Posted by jackjward on Jan 12, 2010 in Conservatism
There’s a reason why most Conservatives I know hate the ACLU and that’s because they fight for those people that no one cares about- worse they fight for those people that people hate. Why do they do it? Because they believe the hallmark of freedom is being about to have the right to a fair trial. Imagine that?
There’s a lot of language going around today that suggests that many people DON’T believe in a fair trial for some. They feel that the rights and privileges that are granted for Americans are not to be shared with the rest of the world.
Now wait a minute, step back a moment. I have two questions for Conservatives at this point.
1. Why do the “Terrorists” (I put it in quotes because that’s our monicker for them not there’s. That they are terrorists is no cause for debate, I agree. But we didn’t call the IRA “the Terrorists” or any other organization that invoked terror before. It begs the question why we use the term now) hate “Us”.
The answer: “Because they hate us.” When pressed further the answer is. “They hate our way of life.”
When I ask followups as to what that means, I get “They hate our freedom.”
What freedoms? But lets hold that for a moment as I ask my second question.
2. Why did we go to Iraq?
The answer: “To free the Iraqi people.” When I ask, “For what?” I get: “So they can have the freedoms that we take for granted.”
Yes there is the “to defeat Saddam” and the like, but Saddam was found and defeated and years later America and her forces are still in Iraq. So it must be for that reason.
Yes some folks think that we are there to fight terrorism, but there were no terrorists in Iraq until American forces showed up, we know that, so that can’t be the case either.
So we’re back to “What freedoms?” What freedoms are worth saving?
Once we look back upon the things that have created Western democracies. It’s not the “Right to Bear Arms”. Democracy has never relied on how much you’ve been packing. If that were the case then Canada, Britain, and all the other free nations of the world would be as black smoke happy as our southern cousins.
Is it the right little taxation?
I would say that too is not a hallmark of a democratic and free government. While social spending is finally beginning to rise in South American countries one can hardly make the argument that the lower taxes have made them solid democratic citizens through the years. Neither has high taxes removed democracy. High taxation in some European nations have actually improved democratic rights and freedoms. So the rate of taxation is not necessarily an indicator of freedom.
I would argue that freedom comes on the basis of two items:
1. The right of free speech without fear of imprisonment and/or death
2. The right to a fair trail which includes the assumption of innocence, and the right to habeus corpus.
Without these two bedrock principles, democracy and freedom cannot exist in a society. More than eight years ago until this day 800 prisoners from aged 13 to 98 have been transferred to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba with no more evidence of their guilt than accusations and a reward bounty. Years later many of those detainees have been kept locked away, and subjected to brutal physical and psychological torture while family and loved ones may even wonder if they are still alive.
I’ve heard the disgust that Conservatives present when they consider giving rights and freedoms to other human beings who are accused of terrorist acts. I read the suggestions of “lawyering up” and “mollycoddling”. That instead of civilian trials, these human beings deserve no less (in some cases) than a firing squad in answer for “their crimes”.
This. Is. Not. Democracy.
You don’t GET to choose who rights and freedoms apply to if you believe in them. You can’t say I believe that everyone has an inherent right to a fair trial, except these folks, and still call yourself a free nation. Some Conservatives get it, but they are being yelled out by the screed of folks like Bill O’Reilly. Bill Barr recently tried to explain to O’Reilly that torture doesn’t do anything but harm us.
But reason and facts are easily pushed aside when fear is in control.
Constitutional lawyer Jonathan Turley has it right when he asks are we as nation of hypocrites or of laws? The fact is, if you believe in the rule of law, then you’d better stand by it. Sometimes it will fail you. Murderers have always gotten free, but its not in our failures that we are judged, but in the strength of our convictions of our morals. The world looks for consistency from America.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. If you are willing to change your beliefs because you’re afraid of Terrorists. If you’re willing to give up your cherished freedoms so easily and not stand to support those freedoms for others, than the terrorists HAVE won. And they will continue to win. Because they will have succeeded in destroying the most precious things that make a democracy stand- its freedom.
Posted by jackjward on Jan 8, 2010 in Conservatism
Thom Hartmann has been asking the question forever: “Why are Conservatives doing Osama bin Laden’s work for him?”
But this is the case constantly. While Conservatives show their frustration in “The War on Terror” by claiming that Liberals “mollycoddle” terrorists by granting constitutional protections to the accused, they amp up the call for tougher and yet tougher measures. Torture. More troops. More weapons. More bombs. Blow the bad guys into the stone age.
It’s a mentality that has not been successful in the past, and cannot be successful in the future, because it ignores the old Biblical proverb “What ye sow so shall ye reap”. Violence begets violence. Just ask Americans if 9/11 made them want to give up as a nation and convert enmasse to Islamofascism. The thought is ludicrous.
So why is it that they believe that in countries that have never known generations without horrific wars and abuse like Iraq and Afghanistan and Iran that somehow when things get harder that the people will just give up? They have successfully ousted the Russians in Afghanistan from their country with next to nothing, and that was a group that wasn’t nearly as well-funded as the terrorists are today.
The war wages on in the Conservative mindset- like the war on drugs. No one talks about that anymore. Did we win? How about the Star Wars Strategic Defence Shield? Or what about the Missile Defence Shield that Bush was touting? More and more money getting sucked into the creation of wasted and useless programmes designed to promote death with the hope of security and stability.
When will we learn?
We know that the best way to defeat an enemy is to remove his desire to be your enemy in the first place. People with a job, food, healthcare, a stable community, and a happy family life have litte desire to destroy that by becoming a bomber in a terrorist campaign. What Conservatives will not acknowledge is that people come to terrorism from actual causes of misery in their nation, not because they believe in the religion alone that it offers.
Just like they don’t want you to realize that its the choices we make in North America that create the climates of terrorism around the world. Gasp. Shock. Is Jack saying we’re responsible for the actions of terrorists?
No. I’m saying the other old adage, “It takes two to tango” applies. Even The National Intelligence Estimate, titled “Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States” and completed in April back in 2004, realized in its conclusions that Islamic extremism was not on the decline, but expanded. The Iraq war, in fact, played a central role in the expansion of terrorist networks. Imagine that. You bomb someone else’s home and occupy a foreign land and it lends a boost to the very enemy you seek out.
But what about Iraq? Even Pentagon Warhawk Richard Perle had to admit to an audience in London that the Iraq War was illegal. Illegal. He said, “a divergence of view between the British govern ment and some senior voices in American public life [who] have expressed the view that, well, if it’s the case that international law doesn’t permit unilateral pre-emptive action without the authority of the UN, then the defect is in international law”.
And the Pentagon has shown a consistent increase in Terrorism inductees when violence is used as the only response to fight the war on terror.
So where does it leave us? Up a creek.
Until the West can come to grips with the understanding that killing people and occupying foreign lands is a trigger for more and more violence, they are going to continue to do what the terrorists want- sow the seeds of their own destruction.
Posted by jackjward on Dec 30, 2009 in Conservatism
After having discussions with Conservatives for many years now, and detailed discussions with Jason, I’m going to try and outline a couple of the major stumbling points between Liberal and Conservative thinking.
Our first?
The simple understanding of cause and effect.
Let me give you some examples:
1. Cause- Six billion plus people on the globe polluting. Effect- adverse reaction to the global biosphere creating devestastion of fish stocks and sea life. Degradation and desertation of forests. Dangerous migration of insects and animals to different climate zones. Rise in sea levels. Mass melting of polar regions. Freak storms. Rise in forest fires. Destruction of rivers and water sources. Rise in local warfare. Hunger. Poverty. Disease. Death.
Liberal response: A call to arms against pollution and global warming. Demands for government intervention against polluters and taxes to deal with environmental impacts to try and change old oil technology for healthier and low impact alternatives. Emergency plans. Outreach to industrialized nations and domestically for infrastructure refits and better growing techniques. Education about recylcing practices and green technologies.
Conservative response: It’s not happening. It’s all a liberal plot. If any actions are taken it must be for profit and by the private sector. The private sector is never wrong and has never steered us wrong.
2. Cause- Occupation of foreign lands. Effect- Rise of Extremism both religious and secular. Terrorism. Domestic Militia groups.
Liberal Response: Mix military response with looking at root causes. Understand that poverty and being disenfranchised is the lead recruiter for Terrorist organizations. Recognize that the problem is two-fold- a. That there are those who despise their way of life being threatened (for good or ill) and that b. There are those who feel that Western countries are taking over resources and occupying foreign lands they have no right to. Education, infrastructure, better access to health care and services, jobs and a helping hand will bring good will and be your best disincentive against Terrorism than strictly a hard line.
Conservative Response: Any conversation about root causes says that the West is at fault and therefore cannot be entertained. These people hate the Western way of life for no reason other than they hate Freedom and Democracy like Vaudevillian villains. Any suggestion that there are reasons for terrorist behavior is anti-American, anti-troops, and most probably anti-semitic, and certainly naive.
4. Cause- Deregulation over the last thirty years creating a speculations market based on numbers and not actual dollars. Banks involved in the housing speculation market and derivative trading placed the very underpinnings of the capitalist system in jeopardy. Effect- The Most Recent Financial Disaster
Liberal Response: One cannot blame strictly the homeowners for being given mortgages in good faith only to have the ownership of those mortgages sold and resold under loose regulations that allow the new owners to readjust the contracts and assign higher and unrealistic payment structures. Strong ombudsmen and regulatory bodies need to be aware of abuse of the system and act as canaries not allowing dangerous and morally suspect business practices to be involved (even if not technically illegal). Acts like Glass-Steegul have successfully protected the economy from devestations in the past, and have only been ineffective when rendered so by ill-thought out legislation. Government needs to take a strong hand in effective legislation protecting consumers and the system from utter destruction. Government needs to have a plan to help those who are currently between jobs because of the destruction. CEO’s should not continually benefit from the Public purse and instead public money if used, needs to be tracked and tied to job creation not bonus’.
Conservative Response: Too much regulation and not too little is the cause of the collapse. Government needs to let the Market decide. If three billion people around the globe are out of work, that will just create more opportunity in the marketplace. Government needs to stay out of the economy.
5. Cause- The United States has a Private Insurance Model of Health Care and not a public access model like the rest of the Free World. Effect- Private adoption of Health Care has killed thousands of people every year in the United States, is not available for those who cannot pay, and is the chief architect for bankruptcies in America as people need to choose whether to live or feed their children. The life expectancy of an American citizen is far below that of other nations, and their costs have skyrocketed being at least a 1/3 higher to that of their neighbour to the north, Canada. It is an unsustainable path economically, as all projections of Private Health Care go through the roof.
Liberal Response: Single-Payer healthcare will keep costs under control, allow private companies to innovate without gouging citizens and give better metrics of where the issues lie in a national healthcare programme. Failing this, a Public option should be put in place to at least keep costs in check and give people an option. Universal access is a right to human beings. People should not die in the street because they cannot afford to have healthcare. Families should not lose their homes because they cannot afford Cancer treatments. Prevention should be part of an overall plan towards health and government response is definitively needed.
Conservative Response: Government is bad. Always has been, so it will screw this up. The Market will take care of us, as it always has. People need to be grown up and make their own choices. Children dying of no health care is the fault of the parents. They should have planned better. And government for their regulation ways. Insurance Companies love regulation because it means they have a monopoly. Other companies are dying to give healthcare away to people, but they don’t have the option. Free up healthcare and you’ll see better competition and prices fall.
And on and on it goes.
As I see it, one philosophy looks for root causes and looks at a balanced means to help deal with the issues in society. The other follows a strict ideology of “the market will ultimately be the best way”. It is a belief system that will always favour the wealthy as the drivers of the market, and will always put business and the economy in front of any other human need or right.
Now there are good conservatives that see past taxes and government being the fault. Ron Paul is a steadfast conservative who recognizes that violence in the Middle East is a direct cause against American encrouchment on to foreign lands and the appropriation of those nations’ resources in oil and mining. And while I disagree with Ron Paul about many of his ideas of government, at least he’s presenting something not seen in a long time- the classical Conservative perspective of non-inteference.
For the most part, the basic concepts of Cause and Effect are lost in the dialogue today with Conservatives in favour of responses that are ideological, nationalistic, and frankly religiously fundamental in nature. Recognizing that every conflict requires two parties to be at fault is the first step to any kind of reconciliation between peoples.
Even when the Pentagon published papers showing that Bush’s response against Terrorism was actually creating a rise not a curtailing of terrorism, the Conservatives of the world did not take the time out to reconsider their ideology. Their beliefs continued, and the world is continuing to pay the price for an inability to simply understand cause and effect.
Posted by jackjward on Dec 28, 2009 in Health Care
As a liberal minded person, I can see the reality of compromise. Teachers compromise a lot. We care about our students. It’s why Teacher’s strikes are rarely long. Nurses compromise. Same thing. You’ll see all kinds of people who are in the business of health care involved in compromise.
We progressive liberals compromised from the get-go. We wanted Single-Payer. We still wanted Single-Payer. But we compromised for at least a Public Option. And that was gutted as well. This is the problem when you’re a caring person who wants to come mid-way with people who simply don’t care. You’re going to make all the sacrifices and they just stand on the line and refuse to budge until they get everything they want.
What does this do? It tends to make compromising people less willing to compromise. So you get people at… well, Loggerheads.
Some things are worth compromising. For example, if you have a road that you want to be made. You begin with the best possible choices and compromise to something that’s safe and effective for a good price. When there’s a baseball strike, you compromise so that both sides get the best deal possible.
Health Care is not something people can afford to compromise. This is what happens.
I’ve shown Jason Names of the Dead many times. His response is that somehow the 44,000 people who die every year because they are uninsurable and therefore uncovered with their Health Care is a made up number. Assume that it is. Assume somehow, a thousand monkeys are somehow inventing all the personal stories of tragedy there. Assume only half as many as the number shows dead people who would be alive today if they actually just had basic health care.
Is that an acceptable loss? Is even 10 people an acceptable loss for “The Greatest Nation on Earth”?
Despite what Conservatives will tell you. Your health is a right in Free Society. You shouldn’t have to face the prospect of having cancer treatment and losing your house and the ability to pay for your family, or die and let them have three square meals a day.
Canadians understood that choice decades ago, and we’ve never looked back. And frankly, we’ve never been happier. I don’t know a single Canadian in my life who’s not grateful for our public health care system. The people who I have been told about tend to be in the top 5% of the financial strata, so they can afford to pay outright the costs of Health Care where ever they are.
I’ve heard some podcaster friends of mine who pay 600 dollars a month just for their coverage. That’s nearly my mortgage. How is that not hampering the economy? How is that not putting money in the hands of a third party that just shuffles the paperwork and looks to get a better percentage for stockholders as opposed to going to new techniques, doctors, hospitals and drugs?
The arguments are tired and saddening to those of us who have seen first person the way Public Health Care takes care of those who need it. Is it a perfect system? No. But at least its a system.
Instead we have people like the above picture Vic Chesnutt, who the Los Angeles Times reported took his own life instead of looking at the prospect of trying to find money to survive.
Vic said it himself:
“I’m not too eloquent talking about these things,” Chesnutt told The Times earlier this month. “I was making payments, but I can’t anymore and I really have no idea what I’m going to do. It seems absurd they can charge this much. When I think about all this, it gets me so furious. I could die tomorrow because of other operations I need that I can’t afford.”
But there are those who are more concerned with things like “money” when it comes to human life. They are happy to send people across to other lands to kill strangers for a war on terrorism and a chance to fill the coffers of War Profiteers.
But what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? A good book wrote that once.
It’s the kind of thing that makes sense to us Liberal minded people.
All my life I’ve seen fine upstanding Conservatives being made into fools by the rich and powerful. They’ve done it consistently, because those who have the money know how to prick at the conscience of a Conservative- through their pocketbook.
These wealthy folks always come off as if they have what’s right for people in mind. They chew away at public trust. They destroy public programmes that provide opportunities for the poor and middle class because they aren’t either. It’s the new aristocracy trying to tell the people that they don’t have a right to opportunity by making it look like opportunities as never made through government intervention.
It’s a lie. I’ve seen first hand wealthy individuals pay good money to suck at the public teet. They will pay off government officials and drain tax dollars in the argument that they provide better options than a government one. Go ask a Conservative if they’d rather have a revenue neutral Crown Corporation providing a service for people, or a Private Business that is profit based being fed by our taxes. Their brains will explode, and then they will make every ideological argument to farm the business our to private interests. Never mind that it will cost more to tax payers. It’s an ideological stance. Not a rational one.
No one has hit the nail on the head of wealthy welfare kings and queens more recently then following up on The Young TurksTruthDig. Check out this clear response to the hypocrisy of the age. Get angry Conservatives. They’re playing you like violins again.. and again.
Jack loves to parrot Apocalypse Al and others when they talk about AGW being settled science. I don’t think it could ever be put better than this cartoon does.
Taken from Townhall.com
Jack and I had an interesting exchange on Twitter that I think illustrates a difference in point of view between us.
Jack made a reference to conservatives not liking free speech. I am sure you can find examples of actively censorious conservatives but in general it has been my experience that conservatives are actually extremely tolerant of peoples free expression and are generally reluctant to seek to censor people. Typically in my experience they don’t object to freedom of expression (at least political speech) they object to being expected to pay for that expression when they disagree with it and they expect (but seem to rarely get) the same consideration from their political opponents. After all it isn’t conservatives who have taken free political speech to such dizzying heights of civil discourse by seeking to shout down people they disagree with or throwing food on speakers they disagree with.
Now Jack noted that he thought it would be censorious to pull your money out of an institution you disagreed with the behaviour of. The specific example was a university that invited a certain objectionable loon from Iran to speak. If the people that gave money to such a university were disgusted with such behaviour and chose to take their money elsewhere how exactly is the unversity being censored? The donations that are being taken elewhere are freely given to the institution and may be freely withheld as well. The university has no right to those donations. Don’t the people giving the donations have a right to spend their money as they see fit?
Free speech is not an absolute right to have someone else provide you with the means of expressing your ideas. It is only a right to be able to express your point of view at your own expense without the state seeking to silence you because they disagree with your point of view.
It’s been many years since I have seen Dar Williams perform, but it was gratifying to hear that Joan Baez had been taken her around to play at more than just the Coffee House and Folk Festival circuit.
As an avid accoustic guitar fan myself, I’ve always felt and continue to feel that folk music has always been the thinking folk’s music. It’s the music people can sing together, and its the brand of music that actually considers and furthers social justice aims.
So, we’re in Bill O’Reilly’s favourite time of year. The time he spends telling us that there’s a war on the holiday Christmas, the word Christmas, and all things Christ-like. While I do admit that political correctness has been silly over the years, I think in the end, the idea of Christmas is not a tug of war. It’s about respect for all beliefs- as Dar explains up above.
It doesn’t matter if you think pagans are simple, silly, mistaken, or evil. It makes no difference pointing to historical elements of the rise and fall of paganism (try coming up with an accurate historical model for early Christian faith), or the plurality of vision as opposed to the relatively singular message of Christianity.
What matters is that people all around the world have a right to their religious and spiritual beliefs as long as those beliefs don’t end up killing others- those who don’t follow their faith or those involved in ”heresy”.
Religion, in my mind is about worshipping the holy- in us, in the world and the universe around us, and if you choose to not call that God, but humanism too, who am I to argue? Faith is always an individual relationship.
For the record, I’m not a pagan. My sister is a pretty highly placed pagan in Eastern Canada. Ironically, she’s also one of the few people who lives her life according to the best in Christian values around- a lesson many Christian believers might consider.
And for the record, we call it Christmas when she comes over with her family, but we also honour those older traditions that are not Christian. Things like, well, you know- yule logs, holly, Christmas Trees, Santa…
If you believe in Christmas, you already have a little pagan in you.
Who says that Conservatives don’t have good ideas?
Most of them they steal from Liberals.
For example, when the Environmental movement came through, the Conservatives considered most of that “Silent Spring” stuff nonsense, even though Rachel Carson used good observational science. But they did cotton on to one piece of Environmentalism- “Efficiency”.
Efficiency made good business sense. It also allowed a whole lot of upper management folk to “down-size” organizations in their ever reaching desire for higher profits and lower expenses. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with efficiency as long as it goes hand in hand with effectiveness. Lots of things can be more efficient- like outsourcing parts of your company to India, but is it really effective when you consider the confusion with customers, or the loss of on-site quality assurance of products. But man are we cutting costs so things MUST be better!
This rush to efficiency has created a pile of other evils as well. We’ve seen it in the past with the complaints about the Kyoto agreement, as well as the current Health Care Bill.
Efficiency demands little actual work be done. It’s one of the few laws of conservation that the Right dogma allows. This is why so much of their attempts to stop actual change requires watering things down.
Look at Kyoto. Tough talk from the American administration was Conservatives irrigating the chambers in Kyoto in order to water down the proposals. The upshot? What they couldn’t water down enough, they simply backed away. The United States refused to ratify the agreement. But they didn’t go without a victory. Conservative pecking away at the ideals of Kyoto produced an agreement in principle that lacked teeth and scope.
So, of course the Conservatives have every right to complain that Kyoto means nothing- that’s always been their plan. Their plan being to make any change as weak as possible, so they can later argue that it’s… well… weak. A Liberal’s natural inclination has always been compromise and collaboration, and that’s been the death knell to powerful and important legislation in the past.
And it’s about to be the same again. With a majority in the House, Liberals are still about to allow the watered down version of healthcare. And this time Republicans are hedging their bets. While people are dying in unexpected numbers for a nation- considered to be by many- the envy of the world, this last bastion of Free Market Health Care loan sharking will continue to get their pay offs to their Mob bosses.
And even if something is in danger of actually changing there’s other cards in the deck to be played- “Hold off for a while. There’s other things to do” or “Have you seen how big this bill is?” (As if somehow the size of a bill is inversely effective as an actual plan. How does that work?)
Meanwhile, on main street, we see record bonus’ for the heads of these Insurance agencies and let’s not forget the banks who pull the strings and are are the real power in the world.
So the watering down continues… The GOP or Great Obfuscating Party continues to do the job of their Corporate masters.
And the once proud American dream finds the levies broken.
And who are the beneficiaries of such neglect? Well just ask the folks in New Orleans who have lost the most. It wasn’t the ultra wealthy. They were helped out regardless. Nope, they are given umbrellas.
But for the rest of us every day folks- watering down eventually has a price!
This argument is an attempt to apply Pascal’s Wager to the concept of “doing something” about climate change. Hopefully the creator of this video knows that he is doing this, but perhaps he doesn’t.
At any rate, there is a long philosophical history of Pascal’s Wager, with the Wikipedia Entry being a good introduction and much more detail being found in Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy that deal with the proper formulation of the argument and criticisms of the argument. You can poke around on Google for more entries but I would recommend those two as the best place to start.
Now the problem with trying to apply such a Pascalian Wager to the threat of Anthropogenic Global Warming is that the original version of the wager assumes infinite losses and infinite gains for God existing and choosing correctly or incorrectly. This is clearly not the case here, as can make reasonable estimates of the various costs of “doing something” versus doing nothing and so on. So this is actually not a valid application of Pascal’s Wager.
Worse yet, the author does nothing to actually tease out the costs involved. He seems to think that the costs for “doing something” will be purely economic but this is entirely false and obviously so. “Doing something” will definitely harm people. There are thousands of knock on effects from attempting to retard all economic growth around the world that will translate into direct harms to other human beings. Take a simple example. Hurricane Katrina is the poster child for a disastrous hurricane in the United States and a horrendous disaster of “unmitigated proportions”, blah blah blah. But how many people were actually killed by it ? The offical count stands at 1,836. Take a look at this list from Wikipedia of Natural Disasters by Death Toll.
Is it just a coincidence that the poorer somewhere is the worse the death toll from a natural disaster is ? I will give you a hint, the answer is no.
Now, given the inevitable economic effects of “doing something” about AGW, and the inevitable result that millions of people will be kept in grinding poverty as a result, they will be more vulnerable in future to adverse natural events. The people that die, will be victims of the AGW policies that cause the global economy to be retarded. Why don’t the AGW cultists ever care about these people that their idiot polices will directly harm ?
Not to mention the ugly and inconvenient truth that, to take Kyoto as an example, even if it had been agreed to by everyone, and everybody had met the targets they said they would meet, would “have a superficial overall benefit.”. That quote is from the Wikipedia article on the subject, hardly a bastion of hardcore AGW skepticism.
So even properly implementing and meeting the targets of an economy wrecking boondoggle like Kyoto, wouldn’t have done much to actually change the outcome.
Am I the only one that is skeptical of claims that we must “do something” when the something proposed is admitted to be only marginally effective, and that “doing something” will absolutely have concrete harmful effects on people ? Unlike AGW cultists I actually care about poor people and believe we should give them access to cheap energy so they can get out of grinding poverty and have better lives. I guess i’m just selfish like that.
After having discussions with Conservatives for many years now, and detailed discussions with Jason, I’m going to try and outline a couple of the major stumbling points between Liberal and Conservative thinking.
As a liberal minded person, I can see the reality of compromise. Teachers compromise a lot. We care about our students. It’s why Teacher’s strikes are rarely long. Nurses compromise. Same thing. You’ll see all kinds of people who are in the business of health care involved in compromise.
