Showing posts with label North American Union. Show all posts
Showing posts with label North American Union. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 07, 2007

Loonie Flashback

Guess they aren't too eager to adopt a blended currency now. Even though the Canadian business class has spent the past two elections and last six years promoting an integrated North American economy.

Yesterday
December 3, 2001 - The loonie's days may be numbered. Earlier this month a poll revealed more than half of Canadian business leaders think Canada should consider adopting the U.S. dollar. Conducted just after the Canadian dollar hit a record low of 62.30¢ U.S. on Nov. 9, the poll also showed that, even if Canada doesn't adopt the greenback, many companies will increasingly set prices for big-ticket items in U.S. dollars.


Today

The commodity boom, and the price of oil in particular, is what's been driving the Canadian dollar to an all-time high. If you did two lines on a chart, tracing the price of oil and the value of the loonie this year alone, you would find they track very closely together. After bottoming out at around $52 at the beginning of the year, the price of oil has rocketed to the mid-90s. And the Canadian dollar, which was thought to be pretty fully priced at 85 cents back in January, crossed $1.08 briefly yesterday, hitting a new all time high. That's a 21-per-cent appreciation relative to the U.S. dollar in only 10 months. Wow.

Only six years ago, the loonie was languishing in the low 60s, back when oil was in the low 20s, which only makes the point. "They are very closely linked," says Jeremy Leonard, an economist with the Institute for Research on Public Policy.

Nothing, it seems, can stop the dollar, so long as nothing can stop the price of oil.

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Monday, August 27, 2007

Them and Us


According to King Stephen the Conservatives don't have time for protesters. Which we knew.

And the reason is that he claims protesters are not ordinary Canadians, or in this case Quebecois, but a new profession. Basically a 'rent a crowd'.
They are not Canadians or Quebecois like you and me or the Conservatives.

"Dear friends, remember always that this is how we can measure our progress as a political movement: bring true results, work for the well-being of families and taxpayers, for truckers, the cashier, the retired person, the salesman, the farmer, the entrepreneur--for people who work hard, and who don't have the time to protest, or have the money to hire protestors.

But who support their families--Quebeckers of the middle class, the enlarged middle class, who were largely ignored for too long, by the political class.

The Conservatives saw them, the Conservatives heard them, the Conservatives have understood them, because we are they [i.e. the middle class]."


Gee someone tell that to the professional protesters at the Fraser Institute, of which Jason Kenney, Rob Anders and Ezra Levant are graduates of. Or the professional protesters of the NCC Lobby, which Harper once spokesman of. Or the professional protesters of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. Or the professional protesters opposed to the Wheat Board. Or the professional protesters at REAL Women. Or the professional protesters who demand Childcare Choice. Or the professional protesters who lobby for traditional marriage. Or the professional protesters who oppose Native Rights and Land Claims. Or the professional protesters of the Canadian Medical Association. Or the professional protesters who celebrate Red Friday.

Apparently they are no longer welcome in Harpers New Conservative Party of the 'enlarged middle class'.

Harper defines this mythical class as; 'truckers, the cashier, the retired person, the salesman, the farmer, the entrepreneur'. Now other than the the retired person and the cashier; who is a wage slave, the rest are gainfully defined as 'self employed' which is the classic definition of middle class; self employed professionals. Who were once called the
petit-bourgeoisie

After liberal ideologue Daniel Bell declared the end of class war, sociologists defined the middle class as the great American melting pot which included blue collar workers, white collar workers, service workers, professionals and the self employed.

It was not based on the Marxist defined 'relations to the means of production', but on their salaries. No one was working class anymore, that was passe instead we all became a nation of the great unwashed 'middle class' we were now all 'consumers', not producers.

Now given that one would think with all those protesters who makeup the Conservative Party base, that Harper would have enlarged his middle class to include professional protesters and those who have the time and money to hire them. What he is saying is that the hard working Canadians and Quebecois who oppose him are simply in the pay of.....whom? Commies? Trade Unions? Maude Barlow?

In true animal farm fashion he has defined some protesters as more Conservative than others. They are the
Special Interests. 'Them' to Harpers 'Us'.

Of course what he really is saying is that by his definition Thomas D'Aquino and his clique of Canada's CEO's are not a special interest group, but the mass of folks who protested last weekend at summit in Montebello are.

We have heard it all before, the protesters are 'commie dupes', and their fellow travelers in the media and blogosphere are 'nattering nabobs of negativity'.

And typical of right wing populism Harper again appeals to being one of the people; "
because we are they" ignoring the political reality that his Party is not only a Minority Government but a minority political view amongst Canadians and Canadien's.



SEE:

The Peasants Are Revolting!

Police Black Block

Day In Wonderland

Jelly Bean Summit


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Saturday, August 25, 2007

Day In Wonderland


Stockwell Day expands on the Humpty Dumpty syndrome of the Harper government, and becomes the Red Queen for a Day,

The Red Queen said, "It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place."


By justifying the Police use of undercover agent provocateurs to incite violence and justify the use of riot police at the SPP protests in Montebello.



Public Security Minister Stockwell Day, meanwhile, continued to brush of questions about a call for a public inquiry. "The thing that was interesting in this particular incident, three people in question were spotted by protesters because (they) were not engaging in violence," Day said Friday in Vancouver. "Because they were not engaging in violence, it was noted that they were probably not protesters. I think that's a bit of an indictment against the violent protesters."

An undercover cop carrying rocks encouraging violence and acting as an agent provocateur is an indictment against the police and idiots like Day.


"They were being encouraged to throw rocks and they were not throwing rocks, it was the protesters who were throwing the rocks. That's the irony of this," said Day,

You see the cop was not being violent he was just carrying a rock. A rock he had handed to him only moments before, and he was going to drop it, but union protesters surrounded him and didn't give him a chance.

So still carrying his rock, he walked towards the riot cops to show them his evidence. And so they pretended to bust him so they could dust the rock for fingerprints for the identity of the real violent protester who handed him the rock.

And all those other rock throwing protesters? Well none seem to have been arrested. In fact they all seem to have disappeared.


On Wednesday, the mayor of Montebello thanked police and protesters, praising the fact that there wasn't a single report of damage during the two-day summit.


In the Wonderland that is Ottawa, Humpty Dumpty logic continues to dominate the mindset of the Harpocrites.


When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone,
"it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less.



SEE:


Police Black Bloc



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Friday, August 24, 2007

The Peasants Are Revolting!

Gee Thomas, I seem to remember that as the crisis hit the auto industry last fall the Prime Minister not only did not have time, but outright refused, to talk to Buzz Hargrove of the CAW.

But of course Tom, can I call you Tom, goes even further and from his elitist ivory tower, looking down cries out; The Peasants Are Revolting!


The demonstrators are also decrying the secrecy surrounding the meeting and that the only people with access to the three leaders at the summit are 30 chief executives of some of the biggest corporations in the world.

But Thomas D'Aquino, president of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, said getting access to political leaders is not the only way to be heard.

"I do not say to myself, 'If I don't get an hour with the prime minister in the next six months, I'm going to go out and protest and reject the system outright,' " he said. "I don't do that because civilized human beings — those who believe in democracy — don't do that."



“The peasants are revolting!”

“They always have been.”

Clearly Tom believes he and his pals represent the ne plus ultra of bourgeois civilization.

Democracy for him is private luncheons and back room meetings between
Heads of State and the executive committee of the ruling class.

And for the rest of us it's the same old crumbs from the same old cake.


SEE:

Police Black Bloc

Jelly Bean Summit

Kim Campbell on North American Union

How The MacDonald Commission Changed Canada

Nationalism Will Not Stop North American Union




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Police Black Bloc

You can't tell the players from their face masks you have to look at their boots.

Union leaders say these three men demonstrating in Montebello are actually a Quebec provincial police officers.

Union leaders say this man demonstrating in Montebello is actually a Quebec provincial police officer.


In this image taken from the scene, the 'protesters' and police are wearing similar boots, although the boots on the 'protesters' appear to have duct tape and spray paint on them.

The YouTube video shows Dave Coles, president of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union, ordering three masked men back from a line of riot police.

The YouTube video shows Dave Coles, president of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union, ordering three masked men back from a line of riot police.
(CBC)

During the era of the Viet Nam war protests we used to be able to tell the police undercover agents and agent provocateurs by the fact no matter what else they wore they always wore police issued boots. Some things never change.


Quebec police admit agents posed as protesters

MONTREAL–With the proof caught on video, Quebec provincial police were forced to admit yesterday that three undercover agents were playing the part of protesters at this week's international summit in Montebello, Que.



As the MacDonald Commission revealed agent provocateurs were often used by the RCMP in the seventies to infiltrate far left groups and promote the idea of armed struggle. Today not much has changed.

QPP admit to ‘agents' but not ' provocateurs'


LOL.

After all these are the same folks that said this;

Officers never posed as protesters: Quebec police


I mean since the cops have all this fancy riot and crowd control equipment it's a drag not to be able to use it. So why not provoke some violence so you have an excuse to bust heads.

The irony in all this is that these guys may not have been exposed so easily if it had been a larger demonstration.

On Wednesday, the mayor of Montebello thanked police and protesters, praising the fact that there wasn't a single report of damage during the two-day summit.


Whose 'sad' now Mr. Harper.


SEE:

CIA Spies In Canada

Infantile Leftism

Really Corrupt Mounted Police

Paranoia and the Security State

Repeated Cover ups by Mounted Police

CSIS vs. CUPW

Canada’s Long History of Criminalizing Dissent




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Wednesday, August 22, 2007

Jelly Bean Summit

"They Melt in Your Mouth Not Your Hands."

Here is the official joint statement of the Three Amigos from the SPP / North American Union Summit in Montebello.

Not one mention of jelly beans, which appear to have been a big focus of trade discussions, which of course had to be kept secret.

Nor any mention of intergalactic highways. Which was a witty way for Harper to dismiss protests about this hush hush secret meeting. He was of course making fun of Liberal Leader Stephane Dion's English. Low blow.

The official press release of the Leaders Statements post summit is just the usual neo-con pap about Free Trade, NAFTA, APEC, etc. So the question is; since we all know what the neo-con agenda is, why all the secrecy?


"I'm amused by the difference between what actually takes place in the meetings and what some are trying to say takes place," President Bush said at a news conference in Montebello, Quebec.


"It's quite comical, actually, when you realize the difference between reality and what some people are talking on TV about," Bush said. "You lay out a conspiracy and then force people to try to prove it doesn't exist.

































SEE:


Kim Campbell on North American Union

Mother Prevails

Nationalism Will Not Stop North American Union


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Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Kim Campbell on North American Union

Former PC PM Kim Campbell was on the PBS News Hour last night revealing the dirty truth about Trilateralism, the SPP and the coming North American Union aka NAFTA2.

She was joined in her paean to the joy of Trilateralism and the new contientalism by former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda. Both of them criticized the 'secrecy' of the meetings between the Three Amigos and their Corporate Counterparts.


KIM CAMPBELL:We have the world's longest undefended border, and there is a concern to create a security perimeter that will create confidence on both sides of the border that those movements can pass relatively quickly, that there's trust in the documentation, trust in the broader security system. And we've had to deal with that.

It's something that predates 9/11, but the 9/11 brought it into very, very high profile. And I think we have to recognize we have in Canada, you know, the nationalists who are concerned that any kind of collaboration, any kind of harmonization of standards is the thin edge of the wedge of Canada losing its identity. And I'm amused to see that there are people in the United States who think that, you know, what they call "socialist Canada" is somehow going to come down and corrupt them.

But the fact of the matter is, our three countries are the world's largest trading region, the largest energy market. We really have an extraordinary future together, if we can find ways of dealing with the impediments for the movements of the things that we want to move and ways of ensuring that the public is confident that their security and that their standards of well-being are assured.

And I think one of the ways of doing that is to take this process -- this is the third summit in this security and prosperity partnership process -- is maybe to take it a little bit even more public and get the debate more open, because I think President Bush has been a bit quiet about it, even Prime Minister Harper. I don't know how President Calderon is dealing with this in Mexico. He's got a new government.

But these are important issues. And if we don't get them right, we really will lose the competitive battle, but also lose a lot of opportunities for prosperity and for security.



Building a trilateral relationship

RAY SUAREZ: Well, Professor, you heard the prime minister talking about the roles security has played in the trilateral relationship since 9/11. Is this a concern that is equally shared on both sides of these borders? Or is this a question of two close allies responding to what's seen as an American need, an American agenda, American wishes to toughen up both borders, north and south?

JORGE CASTANEDA: Well, Ray, I wouldn't want to speak for the Canadians, obviously. I think in Mexico we've been very forthcoming and very cooperative with the United States since 9/11 on security issues. Some of the things the Americans have asked for, we have done with great difficulty. Others we have suggested and they have accepted. And so I think we've come a long way.

But I agree completely with Prime Minister Campbell, Ray, that this could be a lost opportunity, this summit in Montebello, unless the three leaders really decide that they have nothing to be ashamed of in saying that they want to work towards a North American economic union, towards a North American security perimeter, towards a North American energy market.

If each one of the three leaders because of their domestic weaknesses get so scared of saying anything, of doing anything, of even moving an inch off just boiler-plate rhetoric, then this will be a huge lost opportunity. President Calderon has a lot to say about immigration, has a lot to say about drug enforcement, a lot to say about security.

President Bush has to understand that he has to combat his extreme right-wing in the United States which opposes any type of greater cooperation with Canada and with Mexico, because if he doesn't, they will eventually get to him and the Congress the way they got to him on immigration.

And Prime Minister Harper, I think, also perhaps should be a bit more forthcoming with a more trilateral vision of the relationship, instead of continuing to insist, as many Canadian prime ministers have in the past, that Canada has a better deal dealing bilaterally with the U.S. instead of trilateralizing the relationship, so to speak.

So I hope they really use this summit to move forward instead of standing still and being terrified of what their respective oppositions in the three countries would do to the three leaders if they were more forthright and clear about what they want.
Of course its hard to have open discussions when the agenda for Trilateralism and the New Contientalism is being pushed by the Corporate Elite.

The leaders will meet on Tuesday morning with the North American Competitiveness Council, a collection of 30 business leaders, 10 appointed by each country, who advise the leaders.

The Council was created in 2006 and is one of the only tangible results of the SPP process to date.

The group, whose Canadian executives include Dominic D'Alessandro of Manulife Financial, Paul Desmarais Jr. of Power Corporation, and Michael Sabia of Bell Canada, will present a progress report to the leaders.

It is the Council that is a main source of contention for critics of the SPP, who argue the North American governments are consulting only corporate leaders and ignoring labour leaders, human rights experts, environmentalists and even legislators.

"The problem with this process is that there has been no public consultation, and no parliamentary debate in any of our three countries," says Meera Karunananthan, a spokeswoman for the Council of Canadians, one of many activist organizations planning to attend the protests in Montebello.

You can't have authentic Trilateralism without Tripartitism, that is a balance between the interests of government, business and the missing partner in all this; labour and civil society.


SEE:

Will Canadian Labour Accept Free Trade?




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Mother Prevails


Mother Nature does what the protesters could not at the Trilateralist SPP/North American Union Summit in Montebello, Quebec.

Hurricane concerns to cut summit short


Oh he was hoping for more protesters to improve his profile?

Harper dismisses 'sad' summit protest as police fire tear gas

As riot police fired tear gas and pepper spray to hold back demonstrators outside the Montebello summit Monday, Stephen Harper shook hands with George W. Bush and dismissed the protest as a “sad” spectacle.

The prime minister welcomed Bush to the North American Leaders’ Summit as the U.S. president stepped off his helicopter on to the lush grounds of the posh — and heavily guarded — Chateau Montebello. “I’ve heard it’s nothing,” the prime minister said when asked whether he’d seen the protesters. “A couple hundred? It’s sad.”

And actually it was more than a couple of hundred protesters.

The protesters were among about 2,000 people who demonstrated for several hours outside the site of the meeting of U.S. President George W. Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Mexican President Felipe Calderon.


And it is a secret meeting after all, and has not been as well publicized as the "secret" meetings of the Bilderberg's, or Davos World Social Forum of the ruling classes. Which also did not get a lot of protests until after Seattle.


Hallmarks of the People’s Global Action (PGA)

As agreed to by social movements at the PGA Conference in Cochabamba, Bolivia, August 2001:

1. A very clear rejection of capitalism, imperialism and feudalism; all trade agreements, institutions and governments that promote destructive globalisation;

2. We reject all forms and systems of domination and discrimination including, but not limited to, patriarchy, racism and religious fundamentalism of all creeds. We embrace the full dignity of all human beings;

3. A confrontational attitude, since we do not think that lobbying can have a major impact in such biased and undemocratic organisations, in which transnational capital is the only real policy-maker;

4. A call to direct action and civil disobedience, support for social movements’ struggles, advocating forms of resistance which maximize respect for life and oppressed peoples’ rights, as well as the construction of local alternatives to global capitalism;

5. An organisational philosophy based on decentralisation and autonomy.

Ironically for Canada's Gnu Government, which which hates all things Liberal, and supports the SPP the idea for a North American Union was laid out back in the eighties by those nasty Liberals with their MacDonald Commission






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Monday, August 20, 2007

NAFTA Poisioning

With the liberalization of trade regulations, and the neo-con agenda of de-regulation, reducing public services, the privatization and contracting out of inspection services leads to consumer poisoning.

And it ain't just China that's to blame.

NAFTA2 aka the SPP is also to blame.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency is warning the public not to consume Los Angeles Salad Company Genuine Sweet Baby Carrots because the product may be contaminated with Shigella.

The item is labelled as product of Mexico and is sold in 672 gram plastic bags and sell by dates up to and including August 13th, this year.

The agency says the product was sold in Costco stores in British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario, Quebec and Newfoundland.




This is not the news story the three amigos and their corporate buddies wanted to hear this morning.



The Canadian Press reported Sunday night that the leaders will issue a statement regarding procedures aimed at keeping borders open should another 9/11-type emergency occur, yet political activists say there's apparent secrecy on other issues up for discussion.

They say business leaders have been invited to meetings with the "Three Amigos" in Montebello, while protesters have been shut out. Their signs and shouts will only be available to leaders via video link.

"We want Canadians, Americans and Mexicans to know that this is a big-business driven process, for them and by them, to deregulate all sorts of regulations across the board -- environment, health, safety worker standards," said Maude Barlow, chair of the Council of Canadians, the main group behind a protest in Ottawa on Sunday.



Last time it was organic American spinach, then organic carrots. And under the SPP agreement being discussed today America wants Canada to reduce its food safety regulations.

Regulatory harmonization, or regulatory co-operation as it is euphemistically called, is another top priority for business. Leaders have asked their officials to complete a "regulatory framework agreement" in time for the Montebello meeting. This will set the guidelines for many SPP initiatives. It is unlikely that we will see the full framework agreement, and even less so that we will see how it is applied in specific circumstances. Critics believe the government is preparing to weaken Canadian health, safety and environmental regulations and standards in the name of trade.

Let’s take the example of food safety. The SPP’s business council (the NACC) called for the harmonization of Canadian and U.S. lists of toxic substances, which are preventing some U.S. products from being sold in Canada. We also know that an SPP committee is working to resolve differences in pesticide maximum-residue limits. But will we ever know the outcome of these negotiations?

In this case, we do know now, thanks to an astute Ottawa Citizen reporter, who discovered that the Canadian government is in fact planning under the SPP to relax its requirements on pesticide residues on fruits and vegetables entering from the U.S. Some 40 per cent of the pesticides Canada regulates have stricter limits than U.S. regulations. The U.S. sees them as trade barriers and wants the list of priority pesticides to be relaxed. With the Bush administration aggressively dismantling its own regulatory systems, this harmonization concession amounts to Canada importing U.S. deregulation. Will this be the norm or the exception?

SEE:


The Truth About the Farm Crisis

Alberta State Capitalism


Fish Contamination


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Monday, August 13, 2007

North American Union (SPP) Protests In Alberta


The Three Amigos are in Montreal this coming week-end to discuss their secret corporate pact to create a single EU style market place on the North American Continent.

Teach Ins are planned across Canada including in Alberta. Home of Petro Powers That Be. Organizers are to be congratulated for focusing on making these protests Teach Ins rather than the usual street protests that follow the G8, WTO, etc.

Since most folks have no clue as to the nature of these binding yet secret corporatist-state agreements, the point is to inform them.

We did a Teach In in Edmonton during the APEC Energy Conference. Since few people knew anything about APEC or this corporatist state model for global governance.

The annual APEC meeting was held in Vancouver which resulted in the first RCMP Attack on protesters, which was to become national and international state security policy in dealing with anti-globalization protests.

August 19

Edmonton, Alberta
Protesting the SPP in Edmonton! Help preserve Canada’s sovereignty, join the protest.
Host: Protest The S.P.P.
Time: 10:00am - 2:00pm GMT
Where: Legislative Assembly of Alberta Street: 10800 - 97 Ave. Edmonton, AB

Calgary, Alberta

Protesting the North American Union
Host: Lindsay Ross and other concerned citizens!.
Time: 12:00 p.m. – 3 p.m. GMT
Where: Calgary City Hall, 800 Macleod Trail SE, Calgary, AB, then marching to the U.S. Consulate at 615 Macleod Trail for more speeches

For cross Canada protests see Verbena-19


See:

Free Labour = Free Of Unions

Derek Burney Voice of America

Deep Integration

Origins of the Captialist State In Canada

Time For A Canadian Steel Workers Union

Will Canadian Labour Accept Free Trade?

Cold Gold

Mittal Plays Monopoly


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