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eXXon posted:This is a really fascinating pedantic argument about whether combat support qualifies as a combat role, please continue your excited posting about standard military doctrine vis-a-vis dropping explosives from the sky as opposed to from the ground. quote:Because providing humanitarian aid, protection, and help rebuilding is (as I see it) an objective good. It fits well with the Canadian self image of "peace keepers", and it's something we have considerable experience doing. Good or bad, Canada's "image" of being peace keepers has been gone for at least 20 years. We actually have very little deployment experience right now in that area. In fact, if you're going to make an argument from experience then the combat role one is much more "suited" for the CAF.
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Oct 4, 2014 15:36
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From my point of view contributing six F18s to the coalition is merely symbolic, meant to help the other coalition memebers sell the intervention domestically and internationally. I strongly doubt that it'll pull Canada into a ground operation there, with the exception of special forces. The humanitarian aspect will go forward eventually, but you need something resembling stability to deliver the aid without risking the aid workers too much. As for peace keeping, I'm of the opinion it was a Cold War phenomenon that is by and large dead in the modern context. For peace keeping to work you need both sides of a conflict to want peace; the peacekeepers are there more as a guarentor of non aggression, allowing both sides to work out their issues. If one side or the other has no interest in peace, peace keeping will not work and will just get the peace keepers killed. From there your only choice is deciding if you want to do peace 'making' by bombing the poo poo out of the aggressive side. Sometimes it works, most of the time it doesn't. Peace keeping worked during the Cold War because you had the Americans backing one side, the Russians on the other and they'd force their proxies to the bargaining table while using middle powers like Canada to keep the sides seperated. Without having leverage on both sides of a conflict it's hard to force them to negotiate.
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Oct 4, 2014 15:39
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Note that I said "self image" of peace keepers, not that we should be trying to play that role at the moment. The main argument was that providing humanitarian aid and protection for it is an objective good, where as throwing the equivalent of a handful of change into the bombing hat is not. Sending six CF-18s is a loving expensive symbol. If we're going to be throwing money and lives into the clusterfuck that is that region, why not do it in a way that will have definite positive outcomes? The bombing is proceeding just peachy without Canadian intervention, we have only a token force to offer in any case, what is it about this conflict that makes it so important that we land some shots on target too? Just so that we can say we did something? To put it as directly as possible: What value or preferential outcome are you expecting based on Canadian involvement in this conflict that would not otherwise occur without it? swagger like us posted:Good or bad, Canada's "image" of being peace keepers has been gone for at least 20 years. We actually have very little deployment experience right now in that area. In fact, if you're going to make an argument from experience then the combat role one is much more "suited" for the CAF. I'm not making that argument, so that's convenient. infernal machines has issued a correction as of 15:58 on Oct 4, 2014 |
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Oct 4, 2014 15:51
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infernal machines posted:Sending six CF-18s is a loving expensive symbol. If we're going to be throwing money into the clusterfuck that is that region, why not do it in a way that will have definite positive outcomes? The bombing is proceeding just peachy without Canadian intervention, we have only a token force to offer in any case, what is it about this conflict that makes it so important that we land some shots on target too? Just so that we can say we did something? Finding people to contribute money for rebuilding isn't an issue. It never has been. The Saudies, gulf states, Japan, Germany and other major economies are all willing to contribute money to rebuilding efforts. The real problem is and always has been the step before: the military aspect. There really are only half a dozen countries in the world willing to send military forces abroad. Canada is one of them. Sending our token force abroad lets the British and American governments, as well as the French, say to their citizens that they are not acting alone, that this endeavour enjoys committed international support and that the military burden will not solely fall upon them. This makes a difference in the amount of effort countries are willing to expend. We're not there for what we contribute, were there because being there helps the larger powers commit more.
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Oct 4, 2014 16:02
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The Ontario Liberals want to spend nearly $100 million to move an infectious disease lab from Etobicoke to downtown Toronto. This appears to be mainly motivated to prop up the shiny new and nearly 70% empty MaRS tower just south of Queen's Park. This seems like a terrible idea.quote:Last week, the province announced it was paying $65 million to buy out the building’s developer, Alexandria Real Estate (ARE). They sure know how to throw good money after bad. I mean I see the logic in saving on transporting specimens between a warehouse and labs in the UHN area, but the outrageous-sounding sums spent on this can't possibly be justified by the savings, can they? Precambrian Video Games has issued a correction as of 16:39 on Oct 4, 2014 |
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Oct 4, 2014 16:36
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eXXon posted:The Ontario Liberals want to spend nearly $100 million to move an infectious disease lab from Etobicoke to downtown Toronto. This appears to be mainly motivated to prop up the shiny new and nearly 70% empty MaRS tower just south of Queen's Park. This seems like a terrible idea. How many times are they going to return to that money fire? From what I've read the MaRS project has been an over budget failure, and is basically sunk for lack of tenants now that it's complete.
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Oct 4, 2014 16:47
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infernal machines posted:How many times are they going to return to that money fire? From what I've read the MaRS project has been an over budget failure, and is basically sunk for lack of tenants now that it's complete. Last I heard their plan to make it not such a white elephant was to buy the building outright, relocate a bunch of public sector stuff to fill it (especially because it's close to both the UHN and Queens Park complex, and so could be super convenient for a bunch of currently scattered offices and labs), and sell the excess real estate left over. I guess time will tell whether it saves or costs money in the long run (it will cost money, obviously).
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Oct 4, 2014 16:56
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Every time I'd walk by the MaRS centre downtown (since you could hardly miss it if you were trying to get to the subway while on the southern end of UoT), it always seemed a more impressive endeavour than what it apparently has turned out to be. Wasn't it an attempt to spur medical research innovation? It's not entirely surprising that something like that would fail, though I don't know if it's necessarily a bad thing that they tried to make it work.
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Oct 4, 2014 17:00
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AegisP posted:Every time I'd walk by the MaRS centre downtown (since you could hardly miss it if you were trying to get to the subway while on the southern end of UoT), it always seemed a more impressive endeavour than what it apparently has turned out to be. It's a sort of high-tech startup incubator, they mention VC funding amongst other things. Their website is pretty opaque, but it reads like the idea is to have new and established high tech firms across multiple markets sharing space and resources with government and research groups. Basically, if we jam enough people into this building innovation will happen. And then we'll sell it. They've backed away from the medical tech focus by the looks of it, as their mission statement doesn't focus on it the same way it did last year. A spectacular failure of P3s if ever there were one. You'd think at some point the OLP would look at their track record with P3s and reconsider. Gorau posted:Finding people to contribute money for rebuilding isn't an issue. It never has been. The Saudies, gulf states, Japan, Germany and other major economies are all willing to contribute money to rebuilding efforts. The real problem is and always has been the step before: the military aspect. There really are only half a dozen countries in the world willing to send military forces abroad. Canada is one of them. Sending our token force abroad lets the British and American governments, as well as the French, say to their citizens that they are not acting alone, that this endeavour enjoys committed international support and that the military burden will not solely fall upon them. This makes a difference in the amount of effort countries are willing to expend. We're not there for what we contribute, were there because being there helps the larger powers commit more. Thanks for answering my question. I guess it's worth knowing that even a c-list international player like Canada has a place filling out the coalition roster. infernal machines has issued a correction as of 17:57 on Oct 4, 2014 |
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Oct 4, 2014 17:12
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Professor Shark posted:This, but unironically. I wasn't being ironic. gently caress making a profit off essential services.
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Oct 4, 2014 18:17
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infernal machines posted:Thanks for answering my question. I guess it's worth knowing that even a c-list international player like Canada has a place filling out the coalition roster. Basically, remember how everyone made fun of Bush's "Coalition of the Willing" because aside from the UK, Poland, and Australia (I think) it was made up of like 40 states each sending two policemen, but that didn't stop Bush from going on about how 50 countries had all banded together to invade Iraq? The fight against ISIS is kind of like using that same justification but actually having those other countries send some tiny measure of military force in order to generate more credibility for the fight internally and internationally.
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Oct 4, 2014 19:09
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Didn't Bush say only those committed to the coalition could help in development efforts as well? I seem to remember that being a big part of why countries got involved.
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Oct 4, 2014 19:31
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Whiteycar posted:I wasn't being ironic. gently caress making a profit off essential services. Speaking as someone living in post-Klein Alberta: gently caress yes!
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Oct 4, 2014 22:45
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vyelkin posted:Basically, remember how everyone made fun of Bush's "Coalition of the Willing" because aside from the UK, Poland, and Australia (I think) it was made up of like 40 states each sending two policemen, but that didn't stop Bush from going on about how 50 countries had all banded together to invade Iraq? The first Gulf War was fought like this I believe, as the US got other countries to kick in fairly substantial financial support if not actual ground troops.
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Oct 5, 2014 03:14
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infernal machines posted:
If it's like BC's P3 projects, then the private side is still getting their payments from the government, and therefore the project went exactly as planned. Whether the building is used properly or benefits anyone or is actually cheaper than the government just building the thing itself is irrelevant.
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Oct 5, 2014 04:18
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Whiteycar posted:I wasn't being ironic. gently caress making a profit off essential services. Well then get that hand up their, fellow Socialist Flake! 
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Oct 5, 2014 20:51
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Of course it's natural to say that no one should make a profit off essential services, or rather that essential services must be provided whether or not they make a profit (I have no problem with someone making a profit off an essential service provided it does not impact access to that service). The difficulty comes in defining which services are "essential" and which are not -- opinions on that subject tend to differ a lot more.
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Oct 5, 2014 21:15
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PT6A posted:Of course it's natural to say that no one should make a profit off essential services, or rather that essential services must be provided whether or not they make a profit (I have no problem with someone making a profit off an essential service provided it does not impact access to that service). The difficulty comes in defining which services are "essential" and which are not -- opinions on that subject tend to differ a lot more. Everything is essential. We should nationalize it all just to be sure.
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Oct 5, 2014 21:59
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PT6A posted:Of course it's natural to say that no one should make a profit off essential services, or rather that essential services must be provided whether or not they make a profit (I have no problem with someone making a profit off an essential service provided it does not impact access to that service). The difficulty comes in defining which services are "essential" and which are not -- opinions on that subject tend to differ a lot more. What essential services do you believe exist that would not be impacted by having less money due to someone making a profit off of them?
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Oct 5, 2014 22:04
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Electricity is an interesting example.
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Oct 5, 2014 23:39
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Whiteycar posted:I wasn't being ironic. gently caress making a profit off essential services. I hate to tangentially agree with you know who, but I think this is the wrong way to go about it. Partly because of the debate over what counts as an essential service, but also because government intervention in the economy (which is by no means a bad thing!) should consider the exact market structure it's entering. Public Goods are a default area for government involvement, and I'd say infrastructure heavy markets like electricity generation, the telecom sector, and many types of insurance should also be the government's business. But price signalling still is a true and good thing; it works well in food distribution, which realistically is also an essential service in this day and age.
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Oct 6, 2014 00:22
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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PittTheElder posted:I hate to tangentially agree with you know who, but I think this is the wrong way to go about it. Partly because of the debate over what counts as an essential service, but also because government intervention in the economy (which is by no means a bad thing!) should consider the exact market structure it's entering. Public Goods are a default area for government involvement, and I'd say infrastructure heavy markets like electricity generation, the telecom sector, and many types of insurance should also be the government's business. But price signalling still is a true and good thing; it works well in food distribution, which realistically is also an essential service in this day and age. When you look at the trend of destabilization of the economy its hard not to argue for more government expansion in at least some sectors. Clearly giving massive tax breaks to companies which turn around and close up shop 5 years later isn't the way to have a stable tax base, or we can just hop from bubble to bubble and watch as we have to carry a generation of workers who cant retire and another who can't get jobs. Truely the sandwich generation.
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Oct 6, 2014 03:19
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Ikantski posted:Electricity is an interesting example. is this about Ontario hydro again because giving a private company a barely-restrained monopoly is not the same thing as a nationalized Industry
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Oct 6, 2014 04:13
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Welp, that's one way to take care of that problem. e: Oh, Québécor is just selling the anglophone assets to Postmedia, so that leaves PKP's Berlusconi problem intact. Pinterest Mom has issued a correction as of 13:34 on Oct 6, 2014 |
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Oct 6, 2014 13:29
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Yeah, all the English language Sun papers are getting sold to Postmedia, which means the Toronto/Ottawa/etc. Sun, London Free Press, and so on, will all now be under the Postmedia banner. They've committed to maintaining two separate papers where two already exist (like the Toronto Sun and NatPo in Toronto, for example), but this does mean that basically all of Canada's newspapers that aren't Toronto-based like the Star and Globe now fall under one corporate umbrella.
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Oct 6, 2014 14:36
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Pinterest Mom posted:Welp, that's one way to take care of that problem. They sold 175 papers, including the Sun chain, for $316m. I've got to think this is a death knell for the various Sun papers. They've been losing money for decades and that price tag seems especially low. The profitable advertising takes place in the smaller papers and they've been subsidizing the big city papers, as I understand it. e: In spite of their assurances to run two papers in major markets, I can't see it happening 2-3 years from now. I read the only way they acheived 6m positive revenues last year was through 25m in cuts.
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Oct 6, 2014 14:37
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quote:Good Monday morning to you.
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Oct 6, 2014 14:53
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Am I the only one who finds it really perverse when majority governments say stuff like this? “The resolution before Parliament is authorizing this limited military actions for up to six months,” [Baird] said. “If it goes beyond that, we’ll turn to the House of Commons.” Yeah, the resolution before Parliament [which we can pass unilaterally] authorizes limited involvement for six months, and if we want to fight for more than six months we'll come back to the House [which we control], cap in hand, and humbly ask for an extension to the mission [which will be granted because we can do whatever we want in the House].
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Oct 6, 2014 15:02
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Just heard the Postmedia/Sun news. Wow. Postmedia's gonna be dead in five years, isn't it?
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Oct 6, 2014 15:06
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JohnnyCanuck posted:Just heard the Postmedia/Sun news. Wow. Vancouver has its two dailies owned by Postmedia already, right? Are they functionally separate entities still?
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Oct 6, 2014 15:09
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The part I worry about is that postmedia will kill the less profitable of their two papers in whatever markets they have. Tha means in Alberta we lose the Edmonton journal and the Calgary herald. Now many of you might find those two papers too conservative, but given the choice between the herald and the sun I'll take there herald any day of the week and twice on Sunday's (if only they had a Sunday paper still).
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Oct 6, 2014 15:13
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vyelkin posted:Am I the only one who finds it really perverse when majority governments say stuff like this? I think you're underestimating the role of the Conservative caucus. The government will have to put the mission before caucus before it'll bring it to the House, and they have both power and will to question and kill the mission. We've seen the Conservative caucus substantially delay, modify, or outright kill government legislation before. Losing a vote in the HoC is humiliating, so the Conservatives (and the NDP) have a tradition of vetting action through caucus before bringing it to the floor. It's a quieter, less visible, but less messy form of accountability. It's really not as if Harper can wake up, decide to go to permawar, and have the CPC caucus automatically, unquestionably fall in line.
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Oct 6, 2014 15:20
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Gorau posted:The part I worry about is that postmedia will kill the less profitable of their two papers in whatever markets they have. Tha means in Alberta we lose the Edmonton journal and the Calgary herald. Now many of you might find those two papers too conservative, but given the choice between the herald and the sun I'll take there herald any day of the week and twice on Sunday's (if only they had a Sunday paper still). There will be hell to pay if they shitcan the Herald and my mum can't do the weekend crosswords....
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Oct 6, 2014 15:25
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I think we can all agree that in a struggling business (print newspapers), operating two papers in the same market doesn't make a lick of sense. Especially when you're already losing money on at least one of them. Between this news and the Sun News Network (who claim to be losing 16m-18m/yr) lost their case against Rogers last week for disputed fees, I'm feeling optimistic?!?!?! Also,  
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Oct 6, 2014 15:42
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Hey guys, the paper we already own is losing us a poo poo ton of money, let's buy another paper that's even less successful and run them both at the same time! This is gonna end great.
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Oct 6, 2014 16:25
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Seat Safety Switch posted:Hey guys, the paper we already own is losing us a poo poo ton of money, let's buy another paper that's even less successful and run them both at the same time! This is gonna end great. Well in theory there's a business way to deal with this to end up turning a profit. You take the best writers and people from both papers, fire the rest. Consolidate all operations into a one building and one factory in each city. Have the papers exist in name only or just flat out kill the paper in cities that isn't doing as well as the other. Since a bunch of Canadian cities only have one PostMedia paper and one Sun paper, it's possible to have an effective monopoly in news and get all of the advertising revenue. It's a good, if sociopathic plan.
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Oct 6, 2014 16:37
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I find it loving hilarious that media giant Quebecor selling off its newspapers somehow made our media even less competitive than before.
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Oct 6, 2014 16:41
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Is it possible that part of the motivation for selling the Sun newspaper chain is that Peladeau expects to become the next leader of the PQ, doesn't want to sell his Quebecor shares, and therefore thinks it might be prudent to divest himself of his blatantly Anglo-supremacist newspaper chain? Maybe I'm reading a bit too much into what is really just a business decision, and honestly I have no idea if Peladeau still has active oversight and authority over Quebecor now that he's an MNA, but the timing does seem to line up well.
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Oct 6, 2014 16:53
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So, the Gov is going to loosen up the definition of beer Figures my first post in the new thread would be about alcohol.
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Oct 6, 2014 17:23
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quote:“The resolution before Parliament is authorizing this limited military actions for up to six months,” [Baird] said. “If it goes beyond that, we’ll turn to the House of Commons.” Not really that perverse. Look at what Pinterst Mom said, the Conservative Caucus still has to be on board. Also, 6 months is standard military deployment length (Pretty sure all the rotos in Afghan were six months long).
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Oct 6, 2014 17:26
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