[BartSimpson]

llama66 llama66:

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

Seriously, a decent enough military and an armed populace (militia) would be sufficient to deter just about anyone who isn't willing to go nuclear on you.

I think I prefer the Swiss model over the second amendment-y model. A gun in every home and military training on how to use it.

Isn't that what I said?

[CharlesAnthony]

Sunnyways Sunnyways:

Don’t buy local unless it’s the best or very close to it - otherwise you end up with bad deals and impressive amounts of corruption.

There are more police officers in the GTA than there are military in the entire country. I doubt the cops are unprepared.

Canuckletards who believe they need to feed NATO should turn their televisions off and start using their brains before it is too late. The truth is out there and it is hidden in plane site.

[Strutz]

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

Canada is in for some rough times, along with the rest of the global economy. To my mind, we probably should be spending more on defence, based on the risk of the US pulling out of NATO. Rather than this magic 2% number, it should be based on what Canada actually needs.

I'll likely vote for the party that will boost defence spending the most in the next election. It's that time.

Haven't we got through this in previous elections? Doesn't it always seem that the candidates all say they will support our military only to do squat about it once elected? Regardless who holds the reins nothing seems to change in this regard though I sure wish it would as well.

[bootlegga]

Strutz Strutz:

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

Canada is in for some rough times, along with the rest of the global economy. To my mind, we probably should be spending more on defence, based on the risk of the US pulling out of NATO. Rather than this magic 2% number, it should be based on what Canada actually needs.

I'll likely vote for the party that will boost defence spending the most in the next election. It's that time.

Haven't we got through this in previous elections? Doesn't it always seem that the candidates all say they will support our military only to do squat about it once elected? Regardless who holds the reins nothing seems to change in this regard though I sure wish it would as well.

Sadly, the problem is that most Canadians want more spent on health care, education and social programs (national daycare anyone?) than they do on national defence.

Harper tried playing the nationalist card with his "Canada First Defence Policy", but it never really translated into a lot of extra votes, so he did what every other politician has done since the 1960s, talked a good game about supporting the military, then cutting their funding whenever he could - defence spending initially rose under Harper, then dropped again towards the end of his last term.

[DrCaleb]

CharlesAnthony CharlesAnthony:

There are more police officers in the GTA than there are military in the entire country.

*Bzzzzzzzt*

Once again, you prove you don't 'get it'.

There are 68,000 active members in the Canadian Armed Forces. And about 5400 members of the Toronto Police Force.

[Thanos]

bootlegga bootlegga:

Strutz Strutz:

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

Canada is in for some rough times, along with the rest of the global economy. To my mind, we probably should be spending more on defence, based on the risk of the US pulling out of NATO. Rather than this magic 2% number, it should be based on what Canada actually needs.

I'll likely vote for the party that will boost defence spending the most in the next election. It's that time.

Haven't we got through this in previous elections? Doesn't it always seem that the candidates all say they will support our military only to do squat about it once elected? Regardless who holds the reins nothing seems to change in this regard though I sure wish it would as well.

Sadly, the problem is that most Canadians want more spent on health care, education and social programs (national daycare anyone?) than they do on national defence.

Harper tried playing the nationalist card with his "Canada First Defence Policy", but it never really translated into a lot of extra votes, so he did what every other politician has done since the 1960s, talked a good game about supporting the military, then cutting their funding whenever he could - defence spending initially rose under Harper, then dropped again towards the end of his last term.

Have any of these shipyards that multiple governments have backed that were supposed to create thousands of jobs ever actually put a functional ship to sea for the Canadian navy in the last decade? This is bullshit populist nationalism at it's very worst, spending billions to get nothing at all in return when it would have been far simpler and much cheaper to just buy the damn hulls from the US or had the Germans build the entire goddamn ships for us.

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

CharlesAnthony CharlesAnthony:

There are more police officers in the GTA than there are military in the entire country.

*Bzzzzzzzt*

Once again, you prove you don't 'get it'.

There are 68,000 active members in the Canadian Armed Forces. And about 5400 members of the Toronto Police Force.

+1 red pill & +1 creationist science medal pour vous.

[BartSimpson]

I'm hearing that JT is shuffling cabinet members today in response to the US trade issues.

Also, the US Commerce Department is going to put tariffs on uranium from Canada even though we import it from an American owned company.

[peck420]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

I'm hearing that JT is shuffling cabinet members today in response to the US trade issues.

Reshuffle is complete, but had very very little to do with Trump (one position was done specifically for Trump).

Far more with getting ready for the next election. Politicians...everywhere the same.

[bootlegga]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

Thanos Thanos:

Trump's regime has no intention of honouring their NATO agreements either, or their NAFTA ones, or anything else the US has signed since World War 2. On the scale of not living up to a commitment Canada's sins are far less in severity than America's.

It's insane how the anti-Trump crowd thinks that Trump nagging people to invest more in their own defense is going to be the death of NATO.

If he really wanted NATO to wither and die he'd say nothing and let it die on its own.

No, he'd say something like this and undermine the underpinnings of the entire NATO alliance (Article 5 and collective defence):

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video ... negro.html

Frankly, this is worse than his blunder in Helsinki, because this interview, coupled with the trade war he started, have undermined the entire Western World and our way of life.

[BartSimpson]

bootlegga bootlegga:

Frankly, this is worse than his blunder in Helsinki, because this interview, coupled with the trade war he started, have undermined the entire Western World and our way of life!!!!

I added some drama for you. It seemed called for since President Trump is being equated to an extinction-level event.

Meanwhile my stock portfolio continues to climb on all the good news Trump is creating.

[BeaverFever]

Actually markets have been choppy all year with no net gains, the S&P and the DOW are down from January.

$1:

Trump no longer talks a lot about the stock market. Here’s why

US President Donald Trump
President Trump spent the first year of his presidency singing the praises of the stock market, which rose precipitously in anticipation of GOP tax cuts and business-friendly deregulation.

Nearly seven months into 2018, Trump barely mentions the markets anymore. The S&P 500, considered one of the best representations of the U.S. stock market, closed at 2,718 on Friday.

Even as good economic news continues to make headlines, the stock markets have become volatile. The S&P is hovering at the same level it was in late December and early January.

During his first full year in office, Trump tweeted the phrase “stock market” 46 times, almost once a week.

Since Jan. 26, when the market topped out at 2,872 and headed into a correction, Trump has only tweeted about it twice.One of those tweets decried the seeming incongruence between the market and the steady stream of good economic news.

“In the 'old days,' when good news was reported, the Stock Market would go up. Today, when good news is reported, the Stock Market goes down. Big mistake, and we have so much good (great) news about the economy!” he lamented.

The switch makes sense.

In his first year in office, Trump had plenty to brag about when it came to stock performance.

The S&P 500 rose 23.9 percent from Jan. 20, 2017 to Jan. 20, 2018. Of the last eight presidents, only former President Obama had seen faster growth in his first year in office, at 30 percent, according to data from Microtrends.

Just a few months later, the S&P’s performance under Trump has fallen but is up 20 percent since his inauguration. That’s behind the 20.4 percent growth seen by former President George H. W. Bush over the same time period, the 24.8 under Obama and the 39.8 under former President Ford.

It’s possible the markets have stalled because the big market rally at the end of 2016 and for most of 2017 was an early indicator of sorts of the growing economy traders expected from tax cuts under Trump.

But Trump’s move to impose tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum and goods from China has also rattled Wall Street, where worries about a growing trade war are common.

“The markets were lulled into a sense of complacency in the first year of the president’s term,” said Michael Cembalest, chairman of market and investment strategy for J.P. Morgan Asset Management. “This year you’re getting the other side of Trumpism.”

Despite booming corporate profits and high consumer confidence, he said, Trump’s trade policy is putting a drag on stocks.

Trade wars, talks of withdrawing from institutions such as the World Trade Organization, blowing up at allies in the Group of Seven and overseeing a revolving door of advisers make markets jittery.

There are also some things that are out of Trump’s control — most notably the Federal Reserve’s plans to raise interest rates.

“If all these things are good and we still have this increasingly volatile market, who gets the blame?” said Cembalest. “I think it’s fair to say that 50 percent of it is a consequence of the expectations that the Fed’s going to normalize interest rates, and the other 50 percent is the White House, pure and simple. They are snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.”

Another element is the fact that markets are driven by expectations, meaning that traders’ views of what’s around the corner can be just as important as what’s happening right now.

“That’s the tough part about the market, is that it should always be a very forward-looking mechanism. You’re always looking at the next big thing,” said Amanda Agati, the co-chief investment strategist at PNC Financial Services Group.

“The hype and anticipation of the tax package was great for that market. That’s in the rear-view mirror now, so the new question is what that next big catalyst will be, what’s the next big needle mover?” she continued.

Market watchers also realize that the current economic expansion cannot go on forever. Viewed from the beginning of his term, Trump has enjoyed a robust market and unemployment that, at 3.8 percent, is at a nearly two-decade low.

While nobody expects a recession in the coming year, surveys show analysts expect one by the 2020 presidential elections.

“We’re another year into a very long cycle of growing, and the clock is ticking,” Agati noted.

Then there’s the fact that 2018 itself is an election year, and nobody is quite sure how to anticipate the results of November midterms, nor how they would affect policy.

“I think the market relative to last year is struggling with the potential outcome. Could there be a shift in power? And what does that mean for policy?” said Agati.

Some analysts warned that Trump’s early focus on the stock market could backfire if the mood in the market changes. One year’s stock performance has little bearing on the next year.

Former Presidents Clinton and Reagan, who saw substantial stock gains in their two terms in office, both oversaw anemic stock performances early in their first terms.

But others think there’s little danger in Trump’s changing messaging.

Doug Heye, the former communications director of the Republican National Committee, says that Trump has good reason to believe in his ability to change the conversation when it suits him.

“If we further remain distracted by the other good economic news, then the fact that he may have stopped talking about the Dow will not play much of a role in the elections,” he said.

Indeed, Trump has turned his attention to other favorable economic indicators, such as the unemployment rate.

After avoiding the word “unemployment” in his tweets in the first five months of his presidency, Trump has gone on to mention it 35 times since.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/05/trump-n ... s-why.html

[BartSimpson]

BeaverFever BeaverFever:

Actually markets have been choppy all year with no net gains, the S&P and the DOW are down from January.

I've had some wins and losses, for sure. But overall I'm doing fabulously mostly because I moved into industrials after the election. I figured they'd pick up due to Trump's trade policies and while I got smacked on some of them in 2017 I gained it all back and more this year.

[peck420]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

Also, the US Commerce Department is going to put tariffs on uranium from Canada even though we import it from an American owned company.

This will depend on the tariff.

If the tariff is for natural & compounds, then BWXT just moves some of their enrichment north, and bypasses the tariff.

If the tariff is for enriched, then neither of our sides really care.

If the tariff is for depleted...again, non-issue.

If the tariff is blanket, then we just pay more.

[bootlegga]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

bootlegga bootlegga:

Frankly, this is worse than his blunder in Helsinki, because this interview, coupled with the trade war he started, have undermined the entire Western World and our way of life!!!!

I added some drama for you. It seemed called for since President Trump is being equated to an extinction-level event.

Meanwhile my stock portfolio continues to climb on all the good news Trump is creating.

Laugh all you want, but Trump is slowly unraveling the political, economic and security systems established post war to stave off the Soviet Union. Everything the USSR sought to accomplish for more than five decades is being done by an American president - and the only nations it will benefit will be the Russians and maybe the Chinese in the coming years.

Here I thought you had some noble ideals in your head, but it turns out you're a profiteer just like Trump is. Enjoy your blood money, because the next time your nation comes calling after the next disaster, we'll be hanging up, and hopefully, so will everyone else. Maybe Russia can help the next time a Katrina or Sandy wipes out one of your cities.

[martin14]

bootlegga bootlegga:

to stave off the Soviet Union. Everything the USSR sought to

Yeah, ok, we won that one in 1989. 30 years ago.