My vote for removing Doc as a moderator on this forum

[xsbank]

No sales tax, no GST, no income tax, not even any tax on fuel, etc. etc. - tell me how this is not an advantage?

How happy would you feel if you got to keep all that you earned?

How happy does it make you feel to know that all your taxes go to support native enterprise?

Apartheid, maybe, but who is on which side?

[chu me]

To Xsbank: you wrote

No sales tax, no GST, no income tax, not even any tax on fuel, etc. etc. - tell me how this is not an advantage?

Once again I must correct a myth. If the business is wholly owned by a Band or Treaty/Status Indian AND it conducts said business entirely within the bounds of a reserve property then that business is exempt from certain federal taxes. If , however it does business off reserve it will pay all the taxes including ALL SALES TAXES , ALL GST, ALL FUEL TAXES, ALL INCOME AND BUSINESS TAXES ETC ETC ETC ETC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The last time I checked most airports in Canada are not owned and operated on reserve land. In order to conduct business as an airline you must use an airport, THEREFORE WE PAY THE SAME TAXES AS EVERYONE ELSE. Now I know someone is going to post. Well what about float bases and unprepared strips? If you fly outside of a reserve you will pay all taxes on that flight.
I am not aware of any "Native" owned airline that conducts it's business entirely within reserve boundaries, so they all pay their taxes.

To Rowdy: You wrote

the status natives lost the credits from the band

I 'm not sure what you are saying here but I didn't say that. It's nice to here about the bursaries for "native" students because of the poverty experienced on reserve they do need a little help with tuition, however that is an education bursary that is given to individuals not to a people as a whole. Education grants/ bursaries are handed out all the time to students( my wife is a university professor so I do have a little knowledge of this myself).I 'm still not sure how that is a benefit to a "Native" owned airline. I'm a little confused but thats not unusual. To answer your question about personal income taxes ... If a Treaty/Status Indian works on reserve then they are exempt from income taxes, however if they work off reserve then they must pay all the same taxes as you. There are not many business on reserves so most working Treaty/Status Indians pay Federal income taxes. As for taxes on aircraft purchases we paid ours.

To the person who posted the link to FNTI: I believe you forgot this from the website

How much does it cost?

Tuition for year one is $3675
Tuition for year two is $3675
Tuition for year three is $2625

Living expenses are the student's responsibility. Typically the student's First Nations Post-Secondary Education unit will provide a living allowance.

Now those tutitions sound remarkably similiar to the tutitions from say Seneca, Sault, Confederation,etc etc. I say again what unusual advantage. I also ask how does this benefit " Native " owned airlines. I don't care who paid for my pilots education!!!

To North of you: (Chances are, you are south of me!) I have never said whether I was First Nations or not ,you are assuming this ,I might actually be you and your people.

P.S. If you find yourself with alot of dollars in your pocket that way, you might want to consider the possibility that you actually are a racist !( just kidding)

To the poster who corrected my spelling: After several posts and thousands of words I am sorry I missed a T in elementary.

P.P.S I've changed my vote Doc stays

[flyinphil]

Chu me, the more you post, the more lucid those posts become. It is nice to see someone consider the other side of a debate and not turn it into a political shitfest or personal attack. Good on ya!

[Sulako]

Yeah, what flyinphil said. Good post, chu.

[xsbank]

I know a native lady who does not pay taxes on the fuel for her car, nor did she pay income taxes on the income from her off-reserve business. Is that the way it was, or not true, or am I just wrong? Being a pilot, I am not used to being wrong. I also don't like it when someone else gets a better deal than me.

Good post.

Doc seems M.I.A., so lets fire 'im! He won't notice for a week or so.

[hazatude]

Doc stays or I shit on your collective desks!

[twotter]

It would be a sad day to see Doc gone as a moderator.. I think the Mods who have posted on this thread have said it well..

[North of You]

Chu Me wrote:

To North of you: (Chances are, you are south of me!) I have never said whether I was First Nations or not ,you are assuming this ,I might actually be you and your people.

P.S. If you find yourself with alot of dollars in your pocket that way, you might want to consider the possibility that you actually are a racist !( just kidding)

No where in the above do I see you address the counter point I was making in regards to your comment about Canada perpetrating Apartheid upon the Natives. Instead I see you dismiss my comments outright and instead you make more flippant comments and assumptions. And then calling me a racist and then dismissing it with a “just kidding” don’t cut it with me but rather gets my hackles up. I have seen this kind of behavior before up north and I don’t accept it.

Are you having a problem with my post and the comments made therein and are you having difficulty responding to them? Seems so. So instead of addressing my counterpoint you just brush them away with more juvenile apathy. So, show some backbone and counter my argument.

Doc for PM

[Mitch Cronin]

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[...Tom Waits...]

...yep.... vote Doc for King!

[CID]

I see this thread has migrated from discussing Doc's moderating skills to discussing Native run airlines.

Unfortunately two issues are being intertwined and causing confusion. Let's face it. Native Canadians that live on reserves have become part of the third world within a "first world" country. There are various reasons and much of the responsibility must fall on the leaders. There's alot of corruption at the top. There has also been a great deal of abuse and neglect causing the population to further become marginalized.

From what I've observed and disussed with natives, if you don't share the last name with the chief you typically see very little money and benefits. Many people on reserves live in deplorable conditions but the chief and their extended families tend to live in nice digs. Furthermore if you challenge the chief in any way, you get cut off in a hurry.

The reserve system also serves to isolate these people from the very things they crave. They want a "traditional" lifestyle but they also want electricity, flush toilets an cable TV. Its quite a paradox.

Assimilation is a dirty word to these people mostly because it would mean the end of the gravy train for the leaders who constantly tell their people that they need to cling to their culture.

So are native peoples deserving of a helping hand? You bet they are.

Should this be a long term solution where we perpetually give them a business advantage by indirectly financing the operations through tax money? Hell no.

The department of Indian and Northern Affairs is an ineffective dinosaur and the notion of native Canadians shunning "assimilation" in fear of losing their identity is as incorrect as any other cultural group fearing the same. Most large cities have enclaves of cultural groups that actively support their cultures. Ever been to a "China town" or a "Little Italy"?

Most people roll with the times and keep their culture alive in other ways than pretending to live like their ancestors 400 years ago.

We really need to establish a clearing house for the current treaties in place and settle them fairly. And none of this bullshit of claming entire established cities located where they used to live. There are plenty of ways to settle things without resorting to that silliness.

Then we need to abolish the department of Indian and Northern Affairs. No more revisiting the same crap over and over again.

Native Canadians account for about 4% of the population. Thats about a million people. Yet they command so much attention and so many resources in this country in perpetuity. here are legitimate claims but the natives are as opposed to settling them as the government and the rest of the population are. We need to end it but do it fairly.

When are we going to stop the tail wagging the dog?

[snaproll20]

nice post, CID.

The human 'race' goes on. Unfortunately, if you do not join in, you get left behind.

It is called evolution, for good or for bad.

Most languages are going the same route, at an accelerated pace in this modern communications world.

If you don't learn English, you may become a dinosaur.

[BuckNiner]

The department of Indian and Northern Affairs is an ineffective dinosaur

Bingo CID, a department that has been ineffective in doing anything to solve a major social and economic problem in this country.

Before coming up north I had always assumed somebody was stationed at the "drawing board" coming up with a long-term solution to all of this. The more people I meet and more reserves I see the more I realize how massive a problem it is. And it's all too easy to blame and piss on the natives. Yes, they have to take the reigns at some point to turn their own situation around but we have to quit pouring the gravy for it to happen.

[mcrit]

If you don't learn English, you may become a dinosaur.

Chinese might be a better bet in the future. (Unless we get lucky and the Indians [the Hindu type] and the Chinese take each other out)

As for the Doc thing; he's not perfect, but I've not seen him abuse the position (which is to say that he didn't blip the posts where I was calling him stupid). So, no need to axe him as a moderator.
His comments about the native airline thing where a long way from racist. He was just pointing out a political situation that needs fixing.

[nyco]

didn t read all the posts, sorry, but this thread blew my mind

anyways, no reason to boot anybody, guess this is a website to share opinions and ideas, maybe evolve from the difference in ideas, or why not confront your ideas with others

long story short, stupid topic, anyway to just take it off???

anyways, cheers all, may the force be with you

[chu me]

To North of you: Obviously my little joke did not go off as intended. I apologize for any offense. I was just trying to lighten the mood a little.
I have not answered you because I was flying and then sleeping.

First let me clear up a misconception, it was Catdriver who likened this system that deals with FN people to Apartheid.
In South Africa during apartheid the black population was treated as second class citizens. They were not given the right to self determination and a system of laws were developed to keep them in poverty.They were also forced to live in small enclaves that were desperately impoverished.

The UN examined the living conditions for FN people in Canada and found that many of the similar conditions exist in Canada. This is not to say that Canadians knowingly agreed to these conditions and indeed when faced with the statistics and cold hard facts most Canadians are shocked. However, FN leaders have been calling for the right to self determination on land that they consider theirs by tradition( having occupied it for thousands of years prior to the arrival of Europeans). Now most Canadians are scared of this because they think this means separation (from Canada) of these said lands, it does not. You need not look any further than Nunavut. Consider it more like a county, free to make up their own laws (under the guidance of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and other laws of Canada) dealing with land and resource use, zoning, parks and recreation, etc, etc, etc.

As far as schools , FN people would like more say in the schooling of their children.This is because schools on reserve, and in communities in the north, with high populations of FN and Aboriginal Canadians, have notoriously high drop out and failure rates. So they would like to have more say in who gets hired to teach and how it is taught. It is a fact that when subjects are presented to children with the approach to cultural sensitivity those children, whoever they are (Black, white, indian, chinese, FN) tend to do much better. FN leaders realize that education is the key to over coming most problems facing their people today. Therefore, they would like more say. This is not unusual, one only has to look at.. say the Catholic school boards, the English school boards, the French and French Immersion school boards to realize that this is done everywhere. So why not FN school boards ?

I cannot speak to separate Health care because I was not aware anyone was calling for it. That does not mean someone isn't. I speak only of my own opinions and not for anyone else. However, I do know that the average life expectancy for AC( aboriginal canadian) male is 56yrs. That is well below the national average of 76. There is also a huge problem with diabetes in the north that demands different protocol than other health protocols. Once again there are cultural aspects to health care that are not being addressed by the present system.( when is the last time you went to a hospital and no one could speak your language! ).All decisions for FN health care are made in Ottawa, that is a long ways away from where it is applied( and as you know it takes a long time for Ottawa to decide anything, and when they do make a decision it is usually the wrong one! Just look at TC. How would you like them making a decision on your health!!). So for FN to have more say in their health care would probably save the taxpayers( which includes FN people) huge dollars in the end.

I'm not trying to be insulting with what I am about to say, just trying to make a point. I'm sure there are things within the Canadian system that bother you( me also )but you continue to live within that system while perhaps calling for change or critisizing it. We all do this, it is our right. So why can't FN people do the same? Can they not live within this system all the while calling for change? I do not think that is being hypocritical , I think that is merely exercising your rights.

Having said that, I want to remind you that Catdriver said it first, I then agreed with him and the UN apparently does too. We have tried the existing system for hundreds of years with a distinct lack of success! Why not try it their way for a while, it couldn't hurt! Might even work! It may even save us all, hours of arguments, when we should be flying.

I hope that I have shown enough backbone for you now, and again I apologize for the joke.

To everyone else: Thank you for taking the time to listen to my opinions and sharing yours with me. This will be my last post on this subject on this thread, it takes to much time to reply to everyone. I feel like a fart in a thunderstorm. Good luck, Safe flying to you all.

[chu me]

O.K. seriously that was my last post( sorry for the double post!)

O.K. That was the absolutely positively last one

I swear!!!

I mean it!!!

[Cat Driver]

Having said that, I want to remind you that Catdriver said it first, I then agreed with him and the UN apparently does too. We have tried the existing system for hundreds of years with a distinct lack of success! Why not try it their way for a while, it couldn't hurt! Might even work! It may even save us all, hours of arguments, when we should be flying.

I am not very PC so will give my opinion on why Indians are living in apartheid.

First to fu.k them over was the Hunsons bay Company who fu.cked them financially.

Then came the missionaries who fu.ked with their minds.

Then came the Department of Indian affairs in Ottawa who really fu.ked them over big time by keeping them seperate from other Canadian citizens.

The Hudson Bay Company are finished with their work and the missionaries will never quit, but the big problem is still the drones in Ottawa who like parasites just keep sucking the life blood out of Indians.

[2R]

sorry doc looks like your stuck with us as the consensus is you should stay

[Doc]

Well, it has been an entertaining read. A couple of votes for "PM", and one for "King"! You don't want me as PM. I'm just not PC enough for that thankless position. I'd make all Canadians equal. No more "Animal Farm" mentality would exist. I'm not a big fan of the reserve system. I've been flying to reserves since the early 70's, and guess what? It ain't working! Never will. Until everybody is on the same page, there will always be racism. It's a simple fact of life. Picture if you will, forcing the Italians (just an example here kids?) to live on reserves in order to maintain their culture? Yah, like that'd work! Somebody mentioned "China Town" and "Little Italy". That hit the nail on the head, in my book! Neighborhoods that maintain some of the "old" ways, with some of the "new". My thoughts.....that's the ticket. It'll never happen, of course. Ottawa would have to admit they've had their collective heads up their asses for a hundred years! And, like that'd happen! The reserve system is like a really big heavy wheel. It's a hell of a lot easier to just let it roll on, than to try and stop it!
As for the moderating question. I'll just continue trying not to let topics get too personal. Deleting some well known terms....and voicing my, sometimes unpopular opinions! They are just that folks....opinions!
Cheers
Doc

[Rockie]

I have to say something in defense of the Federal Government here (I know, it sticks in my craw too).

There are two directions the government could lean toward. The first is honouring two hundred year old land claims and 100% native self government. The economic, cultural and political fallout from that is unthinkable and just cannot happen.

The second direction is full integration of the native population into 2007 Canadian society as equals. That means settling the land claims in some fashion that reflects todays reality after two hundred years of change, and eliminating native reserves and any law that regards natives as anything but Canadian citizens. Try that and watch the barricades come up.

I don't think there is anything the Government can do that will be palatable to anyone. Honouring ancient treaties is not possible, but there are plenty of people who think not doing so is furthering the shabby treatment the native ancestors received in the 1700's.

Full integration is not possible because the Natives don't want it.

Makes me very glad I'm not in government and have to deal with it.

[Doc]

Well Rockie, that's exactly what the Canadian government intends to do. Nothing.

[Rockie]

Well Rockie, that's exactly what the Canadian government intends to do. Nothing.

I think you're right.

[Cat Driver]

I know you are right.

Just imagine the billions of dollars that flow through the hands of government officials to feed the status quo that is the " Indian " gravy train in Canada.

Can someone explain to poor little niave me the difference between how the system works in Canada compared to what Canadians consider third world countries?

Tell me what the difference is between Cape Town and Ottawa?

Shamattawa and Soweto?

[ei ei owe]

Shamattawa and Soweto?

It gets really cold in Shamattawa during winter.

[Cat Driver]

It gets really cold in Shamattawa during winter.

Sorry, I neglected to mention that, and the construction of the shacks people live in are one of the few differences.