You Have To Nip It In The Bud And Kids Learn Better At A Young Age

Mulder

This goes for what is right and what is wrong as much as it does for French, Math and Backgammon. (My 9 year old is almost getting as good as me at Backgammon, which scares me).

But it doesn’t scare me as much as the information in this post by Steve Janke. I highly urge you all to read it and the comment from Correctional Grunt.

The Supreme Court of Canada, in a judgment sure to spark political controversy, has refused to boost the sentence of one day in jail for a Winnipeg teenager who beat a man to death with a billiard ball wrapped in a sock.

In a 7-0 ruling Thursday, the court said the Youth Criminal Justice Act, as currently written, doesn’t allow for increasing a sentence just to send a get-tough message to the public.

Steve’s post goes on about the “get out of jail free” aspect that aboriginal Canadian youth have. I would like to add to this by noting that we are all letting the youth of today off with a free pass in many more ways than just murder, although letting them get away with murder just sounds priceless. This article at CFRA’s website has some interesting info on how we treat underage drinkers who put, not only themselves, but others at risk.

Two young men are in hospital being treated for alcohol poisoning after a grad party got a bit out of hand in Gatineau last night.

Firefighters were called with reports of a fire in some bush at the end of McDermott Avenue around 11:30.

They found more than a hundred young people gathered around a bonfire.

Paramedics say two of them had to be sent to hospital.

Gatineau Police say they had no problems getting the other kids to head home.

(Bolded highlighting mine)

They just dispersed the crowd. These “kids” were drinking in a public place. They had open alcohol, and it was very likely many of them were underage. They had a bonfire going in the middle of the woods. Like that’s safe. And they were just dispersed with no repurcussions.
How can we expect our kids to grow up understanding that bad behaviour has bad consequences? I can just see a conversation at the bush party now.

Fireman: You kids better get going.

Drunk Teen 1: Awww, bummer. We can’t enjoy our drunk with the fire?

Fireman: No, you should hop on your bicycles and ride home.

Drunk Teen 1: Bike? Ha!. Hey Joe, how many fingers am I holding up?

Drunk Teen 2: Tree?

Drunk Teen 1: Two, close enough. You drive. Take me home.

At minimum these kids should have had the cops called on them and the authorities should have administered breathalyzers and anyone with ANY alcohol level who was underage should have been tossed into the back of a cop car, hauled off to the local holding cell and made to wait until their parents came and picked them up. The rest should have been ticketed and forced to go get buckets of water and put the bonfire out.

When my son does something (for example) like leaving a cabinet door open, instead of closing it for him, I get his ass up from whatever he was doing, make him climb up the stairs or down the stairs and close it. The inconvenience is a big part of the learning curve for children. Make it a bit tougher on them to do the wrong thing and they will start doing the right thing.

Yes, it would be far less painful for me to simply close the cabinet than it is to repeatedly get them off their duffs and deal with their aggravation, but if we make the wrong way the easy way, they will always do it. By making the right way the easier way, they will learn the difference between right in wrong. In this example, close the cabinet when they are done taking what they need out of it.

You might call me a hardass, but I’ll be damned if my kids don’t grow up with good manners, good habits, good work ethics, and most importantly a good sense for right and wrong.

Because that sense for what is right and wrong will let them deal with the numerous situations they will face in life which we as parents cannot predict.

Women's Advocacy Groups Caught In Catch 22

Mulder

How will women’s rights groups resolve this issue?

On one hand they vehemently defend the right of a women to have an abortion. On the other hand, it is now becoming evident that selective abortions for the sake of choosing the sex of a child is becoming more and more apparent in Canada and the females are getting the short end of the stick. Will feminists stand up for these women to be?

i.e. Similar to the situations in China, where male babies are preferred in one child families, Canadians in some parts of the country are starting to abort female fetuses (feti?).

According to data analysis, Surrey is just one part of the country that exhibits a significant deviation in the standard boy-girl ratio. Further evidence, including interviews with doctors and clinic workers, suggests a plausible reason: sex-selection abortions. Canadians are deliberately terminating pregnancies where a girl is expected, in hopes of having boys.

I have never stated publicly my opinion on the pro-choice/pro-life battle because I haven’t done the topic due diligence in research but I can admit to the following in terms of what my opinions are at the current time.

  1. I DO NOT support pro-choice as a method of birth control or sex-selection.
  2. I DO support pro-choice in cases where a female gets pregnant via rape or incest/child abuse.
  3. I DO feel that there should be a limit to how far into a pregnancy an abortion can be performed. Yes, Virginia! We have no law or medical reason to set this limit in Canada.

Re: Number 3 above. In 1996, Brenda Drummond shot her unborn son, Jonathan, in the head with a pellet gun. He was born and survived two days after the shooting. Brenda Drummond was charged under the criminal code but the case was tossed out in December 1996. Her defence? It was a failed abortion attempt. The Ontario Attorney General did not appeal the Court’s decision, leaving us with no law regarding this issue.

Comments are welcome.

ADDENDUM: My wife has informed me that if I think abortions are ok under any circumstance, as I do in the cases listed in number 2 above, that I am pro-choice. I still have a hard time accepting this label due to the broad sweeping brush it paints me with.

Is Today April 1st? It Must Be With Stuff Like This

Mulder

Saudis Offered Scholarships For Aviation Courses In US

I am not making this up … but I wish I were. Talk about Officially Screwed information.

The scholarships are available in majors such as communications, electrical and computer engineering, computer science, systems analysis, air traffic control, flight safety, and other majors related to the airline transport industry.

Applicants for the bachelor’s program must have a minimum score of 85 percent in the science section and 90 percent in other sections, such as Qur’an memorizing, administrative and commercial sciences.

…

There are various scholarships this year being offered by the Saudi government to the US, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, India, China, Australia and New Zealand.

(Bold emphasis mine)

H/T to Kerplonka

Canada Day In Kanata Blows Away City Of Ottawa Celebration Plans

Mulder

Every year since I have moved to Kanata (except one) there has been a huge celebration of our nation’s birthday at Walter Baker park in Kanata. This year, the City of Ottawa fired a shot across the bow of this celebration in Kanata by posting signs on every light standard in the Kanata promoting their own event at a different park in Nepean.

I contacted my local city coun. Peggy Feltmate who assured me that we would be having a celebration in Kanata. But this year the celebration will be anything but usual. The planners for the Kanata celebration have managed to get famous rockers 54-40 to play at the venue. They have a better Pizza sponsor. They have a better hillside for viewing both the band and the fireworks. And this year in addition to the usual blow up rides their will be a midway in the parking lot of the KRC and the Sens Roadshow will also be present making it far better than any other Canada Day celebration I have been to here in our small corner of the city.

I urge anyone who is in the west end of Ottawa or the outlying areas south or west of the city to drop by and make sure this celebration is a huge success … again.

Both festivals run three days with Kanata running Friday evening, Saturday and Sunday and the Ottawa festival running Saturday, Sunday and Monday.

What has me sold on Kanata this year is the prime band on Canada Day. Kanata will have Canadian rock legends 54-40 whom I have been a huge fan of since high school (I think that dates me). As some of you may know 54-40 is the band that wrote and originally performed the song I Go Blind which Hootie and the Blowfish have covered. They have also had numerous hits which many will know. Baby Ran, One Gun and Ocean Pearl to name a few.

The Kanata celebration pizza sponsor is also a local chain called Gabriel’s and Ottawa has the cookie cutter Toronto chain Pizza Pizza. In my opinion, no self respecting Ottawa resident orders from Pizza Pizza. The chain’s only reason for success is the large contingency of Toronto residents who have moved to the nation’s capital and haven’t discovered the cheese being used by Ottawa pizzarias which seems to be the key to a great pizza. One day. But not this Canada Day!!

I was proud to contact the organizers of the Kanata celebration today to offer my help in promoting the event and to offer my help on Canada Day itself. I look forward to seeing many of you who feel Parliament Hill gets too busy in Kanata this year. It will definately be a blast!!

To The Big Smoke, GST means Graft and Sloth Tax – Say No To Option 2!!!

Mulder

To follow up my idea on suing the City of Toronto for stealing the GST savings the Harper Government has laid in place for us starting July 1st, I have more documentation which you can read here. Scroll down to the Appendix A to view the cost analysis options.

The City itself has gone through some pretty thorough analysis on it’s two options. Option 1 to cut the tax down and change the prices, and Option 2, to leave the end cost the same and pocket the 1% GST cut in a classic example of political graft.

If the City has all these figures already laid out, how much more work could possibly be needed? I have a feeling we will never find out due to the sloth. The city is too lazy to bill people prices that are not round numbers. That’s what it comes down to.

OS Bookshelf – Predator by Patricia Cornwell

Mulder

For those who have enjoyed the trials and tribulations of M.E. Kay Scarpetta and her friends, this book will be a nice treat. This one is actually not the latest considering a new one was just released (but my book reading list has been long).

Predator takes you back and forth from the warm citrus growing Florida (where Lucy has set upCornwell-Predator shop with her special tactical investigation organization) to the North East where Benton Wesley is working on a program to analyze hardened killers brain patterns in an intricate mesh of relationships.

Who is playing who? You just have to read the book to figure out where all the bad guys are coming from.

This was an easy read for me as I was pretty much engrossed in it from about the third chapter on and I recommend it to anyone who has been reading the Scarpetta series. For those jumping in brand new, it may be a bit confusing picking up who is who, but the storyline does fit in the one book so knowing the history of the characters is not really necessary.

I give it 7 screws out of 10.

Mini ScrewMini ScrewMini ScrewMini ScrewMini ScrewMini ScrewMini Screw

Multiculturalism Has Failed … This From The Son Of An Immigrant

Mulder

In 1966, my parents came to Canada.

My father lead the way for my mother and my two older sisters. But back then, immigrants knew they were getting away from cultures and societies that were no longer providing them with opportunity for a better life than their parents. My father was one of seven children looking at a worn down farm in Northern Greece, a sixth grade education and a future of hard back breaking work.

He chose instead to come to thriving North America and they settled down in a house in the suburbs of Toronto where my mother still lives to this day. He and his brothers went into the restaurant business and helped introduce Canadians to great dishes like Souvlaki and Tzatziki, but they never EVER took it for granted that the burger and fries would be the staples on the menus.

To this day, my father’s four surviving brothers all work in the restaurant business and have been pretty successful at it.

My father, no longer with us, used to tell me about what it was like. He worked hard to learn English and read the papers daily. He would say to himself “Canadians like hockey? Then I will like Hockey!!”

This to me is the epitome of what multiculturalism should be. They knew what side of the bread was buttered for them, and they added a dash of Greek spices to the mix. I grew up watching hockey twice a week. Saturday’s on CBC and Wednesday’s on CHCH. I did not grow up watching Soccer on a satellite dish.

I guess what I am trying to say is that multiculturalism back in the days before Trudeau was not what it is today. The acceptance of Canadian culture and an oath to Canada, to the Canadian nation, to the Canadian flag, to Canadian languages should be first and foremost.

The multiculturalism of today has turned our nation into a microcosm of the globe with pockets of culture building up neighbourhoods locked into one ethnicity or another. Yet none choose Canada and it’s culture anymore. Instead they choose to bring their own cultures, languages and set up their own neighbourhoods and follow their old traditions.
Quebec was smart to protect itself with the language laws, but the English speaking cities and provinces choose not to.  This creates confusion when you see signs in various languages across a single city. Yet Anglophones rail against Quebec and the language laws when it is those same language laws that English speaking Canada needs to adopt to protect itself.

I think the overall failure of multiculturalism is echoed by Salim Mansur in his column from yesterday.

As we politely enjoyed each other’s music and cuisines, new immigrants learned less about the country they adopted as home — and less was demanded of them from a country increasingly preoccupied by its threatened breakup.

We cannot return to the years before 1967. But we can no longer deceive ourselves about building a secure and prosperous country while indulging ourselves as polite strangers in a Canada soaked with multicultural illusions.

All I need to do to remember is recall those words my father used to say. “Canadians like hockey? Then I will like Hockey.” And he always did.

This Summer I Am Going To Sue The City Of Toronto For My 1%… Join Me!!

Mulder

The City of Toronto is either going to commit fraud or they are liars when they do not extend the 1% GST cut to the residents starting July 1st. If they charge 7% and pocket 1% while sending the 6% on to the feds then they are committing fraud in my estimation. If they simply change the price to compensate for the 1% then they are liars because they are saying it wouldn’t be worth it to change the prices of everything, but in essence, they must do all the calculations to keep the price the same.

In either case, I will be visiting Toronto this summer, and I will be going to a museum and I will be suing them for my 1%. I figure the legal costs alone in defending the small claims court suit will be worth the 1%. The negative press will get Miller canned, which is highly needed. And I hope my showing of solidarity with my brothers in Toronto will help them see that the rest of Canada cares about them and maybe they will elect a few Tories next time around.

Join me. Small claims court cases are easy to file. The City cannot defend itself without showing up which means the legal expenditures to defend itself will get them back into line.

If you are willing to sue the City of Toronto, please sign my comments below. Together we can get Toronto that 1% GST cut they deserve and prevent other companies from following suit and making the GST cut worthless to taxpayers.

Let’s Officially Screw them back!!!!!!

ADDENDUM: How To Sue The City Of Toronto

In light of the interest in this concept, I have provided information below on what you may need to do in order to sue the City Of Toronto.

1) There is a cost to suing. But should you be unable to pay it, there are waivers you can get. If you win, you are also eligible to receive the expenses of filing and setting a court date back in the settlement.

2) This Website has the requirements for suing in small claims court. I urge you to visit and bookmark it.

3) Below is a list of links that will provide you with further information or supporting documentation:

a) Budget 2006 – On page 6 you will find the statement regarding the GST cut which the Conservative Party of Canada has implemented.

b) Toronto Sun Article – Which outlines the City of Toronto’s plan to not offer the 1% GST cut as proposed in the above budget.

c) The Orchestrator – David Soknacki, City Coun. for Ward 43 Scarborough East is the one supporting this concept. I urge you to write him at his email first. This way you can point out that you have raised your concerns. The vote on this issue will take place at the end of June.

d) Toronto Budget Advisory Committee – I urge you to write them as well expressing your disapproval.

e) Budget Advisory Committee Agenda/Minutes – There are no minutes up yet for their end of June meeting, but they will be there eventually and they will probably be your ace in the hole for a court case. Keep an eye on this link.

4)  For those who are golfers, I have screen shots of the current prices for all five City of Toronto golf courses.  Hopefully the prices stay the same and the GST drops.  But if it doesn’t these screen shots may help.

a) Don Valley Golf

b) Dentonia Golf

c) Humber Valley Golf

d) Scarlett Woods Golf

e) Tam O’Shanter Golf

I will post more information as I find it. If you have any other suggestions, please email me.

What The Tories Giveth, Toronto City Council Taketh Away

Mulder

This is simply unbelievable. In what amounts to a financial windfall, the City Council of Toronto is not passing the 1% GST cut on to citizens on anything that they pay for. Instead it is going to pocket the tax relief which the Federal Tories have promised all Canadians, the council is going to bend every citizen over and give it to them good everytime they golf on a city owned course, or buy a recycling box, or pay for any other city service.

That’s because city staffers are recommending that reducing the GST isn’t worth the change.

“Unbelievable,” John Williamson of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation said yesterday. “This is meant to be a tax cut that benefits all taxpayers across the country, not go into the pockets of governments.”

To reduce the GST, the city would have to change billing systems, websites and printed publications to reflect the new, slightly lower fees, staff reported.

It might also force an amendment to the municipal code or other bylaws.

“Boo-hoo,” Williamson said. “Governments never seem to complain when there is a cost to business or individuals when they hike their taxes. It’s funny how they sing this song when it’s going to benefit taxpayers at large. It’s a bad excuse.”
What this amounts to is a direct attack on the Federal Conservative government. The city is setting a precedent, that if followed by other business, will in essence take the Tory GST cut away.

Officially Screwed … Again!!!