Here we go round the mulberry bush. . .

[velvetpage]

For the second time in twelve months, Canadians will have a general election. The exact date is uncertain as yet, but the political pundits who report on such things for newspapers are predicting the end of June.



The signs are clear for all to see. The Liberal government is embroiled in a scandal that has cost billions. Quebec is likely to go entirely Bloc Quebecois as a result. Dalton McGuinty, Ontario's Liberal premier, is distancing himself from Ottawa - or rather, continuing to do so. He has found an issue to blether about in the media, something that he can manufacture worry and outrage over and something that will show him up as a good guy for Ontario in the face of the mean federal government. It's working, too. He's even got Stephen Harper, Conservative Leader, on his side: the mock in parliament yesterday was that Harper understands why Martin would be distancing himself from certain Liberals right now, but surely the Premier of Ontario isn't asking for sponsorship money!

Closer to home (for me) is the riding nomination news. My current MP is Tony Valeri, a Liberal cabinet minister who won the nomination primarily because his supporters stayed in line to vote longer than the competition's. The Tories are courting Brad Clark, a former provincial Conservative cabinet minister. He's a good choice. I have never heard anything bad about him personally, and I was involving the the campaign that saw him voted out of office. The line we were told to use (that I was using anyway) was that Brad Clark was a good guy who happened to be on the wrong side of politics.

Now, in Hamilton, there are really two choices: Liberal, or NDP. (The NDP is the far-left socialist party.) I don't like the NDP; they don't seem to have a good grasp of a balance sheet, and I'm paying too much taxes now. I can't afford them. The Liberals are worse; they pay lip service to balanced budgets, but they get those balanced budgets by cutting services while the size of government continues to grow. NOT ACCEPTABLE. The Conservatives would aim for a balanced budget, but they'd do it by cutting both the size of government (good thing) and services that are needed (bad thing.) Classic example: any pretense of a socialized daycare system will be gone very quickly upon the election of a Conservative government. Can't handle that.

So I'm stuck with a bunch of bad choices. This narrows it down to three, really: suck it up and vote Conservative, on the grounds that any change is a good change at this point and they have the best chance of actually forming a government; suck it up and vote NDP strategically because there's a good chance they could win in this riding and that would rob the Liberals of a key seat; or place a protest vote with the Green Party, who have a snowball's chance in Stelco's furnace of actually winning a seat around here.

Last spring, I went with the protest vote. This spring, I just don't know yet. We'll see.

Comments

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

There is a religious bias, certainly, but it's tempered by the generally socialist leanings of Canadians in general. I'm not too worried about that. Even abortion and gay marriage - I think the Conservatives would leave them both alone, as the Liberals have done for abortion, because it's a lightning-rod for criticism and they don't want to piss people off the way Mulroney did. Don't forget that we've been in a legal vacuum over abortion for - what, a bit more than two decades? - through a large part of which the conservatives had the country's largest ever majority. They did nothing about it then, I see no reason why they would worry about it now. Officially, the conservative stance on gay marriage is, "Leave well enough alone." If the liberals manage to pass it before leaving office, as seems likely, that won't be a problem, either.

The thing is, the really big social-spending programs are all provincial - health, welfare, education. Other than changing the cash flow situation - and the Liberals have done tons of that, to the detriment of the provinces - there aren't a lot of things they can cut back on that will directly affect us at the bottom. I'd be prepared to give it a try for a term and see what happens - while giving the Liberals a chance to get their collective asses in gear.

[wggthegnoll.livejournal.com]

Think again, today cabinet voted for Martin's legislation legalizing same-sex marriage across the country and it was something like 160 to 120, with the majority of Conservatives voting against the legislation. With conservatives in power they won't overturn the court's decision, true, but they won't help people who wish to be married in provinces like Alberta either.

Anyway, I could never vote Conservative since I'm very much against their platform. It's kind of a surprise to me that you would consider it, but I respect your choice. I'm just glad I have friends that vote and actually care what's happening politically in our country.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

Doesn't the new legislation make it legal across the country?

I never said they'd vote for it - only that if the matter were not resolved when they took power, that they'd leave it unresolved rather than trying to take things backwards.

I would not vote Conservative provincially ever again. (Yes, to my shame I've done it before.) However, federally is another matter entirely. I'm not ruling them out, at any rate. I want to see what their platform is before I make a decision.