Tuesday, March 02, 2010

For those who don't think Sidney Crosby saved Canada...

The Mark publishes a cross-partisan look at 14 ways to save Canada.

I'll give a thumbs up to David Suzuki's plea for a comprehensive strategy to tackle climate change (hell, even a half-ass strategy would look good by comparison to what we've seen over the past decade) and Michael Geist's plea for a comprehensive strategy to tackle the digital era.

And I can't argue against the need to ban heckling, boost watchdog powers, hold more free votes, or to make committees mater.

Nicholas Gafuik wants Canadians to be nicer to each other so that government won't have to spend as much on social programs. That's all swell and good, but I'm not sure how he exactly expects to bring this about, and unless we can find some way to alter thousands of years of human behaviour, I think it's still up to government to help those in need.

Oh, and Robert Huish thinks we should stop paying attention to hockey. I'm not sure this week is necessarily the most opportune moment for Robert to be advancing this idea...

7 Comments:

  • That's all swell and good, but I'm not sure how he exactly expects to bring this about, and unless we can find some way to alter thousands of years of human behaviour, I think it's still up to government to help those in need.

    I am reminded of this bit from George Orwell's review of Dickens:

    “Consequently two viewpoints are always tenable. The one, how can you improve human nature until you have changed the system? The other, what is the use of changing the system before you have improved human nature? … The moralist and the revolutionary are constantly undermining one another. Marx exploded a hundred tons of dynamite beneath the moralist position, and we are still living in the echo of that tremendous crash. But already, somewhere or other, the sappers are at work and fresh dynamite is being tamped in place to blow Marx at the moon. Then Marx, or somebody like him, will come back with yet more dynamite, and so the process continues, to an end we cannot yet foresee. The central problem — how to prevent power from being abused — remains unsolved.”

    By Blogger saphorr, at 6:24 p.m.  

  • Je suis d'accord avec M. Adam Chapnick... c'est un réponse vite et simple pour un grosse probleme pour notre pays. Il a raison.

    unless we can find some way to alter thousands of years of human behaviour,

    Moi, je crois que les gens s'agir plus meilleur que 1000 ou 2000 ou 5000 années passé. :)

    By Blogger Jacques Beau Vert, at 6:38 p.m.  

  • This comment has been removed by the author.

    By Blogger saphorr, at 6:55 p.m.  

  • This comment has been removed by the author.

    By Blogger saphorr, at 6:57 p.m.  

  • Je suis d'accord avec M. Adam Chapnick... c'est un réponse vite et simple pour un grosse probleme pour notre pays. Il a raison.

    I think that unless we simultaneously ban the crafting of meticulous talking points that deftly omit the facts and reduce what should be honest discourse about our country's future to a series of contrived, easy-to-digest sound bites designed to sway crucial independent voters, then any ban on mere heckling would be quite pointless.

    By Blogger saphorr, at 6:58 p.m.  

  • Je ne suis pas d'accord; je ne crois il sera "pointless".

    By Blogger Jacques Beau Vert, at 8:46 p.m.  

  • @Jacques Beau Vert: je ne voudrais pas montrer aucune irrévérence aux francophones mais il semble un peu étrange à moi que vous insistiez d'écrire en français ici, au milieu d'une conversation complètement anglaise.

    By Blogger saphorr, at 11:07 a.m.  

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