ReeferMadness

You're right. The reason that we should change the election rules is that the current ones fail to produce governments that properly represent the views of the population. In representative democracy, the purpose of an election shouldn't be to pick an ideological winner that makes the rest of the population miserable for 4 years. It should be to pick representative government.

Maybe. Marijuana legalization was mostly done locally. Same with removal of the confederate flag. Sorry, but Obama has a made an unholy mess of healthcare, at least as I understand it. He managed to keep all of the costs and overhead of the insurance companies, which is one of the biggest problems with American healthcare. Relations with Cuba, diplomacy in the ME, agreed. But limited progress. Obama hasn't fixed the mess in Iraq created completely by Cheney using dubya as his personal puppet, though maybe nobody else could have either. And he hasn't shut down Guantanamo.

Wow. So someone living in, say, China can buy 4 grand worth of property and tell Immigration they are a resident of Canada?

True dat. The question is whether there is enough of the old idealistic movement left to get anything going. It seems like the people with integrity (like Clark and Manning) are the old timers.

It's not far from wrong. The opposition can do little to prevent bad legislation particularly with the government writing enormous bills and then allowing little time for debate The Duffy scandal has proven that the senate is effectively under the thumb of the PMO. The PMO has effectively neutralized the press by refusing to talk to them. Harper is not a guy who encourages dissenting opinion. He's really not a guy who believes in democracy, frankly. He'd make a much better dictator. The real opposition is the public but it is a sleeping giant. Harper has been careful to not move too far too quickly so he doesn't awaken the giant. Fortunately for him, most people care more about hockey than their country. And by denying access to the press, Harper is blunting the ability of the press to hold him accountable.

It's always the way it is. People who don't feel represented demand PR so that they can have some representation. And when those same people find themselves the beneficiary of the system they decried as unfair and dysfunctional, they magically forget the concerns they previously had. A good example is the NDP. Where they are weak, they call for PR. Where they are strong and form government, they don't. In fact, during the last PR referendum in BC, it was a couple of NDP backroom boys who headed up the no campaign. The yes campaign tried to run a positive, educational campaign. The no campaign went with a negative, election-style campaign with attack ads against PR and the type of PR that was chosen by the citizens committee that made the recommendation. The result was as expected. I personally attended a session where a senior NDP representative stood up and told the crowd that he didn't want PR because he felt that BC was a centre-right province and he thought that PR would produce a nothing but centre-right coalition governments. So, he would rather be in a position where the NDP wins maybe 20% of the elections than have PR. That is so cynical and part of the reason I never vote NDP is I think it is how the party thinks. If you believe in democracy, you should be willing to make your case to change peoples thinking instead of relying on a system to give you a majority you don't deserve. And this is far from the only example of Harper the hypocrite. People have gone back and collected quotes from his time in the NCC. This is a guy who should never have been PM.

Don't like the tax rates in your province? No problem. Just buy a $4000 chunk of property somewhere else and tell CRA you're a resident of another province. If CRA questions you, tell them the PM said that's the test of residency.

If rules were needed for residency and if the PMO had any integrity, I'm sure that a number of government agencies (Canada Revenue Agency and Immigration come to mind) already have rules that apply to us ordinary peons. So why is the PM coming up with a residency requirement that wouldn't pass any test anywhere else? Because his sense of integrity is overwhelmed by political expediency. And that's that guy you're voting for. Feel good about it.

Sorry, man but you're wrong. He incurred the expenses but the crown is saying that they were not eligible because (in large part) he was not a resident of PEI. Maybe Duffy can be forgiven for being confused about that because the PM personally interpreted the rules in such a way that Duffy would be eligible. The question is why is the PM trying to determine eligibility rules for senate residency? Is this somewhere in his accountability? No. The reason is that he is a meddling micromanager. And we are expected to then believe that this meddling micromanager was somehow completely unaware when his office orchestrated a conspiracy to cover up the malfeasance. His total ineligible expenses where $154K. So the interesting question is why was Nigel's sudden fit of generosity capped at only $90K? Well, maybe the answer is here: There's your answer. The $90K that Nigel paid him was to cover the expenses that were ineligible because he wasn't a resident of PEI. He thought he was because Harper told him so. And that's why this whole thing stinks.

Just when all of the Conservative mini-spin doctors around here were heaving a sigh of relief because Wright's testimony is over, just when they think they can get back to slagging the opposition (because their guy has no story to tell), along comes Harper's lawyer. And he places the entire mess squarely at the feet of the PM. Read that. The PM decided that if you owned $4,000 worth of property, you are a resident. So, since Duffy owned property in PEI, the PM deemed Duffy a resident and qualified to sit as senator. Now you might ask, wtf is the PM doing deciding the eligibility rules for the senate? That would be an excellent question in itself. But the real relevance of this is that it shows why Duffy was outraged at having to repay his expenses. why he asked the Conservative Party to do it for him. Since the PM is now squarely implicated in this mess, it also explains why Wright was so desperate for the mess to go away, he dug into his own pocket to pay off a sitting senator. So, PM makes a politically motivated and calculated decision to support getting his appointed hacks into the senate. The decision backfires when the auditors come and and look at the PM's idiotic assessment. The PMO decides Duffy should wear it and tries to stuff him under the bus but anyone who's ever seen a picture of him knows that won't work. So Wright throws his body at Duffy to try to make him go away but gets stuck under the bus himself. In doing so, he implicates the entire PMO, including the PM himself. Now, the question is why would anyone cast a ballot for Stephen Harper, who obviously has zero integrity? He claimed to want to fix the senate but was caught manipulating the rules. Instead of taking accountability, he let everyone beneath him take the fall. And now he seems to be decidedly less than truthful about the whole affair. http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2015/08/20/lawyer-surprised-by-harpers-skimpy-criteria-for-senate-residency.html

Which stage of denial are these guys in now? And how long until they reach acceptance?

Well let's be honest. With Dubya and Reagan as the 2 previous 2 term republican presidents, you don't exactly have to stretch to meet the bar, intellectually.

Oh, yeah. That guy is just one big ball of public service.

Well, good. So, the presidential results will be Clinton followed by Trump followed by whatever clone wins the Republican nomination.

Thanks, man. There is hope yet.

This is such B.S. If Wright though the senate rules were vague, there are a variety of things he could have done. If he were REALLY so concerned about tax dollars as the rest of the right wing horde seems to be, he would have counseled Duffy to not claim the expenses, as it was a questionable situation. Or he might have counseled him to claim the expenses but be prepared to pay them back of questioned. What he shouldn't have done was attempt to manipulate the audit report. And he certainly shouldn't have secretly paid off a sitting senator. And when he attempted to bury Duffy's expenses and hide them from the public, it makes people think that he did something wrong. And he probably did. Because, unlike the rest of the PMO, Wright isn't just some yokel who fell off the turnip truck. He's a well connected business man and a lawyer. And yet, we're also supposed to believe that he was just trying to do the right thing. Well, you're the only one around who seems to think that. And one last thing. Why exactly, was the PMO doing interfering in a senate audit? The senate is an independent body and the PMO has no business being involved AT ALL.

Not the ones around here. They will genuflect before the one true Harper until the bitter end.

No, it was a fine system until the 20th century came along.

Yeah, that's it. You can't pin me down to a party. So now I'm a puppet of the CBC? hahahahahaha. that's really pathetic.

Very nice ad hominem shot, Argus. Maybe we can have a moderator look at this one.

Yeah, it's a fine system. Assuming you live in the 1800's. Or still think like you live in the 1800's. Edited to add: And the system in practice has been subverted by the parties. It looks nothing like the way it's supposed to work.

Bingo. There it is. tax dollar. It's all you and others seem to think about. Or care about. Harper can steal elections. Ruin our reputation internationally. Wreck the environment. Stifle intelligent thought. Make us a banana republic economy. But none of that matters. You'll vote for him anyway because you live in fear of taxes. The Fraser Institute has trained you well. The ironic thing is that in all likelihood, most of the people who vote Harper because they think he will have lower taxes are probably worse off financially as well as in all of these other areas. You might think you're better off because a tax cut saves you a few thousand dollars. But money has a way of flowing and you might find that you, or your kids, or others like you are actually not better off. But hey, it's all about taxes. That's a defeatist attitude.

Thank you for attributing views to me that I don't hold. It shows you have nothing when you have to make stuff up to back up your points. I've been a union member for years and have managed union members for years. My view on unions is that they are generally self-interested, rule-bound bureaucracies. At best, unions are, like the military, the police and the courts, necessary evils. However, you have to see them in context. They came about to address the huge power imbalance between employers and employees. And it's also true that some of the most beautiful, selfless people that I've come across are union members I don't know who you ran with and I don't really care. Socialism does attract the young, the naive and the ideological. But it is a higher state of being than capitalism and it needs intelligence and wisdom for it to work. Maybe that's why you gave up on it. Thank you for your concern for my well being. However, I have grown up. I used to think like you; but that was before I learned how to think. Conservatism, particularly as practised by the Harperites is for the dull and the unimaginative. And I don't hate anyone. I have a healthy degree of contempt for the Conservatives and what they stand for. But I don't hate them.

Chretien is long gone. I don't care anymore. And, as you and others have repeatedly ignored, Harper has consistently taken the bad practises from the past and made them worse.

So, they've failed on accountability but they're awesome at consistency.