Passport requirement at Canada-U.S. border crossings delayed

Canadians won't need to pack their passports when entering the U.S. by car until June 2009, according to U.S. legislation passed Thursday.

While I think that this is definitely the right move, I do think all citizens should have a passport. From my personal experience, passports speed up the process at airports and drive through borders because instead of having to carry three of four documents with you, you only need one.



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Ottawa school threatened after Christmas song cuts

An elementary school in Ottawa was flooded with hateful and threatening e-mails and phone calls after media reports that it had removed the word "Christmas" from a song to be performed at its Christmas concert.

It is totally unnessecarry and over the top of these people to call the scool anti-christian. It is simply accepting that there are other cultures that do not nessecarily celebrate christmas and to make the concert meaningful to them as well.



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Winter storm lashes Atlantic provinces after pummelling Ontario, Quebec

Residents in Central Canada began digging out Monday as a massive winter storm that battered Ontario and Quebec moved eastward overnight to deliver its wallop to Atlantic Canada.

This winter is said to be the coldest and snowiest winter in 15 some odd years. As surprising as it may seem, i would attribute this to global warming. The storm was said to be coming from Kentucky, and then the rain moved north and turned to snow. Global warming is a much larger issue that wee think it is, and it needs to be dealt with.



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Rogers accused of hijacking other web pages

In a week when Canadian internet activists are up in arms over the government's proposed copyright reform bill, Rogers Communications Inc. is also drawing fire for what critics are calling the company's violation of net neutrality principles.

I think that this is unnacceptable. People are paying for access to the interent, not access to the internet that has been man-handled by someone. When you pay for phone service, you want to be able to talk to people, not talk then have your conversation intercepted by a third party, manipulated, ads put in and then delivered to the other end. Rogers has been doing some pretty shady things lately such as silently billing people for a service they didnt order and only cacelling it if the user requests. I think that this should be seriously looked into.



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Clash between traditional values, modern culture may be behind teen's death

A slain Muslim teen whose father has been charged with second-degree murder apparently chafed at the prospect of wearing traditional religious garb, but members of the Islamic community warn against anyone using the tragedy to vilify the head scarf known as the hijab.

This is extremely frightening to me. It is especially frightening because there is nothing that can be done. The only thing I can say is clearly if they moved to a western culture, they liked western values more. The parents should be willing to accept that and if they want a more muslim culture, they should move to a country where women must wear a hijab is the law.



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RCMP must curb Taser use, watchdog says

The RCMP's watchdog is calling for the force to restrict its use of stun guns, saying the weapons are increasingly employed to subdue those who are resistant rather than those who pose a threat.

I find that this is a much needed announcement, especially with the past few deaths by tasers here and in the US. Tasers were initially designed to be put in use where a gun would normally be used. In the recent taser stories, police have used the tasers as a substitute for trying trying to physically subdue offenders because it's just easier. The article is spot on, tasers sould not be on the same level as nightsticks and pepper spray.



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RCMP to review Taser policy in wake of airport death: commissioner

Four Mounties involved in the fatal takedown of a Polish immigrant at Vancouver airport have been assigned to other duties as the RCMP reviews its policy on the use of Tasers, Commissioner William Elliott said Saturday.

Finally. It took 3 taser/police brutality related death in the US and one here in the past few months and now finally someone has taken the liberty to investigate. I am glad that they stepped up, admitted it and are trying to do justice instead of following the US and pretending it never happened.




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Canadian Police Tolerates Piracy For Personal Use

I think that this is a giant step in the right direction. It's as if there was a sudden outburst of sense and reason. Consider this: Every time you buy a cd or track off of the internet, you would think that the artist gets a fair share of the profits. Unfortunately, artists get roughly five cents from every $20 album sold. The rest of the money goes to the recording industry (usually orginizations such as RIAA, MPAA, CRIA etc.)

In the US, you could get sued for up to $250,000 per track that you download - even for personal use. This is rediculous. Already, as Canadians, we pay a small tax on blank media such as CDs and DVDs that go straight to the artists. We are basically paying already for anything we download. Artists now, make most of their earnings from concerts and merchandise, etc. that albums are pretty much an advertising tool. The band Radiohead tried a new concept which was to offer their album InRainbows online for download for whatever price you thing is fair, and so far, it has been a success. They have made over $2 million, which went straight to them, and not some middle man. I think that the Industry is a sinking ship and more bands should follow Radiohead's lead.



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Ottawa Senator faces off against Facebook phonies

Some NHL players are worried about the number of people posing as them on the popular social networking site Facebook.



I am not surprised by this by any extent, it was going to happen but The part of this article that I find alarming is that there is no penalty for frauds on this extremely popular social networking site worth over $15 billion. This is giant security issues to its 47 million users. I would think that this would constitute some sort of fraud charges.

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U.S. activists call for consumers to ban the water bottle"

Activists and environmentalists on Wednesday are rallying behind a U.S. campaign that aims to convince consumers to opt for tap water rather than bottled.

I think that it's great that more people are trying to be more environmentally friendly but this just strikes me as stupid. This is like telling people to use their bike instead of their car, it works perfectly for small trips but if you are going anywhere that is more than half an hour away, it is just a hinderance. People drink tap water in their houses but not as much when they go out. The idea behind bottled water is that it is convenient, you can take it virtually wherever you go, now it goes without saying that you cannot take a tap wherever you go. A different approach to this would be the organizations pushing for more environmetally friendly bottles.



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Manufacturers keeping Canadian prices high: retailers

Retailers scheduled to meet with Federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty on Tuesday say the minister's consumer "crusade" to bring Canadian and American prices in line is misdirected.

When I read this article, I realized how much more we are paying compared to Americans. I never really thought much about this but now I realize that it is getting a little bit ridiculous with the Canadian dollar being worth more than the USD. You see the price increase most drastically in electronics where the price is marked up at least 50%. I hope that they are successful in lowering prices.



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Man died after 4 Taser jolts, witness alleges

An eyewitness with cellphone footage spoke out Monday night about what she allegedly saw at the Vancouver International Airport when a man was subdued with Tasers by RCMP and later died.

This to me is discusting.  If I am not mistaking, this is the 4th time a situation like this has come up.  Although the other three times have been in the US, this is starting to become a trend.  A good representation of this type of situation that has happened before is the school shootings issue.  At first it was just one, then it escalated to the point where it starts to happen more and more often.  As I mentioned before, this is not only the fourth time this has happened, but the fourth time this year.   The whole point of tasers is so that you could subdue the target without much or any harm done.  This has escillated to the point where the police are starting to abuse the taser and using it multiple times.  This ploice brutality will keep escillating until we do something about it.



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Loonie hits new 31-year high

The Canadian dollar charged closer to $1.03 US Thursday as it benefited from higher commodity prices, a bigger trade surplus and a U.S. greenback sliding ever lower

While this might be exciting news for most Canadian citizens, it is not exactly great news for Canada in a whole.  The one thing i want to point out about this is that even though the Canadian dollar is rising, the American dollar is falling at a higher pace.  The problem I see in this situation, is it the American economy completely falls, not only is the US in trouble, but Canada is as well.  The main reason for this being that Canada's economy relies so heavily on the US economy, in fact, about 50% of our exports go to the US - if the US economy crashes, we will have a hard time making up the 50% of exports.

Health alerts issued for 4 unauthorized foreign medications

Health Canada is warning consumers about the following four health products not authorized for sale in Canada that may pose serious health risks:

• Zhen Feng Da Brand Xi Tong Wan (lot #060908), marketed as a treatment for bone, muscle pains and rheumatoid arthritis.

• Wellring Brand Yin Qiao Jie Du (lot #51005), used to ease cold, fever, headache, cough, sore throat and runny nose.

• Gu Ci Dan, promoted as treatment for rheumatism, arthralgia, sciatica, headache, and pain in the shoulder, back, waist, lumbar vertebrae and ischium.

• Xu Log Bou, used for joint and muscle pain.

In my opinion it is good that they Health Canada has been made aware of and issued warnings for these harmful products. My only concern is that we are able to purchase such harmful goods. I would think that people would not be able to carry them into the country with such tight security these days. My suggestion would to be to inspect more cargo coming in from foreign countries especially medication.

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Nine protesters arrested in Caledonia standoff

Ontario Provincial Police have arrested nine protesters at the site of an aboriginal demonstration at a housing development in Caledonia.

I think that the situation with the aboriginals is getting ridiculous. There have been too many protests in the last few years that it is starting to get stupid. The aboriginal people keep asking for more money which is making them more and more relient on the government. The more money they get from the government, the less they have to work. There are two feasible solutions that I can think of; they lose the reserves and government grants and live lives like everyone else, or they could support themselves. Although it isn’t entirely the same situation, you don’t see mennonites protesting and asking for money from the government. They support themselves and I think the natives could learn a little from them and try to follow suit. Too many people are being hurt and/or arrest, this needs to stop.

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Day firm on police warrants for access to internet user data

Public safety ministry recently announced that they would not introduce legislation forcing internet service providers to give customer information without a warrant.

This is extremely shocking to me - not because they denied the legislation but because someone would even think of allowing personal data to be given out without as much as a warrant. I am extremely happy that they did not introduce the legislation because that would be a severe invasion of privacy. It is disgusting that people would want to have personal information given out that easily. This is a growing trend around the world, people want to be in control of whatever is happening on the internet. They are, essentially, control Freaks. Another example of this trend is Microsoft recently issued updates to its Operating systems secretly despite if the user had updates turned on or off.

This is an awful trend and needs to stop.





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Teen fatally stabbed outside Toronto high school

A 16 year old student of Winston Churchill Collegiate Institute was fatally stabbed in the stomach at about 12:20 PM o yesterday. He was rushed to Sunnybrook hospital but died a short time later.

What suprises me is not the stabbing, but the fact that only two schools were given the upgraded security. I don't see the logic in this, are we going to wait until someone dies to upgrade security? Does it have to come to the worst case senario to even entertain the thought of having increased school security? This is certainly not being pro-active. My question is, why is the process so passive?



Here is a disturbing image that I stumbled across



This shows all the homocides in Toronto in 2007. It further shows that we are waiting for someone to be attacked before we take action.

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Elections Canada chief won't back down on veiled voting

Elections Canada has decided to stick with their decision to allow veiled women to participate in the polls despite Primeminister Harper's disagreement.


While others may disagree, I believe that Harper's complaint is in fact a valid one.  Even though Canada is extremely multicultural, common sense and security measures should still be put into play. I can also understand Election Canada's decision with Canada being what it 
is, a very multicultural country.



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