Moonbox

He's a prominent political figure. People vote for big shots most of the time. If you think a candidate has a chance at PM, he starts to look VERY strong in his own riding. I think you really overestimate Ontario's forgetfulness for Rae's past blunders. Even IF (and I think it's a stretch) most of Ontario completely forgave his disastrous term as premier, you can be CERTAIN the opposition would be reminding us.

and that's simply not true. The NDP was both inexperienced and idiotic. Their economic policy was disastrous and they had the lowest approval rating of an Ontario government EVER (it was like 9%). They were BY FAR the worst government Ontario has ever had. Harris brought the Ontario budget back in line from an almost $10 billion Rae deficit in just a few years all while having transfer payments from the federal government slashed on him. He and Rae both inherited shitty situations but where Harris lifted Ontario's economy back up and put more money in my wallet, Rae sent Ontario to it's highest deficit ever and made sure the NDP virtually dissapeared provincially. Harris was re-elected for a second term and remained popular. Old man Eves and John Tory with his idiotic faith-based schooling made sure crybaby Dalton got re-elected. PC support right now in Ontario according to polls is around 30%. That's hardly the disastrous scenario you describe in your 'next 30 years' comment.

I largely agree with you there. What I was really saying is that conservative and liberal scare tactics differ greatly in their approach. The conservative approach is more to mock the opposition whereas the Liberal approach is to truly present Harper as an evil scheming dictator. Truthfully I think the CPC attack ads are terrible. Give me a day and I could come up with something better. With that said, I think the Liberal ads are even worse. The Harper = Darth Vader strategy failed them last time but here they are trying it again. *shrug* I see what you're saying and I agree with you in regards to the examples you've given. What you're saying is you think it's wrong to exploit the electorate's ignorance by encouraging politically convenient paranoia right? No argument there. You or I, who obviously show interest in the subject, can rightfully feel insulted. The average Canadian, however, doesn't look deeper than newpaper headlines and television ads. It's their common ignorance and stupidity that encourages idiotic election campaigns. I asked my sister who she was voting for. She said Conservative. I challenged her, "Why?" She said, "Because I think the Green Shift is stupid." I asked her, "Why do you think that?" Her eyes glazed over. That's how far the average voter weighs the issues in an election. You would think they would care a little bit more about something that can and will affect them SIGNIFICANTLY, but the details are too mundane I guess when you can go home and watch, "So you think you can Dance" instead. For the record, I don't really like Stephen Harper that much. I am voting for him because i appreciated the GST cut and because I think that Flaherty knows what he's doing as finance minister. I loved him in Ontario (aside from the 407). With that said, I think Harper is a bit too bible-thumping and I would probably hate the guy in person. He's an enormous hypocrit and I don't respect that but the alternatives, as has already been mentioned, are far worse.

I don't think anyone was saying we should abolish the system. For myself, I think there needs to be massive reform. Welfare, by and large, should be a stop gap measure like EI to rehabilitate people and get them back on track. If they're going to be sucking society's teat for a lifetime, however, and if they don't have a crippling disability, they should be put to work in the community doing whatever needs to be done. The 'free ride and abuse' part of the system is a double edged problem. I already linked the findings of a study of 40,000 Canadian welfare recipients where 20% were found to be abusing the system. It's NOT an insignificant about. The people who abuse the system are not only cheating us, the taxpayers, they're also cheating the people who actually DO need the money to support themselves. Every dollar saved from welfare fraud is another one that can go to the legitimate welfare system. It's so unbelievably easy to make up a disability to milk it's not even funny.

I don't know a lot about welfare, you're right. I do know a lady however about 40 years old who hasn't worked in 17 years who flies to Vancouver from Ontario twice a year because her doctor thinks she needs to see her daughter for her 'mental health'. Yeah...her daughter...I get it. It's important. I still don't think I should be paying for that. I'm equally outraged by this. just a quick look indicated in Ontario in 1994 there was an error/abuse rate of welfare of about 20%. Oh my. Welfare Reform - Check Page 22 I already said I don't think 'decent living' should be expected. I think shared apartments/subsidized housing, Kraft Dinner/Foodbank/Soup Kitchen and Salvation Army clothing is as much as should be demanded. Short term EI or welfare is one thing. Chronic welfare over years and years with no inclination to work is another altogether. Someone with a serious disability may need a little extra help but for someone to mooch off the province their whole life and never offer anything back is a whole different monster. Welfare should be VERY meagre living. If that's the way it is now, then I'm not going to complain. That I agree with completely. These people, however, are underpaid for the WORK they do. Minimum wages across North America are a joke and are making big companies rich.

This is an insightful post and I agree with some of the things you say here. I agree that there are some people with very few to no marketable skills but you simply cannot ignore how many people there truly are who completely abuse social welfare systems in our country. I know two people fairly close to me who abuse the system and if I know two people chances are you do too. Regardless of whether or not people are at disadvantage in terms of employable skills, to say that welfare recipients deserve a decent living is pushing it. I work for a bank and I remember in my earlier years (not long ago) doing loan applications for people living on $1600 a month. They worked 40 hours a week for crap wages and payed rent for crap apartments but they saved slowly and at least had a little money left over. To say that welfare recipients should get as much or near as much as a full time low-wage worker stinks of unfairness. A wellfare recipient, regardless of their limitations, is basically just a charity and to treat it as anything more than that is looking at it through rainbow sunglasses...or whatever. End's meet should be food and rent. That's it. In subsidized housing this is easily possible, even in Toronto. Jack Layton lived in Toronto with Olivia Chow for 2 years mooching in subsidized housing for $800/month. Your lifestyle will be garbage and you'll be have almost no money left over but that's all there should be to it. Expecting the public to cover entertainment and travel expenses or whatever else people feel they deserve is just cheating the system as far as I'm concerned.

As far as I'm concerned a welfare recipient deserves nothing more than what they need to survive. They should receive what they need to feed, shelter and clothe their families. They are effectively leaching from society and unless they're missing limbs or developmentally disabled the money they get should only be what's needed to keep alive.

Ontario's health care went under when Bob Rae (now a Liberal) ran the biggest deficit in the province's history (9 billion). Compounding the provincial debt load was the fact that this was pretty much the exact period of time through which the Federal Liberal's drastically reduced transfer payments to the provinces. Basically the PC conservatives under Harris went from a 9 billion deficit to a balanced budget in just a few years all while having less revenue. Ontario's Health Care problems are a direct result of Chretien Liberal cuts. Oh do you mean those same people that live in North Toronto/Markham and run malls based on pirated media and under the counter cash transactions? Are we talking about the refugees being allowed into the country who end up mooching welfare? I'm all about immigration and Harper is going in the right direction with it. Bring in qualified and productive immigrants and let the rest rot on the wait list. We have a back log of millions so we can afford to be choosey. There is a reason Liberal support is so strong in the 416 and 905. It's because they're largely ethnic communities and the Liberals have pandered to these newcomers and their communities for votes, regardless of their impact on Canada.

I don't understand why people think Bob Rae would be a good leader. The Liberals depend on Ontario and Bob Rae has DEEP problems with Ontario voters. He was the worst premier we ever had.

Aside from the gaff by the CPC during the primaries I would totally agree. With that said, Layton says whatever he wants because he knows he'll never be held accountable for his actions. He's the leader of a national party that he knows pretty much CANNOT be elected and thus he just tries to make as much noise as possible. He's a sensationalist and his campaign relies on nothing but punch-lines and zingers. Dion is following the Chretien/Trudeau thought that bashing Americans scores points with Canadians. It's a cheap, counter-productive and pointless strategy and the only benefit it provide is an estimated increase in votes.

No they definetly did not. I'd really like to know how they came to these conclusions though. It really seems like a funny poll to me.

If Danny Williams wasn't retiring soon he'd be keeping his mouth shut. Take whatever he says with a grain of salt. He's just going out with a bang.

This is a really good post. Very smart and very true. I'm glad I read that.

I would be heavily skeptical of any poll undertaken by the CBC especially when every other REPUTABLE poll shows Harper as the best PM by miles.

and that's why the oppositions are going to flop this year. They've made issues of things most Canadians don't care about. Stephen Harper hasn't made the environment a priority and I'm glad for it. If politicians were SERIOUS about combatting climate change, they would be investing huge amounts of money into research for nuclear fusion and newer efficiency/material technology. Give people an alternative to polluting and let fuel prices steer them in the right direction. Don't babysit and penalize them for behaving normally so that you can come up with thinly-disguised income equalization taxes. As for marijuana, I couldn't care less. Legalize it or don't, it really doesn't matter to me. I'm not going to choose a party based on it nor are the majority of Canadians (who by the way don't smoke it either).

I think that there's HUGE and distinguishable difference between the scare tactics of the different parties. The Conservatives are making Canadians question very specific policies Dion has brought forth. He's said Dion wants to raise GST back, which he's said openly is a strong possibility. They said he'll cost Canadians money via the Green Shift, which is impossible to argue unless you belong to the lowest of the lowest tax brackets. He's said Dion is a poor leader and not worth the risk and I don't think that's really much of a stretch given his bumbling. Opposition, on the other hand, sends the vague and ambiguous message Harper hates the environment, the economy and Canada itself. According to them, he encourages his ministers to say stupid things and his party is the only one that has boneheaded members. NDP (who I hold in absolute contempt more and more each day) have taken it a step further by devolving their propaganda back to WWII era imagery of soldiers marching and bombs dropping. This doesn't make sense to me. Are you saying that we shouldn't be talking policies and we should instead argue image and rhetoric like the Americans? In a sense I get what you're saying in that Bush and his administration have Americans so terrified that they'd probably vote for Rambo as president but I think that's more a testament to their sheeply tendancies than it is of anything else. I think scare tactics regarding things like "higher taxes" are unavoidable in election campaigns. You HAVE to talk about the issues and ponder at the consequences of your opponent's policies. The silly imagery that comes with the idiotic ads all three parties have come up with this year I think is insulting to Canadians and completely unnecessary, but a lot of Canadians buy that sort of crap so it kind of tells you how sophisticated the average mind really is.

I live in Guelph and they have no chance of being elected here. There is a strong little core of voters who will vote Green around the University and in our old downtown but Guelph has quickly become a suburb of Toronto/Mississauga and it will probably be a Liberal again. It could go blue but the local conservative candidate is not impressing anyone.

We can start with the fact that the President has far too much power in government. He cannot be voted out if he's doing a bad job. The American electoral system is done under the system of Electoral Colleges, which is idiotic in and of itself. The American electoral system can result in crippled governments unable to pass legislation (as in President opposed by Congress). The primary system is stupid and exclusive. I realize that I was vague and rhetorical and I'll explain further if i have to, but even the Americans think their system is broken.

I think you're wildly exaggerating the effects of makeup and scripting in the US. It happens everywhere in the world. The only reason you think this is because the American elections are really just a 1.5 year pageant. It's a long, grueling pageant where the candidate who wins is generally the one who stirs up the most positive drama or at least less negative drama than the other candidate. It's just a media frenzy where the candidate who looks the best, guards his words and mind the best and who can make himself look the most 'american' wins. Sadly, Obama, being black, doesn't look 'American' enough for his fellow Americans. McCain and the Bush administration are likely to get another term in office just because the average American's capacity for ignorance and primitive thought is rivalled only by that of the zealots looking to destroy them.

There's fiscal conservatism and social conversatism and I think these are very different things. Fiscal conservatism is low taxes and prudent spending. Social conservatism is what I like to consider stubborn ignorance and religous/moral indoctrination. American Republicans right now are socially conservative but fiscally stupid. Canadian Conservatives, whatever the individual people believe, are socially liberal and fiscally conservative.

but the problem here is that you're acting like you're an expert on Nuclear safety, which you aren't. Numerous experts and agencies have attested that Linda Keen's assessment of risk was 100% bogus. Not surprisingly, Linda Keen, who is not a nuclear expert, has provided no support for her opinions nor has anybody been able to find any experts ready to support her. AECL reported that even if a catastrophic earthquake were to hit directly underneath the plant (an almost impossible occurence), the amount of radiation leaked within the plant would have been equal to that of a CT scan only IF all of the other safeguards failed. What's also interesting is why Linda Keen took 17 months to discover the problem at Chalk River. He was trained. He was certified. He did report. He was supervised. Walkerton happened because a trusted regulator abused his position and the only way to have prevented him from drinking and cheating on his job would have been to double the inspections and make sure someone supervised him when he was doing the inspecting. Doubling the water inspection budget is not something any party is advocating. Differ to a different expert then because the changes the conservatives have proposed as far as I have read haven't even been implemented yet. Oh my. The federal government has very little to do in regards to the day to day management at Chalk River. That's the AECL and Linda Keen's job. As far as I know, and I've been unable to find any information showing otherwise, but parliament had no idea Chalk River wasn't complying with safety standards until after the plant closed down. She made a GREVIOUS error in judgement in her over-reaction and parliament had to step in. She was fired for incompetence, which strangely enough was a unanimous vote in the House of Commons. You're laying a lot of blame but you have nothing to back it up with.

I can appreciate how expensive home care and the like are as I recently had to help a very old grandmother arrange it. The only problem with this is that it is PROHIBITIVELY expensive to provide it to the entire low-income senior population. I fear because of how much it and similar services cost the low income Baby Boomers are going to be in for an unfortunate surprise when our senior population balloons over the next 10-15 years.

I just think it is an interesting choice for leader of the party. Being fat is a lifestyle and the 'image' it exudes is the opposite of environmentalism, which is what the Greens are all about.

It will be amusing to see public opinion drop for the Greens after they get a good look at Elizabeth May. This will probably be taken as hugely offensive and I don't mean it to be a judgement of character but I find it somewhat ironic to see someone leading an environmental crusade who clearly eats more than her fair share. Eating too much food is also not good for the environment.

It was their decision to make. It was also their decision to fire her. There's something to be said about the 'arm's length' argument the opposition makes, but when you have an appointed official from the previous government deciding to close down a facility vital to world health on concerns that were ignored for many years before by the SAME OFFICIAL and discarded by the same previous government who appointed her, you have to question her motives. In this case, there's substantial reason to believe that this was a partisan decision by an arrogant bureaucrat to embarrass the current administration. She made a completely misguided decision that put tens of thousands of Canadians DIRECTLY at risk on the basis of another concern whose risk was negligible and completely unjustified by almost any expert's opinion. If the Canadian government is NOT responsible for making life or death decisions like this and we should be leaving them to petty officials with politically motivated agendas then I think I might move to Iceland.