Canadian Government Muzzling Scientists

IllogicalStudent writes with this excerpt from The Vancouver Sun: "The Harper government has tightened the muzzle on federal scientists, going so far as to control when and what they can say about floods at the end of the last ice age. Natural Resources Canada scientists were told this spring they need 'pre-approval' from Minister Christian Paradis' office to speak with journalists. Their 'media lines' also need ministerial approval, say documents obtained by Postmedia News through access-to-information legislation. The documents say the 'new' rules went into force in March and reveal how they apply not only to contentious issues, including the oilsands, but benign subjects such as floods that occurred 13,000 years ago. They also give a glimpse of how Canadians are being cut off from scientists whose work is financed by taxpayers, critics say, and is often of significant public interest — be it about fish stocks, genetically modified crops or mercury pollution in the Athabasca River."

Comments

My gosh

[Anonymous Coward]

that's like muzzling 1.25 American scientists, eh?

Re:My gosh

[Thud457]

so is this a case of pro-skub bias or dasterdly anti-skub bias?

Re:My gosh

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the muzzles are required to keep the tops of their floppy heads from falling off.

Re:My gosh

[garyisabusyguy]

yep, because .25 of American scientists believe in Intelligent Design, and as such are worthless

Actually, my ears percked up at the mention of past ice age floods, especially since people have pointed to a post ice-age flood in the Black Sea as a source for the story of the Biblical Flood
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Sea_deluge_theory

Of course any real archeaology of a Biblical event is bound to expose some falacies, like how it just flooded a small region and didn't really flood the whole world, Noah actually managed to save some domesticated animals, not every animal on the Earth, etc...

So... have looney Creationists actually gained enough hold on the Canadian government to silence scientific knowledge?

Very America-like, you all must be very proud

Pirate Party of Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.pirateparty.ca/

Re:Pirate Party of Canada

[Wacky_Wookie]

Yar! mod thee parent up!

Canada needs a media reboot, as the media appears to be totally out of line with the people!

Eh?

[decipher_saint]

This reads to me as "Government scientists managed by Government"

There are plenty of scientists who don't work for the Feds that aren't "muzzled".

Re:Eh?

[MozeeToby]

What I read it as is that you will never hear anything from a government scientist that doesn't support the government agenda. It means that government scientists cannot realistically be treated as unbiased sources, the same way you wouldn't trust a tobacco funded study on the effects of cigarets. Would you really trust a government funded scientist's on the possible ecological damage caused by harvesting the oil sands if the current government's agenda had that as item number one? Most people would question that relationship anyway, but this new requirement makes it all but official; if you take government grant money, you will only publish results that agree with the government's stances.

Re:Eh?

[mevets]

The concept is that these scientists work for the Canadian people, not for the zealot of the day.

"The time for study is over, it is time for action" - John Baird, then Minister of Environment, before gutting the climate scientists budgets.

Re:Eh?

[Hatta]

Any scientist who doesn't work for the government works for industry. They're even more controlled in what they can say.

No scientist should have to check with the government before talking to the media. The only duty of a scientist is to advance knowledge. To promote truth. If you trust them to do that, you should have no problem with them talking to the media. If you can't trust them to do that, then why are you giving them grants?

Re:Eh?

[wealthychef]

What's missing for me here is the government's claimed reason for doing this. National security?

Re:Eh?

[iamhigh]

But you made my point for me in your post...

What I read it as is that you will never hear anything from a government scientist that doesn't support the government agenda

if the current government's agenda had that as item number one

*CURRENT* being the key word. "The Government" has no agenda. It is a group of people intended to lay down and enforce some common rules; not a dictator. If you can't convince your countrymen that the government is going the wrong direction, and get them to vote it a different way, maybe you are the one in the wrong.

The fundamental problem with this philosophy is that 50% of voters are dumber than average (median).

Re:Eh?

[commodore64_love]

>>>What I read it as is that you will never hear anything from a government scientist that doesn't support the government agenda.

So it's just like the BBC, PBS, or CBC.
(ducking and running) ;-)

Re:Eh?

[Nidi62]

They commissioned a scientist to research it, but the government didn't like the results so they didn't approve the scientist's application to publish.

Re:Eh?

[quietwalker]

It may be different in Canada, but in the US, the professors in the field of education tend to be some of the greatest contributors to the various scientific fields. They generally don't work for the government or the industry.

Re:Eh?

[oldspewey]

The reason is basically that the current government is allergic to anything that puts them "off message." It's pure politics.

Re:Eh?

[Cockatrice_hunter]

I think that there is a misconception here. The Canadian government didn't suppress the publishing of the results, rather they prevented the scientists from contacting the media. Also, in response to the statement that only government supported claims would be published, even were that true a paper has to go through various hoops in order to get published. This includes peer review to make sure that the science is legitimate. There will always be other scientists who disagree and they are welcome to publish rebuttals.

Re:Eh?

[Hatta]

Research professors get salaries that generally come directly from federal grants. They work for the government.

Re:Eh?

[MozeeToby]

That's great, so whoever is in charge at the moment gets to decide which results get published. Why, they should fund a study to see which political party's policy will be best for the economy. That way everyone in the country will know for sure which party they should vote for... as long as it happens to be the one in charge, otherwise no one will ever see the results.

How are you supposed to convince others that the people in charge are wrong when the people in charge decide what information is available? You need access to information that shows them to be wrong, something that this law appears on the face to be designed to prevent. We've always been at war with Eastasia, and here's a historian that will corroborate that statement if you don't believe me.

Re:Eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

But you made my point for me in your post...

What I read it as is that you will never hear anything from a government scientist that doesn't support the government agenda

if the current government's agenda had that as item number one

*CURRENT* being the key word. "The Government" has no agenda. It is a group of people intended to lay down and enforce some common rules; not a dictator. If you can't convince your countrymen that the government is going the wrong direction, and get them to vote it a different way, maybe you are the one in the wrong.

The fundamental problem with this philosophy is that 50% of voters are dumber than average (median).

And also, don't forget that the average is low to begin with.

Re:Eh?

[wealthychef]

The Canadian government didn't suppress the publishing of the results, rather they prevented the scientists from contacting the media.

You know, that seems a reasonable position from where I'm standing. I might not like it, but I cannot fault the government for wanting to control the media spin. It's not like the reporters are actually going to report the science without a bunch of spin of their own.

Re:Eh?

[FlyingOrca]

Er, no. The publication process hasn't been muzzled as far as I know (and I'd probably know, see my comment further down). But this does point to some interesting challenges for the current generation of scientists.

Take a guy like Dave Schindler - when he ran ELA for the feds, he published and publicised ground-breaking work on nutrient loading and acid rain (to cite a couple of examples) that resulted in improved regulation. Today he's not employed by the feds, so he can and does tackle the oil sands issue, but those scientists who are employed by the feds are the ones who are told to vet their public comments.

Re:Eh?

[Darkness404]

All governments share two common agendas, one is to maintain the power of its rule. This is particularly evident in all of the "qualifiers" to what should be basic rights. You have freedom of speech (so long as you don't offend us), freedom from torture (unless you are a "terrorist"), the right to know what you are charged for (unless you are a "terrorist"), etc.

The second agenda is to maintain the basic structure of the political environment. It is not advantageous for the democrats/republicans in the US to introduce an amendment that would bring proportional representation or otherwise disrupt their power balance. Neither side really wants reforms in tax structure, debate over currency, etc.

If the two major parties can distract the masses with issues that don't really matter they can share the power for the future.

If you can't convince your countrymen that the government is going the wrong direction, and get them to vote it a different way, maybe you are the one in the wrong.

Good luck getting most people to even vote, let alone go beyond their general apathy.

And that reasoning is laughable, the main point of freedom in a democracy is limited government first, that is the real pillar of freedom, democracy is second. Democracy without limited government is nothing more than mob justice. Your reasoning falls apart when you try to use it in a case. For example, is lynching justified? After all, everyone agrees with it!

A free government depends on limited government more than it depends on democracy .

Re:Eh?

[oldspewey]

I always thought the average was average ... looks like I'm going to have to dust of the statistics texts.

Re:Eh?

[Trepidity]

This rule appears to apply only to scientists who directly work for a government agency as employees, though, not to professors who are funded by federal grant money, or even professors who teach at public universities.

Re:Eh?

[oldspewey]

Good luck getting most people to even vote, let alone go beyond their general apathy.

And doubly good luck getting most people to spend more that 25 seconds listening to only the most facile recap of current issues before making up their minds on how they'll vote. I've long thought that the voter form should include a randomized series of questions testing knowledge of current events, political affairs, basic economics - all at a really basic level. The people who get less than half correct have their vote counted as once. The people who do better get their vote counted maybe two or three times.

Of course there is no way this will ever come to pass since it violates your second agenda above. Pretty much the last thing any political party wants is an informed, engaged electorate that can't be swayed with idiotic soundbites.

Re:Eh?

[mrsquid0]

In both the US and Canada most university research faculty are funded through federal research grants. These grants are competitive and administered by various research councils that are, in theory at least, apolitical. The real political influence comes in determining how much money these research councils get, not in how they distribute it.

Re:Eh?

[postbigbang]

Or perhaps the suppression of data that supports a contrarian opinion or action.

The facts are, what they are. Peer review is vital. Yet trusting politicians to use information neutrally is suspect.

Re:Eh?

[wealthychef]

But peer review is still going on here. The only thing being squelched is press coverage. I'm sympathetic to the argument that press coverage, even if biased, is necessary and this should not be happening, but it's not like the government is covering up the results. They are just not allowing their scientists to talk to the press about it. Not the same thing, actually, although they are in the same ballpark, I agree.

Re:Eh?

[Dishevel]

There was a study on cell phone use while driving. The study cam to the conclusion that talking on the cell phone while driving was dangerous. It also stated that there was no difference in the danger level if you were holding the phone or using a hands free device. The politicians where I live used this study to pass a law requiring a hands free device to be used.
How stupid are people that the politicians can believe them to be that stupid?

Re:Eh?

[Defenestrar]

I've worked with a number of great scientists I wouldn't want to talk to media - probably none without coaching. Do you have any idea what kind of damage a 10 second soundbite can do to the objective truth? (Likely taken from several hours of video and interview footage). PR people make their money by not getting excited or passionate about their work and making a comment which can be misunderstood, misinterpreted, or misused - and they never ever forget that that camera is rolling and audio recording even if it's pointed somewhere else.

Re:Eh?

[gtall]

See poster above, apparently the Canadian gov. isn't stopping peer reviewed publication, just gov. scientists pimping their asses to the popular media. In a way, there's a certain logic to that; why should a scientist get media coverage (with enough points it can be turned into real money) on the government dime. On the other hand, there should be wider dissemination for scientific results even if the public is in general too uneducated or distracted to care.

Re:Eh?

[oldspewey]

Well then it's up to the media outlet to ensure they are getting it "right," because you can find all sorts of damaging 10 second soundbites out there, whether from industry, academia, religion, or just some freak standing on the street corner holding a poster talking about the impending doomsday.

Re:Eh?

[RJHelms]

Yup, exactly this. The Harper administration has for the past few years been increasingly exerting control on how the public service disseminates information to the public. In the past (before 2007) a bureaucrat usually only needed the approval of their direct supervisor to respond to media inquiries, unless the topic was particularly sensitive. Now it the system of Message Event Proposals created in 2007, approval frequently needs to come directly from the Prime Minister's Office, even for totally routine and innocuous communications.

I think the biggest problem is, reports on the last ice age might offend the Conservative Party's core supporters - who know that there's no such thing as 13,000 years ago, and even if there was there'd be both dinosaurs and cavemen at the same time.

Re:Eh?

[blueg3]

They don't. There's a big difference between a scientist who is employed by a government agency and one that is employed by a university or private research institution. While university research programs often receive funding through federal grants, they also receive other sources of funding, including non-government grants. People who work for universities aren't employed by the government, aren't directly answerable to government bureaucrats, and aren't subject to rules such as these about what papers they can publish.

Re:Eh?

[digitig]

But peer review is still going on here.

What has peer review got to do with this? Peer review is to ensure that what does get published is valid, but this story is about what doesn't get published. Nobody peer reviews a paper that is never released.

Re:Eh?

[Znork]

stated that there was no difference in the danger level if you were holding the phone or using a hands free device.

Trouble is, if you open up that can of worms you'll get studies noting there's no difference between hands free phone chatting and talking to passengers, and that kids in the car are much more dangerous than even using a chat client on a smart phone while driving and eventually you'll get the conclusion that drivers should be isolated and on uppers, while passengers should be in a separate compartment.

And that just won't be politically manageable. Which is why you get not entirely scientifically supported regulations instead, that may or may not do much good, but that perhaps make it appear that someone's doing something about something so the can of worms can be shoved under the carpet until we have computer driven cars instead.

Re:Eh?

[dsavage]

Yeah, you better. The "average" can still be low. Let's take a 6th grade class taking a calculus exam. The class "average" would be somewhere around 10%, (if that,) which is considered "low."

I'm not sure about Canadian IQ, but right now, American IQ average is right at 98... a little lower than the "average" for all people.
-D

Re:Eh?

[wealthychef]

What has peer review got to do with this?

I was responding to postbigbang.

Re:Eh?

[Dishevel]

I understand all of that. Though when it is known that all distractions are created equal then the law just becomes one more government infringement doing no good, little harm and talking points for politicians.

Re:Eh?

[oldspewey]

I always just assumed this was about climate/oilsands politics. I seriously hope you're wrong about the christian fundamentalist angle - that would just be incredibly depressing.

Re:Eh?

[Gilmoure]

How dare you say abortion and gun control don't matter?!!!

Damn, that made me laugh.

Re:Eh?

[rickb928]

Really.

And 'the media outlet' has what interest in getting it 'right'?

Most of our media is in the entertainment business. The majority of the rest has a political agenda, and uses their power to advance their agenda at the expense of their adversaries.

So expecting the media to get it right is truly futile.

At least the professing news outlets should make an effort to get the 'facts' right, but even that fails regularly. Anything they do is tainted by entertainment value or politics.

Re:Eh?

[briantf]

>>>
professors in the field of education tend to be some of the greatest contributors to the various scientific fields
>>>

Can you please point to the big research universities that do NOT accept Federal funding? Where do you think all that grant money comes from?

Are you implying that there is no political bias in university research? Or just in the education departments of said universities?

Politics is an inherent component of human endeavor, we just aren't used to seeing such ham-fisted approaches as used by the incumbent Canadian government. The US Gov't has a lot more experience channeling research results into the harness of political imperatives WITHOUT getting caught doing same.

Regards,
Brian in CA

Re:Eh?

[oldspewey]

Okay, so then the alternative is for the government to step in and control the ways in which media outlets report on science, politics, religion, economy, technology, current affairs, sports, and history ... because somebody could get their facts wrong while pursuing entertainment value in any of those spheres.

Or should the government control reporting only in the areas of science, politics, and the economy, while leaving media outlets with uncensored control over technology, sports, and some of the rest?

Or is it just science that needs a government minister's approval to make sure there are no damaging 10 second soundbites?

Re:Eh?

[Haffner]

you'll get studies noting there's no difference between hands free phone chatting and talking to passengers

Wrong. Talking to passengers is very different than talking on the phone. I can't recall the study off the top of my head, but this has been tested. A passenger is far more likely to take the driver's state into account before speaking, and is also aware of what is going on outside the car. Talking to a person on the other end of a cell phone has none of these advantages.

Re:Eh?

[MozeeToby]

It should be pretty easy to make a spectrum and say this is more distracting than that, is more distracting than that. At least then you could say that everything on one side of the line is legal and everything on the other side is distracted driving / driving under the influence. If kids are really that distracting then yeah, you'd have to make everything less distracting legal (you're not going to get away with telling parents they can't drive with their kids) but at least things would be consistent.

BTW, talking with a passenger has been shown in studies to be much less distracting than talking on a phone because your passenger will immediately shut up if conditions change and even point out things that the driver might have otherwise missed. Interestingly, the most distracting thing they found was having a passenger talk to someone else on the phone because your brain consciously or unconsciously tries to build up a picture of what the person on the other end is saying.

Re:Eh?

[Haffner]

Correct - and for people who have trouble understanding how university professors work for something other than industry (financial compensation) or the government (financial or political compensation), the other professors work for academic prestige. Which, of course, can be directly correlated to future money, but there ARE a few who publish solely for academic reasons.

Re:Eh?

[yankpop]

What has peer review got to do with this? Peer review is to ensure that what does get published is valid, but this story is about what doesn't get published. Nobody peer reviews a paper that is never released.

You're confusing two different issues here. The paper did get published in a peer reviewed journal. The government didn't interfere with that process at all. There is no evidence that the science was influenced by government agenda.

The government didn't step in until after the peer-reviewed paper was published, and only then did they refuse to let their scientists talk with the media. Even then, the media story wasn't suppressed, it went forward, based on information published in the peer-reciewed literature and interviews with co-authors who were not Canadian government employees.

The sum total of the government interference was to prevent their own scientists from talking directly to the media. Which is pretty darn stupid, without a doubt, but it's not the same as the government burying the data.

yp

Re:Eh?

[rickb928]

"Okay, so then the alternative is for the government to step in and control the ways in which media outlets report on science, politics, religion, economy, technology, current affairs, sports, and history ... because somebody could get their facts wrong while pursuing entertainment value in any of those spheres."

Hardly. Oh, wait. I'm in the U.S. In Canada, that isn't necessarily unconstitutional.

"Or should the government control reporting only in the areas of science, politics, and the economy, while leaving media outlets with uncensored control over technology, sports, and some of the rest?"

Again, Canadians may need to counsel their governmet on how they would like it done.

"Or is it just science that needs a government minister's approval to make sure there are no damaging 10 second soundbites?"

Well, from my experience with the Frozen White North, hoof-in-mouth disease is not limited to scientists, but is known to infect much of the Crown, or whatever they have taken to calling Government up there.

From a U.S. citizen's perspective, the government has no business censoring publicly-funded science, nor even privately-funded science. But that's a U.S. perspective, and Canadians may have different ideas. I suspect not much different, but that's for them to work out. Me, I just watch with mixed glee and sadness. Canada can be different in a good way. But it costs something, and many up there seem comvinced that they will suffer if global warming is real.

Of course, they suffer anyways.

Re:Eh?

[MoriT]

Perhaps if journalists stopped taking studies that suggest minor correlations and presenting them to the public as though they proved major causations it would be reasonable to claim censorship here. Nothing in their directive suggests even that the scientist themselves can't, for example, publish a blog where they discuss their findings, just that they shouldn't talk to journalists attempting to use government-funded science to provide a veneer of respectability to their article.

That seems fair to me. I have frequently seen articles on video games, for example, where the article reported something very different than the peer reviewed paper it was supposedly about based on un-peer reviewed comments from the scientist involved. Like, "video games encourage stimulus-seeking behavior that clearly leads to ADHD", when the study found that children with attention problems were far more likely to play video games than children without. If I could prevent my tax dollars from going to support such misinformation campaigns I gladly would.

Re:Eh?

[billcopc]

Nah, more like National Harperism, aka mr thought control, aka mr billion-dollar-bogus-G20-summit-with-police-staged-vandalism, aka Dubya Eh?

He is a big time New World Order proponent. Nuff said.

Re:Eh?

[Stradivarius]

They're probably trying to avoid the problems that result when some random government employee espouses their personal opinions yet get referred to as "a government scientist" by the media, thus implying that the personal opinion is somehow government sanctioned or verified.

I work at an engineering firm. We have lots of smart people and lots of opinions. But we are not supposed to go talking to the media, because we are neither trained nor skilled in conveying information to journalists. This isn't anything nefarious - it's a recognition of the fact that you can be both a brilliant technical person and utterly incompetent when it comes to communicating with the media or other non-technical audiences. You don't want the media reporting things incorrectly just because the individual interviewed doesn't communicate well.

And that doesn't even factor in how bad some of the science reporting out there is. Sometimes it's so wrong it doesn't make any sense until you read the actual journal paper. Even when it's right, often you see unproven speculation mixed in with what the reported-upon study actually showed. Especially if it fits some cultural stereotype or media narrative. There's so much pseudo-information in the major media's reporting of science, that there is good reason to have an accuracy filter in place when communicating government research results to the public.

That said, such review could also be abused for political ends. But in this case they're not limiting publication to the scientific journals, so it's not like they're keeping their research secret. It's really just being careful not to put unprepared or incompetent communicators in front of the press.

Re:Eh?

[Sprouticus]

It also depends on the rule of law. a lynch mob (or any of the examples above) is not problematic because of limited government, but because the government (in theory) and citizens must follow the rule of law.

That is why people in the US get so cranky when people sidestep that rule of law and abuse the system.

Re:Eh?

[Stradivarius]

The easier alternative is that when it's government research, the government should take the utmost care in presenting its results to the media, so as to minimize the chance that the media misunderstands it.

Most of the media is not intentionally trying to distort the science, but they are human with all sorts of biases and limited knowledge of science. A careful communication to the media of what the study showed and did not show is all they need to do. They don't need to regulate the media's reporting, just make sure they're giving the media hard-to-misunderstand summaries of the research.

Re:Eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

When I get into tough situation while driving (parking, going through the intersections) I tell the caller to hold on. How is that for a solution?

Re:Eh?

[T Murphy]

It is easy to enforce a law banning driving while on a hand-held cellphone, but extremely difficult to enforce one for hands-free. I think there should be penalties in place for getting into an accident while on (any) cellphone, but creating an unenforceable law is bad practice.

Re:Eh?

[Will.Woodhull]

I don't see anything about the Canadian government requiring prior approval before politicians in office, or those seeking office, are allowed to talk about public issues, such as Canada's history and its resources.

Without that, this represents a very blatant attempt to discriminate against scientists based solely on their behavior (which is doing things in a scientific way, rather than a political or religious way).

The whole thing is a bit of bad joke, eh?

Re:Eh?

[OeLeWaPpErKe]

You're confusing two different issues here. The paper did get published in a peer reviewed journal. The government didn't interfere with that process at all. There is no evidence that the science was influenced by government agenda.

Except for, you know :
1) paying everyone who has a say on that "peer-reviewed" thing. I mean, I'm not saying it's the same thing, but Russian scientists also only had to be "peer reviewed" by the supreme soviet ... which had quite a few scientists, who approved quite a few papers. I'm not saying the Canadian government is anywhere near that bad, but ...
2) prevent these scientists from informing the public. This is, of course, supposedly the whole point of science, isn't it ? Making our lives better by increasing our knowledge.

Confusing 2 different issues ... right.

Re:Eh?

[RJHelms]

Thankfully I exaggerate, but that element of Canadian society definitely has it's home in the CPC - look at Stockwell Day, cabinet minister and young earth creationist.

The Conservative base, like it seems to be in many countries, is split between the social conservative religious wackos and the fiscal conservative "yay oil, boo climate" wackos. This move is brilliant (in a very cynical way) because it plays to both - but like most of Cabinet's actions these days, doesn't appeal to anyone else.

Re:Eh?

[OeLeWaPpErKe]

Well that solution clearly diminishes the potential for "your betters" to interfere in your life.

Ergo it's very, very bad indeed.

I guess we don't have it that bad. In muslim states it's forbidden to pick the hand you wipe your ass with. I've heard an algerian tell me they checked this in his high school. If the paedophile thief (excuse me "sex with a minor girl against her will, but 'within marriage' (without even her knowledge) makes everything peachy" and obviously the stealing was "under orders from allah") says it, it must be true, right ?

Re:Eh?

[ceoyoyo]

" if you take government grant money, you will only publish results that agree with the government's stances."

There's a slight difference between the actual situation and what you imply. The scientists in question aren't recipients of federal grant money. They're federal employees.

There's a definite problem here, but it's not that the government is telling it's employees they need permission to talk to the media. It's that the National Research Council (I think the article screwed up - I don't think the Natural Resources Council exists) isn't arms length enough from the government.

Grants are a different thing. The guy quoted in the article, the one is is extremely critical of this, is funded by government grants.

Re:Eh?

[shugah]

The difference is far more subtle than you infer.

The public relies upon high quality, independent science (research) in government agencies to inform and direct public policy. Scientists who do science in government agencies are recruited with the assurances that they will still be able to conduct science. Science relies upon independence, peer review and publication. The fact that the scientist in question co-authored a study with 4 other authors from Canada and the UK and that the study was published in a peer reviewed journal indicates that he was/is doing independent research.

When you interfere with independence and take the "public" out of publication you undermine and cast doubt on the science. This is what has happened in Alberta with the Government monitoring chemical contaminants from tar sands development in the Athabasca basin. As as result of government interference and "vetting" of the results, the public has lost confidence in the "science".

Re:Eh?

[dogsbreath]

Well, it is the ridiculous nature of the process and it is another example of the control freak we have as a PM. The example given in the article is a scientist who published a paper in Nature about the glacial flooding at the end of one of the ice age periods. The government did not allow him to be interviewed about the article until the deadlines had passed. The OK had to come virtually from the PM. We are not talking about anything controversial here: nothing that would be tied to present day issues. This pre-historic science and has nothing to do with contrarian views.

This will shock everyone, I know, but it is an example of the hypocrisy of the govt which came to power partly on the platform of being open. Sigh... meet the new boss same as the old boss.

Re:Eh?

[KermodeBear]

Just wait until legislation is passed that will restrict what kind of research can and cannot be done without government supervision. After all, some things are just too important to be outside of the government's control.

Re:Eh?

[jvillain]

If you read again you will see that only certain scientists need permission and only with certain types of publications. I see both sides of this. On the one hand this does smell authoritarian and ham fisted which is what out prime minister is best known for. But on the other hand there have been some super left wing scientists taking tax payer money and using it for PR champagnes designed to wreck the Canadian economy based on some very specious claims. If we need to do things differently that should be a decision by the people and the government. Not a decision taken by one scientist acting like he speaks for the government based on getting a grant from them.

Re:Eh?

[willy_me]

Another point everyone appears to be missing - this only affects those directly employed by the government. It says nothing about the vast majority of scientists working at universities that are funded by the government - indirectly. This appears to be more a case of the government not wanting scientists in their direct employ from making statements that could be interpreted as coming from the government.

Re:Eh?

[Eivind Eklund]

It should be pretty easy to make a spectrum and say this is more distracting than that, is more distracting than that. At least then you could say that everything on one side of the line is legal and everything on the other side is distracted driving / driving under the influence. If kids are really that distracting then yeah, you'd have to make everything less distracting legal (you're not going to get away with telling parents they can't drive with their kids) but at least things would be consistent.

I see no reason that you'd have to make the less distracting things legal. This is a cost/benefit tradeoff - what's the cost of disallowing each of the distractions, compared to the benefit of disallowing them. And, since we're talking politics, it's probably the political cost that matters.

You've just noted that the political cost of disallowing driving with kids in the car is too high for it to be practical. That doesn't mean that it's not possible to prohibit driving while talking on the cell phone; that's a lower political cost (and, I assume, a lower personal cost for most drivers.)

Eivind.

Re:Eh?

[eggnoglatte]

I agree with the overall sentiment, but one thing that may not have been clear form the summary is that this only affects scientists who work for federal research institutes. The rules do NOT apply to university researchers receiving government grants, only researchers at institutions that are under direct control of some ministry.

Re:Eh?

[eggnoglatte]

Research professors get salaries that generally come directly from federal grants. They work for the government.

Actually, no, they don't. In Canada, salaries for the principal investigators (ie. grant holder(s)) are explicitly NOT eligible expenses for federal grants. Faculty salaries come from university general operating funds (GPOF), which in turn are provided by the provinces, not the feds.

Re:Eh?

[Thangodin]

You probably don't understand the current situation in Canadian politics. The Harper government got in on 35% of the popular vote, and probably less. How? Four other parties split the left of center vote: the Liberals, the NDP, the Green Party, and the Block Quebecois. Two thirds of the country did not want and did not vote for the Conservatives, and voter apathy is at an all time high.

This story hits right to the crux of the matter. The Conservatives beat the Liberals by campaigning on the issue of--wait for it--transparency! They then immediately proceeded to shut down all avenues of public information from the government except official channels, and Conservative ministers usually refuse to talk to the press at all, sending party spin doctors instead when they can no longer avoid talking to the press. Government access is now funneled entirely through Access to Information, which can take months or years (effectively making it useless to the media), and National Security is invoked on the merest wisp of an excuse. So this story is part of a longstanding practice, not just a reasonable approach to the media.

A month ago, the Conservatives triggered a shit storm by attempting to shut down the long form census, claiming that the questions were intrusive. The question they cited was, "How many beds do you have in your house?" I will explain why this seemed significant to their base in a moment (hint: they equate beds with sex.) The Conservatives claimed they could get the data by other means. This means your bank, credit cards, air miles, browsing habits, etc--all of which have your name attached to the data, are quite expensive, and all of which come with non-disclosure agreements. But the census does not associate names with data (these get separated upon receipt), and gives statistical data on the state of the nation. In other words, it serves as a report card on government policy, and is open source. The other data is spotty, not much good for statistical analysis, not available for public view, but gives the government unprecedented access to personal information. In other words, our government wants more information about us, but doesn't want us to know anything about it.

And yes, they will know how many beds we have, and will have a pretty good idea of what we do in them.

How do they get away with it? The 35% comprises two groups: mainly social conservatives (the religious right and immigrants from third world countries), and "economic conservatives"-- the Canadian equivalent to the Tea Partiers. The former I can understand, but those alone would make the Conservatives a political backwater. The latter are a mystery. The Liberals paid down the debt for fourteen years, and Paul Martin could have steered through the current economic crisis with his eyes closed. We threw away the best economic manager we've ever had on a whim. It isn't like our federal government was out of control--Americans would have killed to have a guy like Martin. The Conservatives are now taking credit for Canada's remarkably stable banking system, yet in their first throne speech, they tried to dismantle it, pressuring the banks into allowing subprime mortgages; forty and even fifty years long. Fortunately, the financial institutions imported from the U.S. to foster this insanity were not yet too big to fail, and collapsed without much of an impact. But what if Harper had gotten power in 2000? We would have conditions that mirrored Bush's America, with huge military expenses in Iraq, a housing bubble, and failing banks. And their pet project? Twenty Billion for prisons, to build an American style prison industry/lobby. Conrad Black (hardly a bleeding heart liberal) has discovered for himself the obscenity of this proposal. No one in favour of this has any right to call himself a libertarian. And so, as under the last Conservative government, we have record deficits, a failing economy, and the largest trade deficit in our history.

The majority of Canadians are socially liberal

Re:Eh?

[Thangodin]

The Conrad Black links was this.

Re:Eh?

[Stephen Samuel]

Scientists have been prevented from considering certain possibilities, and researching in various directions. Given that speaking out on something as trivial as a 13,000 year old flood took days, I wouldn't be at all surprised to find that papers that didn't support the Government's position on more contentious issues have been suppressed.

Actually, if you listen to the comments of some DFO (Department of Fisheries and Oceans) scientists when asked about their thoughts on the (many years) raging 'controversy' over whether or not sea lice and other contaminants have been (drastically) affecting salmon runs their answers (or lack thereof) seem to make it pretty clear that they're not allowed to even think about the answers to those questions.

A few weeks ago, the Canadian Government decided that filling out 'long form' census questions would no longer be mandatory. They declared that Stats Canada scientists had assured them that this would not affect the quality of the data collected. The head scientist of Statistics Canada had to quit his job in order to counter the lies spoken by the Prime minister and his Cabinet.

Given the kind of control that they've taken over what government scientists can say, I have little question that some political hack is going to declare that submitting a paper to a scientific journal about a contentious issue is going to fall under this new policy.

Personally, I think that this is a flagrant violation of scientists' rights to free speech, but that's a matter for the courts to decide.

Re:Eh?

[corrie]

In this article, information about science research is being withheld from the media.

What if the fact that this information is being withheld, were also withheld?

Now we have a media with no information, and no idea that they don't have the information, and a public who has no clue about it either.

How would you go about convincing your countrymen that this is a bad thing, if no-one, even you, knew about it?

Re:Eh?

[antnil]

[...] and even if there was there'd be both dinosaurs and cavemen at the same time.

They are called DRAGONS and KNIGHTS. stop spreading such ideas: they sound so scientific.

Re:Eh?

[coolsnowmen]

They should make tech that lets the car (bluetooth microphone/speaker) mute the other person when the jerk* is high enough.

*derivative of acceleration.

Re:Eh?

[tbannist]

Sorry, but that's not really it. The Prime Minister is silencing them because they might talk to the media about things he doesn't want them talking about. It's part of a pattern of hamfisted control freak behaviour. I mean most of the ministers that Harper has appointed aren't allowed to talk to the media without his direct approval of what they're to talk about and when they are allowed, they're given a script to memorize before hand. Only 1 or 2 of his most favoured cronies are allowed the freedom to speak the media without heavy censorship.

Re:Eh?

[tbannist]

Doubtful, it's part of a patten of tightly controlling information. After all if you were going to dictate what these scientists were allowed to publish, first you would have to make sure they're not allowed to talk about that to the media. Frankly the Conservative Party of Canada is a lot like the Republican party. They've become an anti-fact, anti-truth party that likes to drive wedge issues to convince dumb or apathetic voters to vote against their actual interests over some inflammatory issue of the moment. They're slowly ripping the mechanism of government apart to appease their anti-tax, anti-government supporters and trying to stomp out opposition and free thought wherever they can within the government services.

They're even trying to set up their own Canadian version of Fox News.

Re:Eh?

[raynet]

Yup, that awereness also helps to compensate the lack of concentration that the dialogue causes, two impaired eye pairs is better than one impaired pair.

Re:Eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

All of that seems reasonable until you get into situations where the government claims their political decision has a sound basis in science, when in reality it doesn't, but the scientists who could dispute the claim are simply refused permission to talk about it.

It's not like these sorts of things have occurred recently.

When a politician stands up in the House of Commons and claim that a scientific department is behind the statements being made there, shouldn't scientists be able to independently confirm or deny to the media whether that claim is true? Or can the politicians just claim what they like and tell the scientists to shut up about it or be fired (or resign)? There have been enough examples recently where the situation is pretty close to that, and it's wrong. If I was a scientist in that situation it would defy my sense of personal ethics, and if some politician implied the scientists in my department were supportive, when they actually weren't, I'd be quite angry about it.

Re:Eh?

[glatiak]

Am afraid that I would have to agree with you. Whatever their reasons for the various decisions being made they are being bloody quiet about them. We cannot tell what the real driver is, perhaps to push as much public money into private hands as possible or some suite of crackpot theories. But no recognizably rational arguments seem to be made and the results appear to be destroying institutions and raising costs. He did make a comment some years back that we would not recognize Canada when he was finished. That seems to be happening -- unfortunately I don't think it was most people thought they were voting for.

sound like more mass covering laws that

[Joe The Dragon]

sound like more mass covering laws that do good but have lots of dumb / real old stuff that just fails under them.

Sound like copyright with lot's old abandonware failing under it as well.

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[AnonymousClown]

How do they do "good"?

When Government starts restricting information it means they are hiding something.

My only guess is that some of the Canadian Federal scientists have discovered things about climate and the oil sands that the Canadian Government is terrified of releasing. It's obviously a conspiracy among the Canadian big shots.

The Canadian people should demand all of their resignations and get a new PM in there pronto before what's ever going on the we don't know about happens and destroys Canada and possibly the World!

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[oldspewey]

The core of the problem is that the conservative party currently in government is insanely partisan. Their entire MO is about "message management," with actual governing coming in a distant second or third. So of course they are going to try to muzzle scientists, and the actual research they are muzzling doesn't even need to make sense - it's done more as a Pavlovian reflex without taking the time to analyze whether the information is even sensitive or not.

The hypocrisy of it all is astounding considering this same party campaigned on the promise of "transparency and accountability" during the 2006 election.

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[BergZ]

The Harper government must still be stinging from the contents of the RCMP Long-Gun Registry report that they tried to suppress.

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[jd]

I don't see the difficulty. We now know "Transparency" = "keeping the scientists invisible" (you can't get much more transparent than that) and "accountability" = "having bean-pushers really run the country".

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're going to write lot's, why not also write mas's, law's, fail's? And why can't you write "sounds"?
lot's means lot is or lot was. Or that something belongs to the lot.
Do you have a problem with the letter "s"?

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[Mashiki]

You mean the RCMP manufactured report where all the information was based on police requests, and not public opinion? Yes, very stinging.

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[Batmunk2000]

The "Core of the problem" is government, not who is in control. When a government has grown to a point of such abuse it is inevitable that someone will abuse it. Government corruption exists because it has the power to do corrupt things. Lobbyists exist because we allow government to grow powerful enough to be lobbied. Reducing centralized power is the answer.

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[superluminique]

The answer is actually almost more simple than that.

I'm Canadian by the way and I'm really ashamed and pissed off by my government...

First of all, the Conservative Party of Canada is much more like the former Reform Party than the Conservative Party of the old days. There is a very strong base of religious nuts and redneck in the party who would do anything to deny actual scientific fact about too many things. Be it of religious reasons when it comes certain topics like geology/archeology/astronomy etc., and/or if it doesn't suit their own agenda such as for the global warming, pollution, geology, and that kind of things.

So far, we've got several nice demonstration of that. There was John Goodyear (I think I've got the name right), the science advisor to the minister, who turns out to be a conservative christian creationist who clearly doesn't believe in evolution. We've got John Baird, who as the Minister of Natural Ressources went to a big after-Kyoto conference and said that he never realized that global warming was an issue (clearly the government denies any environmental problems on taking place on this planet). One more for the road? No prob! The government pushing the purchase of replacement fighter jets for our old CF18 and pretty much buying new fighter jets them without asking anyone. A few days later, press conference with the Minister of Defense about the fact that two of our CF-18 escorted a Russian reconnaissance bomber away from the Canadian land. The plane was actually in the far away buffer and/or international zone and such kind of things happens a couple of times a year with not a single mention in the medias...

The whole game is very clear: they have their secret agenda and they're trying to sneak it in while the opposition parties are so weak, disorganized and without strong leadership that they aren't afraid that the opposition will make the government fall, unless they come with something big and blatant. So what they do is bringing a few big and controversial stuff along with a bunch of little sneaky things related to censorship for instance. They know opposition parties won't let go the big things so they play the arguing game a bit and give it up in a "package deal" that is like "ok, we're giving up the big piece but let's just not argue the little details".

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[Prune]

My hat off to you, sir

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[Idiomatick]

This actually applies to ALL GOVERNMENT CIVIL SERVANTS

Not just scientists. To speak to the press if you are a city gardener or a Mayor you have to go through a rather involved process asking permission. Also this isn't very new news... few months old.

I think the article is just reinforcing that scientists are not special and they too cannot speak to the press without a permission slip.

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[rtb61]

Canadians are always so uptight about trying to outdo the USians but to stick in a political asshat that will out do Bush, what were you guys thinking. Bush isolated protesters in defined areas, Harper did the same, the only reason there was no chain wire around them was it made in easier for the riot squad to get in there, beat them up, arrest them under false charges, hold them in compounds with out toilet on basically bread and water whilst threatening them with even worse. Even stranger those Canadians begged for the charges to be dropped rather than fighting for their day in court to prove those charges were false and nothing more than political suppression of free speech by the government.

Bush did the exact same thing, seek to silence all government paid scientists to hide the lies. So now it is up to Canadian scientists and their supporters to hold a mass protest (and take their beating prior to be arrested, imprisoned and then having the charges dropped without so much as an apology).

So who is Canada going to declare war, I betting an internal one picking on the Inuit, Metis and First Nations http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Nations where ever they obstruct ruthless exploitation of the environment and diminishing natural resources.

Re:sound like more mass covering laws that

[captainpanic]

The core of the problem is that the conservative party currently in government is insanely partisan. Their entire MO is about "message management," with actual governing coming in a distant second or third. So of course they are going to try to muzzle scientists, and the actual research they are muzzling doesn't even need to make sense - it's done more as a Pavlovian reflex without taking the time to analyze whether the information is even sensitive or not.

The hypocrisy of it all is astounding considering this same party campaigned on the promise of "transparency and accountability" during the 2006 election.

Are you suggesting that there should be a relation between campaigns and actual party programs ???

*dazed and confused*

Seems reasonable

[Anonymous Coward]

Canadians voted for Harper and he is simply giving them what they asked for. Everybody knows scientists just take money from the government by ginning up fear and give us nothing tangible in return. It's time somebody stood up to them.

Re:Seems reasonable

[oldspewey]

Yup, that's basically the conservative talking point: scientists are just a bunch of academic elitists, and we don't need facts or research to tell us what Canadians - deep down inside - really know to be true.

Re:Seems reasonable

[Anonymous Coward]

yeah, I should have put it in quotes. Not really my view.

Re:Seems reasonable

[Apocryphos]

Thanks for clarifying that, AC.

Re:Seems reasonable

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, I have to take care of my reputation, you know.

Re:Seems reasonable

[MiniMike]

Yah, Canada is now full of truthiness, eh?

Re:Seems reasonable

[Anonymous Coward]

The issue of science vs whatever is an entirely separate matter from corrupt "research" based around what is profitable to say and that which is factual in nature. What the Canadians are doing is a good thing, they simply don't want the same degradation of society we experience in America as the result of Liberal propaganda campaigns. Even the Liberals recognize these for what they are, they just think their crafty in doing so because they have little ability to make a profit and control people without such things.

Re:Seems reasonable

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup, that's basically the conservative talking point: scientists are just a bunch of academic elitists, and we don't need facts or research to tell us what Canadians - deep down inside - really know to be true.

Wrong on one count - That is EVERY party's policy position that has been in power for the last 30 years' when talking Canadian politics.
You may not agree with the conservatives policy stance on certain issues, but do not forget the total obscurantism, denial of truth, and outright fraud prevalent in the Chretien and Martin years.

It is not so much that the elected officials want to muzzle critics, as the non-elected bureaucrats wanting to control information and remain employed. The vast majority of these remain in positions of influence long after political parties have lost elections and "official" policies on issues have changed.

For a case study in this fraudulent practice I suggest you Google Robert Fowler, the bureaucrat that practically controlled every aspect of the DND for years through several changes in government and was responsible for degrading Canada's standing internationally through so called "soft power" politics. After he left his government position, we where also crooked enough to make him Canada's ambassador to the UN.

Re:Seems reasonable

[Anonymous Coward]

However, I am a big proponent of eating babies, and fully support Harper's efforts in that area.

Green Party of Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

Green Party of Canada

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

Green Party of Canada

Or how about Liberal Party of Canada?

Seriously. The people behind the sponsorship scandal are gone, and they at least have a chance at winning.

How does that saying go? Something like "a vote for Green is a vote for the Conservatives"?

Let's get the Cons out, then worry about keeping the Libs in line. It shouldn't be hard to do after they saw how quickly and decisively we kicked their asses over AdScam.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[h4rr4r]

As an American, trust me you do not want a two party system. You get only corporatists.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

it wont change anything,
we only elect corporatists anyway

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Neil Watson]

Alas, while the conservatives did a 'Unite the right' and gained votes from the old conservative party and the reform party, the left has become increasingly fragmented. The Liberals, the NDP, the Green party. Even the Pirate party has a Canadian segment now. So if you lean conservative you have little choice. If you lean liberal you have so many choices. Thus the current stead of Canadian parliament.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Galestar]

Hence why I believe in Proportional representation.
Sadly, that referendum was voted down a couple years back.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Mad Leper]

Thank you Green Party for further fragmenting the socialist vote. Thanks to your hard work we can be certain that the two party Liberal/Conservative system will remain intact.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[adonoman]

The Green Party's fiscal policy is actually quite right-wing. They have their environmentalist hang-ups, which means that there's a lot of things they'd like to ban (or at least not subsidize), but they are probably less socialist in many ways than the Conservatives (especially Harper's Tories these last few years). They are strong on eliminating the deficit and reducing payroll and income taxes.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

We didn't have a two party problem until the entire right wing merged to form one party... the left is still much bigger than the right, the right just got rid of their fanatical parties and now they're all happy that they might scrap the gun registry which would be Harper's claim to fame in all his years... what a ridiculous government we have... honestly Harper's done nothing but raise the debt with his fiscal responsibility bs, the kid is a clown and needs to have a pie thrown in his face... too bad that's considered assault now, it used to be every PM would get one in the face

why so serious?

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

In most of Europe we have multi-party systems. We get corporatists AND hippies fighting each other...

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Mashiki]

No the green party is not anywhere close to 'right-wing' even fiscally. They're further to the left of the NDP and that's saying something, including wanting to have dirty, consumption and various forms of health taxes.

I'll say no thanks.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[adonoman]

Have you seen the Conservative party recently? Canada doesn't have a fiscally right-wing federal party. The Tories are only "right-wing" because of their social policies. Otherwise they're just as happy to send money to people for having kids, or sponsor professional sports teams, or pretty much any random group that will either get them votes, or support their social agenda.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Mashiki]

Canada hasn't been right-wing since the 1920's, even more-so since the '70s(lookin' at you libs). It's always leaned left, the only question is, where is the right and to what point is it leaning. The reality is during the 20's we got the start of institutionalized left-leaning "we care for you" programs. During the 70's this accelerated, with things like CPP and medicalcare. It won't ever shift back, because people are stuck on the tit of government entitlements.

However things like having money for kids? Yeah that's a good idea, without a question. Especially if they're natural born, or immigrant who want to integrate fully into society. It means that your country is less reliant on external forces to maintain population(like immigration) and more reliant on those that want the country to move forward based on natural population.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

"Without question?" That's about as arrogant as ending your comment with "Period".

Getting money for having kids is a ridiculous policy that promotes unsustainability. We live in a world with too many people as it is and we have irresponsible governments promoting even more unwanted births for the sole purpose of increasing their phony GDP numbers. When all this fake growth stops (which it inevitably will) everything collapses on itself.

Want to see the result of "money for kids?" Check out Winnipeg's fabulous core area, where Father's Day is the most confusing day of the year for a child and his fourteen half-brothers and sisters.

The kind of future you want comes from kids who had responsible parents who cared enough to raise a child without some sort of monetary incentive. If you need to use give-aways as a band-aid to cover the fact that you have a population who can't, on average, afford to raise a child without assistance, then that government's economic policy is nothing short of a colossal failure.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[internettoughguy]

There's always a choice, it's just looks like those on the right have been tactical voting.

Re:Green Party of Canada

[chrish]

I miss the good old days when our Prime Ministers would personally beat protesters.

Seriously. Remember when we didn't have an enormous US-style federal deficit for 12 years?

Re:Green Party of Canada

[Mashiki]

Wow aren't you a bigot. Just think, you're stating that winnipeg is full of redneck's. Not discounting the fact that manitoba has a sizable native population, and 2 federal prisons and 2 local lockups all within throwing range. Welp, best let the liberals know that baby bonus' and so on are bad. Since they instituted them, while increasing taxes to cover everything else.

Yep, colossal failure.

That's what I love about Conservatives

[kawabago]

They criticize the Chinese about freedom of the press and then do everything they can to prevent truth escaping into the wild in Canada. Unfortunately by trying to hide the truth they highlight that this is good area to look for whatever they are trying to hide. Which highlights another Conservative trait, they aren't very bright.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Anonymous Coward]

How is this different than scientists themselves driving out dissenting views? Would you say scientists who scornfully denounce other scientists putting forth contrary views are as dim as Canada's Conservative party?

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Genwil]

It isn't the same at all if the scientists are heaping scorn on things because the methods, conclusions, etc., aren't supported by the evidence.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Abcd1234]

They criticize the Chinese about freedom of the press and then do everything they can to prevent truth escaping into the wild in Canada.

Forget that, they ran on a platform of transparency. Hell, one of their primary talking points was that the Liberals were corrupt and secretive. And then we see this bullshit. Gotta love the hypocrisy...

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Anonymous Coward]

Which highlights another Conservative trait, they aren't very bright.

So at least you've got something in common.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[jd]

It's so transparent the policy is now invisible. How much more do you want from them?

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[oldspewey]

Hell, these guys barely cast a shadow anymore.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[radtea]

Forget that, they ran on a platform of transparency.

I'm advising a friend who is running for office (city council in a smallish town) and she's been hit with a lot of questions about what her platform is, whereas she's really a pragamatic problem solver with a great record of listening to people and using the best factual information available to fix stuff.

I told her to reply to questions about her platform by saying, "Platforms are what politicians say before they're elected, and we know how that works out. The Harper government ran on a platform of greater transparency. So I'm not going to make you any grand promises, except to say that I'll listen to the voices of my constituents and do my best to find practical, affordable, sustainable solutions to their problems."

The number one issue in the district where she's running--based on talking to the people there door-to-door--is quality of roads and sidewalks, which are not mentioned in anyone's platform.

The whole media circus of political platforms is old and tired and will hopefully be dead soon. We've all seen how it ends far too often. Time to stop listening to politicians lies and start asking them, "Why should we think you're going to respresent us rather than your party after we vote for you?"

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[jd]

Scientists very rarely drive out dissenting views. Science is based on the idea that if a theory is any good, the bulk of it will survive being stress-tested and the bits that do fail needed replacing anyway. When practiced in this fashion, the good views will get stronger. Maybe a mistaken belief is accepted for a while (such as the aether), but eventually the more correct theory will become strong enough that it will supplant all others. Eliminate the weakest links and replace them with links as strong as the remainder.

True, sometimes you do get fanaticism. The Anti-Global Warming scientists (none of whom are climatologists or environmental chemists) demonstrate fanaticism over and above the tried-and-tested method outlined above. They do not test their own beliefs to the breaking point, nor are they concerned with establishing whether global warming is indeed the stronger theory or not. Such people drive themselves out. Science is not the people, nor is it the end result, science is the method. The method is all that matters, nothing else. If you renounce that method, you have stepped from science to religion, regardless of what you say, because that is how these terms are defined.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[roman_mir]

Libertarians, always vote for Libertarians.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[countertrolling]

Which highlights another Conservative trait, they aren't very bright.

Well, they're apparently bright enough to take your money and win elections... Now if you're talking about conservative voters, then you got me there...

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[jd]

Hmmmm. No reflection in the mirror, either. Does anyone know if Canada has banned garlic imports?

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Anonymous Coward]

harper didn't even have a platform last election and some morons in this country still voted for him... it's embarrassing how conservatives can't even see how their party lies like crazy and closes everyone's mouth when they can, seems like everyone forgot where this started... harper saying he won't do media speeches after they leave the house of commons like every prime minister before him... he needs to go and we need a strong coalition to overturn the bs that's been thrown into every department since he's started, totally irresponsible

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[MagikSlinger]

Forget that, they ran on a platform of transparency. Hell, one of their primary talking points was that the Liberals were corrupt and secretive. And then we see this bullshit. Gotta love the hypocrisy...

This single fact alone is what prevents me from voting Tory. The Liberals are idiots and corrupt, but they weren't very good at hiding it. This government goes to extreme lengths to control the message, and that sets of alarm klaxons in my political senses.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Anonymous Coward]

Scientists very rarely drive out dissenting views. Science is based on the idea that if a theory is any good, the bulk of it will survive being stress-tested and the bits that do fail needed replacing anyway.

Theoretically that's the case, but I suspect that in practice there is a lot of driving out of dissenting views.

One of the most blatant examples would be string theory vs supergravity debates a few decades ago. Scientists who believed in supergravity were called crazy. Students were told that if they did research on supergravity, they would never be able to get a job in the industry. (Or so I've heard.)

Scientists have a lot at stake in their core ideas being right. Any human would be resistant to being told that they're wrong and I doubt scientists are any exception.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Anonymous Coward]

They have not, but after eating about 225 grams of the stuff, parliament seemed eerily vacant.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[gizmonic]

Time to stop listening to politicians lies and start asking them, "Why should we think you're going to represent us rather than your party after we vote for you?"

That, really, hits on the crux of the entire problem. The other issue of course is uninformed lazy voters who simply vote for a party than a candidate, thus helping encourage just that kind of thinking from politicians.

Makes me think we should eliminate names and parties from ballots altogether and simply have a 100 question questionnaire that you simply select 1 to 5 for or against, and weight how important that issue is to you and then the system matches your answer to the candidate who most closely matches your choices, and counts your vote for them. Never happen of course since it'd gut the power of the current parties and we might actually get people in there who represent what the people truly want, but hey, I can dream...

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[epine]

Scientists very rarely drive out dissenting views.

The Andrew Weaver complaining about the Harper government is the same guy who sued the National Post for not covering his science the way he wished them to.

UVic's Andrew Weaver sues National Post

Any scientist who disregards Stephen McIntyre because he's unqualified to offer an opinion is a douche bag. Not sure if Weaver himself crossed this line, but he seems sorely tempted.

Portrait of a local climate skeptic

Stephen's criticism of the statistics behind the original hockey stick graph have been upheld by eminent statisticians. The original peer review of the hockey stick study failed to encompass statistical competence, so it was a failed process. The adhesive on the gold star dried up, the sticker fell off. If you ask guys with only average competence in statistics to performed the peer review, they fail to spot subtle errors. An error is an error is an error. No amount of groupthink will spare your conclusion.

Yes, scientists can be plenty good at driving out dissenting views.

1) You have no scientific training.
2) Why don't you publish a paper in a peer reviewed journal if you think you have something to say? (Our anonymous review process will soon send you straight to hell and you'll have hardly any recourse.)

Much less often:
3) That's an excellence point. I'll fix my paper immediately. I disappointed this error made it through peer review. We should fix that, too.

No, the usual argument is that peer review is good because it's the best we have. Sadly, the conclusion does not follow the argument. Peer review has an acceptable track record in coming to long term consensus. For climate change, another century of study would restore my faith in the consensus of peer review. Peer review is a low pass filter. Science is deeply, deeply, deeply wrong for decades at a time. Many of our greatest theories had to first outgrow the pimply teenage years (where peer review is at its most intense).

Back to Harper, I'm beginning to get the feeling that liberalism is the politics of oil surplus. When it's all about grabbing a giant share of a shrinking pie and holding on for dear life, fear and conservatism seems to rule the day.

Scientists resent having their work misconstrued as the ignorant (but powerful) race to the bottom. Sometimes they get a little too worked up and put the boots to Stephen McIntyre in defense of science, when in fact their doing the exact opposite: immunizing science against criticism that points out loose ends in a cherished conviction.

The whole enterprise of science is based on the premise that the smallest valid criticism is worth more than the largest flawed conviction. But I don't have to earn my living as a scientist, so it's cheap for me to espouse lofty views, and I'm able to actually express my views because I'm not a minion of the Harper government.

Wikipedia JSF edits traced to Defence computers in Alberta

Harper really needs to brush up on his Mandarin. Tanks are better for suppressing dissent, and cheaper, too. I wonder, however, if his ideological nose bone will make it hard for him to master tonal pronunciation.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[beanyk]

Makes me think we should eliminate names and parties from ballots altogether and simply have a 100 question questionnaire that you simply select 1 to 5 for or against, and weight how important that issue is to you and then the system matches your answer to the candidate who most closely matches your choices, and counts your vote for them. Never happen of course since it'd gut the power of the current parties and we might actually get people in there who represent what the people truly want, but hey, I can dream...

That only works if the candidates actually really -believe- in their own stated policies, and moreover, actually -act- on them when in power. There's not much point in matching voters' preferences to lies.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Anonymous Coward]

If you think only in the realm of science that is true- bad theories are eventually replaced by better ones. However, what you should be concerned about is bad social and economic policies caused by bad science. Bad theories come to past but bad with policies people have to live with, maybe even for generations to come.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Raenex]

The Anti-Global Warming scientists (none of whom are climatologists or environmental chemists)

You're wrong: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lindzen

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Altrag]

That's a good way to lose an election. It makes you sound like you either don't really care or don't really know why you're running in the first place. There's a reason why parties still toss out grandiose claims when everyone knows they're bogus -- its still better than nothing, and given the choices between two (or more) evils, people will in general pick the one that seems the least evil to them. And "I don't care about current issues" seems pretty evil to most people when they're talking about the folks who are charged with dealing with those issues.

There's no question that our system is short-sighted and highly subject to dishonesty (even if a politician is honest, the problems people vote on today will usually have nothing to do with the problems they face in 2 or 3 years). But its still the fairest practical system we've come up with so far (give or take a specific vote representation mechanism or two).

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[jd]

Not so fast. I see that he does not dispute global warming, merely the magnitude that is caused by man, which he places at 1/3rd that identified in the worst-case IPCC models ("Taking Global Warming Seriously" - you'll find it in his papers). Further, he does not dispute the positive feedback mechanisms or any of the other mechanisms described in global warming, he merely states that other effects also exist and that radiative models alone are inadequate to model the atmosphere as a whole.

In short, his papers do NOT say what you (or Wikipedia) say they say. Unless you can get him to post here himself (verifiably, so no sock puppets), I will have to take what he has actually written over and above any other claim.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Raenex]

He disputes the alarmist view that says we need to take action now. The global warming camp says the opposite. He explicitly says that scientists have fallen under pressure to endorse global warming:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptoBGW3hU-g

There are tons of other videos from him on YouTube.

And from the paper you cite:

"The main point of this paper is simply to illustrate why serious and persistent doubts remain concerning the danger of anthropogenic global warming despite the frequent claims that 'the science is settled.'"

Also, the Wikipedia article is sourced.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Anonymous Coward]

McIntyre is a complete and utter tool. All confirmation bias no facts.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Idarubicin]

I'm advising a friend who is running for office (city council in a smallish town) and she's been hit with a lot of questions about what her platform is, whereas she's really a pragamatic problem solver with a great record of listening to people and using the best factual information available to fix stuff.

Well, it sounds like that is her platform.

Unfortunately - accurately or not - the vast bulk of politicians will tell you that they're "pragmatic problem solvers who will listen to people and use available information to fix stuff". When you catch them off guard and ask about something that they don't want to put in their platform (too controversial, potentially unpopular, etc.) or something that they just haven't bothered to think about, they'll tell you that they intend to "listen to the voices of their constituents and do their best to find practical, affordable, sustainable solutions to their problems."

"No platform" is too close to "I'll wing it when you elect me". Why hasn't your candidate researched the issues and spoken with constituents before the election, rather than asking us to just trust that she'll get around to it after she's won? She can put wiggle room in the platform -- be clear about her reasoning, and open in her justifications for each platform plank. If it turns out that through new information, new evidence, or just plain honest error she can't (or realizes that she shouldn't) follow through on (some of the) stuff said during the campaign, people will know where she was coming from and why she changed her mind.

Moreover, people deserve a window on the way that she would approach the problems that are important to them. People and politics are complex; there may be many solutions to any given problem. (A budget shortfall can be met through tax hikes, user fees, road tolls, cuts to the transit system, etc. Which is best is matter not just of logic or research but also a particular philosophy or vision. How will the candidate evaluate the information that she is given? Which constituents and advice will be taken most seriously?)

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Barncs]

Aether theory was supplanted by Relativity at the beginning of the 20th century, courtesy (trumpets..) Einstein, in large part because the results were the same and Relativity was simpler. I think simpler models are better (the Ptolemaic system was asinine). I compare Relativity to Phlogiston. Simpler, indeed, but it seems to focus on describing observations as opposed to explaining the cause for behaviors. I am encouraged by developments in Quantum physics which seem to suggest a return to Aether in some form. In my OPINION, Aether makes more sense in the grand scheme of things.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[IICV]

Any scientist who disregards Stephen McIntyre because he's unqualified to offer an opinion is a douche bag.

You are correct, sir. Any scientist who ignres McIntyre simply because he doesn't have the right background is a douche - scientists should should ignore McIntyre because he's so often wrong, not just because of his lack of education.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[internettoughguy]

It's really more of an argument for limited, direct democracy.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[Ash Vince]

Makes me think we should eliminate names and parties from ballots altogether and simply have a 100 question questionnaire that you simply select 1 to 5 for or against, and weight how important that issue is to you and then the system matches your answer to the candidate who most closely matches your choices, and counts your vote for them. Never happen of course since it'd gut the power of the current parties and we might actually get people in there who represent what the people truly want, but hey, I can dream...

That only works if the candidates actually really -believe- in their own stated policies, and moreover, actually -act- on them when in power. There's not much point in matching voters' preferences to lies.

This is a brilliant idea. We can also use his method to get rid of the politicians too. Just have a bunch of civil servant that have to implement what ever policies are chosen by the people in the questionnaire.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[jd]

And that final remark is perhaps the most important of all. You differentiate between opinion and theory. Where scientists have failed, it is often because they have lost sight of that distinction. I also like the fact that you are concerned with the underlying cause rather than the observed effect - many causes can have the same effect, so investigating the effect has limited value. It will tell you some of the what and none of the why.

There are phenomena that cannot readily be explained by treating time as in some way a special dimension (a horrible tendency of physicists, I'm afraid). Time-based diffraction grates, rather than spacially-based diffraction grates, should not work - or, at least, not in the same way, if time is not fundamentally the same as space. However, observation shows that they not only work but work in exactly the same way - which is what true spacetime models had predicted. (True spacetime models ultimately stem from the geometric observation that 4D works and 3D+1 does not. Most theories are based on 4D spacetime. The only real problem is that causality and the second law of thermodynamics rely on an arrow of time, a simple 4D spacetime has no more an arrow of time than it has an arrow of space, and you get some really serious problems that appear insoluble if you simply chuck out causality and entropy. My opinion - and it is just an opinion - is that the arrow of time is indeed real but as a consequence of something fundamental and not as some intrinsic property.)

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[radtea]

There's a reason why parties still toss out grandiose claims when everyone knows they're bogus -- its still better than nothing, and given the choices between two (or more) evils, people will in general pick the one that seems the least evil to them.

Nope. Parties lie because they hope that people forgot they lied last time they were elected, and people accept the lies because they've never seen another way to campaign.

The notion that "lies are better than nothing" is so stupid it hardly bears replying to, really.

Re:That's what I love about Conservatives

[DarthVain]

Harper truly believes in transparency. Just not on things that embarrass the conservatives or get in the way of their politics.

The rest is fair game...

no surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

I spent much of my youth - including 2 different highschools - in Canada and it has to be one of the most government controlled propaganda using places ever - honestly you would think that they single handedly won WW2, that the bush pilot is a significant figure in world history and *everything* was invented in Canada.

Re:no surprise

[oldspewey]

How old are you? Because in my observation the real propaganda efforts only really started in the last few years. The other stuff you're talking about is commonly known as "national pride" or perhaps "jingoism," and if you're an American then it's pretty ironic if you're blasting another country for an excess of jingoism.

Re:no surprise

[commodore64_love]

It's that famous inferiority complex I've witnessed while vacationing there (visited every province except Nunavut). They are very, very nice people but feel the need to prove why they are not just a clone of their neighbor to the south, and how Canada created a ton of inventions and other firsts. Personally I think they should just dissolv the Confederation and join as states 51 through 62(?).

Except for Quebec. Give it to France. Or the EU.

Re:no surprise

[MachDelta]

It's not propaganda. Canadian schools simply have a strong focus on Canadian content, especially because most Canadians are bombarded with American culture/news/history on a daily basis. If we didn't give a shit about the things we've done ourselves as a country, we may as well just roll over and officially become the 51st state.

Re:no surprise

[Kitkoan]

Having lived and gone to school in both the US and Canada, I have to call complete BS on this. I've also worked for the Canadian government in and around historical monuments and sites and it is nothing like what your trying to declare. Canada always declares that "the Allies" not "Canada" helped win WW2, that the Bush plane (not pilot...) while is a well known plane is not the be all end all of anything in history, nor do they declare "everything" was invented in Canada. While in the US though, I found that things like the Vietnam war are altered and edited (my history text books enter listing of that war was "The US entered Vietnam, fought the rebels, then the war protests happened, and then in the 80s..." completely removing any mentioning of the end of the Vietnam war, the removal of troops, the fact that the US lost that war (the teachers aren't to mention this)). The US also always wants to declare that WW2 only started after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941, and not in 1939 (since the US was supplying both sides with weapons and supplies) and that the US single handedly ended the war. That they are the center of the world, ect...

Re:No surprise

[Kenshin]

The whole census fiasco was an custom-engineered crisis. Who knows what the hell Harper was trying to accomplish with it, but he likely succeeded. As a bonus for him, it's in the public mind now, so it's a can of worms that can't easily be closed. Even if a new government comes in and tries to undo it, the right wing rabble will still foul the census in protest.

Re:no surprise

[oldspewey]

Very, very few people share your opinion(s).

Re:No surprise

[Ubergrendle]

I'm going to call BS on this one. The story is pretty straight forward -- ~200,000 citizens did not fill out the long form of the census during the last approach. According to the current laws, this was punishable by substantial fines and mandatory imprisonment. The census bureau *never* pursue these fines or penalties. On the basis that a) the law was never enforced, and b) a strong libertarian minority within their supporters were railing against oppressive government, they removed the law.

While all the complaints around the accuracy of the data, the importance of the census, are valid.... this is still about simplifying the reach and authority of government -- something the slashdot community normally endorses. Had this been about liberalisation of pot laws, or eliminating government enforcement of copyright, etc... we've be hailing them as heros.

Re:no surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

Tabarnack oui, donnez nous à l'union européenne

Re:No surprise

[Mad Leper]

Since you mention the long form census controversy, I've talked with some old timers from StatsCan, and they all confirm that the long form census has been on the chopping block for a long time. Even Mr. Sheikh has been on record as noting the information collected by the long form is largely useless and irrelevant, serving only to feed endless studies that provide perpetual employment for a select few in StatsCan.

Essentially, the whole "long form census" scandal is nothing more than some entitled statisticians culture in StatsCan upset that their gravy train has been overturned. Eliminating the compulsory long form has no effect on the accuracy of census data in Canada, any outrage over this is just fodder for media attention and slandering the government.

Re:no surprise

[Skjellifetti]

The U.S. did not lose the Vietnam War. We signed the Paris Peace Accords, withdrew, and then South Vietnam lost to North Vietnam.

More seriously, do you have a cite on the U.S. supplying both sides of WWII between 1939 and 1942 (no, Catch 22 doesn't count)? I've heard this before, but every time I've looked closely, it turns out that the U.S. owned factories in Germany that were the basis for the claim had, in fact, been appropriated by the Germans at gunpoint.

Re:no surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

No thanks, we don't want to join your turd of a country. The USA is going down the tubes.

Re:no surprise

[Chris Mattern]

So it's not propaganda because it has a purpose? Got news for you, *all* propaganda has a purpose...

Re:no surprise

[MachDelta]

It's not propaganda because it's purpose is to inform, not persuade. OP was using hyperbole. And anyways, every other country in the world teaches it's children about the history of their home country first and foremost. So why should Canada be any different?

Re:no surprise

[multipartmixed]

A boxer who loses on points is still a loser, even if the other side didn't actually knock him out.

Re:no surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

In regard to WW2 in the US education system, I admit we downplay the pre-Poland aspects ("Peace in our time", Czechoslovakia, etc.) and pretty much summarize 1939 - 1941 as Poland got crushed by Germans/Russians, France was embarrassed militarily, England gets bombed. Part of this is that in those first years it was a European war (US curriculum largely ignores the Napoleonic wars, 30 years wars, etc). Both the US and Europe often overlook Japan's Chinese conquests when defining WWII as well for that matter. Pearl Harbor merged the two regional wars into a truly global conflict and resulted in globe spanning alliances.

There is some truth to the US single handedly ending the war though -any claim that the US was not the preeminent power in driving the Japanese back and forcing surrender ignores reality. In the sense that Japan was the last Axis power defeated, the US did end the war almost singlehandedly. Claiming the US single handedly ended the war in Europe is a massive distortion, but the US contributions were more than anyone except the USSR and Britain. The USSR probably deserves the most credit (although they did start the war as a German ally). The US and UK were complementary and so hard to separate - the US served as the economic engine and the UK as staging ground for the Western Front.

Re:no surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

Some think WW II started in 1931(?) when the Manchurian Incident started. Others, including me in a history paper long ago, argue that the Campaign of 1919 started 20 years late. This puts 1914 as the starting point of WW II.

Re:No surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

I tend to agree, they were drawing attention away from something. same as they did with trying to make the national anthem gender neutral...was done to draw attention away from the proroguing, or something else.

Re:no surprise

[equex]

I heard trough the tubes that Al Gore is from Canada also ?

Re:No surprise

[ArtDent]

Your spin bears no resemblance to reality.

Yes, the long form census was eliminated, but it was replaced with a voluntary National Household Survey that will ask the same questions, but will be distributed to more households and yield less useful results, all at a greater cost to taxpayers. No gravy train has been overturned. Your alleged "entitled statisticians" can breathe easy, their "perpetual employment" is not at risk.

The data that we rely on to intelligently run a country is, however.

Re:no surprise

[Kitkoan]

The US was selling weapons to other nations by the Neutrality Act of 1939 which allowed the US to sell weapons and supplies until the middle of 1941 helping to pull the US completely out of the last bits of the Great Depression. As for the US owning factories in Germany, those are IBM's factories that were legally allowed to sell the Nazi's the equipment until 1941, when the US offically entered the war, 2 years after it started.

Re:No surprise

[ArtDent]

Hundreds of businesses, governments, and organizations have now testified that they rely on the data produced by the long form census. It is useful and important information.

The intrusion of the census is minimal. It's a minor inconvenience at worst.

If the government wanted to eliminate the threat of imprisonment, they could have done that. They didn't. They opted, instead, to corrupt the data.

Re:no surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet you didn't know Canada won the war of 1812.

Re:no surprise

[bsDaemon]

Well, its a fairly well known fact that the US supplied petrol and credit to Franco and the Nationalists in Spain, who were allied with Hitler and Mussolini, who used the opportunity to try out various techniques and new weapons systems, as well as to feel out the state of Soviet technology -- Soviet tanks and armored cars with light artillery having been supplied to the Republic. The Spanish Civil War was basically the dress rehearsal for WWII.

Re:no surprise

[plcurechax]

Besides Standard Oil, General Motors, and of course IBM (too lazy to bother, see the 2001 book IBM and the Holocaust?

I don't think any US based facilities of GM, and the Seven Sisters from the Standard Oil breakup, were taken by gun point. I also don't know if any US firearm and other weapon manufacturers supplied the Nazi Germany.

I'm not trying to vilify USA during this time period, many countries and companies made some embarrassingly cruel political and economic decisions. Germany was not alone in its anti-Semitism.

Re:no surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

Spain was a non-belligerent in WWII.

Re:no surprise

[AfroTrance]

And Iraq didn't lose the first (second) Gulf War. They just had their army obliterated by UN forces then managed to scare them off towards the end.

Re:No surprise

[Idiomatick]

The census is incredibly important data for the government and policy making decisions. It guides the future of Canada. Being opposed to this is pretty much only something libertarian crazies would do. Honestly, no or lessened census data is basically flying blind.

Pot laws at least in Canada have little to nothing to do with libertarians. The vast majority of Canadians approve of pot legalization. It is opposed by social conservatives. But support of marijuana legalization is the norm in much/most of Canada.

Re:no surprise

[shutdown -p now]

Personally I think they should just dissolv the Confederation and join as states 51 through 62(?).

The two countries have fundamentally different principles. One is "freedom, liberty and pursuit of happiness". The other is "peace, order and good government". The majority of citizens of those countries seem to like things the way they are. What would be the basis for amalgamation?

Re:No surprise

[Idiomatick]

Its possible that he just didn't think data was very important to making decisions. When you have ideology who needs facts?

Re:no surprise

[blackraven14250]

Hitler's propaganda informed the Germans that the Jews were to blame for all of their problems, and that the Aryan race was supreme to all others. That doesn't excuse it from being propaganda.

Re:no surprise

[shutdown -p now]

The U.S. did not lose the Vietnam War. We signed the Paris Peace Accords, withdrew, and then South Vietnam lost to North Vietnam.

The whole point of U.S. war in Vietnam was to prevent South Vietnam from being overrun by the commies. That objective was, ultimately, not achieved. That's what we call "losing a war".

Re:No surprise

[dskoll]

~200,000 citizens did not fill out the long form of the census

That number was actually 168,000 and represents a bit over 1.2% of the 13,576,855 private residences counted in the census. One in five people received the long form, so the non-compliance rate was about 6.2%, meaning 93.8% of people complied with the law.

I agree that the Government of Canada should have fined those who did not comply with the law. However, I very much doubt that 93.8% of people will fill in the new voluntary form, so even the threat of the penalty probably had a significant effect.

Re:no surprise

[bsDaemon]

Spain sent troops to the Eastern Front who took part in the siege of Satalingrad. Calling Spain a nonbelligerent in WWII is about as valid calling Germany a nonbelligerent in the Spanish Civil War.

Re:No surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

Hundreds of businesses, governments, and organizations have now testified that they rely on the data produced by the long form census. It is useful and important information.

The intrusion of the census is minimal. It's a minor inconvenience at worst.

If the government wanted to eliminate the threat of imprisonment, they could have done that. They didn't. They opted, instead, to corrupt the data.

Cue conservative heads exploding and the "INVASION OF PRIVACY" vs "GOOD FOR BUSINESS" wings of the conservative movement tearing each other apart.

Re:no surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but it wasn't the US that lost it- we had left by then. It was just our former allies that lost it. It's like when you're playing a game, and your team is probably not going to win, so you just leave. YOU didn't lose, you weren't there. It was your teammates who lost. Right? Right?

Re:no surprise

[dkleinsc]

I'm not sure about weapons, but there's clear evidence that IBM supplied the Nazis with a sophisticated punch card system to keep track of their prisoners. Clear evidence as in: The punch card records say "International Business Machines" on them, and contracts with the signature of Thomas J Watson Sr.

Re:no surprise

[MachDelta]

Godwin strikes again.

Hitler's propaganda was written for the express purpose of harming the Jewish people. That is what defines it as propaganda - persuasion of some set of facts (real or imagined) about Jews. Historical fact is not normally considered propaganda because it typically does not contain a persuasive argument. This is a case of "all propaganda is information but not all information is propaganda".

Now one can argue endlessly about what constitutes propaganda and what doesn't, but generally those arguments slip into absurdity where anything a person has ever read or heard can be classified as "propaganda" because it invariably contains some degree of presenter bias.

At the end of the day, Canadian schooling has a strong focus on Canadian content not only because it is the global norm to learn about where you live, but particularly because we Canadians live in the worlds largest cultural shadow. If we didn't attempt to protect our own identity (through history, etc) then we would find ourselves very quickly slipping into the enormous cultural pull of the USA. Some may argue that has already happened, but the point of past and current efforts is to reduce or reverse that trend, not to breed a nation of brainwashed zombies nourished on propaganda and lies. At least, that is my opinion. YMMV.

Re:No surprise

[Raenex]

Imagine that, libertarian crazies who don't think the government should compel every citizen to identify their ethnicity?

Re:no surprise

[shutdown -p now]

It's like when you're playing a game, and your team is probably not going to win, so you just leave.

Are you basically saying that US had rage-quitted Vietnam?

Re:no surprise

[ceoyoyo]

The bush pilot is a significant figure in Canadian history. You were in Canada right?

You must either have had some very creative teachers or perhaps some sort of crazy bias of your own. In high school in Canada I learned a little about Canadian history, but mostly about Russian, ancient Greek and Brazilian history. Canada was mostly covered in elementary school.

Re:no surprise

[ceoyoyo]

Kind of like when they tried to take over Canada and didn't. Somehow that war wasn't lost either.

Re:No surprise

[dskoll]

So put down "Canadian" as your ethnicity. No big deal.

Re:No surprise

[Kenshin]

"When you have ideology who needs facts?"

Your opposition.

Re:No surprise

[Raenex]

You were the one clamoring for accuracy in the census. The whole point of compulsion is to require data and make it illegal to supply inaccurate data.

Re:No surprise

[ve3oat]

This is the same government that has destroyed the accuracy of the Census

That is just one example. If you use daily and monthly weather summaries prepared by Environment Canada (in charge of the Canadian weather service), you will quickly discover that they have redefined the daily mean temperature as the median temperature.

Official definition taken from http://climate.weatheroffice.gc.ca/Glossary-popup_e.html#meantemp :

"The mean temperature in degrees Celsius (C) is defined as the average of the maximum and minimum temperature during the day."

It has been like this for a few years now and I suppose it is because Mr. Harper's staffers know how to divide by 2 but not by 24. Of course, the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) has not authorized any Canadian atmospheric scientist to speak out about this, so it has gone unnoticed.

Shades of George W. Bush's war against science! (Recommended read : "The Republican War on Science" by Chris Mooney (Basic Books, 2005, ISBN-13: 978-0-7394-6972-9 and ISBN-10: 0-7394-6972-X).

Re:no surprise

[evil_aar0n]

Does this count?

www.historycooperative.org/journals/llt/51/pauwels.html

Re:no surprise

[blackraven14250]

Hitler's propaganda was written for the express purpose of harming the Jewish people

Not if you consider that Hitler believed all of his falsehoods to be true. Then, he was just informing the German people about the truth behind the Jews, and propaganda was his method. All propaganda consists of is presenting facts (again, real or imagined) while harboring a bias.

Oh, and of course there's going to be a Godwin strike or two. It's a discussion invoking propaganda.

Re:no surprise

[mirix]

Not sure about where you went to school, but they taught us about all of the allied nations participation.

I seem to recall they covered the eastern front quite in depth, everyone that paid attention knew that the immense soviet struggle was a major part of an allied victory.

I've always assumed this part is kinda glossed over in US schools though, esp. during the cold war, and that they just go on about normandy, then play saving private ryan and shout "america fuck yeah" a few times. I'm not sure if that's the case though, hopefully not. ;)

Re:no surprise

[DeathKnoT]

I did learn about the world war 2 stuff with us supplying the allies. Never learned much of anything at all about Vietnam in school. To think of it i'm not even sure if i learned supllying the allies in WWII. I watched tons of history channel when i was in elementary school and middle school so that must be where it is from.

Re:No surprise

[Ubergrendle]

Agree that the census is useful and valuable information. I also agree that the census intrustion is a minor inconvenience.

A safe way to have dealt with this, indeed, was to make it a fine -- say $100-200. Enough to encourage people to take the census, but not enough to be an undue burden to people who consciously objected.

I think what happened in this case, was that the opposition (particularly the Liberals, who greatly benefit from using census data to promote social programs) went for the jugular and made this a big issue; by turning this into a potential confidence of the house issue (note: Canada currently has a minority government) the conservatives dug in their heels.

I just don't see a 'conservatives trying to destroy our society' conspiracy here.

Re:no surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

What kind of backwards ass school did you go too, did they not upgrade there books from circa 1978? Im a dual citizen as well and when I went to school there (9th-11th grade late 90s) this was manditory reading "A People's History of the United States" by Howard Zinn...

There where several other books we had to read that didnt at all seem to rossey up anything to a pro american view point (hell from what I remeber, our history book was very facts only). 1978...called, they want your US history book back to be recycled into low grade tp.

Re:no surprise

[eggnoglatte]

The U.S. did not lose the Vietnam War. We signed the Paris Peace Accords, withdrew, and then South Vietnam lost to North Vietnam.
 

If only there were a term for withdrawing from an armed conflict without having met your objectives...

Re:No surprise

[Idiomatick]

Yeah. It would be horrible data and totally not useful to know information about race. Like say black males get put in prison at a rate far higher than whites. Or that female wages aren't equal to males in similar job positions.

Honestly I can't imagine how that data would be used for evil. But it certainly could be used for good. How is blind policy making better than having information? It really is crazy to not want policy makers to have this data.

Re:No surprise

[khallow]

Cue conservative heads exploding and the "INVASION OF PRIVACY" vs "GOOD FOR BUSINESS" wings of the conservative movement tearing each other apart.

Wow, imagine that everyone that can be labeled by the same broad term not agreeing absolutely on everything. How can such a thing happen?

The thing is, most people agree on many things. We don't think it's a great idea to allow arbitrary murder or theft. Having some sort of wilderness is generally considered a great idea (though we become much more divided when considering what we want to do with it and whether we want to be in it or not). And generally, most people will not sacrifice their desires and interests to further someone else's desires and interests with whom they greatly disagree.

Re:No surprise

[tbannist]

Of course not. This is just one in dozens, if not hundreds of little actions to to move the government to the right. They've muzzled scientists, they muzzled our ambassadors who are no longer allowed to use the words "child" and "soldier" in the same sentence, lest it be used to refer to Omar Khadr. This a government that wants Canadians to be afraid to travel, so they literally refuse to help Canadians over seas if they run into trouble. This is a government that instructed it's member to have no dealings with opposition MPs on comittees. This is a government that has muzzled it's own MPs. They engineered a leave of absence for a pro-registry police chief to make sure he wouldn't be around to give his opinion when the issue came up. They've held back a government report from publication obstensibly "because we already know what it contains" when, in fact, it contains new information that directly contradicts the goverment's line on the long gun registry. This is a government that takes credit for policies they attempted to dismantle, that takes credit for good fiscal management when it has yet to do any. A government that tax cut and spent it's way into a deficit before the 2008 recession and then attempted to refuse to engage in any stimulus spending. When the opposition parties force the governments hand on it, they funnelled funds to ridings that voted conservative almost 2 to 1 over opposition ridings. This is government that has repeated refused to provide information it was required to present to Parliament on the grounds that Parliament couldn't be trusted with the information. I'm sure there are many more instances that I have neglected to list. A govenment that tried to cut funding for political parties because at that moment they had more money than the other parties. This is a disgraceful, conniving government that seeks one thing and only one thing: more power.

The Conservatives don't want to destroy society, merely tame it and make themselves our permanent masters. And to that end they're willing to blind and cripple society if it'll give them an advantage. Frankly, some costs are too great, and any decent man should have greater concerns that just the accumulation of power. Harper is not, by my measure, a decent man. It's sad. When he was first elected leader of the CPC, I had high hopes for him.

Re:no surprise

[IICV]

The Canadians also totally didn't burn down the White House back during the War of 1812.

Ever wonder why Canada still isn't the 51st State for real? We're still afraid of them. That was the largest symbolic attack on US soil until 9/11*, and we never really responded to it.

*Pearl Harbor was an army base, so an attack there is not that surprising.

Re:No surprise

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Actually, that's neither the mean nor the median, but the midrange.

Re:no surprise

[internettoughguy]

And Coca-Cola, although I somewhat doubt that a revolting orange flavoured soft drink would have helped their war effort.

Re:no surprise

[Kitkoan]

The U.S. did not lose the Vietnam War. We signed the Paris Peace Accords, withdrew, and then South Vietnam lost to North Vietnam.

If only there were a term for withdrawing from an armed conflict without having met your objectives...

"We are not retreating - we are advancing in another Direction." Douglas MacArthur

Re:No surprise

[Raenex]

Honestly I can't imagine how that data would be used for evil.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Census#Historical_FBI_use_of_data

How is blind policy making better than having information?

You can do statistical, volunteer sampling rather than compelling every citizen to give up personal information.

Re:No surprise

[Idiomatick]

Why not have the option to have it anonymized after a certain period of time? Or rather immediately after it is completed. I don't believe that names are that necessary for policy decisions. Aside from looking into trends for families... but I'm not certain that is done anyways.

Also, the examples you gave were in regards to information on the short-form census so this wouldn't have any effect on the examples you gave. The long-form was the one basically killed by harper.

In any case I think that the value of the census data outweighs the possibility of something bad coming from them. As there is near guaranteed good to come from having the data.

Wikileaks!

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay

Peek a Boo

[jewishbaconzombies]

"laugh if you want to - and say you don't care"

"if you cannot see it - you think it's not there"

"It doesn't work that way"

Oh dad, we're ALL Devo.

Shame

[Capt.DrumkenBum]

I have never in my life been ashamed to be Canadian. Until today. Thanks Stephen, you stupid ass!

Re:Shame

[Kitkoan]

I was ashamed too when Harper was elected to become the next PM. He keeps doing the same BS that George Bush did a few years ago so much and so often he is known as Mini-Bush for a reason.

Re:Shame

[dpolak]

God forbid he ever gets a majority government!

It's unfortunate, there isn't a single party worth voting for. We're fucked with whatever one we do get. Liberal, NDP, Conservative, then there is the Bloc who's only point of existence is to destroy Canada. How they ever became a national party is beyond me!

Time to move!!

Re:Shame

[Wyatt Earp]

So you weren't ashamed by the Somalia Affair, but are about this?

Re:Shame

[Drakkenmensch]

I personally always believed in the liberals, knowing that whatever accusations the conservatives bombarded them with, they did themselves and worse. Thank you mister Harper for proving me right!

Re:Shame

[Chowderbags]

...Bloc who's only point of existence is to destroy Canada. How they ever became a national party is beyond me!

Because people don't like the French? Or even worse, the pseudo-French.

Re:Shame

[Mashiki]

Hey maybe you can ask the liberals to get out of the political spin on science and the environment. They did a pretty good job for the last 20 years.

Age of Enlightenment?

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember when all the scientists were in consensus w/the politicians that the Earth was flat.
We are heading into that age of society again. And of course, there will be another age of enlightenment after if history proves true.

Re:Age of Enlightenment?

[h4rr4r]

This is a myth. Humans have known the earth to be round since at least the Greeks. Anyone who has ever been on a ship would have noticed the horizon and land seemingly disappearing over it.

The objections to Columbus was that he was bad at math and could not possibly get all the way to India with his supplies that way. He just got lucky that he ran into the Americas, otherwise he probably would have starved after running out of supplies.

Re:Age of Enlightenment?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a myth. Humans have known the earth to be round since at least the Greeks.

Not all humans.

Re:Age of Enlightenment?

[Anonymous Coward]

Crazy historian elites. We all know, deep down inside, that the Earth was thought to be flat until Columbus proved otherwise.

The Name

[bsDaemon]

In Christian Paradis's Canada, science is under the inquisition? Irony and whatnot...

Re:The Name

[dkleinsc]

Nobody expects the Canadian Inquisition! Our chief weapon is Tim Horton's, Tim Horton's and hockey. Our two chief weapons are Tim Horton's, hockey, and a whole lot of boreal forest ... I'll come in again.

Re:The Name

[vm146j2]

Oh, come on now!

Has no one any mod points anymore?

Re:The Name

[Anonymous Coward]

Given the inability of the Dept of Fisheries scientists to accurate guage fish populations, and the 'meltdown' over the errors of climate scientists - its probably a good idea - in any case any citizen can apply through FOIP for the results of the scientists work that the public pays for.

Re:The Name

[Anonymous Coward]

In Christian Paradis's Canada, science is under the inquisition?

I didn't expect that.

Re:The Name

[Wocka_Wocka]

Our two chief weapons are Tim Horton's, hockey, and a whole lot of boreal forest ...

Maybe if your government didn't censor science, you'd know how to count.

Also that statement is made in jest with no malicious intent. But, I know this is going to be modded Troll anyways.

Re:The Name

[Chowderbags]

You forgot your other chief weapon: Polite words. And Ellen Page. Now there's an invasion that's easy on the eyes.

Re:The Name

[RealGrouchy]

Quiet, you, or we'll open a can of Celine Dion on your ass!

- RG>

Re:The Name

[MindlessGenius]

Well, looks to me the Chief Weapon your are referring to "Tim Horton" actually belongs to some rather large and visible U.S. Business named Wendy's

Re:The Name

[dkleinsc]

As of September of last year, it's back to being a separately traded company based in Ontario.

can they use this to by pass can EPA type office

[Joe The Dragon]

can they use this to by pass candian's EPA type office.

So you can fast build stuff with out needing to wait for ever for EPA type stuff.

Permission to speak, or what to say ?

[Alain Williams]

Is this control of them being able to speak to the media, or control of what they say once they can speak ? I suppose that it is probably moot since a scientist who says something that differs from what the govt wants them to say will never get permission to speak again.

When, years ago, the soviets did this they were, rightly, lambasted.

Re:Permission to speak, or what to say ?

[blair1q]

If you only let the scientists who agree with you say what they want to say, it's the same thing.

Re:Permission to speak, or what to say ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Read the post again. It's not.

Re:Permission to speak, or what to say ?

[schon]

Is this control of them being able to speak to the media, or control of what they say once they can speak ?

Both. Before being allowed to speak, the scientists must submit the reporter's questions, along with their supplied answers. The Harper government vets both before giving permission.

Re:Permission to speak, or what to say ?

[youngone]

From reading the article, it seems to be both. I am assuming that "media lines" is marketing speak for some sort of advise on what to say. I don't know, however, as I don't speak marketing. That's what this seems to be. Just a political party that wants to control the message.

they may not be bright

[mevets]

but they make up for it in viciousness.

"Slower traffic keep right" - Canadian road sign or political joke?

Re:they may not be bright

[commodore64_love]

What about a Libertarian Canadian? Where do they fit? Right or left? Or maybe up?

Re:they may not be bright

[mevets]

I think they fit in kindergarten. Most move on once they can read.

"I was a teenage anarchist; But the politics were too convenient" - Against Me!

Re:they may not be bright

[Doc Ruby]

They're corporate anarchists like every other libertarian. No amount of government is ever small enough. Especially when it's reduced to military and police, the usual "reasonable libertarian" utopia, where the rest of the government that can keep those forces from being nothing but private armies/security is missing.

Re:they may not be bright

[Anonymous Coward]

Are Canadians just screwed? I mean do they have guns to vanquish the tyrants?

Re:they may not be bright

[kawabago]

We don't need guns, we just ask them nicely to leave and being good Canadians, they hold on till their party is expunged in the next election. British Columbia is getting ready to do it to the provincial Liberal party if you want to see the whole process in action. From Government ignoring the demands of the people through the upcoming recall of all liberal party legislators and right through to final destruction of the party in the next election still 3 years away. Just follow the HST debate in BC and you can see our whole process from bad policy decision right through to final rejection by voters. I expect the next election will see the rise of the Green party and demise of the Liberal party of BC. Then the whole process will start again.

Re:they may not be bright

[commodore64_love]

I think you have that backwards. Most people start "pro government" in school, but then as they advance towards middle age they tends towards anti-government, because they see how many things the government screws up.

Re:they may not be bright

[shutdown -p now]

The vast majority of libertarians that I knew in my life were in college.

Re:they may not be bright

[shutdown -p now]

What about a Libertarian Canadian? Where do they fit? Right or left? Or maybe up?

Out, more or less.

The concept of welfare state is firmly entrenched in Canadian politics, so much so that even right parties pledge support for it lest they lose the bulk of their votes. The overall consensus of the citizens seems to be that it mostly works, or at least significantly better than the alternatives.

Re:they may not be bright

[shutdown -p now]

Are Canadians just screwed? I mean do they have guns to vanquish the tyrants?

Last I checked, Canada still had free and fair elections.

Re:they may not be bright

[Altrag]

I don't know where you live. Around here its pretty much the opposite. They start off in school believing in "authority" without any consideration about where that authority comes from (most 5 years olds don't care what political party is in power).

By the time they start hitting high school (mid-teens), they're usually anti-authority of any kind, but still without much consideration.. they just want to do whatever they feel like and think they should have that freedom.

Once they start hitting their early to mid 20s (especially if they go to college/university where actually thinking about things is encouraged), they start putting some real thought into why they like (or dislike) what they do. They actually are able to vote so they start actually considering what they're voting for (as much as the propaganda allows.. we're all well aware that what the parties say they'll do often gets ignored or even 180'd).

By the time they've hit their 30s they've pretty much figured out where they lie on the political spectrum. Sure they'll differ slightly from year to year, but short of some massive bullocks on the part of their chosen party (such as the liberal scandal that got Harper elected in the first place), its pretty rare for people to do much of a party swap beyond a certain age.. they've already become set in their ways.. and they've got real responsibilities (work, family) and less time to think about their choices, and so on.

Obviously I'm generalizing and I'm sure there's loads of counter-examples but that's sort of a general flow of things.

Re:they may not be bright

[Anonymous Coward]

troll

Re:they may not be bright

[theaveng]

For what it's worth: Most polls show Americans want smaller government (i.e. the libertarian stance). Don't know what Canadians think.

For me seeing 20-25,000 sucked from my paycheck every year is what made me decide I really don't need government, other than for police functions.

Re:they may not be bright

[theaveng]

Some libertarians are anti-corporation too. They fear centralization of power either in government or quasi-governments (large corporations) as dangerous to individuals.

Some libertarians are also pro-life/anti-abortion, although they are a distinct minority in the LP.

Re:they may not be bright

[Doc Ruby]

Yeah, and you still vote Republican. And chant Teabagger nonsense like "Clinton caused the housing crash" because you hate minorities but love bankers.

Re:they may not be bright

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you go from "no government" to "its reduced to military and police" ?
My understanding of libertarian is that each citizen would hire their own bodyguard because there is no army/police. There would be no fear of a two tier health care system - everyone would pay up front for any health care.
And yes, libertarian taken to the extreme is anarchism. But in moderation, its cost cutting - which all governments need to do right now. The saying is - cut the fat. In nearly all governments the world over, there is quite a bit of fat (figurative or literal if you want to go there..) so the target is easy to see.

That in no way says stop funding hospitals, schools, army, etc. Unless there are two of them doing the same job and each is only half full - eg. two schools in the same neighborhood struggling with low enrollment would benefit from merging into one to cut costs.

As for Harper's media policy - from day one he's been clamping down on media for various reasons. From where I'm sitting, as a taxpayer, none of them are in my interest. All of them are in his interest.

Re:they may not be bright

[Doc Ruby]

Libertarians are all just wannabe mayors of Sim City, so there's no actual reality to what would be an acceptable final result to a libertarian. There is no end to "less government" except "no government". Which is anarchy, which is always a brief period before it's replaced by warlords. That's why a lot of libertarians will tell you the acceptable amount of government would be "military and police only", because they're really just authoritarians. But "military and police only" is just a way to skip right to warlordism, or rather totalitarianism by the warlord running the police and military without the rest of the government to keep it in check.

Your particular version of moderation includes funding hospitals, schools etc. The libertarian next to you doesn't want public funding of schools. The one next to them wants to stop paying for hospitals. The libertarian next to them wants to stop paying for either of them.

Yes, there are efficiencies to be had. If libertarians actually cared about efficiency, they'd run for election to their local school board, find whether there are merger efficiencies, and convince a majority to merge. That never happens. Because there's no glory in it, and libertarians don't want to work - they want to be mayor of Sim City.

Harper is a "Conservative". "Conservatism" is one step away from corporate anarchy: state corporatism. The state funds the corporations, but is run by them (or a select few of them). When that's enforced by terrorism, like violence and its credible threat, it's identifiable as fascism (and usually comes with nationalism, mass murder, military attack of other countries, etc). State corporatism isn't as prosperous for the corporate owners as is corporate anarchy, but it's a lot more likely to include any one corporate owner in those who get to survive and own the corporation; stability of wealth vs greater wealth but risk of none.

Re:they may not be bright

[Anonymous Coward]

They're corporate anarchists like every other libertarian. No amount of government is ever small enough. Especially when it's reduced to military and police, the usual "reasonable libertarian" utopia, where the rest of the government that can keep those forces from being nothing but private armies/security is missing.

This is from people who feel threatened by the appearance of another party. Libertarians don't fall into this mold any more than liberals are all long-haired, smelly, granola-eating, leftover hippy, treehuggers or conservatives are all ignorant, flat-earth, bible-thumping, pro-corporate religious fundamentalists. How does this crap get modded insightful?

Re:they may not be bright

[Doc Ruby]

Not at all. I've never been a member of any political party. You can't argue the actual point, because it's true - even though you don't like it said out loud.

You Teabaggers just never run out of excuses for being wrong.

Re:they may not be bright

[eggnoglatte]

Free? Absolutely. Fair? Not what I would call an electoral system where 34% of the voters get to put in place a government. We need proportional representation.

Re:they may not be bright

[internettoughguy]

What about Noam Chomsky, Philippe Van Parijs, Mike Gravel ect?. Left-Libertarian is not an oxymoron.
Sure I find the far-Left Libertarian Communism and mutualism a bit hard to follow, but Georgism and Geolibertarianism have a fairly consistent center-Left ideology.

Re:they may not be bright

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Some libertarians are anti-corporation too. They fear centralization of power either in government or quasi-governments (large corporations) as dangerous to individuals.

I believe you, but I have to note that very few people who self-identify as libertarians bother to talk about this issue. It's pretty much "all government-is-bad, all the time." A little more acknowledgement that Big Anything is bad -- Big Government to be sure, but also Big Business and Big Religion -- and that playing the various Bigs off against each other can make things go a lot more smoothly for the rest of us, might do a lot to help the LP broaden its base.

Re:they may not be bright

[theaveng]

QUOTE THIS DEMOCRAT: Yeah, and you still vote Republican. And chant Teabagger....

.

There you go insulting my gay friends again. Do you use the "N" word? Or "retard". You're basically saying Gays are inferior people and it is NOT acceptable So much for that open-mindedness you claim to have. And: Nope. Not since 1996 when I voted for Bob Dole. Thanks for playing though, but unfortunately you guessed wrong.

Re:they may not be bright

[hey!]

For what it's worth: Most polls show Americans want smaller government.

Sure, who wouldn't, "ceteris paribus" (all other things being equal). We'd like smaller government, please, but don't cut my Medicare. We'd like smaller government, but you should also do something about salmonella in eggs. We'd like smaller government, and while you're at it do something about the horrible commute I have every day.

It's like my old bolshie Uncle Ivan used to tell me. "Kid," he'd say, "nobody believes in capitalism. Nobody believes in socialism either. It's 'Socialism for me, capitalism for you.'"

Re:they may not be bright

[Anonymous Coward]

calling the tories anything close to libetarians demonstrate your total ignorance of either political maters or canadian politics , it's been a long time since we had such authoritarian in ottawa, and they will lose the next election for it , the only people still suporting them are bigots from the canadian bible belt

Heh...

[DoofusOfDeath]

Why don't I have the feeling there's about to be a flood of, "That's it, I'm moving to the U.S.!"

Re:Heh...

[blair1q]

It's true, but the government scientists with the data aren't allowed to tell you it's true.

Re:Heh...

[Anonymous Coward]

Movies Online

Re:Heh...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why don't I have the feeling there's about to be a flood of, "That's it, I'm moving to the U.S.!"

Because the Canadian Government report on the matter says Canada is the better place to live.

Re:Heh...

[frog_strat]

Maybe they don't want to give up access to a minimal level of health care.

Re:Heh...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's it I'm moving to the U.S.!

Re:Heh...

[jd]

Because all the sane scientists packed up and moved to Scandanavia?

Re:Heh...

[Anonymous Coward]

That will never happen, even under Harper Canada is better off than the U.S. which is still suffering from Bush's policies.

Re:Heh...

[vegiVamp]

Between This and the US, I'd more expect something along the lines of "off the continent".

better a muzzle than a shot of cyanide

[Anonymous Coward]

like we do it here? imagine the vocation of trying to prevent the truth from being known. must be whoreabull.

Harper, Harper...

[stanlyb]

Man, i really love you, believe me....... But why you dont love us? the poor tax-payers? The ones that are paying your salary???

All is Well

[Anonymous Coward]

All is well citizens, we have never been at war with Global Warming. Or our Great American neighbors to the south. Work hard, go to see Justin Beiber concerts. Ignore the insane dictator in front of the curtains addressing you through the tv. Justin Beiber.

Re:All is Well

[mmmmbeer]

So, because you happen to agree with what your current government says about one issue, you're fine with them silencing anyone who disagrees? Well, I hope you don't get what you deserve.

No surprise

[dskoll]

This is the same government that has destroyed the accuracy of the Census under the smokescreen of "privacy rights." (We all know why the Conservatives don't like accurate census data; it makes it harder to spend money based on ideology rather than on real need.)

The Canadian government has always been notoriously non-transparent; even the Liberals have muzzled a scientist in the past.

Sounds pretty standard to me.

[camperdave]

Natural Resources Canada (NRC) scientists were told this spring they need "pre-approval" from Minister Christian Paradis' office to speak with journalists.

Lots of places have policies about who can talk to the press, and who can't. This seems pretty standard to me.

Re:Sounds pretty standard to me.

[stanlyb]

There are lot of places where people kill people.....Is this still pretty standard to you????

Re:Sounds pretty standard to me.

[Doc Ruby]

Preapproval by the chief executive is obviously a policy to politicize science.

Re:Sounds pretty standard to me.

[jd]

It seems pretty standard for New York.

Literally?

[Anonymous Coward]

Muzzling doesn't seem like it would be overly effective. Homo sapiens with their short snouts and all...

Canadian scientists fighting this for years

[FlyingOrca]

My parents are retired scientists of world-class standing, previously employed by the Canadian federal government, with extensive networks of colleagues around the world as well as here in Canada. The current government's efforts to muzzle and control what scientists say is widely viewed as completely unacceptable by the scientists themselves, but the highest levels of the departments which employ them have long been taken over by bureacrats.

I would not be concerned with bias toward government goals on the part of the scientists, though. The government's attempts to vet and spin their public communications speaks quite eloquently to the scientists' integrity... and to this government's perfidy.

Re:Canadian scientists fighting this for years

[jd]

May I advise you and your parents to re-read Fred Hoyle's book "The Molecule Men"? You will find it most enlightening, given your current situation.

If you happen to be a government scientist

[Are You Kidding]

and you expect to be censored, make sure there are plenty of draft copies floating around your agency, and send one to Wikileaks for review.

Re:If you happen to be a government scientist

[Altrag]

Or just make sure you're "collaborating" with scientists in countries with more reasonable laws. The article states that the press reports were based on comments from associated British scientists. Those reports were still out there -- the only thing that's different is that one particular scientist didn't get his piece in in time.

Which definitely sucks for him, no doubt about it. Science is definitely about claims to fame and being the first to discover or intuit something new. But I would hope that at least a few of the scientists who are working on really important stuff (environmental research, contaminants, etc) will be able to let go of their egos and have their associates in other countries publish for them, for the sake of getting important information out into the world.

Then again, if that starts happening to any great extent while Harper's still in power, we'll probably start requiring a license to associate with foreign scientists or some BS like that.

I cried a little inside when Harper was elected. I cried a lot more inside when he was re-elected. The only saving grace is that he's been in a minority position in both cases. I shudder to think what would happen if he ever got a majority.

Harper doesnt think Earth is older than 6000 yrs

[mpetch]

Of course Mr. Harper needs to do this. We all know his party has to tow the line when it comes to the age of the planet. Floods 13,000 years ago could not have happened because God hadn't created the Earth.

Climate change cover-up

[OutSourcingIsTreason]

It's obviously a cover-up of climate change data, ordered by lobbyists for the planet-raping carbon industry. Those other restricted topics are only there to make the climate change cover-up a bit less flagrant.

Re:Climate change cover-up

[Mad Leper]

Or perhaps more obviously to prevent government scientists from using their tax-payer funded research to push their own personal agendas.

Re:Climate change cover-up

[Thangalin]

All weather measurements taken in Canada during the last century are available to you. You can download them from Environment Canada (for $100) and leaf through the millions of daily weather measurements made since the early 1900s. Or click the following link to visit a website that allows you to quickly plot what the Canadian climate has been doing for the last 100 years (per city) using that data:

http://whitemagicsoftware.com/software/climate/

The article itself discusses restricting flood data, which can be used to see how the climate has changed since the last ice age, but does not equate to a lock-down on all climate data.

There is no cover-up: you can now see the trends for yourself. There is no question that parts of Canada are heating up and other parts are cooling down (i.e., the climate is rapidly changing).

The questions we should be -- and have been -- asking are: (1) how much have we influenced the change; (2) what is the likelihood that the trends will continue; (3) what are the repercussions if the trend continues; and (4) what can we do to reverse the trends?

That would be politics as usual

[Sycraft-fu]

Same shit here in the US. Bush ran a very secretive government, and pulled the "We don't have to justify it to you," card to the other two branches often. Obama promised to change that... And really hasn't. The states secrets thing is getting pulled out, few changes are being made, etc.

Politicians don't like it when their opponents have secrets, but they love it when they do.

Re:That would be politics as usual

[hedwards]

That's not really the same thing. Bush scared the crap out of a substantial number of Americans. I'm not sure that McCain or anybody else would've been able to do anything else. Regardless of what he does he's screwed. If he fixes all of it then he loses the independent vote that's necessary to keep his party in power and if he doesn't he gets idiot conservatives claiming that he's as bad as his predecessor.

But at the end of the day, Bush fucked things up to the point where there isn't really any good way of fixing a lot of this. If he doesn't keep it secret, it's just going to embolden the terrorists, and if he does he's going to face well justified criticism for being secretive.

I can't blame him for playing it safe a terrorist attack now would keep the Presidency out of democratic hands for a long time.

Re:That would be politics as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly. Here in the States it's the same crap. I really really wish I could remember what the first hot topic was that Obama said would be more transparent when running for office. I just remember that a month or two after he said, "It's going to remain private, but for different reasons than Bush cited." As if that were somehow any better.

It's like Futurama, "Your 3% tax goes too far!" "Your 3% tax doesn't go far enough!"

Re:That would be politics as usual

[Jesus_666]

The question is: When does it become safe to say things again? When terrorists no longer target the United States? That could be a very long time indeed and at that point people may be accustomed to a government that operates on a "need to know" policy.

Re:That would be politics as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

We need leaders who will do what's right for the country, even if it means getting kicked out next term. Pandering to special interest groups (MIC, unions, Big $, etc) is the quickest way to hell-in-a-handbasket, but also to re-election. This fuck up in the political machine will be the death of the country unless people stand up and demand honest leaders and be willing to accept short-term pain for long-term gain, instead of the other way around.

Re:That would be politics as usual

[internettoughguy]

The question is: When does it become safe to say things again? When terrorists no longer target the United States? That could be a very long time indeed and at that point people may be accustomed to a government that operates on a "need to know" policy.

In terms of actual danger, terrorism in the US is at the bottom of the list, and it certainly does not justify the decrease in Govt. transparency (almost nothing would) that has occurred. I mean even here in New Zealand we got our own terrorism act, and exactly how much domestic terrorism have we had? None. It's just an excuse to make life easier for the Police and the Intelligence service, at the expense of justice.

Mini-Bushes

[macraig]

I think John Howard in Australia might have beaten him to that title by a fair number of years. There's crackpot dictators and theocrats in all but name all over the place.

Re:Mini-Bushes

[internettoughguy]

I think John Howard in Australia might have beaten him to that title by a fair number of years. There's crackpot dictators and theocrats in all but name all over the place.

John Howard was probably worse than Bush, compare the treatment of the Indonesian "boat-people" by Australia, to the treatment of Mexican Illegal's in the US.

Free Speech

[Fantastic Lad]

Harper, in his attempts to create a "Fox News" in Canada blasts those opposed to it using "Free Speech" arguments.

Harper is a hypocritical creep who has NO interest in the good of the people. He is interested in dumbing them down, propagandizing at them and limiting knowledge.

Propaganda is not an attempt to communicate. Rather, it regards people not as people but as little machines which can be programmed using the right strings of words and images calculated to illicit desired behavior. The moment somebody intends to manipulate, the act of communication has ended and the act of programming has begun. Freedom of speech laws were designed with the idea in mind that people fundamentally respected the humanness of their peers. They didn't have to respect one another's opinions, but the underlying assumption is that we are appealing to the soul and intelligence on a personal level and not a cynical machine-programming level. Put another way, humans must treat each other as humans and not as lab rats.

Propaganda doesn't respect fundamental humanity and therefore should not be brought under the protection of freedom of speech. Same with advertising.

-FL

Welcome to the future.

[JMZero]

This isn't just Canada by any stretch - it's everywhere. And scientists are just the newest people being affected.

The problem is media. Not left-wing media, not right-wing media, but scandal happy media. From my perspective (in Canada), media have lost all desire to fill people in on what's happening, all they want is a scandal - something they can sell right now. They want to catch a politician (or a scientist) making a mistake or saying anything that a significant number of people will disagree with. And it's been getting worse for decades.

Now, sure, it makes sense that - to a certain extent - the media needs to maintain a bit of an adversarial role toward government. Media is an important check on the power of government. But that needs to be balanced by a desire to be informative rather than sensational and a desire to inform people with both sides of an issue.

How it is now, we've reached the point that, to be safe, politicians just don't say anything of any interest - and the only information we'll get will be vacuous and committee-written. Nobody wins in this situation.

To me, politicians and media share the blame on this one. Politicians need to be open, but media needs to ease off the trigger a bit so that being open isn't quite so suicidal. The best summary I've seen of this is here (David Mitchell).

Re:Welcome to the future.

[AfroTrance]

To me, politicians and media share the blame on this one.

The media is a reflection of their audience. We are to blame.

Re:Welcome to the future.

[gizmonic]

I agree with you in almost all aspects of what you said. However, I place the blame on the people. If it didn't sell, the media wouldn't sell it. If the voters/viewers wanted and demanded highly informative shows that were impartial and factually accurate, the media would by all means provide it, since it'd give them the ratings. But the people don't want that. And when the people become uninformed and vacuous, so too does our media and politicians. I understand the point David makes in the video, but I think it still boils down to the fact that without the public snapping up only the most salient National Enquirer style headlines, the entire situation would be vastly different.

Re:Welcome to the future.

[Anonymous Coward]

When I think of the media, I'll always think of this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoXi0sUMBvE

Re:Welcome to the future.

[Thangalin]

No.

The problem is that scientists need food; climatologists and meteorologists must earn a living. There are over 19,000 weather stations across the United States alone. Modern Stevenson's screens are not free. Ensuring data quality takes time and effort -- not free. Weather monitoring machines need electricity, and not all weather stations are solar-powered. Climate and weather study is expensive. Consider databases, data storage facilities, backup systems, data analysis tools, and time taken to explore the data.

If you want to know what the data says, download it and analyse it yourself. Environment Canada, for example, allows you to download all daily weather measurements taken at over 7,000 weather stations across the nation. The data goes back to before the 1900s. That's over 230 million data points encompassing snow depth, minimum & maximum temperatures, rain fall, and general precipitation. They charge $100 for the data.

To develop a public-facing website that allows the general public to analyse the data using a simple user interface requires over 500 hours of work for design, implementation, integration, and data transcoding. If you have not the time, money, nor incentive to create such an application yourself, you can use one for free at:

http://whitemagicsoftware.com/software/climate/

Re:Welcome to the future.

[JMZero]

Your reply doesn't seem to have anything to do with my post. Perhaps you missed the reply button for a lower post?

Re:Welcome to the future.

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87WqBDgc7wY (Adam Curtis)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xW3XeT7qavo

When I first saw the headline...

[SilasMortimer]

...I thought they were actually muzzling the scientists. But like the feedbag type. You know, like horses.

I was thinking, DAMN, you're working them to death! They're only human, for the love of god!!!

Frankly, it would have been a much less frustrating story. And I wonder what they're going to do when they realize that the vast majority of stuff they will get will be on stuff like the peculiarities of the reproduction of a certain type of fungus, or some standard survey of fluctuations in the luminosity of a group of stars that the suits won't understand even if it's spelled out to them Dick and Jane style. They don't know what they're getting into. In fact, expect a jump in mundane research that makes no sense to the public as pissed off scientists decide to give the government what for.

Grants != Government Scientist

[Roger W Moore]

...if you take government grant money, you will only publish results that agree with the government's stances.

Hang on that is NOT what the article says. The scientists in question are EMPLOYED by the government. They are not university-based faculty who also apply for grants, are employed by a university and have tenured positions. While this is certainly very disturbing and worrying it is not as far reaching as applying to everyone who gets government research grants, only to those employed directly by the government.

Of course the irony is that, since I am someone getting a research grant from the Canadian government, but not employed by them, the government policy might make you doubt that what I just wrote is true.... which is why it is a really stupid policy to muzzle scientists whether they are government employed or not. It makes it hard to believe scientists if they come up with evidence that actually supports a government policy yet everyone will still believe them if they announce evidence against a policy....and so far university scientists can still do that.

Re:Grants != Government Scientist

[shugah]

This is not surprising from a federal government that has cabinet ministers (Stockwell Day) who believe that humans and dinosaurs co-existed.

My wife is a university based, grant funded, tenured faculty in a major Canadian university who does health policy research. A memo was distributed to her department saying that they would all be required to register as lobbyists with the Provincial government.

Gary Goodyear

[florescent_beige]

No story such as this would be complete without pointing out that the Minister of Science and Technology is a creationist.

To the Conservatives, "science" means "whatever we say". No wonder they want to control what actual pesky scientists say.

Re:Gary Goodyear

[Philomage]

'To the Conservatives, "science" means "whatever we say".' I think you're being a little harsh. To the Conservatives, science means whatever makes the best weapons and the most profits. There's no point wondering about history or fundamental physical laws: God did it. Let's just be practical here.

Censorship

[Jaysyn]

Hey a Slashdot censorship article that is actually about government censorship!

The "Reality" reason for muzzling scientists

[presidenteloco]

The Conservative government in Canada is similar to the Republicans in the USA.

And in the immortal words of Stephen Colbert:

"Reality has a well-known liberal bias."

Re:The "Reality" reason for muzzling scientists

[Prune]

I live in Canada and I have lived in the USA (during my undergrad). I call BS as there's no comparison between US Republicans and Canadian Conservatives.

DANGER

[b4upoo]

Censorship is nothing but dangerous and whoever in Canada is behind censoring scientists needs a rope, a tree and some howling in the night. I hope the citizens of Canada will act up and get this nonsense stopped.

Lord Jesus Fuck!

[multipartmixed]

It sounds like that asshole is taking advice from the Americans!

Has Carl Rove moved north?!!!

Re:Lord Jesus Fuck!

[Concerned Onlooker]

Hey, parent is not a troll! Seriously, has anybody seen Karl Rove south of the border recently?

Mod parent up

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish I could mod you up for that. You're indeed correct. It's one of those myths which take on a life of their own and get propogated generation to generation. Such as the Boston Tea Party as an anti-tax event, rather than as a bunch of tea producers conspiring to damage the competition.

It's the flood that threw them...

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you expect, the guy's reporting a giant flood 13,000 years ago, when we know the earth's only 6,000 years old, and the Deluge can't have been that far back.

It f*cks with their tiny minds...

This administration is awful

[gagol]

It is more opaque than the Nazi Party, avoids medias as much as possible, despite being a minority elected government. What are the other parties doing? Sleeping on gas I am afraid.

lynching

[OrangeTide]

I can't think of any instances where lynching actually helped.

I, for one, welcome...

[planckscale]

...our Canadian Government Scientist Muzzling Overlords! Thanks to them I can happily enjoy my media-induced pleasure place in peace. Excuse me now while I clean the blood from my orifices.

Its a standard policy, what's the problem?

[Yakasha]

I think there are a few too many tin-foil hats here.

This looks to me like nothing more than the very standard policy of saying "Nobody except official spokespeople can speak to the media"... to protect the government from lawsuits.

If 1 bad paper is published, and somebody loses money or a life over it, the Canadian government can be held liable.

Every government and private company uses the same policy.

Sounds like

[Anonymous Coward]

how some US universities persecute any professors who even mention the possibility of intelligent design in the universe.

Wikileaks is about to get more traffic

[Anonymous Coward]

First off that's fascist. 2nd, Wikileaks is going to become a household name in Canada.

Harper faschists are GOP controlled war puppets

[Anonymous Coward]

The harper government has got to go, they are an example of what type of age we are in...an equivallent of the dirty 30's where faschist ideas took hold around the world. The trouble is, is that since Regan go elected, the GOP right wing nut bar loonies (and Thatcher loonies at the same time in the UK), have brainwashed whole generations to the right wing thinking where everybody thinks that they are going to be the next multi-millionare chosen people and that they can rise to the top of some big brawling pile (like all the game shows, reality shows, fictional sci-fi space operas where everybody is in these huge power struggles....trust me, history has shown that revolutions are messy and that most average people die or end up in the gulag or gas chamber.

We have to get rid of these neo-faschist governments....harpers govenment is an wierd example of north koreas cult of personality dictator cult....the house of commons tory conservative digs have TONS of pictures of harper (so every tory minister knows who is in charge), but if the S**t ever hits the fan, then its some underling who is fed to the press/opposition parties. Harper has said (years ago, before he headed up the conservatives), that he hated the canadian model of governmnet and he prefferd the US republican model...if he likes it sooo much, then get the hell out of canada and go live in the self-imploding US model....just today on the news, it was said that the US is spending $160 for every $100 it took in....thats a really good model for keeping your world-empire from exploding....what the US need right now is to close world-bases, reduce military spending by half, invest 200 billion into nanotech/life-extension/age-reversing/nanotech manufacturing tech so that we won't have to get stuff made in china (we can make most things on our table-top nano-relicator machines form downloadable plans on the interweb etc.) and we can make all us old people (hey, i'm 50) young again (see the Mprize/SENS project). I am sick of these decades of warmongers wasting billions and trilions on the useless war machine and then haveing all these wars and then having to salute these returning war people...these soldiers/engineers/scientists that work for the war machine should be getting some REAL jobs in biotech/nanotech/IT (Artificial inetellegence (neural networks etc) industries instead of making ware easier to wage and more reasons to wage them..there is a reason why people with war experience are so revered in the US....it's because everybody are such brainwashed arses that they think that war is the solution!!...wake up, you are being controlled by the rich and powerfull that are leqading you to a messy end, be it more war, or some revolution like the french revolution or the communist revolution that involed lost of other controlling people getting you killed, and in the case of teh communist revolution, lots of gulag prisons and more wars, and more gulag prisons/fireing squads. Democracy works if everybody has jobs and we have a really cool scientific progress, not some dark age religions saying that you cannot have stem cell or synthetic bilology/nanotech research.

Good point

[JMZero]

I agree.

Next step ... cuts

[Anonymous Coward]

Once you prevent publicly-funded scientists from doing the job they are, in part, supposed to do -- i.e. inform the public paying the bills -- they become less relevant to the public and public issues. Then you can start cutting the relevant departments or simply let the scientists retire and not replace them (or replace only half of them), something that has already been happening for at least a decade in the departments mentioned. That way you don't need official cuts, just natural atrophy year by year. This is not a trend unique to the current Conservative government, although this is a whole new level of craziness with regards to "controlling the message", which fits in with the overall plan of slowly gutting all scientific departments.

The end result is a less-informed public that has less access to scientific information, leaving more room for the unopposed political agenda of the day (i.e. whatever the government wants to tell them). You also have fewer embarrassing moments when politicians who don't know what they are talking about get contradicted by scientists representing the facts of the situation, such as the recent fiasco over the long-form, mandatory census, and whether a voluntary short form would be just effective (any competent statistician will tell you the former is better than the latter, but politicians claimed otherwise).

Scientists have an inconvenient habit of telling it like it is regardless of the political effect. The current government is such a bunch of control freaks that these imposing these changes doesn't surprise me at all.

What do you expect?

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you expect from a country that allows one of its provinces to have police with the totally absurd function of supressing the use of any launguage but french!(Sorry about using the f word!)

O Canada!

[Anonymous Coward]

The True North strong and free!

Awesome

[Anonymous Coward]

Stop the filthy hippy movement before it starts. I for one will be moving to Canada when I've lost my last shred of hope for America.

Vietnam was a pawn battle in the cold war.

[HornWumpus]

The whole point was to keep the reds in check until they fell under their own weight.

That objective was ultimately achieved.

The only thing lost to the reds in the Vietnam era was American college campuses.

Those 'powerful' (in their little 'ology' worlds) commie profs will find it hard to replace themselves with new useful idiots.

I give them another 10 years.

Re:Vietnam was a pawn battle in the cold war.

[ImprovOmega]

Meh. The North Vietnamese government never gave two shits about capitalism or communism except as tools to further their goal of keeping Vietnam one nation. The Vietnamese put up with years (*hundreds*) of years of French colonial rule and were pissed as all hell about it. Ho Chi Minh was all about the U.S. and capitalism as long as we were supporting him (and promising to bail him out with the French), but when we stabbed him in the back on that promise to help France save face after being busted up in WW2, he switched to the communists (hello China!) to supply him with the means of getting rid of all foreign control.

The whole "South Vietnam" idea was doomed from the start. Outside of a fierce sense of nationalism (which would necessarily side them with the North Vietnamese folks) the people of the South had no realistic means of holding a government together - as such it ended up being run by corrupt officials who were interested more in maintaining their own power and authority than in actually running a country. They played to our expectations and made decisions that ultimately destabilized the whole southern region. Vietnam was a mess of our own making.

North Korea, on the other hand, exists at the whim and whimsy of China. If China cut off all support North Korea would be gone within a year.

Re:Vietnam was a pawn battle in the cold war.

[HornWumpus]

None of your points changes the fact that the Vietnam war was a pawn battle in the cold war.

That the pawns didn't see it that way doesn't change a thing.

You neglect the fact that the treacherous frogs demanded a restoration of (at least some of) their 'empire' as a condition of joining NATO. We should have spit in their cowardly, NAZI colluding faces.

Oil industry influence

[mangu]

So... have looney Creationists actually gained enough hold on the Canadian government to silence scientific knowledge?

TFA mentions something about oil sands and mercury pollution in the Athabasca river, so it's most probably work of the oil industry.

As a bonus, they get silence about floods at the end of the ice age. Any paper about climate is bad for the oil industry, they need ignorance in order to enforce their truth that there is no climate change and if it existed it would not have been caused by CO2 in the atmosphere.

Be careful what you wish for

[thethibs]

Environmental issues have become international politics; that's government territory. Tough on the scientists involved but this is very much a case of "be careful what you wish for", given that it's many of these same people who politicized it in the first place.

The guys with some innocuous finding to report get caught up in the net put in place to restrain loose cannons.

From the elected government's point of view, these guys are all part of the left-wing bureaucracy that spends much of its time looking for ways to embarrass Harper and the Conservative Party without worrying too much about the facts, ethics, or good science. It's perhaps a little harsh, but they've sandbagged Harper and his ministers a few times too many. Quite simply, as a group they can't be trusted.

Be serious

[Anonymous Coward]

Progressives have won, completely, all around the world.

There is no significant opposition : progressives have to invent them. Republicans in the US, except for Ron Paul and a few others, are as socialist as anyone in the democratic party, they just differ in what corporations are going to get the benefits.

You can't blame the increasingly fascist state of world govs on Libertarians, there aren't any in power anywhere,

Re:Be serious

[Doc Ruby]

Libertarians have voted Republicans into power across the US for decades, on promises to cut government. The fact that Republicans lied, and vastly expanded government, especially its most abusive parts, has not stopped libertarians from voting Republicans into power.

You can't take credit for being too stupid to catch on to Republican lies when you keep voting for them.

No

[ThatsNotPudding]

The general truth is the younger generation grows up bathed in the biases and hatreds of their parents. That's why we still have racists and blind-faithers. With few exceptions, after their adolescent 'wild years of rebellion', the vast majority settle down and become just another link in the chain, ready to pass down the familial 'traditions'.

TFA is exactly WHY the POLICIES ARE REQUIRED

[fygment]

The policy came in to being because it became clear decades ago that dealing with the media requires training because the latter are adept at spinning stories to their own ends (like the TFA). Unfortunately, whenever a government employee speaks, the govt (NOT the employee) is called to account for it so yeah, the guys in charge want to hear whats going to be said first so they don't get blind-sided. It is surprising that the policy only got enforced at Environment Canada so recently as it is (and has been) common practice in every other department you'd care to think of (likely true in _any_ govt anywhere).

As for this specific case:

a) there is a procedure that is pretty streamlined and if there was an unseemly delay it was likely because the scientist didn't get off his butt and push the paperwork through ('Oh, I'm a scientist. We shouldn't have to do administration.");
b) being a scientist, the statement he planned to release likely needed editing because it was poorly written for a media context. Just because you can write a scientific paper doesn't mean you can write; and
c) the scientists paper is available to the public. The media could have gone ahead with a comment or opinion of their own OR sought the comment of a scientist who was not employed by the govt just like all the other news agencies.

That last point is an important one. If any govt employee wants carte blanche to speak to the media, then get out of the govt. Otherwise, get with the program. Take the media relations courses the govt offers its employees (free of charge), anticipate the timelines on the various administrative protocols and thank gawd you are in a position where (unlike most of your colleagues) you get to do research without the burden of teaching, soliciting funding from industry, or worrying about "publish or perish".

"Muzzled"? Hah. The reporter and scientist were too lazy to put in the work for the science story and defaulted with an easy to write conspiracy theory. That's what's wrong with the media, and why policies for release are needed.

So what happened 13K years ago?

[mattr]

Has anyone asked what interesting thing actually happened 13,000 years ago then? Sounds like something surprising was discovered.

no representation

[Alan R Light]

Great idea! I've seldom heard a politician admit the truth, that what we need are pragmatic problem solvers.

Also, my condolences to your friend on losing her next electoral contest.

The people won't countenance a politician refusing to tell them sweet, sweet lies.

I do have one idea, though I'm not sure how it would fit into Canadian politics, but for the U.S. I'd like to see personal representation in the lower house, so that every citizen can choose their own congressional representative, who will vote for their constituents the same way shares are voted at a stockholder's meeting. That way every citizen can have a representative who is accountable to them and no one else.

Unfortunately, there's no way the career politicians will ever let that happen . . . peacefully.