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Politics : Canadian Political Free-for-All -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: SofaSpud who wrote (591)	12/6/2000 7:52:27 PM
From: Stephen O	Respond to of 37056

Why can't we just lock up the pedophiles? Just recently a pedophile Catholic priest convicted in Canada has turned up in France and has been doing his evil ways on the children of a town in Normandy. If it's only 3% of the population and probably only 1/2 get caught anyway, it won't be too many, and really wouldn't they like to be in prison anyway enjoying the homosexual life therein.

To: SofaSpud who wrote (591)	12/6/2000 10:33:02 PM
From: PMS Witch	Respond to of 37056

Dumbing down education --- another thought... Today, in Canada, we have the situation where we have a surplus of people who have both the means and the time to devote to obtaining further education. At the same time, we have not expanded our ability to accommodate this large number of people. So how do we deal with the bottle-neck? In the earlier times, the limited financial resources available to students had the effect of self-selecting the few and denying opportunity to the many. Today, since we must limit numbers in some other manner, academic ability and achievement seems a reasonable filter to select those who will receive the benefits of society's investment in their scholarly preparation. Thus, we have a situation where instead of dumbing down, we should be smartening up. In fact, some older university faculty will admit, if you're lucky enough to catch them in an unguarded moment of honesty, that today's students must invest much greater effort in their studies than was required of them when they were doing their undergraduate work. Unfortunately, at the public and secondary levels, much time and resources are wasted. I sincerely question the need for a degree in performing much of the duties expected of many graduates as they enter their chosen fields. We cannot waste precious time and talent and have Canadian young people falling further behind world standards as our schools continue to offer academic credits in questionable studies such as belly-button lint sculpturing and picket-fence and stick music, while at the same time, neglect basics such as mathematics, language skills, logical thinking, and ethical behaviour: Skills earlier generations acquired in abundance with far less exposure to classrooms. Cheers, PW. P.S. I had the opportunity to observe the inside of a high-school a couple of weeks ago and it's been a few decades since my last visit. I was shocked. Schools, as I remember them, were orderly and clean. Everything had its place and everything was in its place. The atmosphere was somewhat sterile or institutional. If I didn't know it was a school I was visiting recently I would've guessed I had wandered into the primate section of an underfunded zoo. That anything at all is learned in such an environment is a testament to the remarkable abilities and resilience of young people today. P.P.S. I agree that it is sad that so many people who are capable of profound thought choose not to exercise their abilities.

To: SofaSpud who wrote (591)	12/8/2000 4:36:28 PM
From: SofaSpud	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 37056

Steve's always been the voice of reason: Separation, Alberta-style It is time to seek a new relationship with Canada Stephen Harper National Post The latest dribblings from the mouth of Canada's Prime Minister suggest Alberta's wealth can be attributed to the federal government. While there is clearly no merit to the claim, we must not ignore the implied threat: If Ottawa giveth, then Ottawa can taketh away. This is just one more reason why Westerners, but Albertans in particular, need to think hard about their future in this country. After sober reflection, Albertans should decide that it is time to seek a new relationship with Canada. Obviously, I come to this conclusion after long watching the Reform movement and witnessing its most recent rejection by the very electorate that, in creating the Canadian Alliance, it had twisted itself into a pretzel to please. I use the term "rejection" rather than "failure" to describe the Canadian Alliance's fate. Many will want to attribute the Alliance's poor showing in Eastern Canada to a badly run campaign. They are not without evidence. The CA did indeed run a weak campaign by any measure. It lacked any clear strategy, policy focus, or co-ordinated rebuttal to predictable attacks. In the end, however, this had little if anything to do with the election result. The Alliance was devastated by a shrewd and sinister Liberal attack plan. The strategy -- sometimes subtle, but sometimes blatant -- was to pull up every prejudice about the West and every myth about Alberta that could be dredged. That such an approach could even be contemplated, let alone successfully executed, shows it has an enormous market in this country. There is no reason to believe the same strategy could not be repeated at any time under any circumstances against any political movement perceived to have a Western, but especially an Alberta, identity. For many of us, this federal election has stripped away any veneer of openness to reforming Canada. Those who conceived the Reform party, and helped nurture it through its transformation to the Alliance, have not discovered a path to power; they have hit a wall. This is perhaps not surprising. Alberta and much of the rest of Canada have embarked on divergent and potentially hostile paths to defining their country. Alberta has opted for the best of Canada's heritage -- a combination of American enterprise and individualism with the British traditions of order and co-operation. We have created an open, dynamic and prosperous society in spite of a continuously hostile federal government. Canada appears content to become a second-tier socialistic country, boasting ever more loudly about its economy and social services to mask its second-rate status, led by a second-world strongman appropriately suited for the task. Albertans would be fatally ill-advised to view this situation as amusing or benign. Any country with Canada's insecure smugness and resentment can be dangerous. It can revel in calling its American neighbours names because they are too big and powerful to care. But the attitudes toward Alberta so successfully exploited in this election will have inevitable consequences the next time Canada enters a recession or needs an internal enemy. Having hit a wall, the next logical step is not to bang our heads against it. It is to take the bricks and begin building another home -- a stronger and much more autonomous Alberta. It is time to look at Quebec and to learn. What Albertans should take from this example is to become "maîtres chez nous." In one policy area after another, the province of Quebec, with much less financial independence than Alberta, has taken initiatives to ensure it is controlled by its own culture and its own majority. Such a strategy across a range of policy areas will quickly put Alberta on the cutting edge of a world where the region, the continent and the globe are becoming more important than the nation-state. It is true that any achievement by Alberta will only generate more hostility from other quarters of Canada in the short term, but it will just as certainly put them under considerable pressure to evolve and progress. On the other hand, we should not mimic Quebec by lunging from rejection into the arms of an argument about separation. As that province has shown, separation will simply divide our population in a symbolic debate while, still part of the country, it isolates us from any allies. Separation will become a real issue the day the federal government decides to make it one. Neither should Albertans shun federal politics, but we must carefully guard our interests. Much about the Canadian Alliance is worthy of support, and a large number of Canadians do support it. But the CA will be under considerable pressure to rid itself of any tinge of a Western agenda or Alberta control. This we must fight. If the Alliance is ever to become a party that could be lead by a Paul Martin or a Joe Clark, it must do so without us. We don't need a second Liberal party. Westerners, but especially Albertans, founded the Reform/Alliance to get "in" to Canada. The rest of the country has responded by telling us in no uncertain terms that we do not share their "Canadian values." Fine. Let us build a society on Alberta values. Stephen Harper, president of the National Citizens' Coalition, was founding policy director of the Reform party and Reform MP for Calgary West from 1993-97.