It’s clear you disagree with some of his actions, I’m curious who you believe would be better in his position right now, and how they should address the US-Canada relationship.

I think you’re suffering from the same lack of curiosity that the CBC suffers.

I want to know why random Dutch guys thought that it would be profitable to get into the separatist influencer game, and go through the effort of setting all this up in the first place. Why didn’t the CBC ask them why they even know about this issue or why they figured a maximum audience of 6% of the population of Alberta would be enough to give them thousands a month in income? What are their viewership statistics anyway?

Somebody is watching the videos and giving these Dutch guys money via YouTube views. It makes me angry that CBC didn’t push a bit harder to try and find out why these Dutch guys thought to start separatist YouTube channels. Why did they think it would make money, particularly since the movement only has a bare few percent support and only in Alberta? And what are their viewership statistics?

CBC only went far enough to say “nothing to see here, just some Dutch guys making untraceable money on something that they have no earthly reason to know about and even less of a reason to suspect would be profitable, because under normal circumstances it absolutely would not be.”

The whole thing stinks like bullshit, and CBC dropped the ball. We are all way too fucking complacent for the magnitude of these problems and the forces driving them.

There are places to live in smaller cities or smaller communities.

And it appears that the U.S. has more affordable places with jobs today, but Canada’s affordable regions are likely to become much more attractive if U.S. instability rises and Canada actually executes a serious national growth strategy.

I have no problem with Nazi executions at Nuremberg, even if they were horrific, but this dude sounds like a cowardly blowhard who got to live out his sadistic shitty dreams.

The satisfaction I felt when I got to the end of the WP bio and read this: “While changing a lightbulb and standing in a pool of water, Woods was accidentally electrocuted on July 21, 1950 and buried in Toronto Township Cemetery, Toronto, Kansas.”

In the end, he got the chair. Taken out by the competition.

I’m sure you’re aware that splitting the left is often seen as a win for the right, and reasonably so given FPTP and the political aversion in this country to what should be (and are in other parliamentary democracies) acceptable democratic political maneuvering, such as forming coalitions and crossing the floor unimpeded.

Now all those American players can go back to their Canadian teams and continue to suck in the playoffs and never win a cup.

This suggests your advice to everyone is that we should all just give up.

Is this meant to sound condescending towards me? Or am I misreading it?

Hey friend I, and many others here, may be sympathetic to the disrespect that the NDP gets, but your hyperpartisan and absolute rejection of other parties (and similarly- framed NDP boosting) comes across poorly.

Do you honestly believe the NDP is the only honest, principled and righteous party in the country? And you believe they would stay that way when they necessarily grew their tent in order to assume power?

There are very real reasons why someone would vote for Carney Liberals over Poilievre Conservatives, and indeed liberals over conservatives in general. It’s intellectually dishonest and frankly does a disservice to yourself to overlook or dismiss these simply because you don’t understand them.

For example, marginal harm matters. Even if both parties serve capital, they’re not identical in courts, rights, climate policy, labor enforcement, etc. Also, time horizons matter. “Build the NDP” is a long-term project; “prevent a worse 4 years” is a short-term project and there is little doubt that Carney is the best person for the short term project (and perhaps the best person for economic restructuring in general). Most people are capable of rationally doing both short term and long term planning and decision making. And also, finally, coalitions in our government are a reality. In Canada, minority/parliament dynamics make “vote + apply pressure” a real lever. Treating all “lesser evil” as pure self-sabotage ignores that. Many Liberal voters can acknowledge the value of the NDP while also acknowledging their shortcomings. Many Liberal voters have voted NDP in the past when it made sense strategically.

This seems decidedly abnormal…I would have thought private discussions between a US citizen and the US ambassador - likely conducted on US soil (embassy) in Israel - would be confidential and he should tell them they have no right to the content of their discussions and frankly they can suck his nuts from the back.

What’s your criticism here? Is it possible that your criticism is unfounded or missing some key considerations? What evidence would convince you?

Your original claim that having different understanding of things somehow taints criticisms of Canada implies that there’s a set of accepted views that cannot be challenged or diverged from. That’s a description of an echo chamber.

Yeah they’re called foundational values. I believe that people should be free to do as they wish as long as it doesn’t intrude on the right of others, for example. Foundational principles of a Western liberal democracy. I don’t believe you do, and so I don’t trust that you come to have a good faith discussion on anything related to the well being of Canada insomuch as it persists as a Western liberal democracy.

Oil & gas is highly productive per worker/hour, but it’s not “the whole economy,” and it’s not a magic lever that fixes Canada’s broad productivity slump. Diversification is about raising productivity across the rest of the economy and reducing concentrated risk. It takes time.

It sounds like you’re saying “Don’t diversify until you’ve already diversified.”

I’m saying that you and others in this thread are starting from wildly different fundamental beliefs and values, and, to put it kindly, they are divergent enough that they are effectively different realities.

Yes, we have to invest, which usually involves borrowing money to create the conditions for increased revenue.

Did you have another solution that also meets our increased security needs?

You’ll forgive some in this thread, I’m sure, for doubting that any good faith discussion with the OP can be had on the topic of Western values. Their post and comment history is clear. When your pro-socialists leanings have you defending Russia in Ukraine, it somewhat taints your criticisms of Canada’s standards when it comes to a nuanced diplomatic matter like this.

Federal Bureau of Ingratiation

These people have no choice now, they’ll do anything to protect him because they know it’s all over when he goes down.

Honestly if they somehow conduct an entire inquiry without bringing that up it will be inconceivably suspicious in its absence. I feel like that would make the Republican members appear MORE guilty, not less. If you’re a Republican who had nothing whatsoever to do with Epstein, you’ve gotta consider that avoiding the single largest and most disturbing cover up in (potentially global) political history is essentially going to drag you right into it.

I was referring to past treatment of elite financial crimes.

You’re right, we haven’t seen the fallout from the Epstein files yet. Not that I’m aware of.