Partisan Issues – Fact Based Exploration of Political Issues

Angry About Policy?

Angry About Policy? We try to reduce the emotion and look at the facts.

Energy Industry Got You Worried?

Energy Industry Got You Worried? We cover energy industry from 'oil sands', to nuclear power, to pipelines.

Thinking About US Domination?

Thinking About US Domination? We focus on the Canadian perspective including Britain, Germany, China, Japan and even the US!

Future Tech?

Future Tech? If it involves regulations or government interventions, from solar panels, to autonomous cars, to cyber-crime, we cover it.

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VIDEO: Is Canada Being A Boy Scout by Continuing To Prosecute SNC Lavalin?

There is a lot of hype around possible political interference in the prosecution of SNC Lavalin Libyan & Algerian bribery scandals involving Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the Prime Ministers Office and former Canadian Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould. However, we want to know why the Canadian Government is still so aggressively going after SNC in the first place. Karl Moore of McGill University explains in the video below that SNC Lavalin has already repeatedly admitted guilt and paid massive fines in various…

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Do You Think Jason Kenny Would Shovel Out His Neighbors Driveway? Where is My Right Wing Party?

I have helped the Alberta Wild Rose a.k.a. United Conversation Party (UCP) and the Federal Conservatives in many ways over the decades. From telecom equipment, to consulting, to canvasing, to paying for advertising, to IT support, to donations, to… well you get the point. However I have found it increasingly difficult to support the Alberta UCP and the Federal Conservatives in recent years and today may have been the breaking point. I was out shoveling my neighbors driveways when I…

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VIDEO: Did Cryptocurrency Exchange Boss Fake His Own Death To Steal All The Money?

If the insane value gyrations, scams and exchange failures of crypto currencies have not scared you away from them, this story should do the trick. QuadrigaCX was a Canadian based Crypto Currency Exchange until a few days ago when the founder, Gerald Cotten, died and took the decryption codes to his grave. This means about CDN $200M of ‘investor’ money is forever lost in hyperspace. To make this story worse, the are some very smelly peculiarities to it: It is extremely unusual that…

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What is the ‘Oil Curse’ and How It Applies to Amazon and Walmart

The “Oil Curse” or “Curse of Oil” or “Resource Curse” is the net negative outcome that is seen with any single industry that takes over a geographic area. The central idea is that when oil is discovered in an undeveloped land, like rural Africa, the initial promise of great wealth results in rapid development and that leads to what economists call ‘externalities’. Externalities are charges that should be calculated as part of the cost of development but instead are pushed…

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Graphical Breakdown of All Carbon Emissions By Source

There is a lot of conversation around various sources of pollution but many of them have no context so you really can’t get a mental grip on how serious the problem really is. Below is a chart we built with data collected by the University of Calgary. We hope it will help you put things in perspective. This data is specific to Canada in 2015 and while the numbers are shown in the outermost ring and in the table below,…

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Why Artificial Intelligence Isn’t Very Intelligent

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has constant news coverage today and global thinkers like Elon Musk and Bill Gates warn of a dangerous future. A dystopian world run by robots and computers powered by AI not unlike that shown in the Hollywood blockbuster Terminator 2 is one that could come to pass, but it is highly unlikely to occur in your children’s lifetime. The original title of this article was “What’s In A Name? Change Algorithm to Artificial Intelligence & You Have your…

Tan Lines Of The Next Generation

Tan Lines Of The Next Generation

Someone sent this to us a few months ago. I think this accurately depicts the cell phone generation but also… ok… almost everyone under 50 years old. Someone sent this to us a few months ago without a credit so if you know who penned this let us know and we will provide them credit.

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Where Are Canada’s Oil Refineries & How Big Are They?

We wanted to know more about Canada’s oil refineries so we spent a few hours collecting information and mapping it. We show where the refineries are, the year they were constructed and how much they produce. The bubbles are scaled correctly to give you a sense of proportion at a glance. Click to Expand Map Location Year Constructed Operator Details Type Capacity (in 1000s) Lat Long Burnaby, BC 1936 Parkland Fuel (formerly Chevron) Refinery 55 49.1 123 Prince George,…

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Don’t Compare Oshawa GM to Alberta Pipelines

Three days ago Linda Mcquaig wrote an article in the Toronto Star saying: Trudeau should consider buying GM and making electric cars …Yet, oddly, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau showed no such careful consideration when he promptly jumped in with 4.5 billion taxpayer dollars to purchase the leaky, 65-year-old Trans Mountain pipeline last spring, declaring it “in the national interest” to ensure the pipeline’s expansion after the corporate owner threatened to back out of the project. And taxpayers could be on…

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10 Quick Facts About The US Presidents Power To Declare a National Emergency

It turns out that US Presidents have not been shy about declaring so called “National Emergencies” through history and there are things you should know. Here are the quick facts about National Emergencies: Nothing can stop US President from declaring a National Emergency but acting on that declaration is another matter . As of January 2019 the US lives under 31 National Emergency declarations, the oldest is from Jimmy Carter in 1979 . The right to declare a National Emergency…

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VIDEO: Why More Coal Plants Have Shut In Trumps First 2 Years Than Obama’s First 4

Most casual observers hear sound bites and web clips talking about coal jobs coming back to the United States and think that it must be happening, but it just isn’t. The Trump EPA and other regulatory bodies have notably deregulated the coal business, but you can’t sell what people don’t want. In this case ‘people’ are the companies that produce electricity, and they don’t want coal. Power companies have turned toward a much more stable form of energy input that…

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Albertans: Your Local Government Owes You $10K – CFIB Ranks Every Alberta Municipality

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) just published a report that can be used as an efficiency rating for Alberta Towns and Cities. The idea of the report was to note that most Alberta Towns and Cities have been spending at an unsustainable rate. The CFIB found that between 2006 and 2016: If Municipal operating spending had been tied to inflation plus population growth, each household in Alberta would have saved $1,624 in 2016 alone. Over the ten year period…

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Why Trump Supporters Are So Insistent on a Border Wall With Mexico… And Its Not What You Think

Donald Trump and friends have been banging on this border wall idea for years and their supporters are energized by it. Our editorial staff have spent days thinking about how Trump supporters could be so insistent that a border wall is needed when it so obviously is not (let’s not argue the pro’s and con’s here, just follow the big picture logic below)… and we think we came up with the answer. In short, Trump / Wall supporters don’t know…

Should You Be Afraid of the Islamic Party of Ontario?

So should you be concerned or even afraid of the Islamic Party of Ontario? That is a fair question as Canada is a very liberal democracy and the IPoO is… well… not. We spent several hours researching the party and wrote up the 10 Quick Facts You Should Know About the Islamic Party of Ontario which includes: 4 – The Islamic Party of Ontario wants to roll back or ban: Abortion: Abortion is a federal issue so Provincial parties are free to…

10 Quick Facts You Should Know About The Islamic Party Of Ontario

We recently saw the graphic shown on the right (click to enlarge it) that seems to be a slander campaign about the so called “Islamic Party of Ontario”. So we decided to look into the situation and pulled out the following facts. 1 – The Islamic Party of Ontario is Real: They have a poor quality but apparently legitimate website with a notable founder and leader Jawed Anwar. There has been some effort to tie the Islamic Party of Ontario…

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The US Has 5 Times The Percentage of High Income Earners Compared to Canada

US vs Canada Income Distribution Explained in a Simple Graph. In the graph below we compare American and Canadian Individual (as opposed to household) incomes. In particular we were interested in the difference in income distributions. To get to the point, you can see that: If you earn more than USD $50K you are in the top 25% of Canadians but 35% of Americans If you earn more than USD $100K you are in the top 2% of Canadians but…