Bravo Canadians!

[Minor Axis]

Newsweek- Worthwhile Canadian Initiative- World View Column by Fareed Zakaria.

In the past I have heard Canada made fun of, for its health system and its oppressive government regulation. Turns out the laugh is on us (the U.S.), our arrogant corporate leaders and our anti-regulation politicians. Too bad it's really not funny at all. :smiley24:

Guess which country, alone in the industrialized world, has not faced a single bank failure, calls for bailouts or government intervention in the financial or mortgage sectors. Yup, it's Canada. In 2008, the World Economic Forum ranked Canada's banking system the healthiest in the world. America's ranked 40th, Britain's 44th. Canada has done more than survive this financial crisis. The country is positively thriving in it. Canadian banks are well capitalized and poised to take advantage of opportunities that American and European banks cannot seize. The Toronto Dominion Bank, for example, was the 15th-largest bank in North America one year ago. Now it is the fifth-largest. It hasn't grown in size; the others have all shrunk.
So what accounts for the genius of the Canadians? Common sense. Over the past 15 years, as the United States and Europe loosened regulations on their financial industries, the Canadians refused to follow suit, seeing the old rules as useful shock absorbers. Canadian banks are typically leveraged at 18 to 1—compared with U.S. banks at 26 to 1 and European banks at a frightening 61 to 1. Partly this reflects Canada's more risk-averse business culture, but it is also a product of old-fashioned rules on banking.

See the link for more.

Today, I listened to the buffoon Tom Delay on MSNBC, the disgraced Congressman from Texas spewing the same old Republican retoric "less government and less taxes is the solution." But I have news for Tom Delay, the mess we are in today is not because of big government, it's because of an enept government who refused to govern, who refused to regulate, who lacked common sense, and who thinks corporations and a favorable business climate are the only answer, where lack of vision and regulation, and turning a blind eye to rampant fraud was specifically what got us where we are today.

You want more? Big Government is back- Big Time. It was a "conservative" Republican Administration, who did more to turn us into socialists than any Administration in our history!

One of the more lasting effects will be a steady drift toward what could be called a European model of governance, regulation and paternalism. Already, big government is on the rise—projected public-spending figures show the United States will move ever closer to European averages over the next two years. More specifically, in the absence of a robust private sector (or at least public confidence in business) the U.S. government will be forced to fill the gap, firmly directing businesses in all sorts of ways—regulating some industries (particularly banking and the automotive sector) with big-brother vigilance, favoring others like clean energy with grants and loans, and turning still others—health care, pensions—into virtual wards of the state. Harvard economist Ken Rogoff predicts the United States will move toward "a more centralized, redistributional health-care system, as Europe already has," with a greater emphasis on the environment, higher regulation and increased protectionism. "I take the 2008 U.S. elections as marking a turn toward continental Europe," he says.

Newsweek- We are All Socialists Now.

We remain a center-right nation in many ways—particularly culturally, and our instinct, once the crisis passes, will be to try to revert to a more free-market style of capitalism—but it was, again, under a conservative GOP administration that we enacted the largest expansion of the welfare state in 30 years: prescription drugs for the elderly. People on the right and the left want government to invest in alternative energies in order to break our addiction to foreign oil. And it is unlikely that even the reddest of states will decline federal money for infrastructural improvements.

 

[Dana]

that's it I'm moving to Canada

 

[lumpenstein]

I knew all that but if I mentioned it people would think I was just bragging and a certain llittle green hopper would have called me a commie pinko, or something similar.

Melissa just had a Ceaserian with a 5 day hospital stay, support, drugs, etc. I wonder what the bill would have been south of the border? Zero here.

 

[Dana]

I knew all that but if I mentioned it people would think I was just bragging and a certain llittle green hopper would have called me a commie pinko, or something similar.

Melissa just had a Ceaserian with a 5 day hospital stay, support, drugs, etc. I wonder what the bill would have been south of the border? Zero here.

expensive

 

[lumpenstein]

The strength of the Canadian economy is that the banking was both government and self regulated. Only one bank ventured somewhat tentatively into the seedy side of credit. It is ironic that the country that a lot of Americans like to sneer at and call socialist is the one to best weather the serious flaws manifested in the high and mighty capitalist system, and that the greatest damage to Canadian economy is the fact that their best trading partner is fucking broke and can't afford to buy our stuff! Hah! :24:

 

[Dana]

The strength of the Canadian economy is that the banking was both government and self regulated. Only one bank ventured somewhat tentatively into the seedy side of credit. It is ironic that the country that a lot of Americans like to sneer at and call socialist is the one to best weather the serious flaws manifested in the high and mighty capitalist system, and that the greatest damage to Canadian economy is the fact that their best trading partner is fucking broke and can't afford to buy our stuff! Hah! :24:

I don't pay attention to such things normally. I have lineage that comes from Quebec and I'm 4-5 hours from the border.

 

[lumpenstein]

I don't pay attention to such things normally. I have lineage that comes from Quebec and I'm 4-5 hours from the border.

Hey bro! I was born in Quebec - spent most of my life there. :thumbup

 

[Dana]

Hey bro! I was born in Quebec - spent most of my life there. :thumbup

i was actually looking up cost of living there. Doesn't look too bad. Looks cheaper than here.

 

[lumpenstein]

i was actually looking up cost of living there. Doesn't look too bad. Looks cheaper than here.

Yeah, taxes are a bit high but the benefits are really good. It also has the best night life in Canada! Quebecers love to party! Most people live to work. Quebecers work to live! :thumbup

 

[Dana]

Yeah, taxes are a bit high but the benefits are really good. It also has the best night life in Canada! Quebecers love to party! Most people live to work. Quebecers work to live! :thumbup

:thumbup im a nightlifer

 

[Minor Axis]

I knew all that but if I mentioned it people would think I was just bragging and a certain llittle green hopper would have called me a commie pinko, or something similar.

Yes it's been quite pleasant around here for some time...

Melissa just had a Ceaserian with a 5 day hospital stay, support, drugs, etc. I wonder what the bill would have been south of the border? Zero here.

Grats! Let me guess, because of socialized medicine, she had to wait 15 months to get the C Section. Seriously someone has to pay. It all boils down to how you want to system to function and how the load will be shared. A 1 night stay in a hospital including a 50 min operation to remove a gall bladder was billed at approx $17000. Blue Cross Blue Shield (my insurance) knocked it down to about $11000 of which I paid about $2000. My guess is that baby deliverys with C Sections run $10-20k in the U.S.

 

[Mystic]

yay Canada!...i love when we can turn the tables on the yanks...

 

[pjbleek]

hey! what did I do?

 

[Dana]

Yes it's been quite pleasant around here for some time...



Grats! Let me guess, because of socialized medicine, she had to wait 15 months to get the C Section. Seriously someone has to pay. It all boils down to how you want to system to function and how the load will be shared.

she had to wait 9 months anyways :24:

 

[Minor Axis]

she had to wait 9 months anyways :24:

Uh, that was my joke...

I'd like to clarify something, if Bush had come in and had left the economy better than he found it, despite a dismal working class/middle class attitude, it would be much harder to complain. However, since he left the economy a total disaster, it's pretty easy to bitch don't you think? :nod: