Many people are unaware that the 46 year-old U.S. embargo against Cuba contravenes international law as
well as The United Nations Charter, which the U.S. practically wrote way back in 1945. But then the United States and its closest ally routinely ignore anything and everything at the U.N, if they don't like it. This flouting of world opinion is just one of the black marks against American policy that has made the U.S. an object of world-wide scorn.
In a fit of pique, the US imposed an economic, trade and financial blockade against Cuba, after the CIA failed to overthrow the government of Cuba during The Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961.
192 governments are represented at the U.N.
185 of them voted in favour of the resolution calling for an end to the embargo against Cuba.
3 governments abstained or were not present for the vote.
2 governments voted with the U.S to maintain the illegal American blockade.
1 supporter is the tiny island state of Palau located in the South Pacific. (Palau always votes with the U.S.).
1 is Israel.
(enough said).
There isn't much about this story in the MSM but The New York Times has a tiny piece.
'I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered'.
Electoral Reform: Proportional
Representation: A better way
Some may remember the last Ontario election…you know – the one that didn't cost 350.5 mil?
We voted on a referendum, which would have provided us with what is generally
called "proportional representation".
The true results of the 350
million dollar federal fiasco show quite clearly that many people, who ought to have
been represented in Parliament to speak for their constituents are now completely
shut out.
Conservative
voters, for example, have no voice in Toronto. Why? Because we haven’t yet
developed a system that provides for fair representation. Conservatives ought
to have taken more seats there and also in Montreal. 250,000 Conservative
voters cast ballots for candidates in Toronto and yet they elected no one to
speak for them. We have an excellent electoral system- fair and
accurate – but
because the old parties want it to be based on an out-dated system known as "first-past-the-post",
millions of people in the country are not represented. They are mute in
Parliament and that's tragic. Let's take a look at what proportional
representation would have done for the other parties and for Canada.
The Green
Party received almost a million votes. And yet all those hundreds of thousands
of citizens wasted their precious ballots. They don't have a single
representative in Parliament to speak for them. Not one. Under proportional
representation, the Greens would have about 18 seats. And here's a comparison:
813,000 Conservatives in the Prairie Provinces were able to elect 27 M.P.'s.
Fair or unfair?
Our
antiquated method of voting also punished Liberals and New Democrats in the
prairies. Conservatives in the Prairie Provinces cast about twice as many votes
as Liberals and New Democrats, but took about 7 times as many seats. That result
doesn’t seem fair to those who took the time to vote.
The New
Democrats attracted 1.1 million more votes than the Bloc Quebecois, but our
voting system gave the Bloc 50 seats in parliament and the NDP only 37. Somehow
it doesn’t seem right. It's important to remember that the Conservatives have
been able to form a government with less than 38% of the votes cast. Under
proportional representation, they would have received about 117 seats, not the
143 they got. That would have given those citizens who voted for other parties
a bit more say in how the country is governed. Surely that’s what democracy is
all about. Everyone gets represented. British Columbia will try for it next election.
Here's what would have happened in the latest Federal Vote:
The Liberals received 26% of the popular
vote and under proportional representation would have received about 81 seats,
not 76.
The New Democrats received 18% of the
popular vote and under proportional representation would have got 57
seats, not 37.
The Bloc got a piddling 10% of the
national popular vote and under proportional representation that would
have given them 28 seats, NOT 50.
The Greens received a bit more that 7% of
the popular vote, which would have given them 18-20 seats, not 0
The Conservatives form a government with only 36.7%!!
Think about
how different our Parliament would look if we had proportional representation.
Conservatives
117; Liberals 81; New Democrats 57; Bloc 28; Greens 22. Liberals and
Conservatives could form a government together and we would surely have a more
representative government. Liberals, New Democrats and Greens could do it
together, with the same broadly representative result. Clearly, the vast majority of Canadians
rejected the Conservatives, so that too would be fair.
This column
is based on the research of a group called Fair Vote Canada. “With a different
voting system, people would also have voted differently,” said Larry Gordon,
Executive Director of Fair Vote Canada. “There would have been no need for
strategic voting. We would likely have seen higher voter turnout. We would have
had different candidates – more women, and more diversity of all kinds.
From the very beginning, the Liberals failed to explain properly their "Green Shift" plan.
Everyone called it a "carbon tax", when in fact, the term "tax" was a complete misnomer.
Under Dion’s plan, those who pollute would be required to pay a price…a fee…in effect a "carbon premium", or put another way "polluters would have to pay up as part of the cost of doing business".
The rest of us pay a fee to control emissions from our cars. Why shouldn’t big business be required to pay a fee to control their emissions.
It makes sense.
______________________________________
Comment of the week found on the Globe and Mail site:
Gilles Monenemie from Montreal: We need to change the voting
system to encourage participation and to better represent the actual
vote count as MPs in Parliament. It’s so mixed up I ended up giving
money to the Greens and voted for another party. I am a federalist who
ended up voting for the BQ for the first time as I didn’t want to see
the CPC win in my riding because they least represented my values. It’s
a sad state of affairs when Canadians have to hold their nose to vote.
Something needs to be done to fix the problem and the proportional
representation system seems to be the best solution.
I must have missed this story earlier…what an idea!!
Under a McCain administration, if you’re in a financial bind because you can’t pay your mortgage, the government would buy it and then give you something more affordable. Huh?
Apparently it’s true.
WASHINGTON (oct. 8th, 2008) — Scrambling to repair his image on economic issues, Senator John McCain proposed during Tuesday night’s debate a $300 billion plan authorizing the treasury secretary to buy the mortgages of homeowners in financial trouble and replace them with more affordable loans
