why steven harper will make a good prime minister

[#juan]

I hope you are recovering nicely and all that. My mother had a heart thing a while ago and they got her taken care of right away. The last time I saw her she was jogging up and down stairs with laundry in her arms and a smoke in her mouth, so I assume they did a good job.

Thanks Rev, I'm fine. I walk a fast three miles every morning. It sounds like your mother is doing fine also, that is great, though if my doctor seen her with a cigarette he would have had a heart attack.

 

[Reverend Blair]

RE: why steven harper wil

It's okay, Juan. Tell your doctor she's switched to those ultra-lights that I have to break the filter off of to smoke. Wait...it might be best not to tell your doctor about me...they already seem to have an unnatural interest in me.

 

[Colpy]

Perhaps you gentlemen so quick to jump to the defense of the Liberals could explain this little item from the New York Daily News

Stoolie: Canada pol in mob

BY GREG B. SMITH
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Alfonso Gagliano has held titles in Canada that include labor minister, deputy House leader, ambassador to Denmark and minister of public works.
In New York he held a different kind of title, according to secret FBI documents obtained by the Daily News: "made" member of the Bonanno crime family.

Gagliano was identified as a longtime soldier in the Bonanno crime family by Frank Lino, a former Mafia capo-turned-informer.

Lino is now cooperating with the FBI and federal prosecutors as they slowly take apart the mob family to which he once swore allegiance.

Gagliano's name surfaced as Lino described the Bonanno family's operations in Montreal, which has served as an outpost for the Brooklyn-based group for decades.

He said he and a group of top Bonanno gangsters traveled to Montreal in the 1990s to let the northern branch office know the family had a new boss, Joseph Massino.

The group met at a catering hall, and during the meeting, a Bonanno gangster, Joseph Lopresti, introduced Gagliano to Lino as a made man in the family, FBI documents state.

Lino made a point of telling the FBI that only actual members of the Bonanno family were allowed to attend the meeting at the catering hall. Associates were banned.

Gagliano attorney Pierre Fournier did not return calls seeking comment yesterday.

For years, Gagliano was a fixture in Canada's national politics, rising through the ranks of the Liberal Party.

But his most powerful position was undoubtedly Canada's minister of public works and government services, the office that oversees the Canadian mint and awards most of Canada's government contracts.

In that capacity, Gagliano found himself embroiled in a growing scandal over potential corruption in the awarding of contracts for government advertising.

In February, he was dismissed as ambassador.

There is an ongoing investigation into allegations that government funds were funneled to large contributors to the Liberal Party for no-work contracts.

Lino was shown an array of photographs and identified Gagliano, the FBI documents state.

When he began cooperating with the FBI, Lino admitted he was involved in six murders, several attempted murders, loansharking, extortion and gambling.

Originally published on November 18, 2004

Explain to me, please, how some mobster from New York even HEARD of Gagliano, to say nothing of being able to pick him out of a photo montage?

 

[Reverend Blair]

RE: why steven harper wil

How did hear about Gagliano? Maybe he was in a hotel room with a TV set.

It doesn't matter though because Alphonso has been booted out of the party. You want to to get into organised crime in politics and vague connections? You never did respond to the white supremacists acting as body guards for your boys or the KKK/Reformer who shot a man for being native.

You really don't want to play this game.

You also said that you wanted to talk about issues, Colpy. Your own words. Yet you keep diving back into the mud. That's fine, I can play that game if you want. You throw dirt on the Liberals and I'll toss it on you Reform/Alliance/Conservatives. No skin off my ass.

 

[Colpy]

Here's another one for ya:

".......Daniel Dezainde, a former director-general of the Liberal Party of Canada in Quebec, testified that he was worried that his car might be blown up in a garage."....(in revenge for his testimony)

Yep, director-general......... worried.

Nope, no mob connection.....Just the Liberals being Liberals.....boys will be boys, eh?

(from an article by L. Ian MacDonald in Policy Options, June ,2005

 

[Colpy]

Re: RE: why steven harper wil

How did hear about Gagliano? Maybe he was in a hotel room with a TV set.

It doesn't matter though because Alphonso has been booted out of the party. You want to to get into organised crime in politics and vague connections? You never did respond to the white supremacists acting as body guards for your boys or the KKK/Reformer who shot a man for being native.

You really don't want to play this game.

You also said that you wanted to talk about issues, Colpy. Your own words. Yet you keep diving back into the mud. That's fine, I can play that game if you want. You throw dirt on the Liberals and I'll toss it on you Reform/Alliance/Conservatives. No skin off my ass.

No, I don't want to play this game, I wanted to drop it after I apologized for saying it was a joke......somebody else (not you Rev) brought it up again, so..........in defense of the right

Like I said, Truth is not mud. And spare me with the mobster seeing Gagliano on TV. Wise Guys are not exactly politically astute, even in their own country's politics, to say nothing of a foreign country.

 

[pastafarian]

Thanks, Rev. i don't mind long posts, but I get pretty damn tired of running over the same old ground with ideologues. You know, you cite the studies and figures that show how inefficient private health care is compared to single-payer public, you show how Martin gutted the system by slashing provincial-federal transfer payments and then suddenly discovers 8O :roll: that waiting lists have gone up (Big f***ing surprise, Paul), you show how HMOs rip people (and the government) off and how health care premiums are the leading cause of bankruptcy in the US; you discuss why privatizing service delivery is not the same as privatizing the insurer and that the latter runs the risk of a Chapter 11 challenge which will end our Medicare system; you point out that if the Royal college of Physicians and Surgeons didn't put artificial caps on the number of doctors allowed to be licensed in the country, that we could probably end the shortage in less than five years-- and still, without addressing any of these factors, the privatization ideologues, just sit back in their lazee boys, do the Bill Buckley tongue dart and repeat "But of course, everyone knows the system is unsustainable."

By the way, funny story. my Dad was on an 18-month waiting list for a knee replacement, which he needed 1 month before.
At the cost of a mere 15 hours in Emerg., he was fast-tracked and had his new knee in 12 days. As hurin' as the system is, there are ways to work within it, and when it's not possible: blame Martin and fear Harper.

 

[Reverend Blair]

RE: why steven harper wil

A lot of people say a lot of things, Colpy. F'rinstance, Stockwell Day said that he believed that dinosaurs and people walked the earth at the same time. A Reform/Alliance/Conservative or six has expressed a wish to outlaw homosexuality.

Saying these things doesn't make them right, gives no substance to their positions, yet they say them anyway.

 

[Reverend Blair]

As hurin' as the system is, there are ways to work within it, and when it's not possible: blame Martin and fear Harper.

Very true, Pastafarian. Martin has consistently underfunded healthcare, has done nothing to fight privatisation even when it wouldn't have cost anything to do so, and has refused to implement the recommendations in the Romanow Report even though those recommendation would directly address problems within the system.

The push of both the Liberals and the Conservatives is for privatisation. That brings us into an American system because, whether they admit it or not, we are open to NAFTA suits as soon as we open that door.

 

[MMMike]

Wanna hear a funny story? My wife went in for a procedure. She waited about three weeks for it. Due to some twists and turns in her arteries they could not complete the procedure, she needed an operation instead. That happened three weeks after the procedure that couldn't be completed. She's at home now, recuperating.

Wanna hear another funny story? This one's from a few years ago, before things started getting better. It took years for my grandfather to get a new hip. Thing is that he kept cancelling the surgery because it was seeding or harvest or sombody had a funeral. When you do that, you end up at the bottom of the list. When it reached the point when he really needed a new hip badly...when it was affecting his quality of life to the point where he couldn't sit on a tractor...they got him in within a few weeks and worked that around my mother's schedule so she could get him in.

I have a few other funny stories like that. People with cancer, people with Alzheimer's, people who are getting older and sicker all of the time...whatever. Somehow when the care is really needed, the care is there.

Well since we're accepting anecdotes as proof.... I also have a story, not so funny. My mother lost the vision in one eye over a year ago. After bouncing around between specialist, she had to wait for over 6 months for an MRI. The MRI showed a tumour behind her eye, so she was referred to a neurologist. The neurologist finally got back to her, and in 8 months she should be able to get an appointment. 8 Months!! You can be she sleeps very good at night. There's our fecking socialist healthcare system. It's more concerned about equality than access, ideology triumphing over results.

 

[Colpy]

Rev said

You never did respond to the white supremacists acting as body guards for your boys or the KKK/Reformer who shot a man for being native.

Fair enough.

A couple of arseholes from the Heritage Front did volunteer to act as security for Preston Manning way back at the inception of the Reform Party. They were booted just as soon as the connection was discovered.

I hate Nazis. With a hot, angry contempt. I was a Reformer from the first.

As for the Reformer/KKK guy shooting a native, I'm not sure I know what you are refering to......but I believe the guy was just a member, he was certainly not acting for the party, or in collusion with party aims....unlike the Liberals and their questionable buddies.

 

[MMMike]

Thanks, Rev. i don't mind long posts, but I get pretty damn tired of running over the same old ground with ideologues. You know, you cite the studies and figures that show how inefficient private health care is compared to single-payer public, ... based on comparison to U.S. system ONLY... you show how Martin gutted the system by slashing provincial-federal transfer payments and then suddenly discovers 8O :roll: that waiting lists have gone up (Big f***ing surprise, Paul), you show how HMOs rip people (and the government) off and how health care premiums are the leading cause of bankruptcy in the US; ...that's U.S. again! ...you discuss why privatizing service delivery is not the same as privatizing the insurer and that the latter runs the risk of a Chapter 11 challenge which will end our Medicare system; ... that's the biggest fecking red herring ever. That point is what your entire argument for the status quo hangs upon. All the government needs to do is get a NAFTA ruling on this, and if necessary make the appropriate amendments to allow us to design a system along the lines of some European models... who is the real ideologue here?you point out that if the Royal college of Physicians and Surgeons didn't put artificial caps on the number of doctors allowed to be licensed in the country, that we could probably end the shortage in less than five years-- and still, without addressing any of these factors, the privatization ideologues, just sit back in their lazee boys, do the Bill Buckley tongue dart and repeat "But of course, everyone knows the system is unsustainable." ... none of your arguments have adressed this basic fact - that it is unsustainable. The cost of healthcare has been outpacing GDP growth by a factor of two or three... this is the definition of unsustainable.
By the way, funny story. my Dad was on an 18-month waiting list for a knee replacement, which he needed 1 month before.
At the cost of a mere 15 hours in Emerg., he was fast-tracked and had his new knee in 12 days. As hurin' as the system is, there are ways to work within it, and when it's not possible: blame Martin and fear Harper.

 

[Reverend Blair]

Nice try, Mikey. I'll let Pasta defend his own post though.

A couple of arseholes from the Heritage Front did volunteer to act as security for Preston Manning way back at the inception of the Reform Party.

Yes, they did. Ties between white supremacists and the Reform/Alliance/Conservatives. You like slinging mud, let's play.

I hate Nazis. With a hot, angry contempt. I was a Reformer from the first.

Giggle

As for the Reformer/KKK guy shooting a native, I'm not sure I know what you are refering to

Prince Albert, Saskatchewan. Guy walked into a store and got shot because he was an Indian.

but I believe the guy was just a member, he was certainly not acting for the party, or in collusion with party aims.

And yet the KKK and Reform party were virtually interchangeable in the eyes of every native in PA. Then the name changes came. It hasn't changed the perception of the natives though. Wonder why? Oh yeah, they're the ones getting thrashed.

Sorry, man...I realize you live a long way away from the reality of all of this, but I still have friends there. There's a reason why you don't see a lot of support for your party on reserves.

 

[#juan]

Just a word on our medicare system.

and some of the problems we have had. When Kim Cambell handed the reins over to Jean Chretien, the country was broke. Mulroney had nine deficit budgets in nine years. If you don't have the money, you can't buy. It took Chretien three years to balance the budget. Cuts had to be made. Some of those cuts were to our medicare system. Whatever you want to blame Chretien for, he sure as hell got the countries books in order. There is nothing wrong with our economy except the continuing Mulroney debt and we'll be looking at that for at least twenty years.

 

[Colpy]

[

A couple of arseholes from the Heritage Front did volunteer to act as security for Preston Manning way back at the inception of the Reform Party.

Yes, they did. Ties between white supremacists and the Reform/Alliance/Conservatives. You like slinging mud, let's play.

Like I said, Truth is not mudslinging. You conveniently left out that these arseholes were booted out as soon as their connection to the Heritage Front was known. UNLIKE Gagliano, who has been suspected of being a mobster for well over a year.

The thing about slinging mud with a Liberal (and I know you are NOT) is that there is just so much pig slop in the Liberal fold to toss.

I hate Nazis. With a hot, angry contempt. I was a Reformer from the first.

Giggle

Now, you wouldn't be calling me a liar, would you Rev?

As for the Reformer/KKK guy shooting a native, I'm not sure I know what you are refering to

Prince Albert, Saskatchewan. Guy walked into a store and got shot because he was an Indian.

but I believe the guy was just a member, he was certainly not acting for the party, or in collusion with party aims.

And yet the KKK and Reform party were virtually interchangeable in the eyes of every native in PA. Then the name changes came. It hasn't changed the perception of the natives though. Wonder why? Oh yeah, they're the ones getting thrashed.

Sorry, man...I realize you live a long way away from the reality of all of this, but I still have friends there. There's a reason why you don't see a lot of support for your party on reserves.

[/quote]

I don't understand the PA reference as in "every native in PA". And we don't seem to have the same level of animosity here for natives.....unless you're a fisherman around Burnt church.

But (and I have to say this) the Feds are paying out $19,000 for every single person on a reservation.

$19,000.

And it is not working.

I'm not sure of the better way, but there has got to be one. And the reservations are treated like little communist Bantustans, with all the land and housing held in common.

I got news for you, marxism and human nature are incompatible.

It simply doesn't work.

Now they are talking about MORE money.

Are they nuts?

I'll have to get Flanagan's book, and have a read.

Do you have any suggestions for reading on the issue from the other side of the political spectrum? Seriously.

 

[MMMike]

Just a word on our medicare system.

and some of the problems we have had. When Kim Cambell handed the reins over to Jean Chretien, the country was broke. Mulroney had nine deficit budgets in nine years. If you don't have the money, you can't buy. It took Chretien three years to balance the budget. Cuts had to be made. Some of those cuts were to our medicare system. Whatever you want to blame Chretien for, he sure as hell got the countries books in order. There is nothing wrong with our economy except the continuing Mulroney debt and we'll be looking at that for at least twenty years.

Too a certain extent Mulroney didn't put enough emphasis on the debt. But remember that the country had a significant structural deficit before Mulroney ever came to power. And I would even suggest that he sowed the seeds of fiscal recovery (that Chretien reaped) with the Free Trade Agreement and the GST.

 

[MMMike]

Nice try, Mikey. I'll let Pasta defend his own post though.

I'd like to hear your rebuttal as well revvy. We disagree on a lot of things but I do respect your opinion... and Pastaman is not here right now. :wink:

 

[Reverend Blair]

Like I said, Truth is not mudslinging. You conveniently left out that these arseholes were booted out as soon as their connection to the Heritage Front was known. UNLIKE Gagliano, who has been suspected of being a mobster foe well over a year.

Martin fired Gagliano as quick as he could. He would have done so sooner if he could have made it stick. You follow politics, have you completely missed the fun and games in the Liberal Party in the last decade or so? Come on, I have almost as much trouble with Martin as I do with Harper. Let's not not piss around though...I prefer naked coleslaw wrestling to mud-slinging, but I'm pretty decent at both.

Now, you wouldn't be calling me a liar, would you Rev?

Nope, when I want to call somebody a liar I say, "You're a liar." Ask around...I ain't shy. I was giggling at your naivte.

I don't understand the PA reference as in "every native in PA".

Prince Albert. We call it PA. I likely should have said, "Every native in Saskatchewan," but I didn;t want to be presumptious.

And we don't seem to have the same level of animosity here for natives.....unless you're a fisherman around Burnt church.

Good for you. The racism here is institutionalised to the point where politicians will sit in a room full of natives and make lame jokes about being scalped. Oops, sorry...that was one of your boys too.

But (and I have to say this) the Feds are paying out $19,000 for every single person on a reservation.

$19,000.

And it is not working.

F*ck, I spent $5.00 on lottery tickets last week and that didn't work either. I must be poor and incapable of making money.

Oh wait, I'm not poor and make enough money to buy beer and smokes and have a house and feed the dogs and stuff.

Wow, you gave every aboriginal person who lived on a reserve $1583 month last year. that oughtta make up for taking their land and raping them of their culture, or maybe just raping them. 6 or 10 generations of destruction must be forgiven because you gave them an average of $1583 a month, including education and healthcare and housing and everything else, for an entire f*cking year.

Here's a plan, Colpy. Let's just forget about the money for a bit. Let's just define the problems, recognise that we did this, help them to find some solutions, then help them to achieve to those solutions.

Oh wait, we tried that before. We ended up with a bunch of rednecks at meetings saying that even living up to the treaties was communism. We had a whole lot of people worrying that some young buck was going to bed their daughters.

You know the really f*cked up thing? For a while, we almost did the right thing and made things better. Then all the Conservatives started yapping and things started getting worse again. Thanks for f*cking things up.

 

[Reverend Blair]

Too a certain extent Mulroney didn't put enough emphasis on the debt.

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

That's like saying that Jim Morrisson didn't put enough emphasis on drugs.

 

[jimmoyer]

Interesting discussion on health care.