RIP Jack Layton

RIP to Jack Layton
Layton lost his battle with cancer. He was a great politician and was much more than just an elder statesman. I did not agree with all of his policies but every last one of his policies was well meaning. I liked his longstanding policies on gay rights, ribbons for the Montreal Massacre anniversary, and infrastructure funding for cities. He was renowned for being able to work well with Mel Lastman despite their ideological differences, which is in stark contrast to the current situation at Toronto City Hall in which the left-wingers are completely shut out of all policy making. That current situation is not good for a municipal government and it is great that Layton and Lastman could work well together.
Layton is known for having run for Mayor of Toronto in 1991. He only got 32.88% compared to 58% for June Rowlands. He ran a good campaign for mayor but likely suffered in the election due to the unpopularity of the year-old NDP provincial government.
Two times Layton made the decision to prop-up a minority government: in 2005 with Paul Martin’s minority government, and in 2009 with Stephen Harper’s minority government. I believe Layton made the right decision in both those cases to prop-up the government – neither the spring of 2005 nor the fall of 2009 were the right time in my view for a federal election. Both times Layton extracted significant concessions from the government: in 2005 for infrastructure spending and in 2009 for the unemployed who were out of work because of the recession. I loved his eternal optimism and his willingness to work with leaders of other parties, even Stephen Harper, who is not known for his negotiating skills.
I certainly didn’t agree with all his left-wing causes in municipal and federal politics, but some of his policies were good and we will all miss him. My thoughts are with his family and colleagues.

Michaëlle Jean

Apparently, according to a Toronto Star article, Stephen Harper has decided not to renew Governor General Michaëlle Jean’s term and is actively looking for her replacement. I do not agree with Harper’s supposed decision not to extend her term. This is a minority government and in 2004 Paul Martin used the fact that there was a minority government to extend Adrienne Clarkson’s term. What concerns me very much is how many partisan Tories are on the speculation list. From a Globe and Mail News blog, possibilities listed are Tory Senate Speaker Noel Kinsella, Don Cherry (known Conservative supporter), and Preston Manning (Tory supporter and former Reform Party leader). Cherry was suggested on Twitter by former Harper communications director Kory Teneycke. The Globe and Mail blog says that wheelchair athlete Rick Hansen was approached for the Governor General’s job but he declined. Since then Hansen has claimed that he was never approached about the post and would actually consider taking it. I think Hansen would be a great choice if Harper insists on replacing Jean. He would be a much less partisan choice than those Tories listed. The Globe blog also lists the possibilities of diplomat John De Chastelain and Inuit leader Mary Simon. Both of those would be good non-partisan choices. In an update to the blog, it was stated that another possibility has surfaced: Wayne Gretzky. The blog refers to Gretzky as being from Tory ranks. I can only assume that this is said because Gretzky’s uncle Al Gretzky was a Conservative candidate in the 2006 federal election. Harper has close ties to Gretzky but that is mainly from the Olympics. Other than that there is no proof Gretzky is a Conservative supporter. But all the Tory names surfacing sadly makes me think that maybe a goal of Harper’s Governor General appointment is to ensure that they would never allow an opposition coalition like the one proposed in 2008 to take power. This is unfortunate in that such a partisan choice could mean that a coalition would be unable to take power even if after the next election the Liberals are only, say, 2 seats behind the Conservatives.

Good job Michael Ignatieff

Needless to say I am thankful that the election threat has been averted but I still want to take issue with past Conservative characterizations of the previous Liberal proposal to reform Employment Insurance. Tories classified the Liberal suggestion as a “socialist scheme” but that is something I would take issue with. I know of a previous Conservative government who enriched Unemployment Insurance – the government of John Diefenbaker who extended unemployment insurance benefits due to rising unemployment around 1958. The book I have says the Diefenbaker government extended unemployment insurance benefits by 6 weeks, which is longer than the , which is longer than the 5 week extension the current Tories brought forward. My point is that Tories have enriched Employment Insurance before and could do so again and the fact that Tories have enriched unemployment insurance shows that EI enrichment is not a socialist scheme. Sure Diefenbaker was largely a Red Tory. But even Harper’s blue Toryism doesn’t prevent him from supporting farm subsidies due to his farmer base of support still desiring farm subsidies. The Conservatives have actually offered some enrichment of farm subsidies so why is enriching Employment Insurance a “socialist scheme”? And in regards to the EI deal that has been reached by Ignatieff and Harper, I disagree with the negative characterizations of it that I’m seeing in the media, especially from the National Post. National Post columnists in particular are painting Ignatieff in a very negative light with regard to this deal with Harper on EI. They say he caved in from the conditions he set on Monday morning. Nothing could be farther from the truth. At his Monday morning press conference Ignatieff made it clear that his conditions for supporting the government were not rigid demands. He said at that Monday morning press conference that he was flexible and reasonable. He demanded answers from the government on how it would get out of deficit, how it would handle the isotope crisis, how much infrastructure money has actually been spent, and what plans the government has to reform Employment Insurance. Contrary to what is implied in the negative columns about Ignatieff, Ignatieff never made it a condition that Employment Insurance reform be passed into law this week. He only asked what the governments plans to reform EI were. Contrary to what is said in the negative columns about Ignatieff, Ignatieff got all 4 of his conditions met. The government released more information about how it planned to get out of deficit. Ignatieff may also have been given more information about this in his private meetings with Harper. The government agreed to give written information about what it planned to do about the isotope crisis. That is the second condition met. Harper told Ignatieff his plans for Employment Insurance reform, which was his plan to give the self-employed access to EI. Ignatieff and Harper agreed to strike a blue-ribbon panel to study both how to implement access to EI for the self-employed and how to make other improvements to EI. The combination of those things is Ignatieff’s third condition being met. The only condition that is unclear whether it has been met is the condition that the government make it clearer how much infrastructure money has actually been spent. But I think it likely that Harper gave Ignatieff information on this during their meetings which would mean that all four conditions were met and Ignatieff did NOT back down as indicated in the many negative columns written about Ignatieff.

The economy

Stephen Harper recently indicated that the economy was on the mend because the economy contracted by about 5.4% instead of by about 6.5% as predicted. It’s certainly possible the economy may be improving but is it really accurate to say the economy is on the mend simply because it didn’t contract by quite as much as projected? Projections and estimations have tendency to be off by some margin of error. Maybe the economy is improving but an economic contraction of over 5% is quite serious and not something to celebrate.

Yea Barack Obama!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am overjoyed at the recent election of Democrat Barack Obama as President of the United States. Obama won all the Kerry states and also won all the Gore states. In addition Obama created 9 new blue states: Iowa, New Mexico, North Carolina, Indiana, Colorado, Nevada, Virginia, Ohio, and Florida. Obama also got an additional electoral vote from Nebraska by winning the Second Congressional District of Nebraska (NE-2) which consists of the Omaha metropolitan area. This occurred because Nebraska gives two electoral votes for the statewide winner, and one electoral vote each for the winner of the Presidential vote within each of Nebraska’s 3 Congressional Districts. Maine also uses this same method. However, never before had either Maine or Nebraska split its electoral votes as a result of this “district method” of allocating electoral votes. That being said, Bush came close to winning Maine’s Second Congressional District in 2000 and in 1992 Ross Perot came close to winning one of Maine’s Congressional Districts. However, because Clinton narrowly won that Congressional District, Ross Perot was unable to get a single electoral vote despite winning 19% of the national popular vote. Because of what happened in Nebraska, Republicans in Nebraska plan to introduce legislation to restore the winner-take-all system of Presidential elections. Nebraska used the winner-take-all system prior to the 1992 Presidential election. Nebraska has a unicameral Upper House (known sometimes as the Nebraska Senate), all of whose members are officially non-partisan. Unofficially however, Republicans make up a majority of the Nebraska Senate and so the bill to return to winner-take-all could conceivably pass considering that Nebraska has a Republican governor. It is however too late to repeal the “district method” for this election so Obama will get an electoral vote from Nebraska.

I will not object too strongly if Republicans in Nebraska manage to repeal their “district method” because I favour the winner-take-all method for Presidential elections. There are many reasons for this but one of the big ones is that the “district method” opens up the Presidential race to gerrymandering and that needs to be avoided at all costs. So if Nebraska Republicans repeal Nebraska’s “district method” I am ok with that even though NE-2 could have broken a 269-269 electoral vote tie in favour of Obama if the election nationwide had been closer. Due to the electoral vote splitting that is to happen in Nebraska, the 1996 Presidential election will still be the last election when not a single state’s electoral votes were split. In 2000, and 2004, there were split electoral votes due to faithless electors. In 2000, a Gore elector for the District of Columbia refused to cast any electoral votes in protest of DC not having full congressional representation. In 2004, a Kerry elector for Minnesota cast his/her electoral vote for John Ewards (sic) for President and John Edwards for vice-president. This vote for “John Ewards” appears to have been a simple mistake. Even though the vote was for “John Ewards” it was certified as a vote for John Edwards. This faithless electoral vote was very unfortunate because it denied John Kerry a well-earned electoral vote from Minnesota. Due to NE-2 going for Obama, this Presidential election will be the first Presidential election since 1960 in which any state’s electoral votes are split (other than splits occurring due to faithless electors).

I feel that also I need to debunk claims that I have seen that Barack Obama is to the right of Stephen Harper. I’ve seen the argument made but I consider such an assertion hogwash. Yes Obama is to the right of Stephane Dion, Bob Rae, Paul Martin, Jean Chretien, and even Michael Ignatieff. But Obama is not to the right of Stephen Harper. To make my point I want to debunk the claims made in a recent Toronto Sun column written by columnist Lorrie Goldstein. Goldstein says:

“One of the most intellectually lazy and politically dishonest things the liberal media have done over the past few years is to constantly misrepresent Prime Minister Stephen Harper as a clone of outgoing U.S. President George W. Bush.

Lazy because the facts don't support it. Dishonest because those making the comparison know better.

On the bright side, they now have a lot of splaining (sic) to do, given the number of political views Democratic presidentelect (sic) Barack Obama and Harper share and it will be fun to watch them squirm.”

Goldstein goes on to make his points as to why this is his view. He says:

“For example, Harper, unlike Bush (and Obama), does not support the death penalty. Harper, unlike Bush, supports medicare and has never attempted to use the power of the state to restrict access to abortions.”

It is true that both Bush and Obama support the death penalty but I personally suspect Harper also supports the death penalty considering his government’s new policy of not opposing the death penalty given to Canadians sentenced in the United States. As for Goldstein’s claim that Harper supports medicare, I can tell you that Harper certainly did not support medicare when he was head of the National Citizens Coalition. The National Citizens Coalition opposes Canada’s medicare system, opposes the Canada Health Act and would like to see health care in Canada privatized. It was only after Harper became a party leader that he began publicly supporting the status quo for health care in Canada. As for Obama, Obama platform calls for significantly more government involvement in the United States health care system. It is also of note that Obama’s Presidential predecessor Bill Clinton has come to Canada and given speeches lauding Canada’s health care system and indicating that Canada’s nationalized health care system is the ideal. Considering that Obama’s end goal for health care is to make sure every American is covered, I think the argument can be made that Obama does support medicare. I’m sure Obama always has supported some form of medicare, unlike Harper whom we know at one time opposed the Canadian medicare system. As for abortion, Harper has refused to state his own view on abortion but over the years has clearly given more support to the pro-life side. Obama by contrast is openly and steadfastly pro-choice. This makes Obama the more “abortion choice” friendly politician.

Next Goldstein says:

“Harper's position on same-sex marriage, before the courts decided in its favour and which Harper has not overturned by invoking the Constitution's notwithstanding clause, is the same as Obama's.

Both support civil unions for homosexuals but not same-sex marriages. That's also the position of all the major Democratic presidential contenders in recent years, including Hillary Clinton and John Kerry. Both Harper and Obama support the war in Afghanistan.”

Now we’ve reached everyone’s favourite issue: same-sex marriage. First off let us note that of course Harper has never had the Parliamentary votes to overturn same-sex marriage using the notwithstanding clause even if he wanted to. At first glance it does appear that Harper and Obama’s position on same-sex marriage is the same: no same-sex marriage, civil unions. However there is a key difference. Obama does not favour laws that ban same-sex marriage whereas Harper does. Obama opposed the recent California referendum to ban same-sex marriage ; he endorsed the no side of the California referendum to ban same-sex marriage. Obama also opposes the Federal Marriage Amendment. It is very clearly evident that Obama does not support overturning same-sex marriage in a jurisdiction after a court has legalized same-sex marriage in a jurisdiction. This is in stark contrast to Harper. Harper wanted same-sex marriage in Canada overturned the moment it was legalized by a court in Ontario in 2003. After the 2003 Ontario court ruling, it became Harper’s policy that any court rulings legalizing same-sex marriage in Ontario or any other province were to be overturned by the government. In the spring of 2005 when the same-sex marriage Bill was being debated, Harper led a Parliamentary campaign to defeat the same-sex marriage bill and to use government legislation to overturn the court decisions legalizing same-sex marriage. This is in stark contrast to Obama, who opposes efforts to overturn court decisions legalizing same-sex marriage. So it is very evident that Harper’s position on same-sex marriage is very much to the right of Obama’s position on same-sex marriage, in contrast to what Goldstein asserts.

As for the war in Afghanistan, both Harper and Obama support it. But this fact does not contribute to either the argument that Obama and Harper are both as right wing nor does it contribute to the argument that Obama is more right-wing than Harper.

Next Goldstein discusses the environment:

“Harper, from oil-rich Alberta and Obama, from coal-rich Illinois, have both softened their past opposition to the Kyoto accord and reducing greenhouse gas emissions for pragmatic reasons.”

I don’t believe that this statement accurately reflects Obama’s position on the environment. During this long Presidential campaign, Obama has been supportive of the Kyoto protocol and it really is hard to argue that Obama has ever been as hostile to efforts to fight climate change as Harper has been in the past.

Next Goldstein talks about taxes:

“Next, consider this example of the logical absurdities to which simplistic comparisons between Canadian and American politicians can lead.

Obama's major campaign promise was a $2.9-trillion tax cut to 95% of American taxpayers over the next decade, despite having inherited a $438-billion deficit from the Bush administration.

On the surface, that sounds a lot like former Conservative Ontario premier Mike Harris' 30% cut to the provincial income tax rate, despite having inherited an $11.2 billion deficit from the previous government of then NDP premier Bob Rae in 1995.

So, does that mean Obama is a Harris clone, a closet common sense revolutionary? Will the federal Liberals (and liberal media), who attacked Harris for cutting taxes without first balancing the budget, make the same criticism of Obama today? Of course not.”

I consider this comparison between Harris and Obama to be absurd because Harris’s tax cut program involved cutting taxes for all income levels (Harris did not implement enough tax cuts for the low income brackets of course), whereas Obama’s plan involves raising taxes for the wealthiest and cutting taxes for everyone else. Also of course Obama’s tax plan puts a greater emphasis on cutting taxes for lower income earners than Harris’s plan ever did. So therefore Goldstein’s comparing Harris’ tax plan to Obama’s tax plan is like comparing apples and oranges and in reality does not make help make Goldstein’s argument.

Next Goldstein makes another comment on taxes:

“Now factor in that cutting taxes in tough times (albeit with a different emphasis on who gets the most benefits) has been done by both Republican and Democratic administrations. So, is Obama a Ronald Reagan clone? See how silly this gets?”

Of course Obama is not a Ronald Reagan clone. Again, Reagan’s tax cuts did not involve raising income taxes for the highest income earners, unlike Obama’s tax plan. So Obama and Reagan cannot be compared based on taxes.

Finally Goldstein discusses the Iraq War:

“Finally, to address what the liberal media think is their best argument, yes, had Harper been PM in 2003 it is likely, despite his denials today, that we would have joined the U.S.-led war on Iraq.

But in the U.S. at the time, support for invading Iraq was a bipartisan position widely held by Republicans and Democrats -- and by prominent Liberals inside and outside of then PM Jean Chretien's government, including the current frontrunner for Liberal leader, Michael Ignatieff.

For the liberal media to argue, with the benefit of hindsight, that Harper was wrong and Chretien right, is supportable. But to argue that makes Harper a Bush clone is absurd.”

Goldstein makes a good point about Michael Ignatieff. Ignatieff’s position on Iraq really handicapped his 2006 bid to lead the Liberal party. But I disagree with Goldstein on his point about Iraq. Harper supported the Iraq war and would surely have sent Canadian troops to Iraq. This made his position the same as Bush’s. Why can’t we use these facts to make the “Harper is a Bush clone” argument? It is also very noteworthy that Obama opposed the Iraq War from the start, which clearly makes Obama to the left of Harper on Iraq.

To conclude, I feel that it is very fair to say that Barack Obama is to the left of Stephen Harper.

Federal election results

It goes without saying that I am incredibly unhappy about this month’s election results. They really were quite horrendous. That being said, Harper’s brazen attempt to get a majority government by gutting the fixed election date law failed. But the Liberals did so poorly that Harper could have gotten a majority if he had not turned off Quebec voters by insulting Quebec artists. I am an Ontario voter but I couldn’t disagree more with Harper’s assertion that ordinary Canadians don’t care for the arts. I am very pro-art. I like Shakespearean plays, paintings, other plays, musical concerts, and whatever kind of art you can think of. I like certain mainstream television shows and some Hollywood movies, but with the exception of the few TV shows and movies I like, I prefer the “refined art” of the kind that the other parties defended against Conservative attacks during the election.

Now Jean Charest plans to pull a Stephen Harper and call an early election in his province in an attempt to get a majority. I have mixed feelings about this. Although I want Charest to get a majority, I hate early elections. I prefer how things are done in Ontario, when early elections occur very rarely. Ontario has not had an early provincial election since 1990. That’s the way I prefer it and I disagree with politicians of all stripes playing politics with election dates. Charest unfortunately is playing politics with election dates so I cannot on balance agree with his decision to call an election.

This leads to another interesting question. Elizabeth May failed to win a seat in the election. May has since vowed to win Central Nova in the next election and in the meantime promised to run in the first available by-election. But what if the first available by-election is Laurier-Sainte-Marie, Gilles Duceppe’s riding. What if Charest calls the Quebec election and then the PQ does incredibly badly. What if then Pauline Marois resigns the leadership. At that point I see no way Duceppe could resist for a third time going for the PQ leadership. At which point Laurier-Sainte-Marie would be vacant and there would be a by-election. Considering how poorly the Greens did in Quebec, would Laurier-Sainte-Marie really be an appropriate riding for May to run in?

I want to comment on what happened in Outremont in the federal election. This time New Democrat Thomas Mulcair won by 6 percentage points, a much smaller margin than in his by-election win. I even hear that the race sea-sawed back and forth between Mulcair and the Liberal candidate. While I’m glad to see the Liberals do better in Outremont than in the by-election, unfortunately the 33% the Liberals got is still less than the 35% the Liberals won the riding with in the 2006 election. It was also heartbreaking to see Eleni Bakopanos fail to regain Ahuntsic for the Liberals after leading for much of the night. However, the Liberals managed to retake Brossard-La Prairie with a new candidate after a recount. That puts the Liberals at 14 seats in Quebec, which is higher than the 13 won in 2006 under Paul Martin. No doubt this improvement of Liberal fortunes in Quebec is largely due to Stephane Dion’s stellar performance in the French leaders’ debate. It was also good to see Justin Trudeau elected in Papineau. However due to the narrow margin in Papineau, I think it likely that Dion’s excellent French leaders’ debate performance helped put Trudeau over the top.

By contrast however, the Liberals were sadly wiped out in English speaking New Brunswick. The Liberals did much better in French speaking New Brunswick and Dion’s French debate performance probably helped there. What was particularly amazing was that in Madawaska-Restigouche Liberal incumbent Jean-Claude D’Amours increased his margin of victory to several thousand votes over the 800 vote margin he had last time. In part this was due to a slight decline in the Conservative vote, but it was largely due to a substantial increase in the Liberal vote largely at the expense of the NDP. No doubt that some of this was due to strategic voting as a result of the near-Tory win last time. Also the fact that there was a new NDP candidate probably decreased the NDP vote as well. But part of it I am sure is Dion’s excellent French leaders’ debate performance. In addition, I have no doubt that Harper’s poor French leader’s debate performance hurt the Tories in Madawaska-Restigouche.

Sadly I fear Elizabeth May may never win a seat in Parliament. Her chances in a by-election are iffy and her chances in Central Nova are even more iffy. In addition, next time I’d expect May to have a Liberal opponent in Central Nova in addition to the Conservative incumbent. The whole deal about not running a Liberal candidate against May in Central Nova was entirely a Stephane Dion thing and I expect the next leader of the Liberal Party to run a candidate in every single riding as the Liberal Party traditionally does. The Green Party may not even get into the leaders’ debate in the next election because the Green Party no longer has a single MP in the House of Commons and having Blair Wilson was one of the main reasons that May was included in the election’s leaders’ debate.

I was glad to see the Tories wiped out in Newfoundland and Labrador. The NDP won St. John's East with about 75% of the vote and almost won St. John's South-Mount Pearl over the Liberals with the Tories at only 12.6%! In St. John’s East the Tories got a mere 9.3%! I, like all Liberals, wish the rest of Canada could have voted like Newfoundland and Labrador. I’m glad that at least some parts of the country agree that the Tories shouldn’t be in office. I would like to thank Danny Williams for single-handedly wiping out the federal Tories in Newfoundland and Labrador. The strange part is that Williams is a Progressive Conservative, himself a Tory! How strange that a provincial Tory was one of the Liberals best allies in the election.

To be honest, while I’m obviously disappointed in the New Brunswick Liberal results, they do not surprise me too much. English speaking rural New Brunswick is Atlantic Canada’s only Bible Belt so it is not surprising that the Tories do well here. Even English-speaking cities in New Brunswick are somewhat socially conservative so it is not too big a surprise that the Tories won Saint John and Fredericton and almost won Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe (it was probably the francophone minority in Moncton that saved the Liberals here). On a related note, Dominic LeBlanc from Beauséjour, New Brunswick has been the first to announce his bid for the Liberal leadership and I may support him. We need a new leader who can win back government, defeat Stephen Harper, and implement a centrist vision for Canada.

Canadian and American politics

I am distressed about the fact that Stephen Harper wants to call an election. First he wants to meet all opposition leaders. Sadly Stephane Dion has failed to make an appointment with Harper for earlier than September 9 despite the fact that Harper has rejected September 9 as too late a date. If Dion wants an election all he has to do is refuse to meet with Harper before September 9. But if he wanted to try to avert an election he could take time out of his schedule to meet Harper before then. I am unhappy that Dion has not tried harder to find a mutually acceptable meeting time with Harper. If Harper called an election next week all the by-elections would be cancelled and I am very unhappy about that. Recently Bloc leader Gilles Duceppe found time in his schedule to meet Harper on Friday and NDP leader Jack Layton has agreed to meet Harper on Saturday. So why can’t Dion take time out of his schedule and meet with Harper soon like the other opposition party leaders have done?


In the US, I’d say Joe Biden was a fairly good choice for vice president by Barack Obama. I thought his recent speech at the Democratic National Convention was great. His only disadvantage is that he is from an existing blue state, Delaware, and therefore his presence on the ticket will not have a chance to bring in a red state. Biden is simultaneously seeking re-election to the US Senate. If Obama wins, Biden has to resign. If he resigns prior to the start of the new Congress, he will have to resign twice – resign his existing term and decline to serve the new term. Delaware has a Democratic governor who is term limited. Most likely a Democrat will win the gubernatorial election. But even if a Republican wins the gubernatorial election, Biden has plenty of time to resign and allow the existing Democratic governor to appoint a Democratic successor to the Senate before the new governor takes office.

Barrie examiner letter to the editor

I’ve found a good letter to the editor in the Barrie Examiner. It is entitled “Harper's bluff yet to be called”. I like this part. “Since Canadians want another federal election like they want snow in September, there also needs to be an overwhelming issue to send voters to the polls.” I certainly agree with that. There needs to be an overwhelming issue over which to pull the plug otherwise to me doing so seems inadvisable. There is also a Toronto Star article entitled “Bring on fall election, Liberals say”. It quotes Bob Rae and appears to be implying that Rae is saying “bring on a fall election.” Of course I don’t want the Star to put words in Rae’s mouth. What Rae did say is that it is only a matter of time until an election and that the Liberals are increasingly ready for one. The problem with the Liberal Green Shift is that although it is credible and doable, it is polarizing. People either support it or strongly oppose it. There is a sizeable, although minority, population that opposes the Green Shift. Opposition to the Green Shift is heavily concentrated out west, especially in Saskatchewan and Alberta. There is strong opposition in those provinces due to the oil revenue that those two provinces generate due to oil drilling. Of course the Green Shift does not put a tax on petroleum itself. Conservatives still contend that the Green Shift would cause the prices of gasoline to increase. There are genuine fears out west that the Green Shift would devastate the economies of Alberta and Saskatchewan. I would like to reassure those who feel that way. I am thoroughly convinced that the Green Shift would either have no effect on the economies of Alberta and Saskatchewan or the Green Shift would have a positive effect on the economies of Alberta and Saskatchewan. By no means is the Green Shift another National Energy Program as I have seen some contend. The Green Shift is completely different. There is also opposition to the Green Shift in British Columbia where the provincial Liberal government has already implemented a carbon tax. There is strong opposition to the BC government’s carbon tax and as a result there is opposition to the federal Liberal Green Shift. Sadly the Liberals are therefore, I fear, risking the seats they have in British Columbia by promoting a policy that is similar to the provincial carbon tax that British Columbians have already rejected. Thus for all these reasons I am not convinced that the Liberal Green Shift ought to be the overwhelming issue over which the federal Liberals force an election.

The Green Shift will be an integral part of our platform but I firmly believe the Liberals should campaign on other things as well. During an election the Green Shift by no means should be the only thing discussed by the Liberals. There are plenty other issues to promote and plenty of other issues to attack the Conservatives on. Of course we cannot really consider our options on when to force an election until after the by-elections on September 8. If the Liberals, God forbid, get wiped out in the by-elections I am doubtful there would be eagerness on the part of the Liberals to force a quick election. Even if the Liberals lost one of the two seats it held I am doubtful the Liberals would be clamoring to bring down the House. If the Liberals win both, the Liberals can consider their options, part of which should involve weighing the percentage of the vote the Liberals get in each of the three ridings. That being said, I am cautioning against rushing into an election. We need the exact right issue at the exact right time, and I am not convinced we have found those two things yet nor I am I convinced we’d find those two things in the fall. Stephen Harper has talked about making confidence motions in the autumn out of government measures on the economy, crime, and other Conservative policies. It is my guess that the Liberals would look at each of those measures separately and decide individually whether to support or oppose each measure. If an economic proposal put before parliament is not overly radical or nutty, I don’t see why the Liberals wound not support it. Similarly, the Liberals have mostly supported the Conservative crime-fighting agenda. I don’t see this stopping in the fall unless the Conservatives propose something really radical. I do not personally agree with Stephane Dion that Canadians are “hungry for an election”, as one article put it. My party will do what it thinks best on every issue and every vote in the fall. But even when we support certain Conservative measures we will not stop criticizing the government over it’s numerous failures. This is not incompatible. This is what is needed to make a minority parliament work. When the Bloc Quebecois was supporting the Conservatives in confidence votes, the Bloc did not refrain from criticizing the Conservatives at the time. The situation is no different for the Liberals. We will support individual Conservatives proposals as we see fit but we remain the Official Opposition and the role of the Official Opposition is to hold the government to account. We do that by criticizing the many things that this government has done wrong. Anyway, good luck to Frank Valeriote in Guelph, Marc Garneau in Westmount—Ville-Marie, and Roxane Stanners in Saint-Lambert!

Prohibative organ donation restrictions

I would like to express my concern over this new Health Canada policy that seeks to exclude sexually active gay men from donating organs. It opens the Harper government up to accusations of being homophobic. Unfortunately it zeroes in on a single group and reinforces stereotypes. STDs spread in the gay community but this is not inherently due to being gay. There are historical and sociological factors to do with promiscuity. In the articles I read about this I was seeing a lot about families being questioned on these things after a donor is dead. This seems to discount the numerous existences of live donors. This new policy is a blanket ban that doctors can only override in exceptional circumstances. Unfortunately this blanket ban endangers the lives of those in need of a donated organ. Here is a hypothetical example. A gay man marries a woman and has a daughter. They then divorce because the man realizes he is gay. The man enters into a monogamous sexual relationship with another man that carries as little risk of HIV as a monogamous heterosexual relationship. The gay man’s daughter suffers kidney failure in both kidneys. After some time of treatment she is in serious need of a transplant. A test is done on the father and there is a requisite DNA match. The doctors set aside this match and look elsewhere because they have much higher preference for a donor who is straight. It is difficult to find a matching donor elsewhere. This girl’s life is being endangered because of a blanket policy that does not apply to the circumstances and is clearly discriminatory. This is the fault of the Harper government through failure to exercise their responsibility. I also wonder whether this regulation is an invasion of provincial jurisdiction. The Supreme Court might actually use its precedence criteria to strike down this regulation when I think about it. Thumbs down again to the Harper government.

Coming Throne Speech

I can’t deal with whether the federal government will fall on the coming Throne Speech. That seems too far away right now. I want to focus on the provincial campaign. There will be a lot of Throne Speech optics later. If we’re lucky, someone will find away to keep this government in power for now – Liberals in Ontario cannot have two elections so close together. I want this Conservative government out of office just as much as the next Liberal, but a 2007 election is not the way to do it. Bringing down the government only creates an election that the Conservatives could easily win with a minority or majority. Not for decades upon decades has the Governor General asked an opposition party to form government without an election victory for said opposition party. That just doesn’t happen anymore. If we could bring down the government in hopes of Dion simply being appointed Prime Minister on the spot, I’d go for it. But Governors General just don’t appoint new Prime Ministers on the spot following the loss of confidence of a government anymore. So it just is not a doable option. That is why we need to keep this Conservative government in power in the year 2007 and explore our options next year. That’s all the dealing I’m going to do on this topic for now.

But as a closely related aside I want to mention that Harper has been bold enough to say he won’t hold a vote on extending the combat mission in Afghanistan unless he thinks the government can win that vote. The implication is he may hold it eventually, as the current deadline of February 2009 comes close. But he will not hold such an early vote because he thinks he can’t win it. I seem to read signals from the government that the government was hoping certain Liberals would again break ranks and support the extension past 2009 in the same way that certain Liberals voted for the extension to 2009. I expect the government to be disappointed if they are hoping for this. Dion has more or less united the Liberals on this issue. In the spring there was a Liberal motion to end the mission in 2009. Individual Liberals did not break ranks and I wouldn’t expect them to in a future vote. We are now quite united on this issue. When it comes down to it, there cannot be an extension of the Afghanistan mission within the context of this current parliament. Harper would still need a majority government to push through such an extension of the mission. And even then, it would go against the type of “all-party consensus” that Harper has been promising.

Prorogue????

Harper prorogued parliament. When I think about it I'm not surprised. He wants to start his government fresh and is willing to risk an election that he thinks he'd win anyway by having a new Throne Speech. I'm not sure how much emphasis on the environment this throne speech will have. The government says its Clean Air Act won’t be one of the killed pieces of legislation to be resurrected. However, the numerous justice bills that reached the Senate shortly before summer and thus could not be passed will be resurrected at the stage at which they were previously. I don’t know how this works. I can only assume that they have to renumber the bills the match the new parliamentary session. Apparently private members bills don’t die when parliament is prorogued. I was under the impression that ALL bills died, including private members bills. It must be different somehow at the federal level. Recently, I saw some articles referring to a private member’s bill to implement the Kyoto Protocol. These articles said that this was a private member’s bill and thus it would not die when parliament is prorogued. But that bill has already received Royal Assent, so not only does the bill not die, it is already law! I’m not sure where the misconception that this bill had not yet received Royal Assent came from. One of the articles I read said that there is a group (I forget what it was called) that is thrilled parliament was prorogued because doing so temporarily kills the age of consent bill. This group opposes this bill. One argument they make is that teenagers under the age of consent are less likely to speak out and seek health information regarding sexual relationships. Maybe that is true in many U.S. States, with their mishmash of age of consent laws. However, I’m hoping it would be different in Canada because 14 year olds under the new law are not prohibited from having sex. Having sex with someone as much as four years older than them is still legal. So as long as their sexual partner is of the right age there should be no disincentive to seek health information. If however, the partner is more than 4 years older than the 14 year old, then there may be a case of not seeking information in hopes of not being caught. This leads to the group’s other argument against the bill, it limits sexual freedom for young teenagers. Now this is true to a certain extent. The maximum limit of 4 years may have been too few. Any attempts by the Senate to change this, however, will be swiftly rejected by the government as the government is want to do. At least if this Bill is resurrected, it can also receive a fair examination in the Senate before being passed.

I have a bit of political humour. The NDP candidate in my riding of Markham—Unionville for the upcoming provincial election is Andy Arifin. But currently on the NDP website, I can get information on him only in French! Clearly that part of their site is a work in progress. Here is the humourous translation of Arifin’s blurb into English using the Google translator:

Andy Arifin is enthusiastic with the idea to insufflate a new energy with the Ontarian policy. Inspired by the optimistic vision of Howard Hampton of the future of Ontario, it is happy to represent the district of Markham-Unionville in the name of the team of the New democratic Party.Andy always lived in Markham. While it finishes a baccalaureat specialized in political sciences at the York University, it finds time to militate actively.As a student, Andy saw closely how the badly advised policies of Dalton McGuinty as regards education postsecondaire push a number growing of students to be involved in debt always more. Following the deregulation of the expenses of the professional training schemes, a measurement of the McGuinty government, certain students cannot consider higher education any more or to continue their program of studies.Andy impatiently waits the moment to represent the families of workers as new deputy of the district of Markham Unionville in Queen' S Park.

“New deputy” means new MPP. If Arifin wants to be the new MPP for Markham—Unionville, he has his work cut out for him. After all, I think that if the NDP were to win 106/107 seats in the province, Markham—Unionville would be the one seat that didn’t go NDP.

Men more likely to oppose gay marriage

It has just occurred to me that every single Liberal MP to vote for Stephen Harper’s December 2006 motion to repeal same-sex marriage were men. In 2005, almost all of the Liberal MPs to vote against same-sex marriage were men, with only a handful of exceptions. In December 2006, all the female Liberal opponents of same-sex marriage were either no longer in Parliament or switched their vote. Speaking of that December 2006 vote, Liberal MP Glen Pearson had been sworn in that very day after winning a by-election and so was able to vote against Harper’s motion. Raymond Gravel, however, also having recently been elected in a by-election, had not been sworn in yet for some reason and was not sworn in until a few days later. I’m not sure why this is. It meant that Gravel (who was an openly gay Catholic priest) was unable to vote against Harper’s motion as he had announced he would. I don’t know why it took longer for him to be sworn in. All I can think of is that the returning officer took longer to submit the results to Parliament for some reason.

Speaking of by-elections, it has not been since 1986 that a governing party has picked up a seat previously held by an opposition party in a by-election in Ontario provincial politics. In 1986 there was a Liberal minority government. A Tory member resigned from the York East riding. In the by-election, Liberal Christine Hart won. Prior to this, the governing party picked up a seat in 1984 in Wentworth North when the Tories narrowly picked it up from the Liberals. This MPP never got a chance to actually sit in the legislature because a general election was called before the legislature met again.

Cabinet shuffle

Stephen Harper’s cabinet shuffle was mostly about selling the mission in Afghanistan and nothing more. Harper also moved the moderate Jim Prentice from Indian Affairs to Industry and put the more conservative Chuck Strahl into Indian Affairs. This change in Indian Affairs minister has frustrated Caledonia First Nations protestors (http://www.940news.com/nouvelles.php?cat=23&id=81574). Yet I find it strange that by contrast it seems to have pleased Ontario Aboriginal Affairs Minister David Ramsay. Look at thus quote from the article I just cited:

Ontario Aboriginal Affairs Minister David Ramsay suggested the portfolio change shows the federal government considers First Nations matters a priority.

Ramsay said he's currently writing the new minister a letter outlining some of Ontario's priorities. Working closely with the federal government to implement the recommendations of the Ipperwash inquiry and resolving land claims such as the one plaguing Caledonia are among them, he said.

"I think we have a federal government that is very concerned about the aboriginal issue and has really showed some tremendous progress in trying to move yardsticks on this file," Ramsay said.


Why does Mr. Ramsay think that causing disruption on the Caledonia file by replacing ministers mean that the federal government considers First Nations matters a priority? These are words coming from a Liberal cabinet minister. I suspect he is only saying this to try to create a smooth relationship with his new federal counterpart, Chuck Strahl, and that if it were not for this he would not have said such nice things about the disruption being caused by the replacement of the Indian Affairs Minister. The Ontario government has often been critical of the Harper government, so I am still very surprised to see such positive words coming from a minister of the Ontario government. After all there is a lot Ontario Liberals could criticize the Harper government about regarding aboriginal affairs, starting with the scrapping of the Kelowna Accord. But again I don’t think Ramsay meant those praises and I think they were only for the purposes of good diplomatic relations.


My household has been recently receiving unwanted copies of the National Post due to a promotion that we do not want. On today’s National Post paper there was an editorial about Harper’s cabinet shuffle. I was shocked to see how blatantly pro-Conservative the editorial was, heaping much undeserved praise on the Harper government. I also find it interesting that some people are connecting this cabinet shuffle with a possible future election. While the shuffle IS all about the 3 ongoing by-elections in Quebec, it is important to remember that there is a fixed election date Bill in place that means in order to get a general election we’d need a non-confidence vote. The recent SES poll showed a significant drop for the NDP. So they aren’t ready to have an election. The Liberal numbers in the SES poll are stagnant. That is not enough to want an election. The Bloc has been the Conservatives’ coalition partner ever since the government came to power. The Bloc has no reason to withdraw their support now as polls show the Bloc would either lose seats (probably some to the Liberals, maybe a couple to the Conservatives), or keep all the ones they have. Polls do not show the Bloc gaining seats so the Bloc has no incentive to withdraw their support of the government. This means an election will not come until some time next year at the absolute earliest. By then any popularity boost by this cabinet shuffle would be all forgotten anyway. Even if sometime in 2008 the Bloc for some reason withdrew its support, the Liberals might try to keep the Tories in power themselves unless their poll numbers were going through the roof. But it’s more likely the Bloc’s support of the government will last throughout 2008.

There is also talk of proroguing Parliament and having a new Throne Speech in the fall. I’m not sure if this Throne Speech would occur on September 17 when the House of Commons is scheduled to reconvene or after that. I don’t want the Throne Speech occurring in the middle of the Ontario election because this would give an unfair advantage to the provincial Tories. The problem with proroguing Parliament is that it would kill at least temporarily Bills that have not received Royal Assent. This includes some of the government’s vaunted justice Bills that have yet to pass the Senate. There is some kind of procedure to bring back killed Bills that I do not understand. But proroguing Parliament potentially delays the passage of these Bills into law, and I thought the government wanted those justice Bills to become law as soon as possible. Proroguing Parliament would also kill the unpassable Bill to scrap the gun registry and the controversial political redistribution Bill that both Quebec and Ontario are against. Several other government-introduced Bills would die, not to mention countless private members’ Bills. If they want a Throne Speech, the least they can do is wait until their vaunted Bills are passed, unless the Bills’ purported importance was being overplayed for political gain. Nevertheless, proroguing Parliament is not a decision Harper should take lightly.

A website on gay rights

Gay rights issues have been swirling in my head again. Personally I am glad that I am pro-gay marriage. I couldn’t live with myself if I were anti-gay marriage. I have come across a site created and maintained by Bill Myers from Ohio. It is called GAY RIGHTS INFO. Bill cares passionately about gay rights believes strongly in the expansion of gay rights. So he has compiled voting records of politicians in the US and around the world on gay rights issues. He also gives the status of gay rights in all US states and various other countries including Canada. Bill’s site includes a page that gives a table of voting records for all MPs in the current Canadian House of Commons, those from the 38th House of Commons, and most of those who were in the 37th House of Commons. The reason I say “most” is because the table does not include MPs like Brian Tobin who resigned mid-way through the 37th House of Commons and whose ridings were filled in a by-election. It DOES, however, include MPs such as Jean Chrétien who resigned near the end of the 37th House of Commons and whose seats were vacant at dissolution. Here is a link to the table: http://www.actwin.com/eatonohio/gay/canhoc.html

This table for the Canadian House of Commons has 16 Commons votes that Myers considers to be a “homosexual issue”. If the member voted what Myers considers to be the “pro-gay” position on the issue, they get a + sign for that vote. If the member voted what Myers considers to be the “anti-gay” position on the issue, they get a – sign for that vote. If they did not vote, they get a question mark. If they were not MPs at the time of the vote, they get an “I”. The problem with this table is that it has many flaws to it. Another feature of the table is that MPs who are outspokenly pro-gay get a + sign next to their name. MPs who are outspokenly anti-gay get a – sign next to their name. Stephen Harper has, correctly in my opinion, a – sign next to his name put there by Myers. However, there is one error among the + signs and – signs next to peoples names. There is a glaringly incorrect anti-gay – sign next to the name of Conservative MP James Moore. James Moore supports same-sex marriage and has voted for it. What’s more, look at this quote from James Moore (http://www.sodomylaws.org/world/canada/canews018.htm):

“The government has no business in the bedrooms of the nation. And it is no business of any politician to even comment, let alone legislate, let alone preach, about the consenting behaviour of two adults behind closed doors,” Moore said.

“And Larry Spencer was way over the top and I think his comments were ridiculous.”

Clearly the anti-gay – sign did not belong next to James Moore’s name. Myers probably meant to put the – sign one line down next to Conservative MP Rob Moore’s name. Rob Moore is an outspoken opponent of same-sex marriage. I think this is where that – sign belonged, and putting it next to James Moore’s name was a technical mistake.

But the flaws in the table go far deeper than that. Some of the issues voted on that Myers considers to be “homosexual issues” I do not consider to be homosexual issues at all. Votes on Canada’s age of consent could be argued to be a homosexual issue because none of the proposals being voted on equalized the homosexual age of consent. However, I consider the age of consent votes in question to be too specific to warrant being called a vote on “homosexual issues”. Therefore I don’t think the age of consent votes should have been included in the table. There are also two votes that have NOTHING to do with “homosexual issues”. They are a vote on a child pornography Bill and a vote on a Bill that proposed to “increase the maximum sentence for people convicted of using the internet to lure a child for sexual purposes from five years to 10.” I am appalled that these two votes are included in the table and that a vote for either Bill is considered an “anti-gay vote” and a vote against either Bill is considered a “pro-gay vote” In both cases homosexuality may be indirectly involved. However, homosexually-oriented child porn is equally as reprehensible as heterosexually-oriented child porn. So this vote should not have been included in any way in the table. The vote on the internet luring Bill should clearly also never have been included in the table.

It is also appalling how much of an emphasis Myers places on the internet luring Bill. He considers a vote for this Bill to be “anti-gay” and in some cases penalizes the most pro-gay MPs in the House very heavily for voting in favour of the internet luring Bill. For example, MPs first elected in 2006 are only graded on voting on two issues – the internet luring Bill and Harper’s motion to restore the old definition of marriage. This gives several MPs (including newly elected pro-gay NDPers) a C grade when they in fact deserve an A+. For example, Michael Ignatieff’s vote in favour of the internet luring Bill causes Ignatieff to be given only a C grade despite his outspoken support for gay rights. What’s more, Myers gives other MPs like Jack Layton, who have a perfect voting record on gay rights, an A instead of an A+ simply because they voted for the internet luring Bill. None of this is in the remotest way right. As I have explained, several MPs who have a C deserve an A+, and several with an A also deserve an A+. It makes ZERO sense to include the internet luring Bill in the table. And WHY does Myers penalize MPs so heavily for voting in favour of the internet luring Bill? This is a Bill that has NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with gay rights. Just look at the age group mentioned. The Bill covers the luring of children from the ages of 5 to 10. This has nothing to do with gay rights because having gay sex with a 10 year old is EQUALLY as reprehensible as having heterosexual sex with a 10 year old. NO GAY RIGHTS ARE INVOLVED WHATSOEVER. Including this vote distorts the grades of several of the most gay-positive MPs in the House. Inquiring minds want to know why Bill Myers included the internet luring Bill in the table and why he included the age of consent votes and the child porn vote in the table.
Bill Myers says that the site will be shut down on January 1, 2008 because he no longer has time to update the site. He says all data will disappear so readers have to save the data beforehand. I plan to do just that because generally it is a very informative site. But I am baffled in particular by the child porn vote and the internet luring vote being included in the table and distorting the grades of some of the finest pro-gay MPs in the House.

Supplementary to my previous blog post

The by-elections have been called, but only the two in Quebec. The Roberval-Lac-Saint-Jean should be able to be called for the same date of September 17 now that Michel Gauthier has resigned. Harper wants political conditions for him to improve before risking any of the by-elections in Ontario or British Columbia. Harper can't have thought Outremont to be that winnable for his party since he waited until the absolutely last day before calling the by-election. In my opinion political conditions for Harper in Quebec are not as good as he may have hoped, but still better for Harper than the Liberals would have hoped.

I have also found out that in Welland, Jody Di Bartolomeo lost the NDP nomination to Malcolm Allen in March 2007, and that is the reason Di Bartolomeo is not running for the NDP again. The NDP sometimes ends up denying the nomination to a candidate who came close in the previous election. For example, Steve McClurg came within 100 votes of winning in New Westminster-Coquitlam in the 2004 Federal Election, but in 2005 lost the nomination for the 2006 Federal Election to Dawn Black, who is now the MP for New Westminster-Coquitlam. If McClurg had won the nomination, he might well be the MP now. What happened instead is that McClurg recently became a Liberal and sought the Liberal nomination in Burnaby-New Westminster before giving up his ambition for being an MP and withdrawing.

Jody Di Bartolomeo similarly came fairly close in the last election and evidently wanted to again make an attempt to become an MP. While I wholeheartedly endorse John Maloney to win the next Federal Election in Welland, I feel a little bit sorry for Di Bartolomeo because he was denied a chance to run in the next election.

More about the Senate

While it is true that the Senate is currently blocking a Senator term limit Bill, the Senate is not blocking the three justice Bills Stephen Harper is citing. These Bills have only been in the Senate for a few weeks and the Senate has not expedited them. This quote from Stephen Harper is patently false. Harper said “Our bail reforms are backed by police, prosecutors, big city mayors, the NDP and the Ontario Liberals. But not by the Liberal majority in the Senate,”. In fact the Bill in question has not been voted down by the Senate. It has, however, received only first reading in the Senate. It is not stalled at committee. The Liberals support this Bill and the Senate will pass this Bill. Parliamentary procedure on Bills is sometimes slow, even in the House of Commons on the government’s own Bills even when not at committee. The Senate simply has not had a chance to move the Bill forward to the next stages to be passed. It is just that the Senate has not gotten around to debating and passing the Bill yet. I can assure Stephen Harper that the bail reform Bill will be passed in the Senate in the fall. Saying that Liberal Senators are against this Bill is incorrect and Stephen Harper should know it.

As far as the mandatory minimum sentences Bill, the Liberal leadership opposed the Bill in the House of Commons, but I’m guessing that as with the budget it will be passed in the Senate. The third Bill that the CTV article mentions is as follows : “The blocked bills would have: Raised the age of consent from 14 to 16”. This is a Bill that the Liberals and Bloc reluctantly supported. The NDP has been split on this issue in the past but those previously opposed to raising the age of consent also reluctantly support this Bill. This Bill passed without there ever being a recorded vote. I’m guessing the Senate will get around to passing the Bill in the fall. The Bill gives a close-in-age exemption of up to four years. The opposition parties would never have agreed to this Bill otherwise. The Bill however now prohibits a 19 year old from having sex with a 14 year old. Even 20 year olds are now prohibited from having sex with 15 year olds. Some have argued that the Bill is a violation of human rights because it unduly restricts who 14 year olds and 15 year olds may choose as sex partners. The problem is that this is a side of the story that nobody really wants to hear because everyone is too caught up in the hype about supposed sexual exploitation of 14 year olds. I don’t doubt that there is some sexual exploitation that has occurred. Such sexual exploitation is already illegal, however. Proponents of this Bill have argued that somehow Canada’s current law is being used by sexual predators in the United States to come and sexually exploit 14 year old girls. The first problem with this is that luring children over the internet is already illegal and so if any sexual predator tries this they are already breaking the law. I think proponents of the Bill had the internet in mind when they were arguing that Canada’s law was being used to exploit. And I don’t doubt that there have been some who have used the current law to exploit 14 year old girls. But any of them who did it over the internet were breaking the law right off the bat. And even if they did not use the internet, the moment that there is a hint of exploitation in the relationship with the girl it becomes illegal under the current law. I do not know how many people actually come from the United States to Canada and hang around to pick up 14 year old girls and have sex with them; because that is the only way they could do it without breaking any laws. I don’t doubt there have been a few who have done this. And maybe the new law will discourage them from doing this and there will be even fewer strange men from the US hanging around trying to pick up young girls. But sadly I expect this Bill will reduce sexual exploitation by very little because those who want to sexually exploit will sadly not let the law stand in their way.

The CTV article seems to imply that the age of consent Bill was a Bill that the Ontario Provincial Liberals (of Dalton McGuinty fame) supported being passed. If the Ontario Liberals have an official position on the federal issue of age of consent its news to me. I do not know if this is what the article meant or if they were only referring to the bail and mandatory minimums reform. But if the Ontario Liberals have an official position on the age of consent issue that is outside their jurisdiction, I must have missed that.

I do not believe that Stephane Dion is as bad a leader as everybody says. I fail to understand why no one likes Stephane Dion. He is such a great guy. And as a leader he often seems to know what he is doing. For example, he reached the recent compromise on the Senate budget Bill standoff all by himself. He diffused a potential storm by allowing a free vote on the budget Bill, opening the door for Atlantic and Saskatchewan Liberal Senators to vote against the Bill but still allowing the Bill to pass the Senate. This was an excellent compromise that has allowed the Bill to pass but now be judged in the court of public opinion. It was an excellent solution and it was all done by Stephane Dion. He is a far better leader than people give him credit for. He’s even getting more effective during Question Period. I am overjoyed to see that in the last few weeks and months, the Liberals have finally been able to, on a regular basis, hold the government to account as is the Liberals’ duty as the Official Opposition. The Liberals have finally found themselves able to effectively oppose the government and effectively hold the government to account and I am overjoyed at this. And as any opposition party does this, it increases their viability as a government-in-waiting, and I’m glad to see the Liberals finally as a government-in-waiting working on being able to eventually replace the Conservatives and become the Government of Canada once more.


Sources:
http://www.news1130.com/news/national/article.jsp?content=n062269A

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20070622/kyoto_budget_070622/20070622?hub=CTVNewsAt11

All about Ontario politics

It is frustrating how many by-elections the Ontario Liberals lost in the past term. The Liberals fielded candidates in all 10 by-elections this past term but lost every single by-election except two. The Liberals retained two suburban ridings in by-elections: Scarborough—Rouge River and Markham. The Liberals failed to gain from the Tories the suburban ridings of Nepean-Carleton, Whitby-Ajax, or Burlington. The Liberals failed to gain from the Tories the rural riding of Dufferin-Peel-Wellington-Grey. The Liberals failed to pick up from the NDP the urban riding of Toronto-Danforth. When the urban Liberal-held ridings of Hamilton East, Parkdale—High Park, and York South—Weston were vacated, the Liberals lost all three to the NDP. That’s a bad record considering all the opportunities there were to win in York South—Weston, Parkdale—High Park, Hamilton East, and even Whitby-Ajax. The Liberals put their best effort in the 3 March 2006 by-elections but ended up coming up short in all 3. In Whitby-Ajax the Liberals came within 3.8% of winning but it was close but no cigar. The 2006 Parkdale-High Park by-election the Liberals blundered big time by acting vulnerable on the issue of education, running a disorganized campaign, and attacking the NDP candidate with a controversial personal attack campaign that backfired badly. Instead the Liberals should have only talked about welfare, health care and education. In the 2007 by-elections, the Liberals tried their best in Burlington but Burlington proved too Conservative a riding, although they still managed a good 40%+ showing. In York South-Weston, the Liberals dropped over 20 points to just above 40%, just behind the NDP candidate. The Liberals lost out because of the unresolved and polarizing issue of a $10 minimum wage. This was an issue that the NDP ran on and won on in the poor riding of York South—Weston. I fully agree with the government’s plan to slowly raise the minimum wage past $10 per hour. I agree with those who argue that an immediate increase to $10 per hour would have a negative effect on the economy. In Markham, the Liberals managed to win a by-election for a change. Unfortunately, Markham’s result was the exception, not the norm.

However, I calculated and found that the Liberals easily won the popular vote if you add up the results of the 3 2007 by-elections with about 42% or by about 10 points. This is an improvement to the 2006 popular vote by-election results which the Tories narrowly won. And the truth is, for all the talk of there being dissatisfaction in the McGuinty government, in February at least there was enough satisfaction to give the Liberals above 40% in all 3 by-elections. There may be more satisfaction with the McGuinty government out there then people are giving credit for. I would attribute the recent close polls mostly to the controversies surrounding the OLG and grants to immigrant groups. I also think that there is a correlation between poll results at the federal and provincial level. My theory is that when Stephen Harper’s popularity goes up, McGuinty’s popularity goes down. Conversely, when Stephen Harper’s popularity goes down, McGuinty’s popularity goes up. And there is evidence that John Tory suffers from Stephen Harper. A recent Ian Urquhart article describes the fact that Mr. Urquhart recently went canvassing alongside both Education Minister Kathleen Wynne and Tory leader John Tory in the riding of Don Valley West. When Tory was canvassing, this sometimes happened: “But – and this is a potential problem for Tory province-wide – several residents questioned him about stands taken by Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He pointed out to them that Harper represents a different level of government and, indeed, a different party.” That just proves my point about the fact that people associate John Tory with Stephen Harper and thus Tory’s popularity waxes and wanes along with Harper’s. If Tory came to my door, I’d make the Stephen Harper connection. When Tory points out about the different level of government and different parties, I make connections between the two Tory parties. After all, it is obviously John Tory that Harper endorses to be Premier.

Speaking of John Tory, Tory is proposing to provide funding to private religious schools. Firstly, out of curiosity, I wonder whether this funding would be extended to private Catholic schools when there is already a publicly funded Catholic school system. Secondly, this is a divisive can of worms. If Tory is to come up with millions of new dollars to give money to private schools, I think that money would be better spent improving the existing publicly funded school system. Unfortunately this proposal takes away potential money from the existing system and blurs the distinctions between public and private schools. Personally I find it is duplicative to have a public and publicly funded Catholic system, but I do not favor the sweeping change and constitutional amendments required to merge the two systems. I looked at the comments on the article about this on the Globe and Mail website and found mostly comments against Tory’s proposal. I prefer we better fund the existing system and not divide the province any more on religious grounds than we already are doing.

Quebec's unstable minority government

I think I know the reason why Quebec’s minority government is proving to be so unstable. I think it is because Quebec has not had a minority government in over 100 years, and as a result Quebec politicians and Quebec in general has positively no experience in how to handle a minority government. At the federal scene, by contrast, there have been enough minority governments in recent memory that the federal politicians are able to handle a minority government with greater success.

I find it odd that at the federal level, the separatist party is propping up the Tories, but at the provincial level in Quebec, the separatist party is refusing to prop up the right-of-centre Charest Liberals. To me it defies logic. The PQ is deeply in debt and hasn’t even sworn in its new leader. And it still wants an election? Even when the most recent Quebec poll puts the ADQ in first place and the PQ in third place? The PQ opposes the Charest tax cuts on ideological grounds. The ADQ does not oppose the Charest tax cuts on ideological grounds. ADQ leader Mario Dumont instead argues that the tax cuts should not occur when there is a deficit. The ADQ is also opposing the budget simply because it is the Official Opposition and the Official Opposition always traditionally votes against the budget even in minority governments. It is for this reason that I believe it is fallacious when Harper attacked the Liberals for voting against his 2007 budget. The Liberals had every right to vote against the budget in its role as an Official Opposition fulfilling tradition.

I support the Quebec Liberals, although somewhat tacitly because Charest is slightly too right-of-centre for me. But the Liberals are the centrist party in Quebec politics whereas the PQ represents the left and the ADQ represents the right. So in that sense the Quebec Liberals fulfill the same role as in Ontario and federally as the centrist party. If, however, I were in charge of the Quebec Liberals the party would be more left-of-centre.

In conclusion I hope the Charest government does not fall on Friday and that instead something can be worked out to save the government.

Congratulations to the P.E.I Liberals!

The Prince Edward Island Liberals under leader Robert Ghiz won big last night. They achieved a mirror image of the 2003 election results (the seat breakdown is actually an exact mirror image of the 2003 results), sweeping the Pat Binns Tories out of office. The Liberals improved their raw vote across the province by about 10,000 votes, improved the popular vote percentage by over 10%, and increased their seats from 4 to 23. The Liberals received almost 53% of the vote, over 11 points above the Tories’ vote total. I am personally glad that the pro-Stephen Harper Pat Binns (who following the departure of Bernard Lord was the most pro-Harper Premier in Atlantic Canada) has been soundly defeated. The only bit of bad news from this election result is that it could cause Pat Binns to enter federal politics. I did some calculations and found that the provincial Tories won the federal riding of Cardigan by about 4 points or by about 48% to 44%. This was the only place of residual popularity for Binns anywhere across the province. The Liberals easily won the 3 other federal ridings. Binns provincial riding (which he was re-elected in) is located in the federal Cardigan riding and Binns himself represented Cardigan in the federal House of Commons from 1984 to 1988 before being swept out along with all other Island federal Tories in the 1988 federal election due to the Island’s opposition to Brian Mulroney’s Free Trade Agreement. Binns himself was swept out by about 8 points by the now-current MP Lawrence MacAulay. But this was before he was Premier and Binns has gained plenty of stature since that 1988 loss. My concern is that with Binns no longer Premier, he will quit provincial politics and run in the federal Cardigan riding against Liberal MP Lawrence MacAulay. If Binns were to do that he would have a significant chance of winning due to his residual popularity in Cardigan and the fact that he won his own riding within Cardigan by a wide margin. This is my concern about what could happen but for now I will rejoice in the election of a new Liberal majority government in P.E.I. and the ousting of a Harper-friendly Tory. Congratulations to the P.E.I. Liberals!

Harper's Limited Options on Afghanistan

If Stephen Harper wants Canada’s current Afghanistan counter-insurgency mission to be extended beyond the current February 2009 expiration date, he has only a few options of making such an attempt with this minority parliament. Firstly, he can call off the extension and end the current mission in February, 2009. Harper has promised a vote in parliament on all military missions, including a possible extension of this current anti-insurgency mission. The Liberals are now united in their support of ending that current mission at its present expiry date. With the anti-war NDP and anti-war Bloc also sure to vote against such an extension, extending the mission would fail in a vote in this current parliament. So if Harper really wants to extend the mission, he would have the following options left. He could do what he did last time, and say that in the event that the vote fails in parliament, the mission gets extended for one year rather than two. Harper’s second option is to go back on his word and extend the current mission without a parliamentary vote. Harper’s third and final option is to declare the vote on the extension of the Afghanistan mission to be a confidence vote and to then call an election when the vote fails. The problem with this strategy is that Harper may have trouble fighting a campaign that was triggered on the contentious and divisive issue of the Afghanistan mission extension at a time when polls show a majority of Canadians opposing the mission.