Discussions

M&J said "Its funny how many people Ive heard say they want to vote green but will vote ndp or liberal cause green is a wasted vote and wont do anything. Really people? If a million people across canada want to vote green and are unsure but actually voted green it would make quite a difference! If you want to vote green and dont then green will never win. Ill be voting green as theyre the only ones that make any sense. Please check out their platform. Its actually very very good. "

As I've mentioned before, if Canada joined the majority of democratic nations in implementing some type of proportional representation as our electoral process, votes would translate into seats. All votes would help elect MPs and none would be "wasted". The number of MPs each party has in the HOC would be directly related to the percentage of the popular vote those parties receive (depending on the type of PR system adopted).  
 
This is why the conservatives must be, at the very least, reduced to minority status and preferably defeated this election. They are the ONLY political party in Canada to publicly state that the First Past the Post system that we currently have is "fair for everyone". They are the ONLY political party to outright reject any suggestion of changing our electoral system to some type of proportional representation.  
 
If you want 2015 to be the last unfair election, you should be voting for whatever party has the best chance to unseat the conservatives. I'm not saying that a true Canadian conservative government is a bad thing, but for this election, we have to defeat them to ensure our electoral system gets changed for the better.

CommonTater said "http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-election-2015-trudeau-mulcair-harper-minority-government-1.3269314     What are people's thoughts on the possibility of a coalition? I see it as a mutiny spitting on democracy but that is just my opinion. What do others think? "

Of a minority government, because then (in theory) all political parties from all over the country kind of HAVE to work together if anything is going to get done.  
 
Right now, I would be down right pissed if Mulcair and Trudeau formed a coalition to take down Harper. Why? Because of Mulcairs attitude about it. He is spouting off about taking down Harper. Which I agree he needs to be taken down even a few notches, he has become awful cocky - but he does not seem to care about our government working for the people, doing what they are elected to do, he seems to be coming from a place of spite.  
 
Nope, I will be very disappointed if a Lib/NDP coalition forms just to overthrow the government. I think it would not be a good move for Justin and his still very weak Liberal party to do that to his new found supporters that they have worked so hard to get back after the sponsorship scandal and long gun debacle.  
 
I think we are headed for a minority government - with either Liberal or Con taking the helm.  
 
What would be awesome to see with all the in fighting between the three "boys" - if Elizabeth and her Greens would sprint up the middle and become a serious threat. I think the other three are so cocky they deserve a Green wave...

65 years old for old age pension.....That is who gets my vote! I don't want to be working into my 70's which is what it will come to if we allow it. It was unfair and unkind that they changed the rules for many of us part way through the game.  
 

JR said "    CommonTater said "http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-election-2015-trudeau-mulcair-harper-minority-government-1.3269314     What are people's thoughts on the possibility of a coalition? I see it as a mutiny spitting on democracy but that is just my opinion. What do others think? " A coalition is anything BUT a mutiny. Think about it - if one party gets 40% of the seats in the HOC, that is not a majority. The other parties, who hold 60% of the seats and represent a TRUE majority or Canadian voters have every right to join forces and govern. IMHO, that majority should be given the option to govern first, before it is given to a single party that would form a minority government. "

As long as we have a system that allows more than two candidates, we are not guaranteed a majority. However, if the 2nd a 3rd place parties form a coalition after an election, no one voted for that. If our government is run by a group that no voter could say yay or nay to (coalition), I call that a mutiny.  
 
If Justin and Thomas wish to form and run as the ABC party, they can. I just don't see being governed by some new party that was not even on the ballot.  
 
Edited by CommonTater, 2015-10-14 13:14:06

HLF said "65 years old for old age pension.....That is who gets my vote! I don't want to be working into my 70's which is what it will come to if we allow it. It was unfair and unkind that they changed the rules for many of us part way through the game.     "

at 60 but it's the OAS that will wait to 67.  

I want it all! I worked for it all and paid taxes until my nose bled....I want it and the earlier the better. I might not see 67 as many don't!

CommonTater said "    JR said "    CommonTater said "http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-election-2015-trudeau-mulcair-harper-minority-government-1.3269314     What are people's thoughts on the possibility of a coalition? I see it as a mutiny spitting on democracy but that is just my opinion. What do others think? " A coalition is anything BUT a mutiny. Think about it - if one party gets 40% of the seats in the HOC, that is not a majority. The other parties, who hold 60% of the seats and represent a TRUE majority or Canadian voters have every right to join forces and govern. IMHO, that majority should be given the option to govern first, before it is given to a single party that would form a minority government. " As long as we have a system that allows more than two candidates, we are not guaranteed a majority. However, if the 2nd a 3rd place parties form a coalition after an election, no one voted for that. If our government is run by a group that no voter could say yay or nay to (coalition), I call that a mutiny.     If Justin and Thomas wish to form and run as the ABC party, they can. I just don't see being governed by some new party that was not even on the ballot.     Edited by CommonTater, 2015-10-14 13:14:06"

they both have stated that they wern't interested in forming a formal coalition so I hope both the Libs and NDP stick to their promise after the election. If you want to be a coalition, then run on a coalition platform. Funny how they will probably embrace it now that both of them have figured out neither one of them will have the most votes!

There doesn't have to be a formal coalition for two or more parties to govern in place of what would have been a minority government. Remember that we are not electing a party, and we don't elect a Prime Minister. We [b]DO[/b] elect our MPs - our representative in government.  
 
The Prime Minister is the person who has the "confidence" of the House. Normally, this is the leader of the party that got the most seats. However, a party with fewer seats can govern with their leader as PM as long as they have the support of the majority of MPs. There doesn't have to be a formal coalition. There just has to be the support of the majority. THAT is what we vote for - the majority governs.  
 
http://www.parl.gc.ca/marleaumontpetit/DocumentViewer.aspx?Sec=Ch01&Seq=2&Language=E

I heard a good point from someone: imagine Justin in a situation where he needs to stand up to Putin. It would be like a little boy fighting with a grown man.  
 
There are some very previous things at stake here, the pm has to do a lot in the real world.  
 
I find it terrifying to think of Justin leading our army and being responsible for the economy which I'm hoping will provide for me through to old age. I'm in my 30s andhave seen just how much damage a liberal or an NDP government can do in a term whether federal our provincial.  
 
I'm shocked how many people are talking about charisma being relevant in this huge decision.  
 
Were not choosing a movie star, werepicking the CEO of our entire country. Everything you own, everyone you know is in their care in some way. We can't risk handing it over to someone without experience, our someone who is only used to criticizing the person in power ratherthan being a true leader themselves.  
 
I just hope we seriously consider who is best for the responsibly rather thanwho we 'like'.

Heard a good one as well, conservatives won't debate with groups that represent special interests, if a party won't debate within the country I doubt if I would want them in negotiations with people outside our country, besides an elected representative is supposed to represent a riding, which at times should include special interest parties, something that doesn't happen under party politics.

Liberal platform states that anyone with an opinion on abortion contrary to Justins opinion will not be allowed in the party leadership, even if that's what their riding believes.  
 
Not sure how debating with a minority group relates to defending our country against a real threat. Hopefully you don't want a pm who will give way to Russia by making friends and handing over our North.

My problem is I'm sort of old school, where the idea of conservative meant not really catering to business but trying to keep the growth of spending and government programs under control, and liberals would try and look after both business and the interests of others as well. There's an old saying about pleasing people and liberals believe that they can do that, but in reality they can't, the NDP are basically labour as far as I can see with maybe more concern with special interests. This present government showed us what happens if you try to please business to much, they abuse the programs to their advantage but same goes for any group. This brings me to why I hate party politics. How many times have we seen a government elected before the Manitoba vote is even counted, or how many times do we sit and wait for the west coast to determine our government. These sort of things mean that even electing a really good candidate in our riding means nothing when forced to vote party lines when those lines are in contradiction to the feelings in a riding. I guess I'm sort of rambling but how can any conservative agree with people who say they are going to create jobs or manage the economy because the conservative side of me says maybe that's not supposed to be their job.  
 
Many people in politics, and the political arena believe people are stupid and say that they have our best interests in mind, but election time is where people get to decide if our(the people) interests are the same as governments interests, this is another place where party politics can be the downfall of a decent government.  
 
Honestly I would prefer to vote for an in dependant progressive conservative that anything we have right now.

have a question for those of you (like SJK and others) that think that Harper is God's gift to Canada.  
 
What if Harper gets 2 more majorities and in that time blow another 150 billion that our kids/grandkids can pay for? Does he still get a free pass from the Conservative core? Is anything he does ok as long as he wears blue?

WestWind said "sorry to break it to you Intrepid but the CBC Board of Directors are appointed by the government with the current Board appointed by this government. Check http://www.appointments-nominations.gc.ca/prflOrg.asp?OrgID=CBC&lang=eng   All have been appointed since 2008. "

Funny that, cuz the sleazy c leads the way for the harper haters...

JR said "    M&J said "Its funny how many people Ive heard say they want to vote green but will vote ndp or liberal cause green is a wasted vote and wont do anything. Really people? If a million people across canada want to vote green and are unsure but actually voted green it would make quite a difference! If you want to vote green and dont then green will never win. Ill be voting green as theyre the only ones that make any sense. Please check out their platform. Its actually very very good. " As I've mentioned before, if Canada joined the majority of democratic nations in implementing some type of proportional representation as our electoral process, votes would translate into seats. All votes would help elect MPs and none would be "wasted". The number of MPs each party has in the HOC would be directly related to the percentage of the popular vote those parties receive (depending on the type of PR system adopted).     This is why the conservatives must be, at the very least, reduced to minority status and preferably defeated this election. They are the ONLY political party in Canada to publicly state that the First Past the Post system that we currently have is "fair for everyone". They are the ONLY political party to outright reject any suggestion of changing our electoral system to some type of proportional representation.     If you want 2015 to be the last unfair election, you should be voting for whatever party has the best chance to unseat the conservatives. I'm not saying that a true Canadian conservative government is a bad thing, but for this election, we have to defeat them to ensure our electoral system gets changed for the better. "

Am I missing something here, or do some folks WANT to be ruled by Toronto, or Montreal...?  
 
Not this cat...

swmb said "have a question for those of you (like SJK and others) that think that Harper is God's gift to Canada.     What if Harper gets 2 more majorities and in that time blow another 150 billion that our kids/grandkids can pay for? Does he still get a free pass from the Conservative core? Is anything he does ok as long as he wears blue? "

No, I don't think he is "god's gift to Canada..."  
 
As for spending, recall who forced the CPC into stimulus spending and debt...?  
 
I certainly don't agree with everything he or the party does, but at the end of the day, he is currently the one best suited to manage the country. Period. The other options are Not an option.  
 
He will not remain leader of the party forever. No-one does. And until someone new and perhaps better steps up to take his place (preferably conservative...), he is by far the lesser of three evils.  
 
And no, I don't count the "green" party. As far as I'm concerned they are utterly irrelevant...

when you write "We can't risk handing it over to someone without experience, our someone who is only used to criticizing the person in power ratherthan being a true leader themselves." you are describing Stephen Harper in 2006.  
 
Does your statement also apply to him, or only non-CPC parties ?  
 

the CPC was the party in power and made the decision for stimulus spending and debt.

Intrepid said "    JR said "    M&J said "Its funny how many people Ive heard say they want to vote green but will vote ndp or liberal cause green is a wasted vote and wont do anything. Really people? If a million people across canada want to vote green and are unsure but actually voted green it would make quite a difference! If you want to vote green and dont then green will never win. Ill be voting green as theyre the only ones that make any sense. Please check out their platform. Its actually very very good. " As I've mentioned before, if Canada joined the majority of democratic nations in implementing some type of proportional representation as our electoral process, votes would translate into seats. All votes would help elect MPs and none would be "wasted". The number of MPs each party has in the HOC would be directly related to the percentage of the popular vote those parties receive (depending on the type of PR system adopted).     This is why the conservatives must be, at the very least, reduced to minority status and preferably defeated this election. They are the ONLY political party in Canada to publicly state that the First Past the Post system that we currently have is "fair for everyone". They are the ONLY political party to outright reject any suggestion of changing our electoral system to some type of proportional representation.     If you want 2015 to be the last unfair election, you should be voting for whatever party has the best chance to unseat the conservatives. I'm not saying that a true Canadian conservative government is a bad thing, but for this election, we have to defeat them to ensure our electoral system gets changed for the better. " Am I missing something here, or do some folks WANT to be ruled by Toronto, or Montreal...?     Not this cat... "

With our current system, we ARE ruled by the east. In most cases, the government is decided before our votes are even counted. That's First Past the Post where a MP is elected based on who has the most votes, even if the winner has less than 50%. The majority of voters in a riding may want someone else as MP, but they don't get that because of our electoral system. That is why a government can be formed with more than 50% of the seats in the House of Commons yet they receive less than 50% of the vote. The results do not reflect the wishes of the voters.  
 
With a Proportional Representational system, the number of votes a party receives translates into the number of seats they get in the HoC. Sure, this will probably mean we will have to get used to coalition governments like 75% of the democracies around the world have, but it results in actual cooperation in governing. Decisions are made with input from every party and all viewpoints are considered.  
 
Best of all, government won't be decided by the time Ontario's votes are counted. The whole country gets a say in government and nobody's votes are wasted. No one has to vote strategically as people are doing this election. If you like the Green party, vote green without worrying about splitting the left vote and allowing the right to come up the middle. It works for all of us.  
 
The only downside is that we must vote strategically in this election so that the conservatives don't retain power. They are the only party that doesn't want to change the way we vote, and that is something that must happen before 2019.

Here is the Federal Liberal government past performance:  
 
1. REMEMBER the.....EH-101 HELICOPTER CANCELLATION FIASCO - Upon taking power in 1993, the Liberals killed a contract to replace the aging Sea King military helicopters. Few remember the cancellation cost taxpayers a $500 million penalty.  
 
2. HEALTH CARE: While the Liberals portray themselves as the guardians of our national health care system, it was Martin's $25 billion cuts to health care funding when he was finance minister in the early 1990s that led to the crises in the health care system today.  
 
3. REMEMBER the.... TAINTED BLOOD SCANDAL: Millions of dollars in federal funding was not transferred to victims; therefore many victims had died.  
 
4. RESIDENTIAL SCHOOL ABUSE CLAIMS: Of the $200 mil. spent on claims administration; only $38 million went to the victims. (sad)  
 
5. PENSION FUNDS LOST: Military veteran's and widow's of veterans lost their pension funds to the Liberal govt..  
 
6. EMPLOYMENT INSURANCE FUND SCANDAL: $44 billion in excess contributions were placed in a Reserve Fund which was contrary to the federal government's own guidelines.  
 
7. LAX IMMIGRATION STANDARDS: The feds. couldn't find thousands of failed refugee claimants, some had links to terrorism and organized crime  
 
8. TRANSPORTATION FUNDS LOST: Under the Liberals, our national air and rail carriers lived from one crisis to crisis.  
 
9. BUYING ADVICE: Liberals spent $6.5 billion annually on outside consultants - to buy "advice" which was largely available from within the public service  
 
10. 2000 FUEL REBATE: A botched $1.4 billion heating fuel rebate program doled out cash to the wrong Canadians. Some rebates went to dead people, some to prisoners and students who were living at home and didn't even pay heating bills.  
 
11. 2000 HRDC: Calling accounting problems "widespread and serious," the auditor general revealed in 2000 that $1 billion was mismanaged in job creation grants handled by Human Resources Development Canada, under minister Jane Stewart.  
 
12. 2002 CHALLENGER JETS: The Liberal government spent $101 million on luxury Challenger jets deemed unnecessary by officials at the Department of National Defense.  
 
13. 1995-2005 GUN REGISTRY: Originally forecast to cost $2 million in 1995, the Auditor General predicted in 2003 that actual costs would escalate to $1 billion by 2004-2005. Calculations now suggest the costs had actually ballooned to $2 billion for a registry that was ridiculous and did not and would never work.  
 
14. 2003 RADWANSKI AFFAIR: Inadequate oversight and spending controls allowed former privacy commissioner George Radwanski to rack up thousands of tax dollars in lavish lunches and luxury travel.  
 
15. 2004 SPONSORSHIP: The auditor general revealed that up to $100 million of the $250 million federal sponsorship program went to Liberal-friendly advertising firms for little or no work. A new figure of $355 million is from the forensic accounting firm, Kroll Lindquist Avey.  
 
16. "GREAT BUMWAD FIASCO": The Liberal gov't bought the Weston Inc. owned toilette paper plant, an eyesore property across from the Parliament Buildings for $36 million. It was to be the a site of a future park . The Liberal govt. then leased it back to the original owner for 25 years.  
 
17. BLUENOSE GRANT: A $2.3 million Bluenose grant was allocated by the Liberals but $1.9 million has been siphoned off by an ad agency.  
 
18. FAILURE TO COLLECT GST: A seven year failure of the Liberal govt. to collect GST resulted in fraud of over $1 billion lost through loop-holes.  
 
19. MEDICAL MARIJUANA: Ottawa's $5.5 million contract with Prairie Plant Systems to produce "medical marijuana" for registered users was a bust. The active ingredient was so low that the "weak" pot had few therapeutic benefits and little monetary value, yet cost tax payers over $15,000 per ounce to produce.  
 
20. "PRIVATE" GOVERNMENT FOUNDATIONS: The Liberal govt. stashed untold billions in "private" gov't foundations which were hidden from public scrutiny and beyond the reach of the Auditor General and Privacy Commissioner.  
 
21. CSL, CANADIAN STEAMSHIP LINES: Paul Martin circumvented Canadian health, labor and safety standards by re-flagging ships from his former company CSL. Martin fired the Canadian crews on his CSL ships and replaced them with cheap foreign labor. He registered his assets off-shore in Barbados to avoid paying his fair share of Canadian taxes. Also there was $161 million in federal development money paid to CSL which was "unknown" to Paul Martin.

Proportional rep government has worked so well for Greece, the party with the most seats pays.blackmail to the party with enough votes to keep them in power. Works so well in Isreal also. Do people actually look at these things before they jump on a bandwagon.coalition does not mean that you get better represented by government it means they get to blame someone for their poor choices. If people want fair representation vote for an independent who will represent your riding not the party. If you vote for a party all you get is the party leader and no local representation

https://ipolitics.ca/2015/10/14/liberal-campaign-co-chair-resigns-faces-possible-lobbying-investigation/  
 
Why is a lobbyist working on the Liberal Campaign???? I guess the old boys club is still calling the shots in the backroom deals of the Liberal party! Some things will never change!  

standard standard h8r said "the CPC was the party in power and made the decision for stimulus spending and debt. "

Actually, the leader of the party in power at the time refused to acknowledge that there was even a recession occurring until it was too late to do anything but implement stimulus spending to mitigate the damage. If Harper had a majority at the time, this country would have gone down the drain.

tafeel said "Proportional rep government has worked so well for Greece, the party with the most seats pays.blackmail to the party with enough votes to keep them in power. Works so well in Isreal also. Do people actually look at these things before they jump on a bandwagon.coalition does not mean that you get better represented by government it means they get to blame someone for their poor choices. If people want fair representation vote for an independent who will represent your riding not the party. If you vote for a party all you get is the party leader and no local representation "

I agree, but without independent candidates what can you do? In particular with the FPTP electoral system, it IS all about parties. Look what happened last election - 24% of eligible voters resulted in a majority conservative government where ALL votes were whipped to party lines regardless of how individual MPs felt. There was no regard for individual ridings or representing the majority of Canadians.  
 
I'd love to see that whole party system crash and burn, but we all know that it won't happen. The only option we have is to implement some sort of PR system so that the smaller parties and independent candidates will actually be able to represent their constituents.

A good read - statements by each party leader on why they deserve to be Prime Minister.  
 
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-debate/we-asked-canadas-federal-leaders-why-are-you-as-a-leader-best-suited-to-run-our-country/article26805015/

SJK said "https://ipolitics.ca/2015/10/14/liberal-campaign-co-chair-resigns-faces-possible-lobbying-investigation/     Why is a lobbyist working on the Liberal Campaign???? I guess the old boys club is still calling the shots in the backroom deals of the Liberal party! Some things will never change!   "

So why is a foreign national managing the Conservative campaign? Isn't it against the law for non-Canadians to influence how we vote in our elections? Oh.. right. Harper changed the law so that he could cheat in an election. Some things will never change...

http://windsorstar.com/opinion/letters/tory-veteran-support-the-best-in-40-years

JR said "    SJK said "https://ipolitics.ca/2015/10/14/liberal-campaign-co-chair-resigns-faces-possible-lobbying-investigation/     Why is a lobbyist working on the Liberal Campaign???? I guess the old boys club is still calling the shots in the backroom deals of the Liberal party! Some things will never change!   " So why is a foreign national managing the Conservative campaign? Isn't it against the law for non-Canadians to influence how we vote in our elections? Oh.. right. Harper changed the law so that he could cheat in an election. Some things will never change... "

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ndp-liberals-using-grassroots-mobilization-tactics-from-obama-campaigns/article22216447/ The NDP and Liberals using former Obama aides for their campaign because we all know how well Hope and Change has worked out for the Americans. You are also correct that there are many non Canadians/foreign money involved in our election and they all involve trying to eliminate PMSH and the Conservatives, yet that's probably A - Ok with you.  
 
Edited by SJK, 2015-10-15 14:58:36

I wish the candidates would focus their advertisements on what they plan to do and not what "errors" the other parties are planning on doing. I also wish the voters would do the same. I find it disrespectful to hear such meanness when talking about the leaders of the main parties. Also I myself do not vote for a person but the party that most reflects my opinions and way of life. And lastly it seems selfish when I hear people saying that they will vote for whichever party can give them the most. I want what is fair and good for all Canadians present and future. We live in an amazing country and I hope it can stay that way.  

all the desperation type of tactics coming out of PMSH campaign both in talking points, actions and ads, as well as numerous defensive posts even here on ebrandon, I for one am feeling real change is coming and the Cons know it!!!  
 
Also get a good look at the many polls indicating that something is changing and fast!!!