Report on my trip to Vancouver...

[kameelyun]

...I'm moving there. Most incredible spot in the world to live.
It's got ocean, mountains, bay, gulf stream (mild summers and winters), clean air, excellent public transport esp the Sky train, and, the politics are more liberal and the drug culture more relaxed than San Francisco!

By the way, I was in Vancouver when the US DEA hassled the BC Marijuana Party bookstore in Downtown Vancouver, arrested Marc Emery and confiscated all the seeds in the store. I wasn't in that particular area that day, but the next day, I went down there, and found out about what happened.

The next day, the Vancouver Sun, the city's mainstream newspaper, carried a big headline as its leading story, "Uncle Sam Orchestrates Vancouver Pot Busts." Everyone was pissed.

A protest took place at the public square at the end of the block (closest to the Amsterdam portion of town). Lots of anti-US rhetoric. People holding upside-down US flags, and some signs said "USA - Fuck off."

I gladly joined in the protests against my country, and for you xenophobic right-wingers who take the "America: Love it or leave it" attitude, don't worry, I've already downloaded and printed the Canadian immigrations papers. :finger:

This was an outrage because the US attacked Canadian sovereignty. Their claim was that Marc Emery is a drug dealer to the US because he delivers marijuana seeds to Americans via his website. A DEA spokesman compared him to a drug warlord like Escobar.

It was quite something, being an American witness, outside my country, to how the US wields so much military and economic power as to be able to dictate other countries' policies.

Now more than ever, I realize how deluded, brainwashed, and ignorant are the folks who still believe that the USA "spreads freedom and democracy around the world." The next person who tells me that, I'm spitting in their face.

[Štulic]

That's so good to read things like that, props mate ...

[v3d4]

im glad you had a positive experience!

but i dont think you should buy into hate, dont feed the hate. that doesnt do you or anyone else any good. you kno what i mean?
positive action = positive change

[SmokeSomeDoja]

good shit, ive heard great things about canada -- watch out for the beaches tho, i heard theres alot of pierced dickheads and scrotums, haha -- to add to that violating canadian sovereignty business, id get used to it, because under northcom (i think, i forget the name at the moment) the u.s. can put american troops in canada carrying out american law...ill have to get back to you on the specifics, but its really fucked what the u.s. can do to canada

[Štulic]

Veda I like your attitude but don't you think it's sometimes too illusionistic and utopic, I mean would it change much if we all would become and act hippy-like, like in the 60's?
I don't think so.
Times changed and with it people too. We need new movementns and yes, more radical

[SmokeSomeDoja]

read in crossing the rubicon, from canada's national post:

Canada's military impotence threatens Canadian sovereignty because it invites the US to take steps to defend itself against terrorist attacks, even to the point of sending troops onto Canadian soil... [The head of a commission on Canadian security] said it is even possible, if Canada does not cooperate with Washington's continental security plans - that the Americans could seal the Canada-US border and deploy their armed forces in our territory if they felt it necessary.*

*Chris Wattie, "Canada 'all but undefended': study Institute says weakness invites 'anxious' US to violate our border in event of a crisis," The National Post, June 11, 2002, http://www.ccs21.org/ccs21nationalpo...5-06-11-02.htm

[Waves]

dont you think the rest of the world would flip out at this apparent occupation of canadian soil by US troops? Unless Canada agreed with it, which I dont see happening...

[SmokeSomeDoja]

since when did the u.s. give a shit about the rest of the world?

[patriot]

When kameelyun talked about the fact that the employers in Canada do not post garbage notices about their "drug free" workplace in the front of their stores.

[kameelyun]

^^^Specifically, Home Depot. Anyone ever notice that in the USA, every front of every Home Depot has a big, bold-face sign saying

NOTICE:
WE TEST ALL APPLICANTS FOR ILLEGAL DRUG USE
If you use drugs, don't bother to apply!

Well, my local bus stop in Vancouver was right across from a Canadian Home Depot, so with fifteen minutes to kill, I walked over and check out the front of the store. Not one of those fascist signs anywhere to be seen.

[Paranoid Android]

Congratz... hope you enjoy your stay in the best country in the world.