"Canadians in general (and maybe people in Quebec more so - Living here gives me a right to that comment IHMO) seem to have an intense focus on internal issues."
What percentage of Canadians can identify where their country is on the globe versus the percentage of Americans who can't?
The intent of Section 32 (The Notwithstanding clause) was to ensure that laws are made by the Parliament and Legislatures, and not the courts. Furthermore, this section was added to the Constitution Act of 1982 at the request of the Western Premiers who feared an activist judiciary.
Since Section 32 allows for the over-ride of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, any bill invoking that clause must be renewed every few years (don't remember how many) and over-riding basic freedoms cannot be done unless the electorate is in favour of such restrictions. Unfortunately, a sizable majority voters in Quebec are in favour of the language laws.
Potentially as a counter-balance, the federal government has the power to "disallow" (i.e. cancel) any legislation passed by a province without question, but that clause has never been applied AFAIK.
Personally, I think that the language issue has a lot more to do with Quebec xenophobia than with the protection of a linguistic minority. The separatist movement has always had dark under-currents of anti-semitism and anti-immigrant sentiment.
"Tell me, would the language police shut down an English-language site that called for repeal of the province's law forcing French down its citizens' throats?"
Only if the sign were in English only. If the website was predominantly French and the fonts were sufficiently larger for the French text, it would be OK.
It is hard to find a pattern for micro$oft's behaviour. They really like the BSD license - without that they would not have a functional TCP stack for their OS.
And when they were in the process of running Netscape into the ground, they had no problem giving away Internet Exploder.
And in the interests of starting a debate over the merits of open source vs closed source, he adds nothing of significance to the discussion. I am reminded of a quote from Shakespeare:
"It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing"
From the outside looking in, it appears that Hubbard intended to set up a pyramid scheme and masquerade it as an organized religion.
When you read the stuff on operation clambake, it appears that Hubbard intended to set up a pyramid scheme and masquerade it as an organized religion.
Go figure...
Don't panic!
There have to be *some* limits on freedom of speech. To quote a semi-famous example, a person who screams "FIRE!" in a crowded theatre when there was no danger, should not be able to claim they were just practicing free speech and thus should not be responsible for the stampede.
The question should not be whether there should be limits to free speech, but what are the reasonable limits that should be applied in a sane and civilized society.
Slashdot Mirror
Evil purposes?
Yes, I suppose that Bill Gates must be really pissed that someone beat him to the punch and developed this first!
"Canadians in general (and maybe people in Quebec more so - Living here gives me a right to that comment IHMO) seem to have an intense focus on internal issues."
What percentage of Canadians can identify where their country is on the globe versus the percentage of Americans who can't?
micro$oft is reputed to have somewhere in the name of US$26 billion dollars in cash reserves.
I believe that they are being investigated by the US federal government for accounting irregularities, separately from the anti-trust action.
I don't know if being accused of cooking the books is necessarily part of a better business plan...
"Face the reality: MicroSoft is a damn effective company, that makes good software and knows, how to sell it. "
Since when were blue screens of death, weekly reports of severe security holes, and that friggin paper clip considered good software?
25 million lines of code and counting and that is just for the OS!
micro$oft might be a "damn effective" marketing company, but they are not "damn effective" at writing good code.
So then...
"All your posts are not belong to us"
The intent of Section 32 (The Notwithstanding clause) was to ensure that laws are made by the Parliament and Legislatures, and not the courts. Furthermore, this section was added to the Constitution Act of 1982 at the request of the Western Premiers who feared an activist judiciary.
Since Section 32 allows for the over-ride of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, any bill invoking that clause must be renewed every few years (don't remember how many) and over-riding basic freedoms cannot be done unless the electorate is in favour of such restrictions. Unfortunately, a sizable majority voters in Quebec are in favour of the language laws.
Potentially as a counter-balance, the federal government has the power to "disallow" (i.e. cancel) any legislation passed by a province without question, but that clause has never been applied AFAIK.
Personally, I think that the language issue has a lot more to do with Quebec xenophobia than with the protection of a linguistic minority. The separatist movement has always had dark under-currents of anti-semitism and anti-immigrant sentiment.
"Tell me, would the language police shut down an English-language site that called for repeal of the province's law forcing French down its citizens' throats?"
Only if the sign were in English only. If the website was predominantly French and the fonts were sufficiently larger for the French text, it would be OK.
It is hard to find a pattern for micro$oft's behaviour. They really like the BSD license - without that they would not have a functional TCP stack for their OS. And when they were in the process of running Netscape into the ground, they had no problem giving away Internet Exploder. And in the interests of starting a debate over the merits of open source vs closed source, he adds nothing of significance to the discussion. I am reminded of a quote from Shakespeare: "It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing"
From the outside looking in, it appears that Hubbard intended to set up a pyramid scheme and masquerade it as an organized religion. When you read the stuff on operation clambake, it appears that Hubbard intended to set up a pyramid scheme and masquerade it as an organized religion. Go figure...
Don't panic! There have to be *some* limits on freedom of speech. To quote a semi-famous example, a person who screams "FIRE!" in a crowded theatre when there was no danger, should not be able to claim they were just practicing free speech and thus should not be responsible for the stampede. The question should not be whether there should be limits to free speech, but what are the reasonable limits that should be applied in a sane and civilized society.