Comments by west coast canuck

The Republican right may be fanning the flames of American racism into a bonfire that it may not be able to put out. As more and more multicultural Americans achieve voting status this fundamentalist (white) party may soon find itself on the periphery of American politics. What is needed now is a new party of middle of the road leanings that is neither leftist or rightist that represents the majority of Americans... why not call it the American Party?
That may be the only way to avoid the increasing polarization of US politics that has led to a crippling of what was once the greatest power on earth. Now it's just a laughing stock albeit one with weapons of mass destruction.
I don't know who I trust less - radical Muslim jihadists in the Middle East or rabidly racist Christian fundamentalists with nuclear and chemical weapons right on our doorstep.

Lucky for the bankers we didn't use the German Armys method of replacing commanders who lost a battle... a bullet to the head!

How right you are about J&J's attempts to use this most recent takeover as a smokescreen to cover up their massive pr nightmare back at home in the US. Weldon, who has been with J&J for over 40 years is running the place like a despot and is refusing to acknowledge his culpability as the leader of a sinking ship... one he was steering when it ran onto the rocks of the recent lawsuits and US administration investigations.

Even now, there are caveats posted against J&J and its subsidiaries, where they will be paying huge fines if any of their currently operating plants are found to be in contravention of government imposed standards. Yet these fines, although massive enough for any but the largest companies like J&J, are but a drop in the bucket compared to the ridiculously gargantuan billions in monthly profits Weldon and gang make.

Look for J&J to make huge settlements with any and all comers in the coming months and years which may affect their stock prices but will not stop their profit taking at the consumer level. This is not the same customer conscious company that took all of its Tylenol off the shelves in the early '80's. Weldon and his band of cutthroats are whole different beast. Pray that you or someone close to you isn't one of the unlucky ones to have a faulty hip replacement or perhaps one of the dead young women from their failed birth control patch of a few years ago.

The Johnson brothers must be rolling in their graves.

okay... so now I can drive like an idiot (as a lot of my male counterparts already do - based on my own observation and experience) and the insurance company cannot discriminate against me based on my sex using histrical actuarial data.... perfect!
Win - win, for me at least!

And why is this illegal? If I obtain info on a company and then use it to my benefit what does it matter how I got it or who gave it to me... business is war (and all is fair).

Better you should have called it "Voodoo Economics" but I think that title (and the accompanying philosophy) has already been taken.
The current economic malaise is due thoroughly to greed and stupidity... both of which are endemic in the human species. No amount of government or economic input will save us from these character flaws; not then, not now and not in the future. No economic theory will be able to predict or explain this, but any bookstore carries hundreds of social psychology texts that explain it only too well.
Seems there are zombies out there in all the other major financial cities, as well.

Dear Sir,

Dear Sir, Definitely NO... Communist China is merely hashing out the same totalitarian crap it always did, but with a more polished (westernised) veneer. It's not a new model, just a hybridized one - a wolf in sheeps clothing, if you will. Credit the Chinese populace for it's long suffering at the hands of an often brutal and despotic leadership that they haven't yet shed themselves of this heavy overcoat of outdated socialist philosophy... mark my words - they soon will. Not because they believe we are any better than they, but because they feel they can do even better once they attain true political freedom. Then we truly will have a "China Model" to speak of.
Right now, their copying of certain of our practices and policies only shows that our ideas are winning them over, not the other way around. As long as they keep suppressing religious, political and sexual freedoms, executing prisoners for fairly minor offences and selling their organs, annexing and destroying foreign countries such as Tibet and soon possibly Taiwan; they won't be making many converts to the "China Model" but they certainly will try to catch up to the golden boys of the west by mimicking as many of their ideas as they can stand to swallow.
The Chinese people are ever resourceful and exceedingly patient and someday soon they will be showing the rest of the world the true "China Model" without all the authoritarian trappings, but that day will come only after they have learned from us all there is to know about true freedom; then and only then will they have anything new to teach us about truly living in the modern world.

Dear Madam,
Here you go rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic... the sun set on the empire more than half a century ago, or had you noticed.
Better you should start learning Chinese instead of arguing which form of a dying language you should be using.
English; either form, is the new Latin.

Big surprise... Amerika still insists on its so called constitutional right to arm bears. Small wonder that it is covertly and openly involved in armed warfare with a quarter of the planet either through supply of arms or in open armed conflict. What else would you expect of the worlds largest armed bully and purveyor of weapons of mass destruction.
Ever since the implosion of the former USSR, the balance of global power has been in the US' court and the events of 911 notwithstanding, Amerikans have acted as bullies, seeing no need to moderate their actions. Why would they... they see themselves as "gunslingers" of the old wild west variety, or more naiveley as world cops (although, they certainly don't seem to want to let anyone else influence them or their decisions via the UN).
So it's no surprise that the US supreme court would not vote against the status quo. Why would the government treat their own citizens any differently than say the warlords and tribesmen of Afghanistan?

The rule of the gun holds sway at home as it does elsewhere. Until that basic fact changes within the US, it's not going to change anywhere else on the planet. If Amerika refuses to let go of its paranoia of the rest of the world and insists on maintaining its vast ignorance of its neighbours... we'll go on having to deal with the mess a raving, drug induced megalomaniac can cause.

Amerika's most pressing problem is not with islamic extremists but with it's own fanatical and armed civilian militias. An armed christian fundamentalist scares me more than any jihadist, mainly because most of them live right next door.

Obama, disarm your own people before you try preaching to the rest of us, and if you want to be the worlds policeman then work with and through the UN so that we all have a say. But I'll wager that you won't have the stomach to tackle the NRA nor will you trust any of us when it comes to the military control you have over rest of the world. So, until China flexes its muscles, we're stuck with you and your gunslingers.

Apparently we aren't getting off the palm oil bandwagon anytime soon. I had thought that the campaign against saturated fats (palm oil, particularly) would have limited its use in western food circles, but apparently not.
With its exceptional yield, I would tempted to grow it here in Canada to replace canola if the climate would allow it. However the detrimental effects on our health from ingestion of this product would preclude its use, except for uses as a soap additive and fuel/lubricant supplement.
I can fully understand why the evolving economies of the 3'rd world would see this valuable source as a vital economical part of their countries independence and financial (and therefore, political) security. It's a hard lesson to learn that sometimes the easy way is not the best way to solve a problem.
That being said, it behooves us, all of us in the more advantaged parts of the globe to use our buying pressure to force the large food and consumer product manufacturers to respect the planet they are thriving on... especially the parts where they don't live and work in.
Case in point - the constant complaining I hear of how the weather seems to be getting more and more severe is no doubt directly related to the influence of our present practices of clearcutting, then paving and developing and finally driving all over all that nice new, expansive pavement with our polluting and mostly empty vehicles. I'm talking about my own backyard, now... the supposedly "green" and eco-friendly west coast of Canada.
Until we clean up our own messy practices, how are we ever going to convince our impoverished neighbours to "do as we say, not as we do"?

Cutting our purchases of those companies products that are (inadvertantly, or not) damaging the less visible parts of the globe (i.e. where we don't live or travel) is a place to start. But, as those of us who are raising or have raised children know; it's not what we say that makes an impression, but what we do that lasts. And ultimately, what we do is what will be our legacy to our children and the rest of the world.

Dear Sir,
By all means, we should all get the heck out of Somalia and let them settle their squabble by themselves.
This simmering pot has boiled over several times in the past few decades and until they themselves come to an understanding of who they are what they are about as a nation, we are only enabling their bickering and dysfunction.
We have not helped much if at all and like the confused cop that the UN is it only suits the squabbling "family" members of Somalia that we don't know which way to turn or who and how much to help.
But there is a more positive way to end this endless war... blockade them and refuse to allow anymore weapons into the arena and only allow aid and humanitarian relief if they put down their weapons.
This is not an easy thing to ask when all around them are neighbours who benefit from the current chaos. However, even those jaded neighbours would likely find it easier to live beside and work with a more settled Somalia than the out of control and belligerent warlords and militias who hold sway at present.

Illegal detention and attacks on ships in international waters is piracy and Isreal has no more right to claim it was acting in self defence than do the Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean. If the EU or the US or Turkey are so concerned about Isreals actions then why did they not dispatch their own navy(s) as an escort to the humanitarian aid ships from Turkey. They could just as easily have pre-inspected the ships for arms and other contraband and therefore allayed Isreali fears... but this would take some serious backbone as the Jewish backlash at home would have scary repercussions for most politicians except for Turkey.
Hindsight is always 20:20, alas. As for Isreal, which is not a democratic state (and never has been); this international pariah was set up by the British in a land wrested away from its rightful inhabitants, the Palestinians and this theft and ongoing racial displacement is still being aided and abetted by these same meddling Brits. Until Isreal allows Palestinians to live, work and vote in their own country (Isreal), there will be no peace... one side will have to eradicate the other completely before this happens.
As repulsed as I feel towards Isreal for its heavy handed actions lately, I do appreciate that the military has as its uppermost mandate the safety and security of it's own citizens. As does the military in my country and yours (I hope). However, the constant state of war that the Isreali armed forces and Mossad keep their citizens in is a necessity for them to stay in power and to keep Isreal in a perpetual military dictatorship. As long as they have a bogeyman such as the Palestinians to scare their citizens with, the status quo will never be threatened. And there will always be a monster on the other side of the "fence" as long as the righful owners of Isreal (the Palestinians) are not accorded the rights they so deserve. We are slowly and painstakingly doing just that with our own "displaced" natives here... Isreal must learn to do the same if it wants any kind of lasting peace with any of its neighbours.

There's nothing like watching bankers sweat to make my weekend start on a cheery note. After the rollercoaster they and the large investment houses have put us on it's only fitting that their ride be brought to a halt.
For most of us, though, that are not connected to the financial industry; the main concern is what will be left of our pensions if we do not limit the damage done to our future retirement already. It's hard enough to plan for the future without the unease at financial hijinx already perpetrated on company's pension plans through insufficient federal protections. The last thing we need is a big fat loophole for investment houses (read "banks") to be able to play fast and loose with our life savings through derivatives trading without sufficient cash assets to back them up.
Kudos to the Obama democrats for trying to protect the working stiff. After all, we are the machine that powers them and their country along, are we not?

It's more than about time than the US government went after these double dealing investment houses. What Goldman and others should be worried about is how the growing "green" (read "ethical investing") wave slowly sweeping over the newer generations will perceive their actions. It's bound to look bad when the final analyses show that these large paragons of commerce were indeed the major reason that the global economy went into the toilet.
Unbridled greed and the ensuing corruption that naturally flows from all that money and the power it weilds has wrecked many 3'rd world economies... why do we think it couldn't happen here?
I guess the old adage that "money only cares for itself" applies equally to the fatcats that live and die by that money. It's only fair to call them up onto the carpet when they let their more base instincts run wild and almost destroy the world economy in the process.
Better the government should slap their wrists than their own well-armed and angry citizens start feeling that their only course is to take matters into their own hands. The thought of posses running amok on wall street should keep the brotherhood of Goldman, et al awake at night.

Once again, I feel obliged to remind Americans and others who have not read the Declaration of Independence, that nowhere in that lofty document does it say that the populace has the right to bear arms - at all times. It specifically states that the populace may only do so in the event of acts by a foreign state (specifically England, at that time) against the newly formed 13 colonies, in order that the people may assist the newly formed militias to oppose such foreign military occupation.
Where the Yanks got the notion that they should walk around with guns from this seems only to prove their ignorance of their own political history. It's this often misquoted section of their charter of independence that most sticks in my craw and makes me shake my head as more and more zealots here in our country to the north call out for a similar "right" to bear arms.
Thankfully, we've kept that part of British past that sanctions the use and carrying of arms to only provincial and federal police forces and the armed forces. That's more than enough people with guns walking around for my liking.
All the weapons on earth could not prevent the foreign induced carnage of 9/11 or the home grown seditious bombing in Oklahoma... maybe if America stopped producing so many weapons to sell around the world and at home they would have less to fear. Right now, the only real fear I have whenever I travel in the US is not from armed thugs but from an overarmed and overzealous citizenry.
Ignorance and weapons do not make for very neighbourly relations, but there is little hope that the US government will ever muster the political will to set this right, especially when they barely managed to move their medical insurance into the 19'th century recently... I can't imagine a broken down democratic process such as the US has right now having that kind of moxie.

Who was it that said "the more things change, the more things seem the same"? Cuba is still a totalitarian dictatorship, and still staunchly communist... a quaint and outdated state where most thoughts of independent freedom are heavily suppressed.

Castro # 2 isn't anymore inclined to allow democratic tendencies than his brother, Castro # 1 was. And it's not likely to change unless the people of Cuba themselves change it. To allow the current embargo by the US to continue is to keep up the status quo - something that Americans seem equally unwilling to let go of (partly due to the massive influence that the anti-Castro lobby of Cuban-Americans in Florida wield with the US government).

It's too bad that after a century of meddling in Central America's politics the Yanks haven't learned much of anything and they still act as bumbling, heavy-handed bullies both with Cuba and still with the other neighbouring states in the region.

There will be no significant change there until the US lets go of its own paranoia and allows the people of the region decide for themselves what form of government they want. The "Communist Menace" is all but dead - so let's stop propping up the survivors of that failed political ideology in Cuba.

Kill 'em with kindness, I say. Let the flood of consumerism that has swept the rest of the world do what the USA's military might has been woefully unable to do. Flood them with tourists, medical and industrial help and let nature take its course.

The loudmouthed businessman from Peoria can do more harm to Castro than the Pentagon ever did.

Judge Garzon is indeed an exceptional Spaniard... in that he is willing to stand up to the massive cover-up of the massacre of thousands of fellow citizens during the brutal period before, during and after WW11. Perhaps he does have an axe to grind; who could possibly stand by and count themselves "neutral" in what was Spain's most shameful hour in the past century?
These crimes of the past still have many victims and the longer the truth is hidden away the likeliness for more violence is protracted over a longer period of time: just look at the smoldering ethnic warfare still being fought in the Balkans to this day.
The more we attempt to appease the killers and their adherents by circumventing the proper course of investigation and possible punishment for these heinous crimes, the more we prevent the final resolution that we as a race need to find to our own violent tendencies.
The Spanish, like their Mediterranean cousins the Turks seem over eager to sweep their sins under the carpet... shame on all of us for allowing them to do so!
By the way... I'd be curious to know how much the British government was paid to act as Pinochet's rescuer. It seems to me that it would take an awful lot of money to wash all that blood off your hands. Are you even curious about how that came about or are you Anglos just as eager to sweep uncomfortable things under the carpet, too?

Perhaps the most telling thing about the author's treatise about Poland's current political and economic malaise is that he makes no bones that the former (and still powerful) communist rulers are still running what is still a bankrupt country. More than a half century of oppression and misrule does not end overnight and the corruption and cronyism that was endemic in the socialist era really has nowhere else to go.
You surely don't expect generations raised under the misguided principles of Russian communism to suddenly change their thinking and become more like their European relatives or even their North American cousins almost overnight. A leopard without spots is still a leopard, after all.
And as for being European - they are; just the eastern portion. They are certainly not Asian, though with the conquest of that entire region by the Khans centuries ago, I suppose a claim can be made for that.
If their Baltic snobbery won't permit them to lower themselves to the level of their other eastern European neighbours then their attitudes and endless bickering should put them squarely in the group of similarly hard-to-get-along-with states... the Balkan Slavs (which is rightfully where they belong, anyways).
One doesn't have to live somewhere to spot incongruities, fallacies and weaknesses. Indeed it can be argued that sometimes a foreigner's perspective can be more accurate than that of a local with their own axe to grind; why I often find a European's opinions of America refreshing when compared to our own myopic view of ourselves.
So, keep writing about the Poles, exposing their weaknesses and strengths as well... for it's only by keeping the bright light of their other European neighbours (eastern and otherwise) gaze upon those rascally former communists that we can continue the slow and agonizing change in the Polish populace to that of a progressive modern democratic state. You'll just have to develop a thicker skin to endure the endless complaints and criticisms as Poland gets dragged into the 21'st century.It will be a painstaking and thankless task but one that needs doing. My hat's off to you.

It's interesting that your writer thinks that "if" at some future time, the US and (mainland) China don't come to loggerheads over the eventual annexation of Taiwan everything will be fine in that neighbourhood... when the more prudent course of military thinking already acknowledges that it is only a matter of time before that powder keg blows.

The mainland Chinese will not let that thorn stick in their sides for too much longer and the only thing the west can do is plan for what our response will be when the inevitable happens.

I'm personally behind the strategy that a famous US president espoused - speak softly but carry a big stick. The latter is really the only thing any bully understands. And Obama should point this out to the Chinese leaders at every chance; but he should also be ready to follow through when the time comes.