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Canadian Election Outcome
Canadian Election Outcome
#1
On the one hand the Bloc is now DEAD. DEAD! BWAHAHAHAHAH! Thank you!
On the other hand, the Liberals are almost dead as well. This is a literally unprecedented trouncing for the party that has been a mainstay in politics for over a hundred years. It appears that the Liberals ability to self-sabotage finally hit its peak. If this doesn't convince them to get off their collective heads out of each others assholes and realise that the opponents are people outside the Liberal party then nothing will and the Liberal party is destined to go the way of the old PC party (maybe absorbed by the NDP?).
On the third hand yay for the NDP. I voted for them this election mainly because I was sick of Liberal infighting and incompetence, and I think think that's why a lot of people voted for them. I'm very glad to see the massive inroads in Quebec they managed to attain (especially at the cost to the Bloc, wahaha!) and hope they manage to maintain this momentum in 4~5 years.
On the fourth hand we get a Conservative Majority. I can't say I'm happy about that at all. I guess its time for us to watch the Cons dismantle much of our social services for the next five years or so (and it probably cost me, personally, a job) and one can only hope they don't try rolling back our expanded human rights as well (I imagine the Trans rights bill that almost passed pre-election will never see the light of day for as long as they are in office, for instance).
Overall I have to say I am extremely ambivalent of the outcome.
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Epsilon
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#2
The real issue here is, of course, that Harper got over 50% of the seats by winning no more of the vote than he did in the last election (39%). Something really needs to be done about the system; and yes, it's fair to say that left-wingers bitched about it a lot less when there were two right-wing parties for the Liberals to reliably trounce for a decade while getting pretty much the same amount of votes. But personally speaking, that was a long time ago and I'm a lot older now, which has more to do with it than whether "my" guys win or not (besides, I liked Dion better than Iggy... and Dion still won his seat while getting a revising on how historically bad he might have been as leader, so, uh, ha?).

But seriously, half the problem with the Canadian system is how incredibly pointless the vote is in most ridings. Nothing will happen under a Harper government, because the day proportional voting is put into law in Canada is the day we've seen the last right-wing victory in Canada, and that's only fair to expect of him. But next election will see Canada being under ten years (!) of Harper, and the opposition will hopefully have sorted out their game by then. The NDP have always wanted to get rid of first-past-the-post, and I'd say it's fair to say the Liberals are abruptly a little disenchanted with it too. So here's hoping.
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#3
If you want to talk electoral reform I think the best option would be: Keep the Parliament as it is, but change the Senate. An appointed senate is kind of ridiculous in this day and age. So maybe change it so that the Senate gets a Proportional Representation thing going. Fix the number of senators at 100, and then allow the parties to fill those seats with whoever they want after the election based on their percentage of the popular vote.
Of course, any changes to the Senate will require the approval of the Senate which has been debating how to handle some changes to its function for the last five years now...
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Epsilon
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#4
I expected the Conservatives to come out ahead again, but to see them win a majority is pretty much the worse case scenario that I could (reasonably) imagine. Really, I don't think any of the parties getting  a majority would have been a good thing.

Quote: I guess its time for us to watch the Cons dismantle much of our social services for the next five years or so (and it probably cost me, personally, a job) and one can only hope they don't try rolling back our expanded human rights as well (I imagine the Trans rights bill that almost passed pre-election will never see the light of day for as long as they are in office, for instance).
I fear for out health care. You look up the rules for a recall vote, I'll find a book depository.
--
If you become a monster to put down a monster you've still got a monster running around at the end of the day and have as such not really solved the whole monster problem at all. 
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#5
Quote:On the one hand the Bloc is now DEAD. DEAD! BWAHAHAHAHAH! Thank you!

On the other hand, the Liberals are almost dead as well.
Actually, the Liberals have been close to this situation before - they've never been the third-place party before, but they have been close to this small a "rump" in Parliament when Mulroney won his first majority. They didn't die then and they won't die now. As for the Bloc, I'll hold off on the celebrations until after the next election.

Quote:On the fourth hand we get a Conservative Majority.
As a civil servant, it is not my place to speak openly my opinions of my political masters. It is, however, my place to say that I hope I still have a job six months from now.

Quote:I fear for out health care. You look up the rules for a recall vote, I'll find a book depository.
I believe we don't have rules for a recall vote. And there aren't any book depositories between 24 Sussex and Parliament Hill.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
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#6
Eh, I doubt Harper will touch health care. Even in Alberta support is higher for better funding medicare than privatising it. It's one of the few things he could do in the first two years that would still have people eager to vote against him in 2015.

But no, no recall. He won, fair and square, and we shall all have to deal with it. I imagine the Conservatives will lose the next election because at that point they'll have been in power a decade and even without any massive screwups people will be tired of them at that point, much like they were with the Liberals (who were generally well-regarded outside the Prairies and Quebec at the time) in 2004-5. All the opposition parties will have to do is look like a reasonable government in waiting after that long of Conservative rule, much like Chretien did.

The question is which opposition party will it be? The real difference for the Liberals is not that they got destroyed, but that they are no longer the government-in-waiting. They have never been lower than second place, and they have always benefitted from the fact that in the crunch, people who might vote NDP or other third party as protest would shift votes to the Liberals because they are the ones that can win. This was a major source of Liberal strength and NDP weakness for the last 50 years, but now it's broken, quite possibly forever. The Liberals can't run in the next election, even against an unpopular Conservative government, with "Vote for us because we are the only viable alternate government" - unless the NDP has utterly collapsed in the meantime (not improbable, given over half the NDP MPs are rookie members from a notoriously fickle Quebec, many of whom would not have been properly vetted as candidates since they were only warm bodies at the beginning of the election, not expected to have any chance to win). Even then it'll be hard. Liberal invincibility is shattered. They aren't the Natural Governing Party anymore - by next election, they'll have to stand for something else, and they have to have a dramatic increase in fortune by so doing. If they don't do that, I seriously believe they're finished.

In a sense, this means the majority government is actually a reasonably good situation for the Libs (if they had to drop to 34 seats, anyway). It gives them time to rebuild, to take their time picking a leader (who, if they have any sense, won't be Bob Rae or Justin Trudeau), to reorganise their financial structure from the ground up and rethink how to direct and protray the party brand in the future - without having to worry about fighting another election at any time and thereby being constantly in "campaign mode" as they have been since 2004. It also gives time for the current NDP euphoria to cool off and for people to take a good long look at them and what they stand for other than "Not the other two parties". None of this guarantees any sort of Liberal resurgence, but it does give them an opportunity - and Harper's sights are going to be set firmly on destroying Layton rather than whoever the next Liberal leader is, so that's also some breathing room. Still, I only give them 50/50 odds, I think - and it depends a lot on the NDP self-destructing.
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#7
Ayiekie Wrote:unless the NDP has utterly collapsed in the meantime (not improbable, given over half the NDP MPs are rookie members from a notoriously fickle Quebec, many of whom would not have been properly vetted as candidates since they were only warm bodies at the beginning of the election, not expected to have any chance to win).
One of the local NDP candidates took a vacation the week before the election - and still got elected despite that. If there are many others like that candidate, there's a distinct chance that the Official Opposition will self-destruct sooner rather than later.

Ayiekie Wrote:In a sense, this means the majority government is actually a reasonably good situation for the Libs (if they had to drop to 34 seats, anyway). It gives them time to rebuild, to take their time picking a leader (who, if they have any sense, won't be Bob Rae or Justin Trudeau),
I doubt Trudeau would want the interim position - that kills any chance he'd get the job full-time. (Considering he's the only Liberal in Quebec to increase his share of the vote compared to the last election, I'd say he's got a good chance of getting the job. He got where he is on his own merits, not by trading on his father's name.)

And, considering which party Bob Rae was in when he was Premier of Ontario, I can just see the wisecracks from the Conservatives about "two New Democratic leaders" if he got the nod... so bad idea, yes.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
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#8
Also considering that Bob Rae is the single most hated man in Ontario politics picking him as the leader would basically be saying you don't want any seats in Ontario.
Picking Trudeau would only cement the idea of the Liberals as the party of Toronto-Montreal an no one else in the minds of Westerners.
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Epsilon
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#9
Oh, I do believe either Trudeau or (more likely) Rae will win. It's just a terrible idea. The Liberals need to reassert themselves in Ontario and get at least a third or so of Quebec's seats to have a chance at regaining their former dominance. Rae is poison to Ontario and Trudeau is poison to most of Quebec. Nothing against either of them on their own merits, and no, it's not fair, but that's what it is.
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