This is just my 'snap shot' general view of how I perceive things based on how these groups debate, react to and intellectualize various issues (e.g. gun control, minimum wage, free speech etc.). Obviously this is just my personal take and rooted in my own assumptions. However, this is how I generally see how the philosophical tribes are divided.
Classical liberals, libertarians and conservatives: Skeptical and optimistic view of human nature.
Still believe in the strength, wisdom and innovation of the individual and community. They accept man's imperfect nature and the vices and virtues that come with it. Their outlook rests on the notion that limited government is the best way to manage human nature whereas a large one is a threat to it.
Progressives (which includes socialists) and contemporary liberals: Cynical and pessimistic. They recognize man's imperfect nature but believe it can be regulated and managed. Man should behave in a certain manner they believe is conducive to the greater good. In this way, a government is never big enough because of the alleged complexities of the modern world. Freedom can never be threatened because government bestows liberties on the people.
The Liberals make a lot of noises about being pro small business but they're nothing of the sort. Which doesn't surprise me. Prior to the election I didn't think a party led by Justin Trudeau would be. Hence why did not vote for them and likely never will again.
The proof is in the pudding as the liberals broke several promises in the Federal budget.
As per the CFIB:
-The corporate tax rate will remain 10.5%. By 2019, it is estimated it will cost small businesses $900 million. Well, someone had to help pay for the Liberal party's wild spending budget, no? Projected to be $29 billion with no concrete plan to pay it back while heading into a lethargic economy.
-The government reneged on introducing an Employment insurance holiday for workers between 18-24 between 2016 and 2018.
-They will expand CPP/QPP. This one bothers me to no end. I just don't see how they can square wanting growth - which small businesses help contribute to - while taxing them further. Right, infrastructure programs will more than offset this because apparently more jobs and money or something.
None of this is attractive to me nor do I subscribe much to the liberal 'tax and spend' philosophy at this point.
So I wish Mr. Morneau could knock it off pretending yapping on about being for small business. I'm a small business owner and so far color me unimpressed.
Sounds like Mark Donaldson and Janette Drew are a couple of incompetent lying, cowardly, tress passing thugs who happen to have state sanctioned badges who could have not only taken a person's right to earn a living (the victim is a model) but outright taken her life.
In this case (and many like it), it's easy to wonder if there's a difference between gang members and these two delinquents if the story went down as it did- and quite frankly I wouldn't be surprised it did given the immense amount of police abuse stories in North America I've been gathering.
"Const. Mark Donaldson, of nearby Dunsford, Ont., was charged this
week with fraud over $5,000, laundering proceeds of crime, and
possession of property obtained by crime over $5,000. Police are still probing whether his status as a police officer played a role in his alleged involvement. City of Kawartha Lakes Police said Donaldson will keep his job, but be kept off investigative duties, as the case proceeds."
Isn't that quaint and special? A piece of shit like that shouldn't have 'Constable' attached to his name.
1. Harvard biologist George Wald
estimated that “civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless
immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.”
2.
“We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this
nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation,”
wrote Washington University biologist Barry Commoner in the Earth Day
issue of the scholarly journal Environment.
3.
The day after the first Earth Day, the New York Times editorial page
warned, “Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely
to enhance existence but to save the race from intolerable deterioration
and possible extinction.”
4.
“Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small
increases in food supplies we make,” Paul Ehrlich confidently declared
in the April 1970 Mademoiselle. “The death rate will increase until at
least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during
the next ten years.”
5. “Most of the
people who are going to die in the greatest cataclysm in the history of
man have already been born,” wrote Paul Ehrlich in a 1969 essay titled
“Eco-Catastrophe! “By…[1975] some experts feel that food shortages will
have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into
famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic,
think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the
decade of the 1980s.”
6. Ehrlich
sketched out his most alarmist scenario for the 1970 Earth Day issue of
The
Progressive, assuring readers that between 1980 and 1989, some 4
billion people, including 65 million Americans, would perish in the
“Great Die-Off.”
7. “It is already too
late to avoid mass starvation,” declared Denis Hayes, the chief
organizer for Earth Day, in the Spring 1970 issue of The Living
Wilderness.
8. Peter Gunter, a North
Texas State University professor, wrote in 1970, “Demographers agree
almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread
famines will begin in India; these will spread by 1990 to include all of
India, Pakistan, China and the Near East, Africa. By the year 2000, or
conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine
conditions….By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world,
with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will
be in famine.”
9. In January 1970,
Life reported, “Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical
evidence to support…the following predictions: In a decade, urban
dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution…by 1985
air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by
one half….”
10. Ecologist Kenneth
Watt told Time that, “At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it’s only
a matter of time before light will be filtered out of the atmosphere
and none of our land will be usable.”
11.
Barry Commoner predicted that decaying organic pollutants would use up
all of the oxygen in America’s rivers, causing freshwater fish to
suffocate.
12. Paul Ehrlich chimed in,
predicting in his 1970 that “air pollution…is certainly going to take
hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone.” Ehrlich
sketched a scenario in which 200,000 Americans would die in 1973 during
“smog disasters” in New York and Los Angeles.
13.
Paul Ehrlich warned in the May 1970 issue of Audubon that DDT and other
chlorinated hydrocarbons “may have substantially reduced the life
expectancy of people born since 1945.” Ehrlich warned that Americans
born since 1946…now had a life expectancy of only 49 years, and he
predicted that if current patterns continued this expectancy would reach
42 years by 1980, when it might level out.
14.
Ecologist Kenneth Watt declared, “By the year 2000, if present trends
continue, we will be using up crude oil at such a rate…that there won’t
be any more crude oil. You’ll drive up to the pump and say, `Fill ‘er
up, buddy,’ and he’ll say, `I am very sorry, there isn’t any.'”
15.
Harrison Brown, a scientist at the National Academy of Sciences,
published a chart in Scientific American that looked at metal reserves
and estimated the humanity would totally run out of copper shortly after
2000. Lead, zinc, tin, gold, and silver would be gone before 1990.
16.
Sen. Gaylord Nelson wrote in Look that, “Dr. S. Dillon Ripley,
secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, believes that in 25 years,
somewhere between 75 and 80 percent of all the species of living animals
will be extinct.”
17. In 1975, Paul
Ehrlich predicted that “since more than nine-tenths of the original
tropical rainforests will be removed in most areas within the next 30
years or so, it is expected that half of the organisms in these areas
will vanish with it.”
18. Kenneth Watt
warned about a pending Ice Age in a speech. “The world has been
chilling sharply for about twenty years,” he declared. “If present
trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the
global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year
2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age.”
I haven't visited ESPN and pretty much have cut them out of my sports in-take diet. I don't need to be lectured or watch them fire people left, right and center for opinions that, heaven forbid, offend the SJW psychos.
I'm having a little trouble understanding their logic.
Let me see if I get these clowns straight. Women are respected because they're covered. The second they're exposed being 'provocative' they earn the right to be raped because Muslim men can't control their impulses? Aren't they admitting they're weak of mind and flesh?
Sounds as though these pervs are seriously repressed and found ways to justify their backward views on women.
As far as I can tell, defenders of the minimum wage act have a shallow if not dubious understanding on how business works.
Actually, I've argued they have no clue because the majority of people don't know what it is to run a business.
The breathtaking stupidity sweeping the United States and spreading across the continent of paying a 'living wage' is bound to end in failure wallowing in unintended consequences that, I believe, will hurt a whole bunch of people - mostly low income employees and youths looking to enter the labor force.
It's funny how the left just loves to pick and choose parts of the Scandinavian model to push their agenda. For example, Sweden and Denmark don't have minimum wage laws.
Politicians who decree - without much thought it appears - go forth and pay $15 /hr. are living in a dream world. You can't tell a business with a certain cost structure and margins to just pay employees what they think they're worth.
It just doesn't work that way and one is a fool to not expect serious consequences.
Of course, to the simpleton mind with no regard for business owners (I mean, they're swimming in cash right?) the premise (a faulty one of course) is they have the "profits" to pass on and if they don't that means they shouldn't be in business. Or they would 'gladly pay more' if it meant a 'living wage'. Highly doubtful and in any event those who irrationally think this way are a tiny precious few (just like the number of people with families working in a minimum wage job represent an insignificant fraction of the labor force) to have any meaningful impact.
Tell you what, you keep that track and people with capital willing to invest won't come. Which leads to another absurd piece of logic: Where stores close, someone else will take its place.
Never mind the cost to a community in the meant time when someone has to shut down because of government intervention. It's one thing to close down voluntarily (poor sales, death etc.) but quite another when a business is healthy. There's no reason to damage people in this way.
We are where we are in our evolutionary progress where capitalism is concerned.
We've never been more efficient, intelligent, wealthier, healthier and exact in our abilities.
Two, Cirque is originally from Quebec. A place that has its own discriminatory practices where language is concerned not to mention Bill 101 prevents its own citizens from choosing where they can send to school as well as forbidding new immigrants from doing so as well.
And they're gonna talk about liberty?
That's a mighty spicey bull shit!
Like I said, there's no shortage of breath taking hypocrisy and stupidity at work here.
Not all of those classed as authoritarian populists said they opposed the EU. Mr Wells said: "The majority of people have views that can be categorised as authoritarian but within that there are degrees.
"This
isn't half the country are dyed in the wool Ukippers who want to pull
out of Europe straight away, who want to stop immigration."
Recall, Elizabeth Warren wants to threaten companies who lobby against government policies that affect their business or industry. Fake scienticians like Bill Nye want to imprison 'skeptics' of climate change. College campuses are filled with intolerant assholes and cowardly deans.
One day this blog will get in trouble for making fun of Obama and Trudeau or pissing on Sanders and his idiot ideas supported by his idiot base or Trump because he's the type or calling out Hillary for the - ahem - *criminal* she is. And so on.
Yeh. Laugh. You know it's coming.
Remind me who are the reactionaries and authoritarians again?
"For custodians of the ancient heritage of the Middle East and North
Africa, the recent rise of Islamist extremist groups has posed a dire
challenge. Since its seizure of the historic Iraqi city of Mosul in
early 2014, Islamic State has pillaged and demolished mosques, shrines,
churches and other sacred sites across the region. The group continues
to launch “cultural cleansing” operations from Tikrit to Tripoli.
n this grim procession, there have been occasional victories for
culture over extremism, like the recapture last month of the ancient
Syrian city of Palmyra, which may now be restored to something of its
previous glory. A less familiar case of cultural rescue features an
unlikely hero: a 51-year-old book collector and librarian named Abdel Kader Haidara in the fabled city of Timbuktu, in the West African country of Mali.
The
story begins in April 2012, when Mr. Haidara returned home from a
business trip to learn that the weak Malian army had collapsed and that
nearly 1,000 Islamist fighters from one of al Qaeda’s African
affiliates, al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, had occupied his city. He
encountered looters, gunfire and black flags flying from government
buildings, and he feared that the city’s dozens of libraries and
repositories—home to hundreds of thousands of rare Arabic
manuscripts—would be pillaged.
Take a moment to thank Mr. Haidara for helping to preserve and protect humanity against dark, evil, barbaric forces.
Michael Moore, well, that goes without saying. He's a gigantic pillow fart of hypocrisy. Didn't he open one of his films in the United Arab Emirates?
What about Bryan Adams? Dude, has extensively toured in the Arab world.
Do these two nitwits know or acknowledge the human rights abuses (particularly against gays and women) in Mid-East countries?
But you know. KA-CHING!
And then there's Bruce Springsteen who is, dagger in my heart, on his way to derpville.
From Bono to the singer of Midnight Oil (the Beds are Burning bald guy) to Di Caprio to whomever. The list of activist celebrities caught in acts of hypocrisy is long.
I wouldn't be surprised to find out each of these people do business with people or companies that operate in places that kill people based on their, say, sexual preferences.
Alas, to call those people out wouldn't get you invited to the next snazzy cocktail party and all round pats on the back and bums I reckon.
It's so easy to research their hypocrisy it's literally fricken embarrassing.
The day I see celebrities stop being selective and apply the concept of freedom of speech and expression to all people including those they disagree with, is the day I'll take them seriously.
"...And I haven’t even mentioned the rise of the
pitchfork-wielding consumer zombies, the some
276,000-plus who blithely plunked down deposits of $1,000 each
for the Model 3, a car they may see in three-and-one-half years'
time, if they’re lucky, based simply on the overheated
hype generated by the media who have relentlessly
portrayed Elon Musk as the Patron Saint of All that is Good and
Virtuous in the New World. I once wrote that this nation could not exist in the global
economy as a Starbucks Nation of consumer zombies, that
consumerism in and of itself could never replace or
eclipse the fundamental importance of the production of real
goods and services and its contribution to America’s industrial
fabric, or there would be dire consequences. Well, it’s too late for that..."
I've observed a 'cult' like gathering around Tesla. I don't doubt the car has its merits and its objectives interesting but we seem to be seeing quite a bit of that in the form of SJW's, climate change proponents, and political supporters (IE Obama).
I've, in addition, heard all sorts of hyperbole in defense of Tesla from it being 'the greatest car ever built', to it 'will reach Mercedes-Benz status within three years' to it 'will change everything' and so on.
All before the latest cars promised hit the market.
Look at it this way. It's like declaring a new rookie QB will be Tom Brady (not may be the next Brady but will be). It's like giving them a trophy before even entering the ring to compete. It's like giving a Nobel Peace prize to a politician who never - ahem - governed a nation; let alone promoted peace.
Of course, by the way, it's pretty clear Obama ain't no peacenik. Bush made sure of that!
Anyway.
Tesla has a lot - and I meant a lot - of proving to do before it can ever be considered in the same breath of the great automobile manufacturers.
Like many Silicon Valley start ups, the company seems to manage itself based on its promise rather than focusing on how to get to 'Mercedes-Benz' status. It appears the company believes its ideas has already made them bigger than they actually are.
***
A quick comment on putting down $1000 on a car that's filled with over runs, with a company not exactly forthright with its transparency and constant delays.
When you put down your money on an idea or concept you're basically taking a huge risk and placing your money in something in hopes it will bring you future value. If you can forego $1000 and don't care much for the following calculation because Tesla simply trumps these considerations then A) all the power to you and B) this is not for you.
It is for the average person who doesn't think about how money and how it relates to investment and wealth 'works'.
Inflation and returns on investment are the key here.
What does that mean? Let me illustrate. For this scenario let's assume Tesla doesn't deliver the car or delivers them years after the deposit is places.
If you put $1000 down in, say, 2012 and are still waiting for your product, you probably could have put your money in more productive areas - including gold and silver for many reasons we can't get into here.
Which essentially means your $1000 (and let's keep the inefficiency of taxation out of this for now) is now worth $994. Which, in turn, erodes your purchasing power, which is why investing wisely is important. People try to offset inflation by, generally speaking, putting their money to work - IE investing in stocks and bonds as well as properties. If you put your money in the U.S. market, the indices rendered a 3 year 12.1% return. In theory, this means your were able to gain 6% back. So your $1000 is worth $1114. That is, at 4% per year for three years is $120 minus the $6 lost to inflation.
This is what the author is driving at; excuse the pun.
And he's absolutely right.
It's getting ugly out there and the popularity of Bernie Sanders (who insanely claimed companies like GE hurt the fabric of America - the single most successful company in human history I might add. I guess in Bernie's world there would be no GE's) only cements my perception people are not thinking properly where finance, business and economics are concerned.
Have you seen the latest Feel the Bern video? What are you waiting for?
What a miserable place the USSR was. I wonder how much more things have improved.
Yet, today while watching my daughter during her tennis lessons I watched a tattooed millennial waltz into the club with I kid you not a hammer and sickle t-shirt. Maybe next time I should ask the idiot for his email and send him this video.
Anyway, Bernie probably sees nothing wrong with this video, right? So long as he gets to rape the people's money to, whatever he wants to do with it. No one needs clean meat in addition to all those types of deodorants and sneakers.
I can't believe people take his utter banal and commie takes on economics seriously.
Are we that ignorant where finance, business, economics and capitalism are concerned?
***
I just want to say. I'm confident in saying I was probably the first to call Justin Trudeau Zoolander. Now, I understand no one reads this blog but I did lay it on a popular site so it's highly probable it took off from there. And I do know for a fact people have ripped some of my thoughts off in the past (I feel so raped and abused) but since I'm a nobody, it's easy to, you know, bitch slap me.
Yeah, yeah, it could be a coincidence and I'm not the only one (Amy Schumer seems to have carved a career out of stealing jokes) but I'm putting my suspicion face on.
Also, I'm patenting right here and now, in an effort to protect my pointless rants more, 'Grandpa Gulag' in describing Sanders. And 'Belgium is the new Vichy.' And the word 'justifuckation'. And a new velvet condom...wait never mind.
If the government wants to introduce a euthanasia law so be it. Just don't try and pass off as 'rational' decision making - or worse, morally proper - because, to me, in reality it's just another way to keep people off the waiting list.
It's the system finding ways to 'weed' people off it.
Truth is, it's hard and complicated to treat and fund people with chronic diseases or mental illness.
While the simple solution is to improve access to care and doctors (which, in my view, means restricting or removing bureaucratic interference and red tape) while expanding palliative care.
That's the true humanist approach. I bet my life if a person was given such options they would prefer to live in dignity surrounded by family members because this is what humans are wired for.
Instead we say death is an option and absurdly dupe people into thinking it's a choice. Since when do we have choice in the Canadian system? Make no mistake about, bureaucrats will have the final say in your life. I know. Deprogramming Canadians to understand this is hard.
I'm gonna sit back and watch the unintended consequences - whatever they may be - as we move forward.
At which point I reserve the right to tell you 'I told you so'. Or at the very least, 'you shouldn't be surprised'.
Wow. I guess we can surmise what side she was on while she was living in East Germany.
Germany sure never sways from its authoritarianism streak. Know who else cracked down on free speech?
Fuck Merkel.
And especially fuck this asshole Erdogan.
Mark Steyn on the story:
"There will be fewer poems, fewer satirical sketches, fewer jokes - not
just about Erdogan, but about Islam in general. To reprise my old line:
The process is the punishment.
Don't believe that? First of all, the broadcaster has already deep-sixed the offending joke:
ZDF removed the video clip of Boehmermann from its website two days after it aired.
So the anti-Erdogan gag is history. Even if in Merkel's weaselly evasion
"the courts will have the final word", the joke will not be coming
back. Will Herr Boehmermann?
The public TV channel has decided not to broadcast his weekly satire
programme this week because of the furore surrounding Boehmermann.
Ah. So the poem has vanished, and so has its creator. And, given the
backbone ZDF are showing, what are the chances of them or any other
German media outlet broadcasting any further provocations to Erdogan in
the future?
At this stage, Ankara's strongman doesn't really need to win in court, does he?"
Indeed. Canada uses this tactic as well. In the interest of 'decent discourse'. Which is total and absolute bull shit.
Do people not see this is exactly how you get on to a path of totalitarianism?
Sigh. I can't believe what I just heard on CJAD radio about subsidizing the dairy industry. Sigh. Unfortunately, the position of supporting subsidizing dairy doesn't surprise me. Sigh.
The dairy industry is part of what's called supply-side management and its impact does disproportionately impact low-income families.
Interestingly, the same people who claim to care for low-income families are willingly ignoring this because...stable prices!
It's interesting to note how policy picks and chooses how poor people will benefit from their decisions.
That's the very definition of paternalism and arrogance. 'Yes, okay. You pay for it but at least you're not paying wild prices like you see in the USA!'
Let me expand.
One of the panelists used the rock solid anecdotal example of going to buy a pound of butter in the USA .She deliberately or unwittingly took a snap shot price to base her argument on. That is, the price of butter shot up to $5 for a pound. Worse, she went on to pull a ridiculous 'this is what you get in the free market' line. Hence, not fair thus subsidizing is good.
Except it's wrong and all too typical of a left-wing, Soviet-style idea deeply entrenched in the Canadian economic psyche scarce removed from 1974.
How dare the market fluctuate!
It's simple why it's wrong. We know the price of butter won't stay at $5 in the U.S. since price movements are tied to many factors including consumer demand and inflation. For example, if the cost to produce butter goes down, then the price will shoot back down.
More importantly, it's not reflective of the overall average of the price of butter which is far lower in the United States. Same for milk and eggs. Each being staples every citizen wants or needs; particularly the income bracket everyone on the left seems to want to help through paternalism: the poor.
Fluctuation in prices are not bad. In fact, it's healthy. We've been taught it's bad and that somehow someone is trying to screw us over. But this perceived vulnerability has more to do with general economic ignorance than it does Mr. Burns cornering the butter market. Which is what Bernie Sanders and his idiotic economic rantings amount to.
Contrast this to Canada. Where we're so much more progressive, caring and intelligent here.
A subsidy acts to distort market prices. As such, it masks that true and actual cost of what you're paying for.
So to get back to Trudy Mason's specious claim that butter in Plattsburgh is $5 and that we industrious Canadians figured out a way to make sure we 'stabilize' prices seemingly proves her point that this 'stability' is better. I contend this is absurd.
Nobody is subsidizing that $5 butter in the USA. Here, taxpayers do and notice they never bother to examine the exact cost of that subsidy has on prices. They can ignore this all they want but it's the singular factor in determining whether 'price stability' is worth it. Better to just pretend and hide behind a narrative perhaps?
Whatever it is, I'm pretty sure it's above what we pay for. So you may pay $4.50 for butter here but the true cost is probably $6 or $7. In other words, you're really paying $7 all year round.
To take the subsidized day care example here in Quebec. Parents pay $7.30 for day care. But the true costs are closer to $100which taxpayers pay through higher taxes.For your Bernheads out there this can't be said enough: Nothing in life is free. And no, raping people out of their earned income to pay for free shit you demand is not 'free'. You just robbed Paul to give to transgendered Mary - or something.
Anyway. The average cost of a daycare on the continent is about $70-$80. So, in our rush to pretend we're smarter than the rest, all we've managed to do is inflate the costs through policy. And make a mess of an entire industry to boot. Moreover, a private daycare without a subsidy can run its operations at substantially lower prices.
Oh, because they offer less quality you say?
Pish posh. That's just subjective fear-mongering pushed by the subsidy crowd and statists. You can offer a superior service at a fraction of the cost. Whereas, more often than not, you're not getting $100 worth of services on the subsidized side.
In this vain, and to get back to the subject at hand, I've heard the argument made that such protectionism ensures Canadian dairy is a superior product.
Bull shit as my point about daycare illustrates.
I know which system I prefer.
The other dubious argument the panel made was subsidies are necessary for food sovereignty.
First, off I don't even know what that means. I highly doubt by food sovereignty she means people engaging in their own farming and raising of cattle. You know, free of government intervention on the faulty premise that it may be 'dangerous.' True food sovereignty is achieve when people are free to plant or produce their own "cottage food" in the manner they choose to fit best their local communities and not be harassed by a government agency in Ottawa (or Washington) telling them some bull shit policy with little merit prevents them from doing so.
But in this context, the thinking goes something along the lines of we need to pay farmers to stay on their unproductive and unprofitable farms because we need food.
It all comes down to relying on the government.
I mean, we don't want to import from those icky Americans right?
At least, that's how I interpret whenever I hear such rubbish.
Truth is, is Canada's ability to achieve food sovereignty is limited because of climate and unworkable or bad soil. If sovereignty means not having access to grapefruits and rapini, then I'm not for it. I'm for trade. Free trade is the only way to keep any sense of economic bearings in this country.
The only option to make up for this constraints is if you let technology and innovation reign, which in turn means letting the free market determine to what degree we truly are sovereign. In addition, it that would mean removing arbitrary man-made, self-imposed restrictions that hurt trade and scary things like GMO and other 'frankenfoods' Luddites hate. They prefer, as Mason (who by the way does a good job of generally bringing perspective to the table. Just not in this case) seems to push for, a top-down approach. That is, to leave it in the hands of bureaucrats. Yes, because that's always worked.
So we're, to me, hampered by climate, irrational economic notions and anti-science fears.
It's not just food we see this play out.
She mentioned we need to be 'energy independent.' But that won't happen as long as environmentalists and unscrupulous or just plain dumb politicians get in the way to stop projects (think pipelines) that prevent us from achieving this goal and objective.
Canada is not independent in many ways and much of it is because of our choices and decisions we've made over the last few decades. We never made a serious attempt to develop a true finished goods based economy funded by our own industrialists or innovation.
We've always had to rely on American ideas and capital on this front thus leaving us a branch plant economy.
Now don't get me wrong. Canada is not the only country to engage in stupid supply-side management. Most major Western nations do and often to the detriment of poorer countries we trade with.
Multiple wrongs don't make a right.
In the end, as the coins and dollars trickle and slide down, guess who pays?
And this person is in a position of educating youth?
So what happened to cause such a kerfuffle?
A Maryland high school student who obeyed the parameters of the
assignment he was given is now facing widespread outrage because it
wasn't politically correct—even though the point of the assignment was
to write something inflammatory.
Basically, he did what was asked of him - with much ability apparently - and is being stupidly scorned for his skill. I would love to get a copy of what he wrote.
Slowly the left wants to pull a blanket over great pieces of literature that don't fit their narrow and ignorant contemporary narrative. A narrative that is good to basically wipe my ass with.
It's amazing how depressingly whacked out people have become when it comes to reading comprehension and their ability to understand the art of satire.
"Reportedly, a woman came out of the
Guildhall and asked Mr Weston if he had the authorisation to make this
speech. When he answered that he didn't, she told him 'It's disgusting!'
and then called the police.
But those in the Muslim community said the police were correct to
act if Mr Weston’s actions were deliberately intended to incite hatred.
Mohamed Shafiq, leader of the Ramadan Foundation, said: “Of course
there should be freedom of speech, but with freedom of speech comes
responsibility. If someone was to deliver this message in the centre of
Bradford for example where there is a large Muslim population then it
could be seen as a deliberate act of incitement.
“We are banning
extremists from the Muslim community, the likes of Anjem Choudary, so
it is right that the policy is applied equally. "
Shafiq. Listen.
Go. Fuck. Yourself.
How about that?
What you're advocating is not justice but censorship.
"A spokesman for the Muslim Council of Britain said: “We are sure that
even Mr Churchill, if confronted with what he wrote as a young man would
now blush at his own writings, just as he would when presented with his
description of Gandhi as a 'half- naked fakir.' "
Says the spokesman for a religion with no intellectual or cultural heritage where individual rights and free speech are concerned.
Yeah well, nevertheless, I highly doubt Churchill would do so. This is just another way for this organization to form and redefine the concept of liberty. I'd be, at this point, extra-crispy vigilant from this point forward. It's taken Western civilization centuries to claw, fight and intellectualize our way to this.
How the heck did Islam become protected status anyway? Shit, the Jews have faced far worse than the Muslims will likely ever witness and never benefited from it. No, you don't deserve not to be spoken too nicely. If your religion does bad things including something retarded like murder innocent people, then yeah, you're kinda gonna have to go with the flow on that. You're not shielded from criticism in any way.
I'll be damned if we're going to piss it all away based on faulty premises and a boatload of bull shit.
And Canada, to be fair, is not doing its bit on this front either.
The West has to once and for all decide which way they want to go on liberty, freedom of speech and expression. They can go the UK way; which is the shitty way. Or they can follow what the Americans are fighting mostly in the libertarian ranks; which is the correct way.
The problem with boycotts and selective activism is it leaves individuals or groups open to criticism.
Take Bruce Springsteen who cancelled a show in North Carolina over its LBGT laws on transgender bathrooms.
Bruce is free to, of course, voice his displeasure over such an issue but I do find it unfortunate he made his fans pay the price for it. At the end of the day, in my opinion and fan of his art, Springsteen is a musician and probably should not lose sight of this fact.
Here's the problem - and it's a little like the whole anti-war movement's sudden disappearance under a Democrat administration despite its own penchant for war and violence in the last eight years - NC is not the only state to have this on its books.
California - yes, progtard state supreme - is one of those states. Consider:
Under the potty parity laws—first passed in California in 1987 and
now implicitly incorporated into building code guidelines—public places
are required to offer either an equal number of men's and women's "water
closets" or, more frequently, two female toilets for each male toilet
or urinal. Alaska has adopted a 2.7 to 1 ratio; Pittsburgh 3.75 to 1;
Texas and Tennesee two to one.
....
Existing buildings shouldn't be forced into expensive renovations to
desegregate gendered bathrooms; nor would I want new laws requiring all
places to give up gender-segregated facilities. But doing away with
existing laws that force bathroom segregation could go a long way.
Soooo. Can we expect Springsteen to cancel any tours in California?
Yeah. That sound you hear are crickets. I highly doubt it.
Much easier, much like in the case of tax agencies beating up on small guys, to push a small (southern) state around I reckon.
***
Know what else? It's easy for Springsteen to call for 'gender-neutral' bathrooms since, you know, he'd never be forced into one.
Personally, you're fucking crazy if you think I'd go take a piss next to a woman. It's literally immoral as it is barbaric.
Jesus Christ, is their no common decency where privacy is concerned?
I can just see the law suits. 'There's no need for a man to shake his dick so vigorously in front of women without a trigger warning'. Followed with a video showing how to piss properly in front of women as well as sensitivity training. Naturally.
***
In my view, musicians who claim to care about liberty should focus more on the huge problem of anti-free speech movements (oh I'm crazy, eh?) , just to cite one example, pushed by SJW destroying one protest at a time the very idea of freedom of expression on North American campuses.
You can count me in as one of those who is disturbed but not surprised by the revelations of an unholy relationship between the Canada Revenue Agency and KPMG.
None of these stories - from Hillary's corrupt and criminal emails to aggressive police to the Panama Papers to CRA and KPMG - we hear in the news that reveal the level of brutality, corruption and audacity should shock anyone who has been closely following current events.
In the end, whether it's $15 minimum wage or wars on drugs or anything else, it's the middle-class that will end up paying for whatever misdeeds and criminal activity our political masters engage in.
It's especially galling and unacceptable that CRA (and the IRS and Revenue Quebec - I still can't for the life of me understand how Quebecers accept paying to two tax departments. It's redundant. How much waste and corruption can one take? One government suffices) goes after the small guy and business. They throw their weight around bullying defenseless tax payers but simultaneously work to undermine us by protecting and coddling powerful players.
But if they come knocking for your money (taxes are coercion) on your door, they will gladly ruin your life.
This is how systems fall apart and even revolutions begin. Once the process of eroding trust begins, it's impossible to reverse.
And be the fool if you think it will be cleaned up anytime soon.
The best you can do to exercise your rights is to join the Canadian Taxpayers Federation and/or the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. These two organizations speak on our behalf as one voice and do great work bringing our concerns to decision makers.
An active, informed and vigilant population is the only way to combat this.
If there is any lesson to be learned with the arrival of Uber and Lyft on the transportation landscape it's that government needs to get out of the way of business lest it thwarts inevitable progress. This new way forward also brings into question the concept of licenses and permits and its hideous and often corrupt mark on the market. Permits and licenses are impediments and obstacles (just like $15 minimum wage will likely wreak havoc on people) to employment in a naturally free market where people voluntarily wish to enter private contracts.
It's nothing but a racket at this point. More importantly, it smashes once and for all the notion government keeps a level playing field in the market place. No it doesn't. It plays favorites through cronyism (see Bombardier, 2008 market crash with the subsequent bail out etc.) and creates monopolies.
But this 'top-down' mentality is ingrained and embedded into our psyche at this point and is in dire need of some adjustment if not reprogramming.
When the Liberals proposed $835 million in hopes of making Waterloo the next 'Silicon Valley' it should immediately raised a bemused skeptical eyebrow. For starters, this is not how Silicon Valley was made. The government didn't say 'here's some money now go Silicon' which is what Ottawa seems to think things work. Next that springs to mind is silicon production. I would think a country needs to have a lot of it and where it's missing find ways to import it without smashing margins. I didn't see exactly how they plan to overcome this potential obstacle. How do they plan to compete other tech hubs? Never mind the world, there are a dozen other hubs - outside Silicon Valley - in the continental USA alone Waterloo would have to surpass first before challenging SV. Waterloo is a fine institution and is by all standards world class but it's one thing to be among the best and to claim to want to make it the best.
Or what is the plan to attract engineers and designers from, say, Massachusetts? What incentives do they have to come here? What can we offer them they can't already find within the United States?
They think they will achieve their goals for $835 million? Yeah, I don't think so.
I digress.
My point is it's ridiculously absurd to think government spurs all this.
The formula and recipe is simple. Free minds, innovative ideas, free markets and leave them alone.
But it's a lesson progressives are determined to ignore or believe is not accurate and so far they're doing their best to make things unnecessarily ugly. And with it comes a whole heaping of hilarious hypocrisy as we've seen with faux-socialist and populist Bernie 'Grandpa Gulag' Sanders. He rails and rants against this and that blah, blah blah and one of those companies he has attacked is Uber. A company it has been found he and his staff use exclusively.
And people are to take such hypocrisy seriously? Just like enviro-celebrities jet setting on their private jets and yachts spewing nonsensical bull shit about climate change.
I tell ya. It takes a village to sometimes give life to irrational thought.
Witness the inane and pointless fight against Uber in Germany and France. Of course. Those are places that never shook off its paternalism. Its socialist tendencies are entrenched into a labor force now firmly comfortable in its self-entitled mind set. Compete? Are you mad?!
Europe, as I repeatedly remind, is the last place we should look to emulate. We have our own way of operating and for now it's much healthier where business is concerned. However, I'm not liking the track we're on.
The bottom line is consumer choices and demands have changed quite dramatically. Millennials, for better of for worse, are simply not buying cars anymore. And quite frankly, I think they're onto something because the cost of purchasing or leasing a brand new car is obscene (which is why I highly recommend used and second-hand) thanks, of course, to government regulation. Just like it inflates the cost of everything from health services to education it pumps up the price of a car.
Again, basic economics. It's irrational to think companies want higher prices. That's not how achieving profits work. If you price yourself out of a market you're dead. Economies of scale and competition have and will always put downward pressure on prices. I don't give a shit what you're retarded Marxist professor or politicians looking to score votes of our ignorance tell you. It has no basis in reality or fact.
The trend is clear. Where teens used to count the days to getting their driver's permit (almost 50% of 16 year-old kids got their permits back in the 1970s and 1980s.) That figure is down to half of that. The romantic idea of owning a car and representing freedom seem to be gone. All three of my niece and nephews are in their late teens and early 20s and see no rush to get one as they freely move around town with various apps.
And the government wants to fight this by taking on Uber? Just who are the impractical and unrealistic people here?
Stop worrying about the bomb and learn to love it.
I'm so glad Canada is back. We have our virtues back in order now.
But hey. As Dion notes. If we don't someone else will!
It's actually worse than that. Part of 'Canada's values' so espoused vigorous is one in which they adhere to peacekeeping and being an upstanding member of the UN, while focusing on climate change and women's rights.
Got that?
Sooooo let's do business with? Saudi Arabia! A petrol-state with a horrific human rights record and - given it is the home of Wahbabism - net exporter of terrorism that isn't all that into peacekeeping.
"...Into the mix Dion throws the sociologist Max Weber’s distinction between the ethics of conviction (which holds fast to one’s beliefs
regardless of the consequences) and the ethics of responsibility (which
takes consequences into account when deciding how to act). After noting
the futility of being a purist about convictions (e.g. Gandhi’s pacifism
would have got him gassed by Hitler), Dion needs to head off the idea
that supporters of an ethic of responsibility “lack conviction.” So he
invents something entirely new: the ethics of “responsible conviction,” a
formulation that means “that my values and convictions include the
sense of responsibility.”
All word salad. That's all the Liberals excel at. They know it works and people eat it up. They just pulled a similar stunt with the budget. How a guy like Morneau could possibly believe half the stuff he mentioned in the speech is a little beyond me to grasp.
Canada is back indeed.
***
As noted many and multiple times here, SJW and people who shout 'cultural appropriation' are ignorant loud mouth'd shnooks.
Watch this repugnant woman accost a white man accusing of him of 'cultural appropriation' for having the temerity of having dreadlocks. Pay special close attention to her smug smirk. She's a sociopath. Worse, she physically attacks him and claims he attacked her! I bet you anything this idiot eats pizza and pasta. If so...cultural appropriation because, I reckon, she's not Italian!
Lord, the stupidity of it all. And College/University Presidents across the continent actually pay attention to these buffoons.
Yeah, um, it's not an exclusive part of Jamaican or black culture. In fact, it goes farther back all the way to the Ancient Greeks, Indians, Buddhists and Jews.
You know, when you hear on anti-tobacco ads the claim 'smoking causes cancer'?
Yeah, well, it's not true. Well, it may in some cases, but there is no empirical study that conclusively determines smoking causes cancer in all cases. Heck, I'd be happy if I'd come across one concluding in a majority of cases. Alas, it's just not to be.
"...Surprisingly, fewer than 10 percent of lifelong smokers will get
lung cancer. Fewer yet will contract the long list of other cancers,
such as throat or mouth cancers. In the game of risk, you're more
likely to have a condom break than to get cancer from smoking.
That the majority of smokers beat cancer doesn't make for effective
anti-smoking campaigning. So the statistics are turned around: Smoking
accounts for 30 percent of all cancer deaths and 87 percent of lung
cancer deaths; the risk of developing lung cancer is about 23 times
higher in male smokers compared to non-smokers; smoking is associated
with increased risk of at least 15 types of cancer; or that smoking
causes millions of deaths worldwide."
"...Part of the problem of the misconception of real risks is the
emphasis on smoking and lung cancer. The greater danger is from
vascular diseases leading to heart attacks and stroke, which kill more
smokers than all cancers combined. Toxins in the tobacco smoke cause
inflammation and hardening in the arteries.
Fear, fear and lies to get the point across and with it comes the excuse to tax and steal liberty.
Same tactics are used to scare people into believing climate change is set to devour us all and that plastic bag bans are could for the environment.
Just bull shit pimped by irrationalists and pushed by stupid politicians interested in looking good and smart at cocktail parties.
"...As ludicrous as that is, the medical and lay press is littered with such pabulum and
gobbledygook. Even as web literate physician, it took me over 50 hours of internet time to
find enough raw data to write this article. I went through thousands of abstracts
and numerous articles, only to find two articles that even questioned the degree of
correlation between smoking and lung cancer (British lung cancer rates do not correlating
to smoking rates) and another two articles which questioned the link
between second hand smoke (passive smoking) and lung cancer.Everywhere I
looked, the information was hidden in terms like "odds ratio," "relative
risk," or "annualized mortality rate..."
"...If they would say that smoking increases the incidence of lung cancer or that smoking
is a risk factor in the development of lung cancer, then I would agree. The purpose of
this article is to emphasize the need to use language appropriately in
both the medical and
scientific literature (the media, as a whole, may be a lost cause).
Everything in life has risk; just going to work each day has risk. Are we supposed to
live our lives in bed, hiding under the blanket in case a tornado should come into our
bedroom? We in science, have a duty to give the public accurate information and then let
them decide for themselves what risk is appropriate. To do otherwise is
a subtle imposition of our biases on the populace."
Just learn to read how they frame things. Once you learn the game, you can spot - snaps finger - bull shit from a mile away.
"A YARRA councillor wants to see more ‘green and red lady’ pedestrian
signals installed across the inner city to promote gender equality.
Yarra
Council and VicRoads announced yesterday the silhouette of a woman
would be installed at a new pedestrian crossing in Richmond.
The
council last night passed a motion that at new signalised pedestrian
crossings, the ‘green and red lady’ be installed in place of the
illuminated man, subject to VicRoads approval."
Idiocracy. ***
***
I find it amusing to hear Quebec talk smugly about Donald Trump. This in a place where institutional racism is still a thing and one that is no stranger to Trumpian radio hosts. Shoot, just read the cover of Le Journal de Montreal from time to time to see we're already in Trumpland with the most recent outrage of Ontarians have the audacity to buy St-Hubert. Just look at the PQ's Charter or how we justify discrimination for our punitive language laws and hiring practices, for example, within the Montreal Canadiens.
Food labels are useless largely because we simply are too diverse a species to even remotely control with such things. Placing a 'daily' amount figure is pointless since different people get affected by different things in different amounts and portions. Where 5g of sugar may impact someone may not have the same affect on another. From genetics to lifestyle, the permutations are endless.
But apparently food labels and taxes will do the trick.
It's retarded.
Again, more 'one size fits all' alarmist responses to a perceived problem.
Naturally, the solution is to use inefficient taxes that will not lead to the desired goals.
These damn people will not listen to our demands!
And yes, the letter the sugar industry wrote is accurate.
Tax away. But you don't have the right to spin the unintended consequences in your favor.
The idea that a publication needs to write an article explaining why it's okay for progressives to give to charities only points to the criticism of they being cheap bastards who live vicariously through the state.
After all, why give if the government should be taking care of it, right?
Pathetic. My patience with their insipid views of human nature is wearing thin. And they seem to be doubling down on their idiocy.
Her immigration policy against the wishes of Germans coupled with an increasingly aggressive stance by its central bank can only leave a continent nervous.
"We know that we are going to face a unique
challenge with the opening of the first Starbucks store in Italy, the
country of coffee, and we are confident that Italian people are ready to
live the Starbucks experience, as already occurs in many other
markets," said Antonio Percassi, president of Percassi, according to a
news release. And if Starbucks can't win them over with taste, it's willing to try flattery and deference. "Starbucks history is directly linked to the way
the Italians created and executed the perfect shot of espresso," said
Howard Schultz, chief executive of Starbucks. "Everything that we've
done sits on the foundation of those wonderful experiences many of us
have had in Italy, and we've aspired to be a respectful steward of that
legacy for 45 years. Now we're going to try, with great humility and
respect, to share what we've been doing and what we've learned through
our first retail presence in Italy."
"George Martin was the greatest music producer who ever lived. And perhaps the least likely.
His work alone stands testament to his production genius. He was the
man who discovered, nurtured and facilitated the explosive growth of The
Beatles, and in so doing he played an irreplaceable part in a cultural
revolution that changed the world. Whatever else he did (and he did
plenty), those eight years he spent (from 1962 to 1970) as the musical
guide, educator, protector and partner to John, Paul, George and Ringo
ensure his legendary status. Of all the people who could claim fifth
Beatle status, Martin was the closest to making the quartet a quintet."
The Beatles. Forever.
The problem with all these research studies that eventually are proven wrong is it already infiltrated and polluted minds.
It's not just medical. It's something we see across the social spectrum From the 'vaccine causes autism' (just to show its power over people - including celebrities like De Niro and McCarthy still actually take it seriously) to the climate change scare to the smoking causes cancer to the 1 in 5 rape on campus hysteria to gun control.
All rooted in dubious arguments and faulty premises.
"It’s quite interesting indeed when both progressives and
conservatives seem to be nostalgic for those good ol’ days in the 1950s,
for different reasons, of course. Conservatives want to go back to the
nuclear Leave It to Beaver family and what not while liberals
like to talk about those 90-percent tax rates that we owe our prosperity
to. Or something like that. We’ll focus on the latter for the time
being.
Bernie Sanders noted that
“When radical, socialist Dwight D. Eisenhower was president, I think
the highest marginal tax rate was something like 90 percent.” Paul Krugman said the same thing as did Michael Moore in his film Capitalism: A Love Story and you’ll see this factoid repeated on countless memes floating around the Internet.
However,
what a tax rate is and what is actually paid are two very different
things. Indeed, in 1955, the only people paying 90 percent (actually 91
percent) were those making over $3,425,766 when adjusted for inflation. And these are marginal rates, so they only paid that on any earnings above that threshold..."
It's amazing how people actually think and believe the government "creates" jobs. I guess it's all in how you define "create". To classical liberals, the definitions is far more strict and abstract than the prevailing progressive zero-sum concept.
For example, a business creates jobs through an idea or product it invests in to fill a demand. This eventually leads to all sorts of "wealth creation". The government doesn't produce or sell anything. It's a bureaucracy that collects taxes from tax payers who create the wealth and then turns around and starts projects with them. The latter being up for debate if it's actual 'wealth creation.
Canada Revenue officials demanded, and
offered, secrecy in a no-penalty, no-prosecution deal to high net worth
clients of accounting giant KPMG involved in a dodgy offshore tax
scheme. (CBC)
The amnesty allows for "high net worth" clients of the accounting
giant KPMG to be free from any future civil or criminal prosecution — as
well as any penalties or fines — for their involvement in the
controversial scheme."
How about you grow a pair, arrest and deport those assholes?
Novel idea, eh?
***
Vice may have overstated the in the documentary on HBO Killing Cancer but it's promising nonetheless. I recommend watching it if you can find it.
In fact, it's a significant break through in the fight against cancer.
"William C. Phelps, Ph.D., a program director at the
American Cancer Society, said he is “very excited” about the treatments
highlighted in the “Killing Cancer” report, but he feels the program may
have “overstated a bit” the outlook for a cure.
“I
have every reason to believe we will succeed,” said Phelps. “I don’t
want to throw cold water all over this, but it’s too early.”
Usually, when someone or something claims to have a breakthrough, it gets refuted pretty quickly. The fact they didn't do this here suggests to me they're on to something.
"...Using this framework,we demonstrate that on average, the basic social values of Muslim migrants fall roughly mid-way between those prevailing in their country of origin and their country of destination. We conclude that Muslim migrants do not move to Western countries with rigidly fixed attitudes; instead, they gradually absorb much of the host culture, as assimilation theories suggests."
Making the announcement on social media on Monday, the group of
around 20 demonstrators confirmed they had moved into Charles Stewart
House - the university’s financial building - in the city’s Chambers
Street."
In
recent weeks, the U.S. military—led by its Africa and Special Operations
Commands—have pushed for more airstrikes and the deployment of elite
troops, particularly in the city of Sirte. The hometown of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, the city is now under ISIS control and serving as a regional epicenter for the terror group.
...The administration had said that it would not intervene until Libya,
which now is governed by two rival governments on opposite sides of the
country, had created a single entity to govern the state."
Well, they already intervened once. It's just that they don't want to is all.
Libya will be the next hub thanks to Obama's strange way of fighting terrorism. An unstable country is exactly how ISIS steps in yet the Americans aren't interested in preventing this.
More than 50 Somali immigrant Muslims at Ariens
protested the company's recent enforcement of a policy of two 10-minute
breaks per work shift — without accommodations for unscheduled prayer
time."
"A century ago, just as markets were attracting women to professional
life, government regulation in the United States specifically targeted
women to restrict their professional choices. The regulations were
designed to drive them out of offices and factories and back into their
homes — for their own good and the good of their families, their
communities, and the future of the race..."
"...The real story, which is only beginning to emerge within the academic
literature, is striking. It upends prevailing narratives about the
relationship between government and women’s rights. Many cornerstones of
the early welfare and regulatory state were designed to hobble women’s
personal liberty and economic advancement. They were not progressive but
reactionary, an attempt to turn back the clock...."
"...New clerical jobs, unknown a century earlier, were everywhere to be had. Women’s wages
were rising quickly, by an impressive 16 percent from 1890 through
1920. Nor were women working at “exploitative” wages. A Rand corporation
study
of wage differentials discovered an interesting fact: women’s wages
relative to men’s were higher in 1920 than they were in 1980...."
"...Though they are called Progressives, the reformers’ rhetoric had more in
common with the “family values” movement of the 1970s and ‘80s — with
pseudoscientific race paranoia playing the role that religion would
later play. In many ways, they were the ultimate conservatives,
attempting to roll back the tide of history made possible by the advance
of the capitalist economy."
"...Such laws were completely new in American history (and in almost all of
modern history) because they intervened so fundamentally in the right of
workers and employers to make any sort of contract. The Progressive
agenda involved government deeply in issues that directly affected
people’s ability to provide for themselves. It also created
unprecedented impositions on both employees and their employers. Such
laws would have been inconceivable even 50 years earlier."
Emphasis mine. This can't be stated enough.
"...Such laws and regulations are still around today, though they have been
recharacterized in a completely different way. As Orwell might say,
somewhere along the way, restriction became liberation."
Remember when Obama and Democrats said - with a straight face - Obamacare makes people free?
While it's a little rough around the edges, I think once you get past that the candidates made some salient points. Positions I'm pretty sure the average American wouldn't find much to argue against.
Moreover, you can't tell me they're any worse than the stale, statist miserable duds running for the the established parties.
Above all, I think this is good for getting the libertarian (principles that run closely to classical liberalism) message out.
“The first lesson of economics is scarcity: There is never enough
of anything to satisfy all those who want it. The first lesson of
politics is to disregard the first lesson of economics.”
I keep hearing people - be it in opinion pages or comments threads or on TV or whatever - say 'hate speech is not free speech'.
Yes, it is.
Hate speech is free speech.
You see, if you remove any kind of speech you have eliminated the concept of free speech full stop.
Never mind the whole unnecessarily spooky angle of what constitutes hate speech and nominating the people to determine degrees of hate.
It's all so eerie and it won't end well. One day we'll put someone in prison for the most harmless of comments. It's already happening in the UK where the police roam around Twitter arresting people for speech.
It's asinine as it is disturbing as it is flat out evil.
If you think otherwise, you abandon the right to claim you're for free speech.
Once again, the government is interfering and sticking its nose into something it should not be. E-cigarettes are the latest faux public health scare health officials are looking to ban.
And this time we know there is ZERO EVIDENCE for the panic because, well, it takes a long time to conduct such studies. If they've yet produced a conclusive study linking cigarettes to lung cancer, the probability of e-cigarettes causing it is next to zero.
Leave it to the government to take away something, if anything, that has proven to be quite beneficial for people trying to quit cigarettes.
In fact, they're flat out lying to you.Either they know the facts and they still lie - which makes them evil sons of bitches - or they lie because they're inner circle of experts don't know the facts - which makes them stupid.
Both are inexcusable.
In the end, if we're ostensibly free people, then we shouldn't be fighting government to not put salt and sugar bans or preventing us from using or consuming things like e-cigarettes.
My take?
Government bureaucrats are more dangerous to people than e-cigarettes.
The worst kind of person is one who tries to manage your vices and virtues or your habits by controlling, for example, what you eat and drink claiming it's for your own good without much proof to do so. All have
From plastic bag bans to minimum wage laws to e-cigarettes. Watch for the unintended consequences.
