Comments | athelind: For my Canadian readers

athelind

For my Canadian readers

May 03, 2011 05:28

forthright looks for some silver linings in the election results.

Everything I know about Canadian politics, I learned from LiveJournal; I confess I'm only grasping a fraction of what's going on up there.* I do know that I read (and am read) by a lot of people in the GWNE who don't read each OTHER, so one thing I CAN contribute is CONNECTION.

*Here's the ( Read more... )

i don't know, politics, hivejournal, grab a mop, the revolution will be digitized

Comments 5

pyat May 3 2011, 12:40:16 UTC

Not a new lefty party - the NDP have been around since 1961, and were preceded by the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation of the 30s and 40s, which formed the first socialist government in North America.

The NDP are pretty well established. They were the constant third or fourth place guys, who managed to be very influential and win seats in every election. Tommy Douglas, perhaps the most revered Canadian politician, was NDP and CCF. And he is eminently readable:

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Tommy_Douglas

theweaselking May 3 2011, 14:23:29 UTC

"First Past The Post" is a voting rule. It's the same one you guys use in the US: The person with the most votes on the first count gets the seat. In the US, this means that you have two parties and only two parties, and that any third party by definition tanks it's own side by siphoning votes from the nearer party and allowing the further party to win ( ... )

terminotaur May 3 2011, 16:34:30 UTC

I would point to what theweaselking said, as its pretty good ( ... )

As much as I can newwaytowrite May 3 2011, 18:20:35 UTC

agree with most of his comments I still feel that we are about to feel even more separated from what I want Canada to be with a fear mongering bully for a leader. I feel that in many respects this is the beginning of a polarizing of my country.

The thought that a fully tuned Liberal would be more willingly to vote for thoughtless cold cack rather than the NDP with some thought for social justice and something other than business profit is some weird kind of liberal in my mind.

I take great joy in knowing that the PM will have to look across the floor of Parliament and have the NDP in his view after demonizing them. I hope it unsettles his intestinal lining.

kfops May 4 2011, 01:52:39 UTC

The link to forthright's journal is somewhat how I reconciled the whole event with myself this morning. It's nice to seem similar thoughts... thanks for that!

I will now return to my all time favourite priority... puppies!