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Time to pull out that electoral reform idea you've had in your back pocket for the last 8 years.
Seriously, if there was ever a time for something like that, it's now. The CPC seems poised to take a landslide victory in the next election. We might be able to avoid that looming disaster by making a vote against Trudeau not equate to a vote for polievre.
You assume they want electoral reform at all
They don't.
They'd rather lose now and keep the system that would net them another majority of seats (without a majority of votes) in the future, then implement a system that would see them never realize another majority ever again.
The Liberals would rather lose every seat in Parliament and be reduced to zero than implement real electoral reform.
Would be a great time - especially knowing there's a slim chance that he'll win the next election. Instead of handing out country over to an insane christian bag of hot air, implement a voting system that might pass the vote over to somebody else.
Nobody is 'poised' to do anything. The next election doesn't need to happen until the back end of 2025. Thats more than enough time for the Liberals to do what they do best and convince everyone that, bad as they are, they're the only safe choice.
I hate this country's politics. Voting our leaders should not be about the least bad option.
You're not gonna lie any other country's politics then, either.
Some countries actually have politcal debates about the positives a leader will bring rather than the negatives the oposition will. Some countries have even had leaders step down when their policies left their politicians or citezens too divided.
True. Things have gotten worse, though. I remember being fairly shocked by the first Harper campaign, the depths they went to amplify anger towards the Liberal party. To be fair, the Liberals had it coming and needed to be replaced, but they needed to be replaced by the Tories, not the Reform party (which is what the Conservative party was and is)
Electoral reform was an election promise and nothing more.
There really should be a way to hold politicians more accountable for promises they have no intention of keeping.
We are expected to believe the accountability comes at the next (first past the post) election lol
I'm not convinced it's a landslide. I don't think PP is winning the female vote. He's not winning the Toronto vote either, so this is already starting to get pretty murky. You can't lose both and have a bonafide path to majority. So who is going to prop them up, the NDP?
That's a reasonable take, and I hope with all my heart it turns out that way. At the same time, I think it would be a mistake to underestimate the effectiveness of the "axe the tax" rhetoric. People are willing to overlook a lot of dubious political behaviour if they think it will make a them a couple of bucks.
As a reminder, if you're struggling with day to day things like housing, cost of living, education, healthcare access, etc., those would fall under your provincial leadership's duties.
Feds can assist provinces, but if your conservative provincial government is misspending, underspending, making side deals with their buddies, and forcing municipalities to make bad decisions, then change your provincial leadership vote.
A lot of the "fuck Trudeau" people in Ontario, should really be angry at Ford (the guy they voted for twice...). 😵
But but... what about muh "Fuck Turdeau" t-shirt. I just paid 60 CAD to the Ford reelection campaign for it!
That's just it. I mean the Liberals aren't really super appealing either. It would help if Trudeau wasn't an elitist little turd. But oh my God the conservative option, it's just not an option. Unless you are a low key white nationalist, god fearing, system destroyer who actively supports enriching people who aren't of their social economic class.
The irony is also not lost on me, that the most fervent supporters of these new Con hacks, are the very same people that have the most to lose all the social and economic support systems are ripped up. All to be transfered into some richy rich's company in a single source contract deal that wasn't put to tender. But I mean fuck that Trudeau, I'm going trucking!!
Most Ontarians didn't bother voting in the last provincial election. Evidently most of them don't actually care who runs their province or what the province's role is.
They could've elected Lesley Knope from Parks and Rec, or they could've elected an obscure Jim Henson Muppet, but instead they elected Peter Griffin. None were great choices but only one was an actual moron and that's who they picked.
Maybe some day the Liberals or NDP will field someone with enough personality to get Ontario to care enough to vote.
Anyway, your post sent me off on a tangent, but if you couldn't guess, I'm in complete agreement.
Canadians are being convinced that their problems are due to the Federal government rather than the Provincial governments where much of these issues fall and it's going to get a lot of people fucked over very badly.
Twice nothing is still nothing.
In seriousness, I'm very frustrated with the typical Liberal "we promise to consider to study the possibility of starting a commission to make recommendations" style of governance, all the while continuing don't-rock-the-boat neoliberal policies that just further enrich the rich.
What galls me is that, depending on how my riding is leaning, I'll vote for the LPC candidate because the CPC is just as bad economically, and socially much worse.
I'm sorry I can only give you the one upvote. I find myself in the same situation.
Would you mind singling down first? I'm still waiting for proportional representation...
JT before getting elected: "2015 will be the last Canadian federal election under first-past-the-post!"
JT immediately after getting elected: "Well we won, so clearly Canadians are satisfied and don't feel the need for electoral reform if the system works"
Doubling down on what? Inaction??
double down on debt!
Double down on allowing oil companies from fucking up our environment. Double down on allowing property barons to own more residential properties that they'll lease for ridiculous amounts of rent. Double down
“We’ve got a great team of amazing people who are putting forward the kinds of solutions that Canadians need, whether it’s on housing, whether it’s on paying for groceries, whether it’s on building strong careers for the future, fighting climate change, reconciliation,” Trudeau said.
Have their ideas gotten any farther than an email or meeting? I haven’t seen any action. If that were my job I’d have been fired long before 8 years. I wouldn’t have the balls to ask for a 4 year extension.
Housing? Immigration is set to increase the population orders of magnitude more than housing starts. Nothing has changed regarding corporate landlords scooping everything up. Most MPs have a lucrative side gig renting out homes at inflated, crippling rates.
Grocery prices? What have we done? Invited Galen Weston to come to a committee and shrug? They’re still more expensive and in smaller packages.
Strong careers? Salaries have come nowhere near increases caused by inflation. A small number of unions have negotiated something decent, but the government sure doesn’t get any credit for that.
Climate change? The country is on fire annually and the last thing you did was buy Alberta a pipeline nobody can use. The time for action was 30 years ago. You were in power for the last 8 and did nothing.
Reconciliation? You made a holiday for government workers and then went surfing.
The only thing the Liberals have they can use is “we’re not the CPC”, which is often enough, but pretty flimsy when your track record of the last 8 years is part of the next election.
Housing - They put 82 billion dollars towards building new homes. It's a process that takes years, if not decades. Even though, housing is generally, something that should be handled at the municipal/provincial level. I also love the idea of looking into the war time housing measures to mass produce houses.
Groceries - Inflation and a war in the bread basket of Europe have caused an issue everywhere. I'm not entirely sure I want the government mandating prices... Have we seen a plausible alternative from any of the other parties?
Climate change - Did you not see the whole "only EVs by 2030" pitch? Or the carbon tax scheme that has Polievre absolutely freaking out?
The other big things that are in progress (again, government shit, especially coming out of a global pandemic, takes time) and most impress me are:
National $10 a day daycare. That is an absolute game changer, especially for our lowest earners and young families. (Talk to any parent about how crazy expensive day care is. For a parent on minimum wage it makes almost no sense to work.)
Dental care for low income folks. Teeth are super important and I've had low earning friends have serious trouble because they couldn't afford check ups which caused real problems down the road.
And of course, I would say that rolling out the covid relief plan in a coherent targeted way was nothing short of impressive. Compare that to our southern neighbours who gave less money and poorly targeted, a colossal waste of money.
Are things perfect? No! Could they be better? Absolutely. But to say they have nothing other than "we're not the CPC" seems disingenuous, poorly informed or a poor grasp of how politics and reality work.
Housing - They put 82 billion dollars towards building new homes. It’s a process that takes years, if not decades. Even though, housing is generally, something that should be handled at the municipal/provincial level.
They pretty much took the smouldering fire of housing unaffordability, poured gasoline on it, and then watched for two years as it burned. I'll credit that the provinces largely did fuck-all to help, but this is the same government that increased immigration when we have nowhere to house people, and is still steadfastly refusing to do anything with the tax code to disincentive property hoarding and investment/speculation because they're still terrified of offending the rich.
I also love the idea of looking into the war time housing measures to mass produce houses
Liberals love "looking into things". Not actually doing anything, but boy does "looking into" sounds enough like "doing something" that it might fool some people. I'm sure they'll be done "looking at it" just in time for the next election, too.
Are they "looking into" telling the CMHC to directly build public housing? How about nationalizing a developer like how they bought a pipeline to nowhere for Alberta? That 30 billion spent on TMX would sure come in handy right about now, and boy howdy did they jump on TMX real fast, at least compared to housing.
Groceries - Inflation and a war in the bread basket of Europe have caused an issue everywhere. I’m not entirely sure I want the government mandating prices… Have we seen a plausible alternative from any of the other parties?
They could raise corporate taxes. I mean, we used to do that to control profiteering and force businesses to reinvest, instead of hoarding cash.
National $10 a day daycare. That is an absolute game changer, especially for our lowest earners and young families. (Talk to any parent about how crazy expensive day care is. For a parent on minimum wage it makes almost no sense to work.)
Left to the provinces to screw up, subject to the same crippling under-staffing that's currently killing healthcare. Wait lists are still monstrous, and staff are still overworked and underpaid.
Dental care for low income folks. Teeth are super important and I’ve had low earning friends have serious trouble because they couldn’t afford check ups which caused real problems down the road.
Again, I'll believe it when I see it. Right now, it's going to be open to people over 85 and phased in slowly, and even then I suspect the provinces will find ways to nickle-and-dime it into uselessness, as they've managed to do with healthcare in general.
And of course, I would say that rolling out the covid relief plan in a coherent targeted way was nothing short of impressive. Compare that to our southern neighbours who gave less money and poorly targeted, a colossal waste of money.
I'll give you this one, they did this pretty well. What they didn't do well was getting early control of inflation once the economy started to recover. Housing was probably the worst-run aspect of this, and we recognize that governments move slowly, and that the Canadian government is hardly the only one at fault, but it doesn't excuse the government from steadfastly refusing to take corrective action on the housing portfolio eight years ago.
Do I think the CPC would have done better? Heck, no--they'd have made larger versions of the same mistakes and added a soupcon of social conservatism--but "better than the CPC" does indeed seem to be the Liberal modus operandi.
No one's being naive, but we're also seeing that "sunny ways" really meant eight more years of the same neoliberal bullshit that's been degrading western nations since at least 1992.
meant eight more years of the same neoliberal bullshit that's been degrading western nations
I think this is the crux.
I mean that in terms of what a modern western government is going to do, the Liberals have done pretty well. I'd like more etc but I'm relatively impressed by the start.
There's a large difference between "not doing what you would do" on an issue and not doing anything.
I also tend to think that creating and refining multiple new national programs takes more than a couple of years.
They wouldn't have done any of those programs if they didn't need NDP support to govern. National daycare and dental programs are both NDP ideas that they've been pushing forever
Oh absolutely.
$10/day daycare will be a game changer, once there are enough spots. There are waitlists for the waitlists, where I live.
Not saying that's the Fed's fault. Just that in some places, lots of people aren't seeing the benefit yet. And the angry representative of the fields south of Ottawa will happily tell us it's due to a lack of federal planning.