Slashdot Mirror
U.S. Says Canada Cares Too Much About Liberties
A cheeky writer at Canada's Ottawa Citizen newspaper has written a story about the U.S. State Department's 2002 Patterns of Global Terrorism.
← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)
← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)
We have vast oil resources in Western Canada. It is exported to the US very cheaply, and here in Eastern Canada, we import oil from the Middle East at much higher prices.
We also grow large quantities of wheat in Western Canada. However, we are forced to ship it to Eastern Canada first (Canadian Wheat Board). Then we get to buy it back at higher prices. If a farmer tries to circumvent this procedure they are thrown in jail.
Privacy is not liberty, nor is it a "civil liberty", although it might be a "civil right". A liberty is a right to carry out some type of action without being obstructed by anyone else. Privacy rights restrict the actions of others (to obtain or publish information about you) which makes them claim-rights. So the US complaint about Canadian privacy laws has nothing at all to do with liberty.
This gives a pretty good introduction to the theoretical classification of rights.
The stuff about legalizing dope is of course another matter entirely. I have no idea why American politicians gets so wound up about dope, when most Americans have used it without comming to much harm.
This is interesting.. the following are some stats I found on crime in Canada and the US (and Sweden, see this page.)
Reading this reminded me of something I read in my local newspaper (Canadian) a few weeks after 9/11.
It was basically a transcribed message (or something like it) from Osama bin Laden saying, essentially, that they (al Queda) had already won. Supposedly, the idea behind their attacks was not to kill citizens, or destroy landmarks. It was to kill liberties, and destroy freedom. Apparantly Osama wanted the citizens of the US to live in fear, and to loose their freedoms. He wanted them to experience life as other countries did, with checkpoints, searches, and the constant fear of attacks.
It would seem he succeeded admirably.
I don't honestly understand why people get so fired up about marijuana being legalized. I think canada has the right idea here.
;)
Disclaimer: I don't actually smoke marijuana...although i use a Mac, so that's close enough
Deaths from tobacco cigarettes in the US, 2002: 400,000
Deaths from Marijuana in the US, 2002: 0.00
Now tell me, which one should be illegal?
You like your new Mac more than you like me, don't you, Dave? Dave? I asked...She said Yes.
No. Any country without free healthcare is second world in my book. I hate what the USA does to its poor and I hate that the Chileans copy them.
[For the record, I'm a Canadian currently living in Chile]
Well, Canada does seem kinda European...
I would say that Canada is a cross between the U.S. and Europe, civically, politically, grammatically, and geographically. As such, it frequently finds itself in the middle of a tug-of-war between the two poles.
Alaska, no, but they did "liberate" the Alaskan panhandle from Canada. And then too, Britain was the US's bitch.
Notice that is for CRUDE oil.
The US likes to import Middle East crude (unprocessed) oil because it can process it itself (value added). Canada, not being a third-world country, much prefers to do the rifining itself and ship the end product to the US.
This is why you won't see George Bush or any of his set suggest the US make an effort to buy more stable Canadian oil: the oil refiners along the coasts (especially on South-East coast) would go ballistic.
There's more oil in Canada than all of the Middle East combined. Most of it, however, is in the tar sands and expensive to recover (there's still a profit to be made by effecient opperators, but it's not like the Middle East where you just stick a hole in the ground and oil comes rushing out).
Still, even without counting natural gas, Canada is the US's largest fuel supplier. Lets also not forget about hydro-electricity imported into the US from Canada.
The thing I liked about Bowling for Columbine was that Moore was willing to be convinced. He started out believing that gun ownership/control is the major issue, but he later becomes convinced that a culture of fear is the main reason for the gun violence in America. If you really believe that the movie is simply advocating gun control, you should probably see it again with a more open mind.
The Drowned and the Saved - Primo Levi