October 2008
128 posts
The good, the bad and the ugly of the election...
by Scott Piatkowski
Since Tuesday, catching up on sleep has taken precedence over catching up on blogging. Of course, that doesn’t mean that I don’t have a lot to say about the outcome of the vote. So, somewhat belatedly, here is my take on the highlights and lowlights of the 2008 Federal Election results.
The good
Jack Harris winning three-quarters of the vote in St. John’s...
Apathy Gains Majority In Federal Election
by Matthew Good
The federal election produced two results – a practically unchanged government and the lowest voter turnout in Canadian history. While there are those that will shake their heads at that fact and claim it despicable, the stark reality is that a great many Canadians have simply become fed up with federal politics. This was, after all, the third federal election in four years, one...
Quebec and cities save our Canada
by Alice Klein
it’s hard to be upbeat right now since the overwhelming first-past-the-post message of the election is a strengthened Harper minority. But given the array of forces aligned on his side, the Conservatives actually did relatively poorly. Harper had all the ingredients for a perfect Tory storm.
We had the lowest voter turnout in history (which always favours the incumbents), an...
A clean win for corporations, a loss for students
by Mai Nguyen, rabble staff
So here we are again…living in yet another Canada under the leadership of the Conservative government. It’s a hard blow for students, immigrants, families, the working class and so many more. But it’s not so much for the corporations. A sociology professor very recently said to my class of about 50 students that we are essentially feeding into several profit-driven...
Angry Greens call for Elizabeth May's resignation
By Murray Dobbin
Stephane Dion may not be the only leader under pressure to resign as a
result of the election. The knives seem to be out for Elizabeth May over her
toying with the idea of strategic voting. In the last weeks of the campaign
May suggested three times that defeating Harper was more important than
winning votes or seats - and then reversed herself each time. A new web site
-...
Lets ask good questions about what happened
By Fred Wilson
Enough already with the “if only we had PR…” We don’t and won’t anytime soon. The election results are completely understandable when 37% vote for one party, and no other party is within 10 points of that. But it still didn’t produce majority government – thanks to Quebec.
It is likely too soon to really comprehend what happened yesterday. The best we can do today is to begin...
Saved by Quebec
by rabble staff
rabble board member and columnist Duncan Cameron has his take on last night’s results:
The Harper attempt at forming a majority government was stopped at the Ottawa River. The Conservative campaign succeeded in reviving the Bloc Québecois. Putting to rest his critics, Gilles Duceppe managed to keep the nearly 50 seats needed to ensure that to win a majority the...
Post Traumatic Bloc Shock
by Beisan Zubi I am still extremely unsettled by the election results, and am working through them with a furrowed brow. I understand that a lot of the vote distribution issues all relate to our constitution, but they lack a basic sense of equality and reason. In order to prevent premature wrinkles, these conflicting points about the election need to be vented about: 1. The Green party and the...
Three hundred and fifty million dollars later,...
by Dionne Brand
To prove they could waste our time and money.
There should have been not one single pseudo victory/concession speech last night. Stephen Harper should have slunk away in embarrassment. The whole election exercise was redundant.
So the conservatives crow about a ‘strengthened’ minority and walk back their statements, at the beginning of this sham, that they were seeking a majority....
Lament for a nation
By Trish Hennessy, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
As Canadians living in a free and open democracy, we hit a new low yesterday.
It was Canada’s 40th federal election – an election waged during perilous economic times, globally and domestically.
And yet, only 59% of eligible voters came out to vote. That represents the lowest voter turnout in our entire democratic history.
And so,...
War of positions
by Pierre Beaudet Stephen Harper has registered an important tactical victory yesterday. While maintaining his positions in most regions, he has made important headways into the urban bastions of the Liberals, notably in Ontario and BC. A few weeks back, when he was saying that he was hoping for another minority government, most people thought he was spinning. But probably he had calculated...
Learning from the lowest turnout ever
by Blair Redlin
Turns out low voter turnout helps tell the tale of the 2008 federal. At
59%, the turnout yesterday was the lowest
yet.
For all the arcane and complicated discussion about strategic voting,
the record low turnout may explain more. Certainly the turnout offers
important lessons for next time.
With megabucks in their party coffers and a focused message, the
Conservatives...
Democracy Watch calls for Elections Act changes
OTTAWA - Today, Democracy Watch called on the leaders of federal political parties to work together to make changes to the federal Elections Act to respect voter rights, increase disturbingly low voter turnout, ensure election honesty, fairness and ethics, and ensure a representative Parliament is elected, in future federal elections. TO SEE the list of key changes, with links to related...
Morning After Points
by Dru Oja Jay, the Dominion
CKUT’s Wednesday Morning After invited me to come and talk about the elections bright and early this morning. Voici mes talking points, albeit in more articulate form, not that I got to all of them:
Proportional representation is on a lot of people’s minds, but it’s not going to happen. If it can’t be passed at a provincial level (so far, BC,...
Not what I'd call a breakthrough
by Vicky Smallman
Well, it’s 3:30am and I am finally putting aside my spreadsheet for the night. I’ve been tracking the numbers of women elected and here’s the scoop:
68 women total - 22%. A whopping percentage point up from last year. Not what I’d call a breakthrough, although this is the first time we have moved up from the 21% we’d been stuck at for some...
WatchEight Good Reasons to Vote Against Stephen Harper’s Conservatives
As a final call-out on election day, we have video of eight prominent personalities from a cross-section of Canadian NGOs collectively express their opposition to the re-election of Stephen Harper’s Conservative Party. The eight leaders from the environmental, labour, arts, aboriginal, culture, anti-poverty, and anti-globalization...
Media Issues: Where do the parties stand? Where do...
By Steve Anderson
As I wrote earlier, it is clear that Canadians are passionate about communication and cultural issues, and they deserve to know exactly where each party stands.
Campaign for Democratic Media (CDM) formulated five specific questions that were sent out to the five major parties. The objective of the questionnaire was to both provide citizens with a clear sense of the party...
The Kids are All... Where?
by Beisan Zubi As a member of the oft-ignored youth vote, I see some stirrings on my university campus to get out there and have our voices heard. Since the 1960s, when the younger generation was a strong force in societal changes taking place across North America, the atmosphere has settled into one of (perceived) apathy and ignorance. I see this on my university campus, where a vocal and...
Harper's economics, at home and abroad
by rabble staff
On the eve of the election, Nikolas Barry-Shaw has an excellent piece on Znet summing up the convergence of economic and foreign policy issues in this campaign. First, he summarizes the bi-partisan (Liberal/Conservative) implementation of neo-liberalism:
While those fortunate enough to own stock in the banks and the oil companies have certainly enjoyed the fruits of...
Where’s the real money?
By David Suzuki Less than a day to go to the election and, as I feared, the environment has disappeared from election discourse. All the leaders are scrambling to respond to a tanking global economy. But who has considered this crisis to ask some really important questions like how did politicians sell us out to forces of the global economy that are out of our control? I was astounded at the panic...
Let's stop trying to save the Liberals from...
by Scott Piatkowski
Imagine, if you will, that the levels of support for each political party were represented by containers of water.
The container representing the Conservatives is almost full (much the same level as it was in 2006), but there is no opportunity for it to reach full capacity. In fact, the water in that container is so stagnant that it’s clearly starting to evaporate. Of...
Get Out and (Strategic) Vote
By Marc Lee
I feel for other bloggers on rabble.ca’s election blog who want people to vote their convictions. A few recent posts have denounced strategic voting, even if it means a Harper majority government. I don’t get it.
For the first time ever, the web can play a real difference in this election. Sites like VoteforEnvironment.ca offer the promise of defeating an arrogant...
24, 24 hours to go ...
by rabble staff
… or less. So if you are not out doing some last minute campaigning, here’s some great reading and listening from rabble.ca:
Late last month, Naomi Klein spoke in Toronto on the financial crisis and the Canadian election - listen to it here, courtesy of the rabble podcast network. And, in case you missed it, rabble’s Duncan Cameron made the case that the crisis...
Thank God it is Over Soon
by Pierre Beaudet Some times you wake up in the morning and think, ‘why I have put myself in such a lousy situation’! Your relationship is fucked up. You hate your job. Even the roof is leaking. And then you started to reflect. ‘I should have done this and that because for sure, all of this mess did no start today. I should not have engaged with this particular soul. Why did I not have the guts to...
Speak White
by Pierre Beaudet Jeffrey Simpson is an intelligent guy, not one of these cowboys. Yesterday in La Presse, he came out with his usual twist. Basically, Québécois are spoiled brats, they are ‘using’ Canada like a ‘cash machine’. They should be disciplined at some point, and politicians should warn them clearly, ‘accept the rules of the games or else…’ He was very angry that apparently, Québécois...
Elizabeth May be Nader?
by Beisan Zubi http://www.voteforenvironment.ca/may-surge-could-make-difference-between-harper-majority-and-liberal-minority It seems that strategic voting has reared its head again. The overwhelming fear that another Conservative government (and potential Haper majority) might take place on Tuesday has lead “Vote for Environment” to subtly encourage supporters of Elizabeth...
Polling CanWest: Vote Harper!
by Ben Powless
Now we all know the mainstream media has their little biases. Anyone who’s read Herman and Chomsky’s Manufacturing Consent, anything by Bob McChesney, has heard of Judy Rebick, or has read a newspaper would be reasonably able to rhyme off a dozen reasons why our media is inherently conservative (little c).
Yet it’s not so often that we get such a stark reminder about just how much...
Without further comment . . .
by Sharon Fraser
I have just sent this letter to Avaaz.ca who have written — once again — urging the use of the site VoteForEnvironment.ca as a voting aid.
___________________________________________________
I am very impatient with you people — and I’m not the only one — with your continuing campaign for Elizabeth May in Central Nova.
Elizabeth May never had a...
Hey, Steve! Thanks for this!
by Bernadette L. Wagner
It’s weird. Harper doesn’t make these kinds of boo-boos. He makes strategic mistakes but he is not the kind of guy who gets the dates of elections wrong by four months, especially when he’s reading right off the hard copy. So I figure that either he’s drunk in that clip or this is a dog whistle.
The date, February 14th rung a bell for me, not...
The Rich are the New Poor
By Dionne Brand
In recent days I am struck by how many pictures of distraught stockbrokers, stock analysts, bankers, traders, buyers, sellers, I’ve seen in the news. They’ve occupied the focus of web pages, and newspaper front-pages with their dramatic poses. We are alerted to their plight at the start of every newscast, and in extended treatments on cable networks and magasines. Their problem, we...
The sinister legacy of Trudeau
by Pierre Beaudet The specter returns, especially in Ontario and BC it seems, where Dion, Jean Chrétien (he dared to) and the other luminaries of the Liberal Party have ‘celebrated’ the legacy. It is amazing how many Canadians can still be fooled by an image. Here in Quebec, Trudeau is less popular than Stephen Harper, which is not to say much. Not because people love the Conservatives. But they...
Politics during a meltdown
By Marc Lee
What irks me about the Harperites’ non-response to the economic crisis is their claim that they have responded by bringing in tax cuts, announced in the Economic and Fiscal Update almost a year ago, and perfectly timed to the occasion. There is an argument to be made for tax cuts as a fiscal stimulus, although I think they will do little in the current situation where consumers are...
Thinking big or acting small
By Erika Shaker, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
For me, one of the most telling moments of the 2004 election came during the leader’s debates when Stephen Harper asked Gilles Duceppe why he continued to run as leader of the Bloc.
“You’ll never have power,” he explained. Duceppe was incredulous. Is that what you think democracy is all about: power? he asked. It’s...
See you later Stephen
by Pierre Beaudet In the Québec City area where Stephen was hoping to consolidate his 2006 gains (he got most of his 11 Quebec MPs from there), it does not look good for the Conservatives. It would seem that finally, the good ‘pure-laine’ from this sleepy but beautiful city and the semi-urban ridings around it has discovered, after all, that the right wing ‘revolution’ is not a good thing for...
Harper hid the cost of the war
by Steven Staples
As you may have seen from reports in yesterday and today’s morning newspapers, the cost of the war in Afghanistan will reach $18 billion by the end of 2011, according to a new report released by the Parliamentary Budget Office.
The report, by Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page, does not even include the salaries of the 2500 soldiers in Afghanistan, and is still much...
Arts and Culture – Judging the Party Platforms
By Garry Neil
As we head into the final few days of campaigning, arts and culture issues continue to play a key role in the election. Harper’s ill-considered program cuts and comments about cultural elites have come back to haunt him, particularly in Québec where Conservative fortunes have fallen.
In desperation, the Conservative platform, released only a week before the vote tries...
North American Union, Listeriosis, TILMA & the...
by Bernadette L. Wagner
A trip through some blog posts has my neural pathways click-click-clicking! Be forewarned, this is a click-heavy post!
It all started with Alison@Creekside, talking about Stock Day and the hook-up with the Conference Board of Canada, Bell Canada, Microsoft and the RCMP for discussions on the server in the sky, that whacked-out plan for a surveillance society. It’s...
Liberal fools
by Pierre Beaudet
As days go by, the Harper revolution is floundering. With the setbacks it suffered earlier on, it is now the target of ordinary people who think that the PM is not responding to the financial meltdown. For sure, the neocons believe in their religion of neoliberalism, that the ‘invisible hand’ of the market will fix it. They are unable to see what’s happening around them. I...
Backing away from sweater guy
by Sharon Fraser
I am way too cautious a person to count my chickens before they’re hatched, to cross my bridges before I come to them, all that.
But in my compulsive checking of poll results, I began to think about Stephen Harper and about why voters have started to back carefully away from him.
It’s not all about an “economic meltdown.” Many people I know have...
On Fear, Cynicism and Politics on the 'Net
by Vicky Smallman
The other night a friend of mine got a call from a Liberal campaign office (according to his call display, that is). He was screening and didn’t want to talk to them, so he didn’t pick up. The caller left a voice mail identifying himself as a voter in a neighbouring riding (not a Liberal campaign worker); he’d heard that my friend was frustrated that his NDP vote might not...
