-TSS-

If I were British, Danish, Dutch etc I just might support constitutional monarchy. There are very good arguments in its favour. For example the classic if it ain't broken don't fix it or the more important argument that monarchy stops politicians from becoming too powerful. Or I might not support such a system as it is hopelessly antiquated but I would still understand the views of those people who do support it if I were from a European country with a system of monarchy. The thing which I don't understand is that how could people in countries such as Canada, Australia or New Zealand accept a foreigner as their head of state. After all, you do regard the UK as a foreign country, don't you? Don't you? If we in Finland had the king of Sweden as our head of state and our army and the policemen had to swear an oath of allegiance to him I don't think that would go down too well. The funniest argument in this thread, but probably not at all uncommon in Canada, was the one about the foreign queen being the head of state stopping any idea of a military coup. If Canada were a country where milirary-coups happen every once in a while I don't think swearing an oath of allegiance to a foreigner would stop that from happening.

The way I see it the reason you have kept the present system is because there would be too much hassle to change it especially when there are many people in Canada who would oppose any change. Another reason is that the present arrangement of constitutional monarchy and Canada as a Commonwealth-member sets it apart from its giant neighbour and Canada is yearning for anything to make it a distinctly different country.

Two terms for one party in the government is the standard in your anglosphere countries. After two terms winning a third term requires that the alternative must be really lousy. Otherwise people have grown tired after two terms and let the pendulum swing again.

Actually it would be fun to see an old deluded socialist like Corbyn as PM in the UK. Those people who hate Trump are consoling themselves by saying that watching Trump as President is the best comedy ever. Corbyn as PM would not be far behind in terms of comedy-value.

I kind of agree with you; if monarchy didn't exist nobody today would want to invent such a system. On the other hand, in all the European countries where the monarchy still exists it is a very popular system, far more popular than any suggestions to move into a republic. If they are fine with it then who are we to judge? I personally think that as it is a medieval institution from time when people seriously believed that monarchs were chosen by God to reign over them and that gave them their authority. Nowadays when nobody believes such claptrap the whole institution is a joke and the insistence with which people want to cling onto it is somewhat amusing.

On the average conservative parties win elections in various countries because they have a better reputation of maintaining good economic policy than their rivals. In some countries that reputation is deserved while in others it is not. However, people tend to dislike conservatives when they start intruding people's private lives. For some people that intrusion is enough to make conservatives lose elections. For others, conservatives still win elections despite poking their noses where it does not belong, not because of it. I don't think conservatives have ever lost elections because people would be thinking that they haven't poked their noses enough into people's private lives.

For Puerto Ricans keeping things as they are is still the better alternative than the other two; becoming a sovereign country or becoming a full US-state.

The gamble to call an unnecessary early election seems to be failing. The Tories majority may be lost but they should remain the top-party but hence dependant on the support of the N-Ireland fringe-parties.

People always talk about human rights but you seldom hear anyone talking about human duties.

The change has been fast. As recently as in the 70's the weekly church-going rate in Ireland was about 80%. These days it is almost nothing. Even more recently, the Catholic Church was a formidable force in the fall of communism in Poland in 1989. These days to the new generation the church has lost its importance. I would say that all European countries are very secular. I'm not sure about the Latin-American ones.

Since the 60's when contraceptives were invented the birth-rate has been below the replacement-rate of 2.1/woman in every western country. Very unlikely ever to get above that rate again unless there is some coup d'etat by religious fundamentalists. Even though the third-world immigrants have birth-rates way above that 2.1 their rates also fall after a generation or two in a western country.

I'm sure that I'm not the only one who was wondering a long time ago that why are there so many different countries in South-America and Central-America though they are all Spanish-speaking except of course Brazil and a couple of others. later on of course I learned that they are still totally different countries and there just could not be any United States of South-America or other such union. However, has it ever occured to anyone to think about that instead of having two vast English-speaking countries in North-America there could have been, say, 15-20 different sovereign countries?

Even if Merkel loses then she would be replaced by Martin Sculz of the SPD and he is at least as much of a euro-federalist lunatic as Merkel is.

Be it federal or provincial responsibility, I guess the biggest problem in a country like Canada is that there are a lot of very remote places that even good salaries won't attract anyone to move into.

Don't the Canadian provinces actually have way more say in their own affairs compared to the US-states? At least that is what I have always thought to be the case.

They would be foolish not to pick a leader whom they believe to lead the party to a victory in the next election.

8-10 years is the usual time-range after which people get fed up with the government, no matter how good or bad the government has been, and people vote for the change just for the sake of change. Probably the same thing happened in your country when you voted for the Liberals and Justin Trudeau. The previous guy had been there far too long.

The campaigning has resumed after a couple of days pause following the terrorist-attack in Manchester. I'm beginning to wonder if Corbyn is a mole designed to destroy the Labour-party from within. he seems so batshit insane. However, as the party will face a crushing defeat in two weeks time, he will be gone, whether he wants it or doesn't.

The internet has made the world smaller and more open. People cant be lied to in a similar way any more as earlier. Attempts to control the internet are doomed to fail but it doesnt stop many from trying to do so.

There is a clear rift in the EU these days as the eastern member-states stubbornly refuse to dance to the tune of Brussels. There have even been demands that Hungary and Poland should be expelled from the EU.

Has this been noted yet? Jeremy Corbyn's idea of fighting tetrrorism; have a cup of tea with them. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/labour/12199570/British-soldiers-should-have-cups-of-tea-with-Islamic-State-terrorists-says-Jeremy-Corbyn-ally.html

The 9/11-terrorists were sons of Saudi-diplomats so hardly poor beggars, the 7/7-terrorists in London 12 years ago all had good jobs and happy families. Poverty and alienation may explain some terrorism but the issue is more complicated than that.

The unfortunate truth is that once you allow hostile people into your country and give them citizenship what can you do? At least you can deport the foreign citizens who are clearly harmful but where do you deport your own citizens even though they never should have become citizens? The Manchester-bomber was born in Britain. The same thing probably with thousands of people in Canada.

On the average one person a day is arrested in Britain suspected of preparing terrorist-activity. A lot of terrorist-attacks have been foiled and thousands of suspicious people are under 24/7-surveillance. Despite this it is impossible to guarantee 100%-security and every now and then someone slips through the net. The bomber of this attack was himself under watch but when you have thousands of people under watch it is difficult to prioritise. Only big countries such as the USA, Britain or France have any possibilities of having such resources making it possible to maintain such a system of close surveillance of suspicious people.

More gruesome details emerging: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/05/24/leaked-pictures-show-bomb-used-manchester-attack/ Appears that the bomb was remote-controlled in the case that the martyr on his mission to meet allah and 72 virgins got cold feet at the crucial moment. Most probably the death-toll could have been much higher.