New election issues.

[Machjo]

I'm tired of the same old issues being brought up again in elections and politics. Let's look at NAFTA in the 1980s, nothing more than a revival of the Reciprocity debate that started in the 1880s, and that itself going back to older debates about mercantilism! Or what about Official Bilingualism? Language politics was covered by Gibbon in his Decline and Fall when referring to the language conflict between Latin and Greek about 2000 years ago. And it was brought up even earlier in the Book of Genesis in the Tower of Babel story about 3000 years ago. Whether to increase or lower taxes is a debate that has gone on for well over a century already, and still going on. And there are plenty of other such examples that make us wonder if it's even worth voting if we're just going to be debating the same old issues again in a hundred years under a different name.

So on this note, what new issues would you like to see brought up for your next local, provincial, territorial, or federal election that is relatively new? In other words, it would have to be an issue that has not been brought up often in previous elections. It needn't necessarily be a new issue per se, but it would need to be one that has seldom been brought up in previous elections, at least in that jurisdiction, something fresh as opposed to a hackneyed issue that's been debated ad nauseum.

What issues could you recommend for upcoming elections that might break the cycle of seesaw law-making going back and forth election after election?

 

[ironsides]

Suggestion: Narrow Canada down to 3 major political parties. Get rid of the other 60-70 or so parties, no more coalition government, get a real majority goverment.

That will get people's interest.

 

[Machjo]

Suggestion: Narrow Canada down to 3 major political parties. Get rid of the other 60-70 or so parties, no more coalition government, get a real majority goverment.

That will get people's interest.

But how would that help promote new issues for politicians to discuss? By the way, the US faces the same problem. Seriously, name one idea in the last US election that was truly structurally unique (by structural, I mean a new idea that is different in some fundamental aspect as opposed to quantitative (whether to increase or reduce spending on something, or whether to increase or decrease taxes) or qualitative (same idea, but with more funding to make it better)). Can you name one?

 

[Machjo]

Actually another point: often fringe parties are the ones that usually have new ideas.

 

[Machjo]

In the last federal election in Canada, possibly among the most unique ideas was the Green shift. We can debate whether it was a good idea or not, but at least it broke away from the age old question of whether to increase or reduce taxes to focus instead on shifting taxes. Not particularly radical in and of itsef. And how good of an idea it is is debatable. But at least it was a topic not often brought up before.

 

[Machjo]

When the Reform Party brought up Triple E senate reform, or when the NDP brings up STV ballots, or when Saskatchewan had brought up universal health care under Broadbent, or Trudeau's Official Bilingualism, or Pearson's Blue Berrets, or Leveque's Sovereignthism. Heck, some of those were terrible ideas, some not so bad, some good. But at least they were all somewhat unique in their time.

 

[Machjo]

The Establishment of the League of Nations and the UN could be included in this too.

 

[Machjo]

What would be some new topics for political debate that politicians could bring up rather than the same old hackneyed ideas?

 

[YukonJack]

No party that is dead-set against individual prosperity, individual responsibility and individual success will ever succeed in Canada.

 

[Machjo]

Some examples I could think of could include:

Freer movement of labour, international co-operation in second-language teaching policy, discussing a shared currency, shared military force, etc.

Any other ideas?

 

[Machjo]

No party that is dead-set against individual prosperity, individual responsibility and individual success will ever succeed in Canada.

Why not? Is it that they don't know how to market themselves? What about taking incrementalist steps, identifying points that are clearly not working and then attacking those, removing the bureaucracy step by step like peeling an onion?

 

[ironsides]

How right you are, seems the Republican party is still spinning from the defeat. We have heard nothing new from them, just the same old rhetoric. Guess for atleast the next couple of yours it will be what ever Obama and Pelosi want.

One new (probably been discussed before) issue that would promote interest would be getting all those little political parties out of your Federal elections. Would make it easier to pass legislation you want with less arguing.
But do those fringe parties have the political power to get the new ideas voted upon a federal level? I still think they are important at local levels because that is where those grass root ideas start.
​

 

[Machjo]

True enough. Another idea could be to do what Nunavut or the Nebraska Legislature have done, which is to just get rid of political parties altogether:

Non-partisan democracy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Not a radically new idea really, seeing that it's been around for well over a century already, but it is new in the sense that it hasn't been a topic for a long, long time, at least outside of Nunavut and Nebraska who are just mocking the rest of us for being so far behind.

And you're right about Obama and McCain. They might as well have been Clinton and Bush, or Carter and Reagan. Different face, same issues. Broken records all around. Heck, even Carter and Reagan weren't that radical, similar to their predecessors too. Roosevelt came up with the UN which was radical enough, but that's been awhile now. How about a radical reform reform of the UN? That might be something new.

Too many people vote for party X just because grandpapa voted for it. Who knows, maybe it had some new ideas back in grandpapa's time, but if they're still regurgitating the same old ideas today, they're not so new anymore. Imagine someone voting Roosevelt because of his forward-looing ideas for his time, and now imagine his grandson voting Democrats just because grandpapa voted Roosevelt. Let's come up with a new issue already.

Same with those who vote NDP for universal health care. Hey, Thanks Tommy Douglas, but it's been awhile. Anything new?

If we got rid of parties altogether, that might force people to go out and seek new ideological territory, thrus promoting new ideas.

 

[JLM]

No party that is dead-set against individual prosperity, individual responsibility and individual success will ever succeed in Canada.

And then there's the old adage "united we stand divided we fall" or was that, someone just spewing a crock?