Short term savings lead to long term economic blindness

Iwas at some friends house last night for a dinner party when the topic of discussion came to our Canadian dollar. This friend of mine was telling me about how much money he had saved by buying some things across the border on a shopping trip he and his family had taken a couple of weeks ago and how it was so great the our dollar was worth so much in the U.S. Don't people realize that our Canadian economy is in some trouble, even if the western provinces are doing well and will continue to do so as long as oil prices are hight, but the rest of us out east are suffering. Ontario and Quebec are manufacturing based economies and most of our manufactured good head south for American consumption and we all know they are having a hard time with the combination of bad sub-prime mortgage paper and slumping housing prices affecting consumer confidence. The economic crisis that our U.S. neighbors are going through at the moment, will move north soon enough if we aren't careful about how Canadians spend their money. We have to keep our dollars in Canada to keep both our little and large retailers doing well because if they are doing well we all do well. People seem to think that if they buy at places like Wall-Mart, Canadian Tire or Future Shope to name a few, that their money just goes into a corporate fat cat's pocket never to be seen again. But what people forget is that all these stores have employees that live in our communities and that the retail stores they occupy generate tax revenue for our cities and towns who in these time of federal and provincial transfer payment cut backs need all the help they can get. All this to say that we live in communities and it is our responsibilities to keep our communities healthy, because if we keep them healthy then our society will remain healthy and that is good for all of us. So why not go and buy something for the mom & pops store down the lane today, I know they will appreciate it.

people reacting

On Halloween afternoon a tragedy took place, a little girl was killed by a two teenage boys who did something stupid. One of the boys took a car out without having a license and not knowing how to drive a standard shift car, to avoid colliding with the car belonging to the other boy he swerved and hit a fence crushing the small girl behind the fence. And now people are calling for the government to raise the driving age to twenty one years old. As horrible as this loss was I don't believe we should paint all young drivers with the same brush. If this accident had been caused by a twenty five years old would people be as upset as this? Here in this province of ours drunk drivers go on driving even after multiple convictions and having their licenses suspended. A few years ago, a man leaving a country club impaired by alcohol hit another little girl riding her bike home from a friends house, he then left the young girl on the side of the road. After his trial he was sentenced to six months of prison and who knows how long on probation. But now people are calling for these boys heads, and they want to stop all the rest of the young people who never get into trouble on the road from driving. As horrible as this accident was, and as much as we may need to look at what these boys did and punish them accordingly. But punishing all young people is not the answer. We do however need to look a how we give out licenses to new drivers. Maybe we should have a graduated system of licensing or at the very least review the standards we use in our driving school and testing facilities.

Remeber the 5 th of November

I know we are only the November third, but in the U.K. on Nov. 5th a man called Guy Fawkes initiated a plan known as the gun powder plot. And that reminded me of the idea behind the gun powder plot although I don't agree with his tactics (attempting to blowup the houses of parliament) But I do think the idea of change in government is a good one, and hers is why I think this.
In the last little while we have been hearing about this so called reasonable accommodation.
And now our right honorable Pauline Marois and the party she heads saw it fit to introduce a a bill for the house to examine and debate that would require immigrants who decide to settle in this province to know how to speak French before they would be able to run for office or even hold a post in the public service. My question becomes what are we becoming? I believe we are on a slippery slope of intolerance. Have we forgotten how this country was formed? This was not a french only society in the beginning yes the English invaded Quebec and became the ruling class that some people still blame for all of the French woes to this day. But let us not forget the fact that in the beginning the French, Irish, Indian and later Italian, Greeks and Jews worked and lived together as well as intermarried to make what has become todays Quebec. We live in a great province within the greatest nation, but we cannot let our fears get in the way of what can only be seen as progress. Todays immigrant comes from places that are very different to our province but instead of being afraid of what might happen. I think we need to embrace their cultures and by accepting them and who they are into our society then and only then will we be able to make them part of who we are. We need to remember that here in the west we have the most powerful assimilation tool, consumerism. Given enough time our new arrivals will have all the wants and needs the rest of us seem to have its just a mater of time. I ask you one question. When did different become dangerous?

Government Offices

Today I went to the passport office in ville Saint Laurent to renew my my passport. As I was standing in line to speak with the lady at the reception who was going to check my paper work and direct me to the right counter. I took a minute to look around at people surrounding me, behind me were two young ladies pushing a baby stroller both of them were dressed in country stripper chick, faux velvet track suits exposing their mid sections. The young lady pushing the stroller had a tattoo on her lower back, but this tattoo was more of a brand then body art it said Bissonette with a stylized arrow pointing down. Now can someone tell me how else one supposed to interpret that? I don't care what anyone says to that means she practises the oldest form of birth control, (if the swimmers are in the wrong pool how can they win the race?) My trip to the the passport office also made me realize what a great country we live in their were people everywhere waiting patiently for their turn to speak to a civil servant. All of us thinking the same thing that this was taking way to much time and that we would rather be outside enjoying the last few moments of warm weather before winter sets in but no one got upset or out of hand. We all waited our turn.