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Proportional Representation


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1 hour ago, eyeball said:

This is a pretty big departure from what the electorate is sold.

This is the fault of our education system. While the hard sciences are most important and neglected, we also produce teachers with a poor grasp of our history and world affairs. I took Education Foundations: Social Studies and the prof did not even know who the President of France was...and he was supposed to be teaching us how to teach social studies.

Years ago, I was at a function at the University of Saskatchewan where we were celebrating Prime Minister John G. Diefenbaker's 100th birthday (posthumously). I was outside the venue when a University student approached me to ask what was going on. When I told him, he asked who's John Diefenbaker? This was at the U of S, Diefenbaker's alma mater. We were staning less than 1000 metres from the Diefenbaker Centre and the grave of John Diefenbaker. But this student was old enough to vote. Angels wheep.

 

Edited by Queenmandy85
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4 hours ago, Queenmandy85 said:

PR leads to extremist political parties having far more power to influence

Understand, finally: a government that is better than the people does not exist and cannot exist. The dream of wise, benevolent "for their own good" all knowing government is millennia old (Plato?) but it never worked, ever. Every single time it ends in inefficiency, entrenchment, detachment from reality, self-exaltation, inefficiency, complacency, abuses of power, scandals, stagnation, crisis, accumulating and accelerating systemic crises and so on. If a government does not reflect the society, is not checked and controlled by it and cleaned by it regularly, it'll always lead to a worse outcome for the society. Only a matter of time.

With the natural endowments, Canada could have been the richest, most prosperous and most advanced country in the world. It cannot hold leading positions in anything, inefficiencies and problems accumulating fast. A common, regular price of mental laziness and complacency.

Edited by myata
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9 hours ago, myata said:

Like what kind of a dum- (scratch) political genius designs a critical democratic system in such a way that it couldn't be updated, ever? Just look around everything looks just like in 1867 not so?

They picked a system that worked, and then made it something that required ample of effort and force of will to change.  If it's too easy to change, you make it too easy to play games.  

The system isn't nearly as broke as you pretend.  The alternative you propose it not nearly as good as you portray.  Finally, the desire for the change itself isn't as strong as you believe.   

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27 minutes ago, myata said:

Understand, finally: a government that is better than the people does not exist and cannot exist. The dream of wise, benevolent "for their own good" all knowing government is millennia old (Plato?) but it never worked, ever. Every single time it ends in inefficiency, entrenchment, detachment from reality, self-exaltation, inefficiency, complacency, abuses of power, scandals, stagnation, crisis, accumulating and accelerating systemic crises and so on. If a government does not reflect the society, is not checked and controlled by it and cleaned by it regularly, it'll always lead to a worse outcome for the society. Only a matter of time.

No. In the last 1000 years, we have had 42 monarchs. Of those, seven, Stephen, Richard the Lion Heart, Edward II, Richard II, Henry VI, George IV and Edward VIII, were not good monarchs. Thirty-five good heads of State. I can only name 7 good Presidents of the USA in just the last 250 years. I can think of Franklin Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, Reagan, Bush Sr., Clinton, and Obama, out of 45 Presidents.

We educate our monarchs from birth on how to govern, and the value of duty and service to their subjects.

 

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12 minutes ago, Moonbox said:

If it's too easy to change, you make it too easy to play games.  

OMG. Have you tried living a few years by the same norms? Does it need to be that difficult to get?

13 minutes ago, Moonbox said:

The system isn't nearly as broke as you pretend. 

There are different stages of broke, agree. Broke as in "collapsing" or "ground to a full halt" is worse than "no major improvements can be made anymore", "no serious problems solved in decades while new ones are piling". How far is in between? We will find out, shall we?

16 minutes ago, Moonbox said:

not nearly as good as you portray. 

It's not portrayed as "good" just the only one of the discussed that is compatible with the demands of a functional modern democracy. You can be Xi, run some funny-fancy-obscure "elections" and have your "democracy" and who could object? It's a matter of logic not judgement for that feel free to consult our friend here who has a natural sense of "good government".

21 minutes ago, Moonbox said:

the desire for the change itself isn't as strong as you believe.

And again I believe no such thing. I do not want to change Canadian, or Chinese system only observe logical consequences of the status quo.

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4 minutes ago, myata said:

There are different stages of broke, agree. Broke as in "collapsing" or "ground to a full halt" is worse than "no major improvements can be made anymore", "no serious problems solved in decades while new ones are piling". How far is in between? We will find out, shall we?

?

EVERYTHING is BAD. 

We have to do SOMETHING!

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I know, I know: Get rid of J Turdeaux

....

I say it is not so important how we count votes, but how many votes we have, how often we get to vote for things. I'd like to see where citizens have to vote on a wide array of issues, including budgets, government spending programs, our international commitments. Plus MP's compensation and salaries. Then we can hold em more accountable.

Put the screws to em

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Our political heads of government in Canada have never been popular. The leaders of the NDP consistently lead the approval polls going back to Tommy Douglas, yet not very many people vote for them. Our Prime Ministers constantly lead in the disapproval polls Nobody liked Pierre Trudeau, Brian Mulroney or Stephen Harper, yet, all were good Prime Ministers. You hardly hear a good word about Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, yet he put together multi-party bi-partisan teams that saved NAFTA and responded with better outcomes than most countries, in the first part of the Covid-19 emergency.

The first thing a Prime Minister learns about voters when assuming office is everyone wants to go to Heaven, but nobody wants to die to get there. Remember that, the moment you sign the instruments of office. It is all down hill from there, so savour that moment.

When we look at PR, it is worth looking at the choices President Hindenburg had to make in 1933. In order to produce a stable coalition, the President gave in to the backroom dealing that comes with proportional representation and made Hitler Chancellor. That is an extreme example in hindsight, but there is a growing trend towards extremist parties in countries with PR. The Netanyahu government in Israel and La Pen in France are current examples. The moderates in these coalitions always believe they can control the nut jobs. That is what von Paren and von Schleicher thought about Hitler. 

 

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38 minutes ago, OftenWrong said:

I know, I know: Get rid of J Turdeaux

....

I say it is not so important how we count votes, but how many votes we have, how often we get to vote for things. I'd like to see where citizens have to vote on a wide array of issues, including budgets, government spending programs, our international commitments. Plus MP's compensation and salaries. Then we can hold em more accountable.

Put the screws to em

It is hard enough to get people to vote for their MP. Remember what happened when we had a referendum on Meech? Nothing would get done. Do you have the time and resources to research the budget, or government spending programs? Your MP has the best resources available to point out the pros and cons of every aspect.  The same goes for international commitments. Do you have the experience to assess the ramifacations of each decision?

Most MP's are lawyers. That is natural because their basic job is to make laws. They make about the same as Lawyers. You get what you pay for. Many years ago, when I worked for a major bank, our branch accountant used to work in a branch in Ottawa. According to him, MP's did not leave office with as much money as they had when they were elected. When you are an MP, your bosses always have their hand out.

Edited by Queenmandy85
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5 hours ago, Queenmandy85 said:

It is hard enough to get people to vote for their MP. Remember what happened when we had a referendum on Meech? Nothing would get done. Do you have the time and resources to research the budget, or government spending programs? Your MP has the best resources available to point out the pros and cons of every aspect.  The same goes for international commitments. Do you have the experience to assess the ramifacations of each decision?

Most MP's are lawyers. That is natural because their basic job is to make laws. They make about the same as Lawyers. You get what you pay for. Many years ago, when I worked for a major bank, our branch accountant used to work in a branch in Ottawa. According to him, MP's did not leave office with as much money as they had when they were elected. When you are an MP, your bosses always have their hand out.

If I were king, it would be your duty to vote, and mine to provide information in each case so you can make informed decisions.

Provide a tax credit for those who vote. Pay more tax if you don't vote.

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34 minutes ago, OftenWrong said:

If I were king, it would be your duty to vote, and mine to provide information in each case so you can make informed decisions.

Provide a tax credit for those who vote. Pay more tax if you don't vote.

I would rather that people who can't be bothered to vote, not vote. If they don't take the time to vote, I don't believe they would take the time to educate themselves on the issues. An uninformed voter is like an untrained pilot flying a passenger plane. The internet is a terrible source of information.

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41 minutes ago, OftenWrong said:

it would be your duty to vote,

Quite certainly not, sorry. Voting and voting could mean different, even opposite things. The meaning is more important than the formal act. "Voting" as in "pushing a button (one of exactly two) connected, behind the wall, to nowhere" has exactly zero real meaning. And accordingly, it won't change a single millibit in the reality. Why the duty, then?

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I'm saying what we need is more voter power, not just how we count votes. We need more democracy, take some of the decision making away from the government which has grown into an elite separate class that threatens to dictate its terms to us, no matter how incompetent they are. We are in a nanny-state. Because we are coddled by government, we are ignorant of the issues and carry on happy-go-lucky, not needing to burden ourselves with the knowledge needed for good governance. Then we complain bitterly when they screw everything up. For comparison look to the US model, they have far more voter's rights to decide who will be in government, right down to the lowest levels. The right move is to put limit s on government size and power, and Canada needs this drastically.

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I can't see the US model as something to emulate. They are a republic. Part of the issue with the US system of voting for everything is the ballots are so large, a paper ballot is unworkable. This leads to the silly allegations of voter fraud. In Canada, you have four or five names on a ballot. It is a paper ballot that stands as a clear record of the tally. The DRO counts the ballots in the presence of the candidates' scrutineers and if one of them disputes the tally, the DRO counts again until everyone is satisfied. In Canadam we don't take politics too seriously. Most of the elections I have been involved in have been amicable. A classmate of mine was from Ghana. When his father was on the losing side of a change in government, the family had to leave the country in the middle of the night. When I lost an election in BC, we all went for a beer the following Saturday night. During the campaign, at an all candidates' debate, I was sitting beside one of my opponents who happened to be the Liberal leader, and he was giving me pointers and helped me with my presentation. We both lost, but there was no bad feelings amongst us. You don't often see that is US politics. We used to see it. When Senator Goldwater was planning to run against his friend, President Kennedy, they discussed campaigning together, travelling on the same plane and debating each other at each stop. Politics is supposed to be fun. When it starts being serious, the country is in trouble.

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34 minutes ago, OftenWrong said:

We need more democracy, take some of the decision making away from the government

Absolutely. Two centuries on, a blind and mindless ride continues. All the mental effort so far went into conservation and preservation of the status quo, as of Day 1, intact and unchanged. Take the Constitution that just cannot be updated, simply no way (if anything, that seems to be the consensus). Think of the God that couldn't lift the rock They themselves created, yes, done and accomplished!

39 minutes ago, OftenWrong said:

We are in a nanny-state.

Could it be because, as was pointed out eloquently, the request was for a "good" government, which isn't synonymous (especially if it's the governments itself that gets to judge its goodness) with accountable, responsible or even responsive? Unlike these qualities that are objective, clear and measurable, "goodness" can be in the eye of the beholder.

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41 minutes ago, Queenmandy85 said:

I can't see the US model as something to emulate.

No of course not. Perhaps because you've got your head up your culo. I say that in reference to the new forum style of dialogue. We must keep up with the time.   ;)

Quote

republic

Sounds gouda. Tomāto, tomăto. But too many chefs can spoil a broth.

Of course the USA has their problems, too. But that is beside the point here. I don't see counting games as any kind of valuable solution, when all it does is given a green light to limitless power, to the buffoons they put before us.

And as to a cult of personality not being a thing in Canada, when I say buffoons I mean buffoons.

Ecce Homo-

_108872196_trudeau_blackface_3_comp.jpg.

Let us give it

Royal ASSent

 

Edited by OftenWrong
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Pollara Strategic Insights conducted an online survey asking who is Canada's greatest Prime Minister (Buffoon in your language.) 

Number 2 on the list was Pierre Trudeau with 11 %

Number 3 was Stephen Harper 10%, followed by MacDonald 6%, Mulroney6%, Chretien 5%, Pearson5% and Justin Trudeau at 5%.

The winner with a whopping 40% was...(drum roll)... "I don't know!"

Now, this is an online poll so it ain't going to be precise, but given a choice, you would think most of those voters could choose someone, but no. These are the people we want to vote? 

 

 

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26 minutes ago, Queenmandy85 said:

Pollara Strategic Insights conducted an online survey asking who is Canada's greatest Prime Minister (Buffoon in your language.) 

Number 2 on the list was Pierre Trudeau with 11 %

Number 3 was Stephen Harper 10%, followed by MacDonald 6%, Mulroney6%, Chretien 5%, Pearson5% and Justin Trudeau at 5%.

The winner with a whopping 40% was...(drum roll)... "I don't know!"

Now, this is an online poll so it ain't going to be precise, but given a choice, you would think most of those voters could choose someone, but no. These are the people we want to vote?

We need to educate Canadians to the fact most of them are too deplorable to vote and the proper thing to do is make everyone pass an issues comprehension test before being given the responsibility to vote.

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12 minutes ago, eyeball said:

We need to educate Canadians to the fact most of them are too deplorable to vote and the proper thing to do is make everyone pass an issues comprehension test before being given the responsibility to vote.

Yah, good luck with that. (I disagree with the word deplorable) The problem is many teachers do not have a good foundation in history. Neither do some of the profs in the college of education. This is not to say they are not good teachers. Still, it is far more important to ensure people leave school with a firm grounding in Math, Chemistry, Physics and Geography. English / French and History are good, but not as vital as the sciences.

My son asked me to show him how to use a slide rule. I couldn't remember. Neither could my brother who is an engineer. My wife who never attended university, showed him, and me, and my brother. We are losing knowledge.

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58 minutes ago, Queenmandy85 said:

Pollara Strategic Insights conducted an online survey asking who is Canada's greatest Prime Minister (Buffoon in your language.) 

Number 2 on the list was Pierre Trudeau with 11 %

Number 3 was Stephen Harper 10%, followed by MacDonald 6%, Mulroney6%, Chretien 5%, Pearson5% and Justin Trudeau at 5%.

The winner with a whopping 40% was...(drum roll)... "I don't know!"

Now, this is an online poll so it ain't going to be precise, but given a choice, you would think most of those voters could choose someone, but no. These are the people we want to vote? 

 

 

Ir is in itself a rather dumb and unimportant question. I do not know the names of many Prime Ministers. I liked Chretien and Martin, though you've never even mentioned them.

If I were aware of what I don't know, then I might say "I don't know." By what standards anyway? Why should there be a "Greatest".

No, I may not know the history of Canada's PM's and be unqualified to answer, but I can certainly know the issues that affect us today. Canadians are lazy sheep who want to be fed and coddled, then complain about the country going downhill.

Well guess what. It's time to wake up,

Candians.

Edited by OftenWrong
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31 minutes ago, Queenmandy85 said:

Yah, good luck with that. (I disagree with the word deplorable) The problem is many teachers do not have a good foundation in history. Neither do some of the profs in the college of education. This is not to say they are not good teachers. Still, it is far more important to ensure people leave school with a firm grounding in Math, Chemistry, Physics and Geography. English / French and History are good, but not as vital as the sciences.

My son asked me to show him how to use a slide rule. I couldn't remember. Neither could my brother who is an engineer. My wife who never attended university, showed him, and me, and my brother. We are losing knowledge.

I just can't escape the sense that you'll continually work backwards from the problem, the PMO and Cabinet to backbenchers, voters and now the education system that teaches voters.

Instead of working backwards go the other way.  Our governing system was based on an honour system where politicians would be more accountable to the head of state and the Crown which at the end of the trail was really leaving it up to their word to God to provide what most assumed at the time the ultimate check and balance against... chicanery, cheating, stealing, lying, and much worse than that at times.

It's all fine and dandy to say we've stripped religion from government but to this very so-called enlightened day and age we still require Parliamentarians to swear to something that's presumably better, wiser, and more important than and above anything else, that they'll do their jobs honestly.

I'm not buying it anymore, I'd prefer more robust reality based institutions of accountability. You can change the Constitution and Confederation all you like, it won't make a difference when as George Orwell said no matter how egalitarian we think our society is there will always be people who are more equal than others.

What we have now is a wheezy old contraption that was designed for a day and age when an electoral riding was based on how far a rider on a horse could carry a message in a day.  In this day and age that same message could be sent to Pluto and back. It's time to get with the times.

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