Posted on 05/01/2002 1:12:04 PM PDT by Clive
"The view has been that today's immigrant, today's refugee, is tomorrow's voter for the party in power that let people in."
So says David Harris, a former chief of strategic planning at the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS).
He was speaking Sunday on 60 Minutes, a respected CBS television network show seen by millions of Americans, Canadians and others world-wide.
The show was a damning indictment of Canada's notoriously weak immigration and refugee system that's made this country a safe and even supporting haven for international terrorists. Especially those planning attacks against its closest neighbour - the United States.
In essence, it illustrated how terrorists use our porous immigration-refugee system to enter Canada and set up shop - even financing them and not being able to deport them.
It found the driving force behind such a weak system is the corralling of "the immigrant vote" by the party in power.
For many years up to the present, that's been the Liberal party under three-term PM Jean Chretien.
In other words, this was not the kind of soft, fuzzy "investigation" of Canada's immigration-refugee system and terrorism that we've become used to on the government-run and financed CBC - or even the private CTV and Global networks.
Reporter Steve Kroft noted Canada has allocated $200 million to improve screening of foreigners since the horrific Sept. 11 al- Qaida terrorist attacks that killed 3,000 innocent people, including 25 Canadians.
"But many believe the problem is Canada's immigration policy, which last year admitted 250,000 immigrants on a permanent basis. Per capita, that's twice the number of immigrants being admitted to the United States.
"In fact, the number of foreign-born Canadian citizens has grown so large over the years and become so well organized that no Canadian politician can afford to do or say anything that might appear to be anti-immigrant," he said.
"It is purely politics," confirmed Harris.
He added: "And if you are in the business of destroying the Western world and the United States and everything that they represent, you couldn't have a better jumping off point(Canada)."
Noting CSIS had identified 50 terrorist cells operating in Canada, among cases cited were terrorists who entered Canada easily as refugee claimants and even lived off our "generous" financial aid system.
One refugee claimant was Gazi Ibrahim Abu Mezer who used Canada as an entry point to the U.S. in 1997, bringing plans to blow up New York City subways.
And there's Nabil Al-Marabh, who lived six years in Toronto as a refugee claimant and is suspected as one of Osama bin Laden's key operatives in North America. He was arrested in Chicago after Sept. 11 and is still being held by the FBI.
And, of course, there's Ahmed Ressam, the Algerian member of a Montreal al-Qaida cell. He spent six years in Canada, living off robberies plus welfare, free health care and other perqs provided refugee claimants. He was trained in Afghanistan and was finally caught in late 1999 by U.S. border guards while trying to cross into the U.S. with a carload of explosives on his way to blow up Los Angeles airport.
"We have the most generous refugee system in the world," said Joe Bissett, a former executive director of the Canadian Immigration Service.
"Too generous?" asked Kroft.
"Much too generous," said Bissett.
Last year, 44,000 made refugee claims on arrival in Canada - with 15,000 entering since Sept. 11. More than 2,500 came from terrorist countries such as Algeria, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Somalia, Iraq and Iran, it was noted.
Val Diaconescu, a former senior immigration inspector at Montreal's Dorval airport, said 80% of of those claiming refugee status have no documents.
They could be anybody, but are still allowed to stay - and almost all are freed to roam Canada and live off our "generous" system.
John Manley, Chretien's "barking dog" deputy PM, tried to defend the system, but finally had to admit that terrorists "hid in Canada."
Asked Kroft: "We've talked to a number of people who say the problem is Canada's liberal - ultra-liberal - overly generous immigration policy. Your reaction to that?"
Replied Manley: "I-I-I-I guess the question is: What problem?"
So there, the continuing mess is obviously in good hands.
Several years ago, there was an attempt by national referendum to amend the Canadain constitution. One of the provisions would have made political correctness the law of the land. In Ontario, it was a tie, but the geographic distribution was amazing. All of Ontario voted against it, except Toronto, which voted in favor of it. Very analagous to the Bush/Gore geographic vote distribution from the 2000 election.
My point is that Toronto dominates Canadian politics, but the rest of the province is more conservative and, from my own experience, can't stand the immigration policies.
Except for scale, of course.
The exposure of Canada's open immigration policy reduces the US, Canada border to an open sore for the US.
And if you've had a DUI in the US, the Canadians won't even let you across the border for a visit (without a whole bunch of red-tape b.s.)
Al-Marabh worked in a copy shop 1 block from where I live.
I frequently saw his friendly face when I went in to have work done.
There have been reports that trucks had been seen
loading boxes of documents, in front of this shop,
in the early hours of the morning.
I wonder what sized paper they were using?
You've got that right. I can't imagine there were many Americans who watched this without that very thought crossing their minds.
And the answer, of course, is that there is no material difference.
This is pure speculation,
but I would say forged passports,
or, perhaps,
the documents required
to obtain passports.
But I am sure there are a million other creative things
that could be done at a photocopy shop.
I heard that the place was surrounded
by police cars one night shortly after 09-11-01.
If it isn't cannibal b*stards in Zimbabwe heating up water in The Big Pot, it's Liberal b*stards in Toronto preparing to put all of us Canucks in a cannibal stew.
Please, Lord, don't let Toronto win the Stanley Cup.
I don't know if I could bear that! ;^)
The excuse for importing people in Canada is that white people are not reproducing.
Having 1.5 children is not even the replacement rate.
TheHeterodoxConservative:
"And if you've had a DUI in the US, the Canadians won't even let you across the border for a visit (without a whole bunch of red-tape b.s.)"
An interesting datum:
Seventy percent of refugee claimants enter Canada by land across the border from the United States. It does not seem to matter that the US is a safe harbour.
So, if you want to get into Canada, just claim refugee status. If will take years for you to exhaust the appeal remedies and extraordinary remedies. Once you have exhausted your remedies and have been served with deportation process you can either disappear as have many failed claimants (Canada trusts deportees to turn themselves in for transportation) or you may simply take a holiday back home with Canada paying the air fare then simply come back and start afresh with new grounds. (Everybody knows the grounds are fiction anyway).
Another interesting datum:
Often a successful refugee claimant, once he has been granted Canadian landing documents, goes back home for a holiday to tell all his relatives and friends what a sweet deal it is.
No, it's so the liberals can gain and maintain political power.
The second line says it all: 'Toronto Sun'. It's the paper for people who don't want to bother thinking.
As the husband of someone who would be an immigrant if the U.S. had a health system that permitted you to live there, and the father of someone who would be identified by the sort of people who don't believe in asking questions first as an immigrant, are you totally happy with immigrant-bashing by The Toronto Sun (and, for that matter, by those hopeless media Communists at 60 Minutes)?
As for 9/11, none of the people involved in the operation came through Canada. Most of them came directly from Saudia Arabia and Egypt. And they managed to hi-jack four planes simultaneously because of incredibly sloppy security at U.S. airports and a U.S. immigration system that approved a visa for one of them six months after the attack...and what was it, 150 people found to be security risks at the airport in Washington, no less, still ensconced in their jobs up until about two weeks ago? The money that has been spent improving the level of people who do airport security checks since the attack wouldn't by the missile that some part-time pilot fired at a Canadian unit last week.
Two of the three people cited in the story (that means the guy in Montreal, too) were arrested in the U.S. on information from the RCMP after they'd crossed the border. The guy in Chicago is a 'suspected' Bin Laden operative; there have been several hundred such people arrested, most of whom have since been released, but some of whom have been held incommunicado for more than six months now in a denial of basic rights unparalleled since the internment of Japanese-Americans in World War II. And the U.S. constitution's self-evident rights are guaranteed to all 'persons', not 'citizens'.
Without immigration, there will be nobody to do the work and pay the taxes that are going to pay my old-age pension. Neither Canada nor the U.S. has a birth-rate anywhere near the replacement level, and we both have rapidly aging populations. We need those 250,000 immigrants.
Of course there are a lot of refugees from countries like Algeria,Somalia, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq...they are miserable places to@live in...your chances of getting killed in a terrorist attack--or a@government attack, or an attack by the armed forces of the United@States--are very high in those places. If you lived there, wouldn't you be trying to get out? And yes, some of them are going to be terrorists@posing as refugees, since many of them blame the U.S., and not without@justification, for the state their countries are in. It's also worth@remembering that some of them are refugees who posed as terrorists back home so that they could get out.
And while there may well be holes in how hard Canada keeps herd on potential terrorists, they don't allow overt fund-raising to support terrorist activities in the U.S. or anywhere. The IRA, on the other hand, was financed out of Boston and New York for 20 years while Washington turned a blind eye, not wishing to irritate Irish-American voters, descendants of immigrants, by the way. Politics, anyone?
And while it's true that we didn't put our parents deep into debt and risk our lives to come here, we aren't working in our own countries either. It's true that the Japanese government didn't have to put us up three and four in a small room and pay for language lessons and a little spending money when we arrived, but we had jobs that paid far more than the Canadian government spends per refugees. My cousin's wife is a welfare worker in Saskatchewan, and her opinion on the money that is paid to refugees is that she wouldn't want to have to try to live on it. And not many refugees do. If Nabil Al-Marabh lived six years in Toronto on government pay-outs, it's probably because they wouldn't grant him refugee status so he could go out and get a job.
And if David Harris is stupid enough to believe that terrorist@atrocities--even including one that succeeded beyond the wildest dreams@of its perpetrators--are going to destroy the western world, and if he@is stupid enough to equate 'the western world' with 'The United States', I'm very happy that he's a 'former' chief of strategic planning at@CSIS...which, by the way, my navy brother considers a bunch of idiots.@My assumption is that David Harris is trying to get a job in the U.S.
A few things that would lose you marks on a first-year Journalism assignment: 'many believe' is a sneaky way of saying 'I believe'. Also 'barking dog' is in quotes without saying who's calling John Manley that. The inclusion of 'innocent' is an emotive trigger; we all know that they were innocent. That's what random murder is.
I agree with John Manley, barking or otherwise: 'What problem?' as far as our immigration policy is concerned. Our problem is that, through things like NAFTA and the WTO, we've let ourselves get so tied in to the U.S. economic system that our freedom of action is being seriously compromised. As a Canadian, frankly, I resent it.
I'm also astonished at how completely the U.S. is playing into the hands of Osama bin Laden. It has managed to make itself hated through most of the Islamic world now, rather than just in a few parts of it, and it is rapidly wearing through the patience of its allies in Europe, too. China, the biggest country in the world and the fastest growing economy,is feeling encircled, which the Communist Party there will love, because then they can justify their continued hold on power by pointing to the foreign threat. U.S. bases on the territory of the former USSR is omething the Russian far right will love, too. Soon the only ally the U.S. is really going to have left will be Canada, because Canada has no choice but to go along. As another of my brothers says, 'We know which side our bread's buttered on.'
Military power the U.S. may have, but let's say, for example, that Iraq@develops a nuclear weapon next year. I believe in chess that is called@'check'...or perhaps 'put up or shut up,' and as I don't think the U.S.@is willing to risk a nuclear attack on itself (at least I sure as hell hope it isn't) that would be the end of any influence it can bring to@bear in the region. Iran would have one the next week, because Iran and@Iraq are not the best of friends, and Syria the week after that.
What influence the U.S. could have it is squandering at amazing speed. Hell, it can't even rein in Israel. Not with off-year elections coming up.
It's all politics, John. The only question is whether the politics are done well or badly. And unfortunately, the American people elected (well...) a fool.
Cheers.
Ian
Would you care to be a little bit more specific? I would appreciate knowing the exact provision that referred to writing politically correctness into law. Thx
I have no direct evidence, but it seems that the fertility rate drop is in inverse proportion to the proliferation of Fast Food. Beef hormone and antibiotics can’t be of much good to the “little swimmers.” Of course abortion and other social practices do not help either.
Multiculturalism is one significant aspect of the liberal immigration policies in Canada. Diversity is mandatory and assimilation into a common Canadian culture is discouraged.
For example, when Bob Rae was Premier of Ontario, I was finishing college and looking for work. In newspapers and employment guides I read many ads that said literally: "Only applications from women, visible minorities or people with disabilites will be accepted." In other words: White men need not apply.
If you every try to get a job with the federal or provincial government, being bilingual is mandatory - even in areas where less that 10% are francaphone by ancestry and of those only 1% speak French as their native language. Ontario is English dominant yet if you ever need to contact the government, from my experience, the person was almost always an immigrant or transplanted Quebecer.
Another example of PC being the law of the land is the Supreme Court decision that claims that it is impossible to discriminate against white men becusse this group of people are a "priviledged" group of people. Hence, something that would be considered discriminatory against a black or a woman, would not be considered discrimination against a white man.
Or how about the court ruling that Treaty 8 indians don't pay ANY taxes - not property taxes, income taxes or sales taxes at all! Two people couold be doing the same job, one a white man, the other an indian and the indian keeps ALL his income.
The combination of multiculturalism and socialism is why I, and most of my white, english speaking male friends move to the U.S. - Canada doesn't want us! On the other hand, every woman I went to school with had job offers within a month of graduation, yet the men were struggling just to get interviews.
Living in Canada s*cks a$$ if you are a white male.
And at $400,000 per year, you would not have health insurance? The system in the U.S. is the best in the world. I am saying this as a Canadian who has immigrated to the U.S. The Canadian health care system is third world status. People die before getting treatment because of rationing. Hospitals have stopped performing operations becasue their 1950's era X-ray machines have broken down and there is no money to fix them. Governemt budget cuts closed 1/2 the hospitals in my home town. My mother has multiple sclerosis has to travel to another city just to get a doctor who treats this illness. Even MP's travel to the U.S. to get healthcare so they don't have to wait YEARS to get surgery. My grandmother suffered a stroke and the wonderful Canadian medical system didn't even provide 5 minutes of therapy. She was in a hospital bed for 3 years waiting for long term care.
Without immigration, there will be nobody to do the work and pay the taxes that are going to pay my old-age pension.
Another example of why socialism fails. Everyone becomes dependent upon the government for support without trying to save to be self-sufficient in their retirement years. Yet even with a $400,000 per year job, you plan on being governemnt dependent!
Of course there are a lot of refugees from countries like Algeria,Somalia, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq...they are miserable places to@live in
One of the problems is that these people are not escaping persecution, many are escaping prosecution. Canada has a soft spot for criminals that face what Canada deems cruel punishment based upon the culture of the country of origin. Same resaon why Canada won't extradite Americans who potentially face the death penalty in the States. Multicultural Canada is judging foreign cultures.
My cousin's wife is a welfare worker in Saskatchewan, and her opinion on the money that is paid to refugees is that she wouldn't want to have to try to live on it.
The welfare system is so generous in Canada that, 10 years ago, one welfare worker actually quit her job to go on welfare because she would be better off. As a single mother of 2 children, welfare (plus the associated benefits) was the equivalent of a $48K per year job in the private sector. She did this to draw attention to how our tax dollars are spent.
It has managed to make itself hated through most of the Islamic world now, rather than just in a few parts of it
And the U.S. has been the biggest supplier of foreign aid to the muslim world. It is not hated because of what it does. It is hated because the muslim world will not see that it is to blame for most of its own horrible conditions. It's easier to scapegoat someone else for your own problems.
U.S.@is willing to risk a nuclear attack on itself (at least I sure as hell hope it isn't) that would be the end of any influence it can bring to@bear in the region.
Any nuclear attack on the U.S. would result in nuclear retaliation on the perpetrator. I would say that is pretty strong influence and would send a message more clearly than any diplomat ever could. That's why its important to stop nuclear proliferation by rogue nations that are crazy enough to use them on a whim.
Hell, it can't even rein in Israel.
And why should the U.S. reign in Isreal. It would be inconsistent with the Bush Doctrine: Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists. Isreal has the right to defend itself and is doing the same thing the U.S. is doing in Afganistan.
I advise all American lurkers to read this letter that sushiman has posted. It exactly captures the dough-headed conventional Canadian 'wisdom'.
It's almost a parody of itself in its bland oh-so-Canadian smarminess.
I can almost smell a Tim Horton's in the background...or a Legion hall...or a CUPE meeting..;^)
Damn! My fellow-Canadians embarass me sometimes!
Not all Canadians think this way, only the ones who don't question the government program. THe smart ones take advantage of the inexpensive, but quality, university system, then immigrate to the U.S. where their education and talents are appreciated
...or a CUPE meeting
And if you ever work hard and become successful, you will be the bad guy for making everyone else look bad!
What is a CUPE meeting ?
> ƒnThe system in the U.S. is the best in the world ,
--If you are seriously ill and you have the money, it's the best in the world. If I got something serious, I would certainly check out places like the Mayo Clinic. (For hernias, by the way, the best place in the world is just north of Toronto. They do nothing but hernia operations.) If you don't have money, it's the worst in the developed world, and ranks even below Cuba for the quality of health care it delivers to the bottom fifth of the population.
> ...ƒnThe Canadian health care system is third world status. People die> before getting treatment because of rationing. Hospitals have stopped > performing operations becasue their 1950's era X-ray machines have > broken down and there is no money to fix them. Governemt budget cuts > closed 1/2 the hospitals in some places .
--You've been reading the propaganda of the people in the U.S. that don't want you to have socialized medicine. The Canadian health care system has been woefully underfunded over the past 20 years, and there is a great deal of rationalizing going on which will probably take another 20 years for it to recover from. However I suspect in the 1950s X-ray machines story you misread 'Canada' for 'Cuba'. I have three generations of nurses among my relatives in Saskatchewan, probably the hardest hit in terms of what it once was and what it is now, who are always happy to tell you about the horror stories...I've never heard,from them or anyone else, of anybody who couldn't get an operation they needed. Ken Arbour's brother had a heart attack in his doctor's office one morning a couple of months ago and had a quintuple by-pass operation that afternoon. My parents, and all of the elderly Canadians who winter with them in Florida do all their medical stuff (except for emergencies)in Canada before they leave.
ƒn friend's motherƒnhas multiple sclerosis and she has to travel to another city just to get a > doctor who treats this illness.
== You could say the same thing about someone who lives in Stanford and has to travel to New York to see a specialist. My cousin's grandson was born with cerebral palsy, and she got full medical care/day care when she lived in Calgary, and when she moved back to Regina to be closer to her family.
>>Even MP's travel to the U.S. to get > healthcare so they don't have to wait YEARS to get surgery.
--Which MP? When? What kind of operation? And, more importantly, why? Any time an MP does something, look for the agenda.
> Without immigration, there will be nobody to do the work and pay the > taxes that are going to pay my old-age pension.> Another example of why socialism fails. Everyone becomes dependent > upon the government for support without trying to save to be> self-sufficient in their retirement years. Plan on being government dependent ?
--Socialism has not failed in Canada, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark,Germany, France or even, believe it or not, Britain. A nation with the highest average standard of living in the world, a fifth of whose population lives at third-world standards, is in my opinion a failure as a society. At $350,000 a year, which some years I make, no, I'm not planning on being government-dependent, although at $40,000 a pop it doesn't take too many medical emergencies to eat that up. And anyway, most people don't make $250,000 a year. The U.S. seems to act as if the people who don't aren't worth bothering about, which wouldn't bother me except that as the U.S. and Canada are so tightly tied together, the Canadian economy is forced into distortions that drag us along in the American wake.
> Of course there are a lot of refugees from countries like > Algeria,Somalia, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq...they are miserable places to*@live in One of the problems is that these people are not escaping persecution,> many are escaping prosecution.
--They're escaping prosecution, all right...the prosecution of their entire village for not liking the regime in power, the prosecution of their ethnic group for its religion or its language...a lot of them are probably trying to escape simple poverty, as well, for which you can't really blame them--although even the Canadian immigration policy does blame them. And among them are a few genuine criminals, too. But is there a Canadian city which has a crime rate among its immigrant community that is anything to match beside that of Miami?
> Canada has a soft spot for criminals
--That's why we have such a high crime rate.
> that face what Canada deems cruel punishment based upon the culture of > the country of origin. Same resaon why Canada won't extradite > Americans who potentially face the death penalty in the States. > Multicultural Canada is judging foreign cultures.
--Damn right we are.
> the welfare system is so generous in Canada that, 10 years > ago, one welfare worker actually quit her job to go on welfare because > she would be better off. As a single mother of 2 children, welfare > (plus the associated benefits) was the equivalent of a $48K per year > job in the private sector. She did this to draw attention to how > Canadianƒntax dollars are spent.
--I'll e-mail Debbie and ask her what a single mother of two children gets. Factoring in medical care at U.S. prices, maybe it does come out to 48k. Debbie told me a couple of years ago what the figures were...I seem to remember about $300 plus about the same for accomodation...about $600 Canadian a month, basically.
> It has managed to make itself hated through most of the Islamic world > now, rather than just in a few parts of it > > And the U.S. has been the biggest supplier of foreign aid to the > muslim world.
--The U.S. ranks, on a per capita basis, dead last among the developed nations in its foreign aid, and half of that goes to Israel and Egypt. My guess as to who is the largest supplier of aid to the Muslim world would be Japan. >It is not hated because of what it does.
--Who are America's traditional allies in the Muslim world? Pre-revolutionary Iran, whose democratically elected leader was overthrown in 1953 and the Shah restored to his throne....Saudia Arabia,a viciously corrupt monarchy that placates its religious lunatics by sponsoring their activities abroad...Egypt, a corrupt military dictatorship...Morroco, a corrupt monarchy...the Gulf States, all until very recently absolute monarchies...Pakistan, a widely recognized failure as a nation...
>It is hated > because the muslim world will not see that it is to blame for most of > its own horrible conditions. It's easier to scapegoat someone else for > your own problems.
--I agree with you totally here, except that I would put the word 'also'between 'is' and 'hated'.
> U.S.*@is willing to risk a nuclear attack on itself (at least I sure > as hell hope it isn't) that would be the end of any influence it can > bring to*@bear in the region. > > Any nuclear attack on the U.S. would result in nuclear retaliation on > the perpetrator. I would say that is pretty strong influence and would > send a message more clearly than any diplomat ever could. That's why > its important to stop nuclear proliferation by rogue nations that are > crazy enough to use them on a whim.
--That's not what I meant. The U.S. would not be able to risk a conventional attack on a country that had nuclear weapons. Even the possession of a small nuclear arsenal by any state, rogue or otherwise,renders the overwhelming conventional advantage of the U.S. null and void.
> Hell, it can't even rein in Israel. > And why should the U.S. reign in Israel ?ƒn It would be inconsistent > with the Bush Doctrine: Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists.
--The 'Bush Doctrine' is, to use a baseball term, 'bush'. He seems to think he's in a cowboy movie. If you have a hundred characters, five have white hats and five have black hats, and 90 have grey ones. Bush is saying that he has 95 enemies, where at the start he only had five.
>Israel l has the right to defend itself !
--Japan justified its colonization of Taiwan and Korea, and its invasion of China, in the same way. Germany went into Austria (which pleased most Austrians since Hitler was one of them), Czechoslovakia and Poland to secure defensible borders for the Reich. The Soviet Union imposed Communist dictatorships on Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria in supposed self-defence. The U.S. is trying to do the same thing with Canada as I type. The score right now, I believe, is running about five Palestinian dead to every one Israeli. Palestinian women and children are offering themselves up as suicide bombers. They would appear to be sincere in their feeling that they are being wronged.
> Ian
Phew ....!
You've been reading the propaganda of the people in the U.S. that don't want you to have socialized medicine.
I suggest you look at these articles from Canadian sources:
What Universal Health Care Brought the Canadians
But, at the mention of flu, Daniel Brochu, the veteran head nurse here, gave a smirk and ran his pen down the patient list today: "Heart problem, infection problem, hypertension, dialysis, brain tumor, two cerebral hemorrhages." On Thursday, he said, crowding was so bad that he was able to admit one patient only after the ambulance crew agreed to leave its stretcher.
Further west, in Winnipeg, "hallway medicine" has become so routine that hallway stretcher locations have permanent numbers. Patients recuperate more slowly in the drafty, noisy hallways, doctors report.
U.S. is 'tier two' in Canadian health care
It's time we woke up and realized health care for Canadians is already multi-tiered. And let's be honest enough to admit there is hardly a soul among us who would not gladly pay extra to see our loved ones or ourselves receive timely care instead of having to wait in ever-growing lines in the name of "fairness."
Canadian Public Health System is Disaster
They described a surgical system in which patients needing such routine operations as appendectomies are left to the point of rupture and infection. They talked about patients with malignant brain tumors being unable to get timely surgery, only to suffer catastrophic setbacks that require life-saving surgery in the emergency room.
Health-care system needs life support
This is a very good article that shows emergency veterinarian care is better in Canada than emergency medical services!
I've never heard,from them or anyone else, of anybody who couldn't get an operation they needed.
I'm from Windsor, Ontario and, before I moved to the U.S. ten years ago, there were many big news stories about patients waiting for heart bypass surgery had died because they were on a waiting list for over two years! Maybe Sask. has more resources, but people dying while waiting for rationed care is a fact, not propaganda. In the U.S. everyone can get emergency care. On welfare here, you can go to the emergency room for free and you will be treated!
Socialism has not failed in Canada, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark,Germany, France or even, believe it or not, Britain. A nation with the highest average standard of living in the world, a fifth of whose population lives at third-world standards, is in my opinion a failure as a society.
THat is a matter of opinion. You have to remember that, in socialist countries, there is little incentive to be self-reliant. I would not call those European countries to be all that great. I work for a French based company and everyone there is trying to get positions in the U.S. If France is so great, why do so many want to leave? Also, the State of Texas has a larger GDP than France!
I'll e-mail Debbie and ask her what a single mother of two children gets. Factoring in medical care at U.S. prices, maybe it does come out to 48k. Debbie told me a couple of years ago what the figures were...I seem to remember about $300 plus about the same for accomodation...about $600 Canadian a month, basically.
Don't forget that she has two children, so she was getting extra cash just for that, too. Also, the benefits of welfare recipients includes free prescription and free dental care - two things NOT covered by the Canadian healthcare system.
The U.S. ranks, on a per capita basis, dead last among the developed nations in its foreign aid
A per capita basis is meaningless. Even though the U.S. may be the lowest donor nation in terms of per capita, the amount of money it provides is far larger than any other country gives. If you were the recipient of aid, would you want a small amount of money from a country that gives a large proportion of its funds, or would you rather have a large sum of money from a source that gives away proportionatly a small amount of its funds?
That's not what I meant. The U.S. would not be able to risk a conventional attack on a country that had nuclear weapons. Even the possession of a small nuclear arsenal by any state, rogue or otherwise,renders the overwhelming conventional advantage of the U.S. null and void.
And that's why its critical to prevent rogue nations like Iraq from having them. Once a rogue nation gets them, they do not have the restraint Western government have against using them just to inflict pain.
If you have a hundred characters, five have white hats and five have black hats, and 90 have grey ones. Bush is saying that he has 95 enemies, where at the start he only had five.
That's one of the problems with thinking in "grey" hats. There is such a thing as right and wrong; good and evil. Claiming to be "grey" is moral ambivilance and is just as band as "black." Thinking in shades of "grey" on the part of Europe let Hitler rise to power and start a world war.
Japan justified its colonization of Taiwan and Korea, and its invasion of China, in the same way. Germany went into Austria (which pleased most Austrians since Hitler was one of them), Czechoslovakia and Poland to secure defensible borders for the Reich. The Soviet Union imposed Communist dictatorships on Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria in supposed self-defence. The U.S. is trying to do the same thing with Canada as I type. The score right now, I believe, is running about five Palestinian dead to every one Israeli. Palestinian women and children are offering themselves up as suicide bombers. They would appear to be sincere in their feeling that they are being wronged
For two thousand years, the jews have been persecuted without anyone standing up for themselves. The rebirth of Israel follows the "Never Again" rational that I support 100%. The area that is now Israel was once a part of Jordan. Arabs from that region ("Palestinian" is a misnomer and a title of the 20th century) left their homes in hopes of an Arab victory against Israel. The west Bank was Jordanian territory and the refugees are Jordanian. The Arab countries want suffering to continue in the West Bank in order to scapegoat Israel even though they have done nothing to help their own people. Israel is perfectly justified in its actions. Israel offered 93% of the land they seized after repelling a third invasion and they were answered with terrorist attacks. Israel targets the criminal terrorists and infrastructure responsible for violence. "Palistinian" homocide/suicide bombers attack civilians, just like the 9/11 terrorists did. It doesn't matter what the "score" is. Even making such a ratio is disgusting, like its a game or something. unfortunately, the :pali" people are so brainwashed into hating jews, they can't think any other way.
CUPE is the 'Canadian Union of Public Employees', essentially a criminal conspiracy against the Canadian taxpayer.
So a meeting of same is, in the American context, akin to an NEA meeting, except that the 'professionals' at a CUPE meeting are more diverse, ranging from parasites and scavengers to predators at various levels of government.
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