Why bail out students who pursue useless degrees or will drop out of university because they weren't prepared in elementary or secondary schools or people who cannot manage their credit card debt? Isn't that how the Americans got into trouble?
The country's political leaders have their sights squarely set on the hard-pressed pocketbooks of middle-class Canadian families on Day 4 of the federal election campaign.
In Oakville, Ont., Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff has unveiled a proposed "learning passport," which would provide $1 billion a year in tax-free student grants. to encourage roughly one million Canadian students to attend college or university.
The plan, which would see a Liberal government making contributions to existing registered education savings plans, or RESPs, would provide students $1,000 a year for four years, or up to $1,500 a year for four years for low-income families.
"This is the kind of investment in education which is a game-changer for our country," Ignatieff said, calling it the biggest investment in post-secondary education in Canada's history.
"It's a billion dollars of new money to make us the best-educated society on the planet."
NDP Leader Jack Layton, meanwhile, is promising action on a subject that's long been dear to his heart: capping interest charges on credit cards to help Canadian families ease the growing crush of consumer debt.
The NDP believes financial institutions shouldn't be allowed to charge consumers interest at a rate more than five percentage points higher than prime.
"I believe that you need strong banks in an economy so that you can have a healthy level of economic activity," Layton told a news conference outside a family home in Brantford, Ont., west of Toronto.
"I think Canadians deserve something in return here — just a little bit of fairness. But you know what? Under Stephen Harper, Canadians pay some of the highest credit-card fees in the world — and that's just not right."
Layton says the NDP cap on interest rates would save the average credit-card holder about $60 a month, or more than $700 a year.
Were world leaders willing to oust Gaddafi after the Lockerbie bombing?
International leaders meeting in London, England, agreed to establish a group to co-ordinate all international action against the Gadhafi regime in Libya.
World leaders fell short of a concerted group effort to oust Moammar Gadhafi, who has ruled Libya with an iron fist for more than four decades. Instead, British Foreign Secretary William Hague announced the creation of a loose coalition — known as the Libya Contact Group — that will centralize international action in monitoring the unfolding civil war in Libya.
Chinese spies are stealing Western technology. Time to stop trading with the octopus:
Universities acknowledge the threat from espionage, particularly by Chinese students, and are taking measures to counter it. Nicola Dandridge, chief executive of Universities UK, said: "We are very aware this is going on and we are taking it very seriously."
The concerns have emerged just days after Theresa May, the home secretary, watered down plans to slash the number of foreign students in Britain. Dyson said: "Britain is very proud about the number of foreign students we educate at our universities, but actually all we are doing is educating our competitors.
"Foreign governments and businesses are prepared to pay quite a lot of money for people to study at Cambridge, Imperial College and other Russell [Group] universities because they appreciate the value of these research posts.
"They go back home taking that science and technology knowledge with them and then they start competing with us. This is mad - it is madness.
"I've seen frightening examples. Bugs are even left in computers so that the information continues to be transmitted after the researchers have returned home."
A number of such cases have been uncovered at British universities, with leading research institutions the most heavily targeted.
Thievery by any other name....
Good luck with this:
Members of Pakistan's minority Christian community have protested against a senior government officer for allegedly insulting Jesus Christ and the Bible by holding demonstrations in front of the Punjab Assembly.
The protesters marched from the Lahore Press Club to the Punjab Assembly and demonstrated outside the legislature for several hours on Monday.
Provincial Law Minister Rana Sanaullah requested them to end the protest but they refused and demanded action against Solid Waste Management Managing Director Ajmal Waseem.
Addressing the protesters, Christian leader Aslam Parvaiz Sahotra said police were not filing a complaint against Waseem and it seemed they were favouring the officer.
He said the government should immediately remove the officer from his post and register a case against him for committing blasphemy If action is not taken against Waseem, the Christian will launch a protest against him across Pakistan, Sahotra said.
Where are the unsung heroes- the celebrities- raising money and awareness and making movies and such?
Cut. Pakistan. Off.
Take a look at the picture in this article. Did you see it? I'll put it here (all credit here).
It's Lent so I cannot ignore this. The cross, the chief symbol of Christianity, upon which Jesus died (and then ultimately rose) for all mankind will be destroyed by the very man whose divinity is denied by the believers of a seventh century war-monger. Is that right? The Word made flesh who showed compassion to Mary Magdalene and the Samaritan woman at the well (among others) will destroy the means by which He died for all human beings only to follow Mohammad.
Talk about delusions! Hell, talk about stupidity!
Take some lithium, guys. Seriously.
And now, the Stupid Letter of the Day. Sit back and have yourselves a laugh. This is going to be a good one:
Phyllis Chesler's toxic views are out of step with the gains made by the Palestinian-led International Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, and solidarity campaigns and actions taking place around the globe.
(Sidebar: "Toxic"? Melodramatic much? I realise it's fashionable to hate the Jewish state of Israel where people of all religions and sexual inclinations can live without fear of persecution but this is too much. The letter-writers are really over-estimating their importance and inflating claims that everyone feels the same way they do. I suppose low serotonin levels will do that to one.)
Ms. Chesler speaks from a place of entitlement embedded in Zionist ideology. She writes that, "Jewish lesbian feminists . are more concerned with the rights of a country that does not exist, Palestine, than with the rights of real Muslim women who are forced to veil themselves."
This is double-edged racism. With one hand she proclaims there is no Palestine (and we can therefore assume that there are no Palestinians); with the other hand she touts the anti-feminist line that Muslim women have no voice, no agency and no power to choose. Her statement that she has "seen these North American lesbian 'queers' at university-based Israel Apartheid Week events" exposes her lesbophobic discomfort with the power of lesbian and queer activism.
(Sidebar: Three things: "Zionist"? Is there a better way to attack the Jews? "Racism"? Islam isn't a race, nor are homosexuals a race. "Lesbophobic"? Can you actually make up words? Are you allowed to do that? It's obvious the letter-writers have ZERO understanding of what life is like for women, Muslim or homosexual alike. If they do and say nothing, one can measure their moral culpability of excusing or ignoring a backward cults' treatment of either of these groups in spades. But for some people, it's all about them.)
Ms. Chesler asks: "Why are so many 'Jewish lesbian feminists' in solidarity with the Free Palestine movement?" She provides an explanation, with a quote from Jews Against the Occupation-NYC: "The demonization and dehumanization of Palestinians under occupation resonates loudly for queers, as do other forms of racism and militarism." Ms. Chesler herself adds, "They do not view Palestinians as 'terrorists' but as freedom-fighters."
(Sidebar: Palestinians are demonised because they do things like behead three month old baby girls and then hand out candy. What do they think the Palestinians will do to the letter-writers? Welcome them? Fat chance!)
She's got that right.
(Sidebar: don't flatter yourselves.)
Not quite the rocket-propelled chainsaw but good enough.
2 comments:
Saying that the Chinese are cheating is like saying that those darn fish are swimming. It's not bad enough that they've stolen the West's manufacturing by offering an absolute absence of rules and human rights in which venture capitalists can operate in their nation. It's not bad enough that they've negotiated in bad faith with the whole world by refusing to allow their currency to float and reflect its actual market value. It's also not bad enough that they've negotiated in bad faith with the U.S. by buying their debt and treasury bills, thereby breaking with decorum and honourable trade practices. Now, they want our technology too and, for some reason, just don't seem to get that they are not, in any way, entitled to it.
HAROLD HECUBA
Why are we hanging ourselves? We shouldn't be trading with them. Remove China from the political scene and watch a good chunk of the world's ills disappear. Remember- the Chinese make toys for Western children they will not let their own children play with. What does that tell you?
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