44 Replies to “If You’re So Much Smarter Than Your Grandparents”

  1. My parents wondered recently why Brad Wall is going all the way to Ireland to find workers for Saskatchewan, when there are so many unemployed Americans looking for work.
    A friend of mine explained that Americans don’t leave where they’re from. They wouldn’t think of going across the their own country like Maritimers heading to Alberta, just to get a job. They certainly wouldn’t entertain the notion of leaving America to work.
    Better to bring in the Irish. They know what it’s like to travel in search of adventure and opportunity.

  2. Jeff- All the desirable workers in SK moved to AB years ago. I know a few Irish who are willing to work, but you have to think most of the good ones have left already, just as most of the good Newfies are already in AB. I know of an offer that was made to New Orleans residents, just after their flood. An AB church group offered to move 7 families here, find them employment, and provide them accomodations. The deal fell through, because they couldn’t find 7 families willing to make the move. I’m not sure what strings were attached, but it’s a sad story, in any case.

  3. Drive down the road around here and you will see plates from Alaska to Texas. But the US workers come here for the work and leave. The Irish come and stay. They bring their wife and kids and stay. That is building our pro. There is still more US workers by far, but they don’t stay.

  4. My parents wondered recently why Brad Wall is going all the way to Ireland to find workers for Saskatchewan, when there are so many unemployed Americans looking for work. Jeff
    Irish workers who respond to this offer understand they are basically temp workers, as they have essentially commuted to England for decades, and are use to temporary work. Probably less of an entitlement mentality for the same reason.

  5. coach wrote, “I know of an offer that was made to New Orleans residents, just after their flood. An AB church group offered to move 7 families here, find them employment, and provide them accomodations. The deal fell through, because they couldn’t find 7 families willing to make the move.”
    The difference in climate was probably the deal killer. -4F in SK in January, vs 50F in New Orleans in January.
    Then there’s the snow.

  6. My mother was practically estranged from her family in the Maritimes because she dared to “go west” with my father when he was transferred. They moved a few times before settling in AB and making a wonderful life for themselves. One of my cousins followed years later and was similarly nearly shunned. The majority of Maritimers just don’t seem to see the freedom and opportunities to be had in the west. Whether it’s the entitlement mentality fostered by the Lieberals over the years or just inertia I can’t speak to. When I joined the federal public service, (we have since been privatised and have thrived like never before) I ended up seeing parts of the country I never would have seen otherwise. The Arctic, the Yukon and northeastern and northwestern AB, and now the wet (lefty) coast. I like to think I got the urge to move from my parents example. Anyone who won’t move to where the jobs are should be ashamed of themselves.

  7. Lots of our grandparents came to Canada fleeing the deathtrap that Europe became at the end of the 19th Century. They saw they weren’t going to be able to stay and fix it, so they decamped and went to another continent, missed out on two world wars and two megadeath murder states.
    For my part I chased jobs all over North America and ended up right back home like I never left, except with a bit of money and a major attitude.
    Where the hell are -our- kids supposed to go? West again? China is full already.

  8. When they realize life is passing them by, they will emerge from their parents’ basements and go tent out in a park or public square with others like them and demand their entitlements. They will wear cool masks that bear grinning likenesses of that goateed fop Justin Trudeau.

  9. Even in Newfoundland there are young people who won’t travel to work. There is a word for them, “hangashores”, actually an Irish word.
    They are also called “NDP supporters.”

  10. All I know is it sure isn’t hard to be better than the next guy at any job. Not much for competition out there…

  11. If you’re older than Generation X, you should probably not complain about younger generations. After all, it’s the politicians you elected, the policies you’ve favoured, the ideas you championed that bankrupted our governments, transformed our institutions into social experimentation laboratories, and are in the process of destroying the middle class.
    You should also keep in mind that all of those wonderful entitlements that you will be the last to enjoy are paid for by all of us younger workers.
    Generation Y may be lazy and enervated (though I find it odd that conservatives are now big believers in the social sciences accepting their conclusions without question) but you were selfish, greedy, careless, and destructive. So, just excuse us and shut up while we try to clean up your mess.

  13. @slaw
    That’s loser talk. A fairly heavy balance sheet is the worst thing your generation has to deal with?
    Cry me a river.
    Lot’s of that deficit money was spent on stuff you benefited from. Baby hospitals, public schools, transportation…etc.
    (Of course a lot of it was spent on garbage, but that’s life)
    When my Grandfather moved to Canada he lived in a hole in the ground over winter because his parents didn’t have time to build a house themselves.
    He died having built over a million dollars in assests.
    Gen Y has to deal with not terrific voting history choices, and a somewhat high debt-to-GDP ratio……might as well just kill yourself with that kind of challenge.

  14. My outlaws moved to Edmonchuk from PEI in 1948,and bred and died here.In the 51 years my mother-in-law lived here,her ENTIRE family never once contacted her.Total alienation.(BTW.I hail from NB myself). It seems to me that anybody born on/after around 1970,just don’t want the jobs if it involves moving more then 5 minutes from mommy’s basement.

  15. Kids are fat because they can’t play anymore. No real playgrounds, now replaced by “safe” useless apparatus, that are no fun. Parents that don’t allow their children to go to them or even play outside. Let alone run with other kids. As a kid i used to at 8 hunt gophers for 25 cents with a 22. Can you imagine the horror today by the helicopter parents over that? Swat teams would be after me.
    No its not video games nor food that making the wee ones fat. Its the manic attitudes of parents & a Nanny state gone mad.

  16. Gen Y finally gets out of their parent’s basement and meets the real world. Immediately blames problems on the previous generation. Sounds like a typical leftist.
    Well yeah, I guess if you haven’t actually done anything it wouldn’t be your fault. Boohoo, mommy and daddy didn’t leave me a perfect world. Talk about entitlement.

  17. “My parents wondered recently why Brad Wall is going all the way to Ireland to find workers for Saskatchewan, when there are so many unemployed Americans looking for work.
    A friend of mine explained that Americans don’t leave where they’re from. They wouldn’t think of going across the their own country like Maritimers heading to Alberta, just to get a job. They certainly wouldn’t entertain the notion of leaving America to work.”
    I would have come up there to work if your government hadn’t banned handgun ownership for the masses. I even have a girlfriend up there already, but I just cannot wrap my head around the idea of no self-defense, nor getting rid of my collection of fine weaponry.

  18. Sorry Slaw, I beg to differ.
    I am at the tail end of the boomer generation, my parents the beginning…No welfare, No UI, no entitlements. We were not, and are not the lazy generation. However I will grant you the desire to make life better and misguided beliefs that we should be kinder and more understanding has backfired and helped create a portion of this mess. A discussion needs to take place without the finger pointing, your telling me to “shut up” while you clean up this mess is completely unjustified….We are watching the fruits of our labour being thrown away and worry as you do for our children and grandchildren. I was too young to vote for Trudeau however I am old enough to see what his utopian policies have done to this Country, I am also a descendant of early settlers and pioneers and the grandaughter and niece of WW2 veterans blown out of tanks and POW’s.
    I resent your inflammatory words!

  19. This current group of youngsters have been more coddled by their parents than any previous generation. This widespread phenomenon of kids living with their parents into middle age is something new. In my youth, kids were expected to strike out on their own shortly after high school and become productive members of society.

  20. “I would have come up there to work if your government hadn’t banned handgun ownership for the masses. I even have a girlfriend up there already, but I just cannot wrap my head around the idea of no self-defense, nor getting rid of my collection of fine weaponry.” TEXAS
    You gotta use FISTS OF FURY against those who would harm you. I took a Krav Maga class that taught me how to fight three guys at the same time and disarm someone pointing a gun at me.
    My left and right legs are licensed to kill.
    My guns are my arms and they’re locked and loaded.
    My whole body is a weapon of mass destruction. That’s how we roll in Canada!

  21. LOL Jeff. Thanks for the chuckle.
    I daresay you might not want to go hand to hand with a bruin or large kitty cat, or an upset momma moose.
    I just hope Harper gets some of that mess straightened out, because it is becoming more and more untenable here every passing day.
    At least Texas is still a bastion of sanity in this country…

  22. I would have come up there to work if your government hadn’t banned handgun ownership for the masses.
    ROTFL – that’s one of those convenient Canadian myths that keeps us from being overrun by stupid Americans. I enjoy my handgun collection a lot.

  23. “ROTFL – that’s one of those convenient Canadian myths that keeps us from being overrun by stupid Americans. I enjoy my handgun collection a lot.”
    Then maybe you should tell the RCMP that it is only a myth… lol.

  24. Oh for sure, please keep believing it, and while you’re at it keep in mind that we all live in igloos, and it’s cold and dark all the time. You won’t like it here, stay away.

  25. Apples and oranges…
    You are a Canadian citizen I assume. I am not. Different rules apply to me.
    You might want to check up on that.

  26. @fiddle,
    Sorry dude, I’m not a Gen Y’er. Gen X’er with a wife and two kids and proud one-percenter. Refuse to vote Tory cause they’re too liberal for me. Just part of a cohort that knows that all of those entitlements you currently enjoy won’t be there for me or mine and wondering why I should pay enormous taxes each year to support a bunch of wealthy old people who left me a giant bill. I thought conservatives were supposed to be all about individualism and self-reliance. Why don’t your kids pay for you in your old age? After all, I’m sure everyone else’s kids are lazy and stupid but yours are exceptional.
    Now, I need to go check in on my team of 20 somethings who have been working 24/7 for a month to close a deal. Lazy bastards….

  27. “Oh for sure, please keep believing it, and while you’re at it keep in mind that we all live in igloos, and it’s cold and dark all the time. You won’t like it here, stay away.” – north_of_60
    LOL, you aren’t very observant are you.
    I come to your country on a regular basis. The love of my life lives in Kanata, ON., and I have seen a lot of your country, and will be seeing a lot more of it as time passes. Some of my greatest friends live in Canada.
    At this point in time, I consider you just a harmless troll though. Maybe senility? LOL, no I am kidding… Please carry on.
    And for the record and to keep this thread on track I am a very early GEN X’er. My dad wasn’t quite old enough to have been in WWII.

  28. LOL, you aren’t very observant are you.
    …and some people are just too ignorant to understand sarcasm
    You are a Canadian citizen I assume. I am not. Different rules apply to me.You might want to check up on that.
    Just keep believing those myths, we don’t need any more ignorant Americans up-here.

  29. …wondering why I should pay enormous taxes each year to support a bunch of wealthy old people who left me a giant bill.
    How much wealth did you consume the first 18 or 20 years of your life? When you pay that back, we’ll talk.

  30. Texas- I’m pleased that the love of your life lives in Kanata but please don’t take Kanata as representative of Canada. Compare Kanata to Arlington Va. A snake pit of federal government workers.

  31. jeff
    In reality land Jeff you know that Canadians carry knives on them, or crowbars under their seat cars.
    Some have shotguns under the bed. Knives though are King. At least in Alberta. Just look at the knifing stats. Its just another Canadian myth where not as violent as Americans. We just express it differently.

  32. What? Maritimers have been going down the road from before there were roads, relatives across the globe and they are still moving. But yes, there are hangashores (too lazy to fish so they hangashore)
    and Texas your always welcome but don’t mess with the mamma moose – bruins are just practice but mamma gets serious

  33. “Texas- I’m pleased that the love of your life lives in Kanata but please don’t take Kanata as representative of Canada. Compare Kanata to Arlington Va. A snake pit of federal government workers.” – Ralph
    Thanks for the warning Ralph. She just lives there because of her job. That area seems very Americanized to me. but I have been many more places than just there. Her family resides in a small town called Gracefield, in rural Quebec.
    No, I don’t identify Canada with Kanata… LOL

  34. Brad wall should have explained that whether you
    come from PEI, County Cork or Timbuktu, you’re gonna have a whole lotta rural conservative welfare bum Saskatchewan farmers taking a big bite out of your families budget every payday. Small Dead welfare bums, that is.

  35. “Brad wall should have explained that whether you
    come from PEI, County Cork or Timbuktu, you’re gonna have a whole lotta rural conservative welfare bum Saskatchewan farmers taking a big bite out of your families budget every payday. Small Dead welfare bums, that is.
    Posted by: phil at March 13, 2012 9:57 PM ”
    Got any numbers and links for that “big bite” phil?
    (Don’t know why I bother asking the twit.It supports the farmers by the very fact it hasn’t starved to death yet)

  36. I blame the Baby Boomers, my generation. We propagated doubt that you could work hard and get ahead.
    ~Ann Althouse
    And that’s why the Great Depression gave way to the spread of Socialism across Europe and FDR’s America following WWI, because the “Baby Boomers” bought into socialism, uh-huh.
    Read a history book Ann, and take a pill while you’re at it.

  37. @ phil at March 13, 2012 9:57 PM
    Have noticed that you can not resist beating on farmers every chance you get. Why ?

  38. slaw at3:45 PM: “If you’re older than Generation X, you should probably not complain about younger generations. After all, it’s the politicians you elected, the policies you’ve favoured, the ideas you championed that bankrupted our governments, transformed our institutions into social experimentation laboratories, and are in the process of destroying the middle class.”
    Complete and utter BS. Name those politicians that “we” elected. Did you know that the first time Trudeau was elected, early baby boomers could not vote? The voting age was still 21 in 1968, and the first of the baby boom generation was not yet 21. There’s a term for your argument, a term that was quite popular when I was in my 20s. The term is cop-out.
    If you sit on your a$$ doing nothing, that’s your decision and no one else’s.

  39. The truth about kids being fatter than older generations has much more to do with the glut of fast/convenience foods out there today and with the over abundance of labour saving that our grandparents didn’t have and devices and temptations such as blogs that keep us sitting staring at computers all day.

  40. “labour saving that our grandparents didn’t have and devices” should read “labour saving devices that our grandparents didn’t have..”
    Cut and paste is your enemy.

  41. Have noticed that you can not resist beating on farmers every chance you get. Why ?
    Nothing exemplifies the utter hypocrisy of the right in general, and SDA in particular than rural welfare bum farmers swilling in the public trough while small dead blowhards pontificate about self reliance and evil socialists.
    Got any numbers and links for that “big bite” phil?
    Here’s some. Do the math. SK population is about a million. That’s not counting federal taxes, SGI handouts, etc. So yeah, a huge bite.

  42. justthinkin’, peterj? What was that? No response? Only crickets? I guess I won again. This too easy.

  43. @ phil at March 14, 2012 11:25 PM
    No phil, I just dont feel qualified to speak on the subject. I know little about farming and from what I did read it would be enough to p*iss me off too. I’m just not sure if I would blame the farmers for what the politicians are doing. A good portion of the money seems to be a rainy day fund to cover potential future disasters. Going through the link you posted, I did find something that p*ssed me off even more and that was the University for natives with all the useless garbage to study. Wonder what the taxpayers pay for that white elephant?

  44. To all the oldtimers recollecting how hard they had it in their 20-30s (or how hard their grandparents had it)…
    Did you/they have an army of government parasites trying to hamstring them every step of the way, demanding permits and impact studies to build that hut on the prairies, or foisting an encyclopedia set of regulations and restrictions on them when they started a family business?
    It’s not just kids that are being stifled from doing anything, it’s adults too. I look at all the hoops I’d have to jump through to build a small house on land I ‘own’ (ha ha, property rights…) or start a casual business out of my house, or anything else ambitious, and I’d rather just go play World of Warcraft or something.
    Now, you may laugh or sneer at that, but video game makers are very much on the ball when it comes creating an environment with reward feedback that reinforces the desire to keep slogging away at monotonous tasks. That’s why we’re ‘addicted’. Meanwhile, the real world’s reward incentives (not just money, but psychological payoff of seeing a business grow or some other project take shape) is crippled.

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