all things new found land

The core of the European crisis is a lack of economic freedom

2011-12-01T09:05:00.000-08:00

As the Greek crisis rapidly turn into the European crisis there is a scramble by world leaders to “fix it.” Of course it isn’t that easy because the real crisis in Europe is a systemic one; the real downfall of Europe is a lack of economic freedom and it isn’t going to be easy for European leaders to change that overnight.

I backed up the claim that a lack of freedom is the primary issue in a recent op-Ed I wrote with Fred McMahon. We examine where the Euro-countries place on the Fraser Institute’s Economic Freedom of the World Index:

A glance at the Eurozone countries shows us that nine out of 16 of the member countries fall under the “mostly free” category, five of the 16 are “relatively free,” and two of the countries are “relatively unfree.” The freest country in the Eurozone is Finland, ranked 11th in the world in the economic freedom index. In contrast the least free country, Greece, ranks 88th in the world. The massive difference in economic freedom enjoyed in different countries in the Eurozone creates a dividing line and it is pretty easy to see conflict arising across that line.

The list of countries that fall into the less free side of the line reads like a list of the economic problem children of Europe. Spain, Italy, and Portugal all fall into the “relatively free” category. Greece, the main problem child, is ranked “relatively unfree” on the index. The only country that has required assistance that is “mostly free” is Ireland, and Ireland has shown the strongest signs of economic recovery.

The “mostly free” United States has also experienced economic turmoil but the downturn there pales in comparison to Greece or Spain. No one but the most exaggerating of alarmists would claim that the American economy is in danger of imminent collapse, while the complete unraveling of the Greek economy is quite real. More so than in America, it is the less economic free countries of Europe that are bearing the brunt of the ongoing global economic crisis.

Some European countries (as we write above) are pretty high on the economic freedom index.
Proponents of economic freedom would expect these countries to be more able to handle the shock of the crisis, and so they are. At the same time, however, the freer Euro-countries are being dragged down with the not so free.

It isn’t because investors don’t trust Germany that the German bond auction went so badly. It is because investors now know that Germany is tied to the hip to countries that they do not trust. The bad economic policies of Italy and Greece are damaging the German economy and finances in a big way. At the same time the only thing that is keeping Greece from completely sinking is that they are tied to the hip of Finland and Germany

Ultimately, for the long run, there can only be one solution to this problem:

Austerity measures are not enough. Greece and the other troubled countries need to take a fundamental look at the very structure of their economies and find a way to increase economic freedom if they want to ensure a prosperous future for their citizens.

PARKING FOR PATIENTS SHOULD BE FREE

2011-12-01T08:46:00.000-08:00

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"This is parking-centred health care,
which is not compatible with patient-
centred health."

Canadian Medical Association
_________________________________

The issue of forcing patients to feed parking meters at medical facilities across the country has come under the microscope,again, this past week. A citizens revolt has begun here in St. John's led by

Candle Light Vigil Against Radical Islam In Our Schools

2011-12-01T08:18:00.000-08:00

The Canadian Hindu Advocacy, Jewish Defence League of Canada, Costa Christian Mission, and International Christian Voice would like to express our communities’ disgust with the surge in domestic violence and ‘honour killings’ afflicting Canada’s Islamic community.

On December 6th, the National Day of Action on Violence against Women, we will honour female victims of violence by protesting against the TDSB for permitting Islamic prayers and gender apartheid at Valley Park Middle School. We will hold this protest at Philosopher’s Walk (University of Toronto) to coincide with the location of the the White Ribbon Memorial.

December 6 Candlelight Vigil takes place at Philosopher's Walk, which is located between the Royal Ontario Museum and the University of Toronto's Varsity Stadium and Arena, near the major intersection of Bloor Street, Queen's Park Crescent and Avenue Road. The site is readily accessible via the TTC, as it is within a 5-minute walk of the Museum (Yonge-University-Spadina line) and St. George (Bloor and Yonge-University-Spadina line) subway stations.

More information here.

Uhm... didn't we liberate Kuwait some years ago?

2011-12-01T07:40:00.000-08:00

Liberated "Kuwaiti" Imam Preaches Essence Of Islam...Jews are Apes and Pigs etc etc etc...

GOBSMACKED WITH EDUCATIONAL OUTCOMES

2011-12-01T07:24:00.000-08:00

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"This curriculum, in its design, is fundamentally flawed"

Dr Sherry Mantyka

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Another day, another national report slamming aspects of the Newfoundland and Labrador education system. Last week it was early childhood education , this week it is junior high math, science and literature.

For a province that

Randy Hillier pushing to end pit bull ban

2011-12-01T06:04:00.000-08:00

Randy Hillier is leading the charge to repeal one of Dalton McGuinty's many bans, the ban on pit bulls. He is being joined by MPPs from both the Liberal Party and the NDP. Considering the multiparty nature of this move and the minority parliament, I am pretty hopeful that it will get through.

The pit bull ban is a classic example of government policy at its worst. It amounted to nothing more than headline chasing and lacked any pretense of being a measured response. For the sake of a positive news cycle the government took a little bit of freedom away from the people.

“My uncle sold me for 170 dollars to be a suicide bomber”

2011-12-01T04:21:00.000-08:00

Kabul - Sherzai was 13 years old when his uncle sold him to Taliban insurgents for 15,000 Pakistani rupees (170 dollars).

'Then the Taliban told me to carry out a suicide attack,' he said, now in a juvenile correctional facility in Kabul. 'They said I would be a martyr and I would go to paradise.'

The religion of peace.

Britain: Islam In, Christianity Out

2011-12-01T03:55:00.000-08:00

"During a debate in the House of Commons in May 2011 about the treatment of Christians around the world, Simpson said: "In the United Kingdom, the policy seems to be that people can do whatever they like against Christianity – criticize it or blaspheme the name of Christ – as long as they do not insult Islam."

Look no further than the OHRC or CHRC to see the same happening here.

Michael Coren & Mark Steyn

2011-12-01T03:30:00.000-08:00

Thank Sdmatt for the vid

“It’s just wrong to judge other cultures.”

2011-11-30T19:13:00.000-08:00

NB: This article appears in Education Forum, OSSTF's magazine. I'm shocked too.

"Moments Of Startling Clarity" Dr. Stephen L. Anderson

"The picture is horrific. Aisha’s beautiful eyes stare hauntingly back at you above the mangled hole that was once her nose. Some of my students could not even raise their eyes to look at it. I could see that many were experiencing deep emotions.

But I was not prepared for their reaction.

I had expected strong aversion; but that’s not what I got. Instead, they became confused. They seemed not to know what to think. They spoke timorously, afraid to make any moral judgment at all. They were unwilling to criticize any situation originating in a different culture.

They said, “Well, we might not like it, but maybe over there it’s okay.” One student said, “I don’t feel anything at all; I see lots of this kind of stuff .”

Another said (with no consciousness of self-contradiction), “It’s just wrong to judge other cultures.”

"While we may hope some are capable of bridging the gap between principled morality and this ethically vacuous relativism, it is evident that a good many are not. For them, the overriding message is “never judge, never criticize, never take a position.”

I bet he loses his job for that last line alone. Full page link here.

This is Bibi Aisha today. The surgery was performed by an evil Jew doctor.

Moments of Startling Clarity

Related: Out of the mouth of babes ... defeatism - Rondi Adamson

"Explain they did ... and all I can say is, out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained defeatism. Rather than the adorable youthful conviction that war is not the answer, these teens seemed sure of two things: 1) The United States is to blame for the anger and actions of Islamofascists, for "creating more enemies," and 2) War may be the answer, but since Islamofascists will always be two steps ahead of us, we're bound to lose."

“It can not be denied that many of the culprits have an ethnic background with a critical view of women,”

2011-11-30T18:27:00.000-08:00

"An alert has been put out for a “non-Western-looking” suspect after the most recent attack."

Oslo on the uptake.

Downunder human rights case: "Mr Motahari was asked to resubmit his final assignment, a book review, four times, to be told each time it was not his work".

John Oakley Show: Charles McVety vs. The Bitchy Whiner Who Wants To Censor SunTV

2011-11-30T17:15:00.000-08:00

My God but Erickson is a sickening whiner.

Thank Sdmatt for the vid.

"They also demanded a prayer room at the university" WTF?!?

2011-11-30T16:57:00.000-08:00

Tunisia secular, Islamist students clash on campus

They demanded a prayer room at the university? Tunisia is a muslim country and their universities don't have prayer rooms? Ours do.

h/t ds

Egypt's Islamist Parties Behave Much Like Obama's Democrats Observers Find

2011-11-30T15:58:00.000-08:00

Egypt's Islamist parties at work on election day

"According to a source from the Judges Club, judicial supervisors observed an Islamist party representative intimidating a judge in 15 May district as well as voters attempting to break into a polling station where one of the judges was absent.

Al-Tahrir cites Al-Nakib Center for Training and Democracy Support as reporting that FJP representatives at one station coerced voters and ripped the ballots of those who did not cooperate."

Democrats at work on election day

Danger 5....

2011-11-30T14:02:00.000-08:00

Looks good

Today's too dumb to live award...

2011-11-30T13:17:00.000-08:00

goes to...

Death to Pennies

2011-11-30T13:11:00.000-08:00

This makes sense:

And most of the arguments can apply to Canada too.

Government fails and the Happy Meal lives on

2011-11-30T12:21:00.000-08:00

Government regulators are all too often convinced that they know how we as individuals should live our lives and raise our children. At the same time most regulators are incredibly incompetent at getting people to do what they want.

Take this recent case in San Francisco as an example:

In order to include a toy with a meal, restaurants must now comply with city-generated nutritional standards. Those are standards that even the "healthier" Happy Meals McDonald's introduced earlier this year don't come close to meeting. (As SF Weekly noted in January, the school lunches our children eat aren't healthy enough to qualify, either).

And yet it seems McDonald's has turned lemons into lemonade -- and is selling the sugary drink to San Francisco's children. Local McDonald's employees tell SF Weekly the company has devised a solution that appears to comply with San Francisco's "Healthy Meal Incentive Ordinance" that could actually make the company more money -- and necessitate toy-happy youngsters to buy more Happy Meals.

It turns out San Francisco has not entirely vanquished the Happy Meal as we know it. Come Dec. 1, you can still buy the Happy Meal. But it doesn't come with a toy. For that, you'll have to pay an extra 10 cents.

It isn’t so much that they failed to force McDonald’s not to offer toys along with Happy Meals, that is funny enough but what really tickles me about this is how stupid the original premise is.

I remember loving Happy Meals as a child, but I don’t have any recollection of ever caring much about the crappy toys. At best I would play with the Happy Meal toys in the car ride home. If the toys didn’t come with the meals I don’t think I would have even noticed.

I suspect that I am not unique in this. Some children may have cared about the toys more than me, but I really doubt that many children liked the Happy Meals for the toys. The Happy Meals were good in of them selves. So the whole concept of stopping child obesity by forbidding toys be sold with unhealthy food is pretty much guaranteed to have a nil effect.

The fact that the policy failed even to stop the toys being sold with the meals is just icing on the cake.

Muslims Attack Christians in Egypt, 2 Killed, Homes and Stores Torched

2011-11-30T11:18:00.000-08:00

(AINA) -- "Thousands of Muslims attacked and besieged Copts in elGhorayzat village, population 80,000, killing two Copts and severely wounding others, as well as looting and torching homes and businesses. A quarrel between a Copt, John Hosni, and Mahmoud Abdel-Nazeer, who later died in hospital, turned into collective punishment of all Copts in the majority Christian village of elGhorayzat, in the Maragha district of Sohag province. Muslims vowed not to bury Abdel-Nazeer until John Hosni is punished. Mr. Hosni fled from the village with his family, "fearing a wholesale massacre of Copts," reported activist Mariam Ragy."

This happened on the 28th and received little attention due to the elections I suspect.

I'm providing the Luftwaffe coordinates for the TDSB...German school wins court backing for Muslim prayer ban

2011-11-30T10:32:00.000-08:00

"Tilman Nagel, an expert in Islam who appeared as a witness at an earlier court hearing, said that postponing midday prayers was acceptable if there was a good reason.

He also argued that the Islamic ritual of praying undertaken with other people was very different to the Christian private act of praying, and was thus disruptive in a public space."

....

In other new's TIFF honours a child rapist with a film retrospective
...

The genteel sport of Cage Fighting get's a Black Eye

Obama Praises Lunatic "Pastor" Jeremiah Wright

2011-11-30T10:10:00.000-08:00

Video obtained exclusively by The Daily Caller shows Illinois Senator Barack Obama, then campaigning for Democrats before the 2006 midterm elections, praising Reverend Jeremiah Wright and telling an audience that he “stole” the title of his book “The Audacity of Hope” from Wright’s sermon of the same name, which he “loved.” Obama also referred to Wright as “my pastor.”

Suffer the children...

2011-11-30T09:49:00.000-08:00

"Our children are being indoctrinated to think that a lot of depraved behaviour that goes under the cloak of "Gay Lifestyle" is something that they can experiment with and claim as their own natural feelings. The aggressiveness with which the gay lobby is trying to push their agenda is not making them any new friends .... quite the contrary.

RightSideNews has an article today talking about this issue and mention is made about how the Gay Agenda has taken hold of the Canadian schools' mandate."

CIJA To Consult Community On Section 13 - Just say no to Bernie's Law

2011-11-30T09:37:00.000-08:00

"Asked if the Jewish community would benefit from the retention of Section 13, Fogel stated: “What was intended as a shield against hate has become a sword. Certainly in its day, it was helpful in confronting the challenges related to the likes of [Holocaust denier] Ernst Zundel… What it has really done is create difficulties for those who might legitimately want to raise questions about groups or ideas that in fact are a threat to the Jewish community or Israel.

In effect, the act has become an instrument to chill critical debate about important issues like radical Islam.”

NATIONAL GRITS BOUNCE UPWARD BUT IS IT SUSTAINABLE

2011-11-30T09:05:00.000-08:00

The grits might have had the stuffing kicked out of them but they are not giving up!

Despite premature obituaries by many political pundits, the party appears to be on the move. Organizational they have been holding cross country conversations with supporters and fundraising campaigns have improved dramatically. It appears that they have finally realized that grassroots supporters are the key to

“Christians and Muslims alike…unite in their hatred of Zionism.."

2011-11-30T08:49:00.000-08:00

Why the hell are we a member of the U.N.? Anyone?