Computerized models of the earth's climate are at the heart of the debate over how policy should respond to climate change. Global climate models (GCMs)--also called general circulation models -- attempt to predict future climatic conditions starting with a set of assumptions about how the climate works and guesses about what a future world might look like in terms of population, energy use, technological development, and so on.

Analysts have pointed out, however, that many of the assumptions used in modeling the climate are of dubious merit, with biases that tend to project catastrophic warming, and have argued that climate models have many limitations that make them unsuitable as the basis for developing public policy. This paper examines two major limitations that hinder the usefullness of climate models to those forming public policy.

The 2004 Ontario budget has proven to be a watershed event. After months of floating policy trial balloons, the government has finally committed to a four-year fiscal plan. This Alert assesses the new fiscal plan in the light of the prior Progressive Conservative government's two terms in office, also initially devoted to deficit reduction but with a greater emphasis on tax cuts.

This paper raises several issues that have the cumulative effect of suggesting that in the long term, the prohibition on marijuana cannot be sustained with the present technology of production and enforcement. To anyone with even a passing acquaintance with modern history, it is apparent that we are reliving the experience of alcohol prohibition of the early years of the last century.