Compilation 3: Roaming Around

The Problem with Ethics & Business: Oil, Sudan, Talisman, Oil Rights, India, China & Canada

Some observers predict a peak to production some time soon AP, May 30, 05

Waste coal is piled high at Gilberton Coal Company last year. The company plans to turn a $100 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy into the nation's first commercial plant converting waste coal into low-emissions diesel fuel. Energy analysts say such coal liquefaction can produce synthetic oil at a cost of $32 a barrel, well below the $50 range where oil has been trading for the past year or so.

Some observers of the oil industry think so. They predict that this year, maybe next — almost certainly by the end of the decade — the world's oil production, having grown exuberantly for more than a century, will peak and begin to decline.
And then it really will be all downhill. [. . . . ]

Investors are similarly wary about tar sands and heavy oil deposits in Canada and Venezuela. Though they are too gooey to be pumped from the ground like conventional oil, engineers have developed ways of liquefying the deposits with injections of hot water and other means. Already, about 8 percent of Canada's oil production comes from tar sands.

Unfortunately, it costs energy to recover energy from tar sands.

China's a cautious oilsands investor Jon Harding, Financial Post, Jun. 2, 05

[. . . . ] The latest plunge was Tuesday when Sinopec Group invested $105-million with privately held, Calgary-based Synenco Energy Inc. in a deal that gives China's second-largest oil producer a 40% share, or about 40,000 barrels a day, worth of production from Synenco's proposed Northern Lights oilsands mine.

The deal ensures, for the first time, a share of production.

A pact in mid-April between PetroChina Co. Ltd. and pipeline company Enbridge Inc. aims to secure 200,000 barrels a day of future supply from various producers in northeastern Alberta to be moved west to the B.C. Coast. The oil would then be shipped by tanker to China.

That same week, CNOOC Ltd. acquired a 17% interest in oilsands startup MEG Energy Inc. [. . . . ]

Search: chemical engineering

Check also, the connection between CNOOC (or CNOC as I have seen it written) and the government in Beijing.





Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade: Committee Report: United Nations Oil-for-Food scandal investigation -- This could be 'revealing' . . . but undoubtedly, there will be no Canadian connections discovered. . .



Buckee denies talk Talisman in discussions to be taken over May 31, 05, Financial Post

[. . . . ] The stock jumped last week, spurred by a report by Terry Peters, an analyst with Canaccord Capital Corp., that said the Calgary-based international oil and gas explorer was being sized up by French oil giant Total SA, among others. [. . . . ]

Does that ring any TotalFinaElf, Power Corp, Desmarais bells? Check.



Talisman pulls out of Sudan -- Talisman oil workers -- Talisman promises to return when there is peace Mar. 10, 03, BBC

Canadian energy group Talisman has sold its stake in a controversial oil project in Sudan for $750m to India's national oil company.

The 25% stake in the Greater Nile Oil production and pipeline project had attracted heavy criticism from human rights groups.

They accused Talisman of providing the Islamist Sudanese government with oil revenues which were used to finance the two decade old civil war with mostly Christian and animist separatists in the south.

"We say welcome to the Indian company," Sudanese Energy Minister Awad al-Jaz told reporters.

[. . . . ] The Indian company ONGC Videsh also operates in Russia, Vietnam, Iran and Libya. [. . . . ]

The other partners in the venture are Malaysia's state oil firm Petronas, China National Petroleum Corp and Sudan's Sudapet.

One could ask those who agitated to get Talisman out, is this any better for the victimized Sudanese? It does not sound as though anyone would be too concerned with anything but oil.




Special Report on Sudan


"Every major public institutional investor has dumped its Talisman shares. "

Divestment Campaign to Get Talisman Out of Sudan Boston Phoenix, July 12, 2001

An international campaign to get Canadian oil company, Talisman Energy Inc. out of the oil project in Sudan was succesful -- only to have the India based Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) come in and buy its shares. For more information, read the article, India's 'See No Evil, Hear No Evil' Policy in Sudan.

Below is a July 2001 editorial from Boston based publication, Phoenix, laying out the divestment campaign to get Talisman out of the Sudan oil project.

When Will Fidelity Investments stop funding Sudan's civil war?

Fidelity holds some five million shares of stock in Canadian-based Talisman Energy, Inc., making it the company's largest private investor. By virtue of that investment, Boston's mutual-fund giant is supporting a company that contributes to slavery, murder, and famine in southern Sudan. [. . . . ]

The government in Khartoum has made no secret of its desire to amass oil profits, with which it can buy helicopters, tanks, bombs, and guns to use on its southern neighbors. Indeed, the World Bank estimates that since oil profits began flowing into Khartoum, its military budget has doubled. (According to the CIA's World Factbook, the Republic of Sudan spends $1.3 billion annually--$550 million of which is dedicated for military expenditures.) [. . . . ]

India's 'See No Evil, Hear No Evil' Policy in Sudan By Ann Ninan, Special to India Resource Center, September 12, 2002

[. . . . ] What neither the honourable minister nor sections of the media are telling the people of India is that the US$750 million (Rs. 3,750 crore) deal (one third of India's FDI for the last fiscal year) with Canada's Talisman Energy Inc. concerns an area where Sudan's Islamic military government has been waging a brutal war against its own people. Up to 2 million civilians have been killed and more than 4 million displaced in the south of the country, where the people are primarily animist and Christian "African Sudanese" who differ significantly from the ruling "Arab Sudanese" in the north in their race, culture, skin colour and often religion.

[. . . . ] It was exactly these concerns that fired a dogged campaign led by human rights and church groups in Canada forcing Talisman Energy Inc., Canada's biggest oil and gas producer, to give up its Sudanese asset (picked up in 1998 for US$270 million). These had turned into a public relations nightmare for the company in the face of a storm of accusations

I found these through researching something else with Google. Check for the link for the first one.

CRIME, BUSINESS AND POLITICS IN ASIA By Bertil Lintner (Chiang Mai, Thailand) October 17-19, 2002, University of Oslo

In the current debate about democratisation, governance, human rights and globalisation in Asia — and the world — one cast of characters has almost always been overlooked: the region’s organised crime syndicates.

[. . . . ] Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director, James Woolsley, who told the US Congress in April 1994 that “organised criminals from Russia, China and Africa are forging ties with old European and Latin American crime groups to threaten national economies and world security…Violent drug traffickers and other criminal groups are spreading and co-ordinating their activities throughout the world.”

This interpretation of the nature of the globalisation of organised crime which we have seen over the past two decades is also supported by American writer Claire Sterling, who suggests that “the Sicilian and American Mafias, the Turkish arms-drugs Mafia, the Russian Mafia, the Chinese Triads, the Japanese yakuza” are coming together under the informal rules of a new, international Pax Mafiosi.1

[. . . . ] Tackling the menace of organised crime, and the centuries-old system of secrecy, “connections” and lack of transparency that comes with it, will be a vital task if the Asian countries — and especially China — are ever going to develop into more prosperous and democratic countries, and if civil societies all over the world are to be protected from the worst excesses of the globalised mobsters.

[. . . . ] Ho and Ng, as it turned out, were also partners in Macau’s most ambitious construction project: the Nam Van Lakes. This massive US$2 billion land reclamation scheme was going to turn the waterway between the peninsula and Taipa into two giant lagoons, surrounded by hotels, apartment blocks and resorts. Launched during the regional boom in the early 1990s, Nam Van Lakes became a favourite site for wealthy Chinese businessmen and officials looking to move “hot money” out of Guangdong into the more stable precincts of Macau.39

Interesting.




RCMP probe on Taiwan trio shut down again Apr 25, 2002

For 10 years the RCMP has accused three Taiwanese brothers who brought 3,000 Asian families into Canada of fraud, bribery and links to the Chinese mafia. But the cases have died, some mysteriously. Now the brothers are suing Ottawa for $60 million claiming they are the victims of a vendetta by Ottawa's mandarins By Asian Pacific News Service

The RCMP has shut down yet another investigation into the alleged criminal activities by a trio of Taiwanese brothers, who have brought in more than 3,000 Asian families into Canada.

The Asian Pacific Post has learned that the latest investigation into alleged fraud by the brothers, was quietly closed after lawyers for Immigration Canada met with the RCMP's Immigration and Passport section in Surrey.

Also at the meeting held late last year was legal counsel for the brothers, Timothy, Gordon and Robert Fu whose company, Imperial Consultants had offices in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Burnaby, B.C. This is the fourth known investigation in Canada involving the brothers which have been shut down over the last 10 years.

[. . . . ] Almost 80 per cent of the successful applicants in the passport-for-sale scheme were wealthy Asians from Hong Kong and Taiwan. Imperial Consultants, processed Asian applications at less busy Canadian missions in Los Angeles, Rome and Buenos Aires for faster results.

At its height, Imperial . . . . had strong connections to government officials.

Among the influential people used by Imperial Consultants to wave its flag . . . .

Just read it.




Dodge joins U.S. attack on China Terence Corcoran, Financial Post, June 01, 2005

Bank of Canada governor David Dodge appears to have delivered a faithful imitation of U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow's recent trade protectionist demands on China. . . .

[. . . . ] Under Mr. Dodge, of course, the line between Liberal and Bank of Canada policy has become ever so blurry. The bank is supposed to be an independent agency, distanced from political power. Its job is to implement the core of its narrow legal mandate: Keep inflation down. In recent years, however, the bank has issued pronouncements on any number of issues in which it has zero expertise or responsibility. We've had remarks on corporate governance, securities regulation, child care, bank mergers, pension reform. Now Mr. Dodge has begun hectoring China.

The bank, universal busybody, somehow remains silent on Canadian policy weaknesses in areas that fall within the central bank's line of vision. Example: massive ramp-ups in government spending. No problemo, says the bank, so long as the budget remains in balance. "I take the government at its word that those expenditures would only be made as long as fiscal balance can be maintained," Mr. Dodge said on Monday. Do such expenditures undermine Canadian economic growth prospects as forecast by the bank? After five decades of watching governments run state spending and tax levels up to near 50% of GDP, the Bank of Canada -- while expert in corporate governance and now Chinese monetary issues -- has yet to produce one significant research report or commentary on the economic impact of rampant fiscal statism. [. . . . ]

Newsbeat1 June 3, 05

Grewal tapes-..........

Question Period - Hansard excerpts - June 2/05 -- Don't miss reading this one.

What's the real cost of the Child Care Program? -- "Question Period- Hansard excerpts- June 2/02 (between this and the costs of implementing Kyoto-Canadians are going to be in for quite a surprise to their pocketbooks)"

There are other articles but don't miss those.


China flexes chipmaking muscles via Newsbeat1

Resource Sector: China still playing crucial role in commodity prices Sonita Horvitch, Financial Post, May 31, 05

three of the five panelists in this roundtable have just returned from a visit to China.

[. . . . ] Brockelsby: Our clients ask us how they can play China. We say: "Buy Canada." We in Canada are in the idyllic situation in that we are going to benefit from the demand for commodities. Expect to see the TSX outperform most international indexes for the next number of years. But it must be remembered that commodity prices are really sensitive to short-term issues. They move up and down on any data that comes out of China.
Way: A prime example of that change would be to look at iron ore contracts. The price of iron ore is set annually. The 2005 contracts were set 71% higher than they were last year. . . . This is, in part, because of the oligopolistic nature of this market, but also because of the incremental demand coming out of China. [. . . . ]

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LPO-CBC & MSM: the Lib 'version'--That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

First: See the spin below; that's the Liberal 'story' and the MSM are making sure everyone hears it

Second: they are trying to tell us all politicians are the same. NO, they are not. Those who report this just don't hang out with the good guys who tend not to get to the front benches nor into running the show because they're not for sale.

Will no-one rid us of the taxpayer funded Liberal Propaganda Organ . . . at least. The rest we may choose not to support . . . but Canadians are poorly served by the taxpayer funded one.

I heard the spin on CBC (Keep your friends close and your enemies closer -- Lyndon Johnson had a more colourful way of putting it.) but the story is everywhere; one link follows.

Why do I always think "Hello, the politician lied" when I listen to Liberal spin?

Liberals claim Grewal tapes doctored Dennis Bueckert And Alex Panetta, CP, June 2, 2005

[. . . . ] At a closed-door meeting Wednesday, Prime Minister Paul Martin led a cheer for Murphy, his chief of staff, even as opponents called for his dismissal.

And Dosanjh's office released a detailed list of alterations and omissions allegedly made to recordings of his conversations with Grewal.

For example, the Liberals dispute a sentence in which Dosanjh hinted at Grewal being rewarded if he crossed the floor. The released transcript said: "No one can forget such gestures but they require a certain degree of deniability."

But the Liberals say the word "deniability" was spliced into the sentence from another conversation not released by Grewal. [. . . . ]

Sources said the prime minister sprang to his feet at a weekly caucus meeting to lead a cheer for Murphy while Nova Scotia MP Rodger Cuzner was extolling his merits. [. . . . ]

Obviously, without an ethical compass, the PM is desperate. Anyway, I think there is more to this than the Sponsorship Scandal . . . but then, some of us have thought this for a long time.




Martin was fully briefed on negotiations to poach Tory MP, transcripts show

"I talked to the PM moments ago," Dosanjh tells Grewal in a conversation on the afternoon of May 17 - two days before the budget vote that threatened to bring down Martin's minority Liberal government.

[. . . . ] "He said he is going to Regina right now and he said he would be happy to talk to you over the phone tonight or in person if you want to move."

"Nobody will make you totally blunt promises right away, because that is not done in politics usually," Dosanjh told Grewal. "Cabinet right away may be possible." [. . . . ]

Have you ever tried to get a meeting with your MP, let alone the PM? Why would a member of the PMO's staff be talking to Grewel? And the PM?

No class, no honour, no ethics . . . just power . . . truly jaded.

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Various

Pork fat hitting fan?

Bombardier denies CSeries headaches -- Beaudoin insists stretched jet remains viable Nicolas Van Praet, Jun2-05, Financial Post

[. . . . ] Bombardier has spent more than $38-million on the development of the new line of aircraft, called the CSeries, which some industry observers believe it needs to fuel future sales. But the US$2.1-billion project has hit a major snag. Two consortiums negotiating with Bombardier to build a new engine for the aircraft have rejected the plan. That has increased skepticism the company can develop a jet that customers will want to buy. [. . . . ]

Search: Paris Air Show , Embraer, Bombardier's Brazilian rival




Cellphone sales ringing in China Peter Evans, May 31, 05, Financial Post

[. . . . ] India, home of the largest middle class in the world, produces around three million new cellphone users per month, he said.
And the numbers in China are even more impressive: more than five million new customers each and every month. [. . . . ]

Is there any assymetrical aspect here?

How many Prime Ministers and key Ministries are run by MP's from Quebec? Does anyone else notice the overweaning power exerted by one province?

The fix is in for Alliance Quebec -- Ottawa aims to gut its funding -- It defends anglophone rights Diane Francis, Financial Post, May 31, 05

[. . . . ] A few hardy activists have remained in the province, however, but now their efforts to defend anglophone rights, through a federally funded agency called Alliance Quebec, are about to be strangled. The Alliance's funding has been sliced from $900,000 a year to $539,000. The recommendation is to gut the grant to $300,000 a year. [. . . . ]

Alliance Quebec is financed through an annual grant obtained from [Minister Frulla's] Canadian Heritage department, as are a number of francophone organizations. [. . . . ]

Last year, the department's wolves moved in for the kill by auditing the organization. This followed a series of research efforts that embarrassed the federal government. Alliance exposed abuses involving discrimination against anglophones in hiring practices inside and outside Quebec by the federal government; discrimination against anglophone employees at Canada Post and discrimination against businessmen that was brought to the attention of the United Nations Human Rights Committee. [. . . . ]

Search: spent millions financing French language activists who push for , billions more promoting

Meanwhile the Language Czar's office for the Promotion of French is expanding . . . and of course, in sport it has been documented that Quebec received the lion's share of the booty, in the last Olympics, I believe, if not longer. Then there is their share of Adscam . . .




Martin's leadership on official languages lagging, watchdog says Elizabeth Thompson, CanWest. Jun. 1, 05

OTTAWA - Prime Minister Paul Martin's government is failing to show leadership when it comes to fostering Canada's two official languages, federal language watchdog Dyane Adam said yesterday. Speaking to reporters as she tabled her sixth annual report, Canada's commissioner [. . . . ]

Why doesn't Dyane Adam admit she is simply the Minister of the Promotion of French and admit that it's to heck with Anglo Canada?




Ten reasons not to fear separatism Barbara Kay, National Post, Jun. 1, 05

[. . . . ] 7. Playing the language card is over as a result of Bill 101's success. Today, confidently francophone Quebecers are actually militating for more English in a super-healthy French environment.

8. The separatists depend on public gullibility and the dissemination of their nationalist spin through tacitly complicit media. In 1995, the francophone media -- virtually 100% sympathetic to sovereignty -- controlled public debate in French. Technology has fractured that monopoly. Blogs, Blackberrys and chatrooms will democratize the Quebec media ideoligarchy. [. . . . ]

Number 7 is still affecting TROC. Still, our government is expanding the clout of the language czar . . . Promotion of language goes in one direction it appears. How long does English Canada have to bow to Quebec on language on acceptable politicians on funding for . . . well, ? I've had enough and several people are stating what has been felt for years. We speak English and so do a vast majority of Canadians and, for the most part, we cannot work for our own government. Enough already.




Heads up: via Newsbeat1

The Hill Times, May 30th, 2005, LEGISLATIVE PROCESS, Paco Francoli,

On Tuesday, May 31, . . . . Heritage Minister Liza Frulla is at the Official Languages Committee reviewing S-3, a bill sponsored by recently retired Liberal Sen. Jean-Robert Gauthier. The bill, which is in its fourth incarnation, is intended to give the Official Languages Act more bite. . . .

On Thursday, Public Works Minister Scott Brison [was scheduled to be] at the Government Operations and Estimates Committee to explain why the government has been renting a building in Gatineau, at a $575,000 monthly rate, that has been sitting vacant for nearly a year. The lease has generated controversy because Liberal Sen. Paul Masicotte is CEO of the Montreal-based company, Alexis Nihon Group, that owns the building. Tory MP Pierre Poilievre, who sits on the committee, has been dogging the file for weeks. He says that, according to the Parliament of Canada Act, "No person who is a member of the Senate shall, directly or indirectly, knowingly and willfully be a party to or be concerned in any contract under which the public money of Canada is to be paid." [. . . . ]

This came from the Hill Times. Watch for the results.

Hill Times Policy Briefings pdf for download



Don't blame the police Ron Laffin, May 30, 05

First off, let's clarify one thing: In Toronto, as in most other North American cities, it is not a "racial profiling" issue we are confronting: It is a black profiling issue, or more specifically, a young black male profiling issue. Toronto contains well over one million non-white people of all colours. Of these, it is estimated that only about 200,000 are black. And yet we rarely hear of any other cultural or racial group being singled out for excessive police attention.

Throughout the years, many other non-white Toronto communities have been victimized by racism. Pakistani Canadians, for example, have suffered as much discrimination as anyone. And yet the police do not profile them. Nor do the police appear to be profiling the members of other non-white communities. Could it be the controversies in Kingston, Toronto and elsewhere are not about racism at all? [. . . . ]

According to a McGill University study, 70% of Canada's black population emigrated from the Caribbean and Bermuda, the majority during the past 25 years. Prior to 1980, there was little gun crime in Toronto. But as Toronto's black population grew, so did the city's drug and gun problems. Most of us may prefer to cast this fact as a coincidence. But the police, who are charged with protecting us, cannot afford to hide from reality. [. . . . ]

Bang on!




We the (Media) People By GLENN HARLAN REYNOLDS, May 31, 2005
via Newsbeat1

Mr. Reynolds, a law professor at the University of Tennessee, publishes InstaPundit.com.

Quite a few bloggers are moving beyond opinion journalism into firsthand reporting. On my own InstaPundit.com weblog, I feature firsthand reports, often with photos, from places like Uzbekistan and Afghanistan. My "correspondents" are correspondents in the original sense -- people who correspond -- rather than in the modern sense of people with good hair and a microphone. Other bloggers have broken stories from Iraq (involving both alleged war crimes by U.S. troops and large anti-terror marches left uncovered by American media), from the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, and from Canada's government corruption scandals. [. . . . ]

Search: Pajamas Media , the power of quick-and-dirty digital video by , Chinese and North Korean independent journalists , Henry Copeland's blogads




Why, I believe Canada is ahead here, in education, according to this criterion

'Disposition' Emerges as Issue at Brooklyn College BY JACOB GERSHMAN, May 31, 2005, New York Sun, via InstaPundit.com

[. . . . ] Brooklyn College's School of Education has begun to base evaluations of aspiring teachers in part on their commitment to social justice, raising fears that the college is screening students for their political views.

The School of Education at the CUNY campus initiated last fall a new method of judging teacher candidates based on their "dispositions," a vogue in teacher training across the country that focuses on evaluating teachers' values, apart from their classroom performance.

[. . . . ] To drive home the notion that education schools ought to evaluate teacher candidates on such parameters as attitude toward social justice, the council issued a revision of its accrediting policies in 2002 in a Board of Examiners Update. It encouraged schools to tailor their assessments of dispositions to the schools' guiding principles, which are known in the field as "conceptual frameworks." The council's policies say that if an education school "has described its vision for teacher preparation as 'Teachers as agents of change' and has indicated that a commitment to social justice is one disposition it expects of teachers who can become agents of change, then it is expected that unit assessments include some measure of a candidate's commitment to social justice." [. . . . ]

Do you find this scary? I do.




Backup Belmont Club: The Thing -- on the vote in France on the EU via Newsbeat1

EU President Jean-Claude Juncker says a rejection by French voters of the European constitution would not mean its rejection by Europe. 'Non' does not mean no. "The European process does not come to a halt today." Europolitix reports: [. . . ]

Much there to read. VG





Caveat: I came upon this while looking for something else but when I saw Belinda Stronach and Stephen Harper's names in one of these, I was rather surprised at what I read. It is not, to my knowledge, a mainstream news site so I have no idea whether there is any veracity to it. Decide for yourself.

One is the site with the item and I came to it from the other.

Total Information Analysis

CLOAK AND DAGGER -- INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING UPDATE




Cinar pair's assets seized -- Quebec court orders seizure of homes, bank accounts Nicolas Van Praet, Financial Post, May 31, 05

[. . . . ] The company alleges the pair were involved in various schemes to transfer both the assets of Cinar and their own assets out of Quebec to avoid detection.

At the centre of the allegations is the transfer of more than US$120-million from Cinar to two companies in the Bahamas, Globe-X Management Ltd. and Globe-X Canadiana Ltd.

Liquidators of these two firms have alleged that executives of Norshield Financial Group were involved in helping former Cinar principals siphon money from the company.

Cinar says it has a claim of at least $59.3-million directly against Mr. Weinberg and former Cinar chief financial officer Hasanian Panju. [. . . . ]

The affidavit alleges that Mr. Weinberg and Ms. Charest saddled their two Quebec homes with mortgages for amounts far above the municipal value of the properties in an effort to deprive their creditors of winning any proceeds from an eventual judgment. [. . . . ]

How do you get a mortgage for more than your home is worth?




The green genocide National Post, Jun. 1, 05

Tens of millions of humans were sacrificed on the Green altar. The United States extended the ban overseas by various measures, including refusing aid to countries that used DDT. Other rich countries, urged on by their Greens, followed suit.

Malaria, which had been in retreat, came surging back, killing multitudes. [. . . . ]

Having set out the case against the Greens in Africa, a comparison with the work of the Catholic Church is instructive. [. . . . ]

. . . . AIDS is devastating Africa. . . . The breakdown of African families and the high incidence of married middle-aged men copulating with young girls hugely exacerbate the spread of HIV infection. The Pope's message of abstinence outside married life and faithfulness within it would be effective if it were followed -- more so than a message of free love and condoms. [. . . . ]

Greenpeace perpetuates poverty and malnutrition Paul Driessen, Sunday, May 29, 2005

Paul Driessen is its senior policy advisor and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power ∙ Black death.

Greenpeace co-founder Patrick Moore has said the environmental movement’s "campaign against biotechnology clearly exposes its intellectual and moral bankruptcy." It shows little regard for truth or the harm its ideologies inflict on poor people.

[. . . . Read the part here for the reasoning.]

No wonder Dr. Moore says the greens’ position is "insanity."

Ms. Akthen, Greenpeace and UBINIG are on the wrong side of science, history, morality and humanity. Keeping GE seeds out of the hands of farmers — and GE food out of the mouths of hungry children and parents — violates their basic human rights, and perpetuates poverty and malnutrition.

Anti-biotech activists need to be held to civilized standards of honesty, transparency and accountability. And the news media need to demand peer-reviewed proof to support their claims and treat their fraudulent assertions with far more scepticism. [. . . . ]

Just what does "self-determination in aboriginal communities" mean?

Do the rest of us get self-determination? You know, real democracy, I mean, the kind where the ministerial positions are not handed out as rewards for crossing the floor and senatorial positions are not rewards for . . . well, whatever was being rewarded. I don't believe it was contracting competence in the case of Mr. Eggleton. Then, there are the grants to NGO's, foundations, crown corps and other agencies so useful for political manoeuvering. . . . What will self-determination accomplish in aboriginal communities that is different from being just Canadian citizens and equal? Or would it be crass to ask?

Ottawa grants natives policy-making role -- Self-determination will result: Fontaine Grant Robertson, CanWest, Jun. 1, 05

OTTAWA - Prime Minister Paul Martin yesterday reached a deal with aboriginal groups giving them a long-awaited role in federal policy discussions, a move native leaders hailed as a crucial step toward self-government within Canada.

The agreement will see Inuit, First Nations and Metis leaders play a hands-on role in federal policy-making . . . .

. . . the pact sets the stage for self-determination in aboriginal communities [. . . . ]

My take on the whole thing is it is a massive vote-buying of the chiefs and cronies who will bring their own kinds of pressure to bear so that the reserves continue as they are. . . and, incidentally, vote Liberal as the $$$ go through via the chiefs and claque . . . but of course, what do I know?




Behind a Liberal with $800M is Jack Layton -- 'We're supporting a budget': Liberals invite NDP leader to transit cash announcement Simon Doyle, Jun. 1, 05, CanWest

GATINEAU, Que. - Acting like a coalition government, at least on budget matters, Infrastructure and Communities Minister John Godfrey yesterday invited NDP leader Jack Layton to a hotel to announce the details of the amended Liberal budget's $800-million for transit. But Mr. Layton made it clear that NDP support of the government is a budget one-off.

[. . . . ] The amended budget earmarked $900-million for transit and retrofitting buildings for energy efficiency, and yesterday Mr. Godfrey specified that if both budget bills pass in the minority government, $800-million of that will go to urban transit over the next two years.

[. . . . ] The $800-million would be used to replace fleets, upgrade terminals and garages and invest in light rail, subway and rabid bus systems.

The new funding would come in addition to the gas tax in the original 2005 budget, which promised $5-billion over five years for urban transit, waste, water and energy systems. [. . . . ]

We all have our price. Jack's was a little steep . . . but the result was the same . . . a vote to support the #$^&%$* government of PM$$$ and his like. Will making BS the Minister responsible for human resource$ and democratic renewal (so well qualified!) cost less in the long run?

Paul, try offering--or whatever is the current argot for the same thing--those of us with less expensive tastes a cabinet post or a senatorial seat. . . when you want to economize.

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