Wednesday, October 14, 2009
For more than a decade we have been issuing a regular newsletter By George. This publication started as a CG&A COMMUNICATIONS mailing and evolved to an on-line quarterly. Today, By George has morphed into this on-line journal format.
From the mid-90’s to 2008, there has been 50 issues of By George. In November, from the [...]
Young Canadians voting for the first time in the next election likely don’t know anything about P.E.T., or the 1984 landslide, or the 1988 FTA debate. It is a stretch if they know of the 1993 Red Book and Chretien’s promises to scrap the GST and rip up NAFTA.
And, here are some other non-political [...]
Here are some contrarian thoughts from a book I recently read: Stealth Democracy: Americans’ Beliefs about How Government Should Work by John R. Hibbing and Elizabeth Theiss-Morse.
For me, Stealth Democracy explains a lot about our society and the average guy’s lack of concern for what is and isn’t happening in our country’s Parliaments. Even [...]
Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is serious.
Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in his shoes. That way, if he gets angry, he will be a mile away – and barefoot.
A closed mouth gathers no feet.
Eat well, stay fit, die anyway.
Age is a high price to [...]
George Bush is visiting the Queen of England…. He asks her, “Your Majesty, how do you run such an efficient government? Are there any tips you can give me?”
“Well,” says the Queen, “the most important thing is to surround yourselfwith intelligent people.”
Bush frowns. “But how do I know the people around me are really intelligent?”
The [...]
A Japanese company and an American company decided to have a canoe race on the Missouri River. Both teams practiced long and hard to reach their peak performance before the race. On the big day, the Japanese won by a mile. The Americans, very discouraged and depressed, decided to investigate the reason for the crushing [...]
There is nothing permanent except change. Heraclitus
You cannot step twice into the same river. Heraclitus
Everything changes but change itself. John F. Kennedy
Change is not merely necessary to life, it is life. Alvin Toffler
All change is a miracle to contemplate; but it is a miracle which is taking place every second. Henry [...]
So, is it possible to sum up our country in an all-encompassing motto? In 2007, the National Post editorial board conducted a contest to define ‘Canada’ in six words or less. Here are the top ten finalists:
Medicare, we’re dying to keep it - C.N. Johannesson, Calgary
If countries are clothes, we’re cardigans - Paul Meyer [...]
1. Giant beavers roamed Eurasia and North America in the Pleistocene era, rubbing shoulders with mastodons and mammoths. They were 10 feet in length, including tail just smaller than a MINI Cooper and weighed up to 800 pounds.
2. The modern beaver is the second-largest rodent in the world (the capybara of South America is [...]
A man sits down in his Center Ice seat to watch game 7 of the Stanley Cup playoffs, noticing the seat beside his is empty, and stayed that way through the entire first period. Finally, he leans over and asks the man on the other side of it, “Is anyone sitting there?”
“Nope,” the man shook [...]