[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[viper37]

If we didnt let any foreign ownership I suppose you might feel better but then the oil patch would never have been developed.

It's a Chinese State Society.  Wich makes me worry a lot more than with any other occidental country.

[Barrister]

If we didnt let any foreign ownership I suppose you might feel better but then the oil patch would never have been developed.

It's a Chinese State Society.  Wich makes me worry a lot more than with any other occidental country.

But Nexxen is still a Canadian company subject to Canadian law, no matter who its shareholders are.  Nexxen doesn't even own the oilsands - they merely have development rights, and have to pay royalties for every barrel extracted.

[Neil]

It won't matter.  Lawyers will ensure that they manage to defeat Canada, because any other outcome would be racist and violate that Charter or something.

Die lawyers, die.

[Jacob]

Is that German for "the lawyers, the"?

[Tonitrus]

Caught a news piece on NPR about this...

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/first-but-not-equal-canada-grinds-to-a-halt-as-its-native-people-hit-out-8440184.html

...that compares it to the Arab-Spring.  Methinks that may be reaching a bit.

Here is a link to the NPR piece:

http://www.npr.org/2013/01/09/168983530/canadas-indigenous-people-rally-for-rights-around-idle-no-more-initiative

[Grey Fox]

Fucking Indians.

[daveracher]

Caught a news piece on NPR about this...

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/first-but-not-equal-canada-grinds-to-a-halt-as-its-native-people-hit-out-8440184.html

...that compares it to the Arab-Spring.  Methinks that may be reaching a bit.

Here is a link to the NPR piece:

http://www.npr.org/2013/01/09/168983530/canadas-indigenous-people-rally-for-rights-around-idle-no-more-initiative

More Indians laying around on roads and railways, how original.

[Malthus]

At the risk of catching eight kinds of shit like I did last time I commented on aboriginal issues ...

To my mind the issue appears to be this: the natives have a very valid point that the system isn't working and they are suffering because of it.

However, their proposed solutions to that problem appear, at first glance anyway, to be intended to reinforce the existing system - and if the system isn't working because it is fundamentally flawed, stregthening the system could reasonably be expected to result in a bad situation becomming worse.

The "native chiefs are corrupt" thing is a mere symptom, it isn't the cause of the problem. Even if the chiefs were as clean as the driven snow, the problem would remain, and it is this: the British Crown (and hence our government) has in the past promised native groups that they would be sovereign and independent, with the sometimes stated, sometimes understood purpose that they could live their lives as they always had done. These promises were not kept. But more to the point, in the modern world it was not really possible that these promises *could* be kept, as modern natives are (understandably) not willing to actually live as their ancestors did - and even if they were, the natural resources available have changed so as to make it effectively impossible.

So we are putting resources into a system that really cannot work as it was originally intended, and because the system has all sorts of built-in entitlements, changing it is effectively impossible without massive protest from those it was ostensibly intended to help - whose protests generally take the form of demanding that the original, unfulfillable promises be kept (or money paid in lieu thereof).

Hence, our politicians' natural instincts have been to kick the can down the road - maybe shilling out a little more by way or payments. Unfortunately, no amount of cash money is going to solve the basic problem, which is the system was designed to do something which really cannot be done - allow sovereign native groups to live as their ancestors did.

[Grey Fox]

We should take their sovereignity away. They will kick & cry but in the long run it will be better.

[Barrister]

We should take their sovereignity away. They will kick & cry but in the long run it will be better.

I am deeply skeptical of this plan sicne it, coincidentally enough, would be a lot easier for us non-natives as well.

The whole Idle No MOre movement though shows us the problems though - they can't really agree on any demands amongst themselves.  I can't help but think this is going to turn out like the Occupy movement - lots of sound and fury, but no actual result.

[Malthus]

We should take their sovereignity away. They will kick & cry but in the long run it will be better.

I am deeply skeptical of this plan sicne it, coincidentally enough, would be a lot easier for us non-natives as well.

The whole Idle No MOre movement though shows us the problems though - they can't really agree on any demands amongst themselves.  I can't help but think this is going to turn out like the Occupy movement - lots of sound and fury, but no actual result.

My prediction is that it will result in kicking the can down the road for a little longer. So I basically agree.

[crazy canuck]

...that compares it to the Arab-Spring.  Methinks that may be reaching a bit.

Yeah, I think BB was correct in comparing it to the Occupy Wallstreet movement.  A lot of sound and noise made by people with various and sometimes contradictory goals. 

[crazy canuck]

The Globe has published an other editorial authored by three former Attorney's General regarding the legalization and regulation of pot.

Law enforcement officials, academics and government officials gathered in Ottawa this week to discuss how to keep Canadian communities safe at a time when policing costs are soaring. Canada's failed marijuana policies must be part of this discussion.

Last year, we made public our support for the taxation and regulation of adult cannabis use, joining a growing number of prominent voices across the country urging changes to marijuana policy. The proof that cannabis prohibition has failed is irrefutable. We see the evidence on our streets, in our communities and on the nightly news – gang-related homicides and shootings, innocent victims caught in the crossfire, grow-op busts and violent grow-op thefts.

Under marijuana prohibition, violent criminals are provided a protected market that enables them to target our youth and grow rich while vast resources are directed to ineffective law enforcement tactics. Meanwhile, Canada's criminal justice system is overextended and in desperate need of repair.

As four former attorneys-general of British Columbia, we were the province's chief prosecutors and held responsibility for overseeing the criminal justice system. We know the burden imposed on B.C.'s policing and justice system by the enforcement of marijuana prohibition and the role that prohibition itself plays in driving organized crime and making criminals out of otherwise law-abiding citizens.

Recently, a study published in the International Journal of Drug Policy concluded that regulating BC's cannabis market could likely provide government with billions of dollars in tax and licensing revenues over the next five years. These dollars are in addition to the enormous cost savings that could accrue from ending the futile cat and mouse game between marijuana users and the police.

The federal government has now enacted mandatory jail terms for growing as few as six marijuana plants. There will be massive provincial budget and expenditure implications from this bill and yet, our streets will be no safer. It is time for a complete rethink.

We don't take our call for a new system of marijuana taxation and regulation lightly. We know that there are harms associated with cannabis use, like there are with alcohol and tobacco use. But we expect significant benefits from a change in policy. The loss of the massive illegal marijuana market in British Columbia would hobble gangsters involved in the marijuana trade while at the same time raising significant tax revenue. According to health experts such as the British Columbia Health Officers' Council, a strictly regulated legal market that restricts sales to minors would also better protect young people from predatory drug dealers.

We are pleased to see that the debate over marijuana law reform is happening across the country. We recently wrote an open letter to party leaders in British Columbia, urging them to support Stop the Violence BC's call to overturn prohibition and regulate marijuana. Stop the Violence BC is a coalition of law enforcement and leading public health and criminal justice experts who have joined forces to call for the taxation and regulation of marijuana as a strategy to better protect public health and safety. Several former B.C. mayors have joined the effort, and lent their voices to create a groundswell of influential opinion intended to persuade our elected leaders to demand change.

The public recognizes that cannabis prohibition has failed. A recent Angus Reid poll showed that approximately 75 per cent of B.C. respondents support the taxation and regulation of cannabis.

Now it is time to put ideology and politics aside in favour of a level-headed, evidence-based discussion about the failure of marijuana prohibition and the policy alternatives available to us. Provincial and municipal leaders across Canada must join, if not lead, the debate and demand change. Only then will we end the prohibition-fuelled cycle of crime, waste and violence.

Ujjal Dosanjh is a former premier of British Columbia (2000-01) and B.C. attorney general (1995-2000); Colin Gabelmann was attorney general of B.C. (1991–1995); Graeme Bowbrick was attorney general of B.C. (2000-2001); Geoff Plant was attorney general of B.C. (2001-2005)

[Malthus]

Interesting.

Maybe something will come of it, though I'm not holding my breath.

[Jacob]

Maybe something will come of it, though I'm not holding my breath.

I thought you were supposed to hold it in for a bit before exhaling?