[Emancipator]

(05-07-2015 01:17 PM)DjembaDjemba Wrote:  

In Canada there are only 2 Conservative governments remaining, the Federal Conservatives, and the Newfoundland Conservatives (who will most likely be turfed out in September). If the Feds lose in October, there's a good chance that there will be no conservative party anywhere in Canada at any level of government. This isn't a co-incidence.

I would argue that both Saskatchewan and BC have conservative governments (centre right), they both owe their success to taking the good parts(and support) of Liberal/Conservatives

Allows them to be somewhat fiscally conservative while socially liberal, a good coalition of rural and urban votes

And in BC, the Liberals (in name only, no connection to the federal party, pretty much defacto successor to the SoCreds) have the advantage of facing an NDP that had a disastrous period of power during the 90's which voters still remember. The NDP blew a huge chance at winning the last election since shams from the 90s were running things behind the scenes.

This fall's federal election is going to be fun to watch

[DjembaDjemba]

(05-10-2015 02:49 PM)Emancipator Wrote:  

(05-07-2015 01:17 PM)DjembaDjemba Wrote:  

In Canada there are only 2 Conservative governments remaining, the Federal Conservatives, and the Newfoundland Conservatives (who will most likely be turfed out in September). If the Feds lose in October, there's a good chance that there will be no conservative party anywhere in Canada at any level of government. This isn't a co-incidence.

I would argue that both Saskatchewan and BC have conservative governments (centre right), they both owe their success to taking the good parts(and support) of Liberal/Conservatives

Allows them to be somewhat fiscally conservative while socially liberal, a good coalition of rural and urban votes

And in BC, the Liberals (in name only, no connection to the federal party, pretty much defacto successor to the SoCreds) have the advantage of facing an NDP that had a disastrous period of power during the 90's which voters still remember. The NDP blew a huge chance at winning the last election since shams from the 90s were running things behind the scenes.

This fall's federal election is going to be fun to watch

That is absolutely true. And it goes to show that at this present time, Canadian voters (for the most part) are interested in left of centre on social issues, and right of centre on economics policies from their governments. The electorate has very strongly voted against any government that strongly champions right-wing social issues.

Canadian liberalism on social issues is taking a whole new level, at the current time.

Police in Canada's major cities no longer really enforce marijuana possession

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada...-marijuana

Police also simply ignored the socially conservative anti prostitution bill that the Harper government signed into law 4 months ago:

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/barely...it-stop-it

In addition, the supreme court struck down the heart of Harper's tough on crime bill. Stop and think about that for a moment, the supreme court of the land overruled mandatory minimum sentencing for gun crimes as baseless and unconstitutional.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/supreme-...-1.3031847


I think it's time the remaining conservative parties should take cue from the BC Liberals and the Saskatchewan Party. Rule number one, don't find a losing culture war.


PS: The cons didn't lose because of social issues, they lost because they took advantage of voter's trust, became comfortable and corrupt, and thought they could run Alberta like their own personal fiefdom. However, the Wildrose did.

[Albertron]

As someone whose moved to Alberta a couple of years ago, and made a career out of the oil and gas industry, this thread has been a real eye-opener for politically illiterate people such as myself. I'm aware of this drastic change within the province but unfortunately I don't really understand the severity of it. I've been so focused on bettering myself through the mastery of my trade, my physical fitness and achieving my goals that this political turmoil that my fellow tradesmen are worried about has flown right above my head. Big thanks to those who have contributed to this thread. I'm feeling much more informed, and will continue to follow this thread closely.

[Darius]

^To be honest it's hard to say how much this will matter politically. Much of this depends on factors outside of Alberta's politics.

As oil prices increased so did exploration worldwide. This combined with new technology has combined to a huge increase in oil production world wide. We now have more supply than demand in the oil market.

The number one reason for the drop in oil price is the spike in production in the US.

http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHan...RFPUS2&f=A

As you can see the US's production has rapidly increased.

Our problem in Alberta is twofold. First it costs more to exploit our resources than other sources of oil and second the infrastructures costs are much higher. This leaves us in an uncertain and precarious position.

We do have a few things going for us. First that some companies have accumulated a lot of debt, this means that they have to keep producing oil to avoid bankruptcy/losses. Second the companies that have already invested huge sums of money in infrastructure will be reluctant to mothball projects.

On the plus side the NDP are leaning towards upgrading our supply. Something that I have always been in favor of, though I would rather it be from private industry rather than public investment. The problem I see in us investing in refineries(something I would rather avoid taxpayer money being used for) is that they will be sold at later date to private industry.

Hard to say how it will all play out but it definitely has my attention.

[komatiite]

Not related to Alberta politics but since this is a rare popular Canadian political thread, I thought I would post this gem...

Elizabeth May, Green party leader and Member of Parliament, on Omar Khadr:
"Welcome Home"
"Omar Khadr, you've got more class than the whole fucking cabinet"

OOPSIES!!

I wonder if the CBC will mention this little gaffe? Imagine if this was a Conservative...
Edit- yes, sort of... http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/eli...-1.3068674


Her eyes have that Discombobulated look you see in a fish's eyes when you pull it out of the water and deliver a solid smack on its head with a fish bonker to put it out of its misery

[DjembaDjemba]

(05-10-2015 11:12 PM)komatiite Wrote:  

Not related to Alberta politics but since this is a rare popular Canadian political thread, I thought I would post this gem...

Elizabeth May, Green party leader and Member of Parliament, on Omar Khadr:
"Welcome Home"
"Omar Khadr, you've got more class than the whole fucking cabinet"

OOPSIES!!

I wonder if the CBC will mention this little gaffe? Imagine if this was a Conservative...
Edit- yes, sort of... http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/eli...-1.3068674


Her eyes have that Discombobulated look you see in a fish's eyes when you pull it out of the water and deliver a solid smack on its head with a fish bonker to put it out of its misery

The Green party doesn't stand for much really. The left of centre field in Canadian politics is overcrowded. There's nothing Elizabeth May and the Greens offer that is substantial and the NDP or the Liberals haven't dabbled in.

Also praising an Afghani child soldier is in bad taste, especially with so many young men leaving the west to fight for Isis nowadays.

[komatiite]

That chubby student socialist MLA really fucked up this time with homophobic social media posts. Has been kicked out of NDP caucus and is now independent.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/nati...ice=mobile

The Notley Crue cabinet will be named this weekend and I for one am really excited to see which one of these retards will be the energy minister. Not a single one with patch experience. I have talked to a ton of engineers and also lots of tradesmen and the disparity is incredible- every union guy voted NDP while every engineer went right wing. Do union workers realize that oil sands are pretty uneconomic as it is with low oil prices and this is prior to the inevitable royalty review, corporate tax hike, 15 $ minimum wage, and greenhouse gas emission control? Gonna have to pray for $100 oil or everyone is fucked in the oil sands. Then again, if she fucks with fracking then conventional guys like me will be up shit creek too!

Either way, this is going to be a great cleanse of the patch. I was looking at my pipeline project manager buddys invoices his contractors would send- with all the per diems, day rates, mileage costs etc they were paying over 2500 a day each for guys like pipeline inspectors and safety guys to work. Its the same on rigs with geologists and Mwd and drillers. None of these guys are worth that much. This NDP world combined with low oil prices will put an end to this once and for all and cleanse the system of the dead weight. This bubble will burst right quick ...

[DannyAlberta]

The Alberta mainstream media is piling all over Deborah Drever for her astonishingly bad judgment when using social media. One wonders why they could not be bothered to look into her background BEFORE the election. All this stuff was out there before May 5.

Except saying something bad about any NDP candidates before the election seemed to be off limits. Wonder why...

[Atlantic]

(05-22-2015 07:17 PM)komatiite Wrote:  

Either way, this is going to be a great cleanse of the patch. I was looking at my pipeline project manager buddys invoices his contractors would send- with all the per diems, day rates, mileage costs etc they were paying over 2500 a day each for guys like pipeline inspectors and safety guys to work. Its the same on rigs with geologists and Mwd and drillers. None of these guys are worth that much.

None of those three professions come close to 2500 a day.

Geologists are actually quite underpaid - a lot of the money goes to 'pimps' who they have to keep on good terms with or they are out of work. Some pimps can have up to 20 geologists in the field. Most just report what is happening back to town and let them call the shots. Some have no idea what is going on and are purposely kept that way. A good example of this is when a geologists in the field does the maths himself and tells us we need to come up 0.17 of a meter at the bit lol. Yes his maths is right but that is like telling a golf player to hit the next shot one golf ball to the right. They get laughed out of the shack and told to call home for the real answer.

MWD - Yes overpaid somewhat but generally nearly always below 1K all in. Easy job 90% of the time but a lot of responsibility when things go wrong (and they do). The cost to risk ratio is pretty fair I think. Yes we cost 1k a day but if one tiny part of any of our systems fails a trip is costing 10-50k. I have personally been on jobs where I fucked up and cost upwards of 20k in expenses. Very little job security and you are only as good as your last gig. People forget we run our own company too and all the expenses that go with that. it is not cash in pocket.

Driller (by this I assume you mean Directional Driller)
I have worked with maybe 2 guys who were making much over 1,500 a day. They earned it. Lots of these guys have 20 years experience and oversee everything that goes on out there. Sure there are some shit ones and lots have big egos but they earn that money easy. A lot of the good guys keep an eye on EVERYTHING and save the oil company a lot of money in keeping things running smooth.

'None of these guys are worth that much'

I disagree. I worked with a DD last winter who was shaving a week every time off a 4 week planned projects because he knew how to pick better bits and BHA bends then the last guy. That's around 400k of savings. Although I mess up on occasion I usually cut down on a lot of overall project time by being fast on the floor and configuring my tool to run faster. These guys (by and large) are extremely talented and can save projects lots and lots of money. At the end of the day its a small share of what is coming out of the ground and the oil companies can pay it or get some new guy who fucks up all the time.

Although the wages seem high on paper a lot of guys easily earn what they make in reality. They give up huge blocks of time, experience and health for a very small share of the profit. If you want a guy who has been around since the days when they did the maths all on paper you are going to have to pay for that.

There will be no cleansing of the patch because you always need the talent and the numbers to keep these projects going. Guys wash out all the time and without the wages to bring new guys in you are left with a bunch of idiots.

As for other areas I don't know but I think guys on the rig are underpaid if anything.

Damn man most of have expensive drug and hooker habits along with multiple wife, car and kid payments. We are already pretty stretched okay!

[Samseau]

Although I understand why people were fed up with the Conservatives, it sucks that the people they turned to will fuck them over even harder in the long run.

I've seen tradesmen like Scotian vote for democrats in Mass for years in order to protect union stuff, then outsourcing comes and suddenly they are unemployed. Afterwards they are left with democrats who push in all the degenerate social stuff such as gays, drugs, and endless welfare.

Unfortunately no political party can fix these things, sometimes an area just goes into decline no matter who is power and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it without completely revamping the entire political system.

[Atlantic]

I don't concern myself with politics. The price of oil is king.
$100 barrel oil is coming out of the ground one way or another.

[DjembaDjemba]

(05-22-2015 07:58 PM)Samseau Wrote:  

Although I understand why people were fed up with the Conservatives, it sucks that the people they turned to will fuck them over even harder in the long run.

I've seen tradesmen like Scotian vote for democrats in Mass for years in order to protect union stuff, then outsourcing comes and suddenly they are unemployed. Afterwards they are left with democrats who push in all the degenerate social stuff such as gays, drugs, and endless welfare.

Unfortunately no political party can fix these things, sometimes an area just goes into decline no matter who is power and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it without completely revamping the entire political system.

Realistically offshoring is not possible because the oil is here, so at worst, it will remain undeveloped, either until demand increases or new technology makes it obsolete. The conservatives already tried to bring in cheap labour to develop it for cheaper, and that backfired and many of the TFW (Temporary Foreign Workers) are being phased out.

Our prime minister, whether playing lip service or not is looking to phase out TFWs (at least to win the next election)

Quote:

Canada won't have 'permanent underclass' of TFWs, Harper says

Weeks after the clock ran out for thousands of temporary foreign workers in low-skilled jobs, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said that, under his leadership, Canada will not have a “permanent underclass” of workers who stay in the country “forever” with no path to citizenship.

http://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/canada-wo...-1.2364910

As for being replaced with a party that pushes gays, and drugs, the biggest issue Canadian conservatives have to deal with is the liberalization of the population regardless of the party in power. We could have had a Wildrose (right of the Conservative party) as a provincial party, but people aren't voting for a vocally socially conservative party no matter how they stand on economic issues.

Harper thought Canada would become more socially conservative, the opposite has happened, its become more liberal. Even the Liberals are losing votes to the leftist NDP. People want their drugs, are okay with gays for the most part, and most other social conservative issues are off the table.

Conservatives need to concentrate on being good economic stalwarts, not cultural warriors. Might not be what true social conservatives want to hear but it's the reality of our time.

[Lord_Perseus]

I think that ship has sailed for a long time now. There has never really been a culture war in Canada like there has in the US & if there has then the left has won it. This in part explains why the Conservatives have stayed in power as long as they have. They have been smart enough to leave the so-con stuff alone & focus on economic & security issues where by & large the public supports them. The moment they try to restrict abortion or bash gays they'll be consigned to the opposition rank for 20 years. Harper is a shrewd political strategist he isn't stupid enough to go down that road.

[Samseau]

Also, by drugs, I was referring not to pot or booze, but shit like Ritalin and Adderall, Anti-depressents, etc. I'm talking about drugs that aren't for recreation yet get fed to children or as a Soma type substitute.

And the endless welfare leads to endless taxes which crushes the local economy in the long run.

However, Canada may not be out of luck yet. Obviously in future elections the opposing party could just run on a money platform and stay libertine with social stuff. Perhaps this election will be a wake up call for the opposing party to fix their shit. Or perhaps the left will legalize millions of illegal immigrants like here in America so they can stay in power until we all die.

[TheSlayer]

(05-23-2015 01:46 PM)Samseau Wrote:  

Or perhaps the left will legalize millions of illegal immigrants like here in America so they can stay in power until we all die.

Canada doesn't have millions of illegal immigrants though. For the most part immigration here is done by the point system and is of generally high quality people. The funny thing is immigrants favor the Conservative part for the most part here. The Conservatives will always do well in Canada because they have smartly given up pushing social conservatism and focus on economic issues.

As others in this thread pointed out there aren't really any cultural wars in Canada like the US and parties aren't making gay marriage, abortion, and other similar issues political issues.

[komatiite]

Atlantic sorry for the late post. I guess I may have overshot some wages but I swear to God I had DDs on some of my wells making 2000 a day (PM for formation and operator) . As a former wellsite geologist I know my pimp got 3750 a day in day rate charges alone (once the directional surveys confirmed plus/minus one degree off 90 horizontal) , of which he paid the night guy (generally a fresh geology graduate) about 500 and the lead 1400 so he took 1850 a day for setting up the connection. Honestly I just assume it's the same for MWD and DD, the company who spent the cash for tools got the "networking fee" and skimmed a shit load off the top but I worked a few wells with a DD who was basically the Tiger Woods of directional drilling and commanded a huge salary of 2000, guy was about 55 and I honestly think he knew everything about drilling in every productive formation In Western Canada. He was really sweet, he was just like those experts you saw, he had the seniority to call into Calgary and freak out at the Drilling Engineers and say their bit selection and build rates were bullshit!, But still... He worked for a decent sized directional company (PM me for the name) and he said his boss took 500 a day from his day rate and 500 from his MWD hand in exchange for the work since he had the company connection. If a geology or directional company gets an "in" with an oil company, they lawyer up and make sure none of their employees can poach their clients. I personally developed a great relationship with a geologist at a mid size oil company and he asked if I would break out and eliminate my pimp (and his super high day rate) so he could raise my personal rate and still eliminate my pimp from the equation but I had signed a contract with my pimp when he hired me saying that I couldn't work for any of his clients as am independent. Is that the same in directional companies???


Anyways, enough with my own anecdotal evidence... All I'm trying to say is that when oil prices plummet like now, the competition for work will become fierce and even talented guys will be left in the dust- it will boil down to connections and luck. Some of the most intelligent geologists I know are sitting at home right now... I know DDs with years under their belts who know some of Alberta's most productive formations like the back of their hands sitting on their asses. Therefore, the conventional/fracking side of the patch will remain weak until the price of oil rebounds (hopefully!) So guys we know who have like decades plus of experience, and guys like you and me who are young unmarried and ready to grind it out (aka very attractive to clients) will likely see our wages drop as our bosses are forced to dramatically lower rates to score work from oil companies. I know you have spoken of breaking out but still- you don't own any gamma tools do you? Guys like us are still slaves to our higher ups... And they can't find shit all either these days. That's why I quit wellsite geology and opted to pursue pure petroleum engineering... Now I have a production background. PM me of you are interested in production and I can try to find some sources for you, I've worked a fair bit in that side. Not sure if you are interested in that as the pay is much lower but you can get Professional Engineer from being a well operator and it is a very secure job, would be decent for you to diversify as you get your mba. As Scotians video illustrates, that side of the industry will never die so I made sure to pound out a couple years pumping wells in order to understand it. Although you have mentioned the trades before. I'd suggest against it if you are aiming for an oil company job, which I assume you are with the Mba. You know drilling, now you need to learn production and reservoir which will tie in well with the business education.... Those disciplines are where the money is at. But if you truly are passionate about a certain trade then go for it... All is trying to say is that if you want to move up in an oil company then you should focus on the upstream engineering.

Wait- that was in the oil sand thread.. Fuck, I'm on my phone so I guess this post is stuck here! I will add some funny NDP pics in a second.

Sorry for the rambling post, have a sick sister so was up all last night at the hospital. Let me know what your game plan is when you get back from South America, I enjoyed your posts about it and am now very fired up about travelling there. Like I said earlier, I probably fucked up with my very generalized wages, I still don't know what an MWD makes... Even when I did geology I'd make 200 a day for 500meter deep Oil sand In situ wells... But quadruple that for fucked up Montney oil wells. I totally admit I was exaggerating... Although those God damn Pipeline inspectors made as much as service rig or even drilling rig company men sometimes as per my Pipeline sources!!!

[komatiite]

[img]storage.edmontonsun.com/v1/dynamic_resize/sws_path/suns-prod-images/1297706224125_ORIGINAL.jpg?quality=80&size=420x[/img]
Edit- luckily picture link of 400 pound land mass doesn't work., my Samsung always sucks on the Forum. Now click on google image search of health minister below:

http://www.google.ca/search?q=Sarah+Hoff...60&bih=567
I present the new NDP Alberta health minister
http://www.albertandp.ca/sarahhoffman

Any guesses on the weight?


In other news, Canadian Natural Resources cancelled their investor show and tell event, citing concerns over their budget plan finalization. They claimed they cannot commit to finances without the Alberta NDP coming to a conclusion on their plans for emissions taxes, corporate taxes and the royalty review. Let's see if this changes the NDP plan to stall out until after the Federal election... I heard Tom Mulcair wants Notley to hold tight for a while because the federal NDP wants to cash in on the Albertan orange crush...

[Akula]

(05-22-2015 07:58 PM)Samseau Wrote:  

Although I understand why people were fed up with the Conservatives, it sucks that the people they turned to will fuck them over even harder in the long run.

I've seen tradesmen like Scotian vote for democrats in Mass for years in order to protect union stuff, then outsourcing comes and suddenly they are unemployed. Afterwards they are left with democrats who push in all the degenerate social stuff such as gays, drugs, and endless welfare.

Unfortunately no political party can fix these things, sometimes an area just goes into decline no matter who is power and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it without completely revamping the entire political system.

In reading this thread it's pretty clear that there really aren't all that many "conservatives" out there in politics for the most part. Sure there are some "pro business" groups that push for lower taxes and try to stem the growth of big government, but once the system gets going all parties are incentivized to creates more big government jobs and programs.

You can't be "socially liberal" without creating massive economic consequences and we're seeing the results of that now. So being" socially liberal" means that ultimately in many cases you can't really be "economically conservative." There are too many special interest groups and lobbyists on the social side that want government handouts to keep at bay, and eventually these programs eat into economic growth and just have a way of staying around forever and building up their own constituencies that increasingly feed off the government teat, whether it's the LGBT crowed or teacher's unions.

There are too many social programs and services that are sacrosanct and the epitome of big socialist government in Canada and increasingly in the US. I'd argue that the overall debate has been skewed so far to the left in Canada and Europe that you don't see the changes from year to year, but over the past few decades its huge. It will eventually all come to a head I think, but for now we just muddle through.

In the US even most of the Republicans are on the spending bandwagon (look at what Bush did, even with a Republican congress for awhile) and basically have to placate their constituencies and lobbyists 24/7. All they try to do is cut taxes here and there and stem the spending time to the extent they can - but who are we kidding, government in Washington is a spending spree and you either get on the bandwagon and preserve your spending programs (by asking for more money for next year) or lose it. I'd imagine there's a lot of that going on in Canada too, and Alberta will eventually succumb to Ontario-style politics and policies.

From 10,000 feet the real situation is pretty dire really. Democracy is failing across the board in the west, in particular on the social side, as we're all well aware of, but also re economic restraint and being able to grow efficiently.

With all the innovations in technology and production improvements these governments should be doing a lot more with less, but instead they are growing & spending like never before (!) and have become bloated, inefficient, corporatist/statist bureaucracies that literally can't stop spending and intruding into everyone's lives.

[Samseau]

Sometimes, Akula, I fantasize that all of the conservative men could head on up to Canada to overthrow the government and create a new country.

It would work because Quebec has been clamoring for independence for almost a century now; we give them the east side of Canada and in exchange the conservative men get the west side. The existing Canadian government wouldn't stand a chance.

Canada is also safe from invasions from the USA because of it's vast size and brutal winters as well. Invading Canada would be like invading Russia, it's bound to lose out to attrition.

But of course, this is just idle fantasizing... right?

[DjembaDjemba]

^^that wouldn't work. Canadians love government healthcare and social services even with waiting lists. Unfortunately for hardcore conservatives, Canada isn't that conservative, even the so called 'conservative' parts. Setting up an American right wing dictatorship in a society that values liberalism is quite frankly just insanity.

I just worked on a project with a few Canadians who were moved to the states years ago by their employees, and they all ramble, bitch, and moan how much unchecked power corporations and businesses have there. And these guys come from the most conservative part of Canada.

Looking at this objectively, Canada under both liberal and conservative governance has had balanced budgets, safe environment, high standards of living, clean water, good public schools, good health care, positive trade balance, and very high social mobility relative to the USA.

If you took a poll if we should join America, guaranteed it'll overwhelmingly be against. Especially in Quebec, they love their social programs and federal cheese.

[Akula]

(05-31-2015 10:51 AM)DjembaDjemba Wrote:  

^^that wouldn't work. Canadians love government healthcare and social services even with waiting lists. Unfortunately for hardcore conservatives, Canada isn't that conservative, even the so called 'conservative' parts. Setting up an American right wing dictatorship in a society that values liberalism is quite frankly just insanity.

I just worked on a project with a few Canadians who were moved to the states years ago by their employees, and they all ramble, bitch, and moan how much unchecked power corporations and businesses have there. And these guys come from the most conservative part of Canada.

Looking at this objectively, Canada under both liberal and conservative governance has had balanced budgets, safe environment, high standards of living, clean water, good public schools, good health care, positive trade balance, and very high social mobility relative to the USA.

If you took a poll if we should join America, guaranteed it'll overwhelmingly be against. Especially in Quebec, they love their social programs and federal cheese.

Good points all, but I suspect that without it's vast natural resources (and lack of massive low-skilled, third world immigration, due to geographic as well as good immigration policy reasons) Canada would be in the same boat as a lot of the other socialist democracies in Europe that are starting to hit the wall economically & socially. Canada gets away with a lot of it's socialism due to it's natural resource wealth. Will be interesting to see how Alberta does now given how it's footed the bill for the rest of the non-producing provinces for many years now - I suspect as it get's more like the more socialist provinces it will become less of a cash cow and no longer be able to support the others like it did. The low oil price outlook for the foreseeable future sure won't help.

Re "good public schools" I think that's a bit debatable given what's going on in Ontario with the #6+ genders" and gay lifestyle being taught to third graders but I think overall the system is probably pretty good.

(05-31-2015 07:09 AM)Samseau Wrote:  

Sometimes, Akula, I fantasize that all of the conservative men could head on up to Canada to overthrow the government and create a new country.

It would work because Quebec has been clamoring for independence for almost a century now; we give them the east side of Canada and in exchange the conservative men get the west side. The existing Canadian government wouldn't stand a chance.

Canada is also safe from invasions from the USA because of it's vast size and brutal winters as well. Invading Canada would be like invading Russia, it's bound to lose out to attrition.

But of course, this is just idle fantasizing... right?

@samsamsam well the US has been providing Canada with its freedom due to our military and NORAD defense shield protection for many years so the least they could do is throw us a bone! Must have been pretty nice for Canada and Europe to get their defense paid for by the Americans!

Canada doesn't exist without the USA!

[Darius]

(06-01-2015 02:42 AM)Akula Wrote:  

@samsamsam well the US has been providing Canada with its freedom due to our military and NORAD defense shield protection for many years so the least they could do is throw us a bone! Must have been pretty nice for Canada and Europe to get their defense paid for by the Americans!

The price for this high. Americans meddle in the politics of Canada and most of Europe. Hell they mess with the politics of pretty much every country in the world. When you cross them your country tends to get shit on.

(06-01-2015 02:42 AM)Akula Wrote:  

Canada doesn't exist without the USA!

We wouldn't exist if we ever started to pursue policies that America didn't like. Either that or the government that pursued those policies wouldn't exist for very long.

[scotian]

(05-31-2015 03:18 AM)komatiite Wrote:  

[img]storage.edmontonsun.com/v1/dynamic_resize/sws_path/suns-prod-images/1297706224125_ORIGINAL.jpg?quality=80&size=420x[/img]
Edit- luckily picture link of 400 pound land mass doesn't work., my Samsung always sucks on the Forum. Now click on google image search of health minister below:

http://www.google.ca/search?q=Sarah+Hoff...60&bih=567
I present the new NDP Alberta health minister
http://www.albertandp.ca/sarahhoffman

Any guesses on the weight?


In other news, Canadian Natural Resources cancelled their investor show and tell event, citing concerns over their budget plan finalization. They claimed they cannot commit to finances without the Alberta NDP coming to a conclusion on their plans for emissions taxes, corporate taxes and the royalty review. Let's see if this changes the NDP plan to stall out until after the Federal election... I heard Tom Mulcair wants Notley to hold tight for a while because the federal NDP wants to cash in on the Albertan orange crush...

Well they're banning menthol flavoured cigarettes today, which is the type I smoke so I guess I'm going to have to quit again. Ezra Levant makes a pretty good point in this video that its hypocritical for our obese health minister to be banning flavoured cigarettes, given the size of her waistline but of course, being the idiot that he is, he goes on to say that menthols are favoured by African Americans, so there's a race angle. How many African Americans live in Canada Ezra you dumbass?

[Darius]

(06-01-2015 02:00 PM)scotian Wrote:  

Well they're banning menthol flavoured cigarettes today, which is the type I smoke so I guess I'm going to have to quit again.

Have you thought about switching over to vaping?

You can get a ton of different flavors. The prices have also dropped. You can get a decent set up for $40 plus shipping. (Probably pay $80 if you go to buy it from a vape/bong store.) The e-liquid costs about $20 for a 1-2 month supply, depending on how much you vape.

[scotian]

(06-01-2015 02:08 PM)Darius Wrote:  

(06-01-2015 02:00 PM)scotian Wrote:  

Well they're banning menthol flavoured cigarettes today, which is the type I smoke so I guess I'm going to have to quit again.

Have you thought about switching over to vaping?

You can get a ton of different flavors. The prices have also dropped. You can get a decent set up for $40 plus shipping. (Probably pay $80 if you go to buy it from a vape/bong store.) The e-liquid costs about $20 for a 1-2 month supply, depending on how much you vape.

I thought about it but already booked an appointment to have lasers shit into my head tomorrow, I already did it last year and quit for eight months but then got really drunk one night and started again, at $14 a pack smoking in Canada is dumb anyway. Maybe our obese health minister should get some lasers shot in her fat ass so she can stop wolfing down cheese burgers!