Clearly liberals are promoting durg addiction again
 

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don't do durgs, mmmmkay? durgs are bad, mmmkay?

Actually, the reason I think we should invade Canada is to obtain universal health insurance! :p

The new American way. We no longer innovate to solve problems. Instead, we send in the military to take it.

And cheaper prescription drugs!

Maybe we can force them to take GWB as prime minister in exchange for Paul Edgar Philippe Martin as president.

Nah, I think we should just send Junior to N. Korea in exchange for a micro-wave machine. Or possibly a WMD - whichever they can most spare.

Canadian health care sucks.

Socialism sucks.

Canada's tax system sucks.

Canada's military sucks.

Canadian weed, however, does not suck.

And how many miracle drugs that America bashing Americans take for granted are actually invented in Canada?

You guys crack me up.

No Canadian goes without needed medical treatment. 43 million or so Americans do.

What does socialism have to do with Canada? The last I heard, they were capitalist just like the US.

Canada's military has not just lost over 1,000 of its members fighting a war of questionable legality. Nor could the highest-ranking Canadian Generals potentially face a war crimes tribunal in The Hague. American Generals could. The Canadian military acquitted itself with great honor in the last major engagement Canada was involved in - WWII. Perhaps you feel the need to go give them pointers drawn from the US Vietnam or Iraqi experiences?

Keep smoking that Canadian weed. Apparently, it does wonders for your analytical abilities as well as your respect for one of the US's closest allies. In fact, why don't you visit Toronto, toke up, and make your sentiments re Canada known to its citizens in person? I'm betting that our Canadian friends are starting to lose their sense of humor about now. The experiment should prove interesting for you.

Do you know how many life-saving drugs are available in Canada that aren't in the US?

Are you on crack?

That comment clearly indicates that you, sir, are the Cellar crackhead. In theory (which, apparently, is all you understand), no Canadian is "denied" healthcare. In practice, however, the quality is abysmal for the poor and the wait time for needed treatment and surgery can be debilitating if not life threatening.

Ohhh, nothing. Nothing at all.

I sure as hell don't need a lecture from the likes of you about the valor of Canadian military veterans past and present. My comment addresses the fact that Canada's military is practically if not definitely the most underfunded military in the civilized world. It can barely function.

I don't smoke weed. The original post was about weed. It was a joke. Half my family lives in Toronto and none of them smoke it either. My information comes first hand from the Canadian media and from Canadian citizens. I spend enough time in Toronto to know the difference between theory and practice. Oh, and my wife's best friend is a practicing physician in Toronto. But, I'm sure you know volumes more than she does.

Ok. You finally landed one.

And I find it truly ironic how much you defend all things Canadian while bashing all things American. Instead of telling me to "get to know Canada better", maybe you should climb down out of that ivory tower you live in and get to know your own country better. Or at least appreciate it enough not to despise it. And maybe it is you who should spend more time in Canada. It appears to me that everything you know about it comes from having your nose buried in a book about it and is completely void of personal experience.

You're talking out your ass.

Unless you've lived here and been a member of the Canadian military (as I have) and understand what its purpose is, stop spouting opinion as fact.

I'm a Canadian and have spent significant time in the US. I'll take Canadian health care any day.

I haven't made one claim regarding the Canadian military or the Canadian health care system that I have not heard repeatedly while in Canada made by Canadians either to me personally or in Canadian media outlets.

But, if its facts you want, have at 'em....

Canada spends a paltry 1.1% of its GDP on the military which ranks it 137th out of 167 industrialized countries behind such military powerhouses as Niger, Mali, Madagascar, Camaroon and Togo. <table x:str="" style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 105pt;" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="140"> <col style="width: 105pt;" width="140"><tbody><tr style="height: 11.25pt;" height="15"><!--StartFragment--></tr> </tbody></table> <table x:str="" style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 105pt;" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="140"> <col style="width: 105pt;" width="140"><tbody></tbody></table> <table x:str="" style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 105pt;" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="140"> <col style="width: 105pt;" width="140"><tbody><tr style="height: 11.25pt;" height="15"><!--StartFragment--></tr> </tbody></table>
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Am I the only one that thinks that's a good thing? Really?

You are, of course, entitled to your opinion. That's also about what Switzerland spends (1.1% of GDP/$310 per capita). But, the point is not only that Canada spends less than $10B/annually on its military but also that it is not enough simply to keep its troops and equipment in "ready to deploy" mode. France, by comparison, spends 2.6% of its GDP on its military ($663 per capita) and France isn't exactly posturing for war.

So the real problem it seems is that Canada wants a large military (as evidenced by its materiel and manpower inventory) yet it is not willing to commit to fund it to keep it operational. That is the point I was making.

If Canada wants to downsize its military to a size commenserate with its budgetary allotment then no one outside of Canada really has any right to question it. I would suspect, for example, that I would be hard pressed to find one molecule of rust on any peice of equipment in the entire inventory of Switzerland's military or any soldier who lacks the proper training or any machine without skilled and able-bodied operators. All that says is that Switerland's military budget "matches" its desired military strength. Such is far from the case in Canada. And there is a lot of concurrance with that assertion coming from within Canada's own borders.

I was wondering myself who Canada is defenseless from. Military is useless against terrorism, no nation with an army is going to attack Canada, and Canada isn't interested in attacking other countries.

The United States. Read the link.

And terrorism is not the only issue. Canada has 20% of the world's fresh water supply. Not a big deal today but....

Canada would not be able to defend itself militarily against the US no matter what percentage of its GDP it spent.

And, as an aside, the US wouldn't be able to defend itself morally for such an action, though I'm not particularly sanguine about the deterrant value of that fact if things continue down the current path.

[quote=Happy Monkey]Canada would not be able to defend itself militarily against the US no matter what percentage of its GDP it spent.
QUOTE]

nothing like the good old days when they whipped us twice... 'cuz we couldn't get the individual state's militias to support eachother.

You get your information form the media outlets?
Gosh, well, excuse me. We all know that the media would never focus on what makes a good story rather then looking at the whole picture.

The Canadian military under funded? Yup. Chronically. Has been for years. It does not have the resources required to maintain the infrastructure network built up during the cold war. Therefore aircraft and ships are mothballed. Presently there is a restructuring going on to realign funding from its historic path, towards Canadas' primary global responsibility right now, which is peace keeping.
And we are the most respected peace keeping force out there.
But really, the only problem with the Canadian military is funding. During the annual Reforger exerciese in Europe in the 80's and early 90's, the Canadian army consistantly scored better rankings then the any American ground force. The main complaint lodged against the Canadians were their lack of transportation and communications equipment. Pure money issues.
However, if your definition of suckage is bench marked by the amount of equipment bought and number of bodies in uniform? Guilty. We suck. But, before you make that call, you may want to ask a few members of your own military who were in Afganistan about the suckage of the Canadian snipers they served with.
http://www.stormpages.com/swellal/sof.html

As for the state Canadian medical care, we have problems. It would be foolish to deny that. There has been a drain on nurses and doctors for years to the states because of the higher pay. For certain medical procedures there are long waits because there are so few specialist available to perform the procedures. And not every hospital can afford the latest and greatest equipment.
That being said, I am from a small town. One real hospital (and a couple of clinics) serves about 250 000 people. The longest I have ever waited to see a doctor? 2 hours. How long did I have to wait when I dislocated my shoulder or blew a disc in my back? Less the 5 minutes. How much did it cost me? Nadda.
You can always find horror stories. No system is perfect. But how many Canadians stay away from hospitals until it's desparate because they can't afford it? None. How many Canadians had their lives ruined because of medical bills? Zip. Compare that to 1 million Americans last year.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...-2005Feb8.html

Given my druthers, I know where I'd rather be sick.

I will readily clarify that I never intended "suck" to in any way question the skill or bravery demonstrated by any soldier in the Canadian military. My comments were directed at the state of the Canadian miliary machine collectively. I apologize for any offence you might have taken from that.

Apology accepted.
And I'm sorry if I sort of went off here. I readily admit to be sensitive to criticism about the Canadian military. I was intensely proud when I served and still am of the men and women who do such an amazing job with so little in the way of support from our federal government.
If you want to get into the different training philosophies employed by the Canadian and American militaries, and why the Canadian way is far superior just let me know. ;-)

well.....I think Canada sucks. And I base that soley on my vague emotional response to things I've heard about them and a few Canuks I've met and disliked.

I think the mom from 'That Seventies Show' said it best when she said, "Well, honey, they're Canadian. They don't really matter"

leave it to beaver...

well, i don't trust 'em, i tell ya. you can't trust anybody who can't talk without having their head split in two, i tell ya.

now shut up and kick the baby.

Don't kick the baby.

Ike - do your impressionof David Carruso's career!

*nose-dives from a rooftop into a snowdrift and disappears*

France is also less than 500 miles from Bosnia and the Balkans and less than 2000 miles from Uzbekistan, Iraq, and any number of small Asian countries.

Canada, like the US, has thousands of miles of ocean between it and every other country except Russia and the US. Unlike the US it does not feel the need to police the entire world, although it is a member of NATO.

A long tradition of crackshots. SHOTS, I said Shots. :biggrin:
But what about the next generation, now they've been disarmed?

Canada has a long tradition of stripping its military to the bare bones between conflicts. However, we usually keep a nucleus of highly trained pros and a system of calling up large numbers of militia (your reserves) in time of conflict and using that highly trained core of pros to instruct the militia.
You need a small group of highly motivated pros? Can do.
Need to defend yourself from a large aggressive neighbor? Ummm, give us 6-12 months. :-)

Not to rain on anyone's fantasy parade, but the US would not invade Canada for imperialistic purposes. In all of our history of militaristic adventures we have only asked for enough land to bury our dead.

The real reason to have a serious military is that without it you get no diplomatic sway on the world scale. Against Iraq? Who the fuck cares? Canada can't actually oppose it with force and can't actually assist it with force. With a show military the only sway it has with the world is for show. So Canada can't get all mad when the US goes ignoring its opinion in matters.

Canada will never be invaded because it is against the interests of the US. For practical purposes it really doesn't matter if the military is for show. To claim you need a military to avoid being invaded by the US is ungracious.

Similarly, since half of all medical costs are borne in one's last year of life, and since aging Canadians move to Florida and Arizona in droves... without the US, the Canadian health system would fail, utterly and obviously. The fact that it's failing slowly, even with the US acting as a safety valve, should be troubling evidence to those trying to figure out how medical expenses can be shouldered by government.

Or they would just die sooner. :yelsick:

I say again, don't believe what the news is spitting at you.

In the last year, wait times in Canada for most procedures have actually started to decrease. This is due to the fact that the Canadian governement has been running a sizeable surplus. The surplus is being used to pay down the debt. Most of the money saved on interest payments on our debt is being redirected to health care.

http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/english/media...t2004mine.html

What kind of surplus is the US running?

Talk to me about health care in 5 years. We've bottomed out and will now continue to improve.

said the former Worldcom executive...

While in the U.S. military years ago, I had the chance to visit a base in Germany occupied mostly by Canadians. Very efficient soilders from what I could see. The only problem was at night in the bars. The French Canadians and American speaking Canadians appeared to love to brawl. The only problem was it was between each other. However, really no difference than say the U.S. rangers and the Marines. During that period they seem to do the same.
I guess it was that Psychoactive addictive drug alcohol causing the violence. :thumbsup:

6 to 12 months might have worked in 1940 but today wars can be lost in days sometimes hours. Especially when the citizens are unarmed. :eyebrow:

Medicaid/Medicare have some very tricky rules about foreign nationals. A person can't just show up here and be enrolled with no questions asked. Yeah, you can get treatment in an emergency room for a bona fide emergency, but that's about it. Those aged Canadians would have to get legal immigrant status AND prove that they are indigent. Any strains on our system come from folks crossing our southern border - NOT our northern one.

My father served in the Royal Canadian Air Force in WWII, so my observations about Canada are not totally ivory tower ones.

My point was that regardless of why they move south, they remove a burden from Canada's system.

Large aggressive neighbors don't just get that way overnight. Generally they are ten+ years in the making. Diplomacy, spies, political boasting, and propaganda will long since identify threats. It is why 6 to 12 months would be more than enough time for Canada to prepare.

In the meantime we have this other lesson from history. A nation that operates militaries far larger and in excess of all other nations eventually gets a hard-on. And then wants to stick his dic everywhere it does not belong. The great threat to world security is the nation that sees enemies everywhere even where they don't exist - Iraq, Iran, and N Korea.

How big is our hard-on. We are now approaching (and probably exceeding once you add all the money not authorized) cold war military spending. Why? Where are all these threats - except where we make enemies by leaving our military where it was not wanted.

We now have a nation full of hard-ons. Oh. They are called war-mongers. People who want to save the world from itself. We call it being a world policeman. The world calls it vigilantism.

The Canadian question is now resurrected. Yesterday Condi announced that she would not visit Canada due to their non-participation in funding the missile defense shield.

Canada is hoping that TW is right and that a missile defense shield will never really work. Or that if it does, the US will still shoot down missiles headed for Canada out of the goodness of its North American-loving heart, or with the notion that the US can't be sure exactly where missiles are headed. It is an interesting gambit made for solely political purposes - according to the NYT story, the US was looking mostly for moral support on this and not money.

Bonus for Canada!

Most Canadians are rabid anti-Shrub. It would be political suicide for the minority Liberal party to be seen too closely involved in what is viewed by most as another GWB adventure that provides his associates with money but very little in the way of a practical defence.

I'm against anything that might result in a nuclear weapon being brought down over my head. :)
Not that I think any nuclear attack against the US would be missile based. Much easier to ship it over in a container of cheap TV's.

I'm all for missile defense research. At the very least, it will eventually provide more technology to the private sector, as does most military research in the end. It's a bit early for deployment, though.

Unless, of course, one of the missles hits Toronto instead of Buffalo which, on the bright side, would produce about 162 million kilos of Canadian bacon. Mmmmmm. Bacon.

Why would anyone fire a missile a Toronto? As far as I know Celene Dion is still in Vegas...:p

A more likely scenario is a missle on the way to DC or NY is deflected by a near miss attempt to bring it down and ends up coming landing in TO.

If the shield works, and the US says it won't necessarily shoot down north-bound items, Canadian cities become "unhardened targets" representing the west in general. If the shield works it would become a waste of time and money to shoot at Seattle. But Vancouver...!

Personally, I think they'd shoot at Europe first.

lucky canada. Now tell the cow to stay out of my back yard as well. Can't blame them for not wanting to support a deeply flawed, politically outdated, internationally hostile US military-industrial porkbarrel project.

"If" the method of an attack against America is missile.
"If" the shield works beyond any organizations desire to test it.
And the big one, "If" for some reason an attacker lumps Canada and the US in the same catagory.

Sounds like a lot of "If"s to get involved in a project that may very well cause an increase in the rest of the world to view Canada and the USA as the same.
To me, that sounds like the far more dangerous option.

Oh, I dunno whether it's a good or bad idea. I don't know whether it will work or what the type of attack will be. I'm glad I don't have to be the one to decide.

However, I do know the rest of the world doesn't recognize your level of nuance. 80% of Canuck trade is with the US, ergo the interests are wildly connected no matter what any pol says. Terror in an unhardened Toronto target would be highly effective to the rest of NA.

And actually, it doesn't have to work to be effective.

I could not have said it better.
 

Jag--I wish I could have said that. http://www.cellar.org/images/smilies/thumpsup.gifhttp://www.cellar.org/images/smilies/thumpsup.gifhttp://www.cellar.org/images/smilies/thumpsup.gifBravo!!

Well, except for that part about the cow.http://www.cellar.org/images/newsmilies/eyebrow.gif

Nobody gets attacked for who their trading partners are.
You'll note who's been targetted since Iraq. Countries who were at least seemed to partner with the US militarily, politically or ideologically.

*shrugs* Rice always came across as a class A bitch to me.

The bonus I was referring to was the avoidance of having to host a Condi visit.

Why bother? As has already been discussed, Canada's military is pretty toothless right now. So, someone wipes Canada right off the map. Then what? Whoever the entity is that decides to attack Canada has wasted a bunch of perfectly good weapons for nothing, because they didn't do anything about the biggest, meanest kid on the block who happens to live next door.

When's the last time the US ever gave a rat's ass about Canada, anyhow? Look at the comments at the beginning of this thread. Someone bombing Canada would mildly irritate the US, but so what? Nice symbolic gesture, can we switch the channel back to "The Simpson's" now?