Hosed

[petros]

If you don't see the relevance of a former paid aid come lobbyist come aid come lobbyist for the Conservative party since the days of Joe "who" Clack and his 22 year old f*ck monkey getting federally funded water contracts while using the PMO's and PMs name and taking payouts claiming they can get an "in" to the PM a good thing for Canadian politics and the Conservative party then yeah I do think you're ****ing drunk.

 

[CDNBear]

If you don't see the relevance of a former paid aid come lobbyist come aid come lobbyist for the Conservative party since the days of Joe "who" Clack and his 22 year old f*ck monkey getting federally funded water contracts while using the PMO's and PMs name and taking payouts claiming they can get an "in" to the PM a good thing for Canadian politics and the Conservative party then yeah I do think you're ****ing drunk.

And I guess you just can't answer that question.

But hey, what do I know, I'm drunk, because you can't answer a question you know will take the wind out of your sails.

 

[petros]

It's a retarded question with an obvious answer and was already answered quiet nicely by someone else.

 

[CDNBear]

It's a retarded question with an obvious answer and was already answered quiet nicely by someone else.

Of course it must have been retarded, you couldn't answer it, and still can't.

And I checked, no one answered it. Now you're seeing things? Get help soon dude!

So, we have determined that I'm drunk, and you are culpable for any misdeeds committed by anyone in your employ, or close acquaintances.

Good to know.

 

[wulfie68]

It is our system that is to blame.
Political Parties become an entity that is only hungry for power. The citizen's needs comes in second or is dictated to us. We swallow it whole or we become so blazeyed (sp) about it that we don't give a damn. What we have here is mainly elected dictatorship.
Regional representative is lost as soon as the ballots are counted .

Remove the parties , remove how the prime minister reigns over that party.
It may remove the division we have in this country.

I agree with you about the problem, El Barto, but I don't see a way to solve it. The origins of our parties was in the British parliament where temporary alliances were formed to take action on specific issues. This however under states the fact that people of like ideological minds have always banded together, and that the very nature of politics demands some softening of ideologies to make compromises that will achieve some goals. In essence I don't see a way some type of informal party struture wouldn't come into play, even if we did manage to completely revamp our system.

 

[damngrumpy]

The Liberals leadership issue is not really an issue the same as the Liberals being
in the penalty box. For Canadians they don't seem to care, the time is up and the
Liberals return like a jack in the box. Look at some of the Liberal leaders over the
years, that explains a lot.
The Conservatives cannot run a mainstream government, because they never did
intend to operate one, they were heading on a far right path from the get go and that
is simply not possible because a majority of Canadians are not prepared to go that
far.
Social Conservatism would have gutted the social safety net and other programs that
define this country and people feel this is still the case. At present the voters don't
trust Harper and they don't trust the other cast of characters either, so we will keep on
with a Minority Government for some time to come.
I don't think the Tories will for a majority and they might not even for a government when
the dust settles. They do have to go this spring though, because the same trust in the
economy people have, is about to evaporate and we are headed for another economic
downturn the like of which we have not seen in some time.
The Liberals will not for a majority either, the scandals are going to play a role in this
and the media is going to play the cards one at a time, up until know there is an
image, of a Teflon government, that nothing ever sticks to, but I think that is about to change.
I have been around politics a long time and watched a lot of games played, over the years,
this one promises to be a cliff hanger like some of the others. The mood in the country is
changing though as people become a little more engaged that is when change happens.
And yes, the Tories are doing something about getting tough on crime the problem is that
most Canadians are beginning to understand the violent crime numbers are going down
already. Building more prisons is not the answer, creating jobs and giving people something
to strive for, is. We need to ensure people get a good education to be able to access the
jobs we need to fill. I for one believe there are many jobs going begging not because of high
unemployment, but because people are not trained to do them.
This government is going to be the same after the election. That would mean all the leaders
will be replaced in all the parties and the game will continue.

 

[Fallout]

Care to share that list on the Conservatives?

The list keeps growing, as though it has a very life of it's own.

One example would be Harper mysteriously still getting a pass on his HST play.
The one that floored me was his million dollar per minute G20 waste.

If I recall correctly, Harper got himself elected by appealing to the public's craving for common sense in government. (Could very well be that so did all those other G20 leaders who hypocritically lavished themselves on our dime)
His superb bull crap in relationship to fiscal responsibility and elected accountability is what brought him to the dance in the first place.
When he told us all that we need tighten up our own affairs, and not spend so freely, I was in full agreement.

Alas; I guess what is good for our goose is not good enough for Harper's gander. :sadface:

Given our dismal political circumstance, I fully expect Harper to get re-elected, I'm just hoping the big show ends up being but another minority govt, so that self service and corruption can be kept to a minimum.

 

[JLM]

There's no question we've been suffering from a lack of real democratic representation in this country for decades. Even though some of my earliest memories are of a neighbour being elected to Parliament as a Liberal when I was about five(his daughter was my first girlfriend hence my lifelong inability to take anybody who claims the Liberals are evil seriously) I never did buy into Trudeau Mania. While he did help define a Canadian character separate from the Brits and the Americans, the price has been a cult of personality around our PM ever since. Too much hype and too little substance. And while there were too many extremists in the Reform party in my opinion I liked what Manning stood for and Joe Clark has more integrity in his little finger than Chretien has in his whole body.

To me once again we're saddled with just another arrogant, self-interested PM who could care less about what the vast majority believe and in the long term need in the this country. He's too focused on his social conservative agenda and his too-close-for-comfort ties to industry. Even if I didn't believe in the seriousness of climate change(which I do) I still think a PM needs to be more objective and free of obvious conflicts of interest... but that's not likely in this country now or in the forseeable future.

I would have been more than happy to see Steven Harper take the bull by the horns and try to wrestle this country in a different direction politically by repairing some of the serious flaws in our democratic process but instead he's taken us by the balls and tried to squeeze any real will to think independently out of voters. He's taken a page out of the US neo-con manual and turned our political forum into a battlefield to an unprecedented level, with the apparent objective of intimidating and manipulating his way to greater power while doing as little as possible to actually make a real difference to our lives. I know many admire his skill at driving the agenda to favour his own interests at the expense of the overall Parliamentary system and I also understand the Liberals did the same to a degree in the decade before. The difference being when the Liberals took power they really did face a hostile Parliament who's official opposition's main focus was the dismemberment of the country, something most democratic systems aren't really set up to handle. Now the conservatives are taking an even more belicose approach to Parliament than the Liberals did, not with the objective of keeping the country together-which the Liberals just barely managed to do in 1995- but with the singular goal of eliminating any real opposition to their continued control of the country. "Canada's new Government" was notice of new management, "Harper's Government" is notice of new ownership.

Truly we're being hosed once again.

Just read the following in the National Post this morning. Think there may be a bit of truth to it. How much is the question?
Voters think Conservatives best party to deliver honest government: poll

 

[petros]

29% don’t endorse any of the major parties as best to deliver this type of government.

28% of Canadians believe the Conservatives, if re-elected, would do the best job of “providing honest, open and trustworthy government.”

One out of three ain't bad?

 

[JLM]

29% don’t endorse any of the major parties as best to deliver this type of government.

28% of Canadians believe the Conservatives, if re-elected, would do the best job of “providing honest, open and trustworthy government.”

One out of three ain't bad?

I guess where there is five parties plus an undecided category, anything over 25% is good.
Actually, I guess when compared to our Ex illustrious premier at 9% acceptibility, 28% looks stellar. :smile:

 

[petros]

The 1/3 who are dismayed hold the balance of power.

 

[Cobalt_Kid]

Harper is a draw back for this country simply because he is a social conservative and
luckily everyone knows it. The Reform Movement hijacked the Conservative Party and
as we know movements are not political parties. Like the locust they come and send
a message of change, the trouble is, left or right, the people disconnect with them and
all that remains is a line in history. Social Credit is a prime example, they were the
movement before Reform. I don't believe Harper will get a majority because people do
not trust this hybrid, political social movement with the power of a majority.
The trouble is, there is no trust for anyone else either, not Jack, not Iggy and the Block,
well we know where that is going.
I do agree with parts of what you said, Harper is a political gigolo who pretends to be a
mainstream conservative while disguising his true intentions should he get that extra
vote. None of them are trustworthy at this point and time, and as long as the Bloc has
a power base a majority is a long way off. To demonstrate what I mean about the social
conservative agenda being nothing more than a fading dream, count the number of
tory politicians who are not running again. They know the end of the road has come for
two reasons. The first being, the majority numbers are just not there and this Tory
government is not equipped to run a mainstream conservative government,. Their followers
are going to demand a swing to the right and the numbers to govern won't be there.
Secondly the Liberals have been in the penalty box for a long time now and they are about
to be forgiven by the general public. Many in the conservative ranks know it and they are
leaving not because they won't get elected, but because they won't count in opposition after
being cabinet members for so long.
In short the jig is nearly up and that is why they want an election now, as the numbers are
about to swing to somewhere less favourable for the Harper Government.
As for us being hosed, we are a lot better off than many other places in the world.

Well said.

At some point ideology becomes indistinguishable from idiocy and I think we've reached that point with Harper.

And while the Liberals got far too full of themselves after defeating the separatist referendum in Quebec, I think we've punished ourselves enough by letting the Harper conservatives hijack the entire nation on issues like climate change.

 

[wulfie68]

Looking at those poll numbers, I don't think any of the parties should want an election, but the results appear to favour the Conservatives more than anyone else. Like the pollster from Ipsos Reid said, it does baffle me why the Liberals would be posturing like they are when they are so incredibly weak. I will say this about the honesty issue: I do not recall any other PM in the 30 years or so that I have observed our politics, who has been so willing to involve the RCMP as often as Harper, when there is a hint of impropriety. I don't think it makes the Conservatives more honest than the others but rather less tolerant of it when they find out about it.

 

[Cliffy]

The whole left/right, Liberal/Conservative, Republican/Democrat, Atheist/Religious divide is beyond childish and insipid. To chose sides is to close one's mind to greater possibilities. It seems like the wrong knee jerk reaction to a time of crisis. It would seem to me these times call for cooperation and understanding. We could take a lesson from the Japanese who are helping each other through their crisis, not fighting each other. It takes real courage to step outside one's preconceived ideas to embrace your neighbour as your brother.

 

[JLM]

The whole left/right, Liberal/Conservative, Republican/Democrat, Atheist/Religious divide is beyond childish and insipid. To chose sides is to close one's mind to greater possibilities. It seems like the wrong knee jerk reaction to a time of crisis. It would seem to me these times call for cooperation and understanding. We could take a lesson from the Japanese who are helping each other through their crisis, not fighting each other. It takes real courage to step outside one's preconceived ideas to embrace your neighbour as your brother.

You've hit the nail right on the head Cliff.................never could figure out why people mindlessly follow one religious or political faction like a bunch of brainless idiots. Nobody in this world has all the answers and yet most people/factions etc. do have some of them. The more people you can have on your side the better- with a few exceptions like possibly KKK and skin heads.

 

[taxslave]

You've hit the nail right on the head Cliff.................never could figure out why people mindlessly follow one religious or political faction like a bunch of brainless idiots. Nobody in this world has all the answers and yet most people/factions etc. do have some of them. The more people you can have on your side the better- with a few exceptions like possibly KKK and skin heads.

I would add the raging loons on both extremes of the political spectrum.

 

[Cobalt_Kid]

The whole left/right, Liberal/Conservative, Republican/Democrat, Atheist/Religious divide is beyond childish and insipid. To chose sides is to close one's mind to greater possibilities. It seems like the wrong knee jerk reaction to a time of crisis. It would seem to me these times call for cooperation and understanding. We could take a lesson from the Japanese who are helping each other through their crisis, not fighting each other. It takes real courage to step outside one's preconceived ideas to embrace your neighbour as your brother.

There's definitely a greatness of spirtit that's been missing in our politics for a long time.