Canadian Prime Minister and Mexican President Jog Together This Morning

notbush wrote:

Trudeau is immensely better than Harper. Harper was a power hungry, climate denying, censoring, bland twat.

Since this is primarily a right wing forum I can see why he gets the occasional bad comment. For the most part he's pretty bright and has 85% good platform. I would like to have marijuana decriminalized before legalized which is one thing that annoys me and he is still a bit too much into big oil but you can't win 'em all.

For the most part I'm pretty content with our PM

Trudeau is not better than Harper. He is projected to run around a 30 billion dollar deficit this year, with similar levels of debt in years to come. He inherited a surplus. Who's going to pay for that? You?

Trudeau is power hungry. He is trying to put electoral reform in place that would hugely favor his party WITHOUT A REFERENDUM. This is without precedent in Canada's history.

It pissed me off that Harper denied climate change but Trudeau is absolutely killing Canada's economic engine by stalling pipeline plans - especially the one to New Brunswick's refineries, which would hugely boost Canada's economy I'm not aware of any other country in the World that would so willingly shoot itself in the foot by not sending its rich supply of natural resources to market. Additionally, Canada is poised to benefit from global warming. Our agricultural production will increase - both because plants do well with more CO2 in the atmosphere, as well as from the longer growing season. What I would support is investment in green retrofitting in all public infrastructure, with tax breaks for the private sector to go green. In the meantime, we should continue to sell our resources. Trudeau promised that he was going to run "modest" deficits in order to invest in infrastructure. Now, we find out that most of these investments are going to "social" infrastructure. Kind of misleading, wouldn't you say? Investing in green infrastructure would be a much better strategy. Instead, Quebec is getting its oil from Saudi Arabia, which has much weaker environmental standards than Canada.

Trudeau campaigned on transparency. His actions speak otherwise. So far he has repealed transparency laws for First Nations and Unions that used to force them to disclose how their money was spent. His government has denied numerous freedom of information requests into his refugee resettlement plan - citing that the information will not be made available for up to 300 days, even when the question only requires a yes or no answer. He has pledged to post his work/meeting schedule online, but the information is so vague as to be 100% useless. His government is also supporting bank bail-ins and the TPP, in spite of this:

These are Harper initiatives as well. If there was one thing that I was hoping a different government would change, it was these democracy and sovereignty-killing bills.

Trudeau is a narcissistic, selfie-taking twat, with style but zero substance to back it up.

Harper me no-likey!

I agree with you that he should not force through his own plans for electoral reform, even though his election win gives him a mandate to do it, as it was a key plank in his platform so we all knew it was high on the agenda. I'm very leery about electoral form for the sake of reform. To paraphrase Churchill, our form of democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other systems... :-). Bugger with the current system and you are sure to cause unintended consequences that are as bad or worse than the problems we would like to fix. And anyway our problems are first world problems, hardly worth getting fussed about.

They don't look half bad. I would go so far as to say the Mexican guy actually has decent form.

Are you kidding?

Harper ran deficits for all but one year (the election year) so don't spout off about that. Furthermore Trudeau campaigned on running a deficit - it's not like that was a surprise.

As for the oil - Trudeau is certainly more moderate than the NDP & Greens and is campaigning FOR pipelines in BC. It's actually something I don't like but don't say he is "stalling" on pipelines. Also - you're an idiot - just because you have a resource doesn't mean it's always smart to exploit it. Canada should move towards green tech and away from fossil fuels. Short term strain for long term prosperity (Look at nordic countries - canada is actually a pretty bad polluter)

As for transparency Trudeau is not perfect but hella better than Harper - he unmuzzled the press and climate scientists and he's decentralizing PMO power. His electoral reform you fear so much was a campaign promise he was very clear on and will actually make it way harder for libs to win majority next go around (they are canning first past the post) so I don't know what the heck you are talking about there.

Anyway nice try you con.

Exquisite form!

Trudeau graduated from McGill University; palin thinks McGill is a fast food fish sandwich.

Nieto would smoke Trudeau in any distance right now but I like Trudeau's upside. We, LRC Nation, could convert Trudeau's flabby, overly bouncy stride into a World Leader Beater in the 800/1500/5000 with a little fine tuning. Nieto would still own him from 8k and up no matter what we did.

The real question is how does Obama fit into the equation now that he’s quit smoking?

Jefe in the CO wrote:

We, LRC Nation, could convert Trudeau's flabby, overly bouncy stride into a World Leader Beater in the 800/1500/5000 with a little fine tuning.

^this

I see an Abel Kiprop inside him trying to come out.

Harper gained a majority government after the 2008 financial collapse. Just about every government in the developed World ran deficits at that time, as the economy was in turmoil. The U.S. has never managed to balance their budget. Harper did. Why do we need to go more than 100 billion more into debt? While oil prices are low, I would not say that Canada is currently in a recession and, even if we are, it certainly pales compared to 2008. Harper never ran 30 billion dollar deficits per year. Trudeau doesn't even have a plan to balance the budget by the end of his term.

You seem to have poor reading comprehension. I said very clearly in my last post that Trudeau should be investing in green infrastructure, such as retrofitting of public buildings and tax breaks for homeowners and businesses that go green. The tar sands account for a tiny, tiny fraction of the greenhouse gases that are emitted each year. It makes sense to EXPORT our energy so that we have the money to invest in green infrastructure. If politicians like Trudeau and Wynn are so concerned about the environment, then why did they fly far more people than any other country in the World to the climate change conference in Paris? Wynn flew there and back not once, but twice. In this day and age, meetings between leaders don't need to happen face to face. Even if you believe it was necessary to fly all of those people to the conference, how do you feel about Trudeau flying all the way across the country in a private jet for a single day of snowboarding in B.C. Gee, that can't be good for the climate. Face it - the Liberal Party is all about driving up the cost of energy for lower and middle-income Canadians while living extravagantly (and with correspondingly high carbon footprints) on the Canadian tax-payer's dime. They are hypocrites, just like David Suzuki, Leonardo DiCaprio and Al Gore. Maybe if elites were willing to practice what they preach, the rest of us would too.

I find it hilarious that you think that Trudeau has unmuzzled the press. More like he bought CBC's loyalty by pledging around $200 million? per year in funding increases for the broadcaster. Harper, by contrast cut CBC's funding, so you only ever saw negative stories about him on Canada's national news broadcaster. The facts behind climate science were inconvenient for Harper's government, so he muzzled them. The facts behind Trudeau's immigration reform and the refugee crisis are inconvenient to Trudeau so he has prevented the departments in charge from responding to freedom of information requests from journalists on MANY separate occasions. While I generally believe that reviving the census is a good idea, were you aware that Trudeau exported the task of analyzing and tabulating the census data to an affiliate of Lockheed Martin in the U.S. under NAFTA? No chance that the personal data of Canadians is being mined there...

Trudeau ran on electoral reform, but he didn't specify how he was going to reform the electoral system until after he was elected. Additionally, he only received (if I recall correctly) 38% of the Canadian vote, so that is not exactly a ringing endorsement of his platform. We're supposed to be living in a democratic country. You're damn right that there should be a referendum if we're going to change something as fundamental to our democracy as the electoral system. I don't know what the heck you're talking about, because Trudeau's proposed changes do absolutely benefit HIS party, as well as the Green Party, the most. Trudeau is counting on the Liberals gaining more second-place votes than any other party, as many Conservative and NDP voters will pick them as their second choice. The Greens will also have a better chance of electing MPs.

Trudeau has not decentralized PMO power. He pledged to do this, but he has not. Do you think that cabinet minister Kent Hehr was representing his constituents in Calgary when he voted against the Energy East pipeline? Then there's Mark Carney, who I used to respect... Trudeau has completely thrown him under the bus by making him contradict statements that he made in his own book in order to fit Trudeau's narrative.

You may find this hard to believe, but I have never voted for a Harper government in my life. I voted for Stephane Dion and Michael Ignatieff, while briefly becoming a member of the Liberal Party of Canada in order to cast my ballot in their leadership election. Needless to say, I didn't vote for Trudeau. This past election I couldn't bring myself to endorse any of the parties' platforms. Maybe when candidates are allowed to actually represent their constituents, rather than reporting to a dictator - whether that be Harper or Trudeau, I'll take democracy in this country more seriously.

Since you felt the need to write a book here I'll address these one at a time so you can understand. The poster you're responding too is far more clear and correct. 1 - How did Harper balance the budget??? He only did it 1/8th of the time! He had 7 consecutive deficits - this is your most ridiculous point of contention. Harper took office with a budget surplus, now the feds have a large deficit!2 - You're such a hypocrite. You literally say in the same paragraph that tar sands don't matter and are OK because they are only a tiny fraction of greenhouse gases - hmm I wonder what fraction a few extra delegates on a plane are?Also why do we need oil money to invest in green? Why don't we actually try and weed ourselves off the fossil fuels? 3 - Ever heard of PostMedia? Their revenue rivals or exceeds CBC and they were totally pro-Harper. Funny how you didn't mention them. Also there is a big difference between muzzling scientists and eliminating the press box to pledging funding to government radio/tv. 4 - So you think first past the post is better? Again so hypocritical. You mention how only 38% of the popular vote went to Trudeau then condemn a change that would fix this! Shouldn't the green party have more MP's with 7% of the popular vote?? Of course it will benefit them. And yes, perhaps Trudeau hasn't gotten around to perfect decentralizing yet but he's done a pretty great job on a lot of his election promises and quickly as well. Oh, in case you forgot, here is some other very undemocratic crap our former PM did:Robocalling during the 2011 election. Fair Elections Act. Gagging scientists from speaking freely about their research. Spying on environmental and aboriginal activists. Taxpayer funded political adsInvolved in helping shield files of multimillionaires with offshore accounts from CRAHorrible job creation record even relative to the USA prior to electionAnyway there are 100 things. Harper was horrible. Trudeau far better. Not perfect but who is?

They run perfectly well for men who are the leaders of their countries.

1) I already addressed the fact that Harper inherited the economy after the 2008 financial crisis. Which federal governments around the World ran surpluses in the years following the crash? It can't be more than a few. Even after the crash, his deficits are smaller than what Trudeau is currently running. You are 100% wrong on your contention that Trudeau inherited a deficit. He inherited a budget surplus from Harper and turned it into an instant 30 billion/year deficit after pledging during his election campaign to keep the deficit below 10 billion/year. Anyhow, why do I need to defend Harper? Like I said, I voted for the Liberal Party during all the years that he was elected. I was a fan of Paul Martin's fiscally conservative Liberal Party leadership. I am not a fan of Trudeau.

2) Why am I a hypocrite? I'm not overly concerned about the Earth's climate warming. Like I said before, if anything more CO2 in the atmosphere and a warmer climate will be beneficial for Canada. I took 400 and 500 level courses on applied weather and climate in university and, while global warming is obviously happening, it's also true that there is rampant fear-mongering and political opportunism going on.

You or another poster brought up the Nordic countries... well Norway definitely uses its oil reserves to its advantage, investing hundreds of billions of dollars into a heritage fund. Too bad Canada didn't have the foresight to do so. It costs a lot of money to switch over to a green economy. In order to do so, we need a positive trade balance, which includes exporting energy. It is elites, like the ones I previously cited who are the hypocrites, as they demand action on climate change, but are unwilling to make any changes to their lavish lifestyles. Their plan is to price energy consumption out of the budget of ordinary consumers, while continuing to personally consume, consume, consume!

3) The difference is that PostMedia, as far as I'm aware, doesn't receive hundreds of millions of dollars a year from the government. Ezra Levant tried to start up a right-wing news channel while Harper was P.M. and it was turned down. Government should not be funding the media. If CBC jobs literally depend on receiving funding from a Liberal or Green government, then guess who they're going to endorse! I'm not naive enough to think that other media outlets don't have their own agendas that may or may not be in the public interest, but none of them are as blatant as the CBC's. I'm pretty sure that Maclean's Magazine also receives government funding and they were featuring articles kissing up to Trudeau throughout the lead-up to the election.

4) I don't recall offering an opinion on which system of electoral reform is best, and I won't because I haven't decided... There are more than two possibilities. My point was that Trudeau's planned reforms are self-serving and that, in a democratic society, there should be a referendum on his proposed changes. Proportional representation would probably be the most democratic system. If Trudeau gets his reform passed, it would make sense for the Conservative Party to again split in two so that conservative voters will have the opportunity to select a right-leaning party as both their first and second choice on the ballot. Perhaps that will be good for democracy, as I am definitely less than satisfied with the performance of the Conservative Party over the last decade.

Harper acted like a dictator. I agree. Even though I defended him, I'm also not happy about the deficits that he ran during most of his time as P.M. However, of course there are going to be a bunch of scandals that one can point to over the course of almost a decade in power. Do you remember all of the scandals of the previous Liberal government? The longer that a government is in power, the more corrupt they become. Trudeau and McCallum have probably lied to the media and public on the refugee issue at least a dozen times alone. They are certainly preventing any information from being released that would cast the program in a negative light, even though that contravenes freedom of information laws.

Anyways, I'm going camping tomorrow, so, as much as I'd like to rip to shreds some of Trudeau's idiotic spending promises that are contributing to the budget deficit, I believe that I will abstain for now.

realcanuck wrote:

And yes, perhaps Trudeau hasn't gotten around to perfect decentralizing yet...

Expect to be waiting a long time for that to happen... lol

He's yet another globalist leader who isn't strong enough to state that what's happening to minorities in Syria is genocide unless the United Nations asserts it first.

What pace are they running at?

All the cool heads of state play basketball.

Nieto is rocking some sweet split shorts like a boss

................. wrote:

What pace are they running at?

Check out this clip of them running. At around 50 seconds, it shows a massive body-guard, who must weigh around 250 lbs, easily keeping up with them, so 4 mph is my guess.

Maybe the experts from the Robert Young thread would like to calculate their speed with more precision.