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*head desk* and repeat.
Oh god, so in my excitement at the recent political news, I ran over to The Globe and Mail to read how Canadians are reacting. I don't know *why* I subject myself to the comments over there. I mean, I think you'll find more insightful comments over at fandom_wank.
Some actual comments:
Overtaxed and underlaid from Canada writes: Canada is a democracy last time I checked, and correct me if I'm wrong, but none of the bozos in this coalition were elected.
Dude, every member of that coalition was elected, that's how a parliamentary government works. You don't vote for a leader of the country, you vote for a member of parliament and *they* choose a leader.
Gerry Pankhurst from westport ontario, Canada writes: In my view the contents of the telephone call indicate a conspiracy and the intent to overthrow the legitimately elected government indicate insurrection, or sedition.
If what the NDP did is insurrection or sedition, what the hell was Harpers *constant* going ons about over throwing the government being his *main* *goal* back in 2006?
Rawl Boychuk from Upper Canada, Canada writes: Undemocratic. An UNELECTED Gov Gen deciding our fate and letting the SEPARTISTS RULE THE COUNTRY!!!!!!
Ok, "technically" the Gov Gen is the highest office in Canada and it's appointed, but for God's sake she represents the *Queen* who is also appointed. And the Gov Gen only has the power Canada gives her, if she were to suddenly act outside of Canada's laws she'd be gone. This coalition isn't illegal, and in fact, Harper tried something similar back when Martin was PM
Joseph Bloggins from Canada writes: Canada hasn't had its civil war.....yet. ... Canada is finished.
But let's not over react at all....
Although some of the comments I actually like:
Plus 8 from Mont Tremblant, Canada writes: Well said. The electorate chose to create a minority government, We wanted compromises and forced de facto 'coalitions'. Harper cannot manage that mandate.
So according to Parliamentary law, if another part of a minority Commons can show they can manage sufficiently to govern, bless them.
I do not consider a move from a lone minority party with 37% of the last election and no other friends in the Commons to a coalition of 57% as a disaster for democracy. Those accusations are silly Harper spin. He gambled for petty gain, he lost, time to move on.
Gord Gilmour from Winnipeg, Canada writes: @Calgary Guy 'They should throw the three party leaders (Liberal, Bloc and NDP) in jail for their attempt to overthrow the government. '
That's simply NOT the way things work in a parliamentary democracy, which Canada has been since its inception. Under a parliamentary democracy the government is government as long as it enjoys the 'confidence of the house.'
When it's lost that it must either step aside and allow other parties to form government or go to the polls. It's all in black and white (and what's not is governed by long-standing convention) and this current drama is simply following the rules.
By all means, if you don't like the rules, lobby your MP, fund a party that wants to change it, etc. But until that party gets a majority and then makes those changes, everyone must play by the same rules.
You can argue that the resulting government might be ineffectual, run by boobs or any other criticism -- but don't try to claim that it would lack legitimacy. They are in fact NOT trying to overthrow the government. They're trying to FORM it.
It's a world of difference, and one that the federal conservatives don't seem to understand. The government of Canada is bigger than the political parties that form it at any given time. What I fail to understand is why the conservatives seem to feel the only time it has legitimacy is when they control it.
The entire purpose of a democracy is to institutionalize revolution. By that I mean we have mechanisms where we can, from time to time, throw out our government if we think they're not up to the job. And the beauty of our system, of course, is that we can do so without blood running in the streets.
In other news, if there are any Canadians on IJ who are interested, I created a feed for Rick Mercer's blog today (I can't wait to see his reaction to all this), it's![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-syndicated.gif)
rick_mercer on IJ. It was a lot easier than I thought to create an RSS feed....
Some actual comments:
Overtaxed and underlaid from Canada writes: Canada is a democracy last time I checked, and correct me if I'm wrong, but none of the bozos in this coalition were elected.
Dude, every member of that coalition was elected, that's how a parliamentary government works. You don't vote for a leader of the country, you vote for a member of parliament and *they* choose a leader.
Gerry Pankhurst from westport ontario, Canada writes: In my view the contents of the telephone call indicate a conspiracy and the intent to overthrow the legitimately elected government indicate insurrection, or sedition.
If what the NDP did is insurrection or sedition, what the hell was Harpers *constant* going ons about over throwing the government being his *main* *goal* back in 2006?
Rawl Boychuk from Upper Canada, Canada writes: Undemocratic. An UNELECTED Gov Gen deciding our fate and letting the SEPARTISTS RULE THE COUNTRY!!!!!!
Ok, "technically" the Gov Gen is the highest office in Canada and it's appointed, but for God's sake she represents the *Queen* who is also appointed. And the Gov Gen only has the power Canada gives her, if she were to suddenly act outside of Canada's laws she'd be gone. This coalition isn't illegal, and in fact, Harper tried something similar back when Martin was PM
Joseph Bloggins from Canada writes: Canada hasn't had its civil war.....yet. ... Canada is finished.
But let's not over react at all....
Although some of the comments I actually like:
Plus 8 from Mont Tremblant, Canada writes: Well said. The electorate chose to create a minority government, We wanted compromises and forced de facto 'coalitions'. Harper cannot manage that mandate.
So according to Parliamentary law, if another part of a minority Commons can show they can manage sufficiently to govern, bless them.
I do not consider a move from a lone minority party with 37% of the last election and no other friends in the Commons to a coalition of 57% as a disaster for democracy. Those accusations are silly Harper spin. He gambled for petty gain, he lost, time to move on.
Gord Gilmour from Winnipeg, Canada writes: @Calgary Guy 'They should throw the three party leaders (Liberal, Bloc and NDP) in jail for their attempt to overthrow the government. '
That's simply NOT the way things work in a parliamentary democracy, which Canada has been since its inception. Under a parliamentary democracy the government is government as long as it enjoys the 'confidence of the house.'
When it's lost that it must either step aside and allow other parties to form government or go to the polls. It's all in black and white (and what's not is governed by long-standing convention) and this current drama is simply following the rules.
By all means, if you don't like the rules, lobby your MP, fund a party that wants to change it, etc. But until that party gets a majority and then makes those changes, everyone must play by the same rules.
You can argue that the resulting government might be ineffectual, run by boobs or any other criticism -- but don't try to claim that it would lack legitimacy. They are in fact NOT trying to overthrow the government. They're trying to FORM it.
It's a world of difference, and one that the federal conservatives don't seem to understand. The government of Canada is bigger than the political parties that form it at any given time. What I fail to understand is why the conservatives seem to feel the only time it has legitimacy is when they control it.
The entire purpose of a democracy is to institutionalize revolution. By that I mean we have mechanisms where we can, from time to time, throw out our government if we think they're not up to the job. And the beauty of our system, of course, is that we can do so without blood running in the streets.
In other news, if there are any Canadians on IJ who are interested, I created a feed for Rick Mercer's blog today (I can't wait to see his reaction to all this), it's
rick_mercer on IJ. It was a lot easier than I thought to create an RSS feed....
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(I didn't read the comments you posted, because I feared that they would cause me to have even less faith in people!).
* How many times did I see things like 'redeculous' and 'their' instead of 'they're'? Too damn many.
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Granted there were some good posts, the ones on the bottom of this post were ones that I thought were intelligent (unlike the one idiot who said none of the members of this coalition were elected *headdesk*)
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Sometimes I find the world to be such a depressing place. It's so frustrating to read these kinds of things.