The Best View of Toronto

"Hey I can see Winnipeg!"

Canadian Apathy 3: Canadian Citizenship

"Voluntary" and "Mandatory" duties of citizenship?

Now even less about the war of 1812? Should not every Canadian citizen - home grown or not - know how the borders came to be? This also dovetails into Monarchy, Commonweatlth and the Queen we have now.

Our borders did not exist since the beginning of time - thousands of families had their houses burned down in barabaric raids over ties to England versus independence.  Not to mention how Hudson's Bay Co. obtained the lands in the name of trade.

Instead of the test becoming easier and shorter, the volume of material should increased as so many basic things about Canada are not known at large by its citizens, metaphorically it makes us look like the class dunce at the meeting tables and with travelling buddies on our post-university travels.


http://nationalpost.com/news/canada/taxes-census-treaties-described-as-obligations-of-citizenship-in-new-guide/wcm/016bf5ad-58df-4924-82b4-78ea5168e768

"By the sound of it, the new text will read like Quotations from Justin Trudeau:"

http://nationalpost.com/opinion/c-p-champion-new-citizenship-guide-shows-liberals-are-the-copy-cats/wcm/5653a9c6-b260-4a4e-b311-c37edb0f622e

Canadian Apathy 2: How Serious is the Institution of Bilingualism Taken in Canada?

http://nationalpost.com/news/in-quebec-chickens-say-cot-cot-french-canadian-terms-that-are-nothing-like-their-english-translations/wcm/765be3b9-3770-4235-82cf-a6ee08a5215e

"Although Canada is an officially bilingual country, a large majority of Canadians do not speak a word of French" 

1) I did know about the "P.E.T." translation and have giggled childishly for years driving up to the P.E.T. Aeroport (fart-port)...

2) ....However, yes it is a character flaw of most Anglo Canadians, and with a modest amount of effort to learn French by Anglos, would have eliminated a lot of the tensions and problems we have had for over 400 years. Unfortunately Canadians would prefer to be just in awe of multilingual countries like Switzerland or more selfishly would rather learn Spanish so they can mannerly order "cerveza" from the hotel pool bar on their next all inclusive one week vacation.  

The cultural and historical significance of French among Anglo Canadians is sadly below the efforts of say Netflix binge watching or playing Tetris on your expensive latest iPhone during your 1.5 hr commute on a GO train (think of all the time you could have to learn French....or just putting that time to use better, like learning Canadian history -  another topic that Anglo Canadians don't spend an ounce of effort on nor feel they need to know). 

In a country so much to be thankful for yet its institutions are becoming less and less identifiable to a point we have to ask ourselves "what do we stand for?' (large groups are out there to oppose or ignore the Queen, bilingualism, Canadian history, CFL, CANDU reactors, etc), it is sad to see this part of Canadiana, and the efforts to learn both official languages, appear like an annoying mosquito on a clear cottage day for Anglo Canadians. 

Of course, in Canada we have to be tolerant and respective of all cultures, celebrate diversity.... unless it's Quebec, Natives or Americans....then the rules don't seem to apply, especially in the media. 

Canadian Apathy 1: Even After Voluntarily Providing $10M to Khadr, Liberals Likely to Face 2019 Re-Election

As shocking as it sounds, even after protecting citizenship for known and convicted terrorists and doling out $10M to the Canadian-born Omar Khadr, even on the 4th of July and payment unnecessarily accelerated while Parliament was not even sitting (that is, no chance of debate), this band of self-righteous do-gooders (all "for the middle class", of course), are likely facing another victory in 2019.  If this is happening now in year two of the Liberals' term, what will Canada look like after 2019? God help us....

http://nationalpost.com/news/politics/emerging-polling-trend-suggests-khadr-settlement-may-not-have-hurt-liberals-after-all/wcm/387208e0-45ed-4290-9a7a-922ab463c516

Liberal Looney Tunes: Where is Premier Wynne - In Her Office? No, the Courthouse in Sudbury

Thanks to bribery charges related to Pat Sorbara, former Deputy Chief of Staff and Gerry Lougheed Jr. involving a by-election in Sudbury (where Andrew Olivier was to stand down and make way for Glenn Thibault....out of the goodness of his heart?) this episode of "Liberal Looney Tunes" will be playing out in a Sudbury courthouse where The Kathleen will be on the stand defending her underhanded, tax everyone incredulously to pay for their pensions and the pensions of those unionist groups that support the reality challenged Liberal way of environment, labour, economics and debt.

How can a party this low be elected? Sadly, with Canadians' empathy to elected officials, the Liberals will likely win the next election.

http://nationalpost.com/opinion/chris-selley-kathleen-wynne-witness-for-the-prosecution/wcm/e11eab81-52cd-415a-901b-b03720afef39

The Justin's Two-Faced, Passive Aggressive Politics Puzzle Is One Piece Closer to Completion

The Federal Liberals, trying to please everyone and spinning every decision and platform mandate into separate responses to please the public at large (like a high school student council), has just received the greatest gift.

Although announcing the Liberals are for two key pipelines thereby appearing pro-economic growth and risking backlash from the environmental crusaders and extremists, now has the piece in hand (well, in BC) to allow the "democracy of Canada to unfold" and kill at least one of these "approved" projects.

This gives the Federal Liberals the perfect situation of washing its hands from this controversial decision - the Liberals look pro-growth, but their provincial counterparts actually kill the pipeline washing away the risk of loss of votes from his environmentally obsessed voter base.

I do remember Jim Carr, Minister of Natural Resources making a comment to a group of Alberta business leaders two days after approving the $7B pipeline project about calling in the military if he needed to (a comment that he apologized for - wait, was that the sound of another Liberal apologizing?).   

Looking forward to seeing how this turns out.  I suspect Jim Carr and his merry band of soft Liberals will not put up the fight.

http://nationalpost.com/opinion/john-ivison-trudeau-and-new-b-c-premier-come-to-an-agreement-dont-mention-the-pipeline/wcm/3be682af-cc65-44fe-ba1d-943419d4d52f

Canada is a Big Country: Some Perspective on How Green and Sustainable Canada Is

These are the extrapolative and underhanded tactics invoke fear and guilt.  Using simple math and if every Canadian knew more of their country (ex. an appreciation of how big this land mass we know as the best country in the world, despite its problems - some of which have been discussed on this blog), then Canadians would be able to dismiss such comparisons between what Canada does and can do versus say Germany in this example.

The Europeans are associated more with "greener" initiatives; however, their landmasses are MAGNITUDES smaller, their urban footprints are smaller as they typically are living in smaller and older style apartments due to "urban planning" centuries before even ships made to explore the New World were even dreamed of

Groups, as in this article, have taken "apples and oranges" comparisons to the highest degree in misrepresenting the urgency of any environmental situation, even going so far as to creating them. Thank you Peter Foster.

http://business.financialpost.com/opinion/peter-foster-protecting-canadians-from-fake-eco-news/wcm/9f02053e-7bd8-45e2-93c0-c80d922a2a08