Canadian Politics

You never know. He just might become as bad as Bush

God no.

South America tends to treat them better than we do, but that's not saying much.

Don't we already have a thread for this?

You discuss Canadian politicians being as bad as bush in the 2012 election thread?

I heard that the NAFTA was going to be strengthened, in that the US-CAN border controls on the Canadian side will become more 'American', and the trade between the two nations will be standardised, along with the quality standards.

(source: Here.)

Ugh. I don't like NAFTA. It wouldn't be so bad if we just enacted it with Canada, but until we strip the Mexican oligarchy's clutches off of power they're screwed no matter what we do.

It's sad, really. My grandma always talks about how bad it is down there, when she visits. The worst part is that it didn't even used to be that bad; Mexico successfully went from a Second to a Third World country in the span of a third or so of a century.

Anyhow, what's this new deal with Canada going to entail, exactly?

Basically what I said. Stricter border controls, and standarisation of quality control between the two nations.

Either American products increase in standards, or Canadian products go down.

There's a couple of other bits, if I'm not mistaken, but those are two of the main parts.

edited 12th Dec '11 3:44:04 PM by Inhopelessguy

Why do we need stricter border controls with Canada (unless that's what they want; I doubt it, though)?

And I'd bet my ass that Canadian products are going down in quality standards, assuming they sign the stupid thing, rather than American products going up...

edited 12th Dec '11 3:51:25 PM by USAF713

I don't really know.

Apparently, Canadians are comparatively relaxed about border controls for whatever reason.

Yeah, I'm not really buying this. I assume Harper would sign it though.

Several things was...

Stricter border controls on Canadian side (like matching America's insane craze for ass-naked rape searches... okay fine I been through it myself multiple times now, it's only embarrassing because my dick isn't at full size when they look at me... also when they pat me down).

Lowered Canadian standards on pharmaceutical products. Basically if the US approves a drug, you can fast-track approval in Canada, despite it being very well known that US standards are substantially lower. Same thing with food. US has something crazy like 10x the e coli poisoning rate. Yaaaay.

If you got your bags checked at the airport once, you don't need to redo it any more when you cross the border.

And Harper signed it of course, it doesn't need to pass a vote in the house, not that it matters anyway.

What a load of horseshit.

The scariest part of having Harper is that he'll probably drag us into whatever the next 'merican conflict is. He was pretty gung-ho about Iraq and I think we can all agree that that would have been a very bad place to send our soldiers.

You'd be surprised; never assume on TV Tropes...

Canada doesn't want to continue the Kyoto protocol against climate change. So the reaction to the latest version of 'Kyoto' when you think it is "too weak" is to pull out, eh?

I think the only way to force asshole governments like the US, China, India, and Canada to take part is massive economic sanctions against their products in the form of pollution taxes.

edited 12th Dec '11 10:30:40 PM by TheStupidExclamationMark

I keep hearing about this Kyoto Protocol, and while I principally am inclined to support it because at this point even I, a noted "lol, stupid environmentalists" type, agree that climate change is getting ridiculous (we're fucking halfway through December in Wisconsin and it hasn't snowed yet).

However, what are the economic effects of the treaty? Because whether or not I'll support the idea mostly depends on whether or not it's worth the money.

edited 12th Dec '11 10:33:46 PM by USAF713

Invest a lot of money in durable development.

Which has problems:

• some of the so-called 'durable' development that are chosen for, e.g. biofuels, are not durable at all because they simply leave part of the production process out of the equation! Apparently, tractors and other vehicles use no fuel...
• The questionable emission rights market. Trades emission rights based on the amount of forest...except that it is the amount of forest that was already present that is traded for the right to produce more emissions!

On the other hand, windmills, solar cells, etc. cost a bit to build but since they work on freely available natural energy that never ends (unlike, say, coal) the money comes back very easily within a few months to years.

The big problem is fossil fuel producers and their political power. From that point of view, a few more disasters like the BP disaster would be good.

But I guess it has to degenerate to the point it is essentially too late before any action is taken, with freak weather/storms disrupting society, massive pollution spikes gassing cities (see Peking), and nasty critters that currently only occur in tropical areas spreading to previously-temperate areas and killing loads of people (the biological risks are a lot worse than what people realize, and they are already on the move). Welcome to the Future.

edited 12th Dec '11 10:52:32 PM by TheStupidExclamationMark

What if they want to go further than Kyoto, with even tougher targets? And what is the penalty if the targets are not met (aside from The End of the World as We Know It)?

The problem is that the Tories are playing politics on a serious matter and it's frustrating. They know that asking China/India to take absolute caps on greenhouse gas emissions is a no-go. Hundreds of millions of Indians and Chinese don't have access to clean drinking water or electricity and the only way to get it to them is, you guessed it, more emissions, so those countries aren't going to take on caps now when they have poverty rates that put the rest of us to shame.

On the other hand, Canada and USA are the worst polluters in the world by per capita rate and we're not willing to do anything about it. We pollute at 6x the rate of China and pretend that China is "terrible" because their absolute pollution amount is so great.

There's no way forward because everyone is cockblocking each other for political points at home. Tories think this'll save Canadian jobs, which is untrue. Even now they're stifling markets and letting China take hold in things such as solar panel construction or green machinery. In a decade or two, because of the Tories, we'll have missed out on green manufacturing and it'll be too late to get back those jobs because China will have them all.

This is as aggravating as them selling off Canada's nuclear business. Once a darling of crown corps, they ran it into the ground. The instant it was sold off, suddenly billion dollar deals flooded in. That shit is completely corrupt. Nuclear deals take years to do. Tories KNEW those contracts existed. They sold off the nuclear business at -3.2 billion, had taxpayers continue to pay for the liabilities even after it was sold off despite knowing that we could have made billions in deals to other countries, especially China and South American ones, and just ignored that. Some Tory supporter got billions richer.

edited 13th Dec '11 9:21:34 AM by breadloaf

Those are the same methods that Republicans use back at America.

But Canadians won't tolerate it, though. Especially with two parties running agaisnt the Tories.

And are both of those parties in any position to adequately challenge the Tories?

Yep.

People are counting the Liberals out, but Bob Rae is doing a fantastic job. Besides, the Tories are writing the negative ads themselves.

edited 17th Dec '11 1:32:12 PM by Erock

In a way, yes.

The Tory party is strangely in line for a political party, and the other two parties look extremely weak, but that's changing.

Hopefully, the tide of public opinion should be enough incentive for the Tories to change, but I doubt it. It'd be an elected dictatorship until the next elections in '16 (right?).

Pressure groups, maybe. What are pressure/interest groups like in Canada?

edited 17th Dec '11 1:35:14 PM by Inhopelessguy

The only groups I know that have any power are eachers unions, and considering they really helped the Liberals beat the Ontario Progessive C Onservative Party, I like them.

The NDP are actually ina decent position, especially with their oppurutnity to oppose everything Harperites do.

So, it's only unions that have regular access to central government?

Also, how are the levels of government broken down?

Does central government have more power than the lower levels?