Re: Bill Maher Warns Canada Is A "Cautionary Tale" For U.S.: "We're Diving Off A Cliff"

On 2024-04-17 7:40 p.m., The Horny Goat wrote:

On Wed, 17 Apr 2024 04:30:55 -0400, Ubiquitous <weberm@polaris.net>
wrote:
 

Maher argued — during Friday’s broadcast of “Real Time” on HBO — that Canada
should serve as a “cautionary tale” for Americans who wanted the progressive
utopian ideal and thought that they could see it just across the border.

 The catch is in many respects there are multiple United States. Sure
you're all Americans but there are many different regions with greatly
different perspectives. Canada has the same situation regionally but
to a much lesser scale.
 I didn't hear the specific Maher clip you're referring to but have had
heard enough of him that I've got the general idea.
 

Maher began by saying that he agreed with those who said American liberals
should learn from  progressive countries that were getting things right — but
then he pointed out that it was equally important to recognize and
acknowledge flaws when they were present.

 Heck you could even look at Britain. On the other hand I have a cousin
(from WA state) who was doing the tourist thing in Europe and while
travelling in France met the Portugese fellow who has been the love of
her life - and they never left Paris.
 

Giving two examples, Maher noted that unemployment in the United States was
3.8% compared to Canada’s 6.1% — and that air quality in Canada was
measurably worse than in the United States.

 Which is an incredibly dumb comment since one could never compare
downtown NYC with Wyoming - or any other pair of places one could
name. Ditto Canada - if you compare downtown Toronto (or for that
matter the northern Alberta oil sands) to seaside Vancouver or Halifax
you'd get a totally different perspective. Bottom line is that both
the United States and Canada are huge by international standards.
 

“They say in politics liberals are the gas pedal and conservatives are the
brakes. And I’m generally with the gas pedal. But not if we’re driving off a
cliff,” Maher said, adding, “Canada was where every woke White college kid
wearing pajama pants outdoors who had it up to here with America’s racist
patriarchy dreamt of living someday. I mean, besides Gaza.”

 My father was no woke college kid in pajamas - he simply went to
college in Seattle and met a Canadian girl from Vancouver. (They
married between 3rd year and 4th year)
 

“There’s only one problem with thinking everything’s better in Canada: It’s
not. Not anymore, anyway,” Maher said, arguing that the housing crisis in
American cities was nothing compared to what was happening to the north. “The
median price of a home here is $346,000. In Canada converted to US dollars,
it’s 487. If Barbie moved to Winnipeg, she wouldn’t be able to afford her
dream house and Ken would be working at Tim Hortons.”

 No question Canada has had a housing problem these past 10 years and a
lot of it has been based on proportionately higher immigration rates
in Canada - particularly in urban cores - 70% of Canadian immigration
settles in Toronto and Vancouver which not surprisingly have the
highest price housing. What is particularly hard on first time buyers
(my children are now the age we were at when we bought for the first
time) are now competing with domestic and foreign REITs (real estate
investment trusts) in a way our generation wasn't.
 

Maher went on to note that the liberal dream of single-payer health care —
which Canada has — is also not living up to its promise: “Their vaunted
health care system, which ranks dead last among high income countries, and
access to primary health care, and the ability to see a doctor in a day or
two. And it’s not for lack of spending. Of the 30 countries with universal
coverage, Canada spends over 13% of its economy on it, which is a lot of
money for free health care. Look, I’m not saying Canada still isn’t a great
country, it is, but those aren’t paradise numbers.”

 Do Americans expect 'paradise'? Canadians don't.
 

“If Canada was an apartment, the lead feature might be America adjacent. And
if America was a rental car, Canada would be America or similar,” Maher
concluded. “And again, honestly, Canada, I’m not saying any of this because I
enjoy it. I don’t because I’ve always enjoyed you, but I need to cite you as
a cautionary tale to help my country. And the moral of that tale is ‘yes, you
can move too far left, and when you do, you wind up pushing the people in the
middle to the right.’ At its worst. Canada is what American voters think
happens when there’s no one putting a check on extreme wokeness.”

 Which is why people like me (Rhino too I think) are eagerly waiting
for the next election - which must be within the next 18 months.
(Canada doesn't have fixed election dates very much like the Brits)
 

Actually, we DO have (more-or-less) fixed election dates both federally and in some provinces, including mine, BUT I saw a story recently that the feds are developing legislation to delay the next federal election by approximately a week. (I didn't see a proper explanation but I strongly suspect it is to ensure that those who got elected in the 2019 election have just over 6 years in Parliament so they qualify for those very generous pensions.) I had not realized that our feds even had the ability to adjust election dates that way and I'm really not very happy about it.
Of course we do retain the ability to have early elections by defeating the government in a non-confidence motion or by simply calling one because the governing party thinks it can convert a minority to a majority, which Trudeau tried in 2021 but failed to get his majority. THAT is far more in line with the British tradition than the election dates in the US which are immovable due to the Constitution.

And Justin DOES currently have approval ratings at 30 year lows which
obviously thrills people like me who spent last Saturday at a federal
nomination convention for one of the major parties (not Trudeau's) You
can reasonably conlclude from this that I am at least as interested in
federal politics as your average state caucus-goer.

--
Rhino