AGM

No kidding. Social issues aren't off the table in this election. It's just a matter of trying to save progress made on them rather than having them clawed back to mid last century.

The main reason China has had worsening relations with Canada and has been threatening to Canada at all is because we have been so closely allied with the US, and the US overtly wants to hamper China's development and even to overthrow their system of government.

The Meng Wanzhou thing was Canada purely going along with a brash US attack on a leading Chinese company, and it did tremendous and needless damage to Canada-China relations. China didn't start that. The US did, and Canada helped them do it.

Now, while the US has started acting towards Canada in a way a little more like it has treated countries throughout the Global South for decades, China is offering to partner with Canada to oppose the US abuses of the whole global system of trade. China isn't devastating Canada's economy. They've started buying our oil, which is good for our economy. They've been suggesting more open trade with us, and would no-doubt drop tarrifs on our agricultural products if we lowered our ridiculous tarrifs on their EVs, which we imposed at 100% just to please the US even though it's worse for the Canadian consumer and has been primarily beneficial to Tesla and Elon Musk, an overt fascist enabler of our biggest threat who also says we're not even a real country.

The US is the primary aggressor to worry about. They're holding military exercises this week with the Philippines on simulating all-out war with China and Trump appointed a bunch of guys who have years of advocating for war with China. He is waging economic war against China right now.

I support Carney wanting increased economic ties with Europe and more pivoting away from US dependence, but to treat China as an enemy and speak more harshly about them than even the US is something I really dislike. Opposing the foreign interference, asserting sovereignty in the Arctic, protecting Canadian markets to an extent that is reasonable and fair, these are all good things, but they can be done without making an enemy of China, especially while China is actually offering to work with us and to help us out in dealing with our biggest immediate threat.

I find it interesting, and concerning, that in more MAGA-friendly corners of the internet it seems pretty common to see Canadians who are convinced the polls are all fake and manipulated and that Poilievre is headed for a sure majority, just based off of rally attendance and anecdotal observations of lawn signs.

It's a completely different reality from anyone who's not in that bubble of conservative social media.

Nobody cares if your want to go your own direction. It's only an issue to anyone if you're a dick about it.

I expect Jagmeet to be out as leader after the NDP get set back in this election, but the NDP have never been more effective in getting policies passed than they were in the last few years with him propping up the Liberal minority. Those accomplishments will leave a lasting mark on the country.

So, you're telling me that a population of people who spend a lot more time listening to messages that their country is broken, that streets are rampant with crime, and that mass murderers are getting out of jail early is a population of people who feel less safe?

Huh, wouldn't have expected that.

Eby is great. As a former Albertan now living in BC and watching from the outside, it's a real shame Alberta doesn't have leadership equivalent to Eby. Hopefully Nenshi can change that in the not-so-distant future.

This and referring to everyone on stage as "contestants" were both pretty funny.

I would say the reason the NDP, the Bloc, and the Green vote has been collapsing is that this is an election where the key ballot question is one of foreign policy, particularly to do with the US. The NDP, the Bloc, and the Greens are all primarily domestic policy parties, so they're not speaking to the ballot question. The Liberals have a leader who does speak to the ballot question, and so do the CPC in that he's largely aligned with the IDU and MAGA. So, it's a two-party race this time. Doesn't mean it will be that way next go around.

I honestly just don't think it's that big a deal. It's a bad thing to do, but not something that came from the top. On the spectrum of bad things going on around this election, it's pretty run-of-the-mill or minor.

As far as I remember, during the BC provincial elections in the fall, Mainstreet consistently indicated the BC United (conservative) party was around 5 points ahead of the NDP in polling.

The others generally showed it to be a dead heat.

In the end, the NDP won a very close race and Mainstreet was shown to be the one overrepresenting conservative vote intentions as compared to the other pollsters.

Not sure what the differences were in their methodology, but it wouldn't surprise me to see the same thing going on here.

Chinese culture has the concept of 'eating bitterness' and it is universal. It's about being able to take the suffering, loss, pain, humiliation, and all the other bitter stuff that life can throw at you, enduring it, and building character, strength, and resilience out of it. It's a virtue. It's a universally admired trait.

North American culture is not great at eating bitterness. The culture here is more about eating sweet, or living the good life, and when people have to eat bitterness, especially those expecting to eat sweet, it is viewed as shameful and castigating rather than normal, and it easily turns a person towards grievance and a sense of injustice that makes them bitter inside instead of resilient and optimistic.

This is why I think men in North America, especially white men, have turned to characters like Jordan Peterson, or in worse cases, Andrew Tate. Jordan Peterson at least tries to help these men develop a sense of responsibility and strength that can be constructive and meaning- making. Guys like Tate, on the other hand, exploit their grievance to make them socially nihilistic. One is obviously much better than the other, but neither is a substitute for having a common social value place upon eating bitterness.

The "manosphere" gives aggrieved, frustrated, disappointed, and angry men stories to help them process their emotions, but they still rely upon self-centered and egotistical tropes like the hero's journey or misogynistic worldviews. These don't address the deeper and more universal reality that none of us (male or female) are heroes from Marvel movies, that deep, painfully-bitter experience is part of the common human journey, and that eating that bitterness with humility and without expectation of any award for being special, is a virtue that helps you develop character.