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Very often, it is advisable to leave a poisoned work environment. I have heard story after story about people who have been harassed and who have been punished for complaining.

The latest one is an RCMP officer whose sergeant was sexually harassing her. She complained. Nothing. She quit and filed a lawsuit. The government of Canada is putting on a full court press in the media to make her look like a problem employee.

Management doesn't want to deal with this kind of thing. If the harasser is a manager, management almost always sides with the harasser. The victim suffers a lot.

Bottom line: Bail out if you can.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2012/05/10/bc-rcmp-harassment-galliford-sulz.html

São Paulo is a violent city, but you cannot say that's caused by the difference between rich and poor. There's a bigger difference in many other places.

The main cause of violence in Brazil are the extremely lenient laws, especially for minors. If you are under 18, let's say 17 years, 11 months, and 27 days old, you can do anything, literally anything at all in Brazil, and you are guaranteed to walk free after at most three years of detention.

All criminal gangs have at least one 17-year-old who will pull the trigger, or say he did, and take the blame for anything they do.

When people are guaranteed immunity, some of them will do the most atrocious acts, this is true of Canada as well as Brazil.

How about something like this?

A bunch of street thugs decided to take potshots against each other, with civilians in between.

Now add a situation where there's gas obscuring the view, and tons of people with guns exchanging fire. Maybe you can identify the "bad guy", but what's to stop you from blowing the brains out of somebody else either
a) by accident
b) mistakening him/her for the malicious shooter

I just finished listening to an interview with this guy on "As It Happens" (Thursday, July 19, 2012 Episode, which today... Thursday... will still be at the top). You can look for a podcast of it on CBC Radio or I believe on PRI or NPR (but they may just point to CBC). Or listen online.

The fellow said that he was cleared of the indecency charge in Oregon since that charge was under their jurisdiction. However he still has to go through some Federal tribunal or legal process to address his disruption to the TSA people. And if he decides to dispute this, it goes to a secret tribunal and neither he nor his lawyer will be allowed to discuss the matter. So it's not all over for him.

I read a number of newspapers and Internet news sites, and this is the first I've heard of it,

MSNBC: http://www.technolog.msnbc.msn.com/technology/technolog/cyborg-steve-mann-details-alleged-mcdonalds-assault-889595

Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2012/07/17/cyborg-discrimination-scientist-says-mcdonalds-staff-tried-to-pull-off-his-google-glass-like-eyepiece-then-threw-him-out/

The Huff: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/17/steve-mann-attacked-paris-mcdonalds-digital-eye-glass-photos_n_1680263.html

NYT Daily: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/cyborg-professor-claims-assault-paris-mcdonald-digital-glasses-article-1.1116246

Canadian news: http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/story/2012/07/17/tech-mann-digital-eye-glass-assault.html and a few others.

Plus El Reg, CNET, Network World, and the usual tech news sites. And the story is the second top google-news results for "McDonald's".

It's also the second article on Slashdot itself about the incident. http://news.slashdot.org/story/12/07/17/0335227/man-physically-assaulted-at-mcdonalds-for-wearing-digital-eye-glasses

RIM sued others over their stupid "push" e-mail patent. They won big judgements and settlements. (See this.) Now I guess it's their turn to pay. This couldn't have happened at a worse time for them. I hope they are gone soon. I want my company to upgrade my 9900 to something else. Anything would be better (even a Windows phone).

The Bank of Canada stopped printing the $1000 bill in late 2000. They are still considered legal tender but i don't think any institution other than a bank will accept them.

You mean like these guys?

admitted to be police by their own union.

I'm a supporter of SETI in principle, though I can't say I've ever supported it materially (other than a brief run at SETI@home when I was in university). Unfortunately I think it's simply a matter of priorities during economic downturn.

Up here in Canada, we have a program that also costs $2 million a year - the Experimental Lakes Area research station - and it's getting its funding cut by the federal government. It's upsetting to me, as I see valid science being disregarded in the name of fiscal responsibility.

That aside, the SETI program is likely to run, in one form or another, for the entirety of human existence. It may get shut down periodically, but this is not a question that's going to go away. Ever. Perhaps when our collective economies rejig themselves to be less focused on growth and more on sustainability, we can find room for a relatively cheap, pure science initiative. Until then, either donate directly to those initiatives you find appealing, or take whatever action you can at the ballot box. Or both, if you're feeling less apathetic than most of us!

http://blog.google.org/2011/10/new-geothermal-map-of-united-states.html

or maybe even:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2011/10/03/bc-fusion-energy-project.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Fusion

So you call me an idiot without a citation?

I am unaware of any private for profit healthcare in Canada. I was unaware that the Canada Health Act has been amended to allow for it. If there is any it is likely very small in in some fringe service that is a gray area in the act likely. Anyway if YOU read the actual articles, what little private health case that is out there is paid for by the public system in most cases. About the only thing not covered are prescription drugs, dentistry and optometry. None of which has anything to do with a liver transplant type of operation. (Though I think they should be covered, not sure why those are not really)

http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/healthcare/public_vs_private.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Canada#Private_sector
http://timelymedical.ca/
http://www.macleans.ca/article.jsp?content=20060501_125881_125881

The third is to an actual private care referral service in Canada. If you look into their links you will see that they contract out to 22 hospitals in 8 US states...

So in closing, you sir are an idiot. Of course I should have checked your history first as I am arguing with a Troll.

Skippus, the current government we have up here was elected by fraudulent means.

They're actively blocking the investigation into voter oppression with the line "They should have filed the complaint before they found out about the fraud!" The head investigator into the biggest case of voter oppression had his budget cut by seven million dollars and was forced into early retirement last week. A recent court decision found that fraudulent votes for a CPC candidate were greater than the difference, forcing a by-election.

Several senior members of the government are under investigation for election fraud, including the head of the Ethics Committee.

The party has plead guilty to breaking election law in the last three elections, and responded by appointing those that did the fraud into Senate positions. (Our senate is appointed for life!)

That sounds to me like a coup happened. A silent coup. Like Quebec's Quiet Revolution, but malevolent.

The 80% of us that did NOT vote for the current bag of asshats are waiting patiently for the investigations to conclude.

Far too patiently, if you ask me. Far too patiently...

Stewie's lucky it's not the US or he'd be leaving Parliament Hill in a custom-fitted pine suit.

I am mad enough to riot and drag people bodily from the Hill.

I like that image: custom-fitted pine suit. And, as for dragging people from the Hill -- when are "the troops" going to do what they do in tin-pot dictatorships and throw the government out (or in prison) and force new elections? That would be the ultimate (and most delicious) irony: the troops imprisoning "support out troops" Harper.

And it's insightful - we're precariously close to the 4th box to use in defense of liberty (1: soap box, 2: ballot box, 3: jury box, 4: ammo box).

Posting anon to preserve mod points (Maow).

Skippus, the current government we have up here was elected by fraudulent means.

They're actively blocking the investigation into voter oppression with the line "They should have filed the complaint before they found out about the fraud!" The head investigator into the biggest case of voter oppression had his budget cut by seven million dollars and was forced into early retirement last week. A recent court decision found that fraudulent votes for a CPC candidate were greater than the difference, forcing a by-election.

Several senior members of the government are under investigation for election fraud, including the head of the Ethics Committee.

The party has plead guilty to breaking election law in the last three elections, and responded by appointing those that did the fraud into Senate positions. (Our senate is appointed for life!)

The 80% of us that did NOT vote for the current bag of asshats are waiting patiently for the investigations to conclude. Stewie's lucky it's not the US or he'd be leaving Parliament Hill in a custom-fitted pine suit.

I am mad enough to riot and drag people bodily from the Hill.

Nah, Americans are stupid all year long.

You must understand that American stupidity is a moderate stupidity, plumbing neither the heights nor depths of what is achieved in European civilization and many of its offshoots. (I expect you'll take this news sitting down.)

Weird, I just read this new article: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/story/2012/06/15/edmonton-university-school-shooting.html?cmp=rss

And then I came to /. to read this.

It seems that a lot of people are trying to pin Stuxnet firmly on the US Government, current administration. So far it seems to be mostly "unnamed knowledgable sources" which could be BS - but things could get more credible.

Somebody lock you in the closet again? It's been out for weeks.**

Possibly as a retalitory cyber attack, possibly something as crude as blowing up a few buildings full of people. Something that is assured to cost the US more than a few million dollars. Obviously there is very little that can be done to stop such an attack - especially if it came in the form of something like Weather Bug with people clamoring to figure out how to install it in spite of what ever controls, warning and blocks put in their way. Ever seen someone in a business with all locked-down users (no Admin rights) call the help desk to ask if they could have someone install Weather Bug for them? Yeah, like that.

You do realize that there are many, many folks - in the US, in Israel, in Saudi Arabia and all over the world who are simply drooling with pleasure over the mere thought of an Iranian first strike. That opens the floodgates for all sorts of nastyness and it will be all the fault of the Iranians. In fact, if one were so disposed, one could argue that all of the posturing and bluffing we're doing is largely to get Iran to frizzle bad enough to lash out.

** random citation - do a quick search and find this and more including some really entertaining counter-counter-conspiracy tales

And the tax drops were an attempt to combat cigarette smuggling.

Who made and supplied those contraband cigarettes? Canadian tobacco companies, engaged in a massive fraud to avoid paying taxes.

Thankfully they got caught, charged, and had to pay over half a billion dollars to the government.

Har. What, like VISA and other credit cards, debit cards, and Bitcoin?

The best they can do is lower the fraud rates. But "cannot be counterfeited" is probably an impossible standard.

Even as a politician, you have to be careful what you wish for. There's a reason why direct democracy and the "tyranny of the majority" is balanced in most modern democracies with a fairly thorough statement of individual rights.

On the technical side, it's going to be tricky to implement anything that doesn't require people revealing who they are at the same time as their opinions, in order to verify that they aren't gaming the system. That verification will discourage many people from participating. I suggest the "in person" approach is better, or at least use a system that offers the chance for written feedback, because you're still going to need to know *why* people have a particular opinion. A "yes" or "no" majority on a poll doesn't help much with coming up with a compromise that might be satisfactory for most people. I know "compromise" has been turned into a bad word in American politics, but this is quite wrong. The reality is, in a democracy people with differing views have to get along with a third solution: our side, their side, and a third one that is acceptable to both. It's a politicians job to try to find that third one, difficult though it may be.

It's crazy to suggest this, but the slashdot polls are actually useful in this respect. The poll options and the numbers are highly untrustworthy and almost useless (exactly as the disclaimer says). The value is in the comments associated with the poll. Okay, once you get past the missing options complaints, jokes, etc. :-) Anyway, buried in those comments you will sometimes find some real gems. The difficult part in any political version would be getting past the inevitable angry rants and the shills, but the slashdot moderation system helps to some extent.

There's a well documented case of undercover police acting as agents provocateurs in Quebec City.

Their boots gave them away - as well as their behaviour. The other protesters noticed the boots were exactly the same as the police line the provocateurs were trying to provoke.

Some links can be found; CBC should have a fairly authoritative story on it, maybe here.

Yes, Canada does, though it's tied to residency rather than citizenship.
The CBC had some info on this last year.

Seems like we shoud resume the "Tell Vic Everything" campaign. If Vic is really that interested in spying on everyone, then make it easier for him.

- Add @ToewsVic to every tweet you send.
- Start posting your breakfast details on his Facebook page.
- CC him on every email you send using all his addresses (note they made him new ones after the last campaign - vic.toews@parl.gc.ca / toewsv1@parl.gc.ca / Toews.V@parl.gc.ca )

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/02/16/pol-twitter-tell-vic-everything.html

Yeah, well, apparently going after pirates is more important than saving Canadians from pedophiles...

Nice work, but I'm accurate about the law. It was primarily the Toronto Police who enforced it, often with excessive force, but it was the province that misled people about its existence, then left Bill Blair to explain it all. Here's the best link you'll find on the matter: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/story/2010/06/29/g20-chief-fence571.html Cheers.

It used to be just a backbencher's suggestion, the government decided to back the bill a few days ago. Barring something unforeseen, it will become law.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/05/06/pol-ottawa-bill-targets-masked-protesters-jail-fines.html

Those long interruptions are great for channel surfing, as well as the aforementioned using the washroom, making a quick phone call, doing the dishes, or deciding "do I really want to spend another 30 minutes watching this crap?"

Most of the time, "do I really want to spend another 30 minutes watching this crap" wins. About the only exception is Two Broke Girls (when I remember to watch it), reruns of Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother, and Rules of Engagement (I missed them the first time around) and the occasional TV interview (George Stroumboulopoulos on CBC, Denis Levesque on TVA).

I'd like to ensure that everyone can have some basic comfort in a society where total generated wealth clearly allows for it. You would still earn much more by being productive, so I don't see motivation to work as a problem.

And yes, it has been tried in real life, and did work just fine.

They haven't shifted up into Canada, so much as certain Canadians are deciding to adopt the underhanded techniques that are routine in US politics. It's not even a hypothetical:

"McBain was working in the party's central war room for the campaign and says Sona contacted him to suggest a campaign of disinformation. Crawford, who worked on the Burke campaign in Guelph, said he overheard a conversation between Sona and another campaign worker about "how the Americans do politics," but didn't think Sona was serious."

That's pretty awful.

Yes, thousands. In Guelph alone, there were at least 7,670 - EC knows this from records they were able to subpoena from RackNine - http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Fraudulent+robocalls+absolutely+outrageous+Mayrand/6383004/story.html - those same records matched the CPC's CIMS database exactly. Now that's just the ones that "pierre poutine" set up - it's looking increasingly likely he was a rogue, but there was an underlying and much more pervasive and carefully executed national strategy - http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/04/24/pol-election-calls-poll.html - If pierre poutine hadn't gone and blown it by going overboard, we might never have found out.

We have the second-largest province by population basically run by the Mafia, and the RCMP wanting to keep the evidence away from an official inquiry.

While we have students rioting in the streets because the government refuses to sit down and talk, we fine out the Education Minister took Mafia money.

The mob skims 5% off the top of all large construction projects, decides who will be "allowed" to bid, and how the contracts will be divied up. This has been going on for at least 40 years.

And of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg.

It was 4, Unseen, Unicorn,Upholder, and Ursula and whilst there may be issues with the class some of the problems have been self inflicted
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/story/2012/02/13/ns-hmcs-corner-brook-damage.html
that'll buff out right?

Asbestos IS pretty much a closed case.. no???

Oilsands... well..
I lost faith in environmental concerns of the government when it was revealed that all of the monitoring of the rivers were using old equipment designed to monitor chemicals used in the PULP AND PAPER industry.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2010/12/07/f-weston-oilsands.html

I grew up in Alberta and am here now. We used to hear stories from our engineers coming back from the states in shock at the disregard for the environment.
A friend of friend owns an environmental testing company. The image of him making "sweeping under the carpet" motions is burned into my brain. His business is NOT to catch environmental issues... he's paid by the oil companies to show compliance.

The oil companies rebelled at the idea of paying the royalties they had already agreed to pay. They do the accounting on which the royalties are based and when the Alberta government reviewed the royalties they stomped around and corrupted the government in order to get their way. They've since thrown their weight behind the new "Wildrose Party" which is promising everything voters want... but of course will give the oil industry priority. They might get elected on Monday.

Oh, right. Not allowed unless approved by the control freaks we have at the top of the political system at the moment.

I think it's time for ordinary Canadian citizens (and anyone else in the world that wants to help) to start firing off enough requests to Canadian government scientific institutions that we can eventually overwhelm the pinheads in charge of "messaging" and they let us speak with the people doing the work. We used to be able to do that easily, but it has been getting worse and worse over the years. It has achieved truly ridiculous levels of obfuscation with the current government. Scientists should be allowed to speak their minds on scientific matters of public concern. It's good research being paid for with OUR tax dollars. Stop trying to hide it from us for the sake of "controlling the message". If you want to save money, fire the expensive idiots in charge of the "messaging". Scientists are quite capable of delivering a useful message if you let them do their jobs.

If you ever wonder why scientific budgets in Canada continue to decline in terms of money available for research and scientific staff, but the "upper management" and "PR people" staff get bigger and bigger to manage the smaller pool of scientists, this is the answer. These people have nothing to do all day but spin the story to align with the politics of the day.

Being on the other side of the world, I hadn't heard of http://music.cbc.ca/ before. Cool site. Thanks to the media companies for giving them some free publicity!

So now that I've got my initial reaction out of the way...

12.0 Why is there advertising on CBC Music?
Advertising is the primary means that allows us to fairly compensate the artists we play on CBC Music. We signed an agreement with the Audio-Video Licensing Agency (AVLA), which represents over 1,000 music labels. We are very excited to report that through this deal, all artists registered via AVLA will be paid for having their work broadcast on CBC Radio 2, CBC Radio 3, and our 40 web radio stations.

Another reason we've decided to pursue advertising on CBC Music is that, in the current economic climate, CBC cannot afford to have a large new service like CBC Music that isn't self-sustaining. This revenue stream not only allows us to survive, but also helps us to grow and continue to expand CBC Music.

Emphasis added.

So I'm not sure of the full legalities of it, but according to the CBC Music FAQ, they have acquired the right to stream all the music on their site.

What's the problem? My guess is that these are companies that refused to sign, and they're bitching about the fact that they couldn't get the price they wanted for their music. Excuse me while I shed a tear or two.

"The only music that you can hear for free is when the birds sing." In other words, if you haven't paid me and my friends to listen to music, you can't listen to it at all. What an asshole.

This system is supposed to handle micropayments. Yeah, the penny costs 1.6 cents to produce. But, because it's metal, it can easily survive being used in 10,000 transactions. This is equivalant to a surcharge of 0.016% per transaction. In the case of nickels/dimes/quarters and $1 and $2 coins, the overhead ratio becomes even more microscopic. Compare this with what credit card companies charge. From http://www.cbc.ca/news/story/2009/04/16/f-cardfees.html

> Merchants pay two to four per cent of the sale price in various
> transaction fees whenever they accept a credit card for payment.

> âoePlayers you wouldnâ(TM)t have thought of beforeâ are looking for
> ways to get into the market of secure transactions, she said.

The article in the summary ( http://www.thestar.com/business/article/1159513--royal-canadian-mint-to-create-digital-currency ) says...
> âoeYouâ(TM)re seeing competitors that have been in the space in a while
> and new competitors looking at the payments market as an opportunity.â

Being a middleman is very profitable. It would be even more profitable if every minor transaction was charged.

It's worse than that. Here in Canada their main competition is FutureShop, which is modeled after the same big-box-store style. Near where I live the two stores are right across the street from each other. Their prices are usually the same, but if there is ever any difference, Best Buy loses. They can't even compete against a fellow big-box store! Worse, when I bought a TV from a local, non-big box dealer, the local store had a better price during boxing week sales and HUGELY better service. You know its bad when there isn't a single area where they compete: neither price nor service.

Here's the ultimate irony: Best Buy bought FutureShop in 2001, yet here the two stores are, right across the street from each other years later. Talk about inefficiency.

You have hit the nail on the head

Many security breaches can be prevented if we just follow the guidelines that are in place. If you look at the case of Sub-Lieutenant Jeffrey Delisle there were some indicators such as his divorce and bankruptcy which are red flags.

In Delisle's case he was caught, but it is not clear how much info he sold.

Yet a third case of Security Officials dropping the ball is John Walker who I believe was turned in by his wife. This guy at one point didn't even try to keep his clearance updated!

So, in the end it falls to the procedures we have in place. If we don't consistently follow them, we pay the consequences.

I'm not sure which wing is crazier Is a Catholic teacher's union left or right wing?

> BTW what's wrong with movie popcorn that it needs a label?

Because some theaters use really bad oils to save money.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2009/11/19/popcorn-movie-theatre-salt-fat.html

Money quote: "You can get one kind of popcorn with three grams of saturated fat and roughly the same size at another theatre with 38 grams of saturated fat. That's just a phenomenal difference," said Bill Jeffery of the Centre for Science in the Public Interest in Ottawa. "These are things that you can't tell by tasting."

Yes, one sub. First fired a torpedo literally a couple of weeks ago on March 16th, more than 10 years after buying them. It launched an unarmed dummy torpedo, but, hey, maybe now they'll try some real practice.

It was the cons who cancelled the helicopters

Huh? The CBC says:

Then came the 1993 federal election campaign, when Jean Chrétien and his Liberals attacked the Tory plan as wasteful, calling the EH-101 a "Cadillac" helicopter. When the Liberals won and Chrétien became prime minister one of his first acts was to scrap the Tory deal, an act that cost the Canadian government nearly $500 million in cancellation fees.

. . .did a story on cord blood banks a couple of years ago. Basically, it's expensive and the odds that it will be used are extremely low. Methinks companies are preying on parents' fears.

Read this and watch this.

. . .did a story on cord blood banks a couple of years ago. Basically, it's expensive and the odds that it will be used are extremely low. Methinks companies are preying on parents' fears.

Read this and watch this.

... is that the ruling conservative party is already under investigation for illegal election tampering. It would seem to me that the current Canadian government is one of the most corrupt in the western hemisphere at the moment.

I wouldn't say they are the most corrupt it is just that since 1970 screwing around and ratfucking have become the norm. In the states it all depends on how good you are at getting away with it, in Canada all the politicians, especially the ones with deep pockets, like Harper, hire spin doctors and American election monkey business specialists to help direct their campaigns.

  If I remember correctly Harper had one hell of a lot of support from US conservatives getting a majority. He hired several firms and ex republican gerrymandering specialists. As witness to the fact that they lost to the NDP in Quebec big time because in Quebec he is really hated and the reality is that the leadership of the PQ was screwed so Quebec just up and suddenly voted NDP. Harper knew that Quebec was a write off so less of the ratfucking went on there and the result showed that the ratfucking that they did do in Quebec along with the Liberals usual smear and monkey business completely sunk the PQ.

Elections have become little more than a media blitz circus and have very little real substance today. I would not at all be surprised if the ddos of the online voting site was done by hired guns, with conservative financial support from both Canadian and American so called political conservatives. If John A or Lincoln were alive they would puke at what has become of their political parties. The conservatives have lost their traditional base and have become little more than the playground of the rich.

yes.... but no... the PQ is a provincial party NOT a federal party... I imagine you mean the Bloc when you talk about PQ....If you want to seem like you know what you are talking about, it helps when you can at least get the basic facts right.

... is that the ruling conservative party is already under investigation for illegal election tampering. It would seem to me that the current Canadian government is one of the most corrupt in the western hemisphere at the moment.

I wouldn't say they are the most corrupt it is just that since 1970 screwing around and ratfucking have become the norm. In the states it all depends on how good you are at getting away with it, in Canada all the politicians, especially the ones with deep pockets, like Harper, hire spin doctors and American election monkey business specialists to help direct their campaigns.

  If I remember correctly Harper had one hell of a lot of support from US conservatives getting a majority. He hired several firms and ex republican gerrymandering specialists. As witness to the fact that they lost to the NDP in Quebec big time because in Quebec he is really hated and the reality is that the leadership of the PQ was screwed so Quebec just up and suddenly voted NDP. Harper knew that Quebec was a write off so less of the ratfucking went on there and the result showed that the ratfucking that they did do in Quebec along with the Liberals usual smear and monkey business completely sunk the PQ.

Elections have become little more than a media blitz circus and have very little real substance today. I would not at all be surprised if the ddos of the online voting site was done by hired guns, with conservative financial support from both Canadian and American so called political conservatives. If John A or Lincoln were alive they would puke at what has become of their political parties. The conservatives have lost their traditional base and have become little more than the playground of the rich.

... is that the ruling conservative party is already under investigation for illegal election tampering. It would seem to me that the current Canadian government is one of the most corrupt in the western hemisphere at the moment.

Building on their anti-science agenda, the Harper administration has decided to 'repurpose' the National Research Council to serve the whims of private industry in what amounts to a state sponsored capitalism scheme. NRC had been a very long standing institution in Canada dedicated to research in the pure sciences and engineering.

How do this forward thinking decision come about? The Canadian government decided to investigate why the research stimulus money given to private industry was not showing a good return. They received comments from business owners claiming that the process was too complex, lacked leadership, failed to correctly identify promising companies, etc. From that feedback, they somehow discerned that the solution must be to make NRC the lapdog of private industry. The minister of science and technology envisions "a one-stop, 1-800, 'I have a solution for your business problem' " shop. What I'd like to know is how the fuck this in any way address the original problem of businesses squandering their stimulus money?

The kicker is this - the minister claims to be following the advice of some guy who owns a business software company. How the hell is this person qualified to dictate science and engineering research policy for the country of Canada? Clearly he isn't, but when he says something that happens to align with the ideology of the current government, that's all the justification needed apparently.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/story/2012/03/06/technology-goodyear-national-research-council.html

You're confusing accusations with facts. It was a Liberal staff member that leaked the information about Toews, not an NDP politician as the Conservatives initially claimed (without evidence).

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/02/27/pol-liberals-vikileaks.html

Vic Toews tried to bring in legislation that would allow the police, or any designated authority by the ministry, to spy on any internet communications without a warrant. In an interview, Toews then admitted that he had not actually read the legislation, and tried to lie and say that there were no such provisions in the bill (proposed act of legislation).

Anonymous didn't like this, and decided to spy on Vic Toews, releasing personal information about the Minister of "Public Safety" and his multiple indiscretions, including baby-sitters, mistresses, and judges that he nominated while Minister of Justice.

All the whilst, the Conservative (see "Republican") government is under investigation for election fraud for having identified members of other parties, then sending them robocalls telling them that their polling (voting) location had changed to a ficticious location. This resulted in close ridings (electoral districts) being taken by the Conservatives when elderly voters were unable to find the correct location to vote! (source: CBC News)