A month ago, if you had asked the average Canadian who Gary Goodyear is, she or he likely would have responded that Gary had something to do with car tires. Not so anymore. Gary Goodyear, a Conservative Member of Parliament for Cambridge and Minister of State for Science and Technology, has made the news recently for comments he made regarding evolution. Evidently, he was asked if he believed in evolution, and responded that he felt it was inappropriate for the reporter to question his beliefs as a Christian (I’m paraphrasing here). This story probably would have been nothing more than filler material in the Globe & Mail if Mr. Goodyear was a regular, run-of-the-mill MP, but because of his Cabinet position as Minister of State for Science and Technology, it raised a few eyebrows. Obviously the fear is that Mr. Goodyear may not be willing to designate funding for scientific research that is not in accordance with his Christian beliefs, and make no mistake, that is a legitimate fear to have. However, I have not yet seen evidence that would suggest that Mr. Goodyear has allocated funding based on his beliefs. If this was the case, he should be replaced immediately. In actuality, the Harper government has been underfunding all scientific disciplines, regardless of their research. But for the moment, I am willing to give Mr. Goodyear the benefit of the doubt. Do I agree with his beliefs? No. Do I think his attempt to state his belief in evolution was rather pathetic? Yes. But I don’t think his beliefs necessarily proclude him from performing his job.
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Remember when you used to trade marbles? Or baseball cards? Or whatever else you had that someone else saw value in.

How about carbon credits?
Bartering is still going on between countries though you don’t hear much about it. Probably because it falls outside the realm of the global financial order i.e. the IMF, OPEC, and other oligopolies and their various taxing authorities. They probably would not be amused at the growth of the bartering concept.

Recently I was speaking to some college students. We were talking about global bartering as a possible solution to unlocking the stuck banking system that is fueling the recession. After all, a small business can barter just about any product or service on the internet now. Why not countries?

One of the students is Venezuelan. He pointed out that their notorious leader Mr. Chavez was already well into the international barter game. Apparently his country’s oil barters Cuba’s advanced medical services along with a few other key necessities from other South and Central American countries. Makes sense to me.
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As the Canadian death toll in Afghanistan increases and days tick off the calendar, the more that the parallels between the conflict in Afghanistan and the Vietnam War are apparent.

The most notable parallel comes in Canada’s role as a preventative body against the proliferation of terrorist organizations across the Middle East and into the Western World. Canada’s emphasis on preventative action clearly parallels Eisenhower’s Domino Theory, the basis of preventative action in relation to the spread of Communism, as it applies to the War on Terror.
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First of all, I want to thank InformedVote for giving me the medium to express my thoughts.

So I thought I’d start off by introducing myself a little bit. I’m a 24 year old student living in the greater Toronto Area. I’ve always been interested in politics since the day I have been able to read the newspaper. The one thing I have learned about politics is that I have absolutely no idea what is going on. Nobody does. Not even the politicians. I intend my blog to be a place where people can go to find unique and humorous opinions on a broad range of political subjects. Please feel free to send me your emails when you have an opinion you’d like to share with me.

So for my first blog, I thought I`d share with everybody my wish list for changes I`d like to see to the Canadian Political System:
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I got an alarming email in my inbox today. It was couched in the language of “grave threats to our freedom” and “act now before it’s too late” kind of talk. The item in question is a proposed bill in parliament, Bill C-6. One of the lines in my email reads, “Why do bureaucrats need to bypass the Parliament and Senate approval process to create new laws? These processes are open and visible to public scrutiny. What don’t they want us to see?” (font-size and bold all theirs). I’m skeptical, and the line “what don’t they want us to see” reeks of conspiracy theory-thinking to me. The person who allegedly wrote this email warning was “WRITTEN BY HEALTH CANADA AGENT WHO RESIGNED “. rrrrrright.
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In a world of rising energy prices, a growing demand for clean and sustainable energy and a growing demand to mitigate climate change, should we be constructing new coal power plans or other high green house gas (GHG) emitting power sources?

When I go around industrial complexes and see the huge eye-catching plume of smoke rising up smoke stacks in to the atmosphere, the first thing that comes to my mind, possibly like most of your minds is the air pollution and to an extent climate change causing potential of these waste hot gases.
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Last week Jon Stewart turned his satirical eye toward financial new network CNBC. The bit was picked up by the news media and led to Jim Cramer, host of CNBC’s Mad Money, rebutting the charges. Of course, it didn’t end there; barbs were traded between Cramer and the show until it all came to a head Thursday night.

Cramer went on The Daily Show for an extended interview with Jon Stewart. Many were expecting some sort of public lynching, but what we got was a very serious discussion. Stewart called Cramer out on some contradictory and morally dubious behaviour, but he saved most of his venom for CNBC as a whole.
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With the Conservatives already planning their attack ads against Michael Ignatieff in preparation for the next election, one has to wonder just how swayed they can expect the public to be against their second straight Liberal opponent in under a year. Ignatieff has laughed off the threat, sarcastically quipping that he’s “shaking” at the thought. Defiant words, considering the negative impact the relentless bombardment of attack ads directed at Stéphane Dion had. Now it’s the same party with a different personality at the helm, but perhaps that projection of confidence, the cocky/defiant confidence which the more appeasing Dion lacked, is exactly what might bolster the new leader with voters and put the Grits back into office. It’s possible, for what makes a party worthy of governance, and what makes their leader resonate with voters doesn’t seem to be the same thing necessarily, and the Grits numbers have improved since Ignatieff became leader of the party. But is it enough? Will his personality triumph over the inevitable onslaught of smears? Or does anyone really care? Ignatieff, while seemingly more popular than Dion, still doesn’t inspire the same kind of political zeal in Canada that Barack Obama has in the US (or in Canada for that matter). In fact, just about the only safe bet in Canadian poltics these days would be if Barack Obama ran for, well… anything. You see, Canadians are Obama crazy. In fact, some polls during Obama’s presidential campaign run suggested a staggering 80% of Canadians would have voted for Obama given the chance. 80% in any democracy is beyond a landslide. It’s actually getting into ‘was that rigged?’ territory. When Obama visited Ottawa for a few hours a couple weeks ago, Canadians scrambled from all over to get to Ottawa, just to get a chance not to see him. So it’s fair to say that Canadians have Obama mania. It’s all somewhat understandable; by all accounts he is a bright, principled man, but what’s more than that, he’s clearly an exceptional orator, inspiring the basic fibers of inspiration wherever and whenever he speaks, so much so that he unfortunately seems to trigger a reflexive Canadian self-loathing anxiety. For as much as Canadians love Obama, they can’t seem to talk about him without lamenting about the state of their own politics; carrying on about how they ‘wish we could have an Obama’, ‘our politics are boring,’ etc. It’s envy as much as it is mania, and it’s an attitude that’s replete in Canada. Where and how Canadians get this attitude is somewhat of a mystery, because Canadian politics, like the politics of any country, can be very interesting, and there are plenty of good politicians in the fold. So why the self hate?
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Since its inception in 2001 after the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States, Canada’s anti-terrorism laws will take effect for the first time. On Thursday, Mohammad Momin Khawaja will be sentenced after being convicted last fall of five counts of facilitating and financing terrorism. For the full story, click here