Let Kids Be Kids

I don't know about you but I would say but kids aren't allowed to be kids anymore. They can't play like the way I did when I was growing up. Children today are being coddled too much. In some communities street hockey, hopscotch, kids riding bikes on sidewalks are not allowed. They have to wear helmets for what seems like everything now etc. The playground equipment is geared for the safety of the kids but doesn't look like much fun.

The playground equipment that we had when I was growing up in the '60's would be classified way too dangerous today, but we had fun. I don't remember anyone where I lived get an injury anything more serious than a broken arm. Nobody died. We all survived.

My husband told me back when he was a kid in England, he and a bunch of friends would go to an area that used be a landfill. It was a swampy area where there was still some garbage around and of course rats would be hanging around. Hubby said that he and his friends played Robin Hood and Tarzan and had a whale of a time. No one got hurt. No one got sick. Parents didn't panic.

Let kids be kids. Let them have fun exploring and being creative. They'll end up all the better for it.

Today's National Post has a great article on how our children are coddled today.

50 reasons to let children experience a little danger

"It really started as a snowball of observations that my friends' children were not having the kind of childhood that I did or even they did," says Gever Tulley, the California-based author of 50 Dangerous Things. "It got me thinking about how we become competent and where in the last 30 years we changed our definition of what kids are capable of."

The book's title is "deliberately provocative," he says, and it is meant as both a guidebook for fretful parents who want to loosen up and a "call to action for over-protected children," with instructions on safe ways to experiment with dangerous things.

"We create a false impression in our minds that children are in peril all the time and everywhere, when in fact, according to the most recent studies, this is the safest time in history for children," he said. "There couldn't be a better time to be running around outside playing."

HOW TO LIVE AND LEARN

Some of the 50 Dangerous Things author Gever Tulley says we should let our children do:

-Dam up a creek

-Burn things with a magnifying glass

-Throw a spear

-Drive a nail

-Drop from high places

-Whittle

-Make a rope swing

-Play with fire

-Melt glass

-Sleep in the wild

-Fly your homemade kite in a gale

-Cook something in the dishwasher (h/t) National Post

Canada, We Are Winners!

Oh Canada, be proud, we are winners! These Olympic games have instilled a patriotism in this country that I have never experienced before. We won 14 gold medals the more than another other nation. I am so proud of our athletes, all of them. Joannie Rochette especially touched my heart. Her gutsy performance just days after her mother suddenly passed away was nothing more that remarkable. I was in tears all through out her competition. Then we had our ice dancers, Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir. I had never witnessed a more beautiful ice dance. They made it look they were floating on ice. The curling had me riveted, so did the speed skating.
Now how about the hockey, our women were fabulous. What about our men, that gold medal game was heart stopper for sure but so sweet with the Sidney Crosby scoring that overtime goal assisted by one of my favorite hockey players, Jarome Iginila. Way to go Canada!

"What's happened, for me, is all of these things together have caused a different kind of patriotism to break out here, and it's beautiful to look at, and that as a whole for me is the prize," said Vancouver Organizing Committee CEO John Furlong. "There has been a euphoria here, and a change. Something has happened, and it's not just in Vancouver, it's all over the country.

"I think the country has taken a different position around these Games. They have not been spectators, they have lived every moment with us. And I think that is something that we can be proud of. I'm not sure how you describe that in a banner headline, but I'd like to think that this has been a great human occasion for the country."

Some called it a new Canadian patriotism, and perhaps that was part of it. These Games were certainly embraced on a staggering scale, from the flood of happy humanity in Vancouver's streets, to the crowds that lined up for hours to experience anything that had to do with the Olympics, to the millions of people across this country huddled around their televisions like they were prehistoric"
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"Patriotism is not about licensed apparel; one is a cause, and the other a symptom, and I feel like saying this was a new patriotism is too simple. We have always been proud of this grand experiment, proud to be Canadian, proud of who exactly we were. I feel like this was not just a flowering of the Canadian heart, but a revelation of it. It had always been there, beating away. We just decided to let the world see it. And we let ourselves see it, too.

"This," incoming Canadian Olympic Committee president Marcel Aubut said, "was nation-building at its best." Bruce Arthur

Is this a turning point in our country? I think so. Mediocrity in Canada is dead! We are winners. Lets not go back into our shell. Let's keep up our excellence in all areas not just sports. Let's keep this patriotism up! Wave your flags and sing Oh Canada! We are a great nation, never forget that! Let's keep showing the world, we are number one!

The Tea Party Movement Across the Pond

The Tea Party Movement that has been spreading like wildfire in the United States is now spreading into the UK. Daniel Hannan, British politician is hosting the first rally today in his home town of Brighton.

"The inaugural British Tea Party will take place on Saturday in my home town of Brighton, and I’ll be speaking. Do try to come: here are the details.

Labour has raised more than a trillion pounds in additional taxation since 1997. Yet, unbelievably, Gordon Brown has still managed to run up a deficit of 12.6 per cent of GDP (Greece’s is 12.7 per cent). A far lower level of taxation brought Americans out in spontaneous protest last year.

If you happen to be coming to the Conservative Spring Conference, do please pop in: the Tea Party is five minutes’ walk from the conference venue. It is, however, outside the security zone, and anyone is welcome to come. Oh, and this being England, we’ll be serving actual, you know, tea. I hope to see some of this blog’s readers there." Daniel Hannan,Telegraph

Mr. Hannan is a true conservative Brit of real substance. This guy I believe is a future Prime Minister of Great Britain. He is a pleasure to listen to.

Watch him as he blasts PM Gordon Brown. That video that went viral .



Here he is being interviewed by Neil Cavuto on Fox.

On Beck


On Hannity


You can see more of Hannan here.

I hope they have good success with the movement in the UK. I hope it spreads like wildfire over there too.
BTW. When is our tea party movement going start? Where is our Daniel Hannan?

Is It Time To Eliminate Equalization?

I don't know about you but I think it's time to get rid of the pesky equalization program. It is a constant thorn in the side of both the provincial and federal governments. It's basically a wealth transfer program where those so called "have provinces" contribute to the so called "have not provinces." It's an unfair program that we in Alberta have taken a big part of the brunt in having to pay into this socialist scheme.

"TORONTO -- The federal equalization program leads to worse public services in three "have" provinces -- Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia -- while "have-not" provinces maintain gold-plated public services and free-spending governments, say the authors of a new report released Wednesday.

"The evidence presented in this paper strongly suggests that, in many important areas, levels of government services in donor provinces such as Alberta and Ontario are significantly below those that exist in the major recipient provinces," the authors, Ben Eisen and Mark Milke, wrote in the report for the Winnipeg-based Frontier Centre for Public Policy.

They argue Ottawa should freeze the program with an eye toward scrapping it altogether.

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Quebec is the recipient of most equalization payments; it will receive almost $8.4-billion in 2009-10 out of a total equalization budget of $14.2-billion for the six receiving provinces.
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"Equalization was introduced in 1957 to promote comparable public services in all 10 provinces.

The federal program takes federal tax dollars and distributes them to provinces with lower per-capita fiscal capacity.

The formula used to measure fiscal capacity takes account of 33 different revenue sources. A province's fiscal capacity is then measured against the average of five chosen provinces (B.C, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec) and if it is lower, the province will receive equalization.

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"The current system is broken," the report ultimately concludes, "and the equalization program should be abolished or dramatically reformed to reduce the adverse, unintended consequences that the equalization program creates."(h/t) National Post

L. Ian MacDonald, QMI Agency has a very good column on how unequal, equalization is especially when it comes to Quebec. How they actually get more. I like the title of his piece,
Weaning Quebec from Alberta's purse

"As for tuition fees, it’s obvious that Quebec universities suffer from underfunding. Quebec residents pay only $1,700 a year to attend McGill — one of the Top 20-ranked universities in the world, while Ontario students pay three times as much to attend Queen’s or the University of Toronto.

Taxpayers pay the rest, including the taxpayers of Alberta who send $8 billion of equalization payments to Quebec every year.

But there is no evidence that the Charest government has the political courage to raise tuition fees anytime soon, even though it has a permission slip to do so from the youth wing of the Quebec Liberal Party.

Nor is there any evidence that it has the courage to raise day-care fees from $7 a day, when the actual cost is $49 a day — again subsidized by taxpayers, including the voters of Alberta through equalization. (Alberta sends $40 billion a year to Ottawa and gets only $19 billion back from the feds in transfers and entitlements, leaving $21 billion in equalization from Ottawa to the recipient provinces, which now include Ontario).

So Quebec, with 20% of the kids in the country, has 50% of all the day-care spaces in Canada."

I for one am sick and tired as an Albertan having to pay for social programs in Quebec especially right now. We have our own problems to take care of. We have a big budget deficit hole we need to dig our selves out of. Our health care is suffering, our education system is broken, our infrastructure is falling apart. We can't do it anymore. Why would they want our money anyway, it comes from dirty oil after all.

Alberta's Oil Patch Taxed Way Too Much!

No wonder our economy is suffering in Alberta . Our oil and gas industry pays higher taxes in the province than any other industry says Jack Mintz. He also says they're taxed higher than any other jurisdiction in the world. Thanks Ed!

"CALGARY - The oil and gas industry in Alberta pays higher royalties and taxes than other parts of the country and other jurisdictions around the world, according to Jack Mintz, the head of University of Calgary’s School of Public Policy.

In a report released Wednesday, Mintz said the energy industry is effectively taxed higher than other industries in the province after factoring in the royalties. In the report, Mintz advocated harmonized royalty structures."

The response from Ed Stelmach

"Premier Ed Stelmach is now fending off questions about the report, which says the government must rethink its royalty rates if it wants to remain competitive."


Gee, wonder why!

Response from CAPP (Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers

"The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers' Vice President, Greg Stringham, says the study, titled "Taxing Canada's Cash Cow" makes some good points.
He says investors want to see stability and predictability from the Alberta government."