Bizud

How is a fetus any more a person than a dog?

As I see it, there are two logical positions you can have on this. Either a fetus has rights, and therefore killing it is wrong in any circumstance, including rape, or else a fetus does not have rights, and killing it is not wrong. I don't consider fetuses to have rights, because they aren't sentient beings, so abortions are never ethically questionable, and I don't see what responsibility has to do with it.

Harper's really scary. Aside from openly advocating going along with US foreign policy, including Iraq and missile defence, I have no doubt that he's opposed to public healthcare and the Canadian Wheat Board but won't say so publicly, for obvious reasons. As recently as two years ago he was president of the National Citizens' Coalition, a secretive right-wing lobby organization that was originally created to campaign against public healthcare.

For what its worth, most people don't want an election. Let's hope that translates into fewer votes for the Conservatives for forcing one.

Martin's set a budget vote for the 18th. They won't survive it, and we'll go to the polls a month or so after. I doubt Harper will be PM after any election, even if the Conservatives win a few more seats than the Liberals.

Labour is the source of value, not capital. "McDonalds" is not going to pull out of Canada over a tax increase. As long as there's money to be made, they're going to stay and make it.

I really don't want them to until they've passed the budget and same-sex marriage legislation, but they probably should.

Truth. 78

I would feel better not taxing a particular group of people who, statistically, are more likely to be poor than other groups, for choosing to eat food that may or may not "cost us" a dime depending on innumerable other factors. If something's bad, and you want to get taxes from the sale of it, tax the provider, not the buyer, unless you're contending that it's less okay for me to eat a cheeseburger than it is for McDonalds to sell that cheeseburger. And the same goes for cigarettes. As for taxing the rich for the sake of taxing the rich, that's another debate entirely.

If recouping health care funds are the only concern, there are probably less needy people the money could be taken from, not the least of which are the companies that serve the stuff.

It won't discourage people from eating fast food, it will just mean people who eat a lot of fast food will be poorer. I think alcohol and cigarette taxes are bad ideas for the same reason, especially since poor people smoke more, drink more, and eat more fast food already.

I think the prospect of my children and grandchildren never getting to talk to a veteran of any war would be a very happy one indeed, but I'm not that optimistic for the human race.

Most parliamentary systems don't have term limits. I don't agree with term limits myself.

Command economies are extremely inefficient.

First of all, its not like there's been a mass exodus of doctors, though many have left. Two bigger problems the health care system is facing are less funding, and more demand, with "brain drain" a distant third. And, as stated, it can be addressed with government incentives. All good points, which forces us to consider that maybe relying on business to drive the economy isn't such a great idea, if the only alternative is the slippery slope towards an American-style cutthroat capitalist society (and if it's not, what other possible alternatives exist). Anything further I say at this point is only going to sound radical. Suffice it to say that I do believe we're fast approaching the point where we as a society are going to have to seriously consider how long we can continue to avoid the decline and eventual self-destruction of capitalism and property-based economics.

Decreasing population is not a good enough reason for why social democracy can work in Europe, but (you think) it can't work here. A weaker labour movement, a spoiled-rotten business community and political parties that ignore the wishes of the electorate might be better explanations.

Just like in other countries where social democrats have ruined the economy and raised homelessness...oh, wait...

Here's one idea to help solve the brain drain (actually a much smaller problem than it's made out to be), how about free tuition for anyone who puts what they study to use in Canada? It could be done in the form of "loans" that would never have to be repaid as long as you don't leave the country.

Prime Minister, not President. Okay, so Labour won a majority of seats again. However, due to Britain (and Canada's) funky electoral system, that majority was won with only 37% of the vote. Furthermore, many people who voted Labour were still not happy about the war; it's just one issue out of many. So I don't think this can be interpreted as support from the British electorate for the war.

The Greens are corporate cronies who are happy to take votes from the left. The Liberals are corrupt, corporate cronies who are happy to take votes from the left. The Conservatives are corporate cronies, and also bigots. Bloc are separatists, opportunists, and statists. The NDP are far and away the least evil.

There's a dick in my apartment complex with a "Referendum on Same-Sex Marriage" sign in his window. What. the fuck. A marriage is an agreement between two people, what does what anyone else wants have to do with it? The state should respect and allow marriages between people and trees for all I fucking care.

If Quebec can separate from Canada, areas of Quebec that want to stay in Canada can separate from Quebec.

The Parti Quebecois, not the Bloc, are the sovereigntist party in Quebec. Complete secession would be worse for Quebec than for Canada, but most sovereigntists don't favour complete succession. There are more people who would simply prefer increased powers for Quebec's provincial government relative to the federal government, and a referendum may simply mean negotiations that would lead to that (though if the rest of Canada refuses to make such a deal, a unilateral declaration of independence would probably be the next step). I guess it's possible. I tend not to spend much time thinking about it.

Though I'd apply that label to capitalism and not economics (not necessarily a capitalist discipline, it's just the study of the allocation of resources - market economics just happens to be by far the most prevalent current economic system), that is exactly the problem. "Survival of the fittest" does not make for a just society. It only seems fine if you happen to be one of the "fittest," (I use that term very loosely, since it's doubtful capitalism necessarily rewards the "fittest" - most greedy and most lucky, perhaps, with mental and physical "fitness" having some marginal effect) and most people are not.

Sure, Norway, Sweden, Finland, France, Germany, Denmark, and even Britain.