Beef industry Needs the Alta Alliance

[cakadu]

WD, thanks for your explanation. I will go and find the Alberta Alliance on the web and have a good look at what they have to say. I don't feel that any vote is wasted, so long as you are making it on an informed basis. You may feel that the vote is "wasted" but every vote counts and what is important is that people exercise their right to vote.

As for my statement about understanding - it is more than understanding your sentiment, it is understanding what motivates you to want to separate. I should clarify that I don't agree that it is the only alternative, nor do I think it is the best alternative. As to what would be best, it would have to be like anything else in life - negotiated so that all parties involved can get to a win position. Now, win/win does not mean that it is 50/50 by any stretch of the imagination.

I am not a David Suzuki fan by any stretch of the imagination, rather I see him as a publicist and a PR person and not as the scientist that he started out to be. Neither am I a Link Byfield fan and haven't been since the time he was writing for the Alberta Report. I do think he makes some sense, but I don't necessarily agree with everything he has to say either.

What I am is a critical thinker, which is why you will get questions from me so that I understand your viewpoint and can make an informed decision. Your position is that you want respect and will push to separate if you don't get it. What are the underlying interests for your position, ivbinconned? What makes you so interested in what Alberta does/does not do when you don't live here? We all do what we do for a reason, what are your beliefs values and interests in getting Alberta to "wake up"?

I don't think that the PC's will get in with the majority that they have enjoyed in the past - too many people are not happy with what they see in that Party. The time has come for the tide to turn.

[cowman]

I'll be voting Alliance. Don't really buy into everything they say but anything to send a message to Ralph and his gang of racketeers! Actually I consider our present MLA a complete dud who never should have got in!
I like how all these opposition parties can promise the moon, knowing full well they'll never have to deliver? So you get Mason and Taft making promises that are totally unreal and the Alliance promising things like $400 a cow!
I really doubt we'll see much of a change in the next legislature? Good old Redmonton will probably elect a few more NDP/Liberals but I doubt much else will change?
As far as the Green Party goes...maybe they should be called the Watermelon Party?...Green on the outside but red on the inside?

[ivbinconned]

Cakadoo; you ask questions of me but don't answer mine! What is your plan?? And don't tell me you just want to elect better people. That will never correct the STRUCTURAL flaws in our system that I repeatedly show you. You seem to want to only deal with the symptons and not address the cause.

You see "I have been conned" in the past, and understand that most public men and women are driven more by ego than principle, exposing the need for checks on ambition. This is my goal where ever I see it.

Alberta, the province where I was born and raised, but left to seek my fortune in Saskatchewan in 1972, is still of great interest to me as my family are all there including my own kids. Having had the advantage of living outside Alberta but living in a province manipulated by socialist intellectual midgets in government and the media has given me a perspective of Alberta that many Albertans’ don’t see.
The majority of Albertan’s, like Saskatchewanians have been deluded and manipulated into thinking that their success, however measured, is because of government instead of, INSPITE of government.
Why does Alberta interest me so? Because Albertan’s are the only people I see as having the motivation and guts to seek self determination and bring to an end the fraud that is Canada.

A man by the name of Davy Crockett traveled with a band of men hundreds of miles to die at the Alamo. When he got there he was asked “why did you come, this is not your fight!” He answered “it is because if freedom dies here, it is only a matter of time and it will die every where, we must take a stand”

Alberta is being robbed by CON-federation, the natural and earned riches of your province funneled down east to prop of one corrupt federal government after another, and one Quebec government after another!

The youngest provinces propping up the oldest???

This FACT so many of my postings have pointed out. Yet Albertans sit like frogs in the warming frying pan and watch their kin in Saskatchewan struggle, they know the history of the Maritimes…but is there a Crockett among you?

Your farmers get jailed for selling their own wheat…but are there enough Crocket’s among you?

A few years ago in Saskatoon 2500 farmers meet for a rally with the usual array of dignitaries (politicians), protesting the manner of importance given the agriculture sector. But where were the 20,000 to 30,000 Saskatoon Crockett’s who make a living from the spin off of agriculture production?

Edmund burke said; “When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.”

[grassfarmer]

ivbinconned, I really agree with your analogy of Crockett and the Alamo and how we need to be involved in issues that don't necessarily affect us directly today but may do so in the future. Perhaps you could pack your six-shooters and ride over to my thread entitled "Warning" and lend your support to that issue. The world is a bigger place than Western Canada afterall.

[ivbinconned]

Thanks; I guess I favor spending my limited influence and energy addressing issues close to me. If we can't have influence here at home how can we expect to have influence abroad?

But let me say this, monopoly's are always bad. Capitalism and free enterprise are not. When corporations use there influence with government to regulate there competition, they become a monopoly.

In Canada corporations have had a much freer enviroment to do what ever they please ie the packers!!

I will float an idea here where maybe few will notice and I won't get to bloody. Perhaps the Alberta government should take a page out of the 1970's Sask. NDP play book and give Tyson and Cargil 100 days notice. Limit yourselfs to 15% of the cattle on feed, OR name you price, OR expropriation action will commence.

Now before I slap myself or get cut up let me be clear. I do not advocate government owner ship of packing plants. After they become owned by the government, private Canadian (preferably Prarie) ownership must be assured.

I would suggest this only because I believe that the only reason Americans now own so much Canadian industry is because of the drastic dollar difference that exsisted for the past 30 years.

[cakadu]

I don't believe that electing the "right" people into political office is the best thing to do because what is right for you may not be right for me. Further, I firmly believe that many people get into politics with the firm belief that they are going to change things, but eventually get sucked into that great vortex known as the "p"olitics. There are very few that keep their original intentions and their integrity intact.

I question some of the statements being made -for example, how many on the east coast actually make $150,000 per year, even in a combined income? How many do that in Alberta? The gap between the haves and the have nots keeps getting bigger all the time and I don't like that any more than I think you do.

What does Saskatchewan get in transfer payments, as I would presume it is considered on of the "have not" provinces.

It is so easy to "lie" with statistics to prove a point or solidify one's position that sometimes it is hard to separate fact from almost fact from fiction. There is that old adage about believing none of what you hear, half of what you read and everything you see.

Incidentally, I would point out that my moniker on this site is "cakadu" or you may feel free to call me by my name, which is Linda, as many other regulars to the site call me.

I appreciate that this is your hill to die on ivbinconned - it just isn't mine. Having said that though, I am in 100% agreement that at all levels of government there has to be more accountability. I heard the other day that the provincial government is creating another department to ensure that all the existing departments are run more efficiently. Now if that isn't the ultimate is waste, I don't know what is.

As for a plan to bring the accountability to the fore, I see negotiation as being key. Who all the players at the table would be would likely be open for debate, but I'm sure we would have no trouble at all in getting people to the plate. This is an issue that should be decided by the people because it affects all of us.

[cakadu]

I don't believe that electing the "right" people into political office is the best thing to do because what is right for you may not be right for me. Further, I firmly believe that many people get into politics with the firm belief that they are going to change things, but eventually get sucked into that great vortex known as the "p"olitics. There are very few that keep their original intentions and their integrity intact.

I question some of the statements being made -for example, how many on the east coast actually make $150,000 per year, even in a combined income? How many do that in Alberta? The gap between the haves and the have nots keeps getting bigger all the time and I don't like that any more than I think you do.

What does Saskatchewan get in transfer payments, as I would presume it is considered on of the "have not" provinces.

It is so easy to "lie" with statistics to prove a point or solidify one's position that sometimes it is hard to separate fact from almost fact from fiction. There is that old adage about believing none of what you hear, half of what you read and everything you see.

Incidentally, I would point out that my moniker on this site is "cakadu" or you may feel free to call me by my name, which is Linda, as many other regulars to the site call me.

I appreciate that this is your hill to die on ivbinconned - it just isn't mine. Having said that though, I am in 100% agreement that at all levels of government there has to be more accountability. I heard the other day that the provincial government is creating another department to ensure that all the existing departments are run more efficiently. Now if that isn't the ultimate is waste, I don't know what is.

As for a plan to bring the accountability to the fore, I see negotiation as being key. Who all the players at the table would be would likely be open for debate, but I'm sure we would have no trouble at all in getting people to the plate. This is an issue that should be decided by the people because it affects all of us.

[cowman]

Linda: While I may disagree with you on some things/agree with you on others, I do agree with your right to see things as you see them. Ivebinconned has a lot of valid points...obviously I agree with just about everything he says in regards to western seperation.
I do find it offensive when people resort to name calling or derision of another persons true feelings. Hey we are all pilgrims on the path of life here, right? We see it as we see it?
Why would we ever consider trying to use derogatory language to put someones beliefs down?
Now I know Ivebinconned can be a little bit "over-dedicated" but I do believe he never meant to be derogatory! If he miss-spelled your name/moniker I am sure it was just a mistake?

[cakadu]

After reading an article in one of the local papers by one of the more off the wall writers (cowman, you can probably guess which person I am referring to) it came to me why I cannot fully get on board with this whole issue of how much money send away from this province. It is because it is focused on money and I am not motivated by money. Don't get me wrong, I want to have enough to live comfortably, but money on the whole doesn't mean that much to me.

We can't be passionate about all things and I am glad that there are people who are passionate about the whole separation issue, but it is not me. I have other things that I am passionate about and I pursue those interests.

To be more effective in getting people to take up a "cause", you have to find out what motivates each and every one of them so that individually they are able to envision some benefit in it for themselves, otherwise it is a non-starter. People today have too much occupying their minds, so if you can't find the right button to push, so to speak, you aren't going to get the support.

[dsinclair]

Right On Cakadu!! I agree wholeheartedly with you. Everyone has his own drum to beat. It is a sad and sorry day when individuals need to resort to ridicule and criticism to gain popular support. And such an atitude gets little respect from me. We still live in a democratic society and that means the right to decide based on information presented. If we decide against a particular way of thinking, that is our right. For me, anyone who resorts to bashing does not deserve my support. I believe in CANADA, whole and united, whatever that may mean. As for the AB election coming up, the PC's need to be taken down a notch (speaking from personal experience) and I believe they will be. They will be held more accountable. I feel the electorate is responsible for what it gets, but radical is not my bag!