Pick of the Comments pages

Selections from the past week (!)... Scott Ingram: Dammit, if we're going to emulate Central American countries, I wish we'd get the climate to go with it. Tim: Can we please just replace the Canadian national anthem with the theme from "The Smurfs"? "La, La, La-La, La-La ..." mgl: You're shocked by the corruption -- I'm trying to recover from this notion: David Anderson actually did something for his constituents. Elderly Victorians should be sheltered from this news, for fear of inducing a fatal shock. No Dissent: My life seems so different now that I know the government is not God. Tony: Even though Albertans keep coming back to save the country from its excesses, no one ever thanks them for it. Rob: We are a nation of envious sucks. Colby Cosh: It's as concise a statement about Canadian politics as I've ever seen. The Conservatives have to prove positively that they are capable of governing; the Liberals can stay in until it's demonstrated to the last scintilla that they aren't. keith: In some countries, the constitution puts remedies in place that hold the thieves in check, or that at least make them wary. In Canada, we have none (don't speak to me of our pitiful elections process). Here in Ottawa, I know hard working, well educated couples with children who cannot afford a decent house. I also know of public servants who routinely, and, apparently without fear or hesitation, find summer jobs for their kids, and even permanent jobs for their ex-wives, in the public service. Corruption in this city is not a question of rogue bureaucrats, it is simply the normal operation. Jeff: Central Canada views the West as an older brother views his younger brother -- as long as they both live, the younger brother's opinions and ideas will always be unworthy of serious consideration. ld: Crazy suggestion here, but if Paul Martin is as innocent in this mess as he says, why doesn't he offer to take a lie detector test? alvis: Some of us on the East coast don't give a rat's ass about transfer payments, corporate welfare programs or any other nasty Liberal vote buying nuggets. Harper will have more support out here than you think. There is indeed a culture of defeat and it's time someone punctured it with a blast of reason. CJ: As for Professor Potter's exposition, it's time to check back in to Earth. In Canada today virtually every service that is immediately important to the citizenry is managed and delivered by the provinces and municipalities. Health care, education, welfare, police-judges-jails, highways, electricity -- the provinces. Streets, water, sewers, police, parks, school boards -- the municipalities. So, what do the feds do? They appoint ambassadors that serve no one but themselves, run television networks nobody watches, mismanage a postal system that is a relic of another age, pass criminal and civil laws that the provinces are supposed to enforce, waste money on advertising campaigns that don't sell anything and registries that don't register anything, prevent the provinces from finding realistic solutions to health care delivery, send entourages on multimillion-dollar tours of other countries, and scores more useless pursuits. Now, the professor seems to be saying that the trouble with this "system" is that its framers wanted Ottawa to be boss. Today's bigger issue is that Ottawa is 24 square miles surrounded by reality.