie

GoldStone said:


> My niece lives in a country far far away, knows little about Canada, much less about Canadian politics. Last time I talked to her, she told me unprompted that we got a new prime minister and that he is "pretty hot" (her words). That's all she knows about him.
> 
> Apparently that's enough to make liberal Canadians proud. Our PM is famous world-wide for being "pretty hot". Just like Kim. Rejoice!! :biggrin:




goldstone i am wondering if i might make a little suggestion.

it has to do with folks in canada who are overly preoccupied with justin trudeau's looks. One might even say they are obsessed with justin's looks. These folks come across as a bit jealous, see. This in turn raises the hypothesis that perhaps they, themselves, might be on the ugly side.

we never see liberals paying any attention to the PM's looks. As a matter of fact, we don't see NDPers preoccupied with the looks either. The only folks upset about the looks are the PCs.

i'll go further & say that, within the PC camp, it seems to be only the aging males who carry on about the prime ministerial good looks. Is there a prominent Conservative female anywhere who has ever mocked the PM's allure? offhand i can't recall even one.

goldstone no one here would ever imagine that you are among the envious aging possibly one-eyed or otherwise plain, dumpy, homely & cranky fellows. Me i think your critiques of liberal economics are great! thankx! gotta keep em on their toes! we need to hear more!

but imho you do yourself down when you rabbit on about the-good-looks-the-hair-the-selfies-the-yoga-the-athleticism.


----------



## olivaw

MyCatMittens said:


> Sorry. I'm not clear what your point is?
> 
> 1. Women cast their vote based on looks (as most of your post is related to Harper's hair, Mulcair's beard, and how every woman in some café loves him?)?
> 2. Our PM is the envy because he is spending money like crazy, is good looking, and hasn't had to make any difficult decisions yet (unlike the others referenced in the article)?
> 
> We are just going to have to agree to disagree. I don't pick my investments based on the looks of the CEO, and I certainly won't vote that way either.
> 
> When you say "your party" - assuming you are referring to me being included... I don't "have a party". I'm a taxpayer, and I want the person who is going to responsibly look after "my part ownership" of the government.


It's light hearted banter. The last link was to a story about Kim Kardashian. Goldstone brought her up and LBCfan sang her praises. The thread was reanimated with a link to a parody twitter account. It had become as unserious as a Conservative rally in Toronto. 

I don't have a party either. I voted Liberal. I donated to the Liberals. I still support the Liberals. I don't belong to the party though. The previous government introduced terrible legislation, embarrassed us internationally and used divisive rhetoric in the last election campaign. They needed to be replaced and the Liberals were the best choice to replace them.


----------



## kcowan

olivaw said:


> The previous government introduced terrible legislation, embarrassed us internationally and used divisive rhetoric in the last election campaign. They needed to be replaced and the Liberals were the best choice to replace them.


Yes I agree but it remains to be seen whether they were a good choice.


----------



## GoldStone

olivaw said:


> It's light hearted banter. The last link was to a story about Kim Kardashian. Goldstone brought her up and LBCfan sang her praises. The thread was reanimated with a link to a parody twitter account. It had become as unserious as a Conservative rally in Toronto.


Political differences aside, we understand each other well. The last couple of pages were all in good fun. It's just a humorous banter. Thank you for playing your part. :biggrin:


----------



## GoldStone

HP, post #641, you need to lighten up. Try and copy your idol.... he is a fun guy. :biggrin:


----------



## RBull

sags said:


> The economy has taken off and is "rip roaring" along at at annualized 5% GDP growth pace.
> 
> It seems that Justin Trudeau benefits once again from perfect timing.
> 
> http://www.bnn.ca/News/2016/3/31/Canadas-economy-perks-up-after-a-dismal-end-to-2015-.aspx


It seems more like he did a big snow job on Canadians that voted for him. He campaigned on an economy that was in real trouble and needed a kick start and requiring deficits. He certainly did deliver on the latter and then lowballed all of the data points for the budget. Some of us know better than to be misled. Now he's traveling the world as an economic genius preaching the gospel to other nations on the evils of austerity and how they like Canada should be spending their way to prosperity.

It's odd but he appears obsessed with doing the opposite of whatever the conservatives and Harper would do, no matter whether it makes any economic sense or not.


----------



## Rusty O'Toole

He never struck me as great looking unless you mean compared to other politicians. I would rather see some signs of intelligence.


----------



## humble_pie

RBull said:


> ... Now he's traveling the world as an economic genius preaching the gospel to other nations on the evils of austerity and how they like Canada should be spending their way to prosperity.




sorry, i'm not seeing this in the news anywhere. Trudeau doesn't preach any gospel when he travels nor does he tell other nations what they should do, why would you say this?

what he's been doing is mending relationships that were savagely bruised during the Harper years. With the US, for one. With europeans, for another.

because of trudeau's french side - don't forget the other half of his DNA hails from british columbia - europeans say they perceive him as more of a european figure than a north american leader. They're liking this.


----------



## humble_pie

GoldStone said:


> HP, post #641, you need to lighten up. Try and copy your idol.... he is a fun guy. :biggrin:



goldstone it's you who needs to lighten up. The PM is not a "playboy." He's not an "idol." You're failing at "mocking" him. All you're doing - in this & countless other threads - is channelling that you're one of the bitter old boys.

it's too bad, because the progressive conservative party has to re-invent itself. It's a vital, integral part of canada. Putting conservatives back up there where they belong is going to be a huge challenge. Even Rona Ambrose has declined the job.

you're one who could have worked the re-build. That was all i was suggesting. That you stick with what you're good at. Leave the coy pop star cracks that don't work & the 10-year-old schoolyard bullying to the Trumps.


----------



## Userkare

humble_pie said:


> goldstone it's you who needs to lighten up. The PM is not a "playboy." He's not an "idol." You're failing at "mocking" him. All you're doing - in this & countless other threads - is channelling that you're one of the bitter old boys.


I would prefer that the world see Canada's political leader as having some desirable trait other than looks. But of course that could never be the case; everyone is obsessed with beauty above substance. I don't think young Mr Trudeau, like his old man before him makes any attempt to discourage it.

http://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity...minister-justin-trudeau-is-super-hot-20152010
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/justin-trudeau-sexiest-politician-world-6666495
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...rudeau-named-Canada-s-new-prime-minister.html
http://us.hellomagazine.com/celebri...udeau-white-house-visit-toronto-pride-parade/
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opin...gling-our-new-prime-minister/article26951125/
http://www.vancitybuzz.com/2015/12/justin-trudeau-gregor-roberston-meeting/
http://www.vox.com/2016/3/10/11193958/justin-trudeau-canada
http://www.thespec.com/news-story/5...-s-victory-and-ogles-photos-of-him-shirtless/


But of course, it's just us bitter old jealous conservative men who think that anybody cares more about Justin's looks than his substance.


----------



## olivaw

CBC: *Justin Trudeau invited to visit India by Narendra Modi*


> Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been invited to visit India.
> 
> Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made the offer during today's nuclear safety summit in Washington and Trudeau accepted.


Did the Prime Minister of India invite Prime Minister Trudeau to visit because he thinks that Trudeau is dreamy? each:


----------



## humble_pie

Userkare said:


> everyone is obsessed with beauty above substance. I don't think young Mr Trudeau, like his old man before him makes any attempt to discourage it.
> 
> http://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity...minister-justin-trudeau-is-super-hot-20152010
> http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/justin-trudeau-sexiest-politician-world-6666495
> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...rudeau-named-Canada-s-new-prime-minister.html
> http://us.hellomagazine.com/celebri...udeau-white-house-visit-toronto-pride-parade/
> http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opin...gling-our-new-prime-minister/article26951125/
> http://www.vancitybuzz.com/2015/12/justin-trudeau-gregor-roberston-meeting/
> http://www.vox.com/2016/3/10/11193958/justin-trudeau-canada
> http://www.thespec.com/news-story/5...-s-victory-and-ogles-photos-of-him-shirtless/




there you go, no less than 8 links all mongering trudeau tabloid craptoodle. Where do you find the time to read all this stuff, let alone copy/paste the trivia here?

there are intelligent young conservative voters in this forum. They have never said one word about the trudeau looks or the muscles or the alleged fortune - which doesn't even exist any more. Not a peep out of them along these lines.

to these young PC voters, canada owes a future. For their sake, perhaps the BOBs could stop obsessing over the bollywood gossip & start rebuilding the grand old progressive conservative party?


----------



## Userkare

humble_pie said:


> there you go, no less than 8 links all mongering trudeau tabloid craptoodle. Where do you find the time to read all this stuff, let alone copy/paste the trivia here?


Oh, so all the hoopla about Trudeau's looks are a total figment of my imagination? O.K. never mind.


----------



## RBull

humble_pie said:


> sorry, i'm not seeing this in the news anywhere. Trudeau doesn't preach any gospel when he travels nor does he tell other nations what they should do, why would you say this?
> 
> what he's been doing is mending relationships that were savagely bruised during the Harper years. With the US, for one. With europeans, for another.
> 
> because of trudeau's french side - don't forget the other half of his DNA hails from british columbia - europeans say they perceive him as more of a european figure than a north american leader. They're liking this.


Fair enough. I'm speaking of his economic decisions and the opinions he's voicing about the same. I am less interested in satisfying any perceived need to mend relationships internationally than I am in avoiding endless large deficits... oh sorry "investments" when they aren't justified nor are they close to what was promised. It seems we may be doomed to big social spending once again like some of the old days with both the liberals and conservatives. 


http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...stimulus-at-foreign-meetings/article29490981/


http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/...pportunity-at-davos-world-economic-forum.html


----------



## sags

Most economists and business are highly supportive of the government running deficits at this time.

The economy was in recession last year, and has been trending along at 0% until it spiked in January. 

It could be the Trudeau government has taken a page from the Federal Reserve handbook and signaled to business well in advance that is committed to spending to assist in economic growth.

I have more faith in the economists and business, than conservative media espousing government austerity that they never attained themselves.

Canada's finances are in good shape. Our debt to GDP is much lower than most other developed countries. The cost to service our debt is 1.5% of the budget, which is half that of the US spending 2.8% of budget.

The government inherited an $18 Billion dollar deficit from Harper, despite Joe Oliver claiming to have balanced the budget. The Tories never came close to balancing the budget, and proved that corporate tax cuts don't create jobs and spending cuts cause big problems in the delivery of public services, as Conservative cuts did in veteran affairs and employment insurance. Conservative economic theory is wrong and always has been.

Finance Minister Morneau is held in high esteem by the business community. He is a leading pension expert and takes a long term view of economies.

If the Liberal economic plan doesn't work, it won't be the end of the world. Much of the expenditure will flow back to the government in increased tax revenues.

There will be a new budget next year, and if adjustments need to be made they can be done then, but at this time the economy appears to be growing much faster than projected and built in contingency funds will lower the final deficit number.

Some critics of the budget say the government isn't spending enough. They are more likely to be right than the conservative slash and burn advocates.

"Spend to expand and grow. Cut to wither and die. It has always been thus".....So saith Sags.


----------



## humble_pie

Userkare said:


> Oh, so all the hoopla about Trudeau's looks are a total figment of my imagination?




that's not what i said. Please don't put words into my mouth.

what i said is that the grand old conservative party is lying in ruins. Yes, the youthful new prime minister did create a stir. He did draw positive attention to canada from around the globe. That was several months ago.

back home here, right now the PC needs to raise a new leader with a new platform for a new generation, or else their party is going to shrink down into the ignored limbo that was once occupied by its earlier incarnation, the reform party.

the PM's looks have been done like dinner. Rabbiting on foolishly about tabloid gossip isn't going to re-engineer the conservative party.

it's sadly evident who are doing the rabbiting. Certainly not young conservatives. Not even conservative women of any age. These groups are likely spending their energy considering whether they'll support Peter McKay .each:


----------



## MrMatt

Yes, left leaning economists and businesses who will benefit from massive government spending are in favour of this reckless approach.

Canada is very heavily in debt if you consider provincial debt.

There are a lot of economists and businesses who think massive government debt is bad for the larger economy. Spending way more than you make for years on end is a quite simply a bad idea.

So what, you prefer the Leftie media and experts to the Conservative media and experts, and that's fine.
But don't go pretending it's some sort of superior opinion because it's "scientific". Both schools of thought have their merits and their backers.

That being said, the amount of debt the feds are pushing on each of us working people is a extreme, it's more than my car payment of additional debt, and close to my families property taxes. Think about that, they're adding as much debt this year as a typical city charges the residents to operate. That is a LOT of money.


----------



## humble_pie

MrMatt said:


> But don't go pretending it's some sort of superior opinion because it's "scientific"



you were OK until you got to this sentence .each:

has anybody used the word "scientific" in this thread? anybody at all?


----------



## Userkare

humble_pie said:


> it's sadly evident who are doing the rabbiting. Certainly not young conservatives. *Not even conservative women of any age*. These groups are likely spending their energy considering whether they'll support Peter McKay .each:


http://www.torontosun.com/2015/12/12/caroline-mulroney-lapham-could-be-tories-heir-apparent

Well, here's a conservative woman who believes that the CPC should have Caroline Mulroney Lapham as its leader. She starts the article with "_She's beautiful_" ....then.... "_*Like Trudeau*, she has an impeccable political pedigree and *is glamorous*_". Why is this important in a leader? I will concede that a youthful leader could be a good idea, but why must they be attractive or glamorous? Can you tell me that, please? Why is that even mentioned when describing the qualifications of a leader? Does a political leader also need to have a rock-star image and/or a famous name?

Could it be that a large part of our voting population are vacuous bimbos and himbos who would vote based more on appearance and celebrity than qualifications? 

And as for qualifications, I would prefer Caroline's resume over Justin's any day - even if she were the Liberal candidate.


----------



## RBull

Pretty doubtful about your claims Sags. Would like to see credible sources for all. 

The economy was in the shortest mildest ever technical recession that ended 9 months ago, 6 mths before the government changed. 

The very article you linked said gains 4 months in a row .1, .3, .2, .6 

Most businesses and most economists...... That's a lot of people and businesses to survey. 

Yes our finances have been left in good shape. This is all the more the reason why we do not need a deficit at this time and with no end in sight. GDP to debt numbers also aren't necessarily a safe measure. There are countries that had very low ratios that ballooned in bad times. We should not want to emulate other developed countries most of which have crushing debt and significant problems. 

The finance ministers reputation in the business community running his fathers company is not in question. His actions relating to large never ending deficits as the minister in charge of finance have been questioned by many and were a surprise to most. I suspect he had to really hold his nose to present this budget. 

You can choose to believe whomever or whatever media you choose. This governments heavy spending has nothing to do with conservative media or the conservative government. For me it's about good financial stewardship of the country and doing what you say you will, no matter who is in power. So far we've seen little of that. 

Don't worry be happy. It's just another 30 billion and if that's not enough we can pump it up even more in future years. Oh yeah, we are already going to do that.


----------



## mrPPincer

Userkare said:


> Could it be that a large part of our voting population are vacuous bimbos and himbos who would vote based more on appearance and celebrity than qualifications?


Yep, unfortunately, anybody remember a plan called 'The Green Shift' and who was point-man for it?
ofc not, because it was a fail only in the presentation level, and not because it wasn't an excellent forward-thinking plan.

It was Stéphane Dion in 2008.


> In June 2008, Dion unveiled the new policy called The Green Shift (le Tournant vert) and explained that this tax shift would create an ecotax on carbon while reducing personal and corporate income taxes. He stated that the taxation on carbon would generate up to $15 billion per year in revenues to offset the reduction in income tax revenue.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stéphane_Dion


----------



## andrewf

RBull said:


> Pretty doubtful about your claims Sags. Would like to see credible sources for all.
> 
> The economy was in the shortest mildest ever technical recession that ended 9 months ago, 6 mths before the government changed.
> 
> The very article you linked said gains 4 months in a row .1, .3, .2, .6
> 
> Most businesses and most economists...... That's a lot of people and businesses to survey.
> 
> Yes our finances have been left in good shape. This is all the more the reason why we do not need a deficit at this time and with no end in sight. GDP to debt numbers also aren't necessarily a safe measure. There are countries that had very low ratios that ballooned in bad times. We should not want to emulate other developed countries most of which have crushing debt and significant problems.
> 
> The finance ministers reputation in the business community running his fathers company is not in question. His actions relating to large never ending deficits as the minister in charge of finance have been questioned by many and were a surprise to most. I suspect he had to really hold his nose to present this budget.
> 
> You can choose to believe whomever or whatever media you choose. This governments heavy spending has nothing to do with conservative media or the conservative government. For me it's about good financial stewardship of the country and doing what you say you will, no matter who is in power. So far we've seen little of that.
> 
> Don't worry be happy. It's just another 30 billion and if that's not enough we can pump it up even more in future years. Oh yeah, we are already going to do that.


If you sincerely cared about Canada's level of indebtedness, you would have been vociferously opposing Harper's tax cuts. 25% of our current debt is due to GST cuts since Harper was elected. Chew on that.


----------



## sags

This article from the Globe and Mail quotes several senior bank economists, supporting deficit spending at this time.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repo...--run-fatter-budget-deficits/article28846864/

BNN had an interview with David Rosenberg last October from Gluskin Sheff saying the same things. His indepth video interview is both excellent and informative.

http://www.bnn.ca/News/2015/11/20/R...80s-90s-mentality-about-running-deficits.aspx

_*“Even with these new numbers, they could ramp up the deficit to $20-to-$25 billion annually. And the debt-to-GDP ratio, which is the most important metric, does not change one iota*,” said the chief economist and strategist at Gluskin Sheff + Associates in an interview with BNN.

Rosenberg is baffled by the fact that some Canadians are adverse to deficit spending while nation-wide employment is “barely more the 60 percent,” and “no higher than it was coming out the depths of the worst global recession since the 1930s.”

*“With interest rates where they are right now, it’s amazing how, collectively, Canadians are stuck in this 1980s and early 1990s mentality where we ran up these huge deficits*. Those deficits were structural in nature. We got to the point where interest payments on the debt were larger than the debt itself. This is a totally new ball game,” he said.

*Rosenberg pegs Canada’s deficit-to-GDP ratio at 0.5 percent under the new Liberal government, a far cry from the 2.5 percent level south of the border.
*
“There was a time 20 years ago when we would have given our teeth to get the deficit down to those levels,” he said._

The Liberals won the election because they were the only party that recognized fixating on a balanced budget was not going to spur the economy or help the economy or Canadians.

It wasn't Trudeau's hair or looks, his physical abilities, or his ability to take a selfie, it was his ability to listen to the people and his senior economic/business advisers and change policy and the outcome of the election.


----------



## RBull

andrewf said:


> If you sincerely cared about Canada's level of indebtedness, you would have been vociferously opposing Harper's tax cuts. 25% of our current debt is due to GST cuts since Harper was elected. Chew on that.



You would be wrong about that. I would humbly suggest you might want to know what you speak of before you question someones sincerity. 

I actually would like to see taxes raised then and now to get to balance and eliminate debt. My wife has listened to me for many years saying this regardless of government. Even though it would cost my wife and I money I would like to see the OAS raised back to 67.

Chew on that.


----------



## MrMatt

sags said:


> This article from the Globe and Mail quotes several bank economists, supporting deficit spending at this time.
> 
> http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repo...--run-fatter-budget-deficits/article28846864/
> 
> BNN had an interview with David Rosenberg last October from Gluskin Sheff saying the same things. His interview is excellent and informative.
> 
> http://www.bnn.ca/News/2015/11/20/R...80s-90s-mentality-about-running-deficits.aspx
> 
> _“Even with these new numbers, they could ramp up the deficit to $20-to-$25 billion annually. And the debt-to-GDP ratio, which is the most important metric, does not change one iota,” said the chief economist and strategist at Gluskin Sheff + Associates in an interview with BNN.
> 
> Rosenberg is baffled by the fact that some Canadians are adverse to deficit spending while nation-wide employment is “barely more the 60 percent,” and “no higher than it was coming out the depths of the worst global recession since the 1930s.”
> 
> “With interest rates where they are right now, it’s amazing how, collectively, Canadians are stuck in this 1980s and early 1990s mentality where we ran up these huge deficits. Those deficits were structural in nature. We got to the point where interest payments on the debt were larger than the debt itself. This is a totally new ball game,” he said.
> 
> Rosenberg pegs Canada’s deficit-to-GDP ratio at 0.5 percent under the new Liberal government, a far cry from the 2.5 percent level south of the border.
> 
> “There was a time 20 years ago when we would have given our teeth to get the deficit down to those levels,” he said._


"We got to the point where interest payments on the debt were larger than the debt itself. " << Huh? when was that? 
"Rosenberg pegs Canada’s deficit-to-GDP ratio at 0.5 percent under the new Liberal government,", lets see $30Billion/2 Trillion is 1.5%, and that's just the Feds.

I do agree, 20 years ago we were in rough shape, it's good Chretien slashed spending, why Trudeau wants to go spend our way back into that same mess is beyond me.


----------



## sags

In the 1980s interest rate hit 21% on mortgages. 

There was no such thing as HELOCs, lines of credit or remortgaging a home. Credit cards were mostly gas station and retail store cards for small limits.

A lot of borrowing was done at "finance companies", such as Household Finance at pay forever interest rates, for autos, furniture appliances, etc.

We owned homes from 1980 - 2005 and the lowest interest rate we ever paid on a mortgage was 7.9%. People thought that was a great rate.

The flip side was that people could put money into a CSB or GIC and get 16% a year interest. We used to calculate how many years it was going to take to "double" our money.

10 years.........7 years..........5 years.

My mom was smart and tied up all her money from their home sale for as long as possible. She collected 15% a year until she passed away and they were cashed in.

The high interest rates of the 1980s were a result of the Bank of Canada fighting annual inflation that topped 10% per year for several years in the late 1970s.

In 1975 the government introduced the Anti-Inflation Act which controlled prices and wages. It was rescinded in 1978 as higher interest rates took affect on inflation.

In 1976 over 1 million Canadians walked off the job in a National Day of Protest over wage controls.

As one of the union leaders, I led our plant workers out of the factory that day. The company terminated all the union leaders immediately for leading an illegal work stoppage.

The people refused to go back to work until the union leaders were reinstated and the company gave in and handed out written warnings instead.

It was a different era............when working people stuck together for the improvement of all.

The PM at the time was..............Pierre E. Trudeau.


----------



## bariutt

Justin (Jughead) Trudeau is a bobblehead


----------



## olivaw

bariutt said:


> Justin (Jughead) Trudeau is a bobblehead


 Now Conservatives will complain that Trudeau's bobblehead doll is too good looking. :apathy:

Meanwhile, *Justin Trudeau pushing for new membership rules for Liberal Party of Canada*


> The proposal, adopted Saturday by the party's national board during a three-hour meeting with the prime minister in Halifax, would do away entirely with the long-held principle that only dues-paying, card-carrying members are entitled to take part in party activities.
> 
> Indeed, there would no longer be any party members. Instead, anyone willing to register with the party — for free — would be eligible to participate in policy development, nomination of candidates, party conventions and the selection of future leaders.


----------



## humble_pie

olivaw said:


> Meanwhile, *Justin Trudeau pushing for new membership rules for Liberal Party of Canada*



i first heard about this 2 years ago, from my local liberal MP's office. When liberals were electing the new party chief, who turned out in the end to be justin trudeau.

anybody could join to vote. No dues.


----------



## olivaw

I didn't know that non members could vote in the last Liberal leadership race but it worked out well for them. Justin Trudeau was the right leader at the right time for the Liberal party.


----------



## Eclectic12

sags said:


> In the 1980s interest rate hit 21% on mortgages.
> 
> There was no such thing as HELOCs, lines of credit or remortgaging a home. Credit cards were mostly gas station and retail store cards for small limits.
> 
> A lot of borrowing was done at "finance companies", such as Household Finance at pay forever interest rates, for autos, furniture appliances, etc.


I can recall my parents talking to people with 2nd and 3rd mortgages at that time so it does not seem to match what you recall.


I can confirm that my student BMO MC had a low $800 limit but Visa and MC were heavily recruiting on campus with no connection to gas station or retail. The one CC app at the student hall with a connection was GM.

I had no trouble getting a car loan from BMO for $16K+ despite being a student with no permanent job.


I can also recall secured LoCs ... though the people I was talking to were securing it with a GIC. I can only recall one person who secured the LoC against their house (thought it wasn't called a HeLOC).




sags said:


> ... The flip side was that people could put money into a CSB or GIC and get 16% a year interest.


Say what?

I was watching the CSB rates each year where there was the one year that the Canadian gov't screwed up and set the rate exceptionally high (I scrapped together as much as I could) but that was a one time thing. It resulted in the bonds being changed to allow the interest rate to be adjusted on yearly basis.

I recalled around 9%. 

When I check the historical record I am a bit low and you are are high:
1975 was 8.75%
1976 8.50%
1977 7.00%
1978 9.25%
1979 12.00%
1980 11.5%
1981 was the bonus year at 19.5%
1982 12.0%
1983 9.25%
1984 11.25%
1985 8.50%
1986 7.75%
1987 9.00%
1988 9.50%
1989 10.50%
1990 10.75%
1991 7.50%
1992 6.00%


Heady days compared to today's rates but definitely not 16%+ in a steady sequence, as your wording implies.


Cheers


*PS*

I'd have to find some records to check my memory but I believe CSBs at the time were at the higher end of what interest rates that were being offered.


----------



## Eclectic12

Userkare said:


> ... Well, here's a conservative woman who believes that the CPC should have Caroline Mulroney Lapham as its leader ...
> 
> Why is this important in a leader? I will concede that a youthful leader could be a good idea, but why must they be attractive or glamorous? Can you tell me that, please? ...


You haven't heard of the television age? Or media exposure?

Sure ... it doesn't mean the policies will be great but is an advantage to get elected. OTOH, what is the advantage to having a leader who looks like they have been out all night drinking and was hit by a truck on the way to work?


If non-glamour is so beneficial, surely Joe Who should have been PM for many years. :biggrin:




Userkare said:


> ... And as for qualifications, I would prefer Caroline's resume over Justin's any day - even if she were the Liberal candidate.


Unless they run, the resume won't make a bit of difference, correct?


Cheers


----------



## Userkare

Eclectic12 said:


> You haven't heard of the television age? Or media exposure?
> 
> Sure ... it doesn't mean the policies will be great but is an advantage to get elected. OTOH, what is the advantage to having a leader who looks like they have been out all night drinking and was hit by a truck on the way to work?
> 
> 
> If non-glamour is so beneficial, surely Joe Who should have been PM for many years. :biggrin:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Unless they run, the resume won't make a bit of difference, correct?
> 
> 
> Cheers


I would agree that glamour might be important for celebrity in the entertainment industry. It surely didn't hurt Taylor Swift's career; although, as a singer and performer, honestly she's not really all that talented. But wow, that face!

I truly don't care what a politician looks like, but more how they speak and act; it's called class, or charisma. Listening to Justin go ahhh, ahhh, ahhh, ahhh, and seeing his body language, like touching the shoulder when meeting senior world leaders, makes me cringe. Although I was happy to see him become an MP, I was really surprised when he became the Liberal leader- pushing aside Deborah Coyne, a Canadian Constitutional lawyer, who worked with P.E. Trudeau against the Meech Lake Accord, then worked later against Charlottetown, had an economics degree, an international relations degree from Oxford, served on the Immigration and Refugee Board, and so on. I guess those qualifications were overlooked because she wasn't physically attractive enough to lead the party. Apparently, she was so unattractive that the Liberal Party wouldn't even nominate her as a candidate in any riding. Rather strange that the front-runner for leader, before J.T. entered the race, with such qualifications, wouldn't be offered something, no? She wound up running for the Green Party in my riding - where she was soundly squashed with about 3% of the vote. It's a shame really; I might even have seriously considered voting Liberal if she was the leader.

As for Mulroney Lapham, I know that she hasn't expressed any interest in politics, but neither did JT at some point. Her resume as a Harvard and NYU graduate doesn't automatically make her the ideal political leader either.

Finally, I guess if there had been media celebrity over the past few hundred years, the world would never seen the likes of Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, Mahatma Ghandi, etc. Then again, being ugly didn't hurt Adolf Hitler's political career.


----------



## andrewf

I think there is a fair amount of fish tales about the high inflation of the 70s and 80s. These people never mention that they were getting double digit pay increases each year...


----------



## sags

Mortgage rates in the 1970s and 1980s. The BOC rate was 21%. The prime rate at chartered banks was 22.75 %.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repo...rned-from-80s-interest-rates/article24398735/

The 1,000,000 worker National Day of Protest was held because wages were frozen under the Anti-Inflation Act, but companies were allowed to continue to raise prices.

That was when Pierre Trudeau uttered the infamous words while touring an auto plant and being told the workers couldn't afford to pay their mortgages and buy food......"let them eat cake".

Pierre Eliot Trudeau was not a fan favorite of unions or workers.

On the savings side of the ledger...........Canada Savings Bonds from 1980 to 1987. 

_Take Canada Savings Bonds Series 35, a seven-year borrowing by Ottawa in 1980. Year one paid 14.41%, year two 19.5%, year three 12%, the rest 10.5% per annum. The bond paid out $228 in 1987. _

The interest was compounding and $100 was worth $228 after 7 years, but the purchasing power was only worth $138 due to inflation.

http://www.canadianbusiness.com/business-strategy/the-excessive-80s/


----------



## gibor365

> Mortgage rates in the 1970s and 1980s. The BOC rate was 21%. The prime rate at chartered banks was 22.75 %.....


Wow! I didn't even know that Canada was in so miserable economic situation not so long time ago! Now I understand why in those times very very few Soviet immigrants immigrated to Canada


----------



## sags

There was a slowdown in Russian immigration into Canada in the 1980s, after a huge influx in 1973 following the 1972 hockey Summit Series.

https://www.nhl.com/news/summit-series-changed-hockey-forever/c-642109

Many Russian fans couldn't take it anymore and moved to Canada to embrace their new Canadian hockey heroes......Phil Esposito and Paul Henderson 

Interesting that an authentic Russian game program from the final Game 8 in Russia still exists and is for sale for $950.

http://www.kijiji.ca/v-art-collecti...ssia-summit-series-russian-program/1142930794

I have one of these around somewhere.............only worth $48 bucks after 43 years though :upset:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Official-19...-TV-Program-/381377810288?hash=item58cbe38f70

And what does this have to do with Justin Trudeau a reader might ask.............

Well, the Richard Nixon Prophesy of course. In 1972 when the Summit Series was played the PM was Pierre Trudeau and his son Justin Trudeau had just been born.

At a state dinner in Ottawa President Richard Nixon congratulated PM Pierre Trudeau on the birth of his son and predicted that Justin Trudeau would become PM himself one day.

_It has already been dubbed “the Richard Nixon prophecy.” At a state dinner in Ottawa in 1972, when Justin Trudeau was just a few months old, the then-U.S. president toasted the baby’s arrival, and joked that Pierre Trudeau’s son would himself become prime minister someday.
_
And now we know the rest of the story............

http://www.thestar.com/news/federal...xon-predicted-justin-trudeau-would-be-pm.html


----------



## olivaw

*Justin Trudeau: The people's prime minister aims to be different*



> "One of the things I remember him saying at one of our first cabinet meetings is that openness to Canadians and having a real conversation with Canadians had been the leitmotif of our campaign. And he said, 'I want you all to know this was not just a campaign technique.… We need to really talk to Canadians and, more importantly, we need to really listen,'" International Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland said in an interview earlier this year.
> 
> "And that sounds really simple. But it's really hard to do. Witness the fact that so many people in so many countries don't feel their government is doing it. I think that's something very powerful that the prime minister has brought to government in Canada. And is something that is, and will continue to be, really transformative in how our country works."





> "One thing you have to understand about our prime minister … is that he's not guided just by doing that which is popular, he's guided by doing what is right," [SCOTT] Brison declared. The Liberal commitment to openness and transparency, he said, "wasn't designed to win an election, it was built as a plan to inform the actions of a new government."


Openness and transparency, what's not to like? The Prime Minister's real test will come when there is a crisis (or a perceived crisis). Perhaps we have one brewing with the Canada Health Act. Perhaps it will be something else.


----------



## steve41

olivaw said:


> Openness and transparency, what's not to like?


Yeah, like cancelling the First Nations funding transparency. What a joke!


----------



## Mukhang pera

Eclectic12 said:


> I can recall my parents talking to people with 2nd and 3rd mortgages at that time so it does not seem to match what you recall.
> 
> 
> I can confirm that my student BMO MC had a low $800 limit but Visa and MC were heavily recruiting on campus with no connection to gas station or retail. The one CC app at the student hall with a connection was GM.
> 
> I had no trouble getting a car loan from BMO for $16K+ despite being a student with no permanent job.
> 
> 
> I can also recall secured LoCs ... though the people I was talking to were securing it with a GIC. I can only recall one person who secured the LoC against their house (thought it wasn't called a HeLOC).
> 
> *PS*
> 
> I'd have to find some records to check my memory but I believe CSBs at the time were at the higher end of what interest rates that were being offered.


For my part it's only in recent years I have heard of HELOCS. I took out a second mortgage from the long-gone Bank of B.C. in 1980 to secure that was then called a "revolving line of credit". The facility had a $120,000 limit and the interest was Bank of BC prime + 1.75%. It was less than fun when the prime hit 22.75%, so I was paying 24.5%. On the other hand, my parents were savers in those days and they loaded up on CSBs at 19.5%.

As for credit cards, I had both Visa and MC by 1980. By that time, having cards that could only be used to buy gasoline did not seem to make much sense and I dumped the couple that I had (Esso and Shell, as I recall). I did not have cards from other gas vendors such as Gulf, Cities Service, BA, BP, White Rose, Sunoco, and Supertest, to name a few I can recall from my youth. And then there was "Joy" gasoline, which I think was perhaps local to Toronto, with stations built to resemble castles.


----------



## olivaw

*Justin Trudeau defends Liberal ethics record amid fundraising controversy*

This is a controversy, not a crisis, but it may test the new Government in the face of public criticism and a motivated opposition. Minister of Justice, Jody Wilson-Raybould will be the main attraction at a $500-a-ticket private reception at a Toronto law firm. 

Ouch.


----------



## bariutt

Justin Trudeau is no better than the politicians who recently got revealed in the Panama Papers scandal. For years he lived off of a trust fund invested in numbered companies managed by lawyers/accountants who were experts in evading taxation.

What about when he first became an MP. He went around giving speeches at $20,000 per speech. Most people thought he was fund raising for the Liberal Party. One year he made more than $400,000 giving speeches and every cent went into his own pocket.


----------



## humble_pie

bariutt said:


> Justin Trudeau is no better than the politicians who recently got revealed in the Panama Papers scandal. For years he lived off of a trust fund invested in numbered companies managed by lawyers/accountants who were experts in evading taxation.



if it weren't that trudeau is a politician & therefore sleaze attacks like the above are to be expected, this would be grounds for libel.

justin trudeau's portion of funds inherited from his father was - the remnants still are, i believe - managed by the montreal investment counsel firm of Jarislowsky Fraser. This is a long-established, highly reputable firm. Founder Stephen Jarislowsky is a well-known philanthropist who is still alive. The phrase "lawyers/accountants who were experts in evading taxation" is a libellous fiction invented for reasons that grievously harm the public good.

a year or two before the liberal leadership race, Jarislowsky Fraser was authorized to release the justin trudeau trust figures. There was just over $1 million, which is peanuts as trusts go. When trudeau was first elected MP for papineau riding, he lived in a modest ottawa apartment while Sophie stayed at home in montreal with their two eldest children. The reason was that the couple could not afford to buy a house in ottawa until they had managed to sell the house in montreal.


----------



## bariutt

If Justin Trudeau was all above board then why have his investment trusts in numbered companies. There is nothing illegal about this however there are very poor optics for a Prime Minister who keeps spouting off that small businesses are avoiding taxes. 

Read the article in the attached link:
http://news.nationalpost.com/news/c...ys-benefit-from-small-business-tax-deductions

Here are some quotes -
Trudeau himself was involved in at least three small business that were federally incorporated, one of which he used to receive income for paid speaking events he did between 2006 and 2011.

He was the owner and sole director of JPJT Canada Inc., the corporate face of a speaking business that earned him about $1.3 million over a six-year period.

The speaking fees became an issue of controversy in 2013 when the Citizen reported that he charged as much as $20,000 per speaking event, even after he was elected as an MP for the first time in 2008. He discontinued the speaking business when he decided to run for his party’s leadership.

At the time, Trudeau was also listed as a director of two other corporations:

– 90562 Canada Inc., the federal corporation that held a portfolio of securities that were part of Trudeau’s inheritance from his father, Pierre Trudeau, that he shared with his brother, Alexandre. The securities were managed by Montreal investment firm Jarislowsky Fraser. The corporation was dissolved in December 2013.

– 7664699 Canada Inc., Trudeau’s personal holding company, which was used when the inheritance was split up. In 2013, the company listed $958,000 in short-term investments and $255,000 in cash.

Because he had incorporated, Trudeau could have lowered his personal tax burden by having any speaking-related expenses paid through JPJT Canada Inc.


----------



## humble_pie

^^

it's likely you won't be able to get yourself off the hook by covering up with a bushel of fog, smoke, dust & mirrors.

what you posted upthread was libel pure & simple. Harvard economist Stephen Jarislowsky, for half a century a respected investment counsel, author & philanthropist, is suddenly an "expert in evading taxation," according to your vicious defamation.

the prime minister is not likely to sue you. Politicians are routinely expected to withstand attacks such as yours.

mr. Jarislowsky might be another story, though. All his life he's been a scrappy legal fighter, often initiating & winning class actions in favour of small minority shareholders. Jarislowsky once took on the family owners of Canadian Tire over their multiple voting shares ... and he won.

tax evasion is a federal crime. Perhaps you might consider retracting your statement that the managers of justin trudeau's small remaining inheritance, ie the firm of Jarislowsky Fraser, practiced tax evasion?




bariutt said:


> Justin Trudeau is no better than the politicians who recently got revealed in the Panama Papers scandal. For years he lived off of a trust fund invested in numbered companies managed by lawyers/accountants who were experts in evading taxation.


----------



## GoldStone

G&M

*First Trudeau budget less transparent, inflates job growth, watchdog says
*


> Parliamentary Budget Officer Jean-Denis Fréchette is giving poor marks to the Trudeau government’s first budget, warning it is less transparent and overestimates the number of jobs that will be created.
> 
> In a report released Wednesday, the PBO takes issue with several key points related to how the budget numbers are presented.
> 
> *“The government has made changes to the presentation of its fiscal plan that have made it more difficult for parliamentarians to scrutinize public finances,”* the report states.
> 
> *The removal of key financial data from this year’s budget has limited the parliamentary watchdog’s ability to report to MPs*, according to the report.
> 
> “PBO is unable to provide completed tables due to the lack of information provided in Budget 2016,” the report states, adding that it has requested this additional information from the Finance Department.
> 
> Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was elected on a campaign platform that specifically promised to “raise the bar on fiscal transparency.”





> Secondly, the PBO takes issue with the budget’s claim that its package of tax cuts and spending measures will create or maintain 100,000 jobs by 2017-18. The PBO notes that these estimates were created entirely by the government. The previous Conservative government subjected similar estimates to an outside review in their 2009 stimulus budget.
> 
> According to the PBO’s own analysis, the jobs estimate should be 60,000, not 100,000.





> Thirdly, the PBO criticizes the fact that the budget ended the previous practice of projecting the cost of various policies over five years. Instead, the cost of specific budget measures are presented over a two-year horizon. The budget does project the cost of the government’s overall program over five years.


----------



## GoldStone

G&M updated the article.



> The Liberal government’s first budget is less transparent than Conservative budgets under Stephen Harper ...





> The PBO report is unwelcome news for a government that came to power with a pledge to be more open, particularly when it comes to how budget numbers are presented.
> 
> On fiscal transparency, Mostafa Askari, the assistant Parliamentary Budget Officer, says the 2016 budget is a step backward on several fronts.
> 
> “What they have provided is not sufficient. It’s certainly much less than what was produced over the last 15 budgets that I remember,” he said, referring to a period that covers both the Harper and past Liberal governments.


----------



## sags

Estimates and projections.

We will see how it all works out. If the budget deficit is lower than projected, the government will have extra money to spend next year.


----------



## GoldStone

sags said:


> Estimates and projections.


You missed the main point or willfully ignored it.

Your beloved Liberals are a bunch of hypocrites. They vilified Harper for lack of transparency, yet what do we get from them?

*"The Liberal government’s first budget is less transparent than Conservative budgets under Stephen Harper" *

So much for "real change".


----------



## sags

Estimates and projections are the point.

'_The PBO does acknowledge the 2016 budget contains an element of additional transparency by showing how changes in economic growth would change the *projected* bottom line.

The office, however, criticizes the fact that the budget *ended the previous practice of projecting the cost of various policies over five years*. Instead, the cost of specific budget measures are presented over a two-year horizon. The budget does *project *the cost of the government’s overall program over* five years*."
_

The Harper government made 5 year budget and program projections and failed to meet any of them. There is no point to making projections for individual programs that far out in time.

The Liberals are being honest and open. The economy is weak. There will be deficits for the next few years. The budget won't be balanced until the economy improves.


----------



## GoldStone

*The removal of key financial data from this year’s budget has limited the office’s ability to report to MPs and makes it harder for parliamentarians to review government spending, according to the PBO.*


----------



## GoldStone

On fiscal transparency, Mostafa Askari, the assistant Parliamentary Budget Officer, says *the 2016 budget is a step backward on several fronts*.

*“What they have provided is not sufficient. It’s certainly much less than what was produced over the last 15 budgets that I remember,”* he said, referring to a period that covers both the Harper and past Liberal governments.


----------



## GoldStone

sags said:


> The Liberals provided a projection for the next 2 years. The PBO wants a projection for the next 5 years. What would be the point of that ? Let's see how the first two years go first.


You cherry-picked the most minor of all points, but completely ignored the rest of the criticism.


----------



## sags

The Liberals omitted the financial data that is meaningless, because it is based on projections and estimates years into the future.

The PBO is asking for information that is based on "best guesses". They can do their own estimates.

Are oil prices going back up ? Is the Fed going to raise interest rates ? What will consumer spending be in 4 years ?

There are too many moving parts to give an estimate that would be worth anything.


----------



## GoldStone

You are making excuses as you go. Your claims have no connection to what PBO report actually said.

PBO said that Liberals omitted KEY financial data. Not some obscure estimates and projections, but KEY DATA.

Liberals promised a more transparent budget. They delivered the exact opposite.


----------



## sags

Harper provided volumes of pages full of worthless data............and the PBO criticized him years later when the numbers didn't pan out.

Trudeau isn't going to make the same mistake as Harper.

Smart guy...............that Justin Trudeau.


----------



## bariutt

Smart guy...............that Justin Trudeau.[/QUOTE]


In my opinion Justin (Jughead) Trudeau is quite a "bobblehead". His father was quite an intellectual. Justin may have got his good looks from Pierre however he must of gotten his brains from Margaret.


----------



## olivaw

The poor showing by the official opposition and principled governance by the Liberals will combine to give us years and years of Trudeau leadership. 









The NDP can use the time to debate the Leap Manifesto. Conservatives can try to figure out why the Supreme Court's strikes down all their legislation.


----------



## sags

A new poll by Forum Research Inc. shows 51 per cent of Canadian voters would vote Liberal if an election were held today — producing a super-majority of about 256 seats — or 75 per cent — in the 338-seat Commons.

The poll found the Conservatives at 28 per cent — good for about 74 seats — and the NDP at about 12 per cent, which would produce no more than five seats.

Two-thirds of Canadian voters reported being satisfied with the outcome of the 2015 election, and more than a third — 36 per cent — said they are very satisfied.

Liberal popularity covers all age groups, both genders, and most regions of the country. The Liberals are within two points of the Conservatives in Manitoba and Saskatchewan and trail only in Alberta.

“It appears as though the Trudeau honeymoon is back on again, after some minor slippage last month,” said Forum president Lorne Bozinoff.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2016/04/09/trudeau-liberals-continue-to-soar-high-poll-shows.html


----------



## sags

I posted upthread that Trudeau is smart.

Look at the equations he put up on the blackboard behind him calculating the funding formula to the Perimeter Institute. That is one smart fella I tell ya.

View attachment 9658


http://www.cp24.com/news/trudeau-br...ting-lesson-during-stop-in-waterloo-1.2861300


----------



## andrewf

Kind of amazing when you consider how close the party was to death. Also that despite the conservative's best efforts to shift Canadians' attitudes to the right, the Liberals still seem to have much broader appeal than CPC ever did under Harper.

Of course, it helps that the NDP basically imploded, and is now poised to self-immolate with the far left leap manifesto. If they had kept Mulcair, I think there might have been a chance for them to really erode Liberal support in the next election. If they go with a far left candidate, they will capture their 15-20% of the vote, and allow the Liberals to tack to the right and capture more moderate Tory voters (the Chretien/Martin approach). Of course, depending on what form of electoral reform is proposed/adopted, the game may change.


----------



## humble_pie

andrewf said:


> Kind of amazing when you consider how close the party was to death. Also that despite the conservative's best efforts to shift Canadians' attitudes to the right, the Liberals still seem to have much broader appeal than CPC ever did under Harper.
> 
> Of course, it helps that the NDP basically imploded, and is now poised to self-immolate with the far left leap manifesto. If they had kept Mulcair, I think there might have been a chance for them to really erode Liberal support in the next election. If they go with a far left candidate, they will capture their 15-20% of the vote, and allow the Liberals to tack to the right and capture more moderate Tory voters (the Chretien/Martin approach). Of course, depending on what form of electoral reform is proposed/adopted, the game may change.



excellent insights, bang on re an eventual chrétien/martin style reverse voter pickup.

plus fine posts from sags & olivaw just below.

there is likely no liberal voter who is not concerned about gummint debt & expenditure. On no other front can we fault trudeau, who has proved himself to be amazingly articulate, responsible & sure-footed as a cat during his first 5.5 months in office. 

but the budget pudding has no proof yet, i'm willing to wait out the benefit of the doubt. What will count most for me will be increasing opportunities for youth.


----------



## mordko

It was a truly excellent start for this government. The number of selfies alone shows what a great PM we have in Justine. So glad his kids are going to be well looked after - because rich people like him don't need family tax breaks. They just need the taxpayer to look after the kids. Withdrawing Canadian airforce from fighting ISIS is such a good idea... For ISIS in Syria can be easily defeated simply by getting all their foot soldiers over here. Breaking the deficit campaign promise is just an indication of the kind of Liberty this government is going to fight for. Total Liberty from keeping ones word.


----------



## humble_pie

^^


why anyone is still shuffling off this fantasy that the PM is still rich is beyond me.

that was his youth, when he grew up on sussex drive. Justin shared an inheritance with his brother & possibly with the mystery illegitimate half-sister, whose mother keeps her out of the limelight.

a few years ago, trudeau had his accountants publish his trust fund residue. There was less than $1M. When he first served as MP for papineau riding, the couple couldn't afford to buy a house in ottawa until they had finally managed to sell their existing home in montreal. 

there are cmffers of trudeau's age - 44 years - who are richer. Please see the Diaries section.

as for the sneering about the CF-18s, that is a cheap shot. Canada is sending more elite special forces troops to join those already based in northern iraq. They are training the kurdish peshmerga, the most reliable anti-ISIL ground forces that exist. At least, until iran joined the struggle.

those special canadian forces in Erbil are spending every day at extraordinarily high levels of danger & i would thank you to keep a civil tongue in your mouth about their heroism.


----------



## mordko

Justin Trudeau: "Rich "one-percenters" like me don't need a child care subsidy".

Now we know why.


----------



## humble_pie

paul martin & john turner were probably richer than trudeau jr


----------



## mordko

Don't care how mouse poor he really is. It's the hypocrisy that draws attention.


----------



## humble_pie

what's hypocritical? they're a gorgeous couple & they know it


----------



## mordko

I'll type a bit slower, OK?

1. Before elections - Justin Trudeau: "Rich "one-percenters" like me don't need a child care subsidy".

2. After elections: Justin hires several nannies at taxpayers' expense.


----------



## humble_pie

^^

no, trudeau did not hire nannies at extra taxpayers' expense.

there is a budget for household upkeep for the prime minister's residence, including staff. There always has been such a budget. You cannot complain about taxpayers paying for upkeep of a PM's residence when this has been going on since confederation, if you try this you will be laughed out of the forum.

trudeau himself has explained how his budget has *not* exceeded by one penny the identical budget provided for stephen harper when he, harper, resided at 125 sussex drive. All that has happened is that the trudeau budget is different. The hirees are different, that's all. Harper did not have very young & infant children who needed a nanny, see.


----------



## andrewf

Paul Martin was by far wealthier than either Trudeau.

Even Harper has a higher net worth ($5 million) than Trudeau (not sure how he managed to acquire it given his career as a lobbyist and then politician--never any questions raised about it either). Not sure why Trudeau is getting all this flack for his supposed exceptional wealth.


----------



## mordko

humble_pie said:


> ^^
> 
> no, trudeau did not hire nannies at extra taxpayers' expense.
> 
> there is a budget for household upkeep for the prime minister's residence, including staff. There always has been such a budget. You cannot complain about taxpayers paying for upkeep of a PM's residence when this has been going on since confederation, if you try this you will be laughed out of the forum.
> 
> trudeau himself has explained how his budget has *not* exceeded by one penny the identical budget provided for stephen harper when he, harper, resided at 125 sussex drive. All that has happened is that the trudeau budget is different. The hirees are different, that's all. Harper did not have very young & infant children who needed a nanny, see.


We'll see how he does within the budget. Staying within the budget seems like a foreign concept to him. Regardless, if he is claiming before election that "rich people like him" do not need child subsidies and then removes tax rebates from others but gets the taxpayer to fund round-the-clock care for his kids because he is "entitled"... Hypocrisy is kinda obvious.


----------



## olivaw

mordko said:


> I'll type a bit slower, OK?
> 
> 1. Before elections - Justin Trudeau: "Rich "one-percenters" like me don't need a child care subsidy".
> 
> 2. After elections: Justin hires several nannies at taxpayers' expense.


Old story, put to bed months ago. He reallocated staffing at 24 Sussex, just like every previous PM. Most Conservatives consider this argument to be nonsensical too. Anybody who considers it relevant is probably so far out of touch with Canadian mainstream thinking that they will feel like a perpetual outsider.


----------



## mordko

andrewf said:


> Paul Martin was by far wealthier than either Trudeau.
> 
> Even Harper has a higher net worth ($5 million) than Trudeau (not sure how he managed to acquire it given his career as a lobbyist and then politician--never any questions raised about it either). Not sure why Trudeau is getting all this flack for his supposed exceptional wealth.


The issue I have is that Trudeau is a little prince. His daddy's name got him the job for which he had no credentials other than drama tutoring. it's like Bush/Clinton in the US or the Dear Leader in North Korea.


----------



## andrewf

mordko said:


> We'll see how he does within the budget. Staying within the budget seems like a foreign concept to him. Regardless, if he is claiming before election that "rich people like him" do not need child subsidies and then removes tax rebates from others but gets the taxpayer to fund round-the-clock care for his kids because he is "entitled"... Hypocrisy is kinda obvious.


Harper felt he was entitled to a personal chef.


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> The issue I have is that Trudeau is a little prince. His daddy's name got him the job for which he had no credentials other than drama tutoring. it's like Bush/Clinton in the US or the Dear Leader in North Korea.



that's only your personal jealousy issue

you don't think serving as MP for eight years counts? you're so envious all you can do is talk babytalk about "daddies?"

as a matter of fact, both bush senior & husband clinton had & have credible assigns. You may not personally like them, but dubya & hillary more than cut the biscuit as qualified political candidates.


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> We'll see how he does within the budget. Staying within the budget seems like a foreign concept to him. Regardless, if he is claiming before election that "rich people like him" do not need child subsidies and then removes tax rebates from others but gets the taxpayer to fund round-the-clock care for his kids because he is "entitled"... Hypocrisy is kinda obvious.



"seems like?" now you are reduced to criticizing trudeau because it "seems like" maybe he might up & do something that happens to miff you?

:biggrin:


----------



## olivaw

Setting aside silly allegations about Nannies, there is some real news from the PMO. Trudeau announced $50 million for the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo. Two hundred high school students were in attendance for the announcement, When the Prime Minister is taking steps to encourage young people to enter the hard sciences, then you know that he understands the importance of science and technology to our future.


----------



## mordko

Tax&spend does not take a lot "understanding".


----------



## fraser

This is exactly the sort of investment we need. Hopefully there will be more dollars coming. We need for our economy and for those who will eventually be entering the workforce. 

Bravo.


----------



## mordko

Investment is when one puts money into a company and gets profit back. What Trudeau did is called "spending". It may be the type of spending you like, but it's spending nevertheless. And when governments actually try to invest in business it's wildly inefficient.


----------



## fraser

It is an investment in education. Canada will get a return on it. Canada's future depends on it. Technology and Innovation is where we need to be.

Our economy has changed. As an aside, businesses are encouraging Governments at all level to invest in education, skills, retraining. High paying manufacturing jobs are disappearing. We need to change our focus otherwise in a few very short years there will be no middle class. Just high paid skilled workers and low paid minimum wage service workers.


----------



## mordko

As someone who studied Theoretical Physics, I assure you: it's 100% spending. 

Education - as almost anything - is far more efficient when people themselves do the "investing". When they get goodies for free, it usually ends up as waste. There are many thousands times more theoretical physicists today than in the times of Einstein and Bohr. Bohr's university had only one Professor of Physics and Bohr duly paid for his education. Einstein funded his research by working as a clerk in a patent office - and that's where he made the most astounding discoveries. 

Today hundreds of thousands theoretical physicists worldwide have their education heavily subsidized and spend the rest of their lives on government grants while achieving zilch in comparison to the early 20th century.


----------



## humble_pie

.

mordko sorry to go on at you but alas this does not seem to be your day.

now that we've quashed Nannygate, let's look at your claims that the new liberal minister of defence is falling down on his job.



mordko said:


> Withdrawing Canadian airforce from fighting ISIS is such a good idea... For ISIS in Syria can be easily defeated simply by getting all their foot soldiers over here.



in fact AFAIK canada has not left the anti-ISIL air force coalition. What has happened is that the 6 Hornets have been moved, four to roumania & 2 to northeastern europe.

http://news.gc.ca/web/article-en.do?nid=1036239 

still flying with the anti-ISIL coalition are canada's Aurora radar & combat control planes, plus the refuelling aircraft.

altogether, given the Liberal increase in elite special forces now serving on the ground in northern iraq, the danger to canadian military is currently greater, not less, as defence minister Harjit Sajjan pointed out recently.

btw have you seen the Monumental Eye Roll? the one that's in the looks-can-kill category?

Cheryl Gallant (PC renfrew-nipissing) criticizes the new defence department review during question period in the Commons, while backbencher Nick Whalen (Liberal st john's east) counters her attack with eye rolls that are fully capable of slaughtering ISIL's best fighters.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/nick-whalen-eye-roll-1.3535248


----------



## fraser

I guess we will have to disgree.

My understanding is that only bout 25 percent of university costs are funded by tuition fees. The balance by federal and provincial grants.


----------



## mordko

- "now that we've quashed Nannygate" Glad you are so happy with your achievements. May I suggest a selfie with Justin as a reward? Perhaps he will give you a free nanny as well. 

- A lot of words, but in a nutshell, Canada stopped its airstrikes against ISIS. There is no logical reason for this. Most Canadians are opposed to this gargantuan stupidity.


----------



## sags

Trudeau certainly deserves high marks for bringing Canada out of the shadows and back onto the world map.

Much of the Harper legacy legislation has been rescinded or overturned and there is more to come. 

Marijuana legislation, end of life legislation, CPP expansion..........Trudeau could well successfully navigate the most extensive policy changes in the first term of a government ever.

These are all popular measures among Canadians, that Harper refused to acknowledge. With Harper gone, some Conservative MPs are free to now come forward to support some measures.

It isn't surprising his poll numbers keep rising, and are much higher than they were during the election.

The Conservatives have to appoint a progressive leader or they are destined to be wiped completely out.


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> Canada stopped its airstrikes against ISIS. There is no logical reason for this. Most Canadians are opposed to this gargantuan stupidity.



wrong again. Canadians are *not* opposed. Only the diehard PCs - the rona ambroses & the cheryl gallants screeching away during commons question periods - as if either would know a Hornet from a mosquito - are going on about this old, old, old news.

withdrawing the CF-18s was a liberal party decision made more than a year ago, long before they came to power. Canadians voted the liberal party into power because of this decision, among others.

trudeau is working towards a global non-aggressor peacekeeper military & diplomatic role for canada, in keeping with our history. Other small to mid-size nations have adopted a similar policy, or even a 100% neutral policy, in all military conflicts.

this is the logical reason. It's fine to disagree, but please don't post gibberish.


----------



## mordko

sags said:


> Trudeau certainly deserves high marks for bringing Canada out of the shadows and back onto the world map.
> 
> Much of the Harper legacy legislation has been rescinded or overturned and there is more to come.
> 
> Marijuana legislation, end of life legislation, CPP expansion..........Trudeau could well successfully navigate the most extensive policy changes in the first term of a government ever.
> 
> These are all popular measures among Canadians, that Harper refused to acknowledge. With Harper gone, some Conservative MPs are free to now come forward to support some measures.
> 
> It isn't surprising his poll numbers keep rising, and are much higher than they were during the election.
> 
> The Conservatives have to appoint a progressive leader or they are destined to be wiped completely out.


- Under Conservatives Canada was the most admired country in the world: http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/canada-ranked-as-most-admired-country-in-the-world-report-1.2470040. Selfies with Obama don't count for actual respect. 

- Marijuana legislation - devil in the detail. We shall see.

- End of life legislation - that is a positive, long overdue. 

- CPP expansion - stupidity. Canadians are doing an awesome job of saving for themsevles, government should try and keep it's nose out of the system that isn't broken. We really don't need yet another tax.


----------



## fraser

CPP expansion is NOT a tax.


----------



## mordko

Anything you are forced to give to the government is a tax, whatever you call it. If they make it voluntary then it wouldn't be a tax.


----------



## fraser

It is not a tax. The monies do not go into general Government revenues.

The monies go into you pension account. They are managed by the CPP folks. Absolutely zero to do with taxation. 

It is forced retirement savings. Not tax. There is a huge difference.


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## mordko

It does not go into your account. It goes into a common pot. Then charges get levied on it. You have no say what happens to your money. Then it gets redistributed. Those who take time off work get more, others get less. Youngsters will get screwed. And on and on... Government collects and then Government giveth away. 

Regardless, it is a compulsory deduction, levied by the government on workers' income and business profits = tax.


----------



## fraser

Not much different than any other DB pension plan. Except that because of it size CPP has lower overall admin fee percentage and they have a track record of above average investment returns. Wish I could do as well personally as they do! Other countries are studying CPP investment and management strategies because they are considered 'best in class'.

Still NOT a tax, notwithstanding your opinion!


----------



## mordko

Basic differences from a DB pension plan:

- if you spend all your life working full time, you are guaranteed to lose out with CPP.
- If you take breaks in your career, you are benefiting.
- young people get screwed. When CPP started it amounted to giving older generation something for nothing, paid for by young people. Basically inter generational transfer, happens every time there is a change.

Crucially, this are not your funds. With company DB you are assigned a pot of money and nobody can take it. Rules may change but what is yours will stay with you. With CPP you are entirely in the hands of future governments who are free to do anything they want. As population ages they will be forced to change the age of payout or reduce the payout... The money does not belong to you.


----------



## olivaw

CPP is DB pension plan. Expansion is a wonderful idea and I hope the government proceeds with it. 

For now, we can focus on the new health accord. 



> Canada's health minister is eager to draft a new health accord so the federal government can start flowing funds to help cash-strapped provinces deal with the mounting costs of care.


The Harper government imposed a deal on the provinces without much debate. It was counterproductive because the government refused to address critical health care issues such as home care; pharmacare; mental health; palliative care; dental and vision. I don't expect Minister Philpott and provincial health ministers to solve every problem during this round of discussion, but I think they will do far better than the previous government.


----------



## Eclectic12

mordko said:


> Basic differences from a DB pension plan:
> - if you spend all your life working full time, you are guaranteed to lose out with CPP.


What is the form of loss?

For both the DB pension and CPP, working full time all your life means more years of contribution as well as likely an increasing over time income. The payout formula for both pensions say these two things will increase the retirement income.

Since changing jobs does not stop one from participating in CPP, this is an advantage where changing jobs in a DB pension usually means deciding between a range of choices that can include a capped benefit (i.e. no further increases), taking on managing the retirement funds on one's own with part under special rules or in rare cases, transferring into the new DB plan (though ten years in the old plan may only buy a couple of years in the new DB plan). 




mordko said:


> - If you take breaks in your career, you are benefiting.


Both pension formulas use the number of years of contributing as well as salary level so I don't see the benefit to taking breaks.




mordko said:


> - young people get screwed. When CPP started it amounted to giving older generation something for nothing, paid for by young people. Basically inter generational transfer, happens every time there is a change.


Hmmm ... so where starting CPP at age 60 used to reduce the pension 30%, the changed rules mean the reduction is 36%. How is reducing the pension to be paid to age 60 retirees screwing young workers?





mordko said:


> Crucially, this are not your funds. With company DB you are assigned a pot of money and nobody can take it. Rules may change but what is yours will stay with you.


Sort of ... or more accurately, assuming the company hasn't been skipping pension payments then going bankrupt (ex. Nortel).




mordko said:


> ... With CPP you are entirely in the hands of future governments who are free to do anything they want. As population ages they will be forced to change the age of payout or reduce the payout... The money does not belong to you.


There is that risk ... though having been told CPP would be gone in the 90's and seeing it is still around - I am not as pessimistic.

Then too, as the population ages - a lot of immigrants are coming from places like the Philippines, where they are paying into CPP as well. So the key factors are what drives CPP debts as well as assets, how well are these balanced and what is the overall employment picture.


Cheers


----------



## mordko

Eclectic12 said:


> What is the form of loss?
> 
> For both the DB pension and CPP, working full time all your life means more years of contribution as well as likely an increasing over time income. The payout formula for both pensions say these two things will increase the retirement income.
> 
> Since changing jobs does not stop one from participating in CPP, this is an advantage where changing jobs in a DB pension usually means deciding between a range of choices that can include a capped benefit (i.e. no further increases), taking on managing the retirement funds on one's own with part under special rules or in rare cases, transferring into the new DB plan (though ten years in the old plan may only buy a couple of years in the new DB plan).
> 
> Both pension formulas use the number of years of contributing as well as salary level so I don't see the benefit to taking breaks.
> 
> Hmmm ... so where starting CPP at age 60 used to reduce the pension 30%, the changed rules mean the reduction is 36%. How is reducing the pension to be paid to age 60 retirees screwing young workers?
> 
> Sort of ... or more accurately, assuming the company hasn't been skipping pension payments then going bankrupt (ex. Nortel).
> 
> There is that risk ... though having been told CPP would be gone in the 90's and seeing it is still around - I am not as pessimistic.
> 
> Then too, as the population ages - a lot of immigrants are coming from places like the Philippines, where they are paying into CPP as well. So the key factors are what drives CPP debts as well as assets, how well are these balanced and what is the overall employment picture.
> 
> Cheers


In reality if you work for ~43 years in Canada, your actual rate of return in terms of CPP will be poor. This is because CPP "generously" permits you to drop 17% of the time you spend working. This makes returns good for those who spend part of their career sitting at home or unemployed or taking the time off to travel or go abroad and stop contributing to CPP. Naturally "generosity" has to be paid for, and it's the ones who work all their lives that have to pay up. 

And it is a fact that every public pension fund does what is called "intergenerational transfer". Basically they initially set contributions too low or overestimate returns. Works great for those approaching retirement but someone has to pay; invariably it's the younger people who don't vote as much. 

Bringing in immigrants to pay for underfunded pensions seems like a great idea, but immigrants tend to earn less and less and fewer and fewer of them are coming on skills programs. Family unification immigrants or recent refugees don't do a heck of a lot to generate contributions.

Bottom line - it's involuntary and tries to solve a problem that does not exist (Canadians do quite well saving for themselves) while penalizing already overtaxed population of working youngsters. Let's have an opt-out and then I'll be OK with it.


----------



## mordko

Another problem worth considering is that if CPP is supposed to be large, young people will rely on it. In reality they shouldn't because a future government will change the rules.


----------



## Woz

What mordko’s saying about CPP being a bad deal is true. Anyone who started working post 2003 is getting a poor return. Still, I’d be ok with an expanded CPP if the contribution rates were set appropriately.

Instead of cutting benefits in the mid-90s they increased contribution rates for future contributors. From 1966-1986 total contribution was 3.6%. From 1987-1996 it increased 0.2% per year to 5.6%. From 1997-2003 it increased 0.4%-0.8% per year to 9.9%. Those who contributed pre 1986 are getting a far better return than those who contributed post 2003.

You’re allowed to drop-out 8 years from 18 to 65. Those who don’t dropout any years are getting a lower return than those who drop out 8 or more years. This could be fixed by allowing people to stop contributing after 39 years of contributions.

Those who stay at home to raise a child get to drop out additional years. Those who use the child rearing drop out get a higher return than those who don’t. I don’t have a problem with giving benefits to families, but I do think they should be transparent. There’s no real reason a family benefit should be bundled with CPP. It should be removed from CPP and come out of general revenues.


----------



## Userkare

humble_pie said:


> ^^
> 
> Justin shared an inheritance with his brother & possibly with the mystery illegitimate half-sister, whose mother keeps her out of the limelight.


Well, since you brought it up. I alluded to it up-thread that the mother of this 'mysterious' half sister is Deborah Coyne... The person that Justin displaced as the leading candidate for the Liberal leadership; who then, in spite of her impressive credentials, wasn't offered any riding to run in, so that she might be included in Justin's "because it's 2015" gender balanced cabinet. Any connection? Of course not! Our Boy Wonder could never be so petty!

Deborah Coyne had a relationship with P.E. Trudeau after his divorce from Margaret, and they had a child they named Sarah Elisabeth Coyne, now in her 20's. I'm surprised that such a Liberal enlightened individual as yourself would call her 'illegitimate'. What is this the 18th Century? Both Ms Coynes never speak publicly about their relationship with the Trudeau family. They are very classy ladies.

From what I've read, the Trudeau boys shunned the girl. Who knows why! One would think they would want to protect their little sister, but then I don't know that family's values. I don't know if the girl got anything from the inheritance, but I read that P.E. did visit her in Toronto as she was growing up. You would think he would explicitly name her in his will, but I don't know if that information is public.

As far as Justin being rich. Yes there's the $1.2M inheritance, plus speaking fees up to $450,000/year. Not bad for a teacher /ski bum.


----------



## olivaw

There was a story about P.E.T's daughter Sarah Coyne in the Star in November. The Star didn't report that the boys shunned Sarah, only that they had little interaction.


----------



## Userkare

olivaw said:


> There was a story about P.E.T's daughter Sarah Coyne in the Star in November. The Star didn't report that the boys shunned Sarah, only that they had little interaction.


You say "potato", I say "pariah". :biggrin:

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/c...who-in-canadas-first-and-only-federal-dynasty

"_But Justin has been almost completely estranged from Deborah and his 23-year-old half-sister Sarah Coyne." _


----------



## mordko

Relationship with his sister or how much money he has - his private matter, none of our business. The fact he is prince Trudeau makes a mockery of the whole concept "equality of opportunity". We should be getting rid of this nostalgia for feudalism in the 21st century.


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> Relationship with his sister or how much money he has - his private matter, none of our business. The fact he is prince Trudeau makes a mockery of the whole concept "equality of opportunity". We should be getting rid of this nostalgia for feudalism in the 21st century.


there you go again, contradicting yourself each:

it was only 24 hours ago that you were caterwauling & cavailing against the looks, the legend & the alleged wealth. Now you're saying that these don't matter after all? instead it's some problem rooted back in the 13th century?




mordko said:


> The number of selfies alone shows what a great PM we have in Justine. So glad his kids are going to be well looked after - because rich people like him don't need family tax breaks. They just need the taxpayer to look after the kids.


----------



## mordko

humble_pie said:


> there you go again, contradicting yourself each:
> 
> it was only 24 hours ago that you were caterwauling & cavailing against the looks, the legend & the alleged wealth. Now you're saying that these don't matter after all? instead it's some problem rooted back in the 13th century?


Read a bit slower, please. I don't give a flying f-k for his wealth or lack thereof and his looks don't do anything for me. Let me try again...

it's ok when teenage girls do a lot of selfies. PM? Not so much.

Prior to election Trudeau said that rich people like him don't need help with looking after the kids. I am quoting his words. After election he hires foreign nannies for round the clock childcare at taxpayers expense. It's the hypocrisy that I find appalling.


----------



## mordko

And yeah, electing kids for leadership positions is nostalgia for feudalism. Chances it's on merit are very close to zero.


----------



## andrewf

mordko said:


> it's ok when teenage girls do a lot of selfies. PM? Not so much.


Those dang kids better get off your lawn.


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> After election he hires foreign nannies for round the clock childcare at taxpayers expense. It's the hypocrisy that I find appalling.



what's pitifully clear these days is who the poison haters of justin trudeau are.

the NDP is not attacking the new prime minister. Most conservatives are not attacking the new PM. Women of all political parties are not attacking the new PM. Youth is not attacking the new PM.

that leaves the get-off-my-lawners
especially when there's nobody on their front lawns


----------



## olivaw

mordko said:


> it's ok when teenage girls do a lot of selfies. PM? Not so much.


Perhaps you misunderstood the selfie thing. Justin Trudeau doesn't take selfies. Other people take selfies with Justin Trudeau. 

Now the last Prime Minister - talk about a photo queen. Remember how he would dress up in military costumes and prance around in front of government photographers? That guy thought our troops were his personal props. It was all terribly undignified. :distress:








And then there was the time he used our expensive submarine as a prop. 








Harper's staged photographs cost taxpayers an awful lot of money.


----------



## mordko

humble_pie said:


> what's pitifully clear these days is who the poison haters of justin trudeau are.
> 
> the NDP is not attacking the new prime minister. Most conservatives are not attacking the new PM. Women of all political parties are not attacking the new PM. Youth is not attacking the new PM.
> 
> that leaves the get-off-my-lawners
> especially when there's nobody on their front lawns


Are you saying Rona Ambrose is a man? And all them people with distinctly female voices and names who called radio stations to complain about Trudeaus duplicity on the nanny issue? I am not sure what this problem is called when you can't tell a man from a woman but your shrink may be able to help. 
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/rona-ambrose-rich-trudeau-nannies-1.3347148


----------



## mordko

olivaw said:


> Perhaps you misunderstood the selfie thing. Justin Trudeau doesn't take selfies. Other people take selfies with Justin Trudeau.
> 
> Now the last Prime Minister - talk about a photo queen. Remember how he would dress up in military costumes and prance around in front of government photographers? That guy thought our troops were his personal props. It was all terribly undignified. :distress:
> View attachment 9698
> 
> 
> And then there was the time he used our expensive submarine as a prop.
> View attachment 9706
> 
> 
> Harper's staged photographs cost taxpayers an awful lot of money.


You may find that Justin holds the camera in a whole lot of his selfies. And pandas really don't give a **** for them selfies. It's not for nothing that they call him Canada's king of selfies.


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> You may find that Justin holds the camera in a whole lot of his selfies. And pandas really don't give a **** for them selfies. It's not for nothing that they call him Canada's king of selfies.



could you please find an example of justin trudeau holding his own camera for his own selfies? thankx for your consideration


----------



## mordko

humble_pie said:


> could you please find an example of justin trudeau holding his own camera for his own selfies? thankx for your consideration


NP:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montr...s-at-montreal-s-jarry-metro-station-1.3279728


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> NP:
> 
> http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montr...s-at-montreal-s-jarry-metro-station-1.3279728



as you can see, those are not trudeau's own cameras. They're the constituents' cameras.

in most cases he's holding the cams because the voters visibly asked him to do this.


----------



## olivaw

humble_pie said:


> as you can see, those are not trudeau's own cameras. They're the constituents' cameras.
> 
> in most cases he's holding the cams because the voters visibly asked him to do this.


Trudeau is good that way, he helps people. He's not arrogant and aloof like the previous prime minister.


----------



## mrPPincer

mordco, selfies don't cost the taxpayer a damned thing!

I'd think you'd be happy he's not blowing a *billion* dollars on a weekend due to moving the G8 photo op to T.O. like the previous one did.


----------



## fraser

I am not in the least fixated by Trudeau. But I am very impressed with his style of Government and with the Cabinet.

Part of it is qualifications. I think that you would have to go back to the Pearson era to find as qualified a Cabinet as we now have. Interestingly enough, it was displeasure with the former administration that drove some of these people to personally move forward with change and stand for office. Just as it was with the displeasure with Mr. Diefenbaker.

The second part is independence. It has been ever so long since I have seen so many Cabinet Ministers and Parliamentary Secretaries running their own show and responding to requests for interviews and appearances. So refreshing.

Finally, it is so good to see a Government doing their job and not focussing all of their efforts to please the small group of ultra conservative Canadians who formed their core support group. It is also great to see the former Conservative Cabinet Ministers speaking...and not from scripts written and controlled by the PMO. Cannot remember when I heard and seen so many of them respond for interviews and news spots. This is good...it will make for a great Official Opposition.

Canadians will soon forget about Steven Harper. If only because there is not one thing or one special piece of legislation that he will be remembered for or commended for. Jim Flaherty, yes, Stephen Harper no.


----------



## Userkare

I don't care what pictures Justin takes, or that any political figure or celebrity has taken of them. I don't care how much money he has; just don't tell us how you identify with the common folk as you jet around the country getting paid buckets for talking; it's phony. Every politician that wants to be elected needs to get on the business end of a camera. Our Ottawa mayor is a real shutter-whore; every opportunity he possibly can, he gets his picture in it. Chretien had his ugly mug in front of every hi-tech trade delegation to China, as if somehow it was because of his great leadership. When things started to go bad for the hi-tech industry, Jean couldn't distance himself from it faster. Yes, and even Conservatives do it too! I don't see this as an issue.

What I do want to know, is if our PM truly knows what he's doing. Who is advising him? Does he base his decisions on what is best for the entire country, or what will win him the most rock-star popularity? Sometimes, it's not the same choice. Time will tell, but so far, I'm not overly impressed. He hasn't done much yet, but the 25,000 refugee plan is still causing strain on the local food banks, and I don't know if they've even found permanent housing for them all. I'm not against the refugees, or Muslims; I don't think there's even a tiny chance of terrorists in their midst. I just want to know that our leaders have done the proper planning, not just did whatever made them look better, more compassionate, than the other guy. If some of these refugees were living and working in Lebanon, why did we drag them here to have to beg for food? So that our PM could look like he's fulfilling an election promise? That's just cruel, if it's even only slightly true.

The first budget was almost 3 times the projected deficit; sure blame it on oil, but a good leader would have seen the downward trend of the oil markets. Nobody seems to think that deficit budgets are a bad thing; interest rates are low. If it takes 30+ years to pay if off, we'll see if that comes back to bite us. Those of us who remember 20% mortgage rates during Papa Trudeau's reign can tell you about that. 

As I've said before, isn't it interesting how criticizing the PM has become such a horrible thing to do? Where was the outrage when PM Harper was called "Harpo", "Herr Harpler", "Heave Steve" ? Even during the election - Mulcair standing in front of a "Stop Harper" banner. I would love to have seen Stephen Harper standing in front of the NDP convention with a "Dump Tom" banner. "How do you like it now?" As the saying goes... what goes around, comes around.


----------



## humble_pie

olivaw said:


> .
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> .



i did think those photographs of harper are real nice, though.


----------



## cheech10

Userkare said:


> The first budget was almost 3 times the projected deficit; sure blame it on oil, but a good leader would have seen the downward trend of the oil markets.


And if Mr. Harper had not cut the GST, we would have had a much smaller deficit.


----------



## sags

And Harper cut corporate taxes claiming it would create millions of jobs. It didn't happen and former BOC chief Mark Carney said it was a failure.

I wonder how much of the money saved by corporations was spent building factories in Mexico or funneled into offshore bank accounts.


----------



## fraser

Mr Harper only balanced the books once. That was during his first term in office and he inherited the surplus from Paul Martin.

Interesting that people think he is such a fiscal conservative yet they did not post ONE surplus during any of their full years in Government. Many people think that they did. The reality is very different.


----------



## mordko

Harper was in charge through the worst throws of the crisis which impacted the whole world. Canada came out of it in a far better fiscal shape than any other developed country. And let's not forget it was the Libs and the NDP that were screaming for shovels to throw money at the problem and that the shovels were way too small. 

Current deficit is 3 times what was promised a few month ago - and the economy is growing before the taxpayers money is being thrown out of the window. Where is in any sense in it? Clearly spending is the objective in itself.


----------



## olivaw

Canada came through the crisis in better shape than other countries because the previous Liberal government maintained strict banking regulations.


----------



## mordko

A couple of major Canadian banks would have been bankrupt had it not been for regulations which are lax compared to the US. On the top of it, Canadian banks don't need to take risks because the market is not as competitive as elsewhere. I have never seen such ridiculous banking charges anywhere other than Canada... And Canadian mutual fund charges are astronomical compared to US/UK and most other countries. Not sure it's a good reason to be proud.


----------



## sags

As i recall, Harper was in denial of a recession long after it had already begun. Much of the "stimulus" money that was announced was too late and was never spent.

In fact, I believe the Liberals are now dispensing money to Alberta that was budgeted by the Harper government in successive budgets.

Last year before the election, Finance Minister Joe Oliver was still talking about a balanced budget and denying that Canada had a period of negative growth...........and was wrong on both counts.

The Harper government was either deceitful or incompetent..........and good riddance to them either way.


----------



## mordko

http://www.motherjones.com/contributor/2016/04/cant-spell-canada-without-fraud

Oopsee...


----------



## mrPPincer

mordko said:


> http://www.motherjones.com/contributor/2016/04/cant-spell-canada-without-fraud
> 
> Oopsee...


Straight out of the comments section..


> For the non-Canadians who might read this here's the 411: the "source" in question is a non media-accredited right-wing blogger, like a Canadian Anne Coulter but dumber if that's possible. The people that piled on afterwards work for The Rebel which is like a sad, limp little northern copy of Breitbart or The Blaze which has an actual numbered audience of a couple hundred. In other words: nothing to see here.


----------



## mordko

National Post, Hufftingtonpost, The Guardian, cantechletter,... All published similar articles. Partly because Trudeau had them initially... Who would have thought all of these publications and mother Jones are exactly like Anne Coulter? 

Nothing to see


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> NP:
> 
> http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montr... personal souvenir of the watershed election.


----------



## mrPPincer

haha you're right mordco 

I looked it up on Huffington Post just now and they have one too.
It's titled "Tories Use Viral Trudeau Video In Attack Ad"

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/04/19/trudeau-quantum-computing_n_9732386.html
an excerpt..


> The ad does not mention that Trudeau went on to answer Perkel's question after finishing his quantum spiel, and the initial video — uploaded to YouTube by CBC News — ends before Trudeau touches on Canada's ISIL mission


----------



## mrPPincer

& out of the huffington post article's comment section, this pretty much sums it up nicely..


> Trademark Tory BS. You'd think they might have learned something from the last election and knock if off with the moronic, petty, and transparently dishonest "attack ads." Who within the party is responsible for this garbage? Some ridiculous excuse for a publicist or ad agency? Fire the lot at long last! Canada needs a strong, progressive, intelligent Conservative party. We don't need this preadolescent "attack" drivel shoved in our faces time after time. Why don't more of us vote for you? Because we're not as stupid as you think we are!


----------



## mordko

As well they might. The evidence is there for all to see: https://ca.news.yahoo.com/quantumgate-skeptics-question-authenticity-of-1410410314694710.html

But if you love spin, Trudeau is the right guy for you


----------



## mrPPincer

but who's doing the spin here?

Trudeau was on stage to announce some some new funding to the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Ont., of which he'd just taken a tour, and had mentioned earlier that he was excited to discuss the subject if asked.

He went on to answer the Isil question.

Pretty poor choice of fodder for yet another lame dishonest Tory attack ad.


----------



## bgc_fan

Really, this thing about the presser in Waterloo is much ado about nothing. He did answer the question about ISIS although that isn't widely reported.

So is the criticism that the press is giving Trudeau an easy ride? I'm not sure how that is his fault. Maybe this reinforces the idea that the media is biased towards the Liberals? Of course when you consider that outside of The Toronto Star all the newspapers endorsed the Conservatives in the last election, maybe you should starting rethinking that. Pretty easy feat when you are talking about one company owning all those newspapers and the owner has Conservative leanings. And then you have Joe Oliver with his periodic column in the National Post and Rona Ambrose who likes sending open letters to the NP instead of debating in the Commons.

Or maybe people find it interesting that the leader of a country has some interest in science and technology and is willing to talk about it? I think this Guardian article explains the fact that all this press is unwarranted. Basically, we should expect that leaders have some interest/knowledge of some basic science. The fact that we see people (Conservatives) denigrating the "elites", read as educated people, makes this story a "man bites dog" sort of thing.

Or maybe it is that the Conservatives were on a media blitz saying how unready or what an intellectual lightweight that Trudeau is lowered expectations. So when he comes out with a fairly simple explanation to the basic idea of quantum computing we are all impressed. But, you have the Conservatives to blame for that, and when you make hay out of this event, you lose credibility when real issues come into play, i.e. policies. Instead you are wasting time and ressources for nothing to gain.

Maybe Trudeau should be ejecting reporters who ask out of place questions or limiting the questions that are being asked.


----------



## mordko

bgc_fan said:


> Really, this thing about the presser in Waterloo is much ado about nothing. He did answer the question about ISIS although that isn't widely reported.
> 
> So is the criticism that the press is giving Trudeau an easy ride? I'm not sure how that is his fault. Maybe this reinforces the idea that the media is biased towards the Liberals? Of course when you consider that outside of The Toronto Star all the newspapers endorsed the Conservatives in the last election, maybe you should starting rethinking that. Pretty easy feat when you are talking about one company owning all those newspapers and the owner has Conservative leanings. And then you have Joe Oliver with his periodic column in the National Post and Rona Ambrose who likes sending open letters to the NP instead of debating in the Commons.
> 
> Or maybe people find it interesting that the leader of a country has some interest in science and technology and is willing to talk about it? I think this Guardian article explains the fact that all this press is unwarranted. Basically, we should expect that leaders have some interest/knowledge of some basic science. The fact that we see people (Conservatives) denigrating the "elites", read as educated people, makes this story a "man bites dog" sort of thing.
> 
> Or maybe it is that the Conservatives were on a media blitz saying how unready or what an intellectual lightweight that Trudeau is lowered expectations. So when he comes out with a fairly simple explanation to the basic idea of quantum computing we are all impressed. But, you have the Conservatives to blame for that, and when you make hay out of this event, you lose credibility when real issues come into play, i.e. policies. Instead you are wasting time and ressources for nothing to gain.
> 
> Maybe Trudeau should be ejecting reporters who ask out of place questions or limiting the questions that are being asked.


Heh. There is a peculiar assumption in this screed that Conservatives are not educated and are "denigrating educated people". As a physicist I beg to differ. Trudeau is an ignoramus who is doing theatre shows based on the training he gets from his stuff. Suckers bite and swollow the spin including many in the media, others don't. Hence difference in interpreting the show.


----------



## Userkare

mordko said:


> Heh. There is a peculiar assumption in this screed that Conservatives are not educated and are "denigrating educated people". As a physicist I beg to differ. Trudeau is an ignoramus who is doing theatre shows based on the training he gets from his stuff. Suckers bite and swollow the spin including many in the media, others don't. Hence difference in interpreting the show.


Exactly, it was 'theatre'. In the early 70's I had a girlfriend who was an arts major, and had an incredible memory. When she would be with me while talking to my geek computer engineering friends, she would say things that made their jaws drop. She didn't have the slightest clue what she was talking about, but was simply parroting something she had heard someone say days or even weeks ago. Justin, on the other hand, had just learned something that morning; and like an eager little boy wanting to impress the adults, just had to show everybody what he knew. Had he then turned around and proved the formula on the board behind him, I would really have been impressed.

OTOH, it was petty to use that in an attack ad by the Conservatives. There will be plenty of real Justin asinine moments to come, to be sure.


----------



## bgc_fan

mordko said:


> Heh. There is a peculiar assumption in this screed that Conservatives are not educated and are "denigrating educated people". As a physicist I beg to differ. Trudeau is an ignoramus who is doing theatre shows based on the training he gets from his stuff. Suckers bite and swollow the spin including many in the media, others don't. Hence difference in interpreting the show.


So your argument in response is to ignore everything I state and pick out a meaningless detail. I didn't say or imply that Conservatives are uneducated. I said that Conservatives put down elites which they define as those who are educated and oppose Conservatives. Then again that article is from the Sun, so take it as you want.


----------



## mrPPincer

On sunday you mentioned that you'd studied theoretical physics; and now you are a physicist, congratulations on the achievement, and in only 3 days 


mordko said:


> Heh. There is a peculiar assumption in this screed that Conservatives are not educated and are "denigrating educated people". As a physicist I beg to differ. Trudeau is an *ignoramus* who is doing theatre shows based on the training he gets from his stuff. Suckers bite and *swollow* the spin including many in the media, others don't. Hence difference in interpreting the show.


If you are going to go around calling people ignorant maybe you should try to get the spelling right in the same paragraph 
(with the 'A' and the 'O' being on opposite sides of the keyboard it doesn't look like a typo).


----------



## mordko

mrPPincer said:


> On sunday you mentioned that you'd studied theoretical physics; and now you are a physicist, congratulations on the achievement, and in only 3 days
> 
> 
> If you are going to go around calling people ignorant maybe you should try to get the spelling right in the same paragraph
> (with the 'A' and the 'O' being on opposite sides of the keyboard it doesn't look like a typo).


Thank you so much for the corrections. I am not a native English speaker and had no time to check the spelling while typing on a cellphone. Your effort is much appreciated.


----------



## mordko

"On sunday you mentioned that you'd studied theoretical physics; and now you are a physicist, congratulations on the achievement, and in only 3 days"

Good memory, thank you for following me so attentively. I am not sure what I achieved in 3 days but I am sure your comment has some kind of hidden meaning to you. In general, people who study theoretical physics sometimes graduate, complete MSc/PhD and become physicists. It takes a little longer than 3 days but whatever.


----------



## mordko

Btw, "ignoramus" was spelt correctly. Just sayin.


----------



## mrPPincer

> I am not a native English speaker and had no time to check the spelling while typing on a cellphone.


apologies :apologetic:
My assumption was that you were exaggerating a tad about your profession in light of the poor spelling, but it didn't occur to me that english was not your native language, my mistake. :redface:



> Could memory, thank you for following me so attentively.


well, not exactly, I just remembered reading something and scrolled up


----------



## olivaw

*6 months in, Justin Trudeau's Liberals still riding high in polls*



> Six months after winning a majority government in last year's federal vote, the Liberals continue to poll above their showing on election night. But is Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's honeymoon with voters over?
> 
> Short answer: no.
> 
> Long answer? Well, still no. In fact, there are very few negative indicators for Trudeau's Liberals in the polls in this early stage of their four-year mandate. But there are some signs that the Liberals may face some headwinds in the future.


----------



## mordko

mrPPincer said:


> apologies :apologetic:
> My assumption was that you were exaggerating a tad about your profession in light of the poor spelling, but it didn't occur to me that english was not your native language, my mistake. :redface:
> 
> 
> well, not exactly, I just remembered reading something and scrolled up


What's so poor? "Ignoramus" was spelt correctly, contrary to your comment.


----------



## olivaw

Justin Trudeau's sunny ways have created sunny days for the Liberal Party. 

*EKOS: Liberals Still Feeling the Love, NDP not so Much*



> [Ottawa – April 18, 2016] The Liberals remain at stratospheric levels. The dip we saw in our last poll may be receding and the party is going strong at 44 points. The Conservatives are fairly stable, but at 29 points, they are well back of the Liberals. At 12 points, the NDP sits in a distant third place.


*FORUM: Federal Liberals up, Conservatives down in latest poll*



> TORONTO April 6th, 2016 - In a random sampling of public opinion taken by the Forum Poll™ among 1455 Canadian voters, just more than one half will vote Liberal if the federal election were held today (51%), while just more than a quarter will vote Conservative (28%) and about one tenth will vote NDP (12%). Few will vote for the Bloc Quebecois (6%), the Green Party (3%) or anyone else (1%).


----------



## humble_pie

only 6 months in power & the federal government under the liberals has brought out major initiatives in immigration (refugees), defence (defence strategy review plus prioritize global peacekeeping), finance (budget), first nation & northern affairs (investigation of murders of more than 1,000 women), health (assisted dying) & foreign policy (seek canada's seat on the UN security council plus restore relations with the US.)

meanwhile the hatemongers have nothing to say other than to whine on & on about nannygate & selfies.


----------



## fraser

I have voted for Harper in the past. Heck, he was our MP.

Why did I move away from the Harper Conservatives? In the last six years they seemed to get extremely mean spirited. Just about all of their tax legislation was targeted at a middle class family vote. The benefits were not inclusive for those in the lower tiers. Also disliked the pandering to the far right wing in the party. I predict this will cause issues for them in the leadership race.

Bottom line is that I detest mean spiritedness. It was my perception that the Harper Gov/t had moved into that territory in a big way. . Plus, he did zilch, nothing, absolutely nadda for my province of Alberta. Lots of cheap talk because he could count on the seats, but no action. 

My prediction is that Trudeau will move the eastern pipeline to a reality.


----------



## humble_pie

^^

actually on the pipeline i think andrewf has had the best insight so far.

yesterday he posted - somewhere into the chaos that is cmf forum - that Hillary will likely permit keystone after she's elected.

that will knock out Energy East, with its large costs, environmental concerns & slow-growing but deep-rooted opposition.

re the new Liberal gummint in general & mean-spiritedness in particular. This is the honeymoon period, these are the halcyon days. We can have all the innovation & idealism of the far left while policing it firmly with the big business mainstream commitment of the traditional liberal party.


----------



## olivaw

humble_pie said:


> ^^
> 
> actually on the pipeline i think andrewf has had the best insight so far.
> 
> yesterday he posted - somewhere into the chaos that is cmf forum - that Hillary will likely permit keystone after she's elected.
> 
> that will knock out Energy East, with its large costs, environmental concerns & slow-growing but deep-rooted opposition..


I think andrewf's guess about Hillary Clinton and Keystone XL completely wrong. That type of decision is not made by the president alone. The State Department has declared that Keystone XL is not in America's self interest. The US has developed a shale oil industry and now competes with Canada as an energy producing and exporting nation. Like every nation (except Canada) America considers energy self sufficiency to be a strategic necessity. 



fraser said:


> I have voted for Harper in the past. Heck, he was our MP.
> 
> Why did I move away from the Harper Conservatives? In the last six years they seemed to get extremely mean spirited. Just about all of their tax legislation was targeted at a middle class family vote. The benefits were not inclusive for those in the lower tiers. Also disliked the pandering to the far right wing in the party. I predict this will cause issues for them in the leadership race.
> 
> Bottom line is that I detest mean spiritedness. It was my perception that the Harper Gov/t had moved into that territory in a big way. . Plus, he did zilch, nothing, absolutely nadda for my province of Alberta. Lots of cheap talk because he could count on the seats, but no action.
> 
> My prediction is that Trudeau will move the eastern pipeline to a reality.


Harper is my MP but I have never voted for him. He supported the American led invasion of Iraq too vehemently. 

Do you really believe that Trudeau will move Energy East to reality? I have neighbours and friends who think the same thing but I am not confident. There is strong opposition in Ontario and overwhelming opposition in Quebec. Justin Trudeau may (or may not) deeply believe that Energy East is a good thing for Canadian energy self sufficiency but it would be politically dangerous for him to actively promote it.


----------



## bgc_fan

olivaw said:


> Do you really believe that Trudeau will move Energy East to reality? I have neighbours and friends who think the same thing but I am not confident. There is strong opposition in Ontario and overwhelming opposition in Quebec. Justin Trudeau may (or may not) deeply believe that Energy East is a good thing for Canadian energy self sufficiency but it would be politically dangerous for him to actively promote it.


I don't think there is a huge opposition in Ontario and Quebec. The main opponents of the project are certain First Nations bands and the mayor of Montreal. I don't think there is an overwhelming opposition to it.

I think if TransCanada can pick the pipeline routes carefully and meet the concerns about possible pipeline leaks, it has a possibility of going through.


----------



## olivaw

bgc_fan said:


> I don't think there is a huge opposition in Ontario and Quebec. The main opponents of the project are certain First Nations bands and the mayor of Montreal. I don't think there is an overwhelming opposition to it.
> 
> I think if TransCanada can pick the pipeline routes carefully and meet the concerns about possible pipeline leaks, it has a possibility of going through.


I would certainly be happy to be wrong but headlines like *Tensions high during Quebec's environmental hearings into Energy East pipeline* give me pause.

On Keystone XL, I was chatting with an American friend a few months ago. He is not terribly well informed about the energy industry but he is in touch with the politics of the American left. He stated that "Tar Sands" oil is the dirtiest energy in the world. This is only anecdotal evidence, but it struck me as interesting.


----------



## fraser

I think Quebec is doing what Quebec knows how to do best. Lots of pretend opposition will disappear after the trade off goodies are on the table for the provincial politicians to take credit for.

I think that it is all about money and politics.


----------



## humble_pie

i don't see how energy self-sufficiency for canada goes with Energy East.

the refineries in Montreal East can't handle dilbit. AltaRed has posted that one Suncor refinery in the montreal east complex might be retrofitted to handle dilbit, but the rest cannot.

this means that most of Energy East's payload will transit on to the port of st John NB. IIRC altaRed was more sanguine that the Irving refineries could handle dilbit, but still a large part of the alberta product would have to be exported from st John. Would be shipped to texas coast refineries. The same refineries that would receive Keystone XL if it were to be built.

meanwhile, eastern canadian refineries will continue to import saudi crude through the port of montreal, as always.

i'm not seeing how the above is "energy self-sufficiency"

i do see that there is a self-sufficient aspect in that EE does not require approval & permission from a foreign government, that's all.


----------



## mrPPincer

mordko said:


> What's so poor? "Ignoramus" was spelt correctly, contrary to your comment.


good god, give it a rest already..
Try re-reading it.

My comment was about you using 'ignoramus' and 'swollow' in the same paragraph.
It makes you look like hypocritical (not to mention judgemental and possibly uneducated contrary to your claims), that's all.


----------



## mordko

mrPPincer said:


> good god, give it a rest already..
> Try re-reading it.
> 
> My comment was about you using 'ignoramus' and 'swollow' in the same paragraph.
> It makes makes you look like hypocrytical (not to mention judgemental and possibly uneducated contrary to your claims), that's all.


Possibly. "Makes makes". "Like hypocritical". Got it.


----------



## mrPPincer

I must be an ignoramus too, well at least I'm in good company 
Apparently prime ministers and rocket scientists are also ignoramuses.
___

added..

btw though I can't claim to have taken a course on Theoretical Physics (as you have) or that I am a 'Physicist' (as you have.. just wondering, do you also have participation trophies on mommy & daddy's mantle proclaiming you to be a 'football player' or some such thing?)

I haven't made any claim to being some snooty over-educated snob as you have, I'm as blue-collar as one could be.
In fact I was out of the house before finishing highschool.
While finishing highschool I lived in a shed in a small zoo in exchange for taking care of the animals (it had one room fully filled with a small bed and another with a fridge and a table and an oven, no running water but an outhouse), I had a second job for money.
Before that I paid my parents room & board as soon as I had a job.
At age 23 I bought my first (and present) home for cash. 
At age 40 I became semi-retired.
Now I do volunteer work.

Today, for free, between my morning posts and yours above, I googled how to fix some ****, went out to my 80-y-old mother's rental which she wants to sell asap (totally effed up by the previous tenants), and fixed two things, one plumbing, two an electrical issue due to leakage of the bursted frozen pipes when ex-tenants didn't pay bills and vacated.

So when I got back, made a quick response, then read all the further posts in this thread.
Should have spell-checked etc, but the further posts in this thread were more interesting and I got distracted (again, my apologies for confusing you, unintentionally).


----------



## andrewf

olivaw said:


> I think andrewf's guess about Hillary Clinton and Keystone XL completely wrong. That type of decision is not made by the president alone. The State Department has declared that Keystone XL is not in America's self interest. The US has developed a shale oil industry and now competes with Canada as an energy producing and exporting nation. Like every nation (except Canada) America considers energy self sufficiency to be a strategic necessity.
> 
> 
> Harper is my MP but I have never voted for him. He supported the American led invasion of Iraq too vehemently.
> 
> Do you really believe that Trudeau will move Energy East to reality? I have neighbours and friends who think the same thing but I am not confident. There is strong opposition in Ontario and overwhelming opposition in Quebec. Justin Trudeau may (or may not) deeply believe that Energy East is a good thing for Canadian energy self sufficiency but it would be politically dangerous for him to actively promote it.


It is totally in the US's interests. American refiners would love to have access to discount bitumen from Canada, and avoid shipping it by rail as they currently do. It reduces their reliance on Venezuelan bitumen, which is at much more risk of supply disruption.

Energy East is not even about energy self-sufficiency. Alberta bitumen would be brought to tidewater for export, while Saudi light oil would continue to the feedstock for East Coast refiners. It makes zero economic sense to retrofit those refineries to use oil through an uneconomic pipeline.


----------



## bgc_fan

andrewf said:


> Energy East is not even about energy self-sufficiency. Alberta bitumen would be brought to tidewater for export, while Saudi light oil would continue to the feedstock for East Coast refiners. It makes zero economic sense to retrofit those refineries to use oil through an uneconomic pipeline.


You might want to tell that to many pipeline supporters. Quite often you see the argument that the East should reduce their dependence on Saudi oil, or that because bitumen crude is cheaper, it will reduce gas prices in the East.


----------



## andrewf

Most people haven't the foggiest clue of how oil gets from the ground to their gas tank. I would say most people think we burn Alberta oil in our cars here in Ontario already.


----------



## mrPPincer

andrewf said:


> Most people haven't the foggiest clue of how oil gets from the ground to their gas tank. *I would say most people think we burn Alberta oil in our cars here in Ontario already*.


what? we don't?? solution. fix that asap! right???
jk
sorry my sense of humour seems to be slightly impaired atm :drunk:


----------



## bgc_fan

andrewf said:


> Most people haven't the foggiest clue of how oil gets from the ground to their gas tank. I would say most people think we burn Alberta oil in our cars here in Ontario already.


Well, Rachel Notley seems to think that Energy East will cause Canadians not to rely on oil imports.

Quote:
She said Canada shouldn't rely on oil imports, which currently stand at one million barrels a day.
“That just makes no economic sense for anybody in Canada,” she said. “Canada should be relying on its own abundant energy resources and our energy dollars should be building our economy here in Canada. It’s simply that clear.”

http://m.metronews.ca/#/article/new...lberta-mayors-back-energy-east-pipeline-.html

I guess she didn't get the memo that Energy East won't do that.

Of course using that as a speaking point is nice, but is pretty much a lie.


----------



## olivaw

bgc_fan said:


> Well, Rachel Notley seems to think that Energy East will cause Canadians not to rely on oil imports.
> 
> Quote:
> She said Canada shouldn't rely on oil imports, which currently stand at one million barrels a day.
> “That just makes no economic sense for anybody in Canada,” she said. “Canada should be relying on its own abundant energy resources and our energy dollars should be building our economy here in Canada. It’s simply that clear.”
> 
> http://m.metronews.ca/#/article/new...lberta-mayors-back-energy-east-pipeline-.html
> 
> I guess she didn't get the memo that Energy East won't do that.
> 
> Of course using that as a speaking point is nice, but is pretty much a lie.


Frank Mckenna said that *Irving could refine western crude*. It was 2012. The product was the same but the economics were different. 

Keystone XL is either dead or in a coma. There are upgraders in Texas that process Alberta bitumen but the US State Department rejected the pipeline. I doubt that an ex-Secretary of State such as Hillary Clinton is going to fight the State Department on behalf of a Texas oil companies and a Canadian pipeline company. It's not how she would spend her political capital. *Mayor Nenshi said*: 



> I am very disappointed that one pipe, nearly a metre wide, is being asked to bear all the sins of the carbon economy. Nonetheless, Canadian energy must have access to markets, and I will continue to partner with industry and other orders of government to advocate for other alternatives, of which there remain many viable options.


Poor Rachel Notley clan't catch a break. Most of my friends in Alberta think she is an anti-oil socialist. The rest of the country seems to think that she's an oil industry puppet.


----------



## humble_pie

.

someone should send ms notley another memo. There's no energy self-sufficiency for eastern canada, the existing refineries can't handle bitumen. Frank McKenna talking here sounds like an ex-premier boosting the local economy.




olivaw said:


> Frank Mckenna said that *Irving could refine western crude*. It was 2012. The product was the same but the economics were different.
> 
> Keystone XL is either dead or in a coma. There are upgraders in Texas that process Alberta bitumen but the US State Department rejected the pipeline. I doubt that an ex-Secretary of State such as Hillary Clinton is going to fight the State Department on behalf of a Texas oil companies and a Canadian pipeline company. It's not how she would spend her political capital.



but how could Irving handle 1 million barrels a day with just one refinery, even if they upgrade it.

a million barrels per day is the projected Energy East flow, they say. Most of it would have to be exported. By ship to the Valero refineries on the texas gulf coast. The same refineries that would be receiving the same bitumen if they built the Keystone extension. They also say that some will ship to china.

meanwhile refineries in eastern canada will continue to receive saudi crude by ship to montreal, levis & st john & by pipeline from new england, USA.

re Hillary Clinton, i believe the president has the absolute power to decide Keystone? so it's perhaps not wise to count on her kow-towing to the state department.


----------



## andrewf

olivaw said:


> Frank Mckenna said that *Irving could refine western crude*. It was 2012. The product was the same but the economics were different.
> 
> Keystone XL is either dead or in a coma. There are upgraders in Texas that process Alberta bitumen but the US State Department rejected the pipeline. I doubt that an ex-Secretary of State such as Hillary Clinton is going to fight the State Department on behalf of a Texas oil companies and a Canadian pipeline company. It's not how she would spend her political capital. *Mayor Nenshi said*:
> 
> 
> 
> Poor Rachel Notley clan't catch a break. Most of my friends in Albertan think she is an anti-oil socialist. The rest of the country seems to think that she's an oil industry puppet.


Sure, Hillary may not approve Keystone XL, but maybe she will approve Schmetone YZ. Especially if that is what is needed to give her and the state department cover for reversing on Obama's climate policy. The brand Keystone XL is toxic in the US, but thankfully it is just a meaningless made-up brand that is easily replaced.

Think along the lines of the endless series of laws the US introduces to weaken internet privacy. The internet rises up and protest each, and sometimes it is killed amid the public backlash, but each time it is revised as a slightly tweaked new version of the same legislation with a new name. Depending on what else is happening in the news, they may be able to push it through before opposition can build to shut it down.


----------



## fraser

Many people think that oil is oil. Not so.

We can be energy self sufficient but still import oil. It comes down to the refinery and what oil it is set up to efficiently refine. Refineries are designed, built, and maximized for specific types of oil. 

The crude shipping out of Fort Mac is very different than the cruise from Dakota/Saskatewan. In the same manner, it is much safer to ship Ft. Mac crude by rail than it is to ship, say the oil from the Dakotas. They are very different, right down to the flash point. The latter has a much lower flash point.


----------



## olivaw

bgc_fan said:


> I don't think there is a huge opposition in Ontario and Quebec. The main opponents of the project are certain First Nations bands and the mayor of Montreal. I don't think there is an overwhelming opposition to it.
> 
> I think if TransCanada can pick the pipeline routes carefully and meet the concerns about possible pipeline leaks, it has a possibility of going through.


No opposition? I give you humble_pie and andrewf.


----------



## andrewf

I don't feel too strongly about it from an environmental perspective. If they can build it reasonably safely with no government funding, have at it.


----------



## bgc_fan

olivaw said:


> No opposition? I give you humble_pie and andrewf.


I said that there was no *overwhelming* opposition. Not that there wasn't any opposition. Two people on an anonymous board doesn't equate to overwhelming opposition.


----------



## humble_pie

olivaw when have i ever been opposed to Energy East .each:

what i've said is that EE won't bring energy self-sufficiency to eastern canada, because the refineries here can't process alberta bitumen. 

it appears there may be one exception, a large refinery - just one refinery out of the big Irving refinery farm at st John NB - which a company spokesperson said could be retrofitted for dilbit.

the self-sufficiency loop won't close because refineries in quebec can't handle alberta bitumen. If the pipeline leg from montreal to st John is built, most of the dilbit will have to be exported from the port of st John. By sea to the texas gulf coast.

meanwhile, refineries in montreal, levis & st John will continue to run on imported saudi crude, just as they always have. This arrives by ship & also via a pipeline running north from new england in the US.

i don't see how the above is any kind of opposition to Energy East. It's only an attempt to deal with the facts. Folks who think EE will mean cheap gasoline or cheap fuel in eastern canada are mistaken.

FWIW folks in the ROC who think that it's only quebec politicians who are in a swivet about energy export plans don't have the correct number either. The grass roots in rural towns & villages are hugely concerned with energy/enviro issues. These issues include possible fracking of the gas deposits that lie south of montreal, from the new york state border almost to quebec city. Also contested is construction of a deep water LNG terminal at one of several possible sites along the south shore of the st Lawrence river,

just because an observer posts about anti-pipeline anti-fracking anti-LNG-terminal meetings that are taking place in small town school gyms & church halls across quebec, doesn't mean the observer sides with them.


----------



## AnnaDanishek

Anyway he is sooo cute))


----------



## olivaw

Understood, andrewf and humble. 

Anna, he's not just a pretty face. *Our Prime Minister fights for Canada * and Time named him one of the *100 Most Influential People*. 



> In many ways Canada is no longer the country I grew up in, but when I hear Justin Trudeau talk, it sounds like my Canada again. Bold, clear as a bell and progressive.
> 
> In politics as in show business, there are three things you need to be successful: talent, discipline and luck. Trudeau clearly has the first two. I wish him luck.
> 
> I believe he will be a force for good.


----------



## mordko

An article in WSJ today waxes lyrical about Canada doing good for the world. In a nutshell:

- Canada is spending like crazy. This is only possible because the previous government left finances in the state that is by far the best of any developed nation.
- As we are flushing $s into the economy, our interest rates are staying put while everywhere else banks have to cut interest rates.
- Hence Canadian dollar is strengthening vs every other currency in the world.
- Therefore we are sucking in everyone's goods and helping out all the other world economies. 
- Had the expenditure been limited to infrastructure, it would have been "one off" and easy to reverse. Actually more than half of it is increased social spending, which is structural, long term and can't be reduced easily. Works well for the big nanny-state party in charge.


----------



## humble_pie

.

this thread is all over the map so here's an addition to the legalize pot issue. Trudeau is actually behind the times. Ginseng is the new marijuana, except it doesn't have hallucinogenic side effects. Seng is a fine tonic for run-down or stressed conditions, can alleviate many ailments of the elderly, usually boosts energy slightly.

this article says that ginseng roots are now a $600 million crop in ontario alone.

in the historic chinatowns of canada's large cities one can find chinese grocers & apothecaries bulging with dried ginseng roots for sale. A problem is most of those roots are too young, generally the oldest roots are only three years. To be effective, they say that ginseng roots should be at least seven years old.

the mother of a chinese friend of mine goes to new york city once a year on a root-buying binge in NYC's legendary chinatown. She comes home with a big box that always costs her north of $1,000. I have no idea how she gets the thing through customs.

http://business.financialpost.com/n...came-to-dominate-the-global-supply-of-ginseng


----------



## Eclectic12

mordko said:


> In reality if you work for ~43 years in Canada, your actual rate of return in terms of CPP will be poor. This is because CPP "generously" permits you to drop 17% of the time you spend working. This makes returns good for those who spend part of their career sitting at home or unemployed or taking the time off to travel or go abroad and stop contributing to CPP. Naturally "generosity" has to be paid for, and it's the ones who work all their lives that have to pay up.


At the same time, those who are working get their lower income earning years dropped as well ... those that start at or above YMPE are the ones that have the widest disparity.
I wonder how many starting out or in mid-career are deciding to do these types of things based on CPP? 




mordko said:


> And it is a fact that every public pension fund does what is called "intergenerational transfer". Basically they initially set contributions too low or overestimate returns. Works great for those approaching retirement but someone has to pay; invariably it's the younger people who don't vote as much.


Those that are funded out of revenues with nothing tying back to what the costs are ... sure.

My first private DB pension collected more than needed which meant when I left, a large chunk could be taken as cash (after paying income tax, of course). Mine between the employer plus employee contributions was taking something under 6% while the few public pensions were taking 10%+. Then too, Mike Harris wanted to change the pension legislation to allow the US model of profiting from pensions. A company would notice that the company itself wasn't worth buying but the pension had a large surplus ... they could then buy the company for little, announce just about everyone was redundant, layoff them off which capped the future payouts and multiplied the pension surplus. The Canadian rules didn't allow the buying company to withdraw the surplus to spend as they pleased where the US rules did.

While there are examples of the contribution rates being too low, I am not so sure this is the major/only reason for shortfalls.




mordko said:


> Bringing in immigrants to pay for underfunded pensions seems like a great idea, but immigrants tend to earn less and less and fewer and fewer of them are coming on skills programs. Family unification immigrants or recent refugees don't do a heck of a lot to generate contributions.


Have you seen anything matching up the need for new workers who are contributing to CPP, income levels and what immigrants are making?
Without this sort of detail ... I am not so sure one can confident in this view.

The first reason is that I know of several people who are looking at retiring in the next several years who are in low income jobs and from their history, have been in such jobs all their lives. The loss for these jobs to CPP is going to be pretty much balanced by a working immigrant that pay into CPP.

The second is that I know several immigrants who used their low paying jobs to save up for education upgrades while investigating Canada's employment needs. They took all of eight years to move from being nannies to nurses. One could brush off the jobs they have as nurses as the job is "permanent, part time" but before volunteering for extra shifts or overtime, the income is slightly under YMPE. 

As for fewer on the skills program, the engineer and nurse I met came in late 2015 ... stepping directly into over YMPE income jobs. I was surprised to learn that "skilled" includes butchers and bakers. The 2015 numbers say 25K slots are available ... so the questions I have are how many are being filled and what were the slot numbers before the revamp was started? 

Certainly the engineer/nurse were talking to any of their relatives that qualified to apply.




mordko said:


> Bottom line - it's involuntary and tries to solve a problem that does not exist (Canadians do quite well saving for themselves) ...


Most that I talk to are saving little plus know little about the various plans they are contributing to so I am not as confident as you seem to be. Then too, having watched a lot of over-confidence in one's investing ability/knowledge lead to poor performance ... it seems that far fewer will do well with controlling the funds compared to those that won't.




mordko said:


> ... while penalizing already overtaxed population of working youngsters.


Which raises another topic ... why there are posts about how challenged the working young are when people are being imported into over YMPE jobs because positions can't be filled. But that should probably have it's own thread. :biggrin:


Cheers


*PS*

I missed commenting on the "Family unification immigrants or recent refugees don't do a heck of a lot to generate contributions" part. Overall, maybe not ... at the same time, I am aware of immigrants whose established relatives arranged for or gave them jobs in their business. It would appear the number is something above zero.

Then too, when the nanny went back to school to become a Canadian system trained nurse, her employer still needed a nanny so she recommended her sister, who was hired. From a CPP perspective - the training period meant no contributions from the original nanny but CPP didn't lose out as her sister was contributing.


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> CPP expansion - stupidity. Canadians are doing an awesome job of saving for themsevles, government should try and keep it's nose out of the system that isn't broken. We really don't need yet another tax.



is it possible that you could have that backwards, about how canadians are saving for their retirement years so awesomely ?

what we keep hearing is the opposite. We keep hearing that many aging canadians will be facing hardship & poverty in their senior years.


http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...ore-debt-young-people-aren-t-saving-1.3450941

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/glob...nadequate-savings-study-says/article28761394/

http://www.broadbentinstitute.ca/ca...gs_seniors_poverty_rates_increasing_new_study

http://povertyresearch.ca/blog/seniors-poverty-rates-on-the-rise-in-canada/

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/0...eparedness-broadbent-institute_n_9244172.html

http://homereversemortgages.ca/blog/canadians-not-saving-enough-for-retirement-study/

http://canadianlabour.ca/issues-research/did-you-know-senior-women-are-twice-likely-live-poverty-men


----------



## jargey3000

(OP here)... so...what's with the pretentious 'hand-over-the-heart' thing?...who does he think he is? ...Prince? or what?...
(love "when Doves Cry" BTW)


----------



## LBCfan

jargey3000 said:


> (OP here)... so...what's with the pretentious 'hand-over-the-heart' thing?...who does he think he is? ...Prince? or what?...
> (love "when Doves Cry" BTW)


Just another American, or Cuban, or whatever.


----------



## olivaw

*Trudeau Mania | Has the media stopped asking the hard questions?*
http://www.cbc.ca/player/play/2687397996

Probably not, according to the panelists. The Canadian media is doing a marvelous job but the public only cares about fluff. (_eye roll_)


----------



## andrewf

I watched that segment last night. I think part of the problem is that the Saudi arms sale is a loser of an issue. The government is following through with what it promised to do during the election (complete the sale), and the opposition can't argue that strongly against it since it was their deal to begin with! There are issues on which the government should rightly be grilled, but this is not among them.


----------



## mordko

humble_pie said:


> is it possible that you could have that backwards, about how canadians are saving for their retirement years so awesomely ?
> 
> what we keep hearing is the opposite. We keep hearing that many aging canadians will be facing hardship & poverty in their senior years.
> 
> 
> http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...ore-debt-young-people-aren-t-saving-1.3450941
> 
> http://www.theglobeandmail.com/glob...nadequate-savings-study-says/article28761394/
> 
> http://www.broadbentinstitute.ca/ca...gs_seniors_poverty_rates_increasing_new_study
> 
> http://povertyresearch.ca/blog/seniors-poverty-rates-on-the-rise-in-canada/
> 
> http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/0...eparedness-broadbent-institute_n_9244172.html
> 
> http://homereversemortgages.ca/blog/canadians-not-saving-enough-for-retirement-study/
> 
> http://canadianlabour.ca/issues-research/did-you-know-senior-women-are-twice-likely-live-poverty-men


I looked at the first 3 of your multiple references. All of them point to the same study. Not only do they point to the same study, but it's a "study" that comes from the Broadbent Institute, aka a socialist lobby. Sorry didn't bother looking at the rest of them, but I got the picture. 

Here, let me help you with a less biased source: The C.D. Howe Institute: "Canadians are reasonably well prepared for retirement, he concludes." https://www.cdhowe.org/pdf/commentary_428.pdf

Another one from a BMO study: Canadian seniors are the richest ever; their wealth in real terms has quadrupled (!) since 1984 - http://newsroom.bmo.com/press-relea...sts-today-s-older--tsx-bmo-201407110957072001

Meanwhile the real net income of young people has been relatively stagnant. 

And you know what? Those who are not saving enough generally have an option to work for a few more years. And then there is the OAS (~$500/month?). And TFSA. And then there is family. And then there is the safety net - Guaranteed Income Supplement (up to $1100?) Not rich, but way more than people get by on in most countries. 

The main problem in our economy in general is not low saving rates but low productivity because young people have little intensive. Taking even more money away from young people and transferring them to - for the most part - wealthy old people is so not gonna help. Plus it's the general principle that nanny state is going to do it instead of stupid incapable individuals. And the advice is freely available on the web. And perhaps more should be done to help with guidance. And some people don't earn enough, taking money by force from non-existent incomes isn't going to help.


----------



## mordko

Eclectic12 said:


> At the same time, those who are working get their lower income earning years dropped as well ... those that start at or above YMPE are the ones that have the widest disparity.
> I wonder how many starting out or in mid-career are deciding to do these types of things based on CPP?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Those that are funded out of revenues with nothing tying back to what the costs are ... sure.
> 
> My first private DB pension collected more than needed which meant when I left, a large chunk could be taken as cash (after paying income tax, of course). Mine between the employer plus employee contributions was taking something under 6% while the few public pensions were taking 10%+. Then too, Mike Harris wanted to change the pension legislation to allow the US model of profiting from pensions. A company would notice that the company itself wasn't worth buying but the pension had a large surplus ... they could then buy the company for little, announce just about everyone was redundant, layoff them off which capped the future payouts and multiplied the pension surplus. The Canadian rules didn't allow the buying company to withdraw the surplus to spend as they pleased where the US rules did.
> 
> While there are examples of the contribution rates being too low, I am not so sure this is the major/only reason for shortfalls.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Have you seen anything matching up the need for new workers who are contributing to CPP, income levels and what immigrants are making?
> Without this sort of detail ... I am not so sure one can confident in this view.
> 
> The first reason is that I know of several people who are looking at retiring in the next several years who are in low income jobs and from their history, have been in such jobs all their lives. The loss for these jobs to CPP is going to be pretty much balanced by a working immigrant that pay into CPP.
> 
> The second is that I know several immigrants who used their low paying jobs to save up for education upgrades while investigating Canada's employment needs. They took all of eight years to move from being nannies to nurses. One could brush off the jobs they have as nurses as the job is "permanent, part time" but before volunteering for extra shifts or overtime, the income is slightly under YMPE.
> 
> As for fewer on the skills program, the engineer and nurse I met came in late 2015 ... stepping directly into over YMPE income jobs. I was surprised to learn that "skilled" includes butchers and bakers. The 2015 numbers say 25K slots are available ... so the questions I have are how many are being filled and what were the slot numbers before the revamp was started?
> 
> Certainly the engineer/nurse were talking to any of their relatives that qualified to apply.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Most that I talk to are saving little plus know little about the various plans they are contributing to so I am not as confident as you seem to be. Then too, having watched a lot of over-confidence in one's investing ability/knowledge lead to poor performance ... it seems that far fewer will do well with controlling the funds compared to those that won't.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Which raises another topic ... why there are posts about how challenged the working young are when people are being imported into over YMPE jobs because positions can't be filled. But that should probably have it's own thread. :biggrin:
> 
> 
> Cheers
> 
> 
> *PS*
> 
> I missed commenting on the "Family unification immigrants or recent refugees don't do a heck of a lot to generate contributions" part. Overall, maybe not ... at the same time, I am aware of immigrants whose established relatives arranged for or gave them jobs in their business. It would appear the number is something above zero.
> 
> Then too, when the nanny went back to school to become a Canadian system trained nurse, her employer still needed a nanny so she recommended her sister, who was hired. From a CPP perspective - the training period meant no contributions from the original nanny but CPP didn't lose out as her sister was contributing.


Those are great anecdotes. I know several myself. One guy I know is from Ukraine. He works but does not earn much. Last year he brought his mother and had her operated here in Canada for free. Do not know how, but somehow he did it. This year he brought himself a young wife from Ukraine who isn't working and does not speak English. Eventually she might learn and get a low-paid job. He is a great guy and a good son but this isn't helping the taxpayer. 

Then I know an English couple, who both work and had their elderly parent living with them. He was kicked out of the country once he got cancer because he wasn't a citizen. Not sure how the logic works here. 

Then we have a very large number of immigrant taxi drivers... Hard workers, crazy hours, but hardly an economic boost to the country. 

Anyway, that's anecdotes... The numbers are here: http://news.nationalpost.com/news/w...e-than-305000-new-permanent-residents-in-2016

Recently annual immigration has been about 1% of the population per year. Most were economic immigrants (170K in 2016). The rest were refugees or family reunification (~100K in 2016). Well, the new government plans to turn this around by rapidly increasing the number of refugees/family reunification and cutting down on skilled worker immigration. 

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/w...e-than-305000-new-permanent-residents-in-2016

And even among skilled English-speaking economic immigrants, unemployment rates are much higher and earnings are much lower than among Canadians. 

Now... Immigration is helping the economy in some respects and the skilled worker program has been well refocused to bring truck drivers instead of exotic dancers, but overall I wouldn't count on them for your huge state-funded pension going forward.


----------



## olivaw

mordko said:


> Here, let me help you with a less biased source: The C.D. Howe Institute: "Canadians are reasonably well prepared for retirement, he concludes." https://www.cdhowe.org/pdf/commentary_428.pdf


C.D. How Institute is a conservative think tank. It's about as biased as the Broadbent Institute. Let me help _you_ with a less biased source: *Canada’s looming pension wars: Boomers are only now starting to take stock of retirement and many don’t like what they see*


> Thanks to the decline of manufacturing jobs, the percentage of private sector workers enrolled in defined benefit pensions dropped from 35 per cent in 1970 to 12 per cent by 2010.


This thread is about Prime Minister Trudeau. Yesterday, he said: *Canada 'does not and will not pay ransom to terrorists'*'.


----------



## mordko

olivaw said:


> C.D. How Institute is a conservative think tank. It's about as biased as the Broadbent Institute. Let me help _you_ with a less biased source: *Canada’s looming pension wars: Boomers are only now starting to take stock of retirement and many don’t like what they see*
> 
> 
> This thread is about Prime Minister Trudeau. Yesterday, he said: *Canada 'does not and will not pay ransom to terrorists'*'.


False. C.D. Howe Institute is NOT a "conservative think tank". Where did you get that idea from? 

Here: "The Institute's research has been cited by Liberal,[9] New Democrat[10] and Conservative[11] members of parliament. The media has described the Institute as a leading,[12] liberal,[13] conservative,[14][15][16] non-partisan,[17][18][19][20] credible[21] and respected[22][23][24] think tank. It has a history of publishing research on both sides of the ideological spectrum, provided it is supported with empirical evidence.[25] It has been described as having a "deep intellectual grounding to its public-policy approach." Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._D._Howe_Institute

Your quote about percantage of defined benefit pensions is certainly true, but does not support the point you are trying to make.


----------



## humble_pie

mordko said:


> False. C.D. Howe Institute is NOT a "conservative think tank". Where did you get that idea from?
> 
> Here: "The Institute's research has been cited by Liberal,[9] New Democrat[10] and Conservative[11] members of parliament. The media has described the Institute as a leading,[12] liberal,[13] conservative,[14][15][16] non-partisan,[17][18][19][20] credible[21] and respected[22][23][24] think tank. It has a history of publishing research on both sides of the ideological spectrum, provided it is supported with empirical evidence.[25] It has been described as having a "deep intellectual grounding to its public-policy approach." Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._D._Howe_Institute




the above-linked wikipedia article describing the venerable CD Howe is adorned with the following warning:

_*"This article contains content that is written like an advertisement. Please help improve it by removing promotional content and inappropriate external links, and by adding encyclopedic content written from a neutral point of view."*_

specifically, the paragraph that mordko quotes reads like a piece of propaganda that was drafted explicitly to counter numerous descriptions of the CD Howe as a "right-wing think tank." In all the major media, over many years.


----------



## Eclectic12

mordko said:


> ... And even among skilled English-speaking economic immigrants, unemployment rates are much higher and earnings are much lower than among Canadians.


Is there another link or sub-link I missed?

I seem numbers for categories of immigrants by year but nothing for unemployement or income.


I find this an interesting situation as over the last sixteen years, all six DBAs hired by my current employer are Canadian citizens. Where one breaks it down into first generation immigrant versus born to Canadian parents, immigrants is five and Canadian born is one.

When getting trained for new hardware, the DBA doing the training is also a first generation immigrant. At break, the DBAs were chatting about the DBA consulting firm they had learned a lot from but burned them out ... it was pretty clear that the consulting company is bringing in immigrant DBAs as fast as they can.

There seems to be a sizeable amount who are coming into Canada and shortly making enough to be at the max CPP contribution.




mordko said:


> ...Now... Immigration is helping the economy in some respects and the skilled worker program has been well refocused to bring truck drivers instead of exotic dancers, but overall I wouldn't count on them for your huge state-funded pension going forward.


If the jobs are there and aren't being filled by Canadians ... immigrants will be brought in. That has been a long standing tradition where I don't expect it will change.

The question is whether the investments are supporting the liabilities and if jobs are disappearing.


Cheers


----------



## sags

One of the biggest problems in the world is that of aging populations.

Germany, Greece, Italy..........all need young refugees to augment their future workforces.

In Canada, it isn't quite as bad yet, but over the next few decades people will be leaving the workforce faster than they can be replaced.

In a few years the baby boomer generation retirement will peak and 25% of the population will be seniors. The cost of OAS/GIS and healthcare will increase dramatically.

The government would be wise to encourage young refugees and immigrants to come to Canada, even if they are still in their education and learning years.

There is little long term benefit for Canada to bring in older immigrants and refugees who may provide a short term gain for employers but will be a long term cost to the government.

Perhaps that has something to do with the alleged government focus shift from older skilled workers to younger people who will become skilled workers in the future.

A lot of countries are in the same situation and will be forced to seek greater numbers of young immigrants/refugees or their economies will decline as their social costs rise.

If Canadians don't want to allow greater immigration,............they best start having more babies.


----------



## mordko

humble_pie said:


> the above-linked wikipedia article describing the venerable CD Howe is adorned with the following warning:
> 
> _*"This article contains content that is written like an advertisement. Please help improve it by removing promotional content and inappropriate external links, and by adding encyclopedic content written from a neutral point of view."*_
> 
> specifically, the paragraph that mordko quotes reads like a piece of propaganda that was drafted explicitly to counter numerous descriptions of the CD Howe as a "right-wing think tank." In all the major media, over many years.


In the same quote are references supporting that the institute has been quoted by the left and right and that its studies support the left and the right. You on the other hand have not produced anything at all to support your claim.


----------



## humble_pie

my "claim" is the quoted wikipedia warning - from mordko himself - which says that the entire CD Howe piece was "written like an advertisement." Readers are asked to "help improve it by removing promotional content and inappropriate external links."

shoot oneself in the foot, _*not*_


----------



## mordko

sags said:


> One of the biggest problems in the world is that of aging populations.
> 
> Germany, Greece, Italy..........all need young refugees to augment their future workforces.
> 
> In Canada, it isn't quite as bad yet, but over the next few decades people will be leaving the workforce faster than they can be replaced.
> 
> In a few years the baby boomer generation retirement will peak and 25% of the population will be seniors. The cost of OAS/GIS and healthcare will increase dramatically.
> 
> The government would be wise to encourage young refugees and immigrants to come to Canada, even if they are still in their education and learning years.
> 
> There is little long term benefit for Canada to bring in older immigrants and refugees who may provide a short term gain for employers but will be a long term cost to the government.
> 
> Perhaps that has something to do with the alleged government focus shift from older skilled workers to younger people who will become skilled workers in the future.
> 
> A lot of countries are in the same situation and will be forced to seek greater numbers of young immigrants/refugees or their economies will decline as their social costs rise.
> 
> If Canadians don't want to allow greater immigration,............they best start having more babies.


Here is a link: http://www.sfu.ca/~pendakur/Fiscal Effects of Immigration_V5.pdf. On average immigrants get more from the taxpayer than give back. This is a 2013 study but I have seen indications that the trend has been worsening. 

Actually, under this government the shift has been from economic migrants to refugees; on a very large scale. Refugees often don't speak English and take a lot longer before they are established - if at all. 

Here is today's example of a potential "refugee": https://vk.com/topic-19200573_26539636?post=25747. He is a Russian Muslim, living in Turkey. In the thread he is seeking advice on the process for requesting asylum in Canada. It's easy - turn up in the airport or at the border, request asylum and a "free" lawyer. Most applicants are granted asylum within 60 days. This particular candidate sells watches and Turkish residencies, supports the Caliphate and Hizb-ul-Tahrir, a fundamentalist islamist group. Doubt any of this is beneficial for the Canadian tax-payer.


----------



## mordko

humble_pie said:


> my "claim" is the quoted wikipedia warning - from mordko himself - which says that the entire CD Howe piece was "written like an advertisement." Readers are asked to "help improve it by removing promotional content and inappropriate external links."
> 
> shoot oneself in the foot, _*not*_


No, your claim is that CD Howe is a "right wing think tank". You have provided exactly zero evidence while the reference to the contrary is linked in the Wiki. And if you don't like Wiki, you are welcome to read primary sources. Here NDP is relying on the "right wing" research: http://www.parl.gc.ca/HousePublicat...Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=41&Ses=2&DocId=7861036. Is the source good enough for you?


----------



## humble_pie

my claim? why would you pronounce on what my claim is or is not :biggrin:

whatever happened to the rule of debate that goes Do Not Put Words in Adversary's Mouth


----------



## mordko

humble_pie said:


> my claim? why would you pronounce on what my claim is or is not :biggrin:
> 
> whatever happened to the rule of debate that goes Do Not Put Words in Adversary's Mouth


Let me quote Humble pie: "piece of propaganda that was drafted explicitly to counter numerous descriptions of the CD Howe as a "right-wing think tank." I have not seen these "numerous descriptions". I have only seen your claim.


----------



## humble_pie

.

alas, today is not mordko's media day! the National Post headline he complains about here is a gross misrepresentation of what is being put forth in the article itself.




mordko said:


> The numbers are here: http://news.nationalpost.com/news/w...e-than-305000-new-permanent-residents-in-2016
> 
> Recently annual immigration has been about 1% of the population per year. Most were economic immigrants (170K in 2016). The rest were refugees or family reunification (~100K in 2016). Well, the new government plans to turn this around by rapidly increasing the number of refugees/family reunification and cutting down on skilled worker immigration.
> 
> http://news.nationalpost.com/news/w...e-than-305000-new-permanent-residents-in-2016



the natPost headline goes:

*" Liberals plan for huge influx of refugees, immigrant spouses at expense of skilled foreign workers"*

but the article itself says that family immigration will temporarily increase by 20,000 due to the syrian influx this year, while skilled worker admissions will return to historical norms after this year.

contradictions between newspaper headlines & article content are frequent media errors. Headlines are written by a separate editorial team, never by the journos who research & write the articles. Often the headlines don't fit the articles. Sometimes headlines flat out contract their articles. This is a source of frequent complaints by scribes who find that their articles get badly twisted in the headlines.

the above headline is one of those twistings. it's what one would expect, now & then, from a newspaper that is a conservative party mouthpiece & a liberal party gadfly.


----------



## mordko

Article: "McCallum would not say whether that means the number of refugees admitted into Canada will return to previous levels starting next year."

Humble Pie: "the article itself says that family immigration will temporarily increase by 20,000 due to the syrian influx this year, while skilled worker admissions will return to historical norms after this year."

Yep. Twisting indeed.


----------



## Eclectic12

sags said:


> ... In Canada, it isn't quite as bad yet, but over the next few decades people will be leaving the workforce faster than they can be replaced.


The question is who is Canada competing with and how are their demographics going?




sags said:


> ... The government would be wise to encourage young refugees and immigrants to come to Canada, even if they are still in their education and learning years.
> There is little long term benefit for Canada to bring in older immigrants and refugees who may provide a short term gain for employers but will be a long term cost to the government.


Barring the recent refugees, is this a problem though?

According to Stats Canada, for 2011 looking at the working ages - 58+% were aged 24 to 54, with only 4.4% from 55 to 64.

When the time frame is expanded to what looks like a five year span(i.e. 2006 to 2011), those up to age 24 account for 33.7% of the total numbers while over age 64 is 3.3%.
http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/as-sa/99-010-x/99-010-x2011001-eng.cfm




sags said:


> ... Perhaps that has something to do with the alleged government focus shift from older skilled workers to younger people who will become skilled workers in the future.


Or more likely, those who are younger have more energy/willingness to take risks ... similar to how reluctant older workers are to switch companies or careers until there is no choice.




sags said:


> ... A lot of countries are in the same situation and will be forced to seek greater numbers of young immigrants/refugees or their economies will decline as their social costs rise.


Having overheard many discussions where the younger relatives have been asking what Canada is looking for, how to apply and what advice those who are already working in Canada have (and potentially have received Canadian citizenship), there does not seem to be a shortage of those looking to work here.


Cheers


----------



## andrewf

I think CD Howe has some balanced views and less of an agenda. Unlike, say, the Fraser Institute or Centre for Canadian Policy Alternatives (right and left wing agendas respectively). Fraser Institute is particularly bad for starting with the conclusion and working backwards.


----------



## sags

Eclectic12 said:


> The question is who is Canada competing with and how are their demographics going?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Barring the recent refugees, is this a problem though?
> 
> According to Stats Canada, for 2011 looking at the working ages - 58+% were aged 24 to 54, with only 4.4% from 55 to 64.
> 
> When the time frame is expanded to what looks like a five year span(i.e. 2006 to 2011), those up to age 24 account for 33.7% of the total numbers while over age 64 is 3.3%.
> http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/as-sa/99-010-x/99-010-x2011001-eng.cfm
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Or more likely, those who are younger have more energy/willingness to take risks ... similar to how reluctant older workers are to switch companies or careers until there is no choice.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Having overheard many discussions where the younger relatives have been asking what Canada is looking for, how to apply and what advice those who are already working in Canada have (and potentially have received Canadian citizenship), there does not seem to be a shortage of those looking to work here.
> 
> 
> Cheers


Here is link to some of the charts and statistics from a Globe and Mail series of articles last year.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-investor/retirement/who-are-the-baby-boomers/article27124275/

Another link to a series of articles on the affects of the Boomer Shift.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/topic/The-boomer-shift


----------



## olivaw

CD Howe is not as ridiculous as the Fraser Institute but it is a right wing think tank.

It has been well established by Sags in this thread, that Canada's aging demographics are such that OAS and GIS are at risk of becoming unsustainable. Our challenge is to take steps to prevent a demographic crisis. Here are some ideas. 
1) Have more babies. Not going to happen. 
2) Run perpetual deficits like Japan. Bad idea. 
3) Allow more immigration: The United States Government is more immigration friendly than Canada, which is why their population is not aging as fast as ours. We need to be more like Americans in this regard. 
4) Encourage young people to save more for retirement. RRSPs and TFSAs have not worked as well as hoped. Private DB pensions are fading away. An option is to increase CPP (i.e. make people pay themselves first). It's a good idea. 

The Liberals, the NDP, the Greens and the Bloc believe options 3 and 4 are the right thing to do for Canada. The Conservatives don't. 

Everybody is right except the Conservatives. They are wrong.


----------



## sags

Germany's population is declining and it's work age populace is projected to decline by 30%. They need millions of refugees and immigrants to maintain their economy.

http://www.spiegel.de/international...rtunity-for-the-german-economy-a-1050102.html

Japan is an example of what happens to a country unprepared for demographic change.

Larry Berman just gave a talk and article on central banks and the ZIRP..........NIRP response to demographic change.

http://www.bnn.ca/News/2016/4/25/Central-banks-Are-they-stealing-your-safe-retirement-income.aspx


----------



## sags

What Canada needs for the future is young families and that is exactly what the Liberals have vetted and brought to Canada.


----------



## mordko

olivaw said:


> CD Howe is not as ridiculous as the Fraser Institute but it is a right wing think tank.
> 
> It has been well established by Sags in this thread, that Canada's aging demographics are such that OAS and GIS are at risk of becoming unsustainable. Our challenge is to take steps to prevent a demographic crisis. Here are some ideas.
> 1) Have more babies. Not going to happen.
> 2) Run perpetual deficits like Japan. Bad idea.
> 3) Allow more immigration: The United States Government is more immigration friendly than Canada, which is why their population is not aging as fast as ours. We need to be more like Americans in this regard.
> 4) Encourage young people to save more for retirement. RRSPs and TFSAs have not worked as well as hoped. Private DB pensions are fading away. An option is to increase CPP (i.e. make people pay themselves first). It's a good idea.
> 
> The Liberals, the NDP, the Greens and the Bloc believe options 3 and 4 are the right thing to do for Canada. The Conservatives don't.
> 
> Everybody is right except the Conservatives. They are wrong.


CD Howe conservative - just no. Never heard of Wikia but their own references do not support the claim (they refer to Wikipedia and CD Howe, neither of which claim conservative affiliation). NDP, Liberals et al regularly use CD Howe as a source. I am thinking NDP isn't going to reference a conservative think tank. 

3. Canada is by far more immigration friendly than the US. US has much higher birth rate. 
4. RRSPs and TFSA are working very well, as are company pensions. Ultimately it's individual's responsibility. Relying on nanny-state forcing people by even more redistribution/taxation is dumb. Will hurt the economy right away. 

The Conservatives support immigration and did an excellent job at both increasing and refocusing economic immigrant programs from bringing in exotic dancers and overeducuted taxi drivers to the people our economy actually needs. They also made it cheaper to come to Canada. They do not support escalation of the asylum programs to the same extent as the Libs and NDP.


----------



## olivaw

CD Howe conservative - just yes. 

3) Harper's Conservatives imposed a number of burdens on immigrants that made Canada far less immigrant friendly. On the bright side, exotic dancers no longer enjoy foreign worker eligibility. 

4) RRSPs and TFSAs are underutilized. The number of Canadians enjoying a defined benefit pension plan has decreased substantially. Many companies with DB Pensions have placed younger workers in a DC plan instead. OAS and GIC may be unsustainable as our population ages. We need solutions, not pithy comments.


----------



## mordko

olivaw said:


> CD Howe conservative - just yes.
> 
> 3) Harper's Conservatives imposed a number of burdens on immigrants that made Canada far less immigrant friendly. On the bright side, exotic dancers no longer enjoy foreign worker eligibility.
> 
> 4) RRSPs and TFSAs are underutilized. The number of Canadians enjoying a defined benefit pension plan has decreased substantially. Many companies with DB Pensions have placed younger workers in a DC plan instead. OAS and GIC may be unsustainable as our population ages. We need solutions, not pithy comments.


There is no law that says it's bad if RRSP and TFSA are Underutilized. It's dumb when one is habing a baby, buying a car or a house or is simply starting his career and would need to borrow to invest. There could be a hoast of other reasons when maxing isn't a good idea, particularly for the young. Of course when the government starts taxing you there won't be any flexibility. 

If you are incapable of finding your own solutions, please get a nanny for yourself, don't shove it up everyone's throat.

And skilled worker immigration has increased under Harper.


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## kcowan

mordko said:


> 4. RRSPs and TFSA are working very well, as are company pensions. Ultimately it's individual's responsibility. Relying on nanny-state forcing people by even more redistribution/taxation is dumb. Will hurt the economy right away. .


Where does this stuff come from? Is there an alternative universe that I am not aware of. If those 3 things were working well, there would be no concerns. Yet there are concerns. How can a rational conversation take place with such positions being proclaimed?:stupid:


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## fraser

Canadians should be embarrassed by Harper's Temporary Foreign Worker Program.

In our neck of the woods it gave some very well known employers a chance to bring people in (and lay off locals), pay them less than the minimum wage, overcharge them for room and board, work them long hours with no overtime pay, and threaten to send them home if they dared to speak out or complain to the authorities. 

Yes, the hospitality and lodging industry loved it-most especially some of the best known names in fast food and coffee.


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## humble_pie

kcowan said:


> Where does this stuff come from? Is there an alternative universe that I am not aware of. If those 3 things were working well, there would be no concerns. Yet there are concerns. How can a rational conversation take place with such positions being proclaimed?:stupid:



you'll remember pension expert & popular pension author moneyGal in this forum. She was sitting on a provincial committee to study what can be done about the growing number of canadian seniors who have no savings for their old age.

so far, this country hasn't started talking about shipping such poor seniors off on ice floes. But people who rant about the nanny state are getting close.

i'm kind of in favour of increased CPP contributions, especially since the CPPIB is able to return a profit that bests both indexes & of course most mutual funds.


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## fraser

One of the challenges with the studies is that they are backward looking and we are in a state of change.

We have been, and are, moving into a new economy. Fewer middle income jobs. More contract work, lower rates of job tenure, increasing trends toward contracting, and decreasing er sponsored pension plans bring in to question the notion that we can accurately apply stats from the past ten years to f'cast ten or twenty years forward. One of my biggest concerns is the growth in consumer debt and the growth of the home affordability gap in most of our large cities.


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## Rusty O'Toole

Why do we need more population? Were we really that much worse off 50 years ago when our population was half what it is now? Farming doesn't require the number of laborers it used to and neither does manufacturing. Seems to me we could get along fine without a lot of the people we have now. Just getting rid of the crooks, criminals and parasites would be a great thing.

We could see our population go down quite a bit, and be better off than we are now. Anyone who thinks we have to have a growing population, and growing debt to have a thriving economy is 100 years behind the times.


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## mordko

kcowan said:


> Where does this stuff come from? Is there an alternative universe that I am not aware of. If those 3 things were working well, there would be no concerns. Yet there are concerns. How can a rational conversation take place with such positions being proclaimed?:stupid:


There are always concerns. Who wouldn't want more money, particularly if it's other peoples money? Then again, pensioners now are 4 times richer than a couple of decades ago and eventually governments run out of other peoples money.


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## Eclectic12

mordko said:


> There is no law that says it's bad if RRSP and TFSA are Underutilized.


Law?

No ... but with something like six out of ten working people with *no* company pension at all, debts at sky high levels and something like 40% of retirees reporting going back to work to service one or more debts - low RRSP and TFSA utilisation does not bode well.

I also seem to recall that the average boomer looking to retire estimated they needed $658K saved to feel their retirement was secure, on average they've saved $228K (I'll have to see if I can find it again).

Part of the puzzle is how accurate the $658K is as the 2009 Stat Can numbers put the average senior couple spending a bit over $54K. Generating that kind of income is estimated as needing more like $1.35 million. 



> ... There could be a hoast of other reasons when maxing isn't a good idea, particularly for the young.


Question is which ones have a plan and which are being silly?

Examples of being silly include but are not limited to:
- retirement is decades away - I'd rather have a kick *** stereo now than save anything.
- I read an article that some folks have put too much into their RRSP so I will liquidate mine to avoid paying extra taxes in the future.
- Interest rates on TFSAs are crap so I am skipping it where I am not interested in hearing again that TFSAs can hold more than GICs/savings.
- employer matching to 3% of salary with a 2% MER means only a 1% gain so I'll skip it (matching really meant the contribution was doubled, with the 2% taking from the double).
- RRSPs will be cancelled by the gov't in a few years so I am skipping them (been hearing that one since the early '80s).

I have no proof but I suspect my co-worker who was shocked to find out her DB pension would at best be 60% of current salary might have made different choices for the years she was thinking she'd collect 100%.


Cheers


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## none

I admit, when I found out that my pension was going to be a measly $2400 a month I really felt like I needed to plow some savings in. What about the 'golden government pensions' I had heard so much about???

Anyway, I figure my pension will over my rent - I need to make and save for play money (read: booze & hookers).

I signed up for a Budgeting 101: Learn How to Budget Your Money course next week through our union. I'm interested to see what they have to say about all of this.


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## fraser

The discussion about increasing CPP amounts and about pensions is NOT about people who are currently retired or indeed about people who are within 10 years of retirement. A larger CPP will not really help these people.

The discussion is more about people in their 20's and 30's etc who have years of work and years of pension contribution years ahead of them. Looking at boomers-retired and about to retire will lead to some very false assumptions about what retirement income may be 20, 30 years from now. 

I started to get concerned when I first saw a very low number as a pension estimate years ago. Fortunately our plan was enhanced, the numbers grew, and I was grandfathered in a DB plan. The DB plan, plus CPP, and OAS will not meet my retirement lifestyle requirements. Fortunately my savings will bridge that gap comfortably.


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## steve41

none said:


> I need to make and save for play money (read: booze & hookers).


 OK, we definitely need a "Booze and Hookers" sub topic. Moderators take note.


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## andrewf

Rusty O'Toole said:


> Why do we need more population? Were we really that much worse off 50 years ago when our population was half what it is now? Farming doesn't require the number of laborers it used to and neither does manufacturing. Seems to me we could get along fine without a lot of the people we have now. Just getting rid of the crooks, criminals and parasites would be a great thing.
> 
> We could see our population go down quite a bit, and be better off than we are now. Anyone who thinks we have to have a growing population, and growing debt to have a thriving economy is 100 years behind the times.


Economies of scale?


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## mordko

Eclectic12 said:


> Law?
> 
> No ... but with something like six out of ten working people with *no* company pension at all, debts at sky high levels and something like 40% of retirees reporting going back to work to service one or more debts - low RRSP and TFSA utilisation does not bode well.


Again you are making an assumption that going back to work is somehow bad. Sure it's not what many of them would do if they didn't have to, but then most people wouldn't work at all if they didn't have to. As people life spans approach 100 years, starting to work at 25 and finishing at 55 might mean we may not be able to travel that much when we retire. Yet I am reading here that people want to start retiring in their 40s. Something gotta give. And if pensioners are having amazing state-funded pensions while 100% of kids are having the superlong heavily subsidized education then the poor 25 to 55 year olds will be paying through the nose. Eventually one runs out of other peoples' money. 



Eclectic12 said:


> Question is which ones have a plan and which are being silly?


Good question, but adults should be permitted to be silly and make mistakes. Oftentimes they do, but most of the time they don't - assuming they know that they have to be responsible for themselves. 



Eclectic12 said:


> I have no proof but I suspect my co-worker who was shocked to find out her DB pension would at best be 60% of current salary might have made different choices for the years she was thinking she'd collect 100%.


DB pension that is 60% of current salary means she has plenty to retire on. This amount is already topped up by government benefits + retirees have no mortgage, kids to pay for or expenses relating to travelling to work. She wanted to be really really rich when she retires? Great! She should have done the calculations beforehand and saved. No government will ever be able to take care of this particular problem.


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## fraser

A DB payout of sixty percent is wonderful. Many only pay 1 percent per year of service.

My former employer, prior to my retirement, was searching for previous employees who still had an interest in the DB plan. They wanted to get them off the books by transferring commuted balances to registered plan. Well over have the employees in the plan were former employees with 5 years or less in the plan. My guess, based on the stats of active, retired, and total plan members was that less than a third of the ees ever made it to retirement age with a pension. And I have no doubt that the ratio is even lower now.

The stats on the number of people enrolled in a DB plan is deceiving. The real question should be how many will retire from that DB plan with a reasonable pension.


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## kcowan

Eclectic12 said:


> I have no proof but I suspect my co-worker who was shocked to find out her DB pension would at best be 60% of current salary might have made different choices for the years she was thinking she'd collect 100%.


I don't think any government program can fix stupidity!


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## Eclectic12

mordko said:


> Again you are making an assumption that going back to work is somehow bad. Sure it's not what many of them would do if they didn't have to, but then most people wouldn't work at all if they didn't have to.


Is planning to be off and having to go back to work a good thing for a 65+ person?
If you planned to spend four months touring Europe and at the third month had to take an unplanned for job to get home, is that a good thing?


It seems to me that where one planned to not work then have to - the right amount to retire wasn't saved.




mordko said:


> ... As people life spans approach 100 years, starting to work at 25 and finishing at 55 might mean we may not be able to travel that much when we retire. Yet I am reading here that people want to start retiring in their 40s. Something gotta give.


I don't think many, if any, who report having to go back to work at age 66+ were retiring in their 40s.

BTW ... I personally don't see a huge challenge to traveling in retirement. Between relatives to stay with and trips that are 80+% a charitable donation ... health issues seem more of an issue.




mordko said:


> ... And if pensioners are having amazing state-funded pensions ...


Did we leave the topic of CPP?
Last I checked, almost no one qualified for the top benefit of under $14K a year.





mordko said:


> ... DB pension that is 60% of current salary means she has plenty to retire on.


Her retirement plan assumes an income that is 40% higher than it will be. Other areas like CPP will help but likely won't make up the difference. That's a rather major mistake that may affect what she can do. Certainly she didn't look like she had all that many years left to make adjustments.




mordko said:


> ... This amount is already topped up by government benefits + retirees have no mortgage, kids to pay for or expenses relating to travelling to work.


Actually a good chunk of those going back to work after age 65 had a mortgage. No kids may also be an assumption as one of my classmates lamented that he felt he missed out as by the time he was eighteen, his father was sixty eight.




mordko said:


> ... She wanted to be really really rich when she retires? Great! She should have done the calculations beforehand and saved. No government will ever be able to take care of this particular problem.


But saying everyone is saving what they need to does about the lack of retirement planning?

How does one save properly for retirement when one clearly does not know some rather basic factors?


Cheers


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## Mukhang pera

Eclectic12 said:


> No kids may also be an assumption as one of my classmates lamented that he felt he missed out as by the time he was eighteen, his father was sixty eight.


On what did he miss out?


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## Eclectic12

fraser said:


> A DB payout of sixty percent is wonderful. Many only pay 1 percent per year of service.


This one was 1.68% per year of service ... the point is that *at maximum*, assuming the required number of years of service were met - the payout was 60%. It was all clearly laid out, many pension Q&A etc. so there should have been no reason for her to think there was any possibility of 100%.

The claim is that Canadian are saving adequately yet more often than not, the people I am talking to have major misconceptions, lack of basic knowledge, take the "I can worry about it later" approach and/or avoid learning.

I don't see how the planning/saving can be all that good based on bad info.




fraser said:


> ... My guess, based on the stats of active, retired, and total plan members was that less than a third of the ees ever made it to retirement age with a pension ... The stats on the number of people enrolled in a DB plan is deceiving. The real question should be how many will retire from that DB plan with a reasonable pension.


Yes ... and one I don't think surveying the people themselves will answer.

As another example, I might be repeating here from another thread so my apologies if so - two co-workers loathed the loss of RRSP contribution room from the PA of their DB pension. They felt they could do so much better by having no DB pension and more RRSP contribution room. The discussions of who pays what as well as risks went nowhere. What made the difference was when one ran the numbers ... by his projection, the DB pension would pay out for a minimum of ten years where the added RRSP contribution room would last six point five years, with an optimistic growth. I think his more realistic number meant running out of money in five point two years.

Both were bright guys with good heads for numbers so I question how trustworthy the idea that "people are saving appropriately for retirement" can be when they can be all over the map just looking at a few parts of the retirement picture.




kcowan said:


> I don't think any government program can fix stupidity!


She was handling far more complicated info/numbers so IMO, it was not that she couldn't understand (i.e. stupidity). 
OTOH, regardless of what the cause is ... CPP is going to add to whatever she earned in the DB pension, over the years she participated (max of 60%).


Consider also that the presentation was to compare staying in the DB pension versus transferring to new DC pension. If people weren't already familiar with all the concepts/jargon, would they have noticed that to compare contribution differences?

The comparison was ..
DB was employer + employee to total a bit under 6%, for thirty years means an annual payout of $x
DC was employer + employee to total 2% *with* personal RRSP contributions of 4% to end up with retirement income of pretty much $x.


I am doubting that many noticed that the DB pension employee contribution was just under 3% where in the DC pension, employee contribution was 5%.


Cheers


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## Eclectic12

Mukhang pera said:


> On what did he miss out?


His friends were doing physical activities (hiking, canoeing, sports) that his father was no longer able to do.


Cheers


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## Mukhang pera

Eclectic12 said:


> His friends were doing physical activities (hiking, canoeing, sports) that his father was no longer able to do.
> 
> 
> Cheers


I take it he was saying that his friends were engaging in such physical activities with their fathers, but his father was not up to it. Well, that is a bit sad. I raised the question, because the age difference between my father and I was similar, yet I never felt that I missed a thing. Au contraire. My dad made it to almost 100 and he was in good shape until the last few months of his life, although he did voluntarily stop driving somewhere around 90 or so.

My dad loved fishing and hunting and, in general, just being outdoors, the more remote the better. From the time I was little until the time I got married, we used to spend weekends - plus some more extended periods when there was no school - out on the lakes and rivers and in the woods. Our fishing and hunting trips almost always involved camping, hiking, trailering boats, portaging canoes, you name it. He always had the energy of a magnum shell. We would fish or hunt whatever was in season, year round. We'd don snowshoes to hunt snowshoe hares and jackrabbits. Even when I was well into my teens and quite active and fit, I had a hard time keeping up with him. Twice, when he was in his 60s, we went goose hunting on James Bay. That would see him driving us from Toronto to Cochrane, ONR train to Moosonee, freighter canoe to just south of Fort Albany and set up camp for a week. Lots of gear to transport in less than ideal conditions. Freezing temps most of the time, so the tent would be frozen solid at the end of the trip - no poles needed to hold it up. It was, overall, a tough slog, but he never complained and certainly pulled his weight, and more. Perhaps his one indulgence on some of those trips was allowing me to be his driver. He taught me to drive starting at about age 10. By the time I was 12, once we cleared the city limits on those early morning trips to the wilds, he'd pull over and tell me to drive. Thanks to him, by age 13, I could back a good size trailer down a launching ramp with the best of 'em.

When my dad got into his 70s, he gave up some of the tougher hunts. His last moose hunt was probably around age 70. He did more upland game hunting then. He could still set out from TO at 4 a.m., drive to some backwoods locale, arriving before sunrise, and walk all day through the woods - still-hunting - carrying a pack and a 9-pound shotgun. He would return to the car at dark, clean any game, and drive home. The next day, I would wake up stiff and sore, but he seemed unaffected, just like it was what he did every day.

I have no way of knowing how things would have unfolded had my dad been younger in my early years. But I certainly feel that I missed nothing. Now, getting into my 60s myself, probably the best memories I have are of those hours spent outdoors with my dad. I have a treasure trove of them. I am sure it's because of him, and what he taught me, that I now live off-the-grid in the natural place that I do. There is something of him in everything I do. Thanks dad.


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## Eclectic12

Mukhang pera said:


> I take it he was saying that his friends were engaging in such physical activities with their fathers, but his father was not up to it. Well, that is a bit sad.


Correct ... and he thought so.




Mukhang pera said:


> ... I raised the question, because the age difference between my father and I was similar, yet I never felt that I missed a thing. Au contraire. My dad made it to almost 100 and he was in good shape until the last few months of his life, although he did voluntarily stop driving somewhere around 90 or so.


That is where there is a lot of variation ... I know some who put much younger folks to shame for activity


Cheers


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## GoldStone




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