Oh, Canada. Are you going to get it for the next five years now that the neo-cons have full power in your country too. Say goodbye to your reputation as a peaceful tolerant prosperous nation, because that nightmare of peace and prosperity you had under Liberal governments and managed to hang onto during the coalition government is going to seem as distant a memory of an earlier paradise by the time the neo-cons are through with you as the Clinton administration seems today to Americans. (And that's said as someone who didn't even particularly *like* the Clinton administration, which I felt sold out poor Americans by shredding the social network with its GOP-written "welfare reform" bill).
Canada. It was a nice experiment, but seems that the corporate masters figured out how to deal with that too. So it goes.
-- Badtux the Wistful Penguin
Woo-hoo! Maybe things will get bad enough up here that Mrs. Bukko will become so sick of it that she wants to move back to Australia. It's not that Canuckrainia is a BAD place, at least not right now, but I still like Australia better. We have unlimited "ins-and-outs" rights until January 2014 through our "permanent residency" status there (which is only good for 5 years, when you read the fine print) so Harper and the Cons had better get to ruining Canada quick. I think he can do it.
ReplyDeleteThe "Liberal" who lost, Michael Ignatieff, has many of the worst characteristics of John Kerry and Michael Dukakis. He's a pompadoured patrician like Kerry, and a stumbling speaker like Dukakis could come across as. The Liberals were as corporate as the U.S. Democrats are. They were also stupid politically, forcing an election via that "contempt of Parliament" vote while not being ready to really rack the Cons. How can you attack the other guys when you're so much like them, eh?
I had hopes for the NDP (New Democratic Party), which is like the Social Dems in the U.K., from what I understand of their positions. A leftish alternative, but not full-on progressive. They're the "official opposition" now, but when the full-on economic crisis hits -- I can foresee this happening in the next two years -- Canada might fracture. There's a bit of separatist restlessness in the prairie oil provinces, which are as arrogant as Texas, as well as Quebec.
Soft fascism is on the march across the English-speaking world! The maggots at the top are going to put the screws to the sheople. Will they just huddle and bleat, or will they kick and bolt? My vote's on bleating, unfortunately. Because bolting would mean burning shit down and fucking stuff up. The complacent fat people in both our countries are too PW'ed to do that.
Meanwhile, I will be the stray sheep prancing around the outside of the flock, bleating "You're being led by a pack of wolves who are herding you to the slaughterhouse!" And the sheep will continue marching ahead, not listening or changing course, believing as hard as they can that there's a nice trough of food just up that ramp inside the big, smelly building...
BTW, the Canadian election results bear out the point you make about third parties. The Conservatives got only 40% of the popular vote. The NDP pulled 31% and Libs 19%, so you had half the population voting "Hell no, I don't want Harper's party" but they split between two sides, so the minority party won.
ReplyDeleteFWIW, the election seemed to be a non-issue with the public. Some election signs on yards and commercials on TV (nowhere near as intense as in the U.S.). A couple co-workers discussed voting, but there was no strong political chatter amongst the people I encounter. We went to a nice Italian restaurant last night because it's almost my birthday, and it was just like any other night, no buzz. In Australia, there was more palpable vibration surrounding elections -- it seemed to matter to folks there. Canadians are so blase. Ottawa seems far removed from most folks' lives.
First-past-the-line polling needs to go away, already. There are some U.S. states that require a majority, not a plurality, to get elected. In those states, if nobody has a majority, the two top vote-getters then have a runoff election. It's clear the majority of Canadians are not inclined to vote for Conservatives, so the result would likely have put the NDP in charge (assuming NDP was in second place in those ridings where the Cons didn't win the majority of the vote). We have a name for a system of government where the minority can rule over the majority, and "democracy" ain't it.
ReplyDeleteBTW, local reaction to the capture of Osama bin Laden was similarly muted. Despite all the hysterical reporting in the U.S. media and occasional blog, it just wasn't a big deal for most Americans.
- Badtux the Democracy-desirin' Penguin
Because you're a tuned-in penguin, you're probably aware that Britain has a national election tomorrow about reforming the voting system to eliminate "first past the post." (I was surprised at how many headlines on teh Oogle called it "Oscars-style voting." A way of trivializing it, eh?)
ReplyDeleteThat was one of the key demands by the Liberal Democrat third party when they joined the Tories in the UK's coalition government. But now, strange bedfellows that they are, Labour and the Tories have united in their opposition to anything that would challenge their duopoly power.
I wonder how the average Brits will vote on this. Will enough of them care enough to pay attention and analyze the issue? Can they be bothered to vote? I used to have a lot of respect for Brits, but after learning about the "chav" culture there and working with a lots of Poms in Australia, I now see them as a degenerate society. They got stupid and nasty when their empire blew away. Foretaste for the USA, eh?
Australia can manage a complex preferential voting system, and it is in many ways a pretend country. Yet drunken and trivial as the Aussies are, they still have a small spirit of caring about democracy, plus well-organized political party structures that fight to make sure they get a slice of the pie.
More than anything else, active party organizations are essential to keeping democracy from turning into oligarchy. Unions used to be a counterbalance to the organized party of money. Now it's one-sided, with the money party in control of the U.S. and increasingly elsewhere.
Tomorrow belongs
ReplyDeleteTomorrow belongs
Tomorrow belongs to Steve....
"which are as arrogant as Texas." - Bukko Canukko
ReplyDeleteAre you sure about that, Bukko? I find that hard to believe...