I always tell people I started life somewhere to the right of Genghis Khan and am now somewhere to the left of Karl Marx. Which isn't quite true but close enough. At heart I have pretty much always been a Social Democrat. The older I get, the more of the world I have seen, the more I have read, the more I understand that the moneyed class, the 0.01% has rigged the game against the rest of us. My mother used to say, "Them that has, gets".
I have voted all over the map. In the days of people like Bob Stanfield, Joe Clark, Flora MacDonald, when Progressive Conservatives actually had some principles, I voted Tory. Mulroney and Grant Devine put paid to that. Grant Devine's government almost destroyed Saskatchewan out of arrogance and ignorance. The GST, which cost Mulroney the election, was actually a good thing. I suspect anyone with the ability to think was hoping the Chretien government would keep it and they did. I switched to NDP in Saskatchewan and Liberal federally. The two best governments in my life time were Roy Romanow's and Jean Chretien's.
Did you ever notice how the right is so keen to cut taxes for the rich. It is supposed to be "good for the economy". Then to balance the budget, they cut programs for the people they were elected to serve. This is deliberate. "Socialists" are accused of "tax and spend". Like it was a bad thing to pay as you go and for the ones who have benefited most to pay the most. The Right just spend, incurring huge deficits and running up huge debts. Why?
Two reasons. 1. You can only borrow money from those that have it, so interest is essentially an upwards transfer of money from the citizens to the wealthy. The Right hate transfer payments ONLY when they are downwards. 2. When people finally get fed up enough to boot the bums out, the new government finds, after they create a clean set of books, there is nothing left in the kitty for them to fulfill their promises. In order to clean up the mess, they have to manage on much less and do much less.
Once the mess is cleaned up, people vote the spendthrifts back in because the government "didn't keep its promises". The Right claims to manage the economy better but the facts always put the lie to that nonsense. Left and Centre-Left seem to be much better managers. Both Canadian and American data show it to be true.
Harper isn't even a Tory. He is a Republican which is a group of people I despise with all my heart. He is set on turning Canada into Mississippi. Every dirty trick, and the list is myriad, is a direct copy of Republicans.
Yes, yes, as a resident of Ukraine I am grateful for the support Canada has given us in our struggle against Russian aggression. I would be much happier if Harper were as concerned with democracy in Canada as he pretends to be in Ukraine.
Reasons why I will never vote Conservative while Harper or anyone like him is in charge: (read the first two for sure, the rest are in case your blood pressure is low)
The fact that the Liberals voted for
Bill C51, the Canadian version of the Patriot Act was enough. Harper's
"security concerns", like American security concerns, have little or
nothing to do with terrorist and everything to do
with controlling the population once people start taking to the
streets over growing economic disparity. I suspect the Liberals are
not too far from the same reasoning.
I have voted all over the map. In the days of people like Bob Stanfield, Joe Clark, Flora MacDonald, when Progressive Conservatives actually had some principles, I voted Tory. Mulroney and Grant Devine put paid to that. Grant Devine's government almost destroyed Saskatchewan out of arrogance and ignorance. The GST, which cost Mulroney the election, was actually a good thing. I suspect anyone with the ability to think was hoping the Chretien government would keep it and they did. I switched to NDP in Saskatchewan and Liberal federally. The two best governments in my life time were Roy Romanow's and Jean Chretien's.
Did you ever notice how the right is so keen to cut taxes for the rich. It is supposed to be "good for the economy". Then to balance the budget, they cut programs for the people they were elected to serve. This is deliberate. "Socialists" are accused of "tax and spend". Like it was a bad thing to pay as you go and for the ones who have benefited most to pay the most. The Right just spend, incurring huge deficits and running up huge debts. Why?
Two reasons. 1. You can only borrow money from those that have it, so interest is essentially an upwards transfer of money from the citizens to the wealthy. The Right hate transfer payments ONLY when they are downwards. 2. When people finally get fed up enough to boot the bums out, the new government finds, after they create a clean set of books, there is nothing left in the kitty for them to fulfill their promises. In order to clean up the mess, they have to manage on much less and do much less.
Once the mess is cleaned up, people vote the spendthrifts back in because the government "didn't keep its promises". The Right claims to manage the economy better but the facts always put the lie to that nonsense. Left and Centre-Left seem to be much better managers. Both Canadian and American data show it to be true.
Harper isn't even a Tory. He is a Republican which is a group of people I despise with all my heart. He is set on turning Canada into Mississippi. Every dirty trick, and the list is myriad, is a direct copy of Republicans.
Yes, yes, as a resident of Ukraine I am grateful for the support Canada has given us in our struggle against Russian aggression. I would be much happier if Harper were as concerned with democracy in Canada as he pretends to be in Ukraine.
Reasons why I will never vote Conservative while Harper or anyone like him is in charge: (read the first two for sure, the rest are in case your blood pressure is low)
I would not ever vote for Elizabeth May.
I could likely be sued for the adjectives I would use to describe her.
She was in Greece in 2013 badmouthing a Canadian mining company.
The piece on her website regarding the visit
is mostly filled with lies and less-than-half truths. The sort of thing
one finds on the anti-everything sites, ideology which the Green Party supports.
In spite of the high regard I have for Ralph Goodale who was my MP for many years, I have no faith that Justin Trudeau's Liberals will fix the mess Harper made of our country. Opposition parties tend to decry everything the government does but too often when they are in power, they just carry on from there. I want my country back.
The fact that the Liberals voted for
Bill C51, the Canadian version of the Patriot Act was enough. Harper's
"security concerns", like American security concerns, have little or
nothing to do with terrorist and everything to do
with controlling the population once people start taking to the
streets over growing economic disparity. I suspect the Liberals are
not too far from the same reasoning.
And it will come, unless people are successful in taking back their government
from the hands of the wealthy elite. I don't much like revolutions. There
have been two successful ones, the French Revolution and the Bolshevik
Revolution. They did not end well. By the time it comes to revolution,
the moderates are long gone and only the radical are determined enough to put
their lives on the line. Consequently one set of despots is replaced by
another. We need to use democracy while we still have it.
Which leaves Thomas Mulcair who is a decent chap and well worth the risk. And there is a great risk. Remember what happened to Bob Rae? The 0.01% do not like it when a government puts the interests of the people ahead of the interests of the wealthy elite. And they fight back. It would be even worse for a national government than a provincial one. We would have the entire American right-wing allied against us. Their banking system could literally destroy us. Or recall what happened to Central American countries in the 1980's which tried to govern on behalf of their citizens.
Besides that, Mulcair has a few crazies in his camp. Elizabeth May didn't mention it but Niki Ashton, NDP MP for Churchill-Keewatinook was with her on her anti Canada tour to Greece. And of course, Linda McQuage just told Alberta their tarsands oil can stay in the ground.
You keep on top of the Canadian news better than most people who live here, Al.
ReplyDeleteI follow Russian/Ukrainian/European politics in some detail. I follow national politics in Canada but not provincial very much. Then American politics. And keep tabs on Turkey and Greece to some extent and the rest of the world in general. Facebook is excellent for keeping up with the news.
DeleteI wish I could still vote but last time I was suddenly informed that I no longer had the right. Nice, that, being a citizen but not allowed to vote. So I don't get to vote anywhere these days. Thanks for the thorough update, Allen.
ReplyDeleteThat be Rascalndear... lol
DeleteI don't get to vote either but I would like the country to be a decent place to return to and for my children to live in, so I take an interest.
DeleteAfter seven decades I am not impressed with the results of voting. We vote for president but it is the Electoral College that elects the president here in the US.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe there should be a literacy test to vote, but there sure dam well should be one to run for office.
the Ol'Buzzard
OB, your constitution, which might have made your country the greatest beacon of freedom in the world and a true democracy, had in it the seeds of its own failure. With your strange system of electing everything from "president to dogcatcher" every two years you have put your candidates at the mercy of the money men who must finance them if they are to be elected. Voting has become an exercise in futility in America. We are well on our way to the same in Canada if we do not change our government this trip.
DeleteYou need a new constitution, from scratch. But you will never get it unless the common people rise up, select and vote for candidates who have no moneyed interest behind them. Democracy is not about making an X every 2-4-5 years. It is about active, informed participation in selecting representatives and setting policies. Otherwise, things get done by those who show up.