Bush faces protests during Calgary (Canada) talk

[LargoWinch]

I wonder if Bush will be as popular as Clinton with conferences (and the associated fees)?
-W.

By Robert Remington and Richard Cuthbertson
Canwest News Service
March 18, 2009



In his first speech since leaving the White House, former U.S. President George W. Bush defended free trade and free markets, railed against isolationism, and told a friendly Calgary audience that Canada should be America's major supplier of oil.

With his appearance in Calgary on Tuesday, the man who remains reviled by many for his so-called war on terror also showed he could still draw a crowd -- as about 200 protesters gathered outside the site of his address.

In his address at a $400-a-plate luncheon, Bush emphasized he was not criticizing his successor, President Barack Obama, but cautioned against too much government involvement in the current economic downturn.

"It's the risk takers, not the government, that is going to pull us out of this recession.

"My message to policy-makers is, don't substitute government for the marketplace. Don't become protectionist. I'm a free trader to the core."

...

See full Article here:
http://www.canada.com/Bush+faces+pro...683/story.html

[petertribo]

Re: Bush faces protests during Calgary (Canada) talk

A British Member Of Parliament banned from Canada:

OTTAWA -- Controversial British MP George Galloway is vowing to take the Canadian government to court for barring him from entering the country for a speaking tour about the Middle East.

Although he has visited Canada before, the Canada Border Services Agency declared him inadmissible on national-security grounds and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney decided he would not use his power to let Mr. Galloway in.

"We're not going to seek to overturn that [CBSA] assessment in order to let into the country someone who has provided financial support to Hamas, a banned terrorist organization in Canada, and someone who is, in a sense, a popinjay for those Taliban fighters who are trying to kill Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan," said Mr. Kenney's spokesman, Alykhan Velshi.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servl...query=galloway

I guess you would not want to be sitting next to Dangerous George in the Commons.

[LargoWinch]

Re: Bush faces protests during Calgary (Canada) talk

A British Member Of Parliament banned from Canada:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servl...query=galloway

I guess you would not want to be sitting next to Dangerous George in the Commons.

Mr. Galloway voted against the Iraq war from the onset and is delivering much needed supplies in a war zone.

Based on this article (which is all I know about the guy) he is a hero and should be welcomed in Canada as such.

[Shakespear]

Re: Bush faces protests during Calgary (Canada) talk

Mr. Galloway once came to DC to give testimony regarding payments from shady sources (if I'm correct) and delivered a speech that few there will forget. He basically said it like it was which no one ,I think, expected. Since that time I don't think much has happened to him legally so where is the beef?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...o-justice.html

Guess Canada (gov) does not want a high profile guy like him speaking his mind on Canadian soil. It is amazing how Canadian gov. has changed over the years

[LargoWinch]

Re: Bush faces protests during Calgary (Canada) talk

Guess Canada (gov) does not want a high profile guy like him speaking his mind on Canadian soil. It is amazing how Canadian gov. has changed over the years

Agreed.

I will add what you are too polite to say: [has changed] for the worse.

[Mango]

Re: Bush faces protests during Calgary (Canada) talk

"It's the risk takers, not the government, that is going to pull us out of this recession." ?????

As if Bush's favorite risk takers haven't gotten us into enough trouble already. GWB is lucky he got out of Washington when he did, while the rest of us are unlucky that it wasn't far sooner.

[GRG55]

Re: Bush faces protests during Calgary (Canada) talk

Agreed.

I will add what you are too polite to say: [has changed] for the worse.

I'll call B.S. on this...;)

At the core the Canadian Federal Government hasn't changed one teeny, tiny little bit since WWII, regardless of the party in power. We are a firm one party state with no true distinction between the two major parties, other than the colour of their campaign banners.
Long ago policy converged to the center and any differences between the parties are truly at the fringes and in the margins...there is no substantive difference in core policies at all. There hasn't been for 60 years. Look at the campaigns, which consist mostly of a contest to see who can promise more taxpayer funded goodies for the voters. The arguments are never about "what" but always about "how much". The brief period of "restraint" that the Liberals claim as their doing was actually on the back of massive tax increases during the Mulroney years when Michael Wilson was the Finance Minister [partial de-indexing of the base personal income tax exemption, and the introduction of the GST, among them]. Initially as Finance Minister Paul Martin continued that tradition...remember his infamous "Canadians like to pay taxes" statement? Apparently he didn't fit in with the rest of us so well because his company, CSL, moved its headquarters from Liberia to Barbados, specifically to avoid Canadian corporate taxes through a tax haven loophole that he left open in his first budget as Finance Minister in 1994. Nice work, if you can get it, eh.

The Liberals under Cretien campaigned to eliminate the GST, and once elected didn't. The Tories campaigned under a policy of not tinkering with the royalty trust tax policy, and did. Worthless politicians lying and breaking their useless promises. What's the difference? So what's new?

Today the Tories are "pissing money down a rat hole" [to quote former Bank of Canada Governor David Dodge, in an interview last week ] while the Liberals squawk that, unlike Obama, the Tory government is grossly deficient because it 1) isn't pissing away enough money in aggregate; and 2) it isn't pissing it away nearly fast enough. This from the party that alleges that the Tories are always too close to the dreaded Americans. Now apparently we aren't enough like them. Go figure.

What a pathetic joke is the whole affair. The only reason Canada looks like a well governed nation is because such an overwhelming number of the rest of the world's citizens are served even more abysmally by their governments.

[LargoWinch]

Re: Bush faces protests during Calgary (Canada) talk

I'll call B.S. on this...;)

At the core the Canadian Federal Government hasn't changed one teeny, tiny little bit since WWII, regardless of the party in power. We are a firm one party state with no true distinction between the two major parties, other than the colour of their campaign banners.
Long ago policy converged to the center and any differences between the parties are truly at the fringes and in the margins...there is no substantive difference in core policies at all. There hasn't been for 60 years. Look at the campaigns, which consist mostly of a contest to see who can promise more taxpayer funded goodies for the voters. The arguments are never about "what" but always about "how much". The brief period of "restraint" that the Liberals claim as their doing was actually on the back of massive tax increases during the Mulroney years when Michael Wilson was the Finance Minister [partial de-indexing of the base personal income tax exemption, and the introduction of the GST, among them]. Initially as Finance Minister Paul Martin continued that tradition...remember his infamous "Canadians like to pay taxes" statement? Apparently he didn't fit in with the rest of us so well because his company, CSL, moved its headquarters from Liberia to Barbados, specifically to avoid Canadian corporate taxes through a tax haven loophole that he left open in his first budget as Finance Minister in 1994. Nice work, if you can get it, eh.

The Liberals under Cretien campaigned to eliminate the GST, and once elected didn't. The Tories campaigned under a policy of not tinkering with the royalty trust tax policy, and did. Worthless politicians lying and breaking their useless promises. What's the difference? So what's new?

Today the Tories are "pissing money down a rat hole" [to quote former Bank of Canada Governor David Dodge, in an interview last week ] while the Liberals squawk that, unlike Obama, the Tory government is grossly deficient because it 1) isn't pissing away enough money in aggregate; and 2) it isn't pissing it away nearly fast enough. This from the party that alleges that the Tories are always too close to the dreaded Americans. Now apparently we aren't enough like them. Go figure.

What a pathetic joke is the whole affair. The only reason Canada looks like a well governed nation is because such an overwhelming number of the rest of the world's citizens are served even more abysmally by their governments.

Well Greg, you just shattered my belief that we once had sensible governance...even if it was a long time ago.

There is much more work to to do than I could have imagined...

[GRG55]

Re: Bush faces protests during Calgary (Canada) talk

Well Greg, you just shattered my belief that we once had sensible governance...even if it was a long time ago.

There is much more work to to do than I could have imagined...

Hey, when the former top dog at the Bank of Canada uses language such as "pissing money down a rat hole", that pretty well says it all. :p

We've got a great country Largo. But it could be so much more if only...