Military vote turning on the Conservatives?

[Omicron]

It was long term Liberal foresight that provided much of the protection Canada enjoyed during the financial crash and we need the much wider worldview of people like Ignatieff to lead us out of what is in reality a very serious long term problem.

I've heard people who talked like they never finished high-school rant about how Iggy spent time out of the country therefore he doesn't qualify (they'd also rant about his family roots being Russian aristocracy, as if that's a problem - gee, sorry his heritage isn't poor peasant stock - and as if it's been an issue since the Bolshevik revolution 100 years ago), and it makes me wonder...

Doesn't it mean he's going to know more about how to deal with the rest of the world, if Canada's going to dig into being even more hyper-dependent on global trade than it is already? His contacts with foreign authorities are going to be way better than Harpo's. All Harpo can do is keep punching down Canada's rep on the international stage, which used to be stellar.

Also, does it mean people would prefer someone born elsewhere and immigrated, rather than having been born here, then worked abroad, and then came back?

 

[earth_as_one]

I did my service a long time ago.
Any 'preferential' treatment is introducing inequality. Why should somebody, even if they have been shot at, get bumped ahead of another qualified applicant, who may have been on a wait list already, for a placement in school or hired ahead of a better qualified candidate for a job. What you suggest may increase the amount of applications to join the forces but will seriously discriminate against anyone who doesn't. If you really stop and think about the ramifications of what you suggest it is farcical.

Why shouldn't people who risk their lives for their country get preferential treatment? When I said preferential treatment, I meant like affirmative action. all things being equal, the jobs goes to the vet. If Vet needs a hip replaced, they go to the front of the queue. Vets should get subsidized or free university and college.

BT, I never served in the military.

 

[Omicron]

Why shouldn't people who risk their lives for their country get preferential treatment? When I said preferential treatment, I meant like affirmative action. all things being equal, the jobs goes to the vet. If Vet needs a hip replaced, they go to the front of the queue. Vets should get subsidized or free university and college.

BT, I never served in the military.

Well, the vets themselves aren't expecting equal-but-more-equal-than-most treatment. Just some basics like medical/health care for injuries sustained, including psychiatric problems, a pension they can keep contributing into if they don't go career, but most importantly... access to education and job training in order to get the qualifications to make a good living.

They're not going to ask for front-of-the-line access to jobs... they just want the degree.

They're soldiers... they *expect* to fight for things... they just want to be armed with a degree when the fight for employment begins.

I've chatted to a few US vets about this, and they expected health-care as a for granted, but after that, bar none, what they valued the most, and had the strongest emotions about feeling like they'd earned, was access to education.

 

[Omicron]

Fiscal conservatism is not particularly ideological really. A socialist party running on tax increases and making spending increases conditional on paying off the debt is far more fiscon than a conservative party that promises tax cuts without cutting spending or cutting it in all the wrong places.

I like the Swedish model too, which many incorrectly call 'socialist' when in reality it's more of a liberal-corporatist or social-corporatist system, whereby its main focus on democratization of the economy (codetermination laws and such for example, which do not affect govrnment revenue at all).

Actually what's interesting about the Swedish system is that there is in fact no legally mandated minimum wage and in fact never has been, but co-determination legislation ensures that during recessions labour can negotiate fair wage reductions with management requiring management to take wage reductions too. In Canada in bad recessions that's not possible since:

1. Workers have no representation on the board of directors, and
2. We have a legally mandated minimum wage not allowing companies to negotiate wage reductions if necessary.

Ironic, seeing that Sweden is often hailed as a 'socialist' model by many on the left. But again, strictly speaking it's a corporatist state, not a socialist one. And I'm not using 'corporatist' in a negative sence, but rather in reference to the economic ssytem of the same name.

I know about how that works in Germany. Did they get that from Sweden? Germany was the greatest exporter on the planet until last year, when China took over by volume..

Figure that out... Germany, the size and resources it has, the (now second) greatest (unpublicized) exporter of refined, value-added goods in the world...

Taken over in volume by China feeding north Americans stuff on credit such that now north America owes China insane amounts of money for the stuff it bought.

You guys never read Karl Marx's chapters about how to attack Capitalism, did you?

You never read the parts where he said how to use their corrupt (like Wall Street this recession) system against them.

Stalin was too stupid to do it, but you're getting it now.

Question... is it because rats reading economics texts read it and think things are so cool they can count on Uncle Sam to stop them if they go blitzo beyond their ability to comprehend the consequences of their actions.

What gets me is, Alberta used to be the most advanced province for education.

Maybe Alberta has proven nature and why some dumb nuts should be left to dig holes.

 

[Veryconcerned]

Here is a quick idea,lets get the polliticians to take huge pay cuts. Pay them for what they are worth $8.00 an hour. Think about it you get more work and progress from a mcdonalds employee than you do from are politicians. I know thats pretty bad, but really look at how they treat are veterans over all. Are war veterans should be taken care of for the rest of there lives with no second thought about it. It just shows how much the government cares about our troops, they are allways cutting there budgets and god forbid if one of them dies serving our country, the family is lucky to even get the funeral covered by the government. They seem to have forgotten along time ago, that we the people are CANADA not the politicians and the rich. We just need to stand up and remind them.

 

[Deputydrew]

I believe Harper is really screwed this time out. Car sale may be in his future. Don't worry about your commissions other car salesmen. Do you really think anyone would buy a car from a guy like Harper?

The military has really taken a gigantic hit since Harper got into power. The senior staff had some big loses, moral is down, recruiting rates and standards are down. Most importantly, the perception on one of our most treasured and important institutions is way down at home and around the world. This has to stop and closing our eyes will not do it. Harper believes the bat is more important than the baseball team. You can't build a winning team like that. Like the economy, he inherited something of world greatness in great shape and destroyed it quickly. Bad advise, bad judgment and bad ideals. This will take decades to repair. It again will take smarter people to get us out of this mess than the ones that got us into it.