the secret of comedy

[jazzfish]

Just under six and a half years ago, I'd been quietly talking about fleeing to Canada if Bush won a second term. An acquaintance posted something to the effect of "hey, all you people talking about how you'd move to canada if bush won: put your money where your mouth is and shut up about it and just go do it."

"Fine," I thought (but didn't say), and started thinking more seriously about the idea.

It took some doing but in less than a month I will have pulled it off.

... just in time for the Conservative Party of Canada to have won a majority government after being found in contempt of Parliament, thanks to stupid awful first-past-the-post elections with one right-wing party running against three and a half left-wing ones.

The Liberal Party has lost more than half their seats, and the Bloc is essentially finished (down to three, I believe). Congratulations to the pinko commie socialist New Democratic Party on their amazing hundred-plus seats, and to Elizabeth May for winning one for the Green Party.

The trouble is, the collapse of the Liberals (and the Bloc) moves Canada much closer to being a two-party state. And coming as it does after a Conservative victory that appears much more decisive than it actually is (40% of the vote, 55% of the seats), I fully expect the NDP to tack more to the centre. They'll need to absorb the last of the Liberal supporters; in addition, well, where are the more left-wing voters going to go? In another twenty years Canada will look like the US with better health care.

(Of course, I'm very likely wrong on this. All I know is what I read on the internet. I'm just in a rather bad mood, and finding it difficult to see any silver lining at all.)

A Conservative majority also ensures that there will be no election for another five years. I suppose I might be able to vote in that one, at least. But really, what the hell do I do now?

Comments

[thanate]

enjoy the healthcare? (and avoid as many government sanctioned gropings as possible?)

That is upsetting; my sympathies to canada.

[notmatt]

I've heard that the Conservative party in Canada is still somewhat to the left of the Democratic party in the US. I don't know if that's actually true; you'd know better than I would.

[pictsy.livejournal.com]

I'm not familiar with the platform of the Canadian Conservatives, but I can't imagine it's as bad as the nutjobbery down here.

[candle.livejournal.com]

One of the key statements I keep seeing from NDP supporters on the message boards that I've followed the election on is that for years they've asked the Liberal party for the types of voting reform that would have prevented the CPC from taking control of the country with a minority of the popular vote but were refused time and time again.

Maybe in five years, the Liberal Party and the NDP will unite with a platform of voting reform. I can't see either of them really becoming _the_ single liberal party in opposition to the CPC in the next decade - the NDP is too leftist (and consistently so) to get a majority (not to mention the fact that French Canadian politics are likely to increasingly affect the party's platform in ways that won't appeal to central and west coast moderates) and the Liberal Party demonstrated that a platform of "we're not Harper" wasn't enough to hold the votes. Perhaps I'm hearing disproportionately from NDP supporters, but many of the statements I've heard is that there wasn't enough difference when it came to governance between the Liberals and the CPC for them to be willing to vote for either.

At the very least, maybe they'll cooperate enough in some ridings where a single left wing candidate might hope to overcome a right wing but not two. I still think the great wasted opportunity of the 2000 election was that Nader didn't extract some very public and hard to go back on concessions from Gore in exchange for endorsing him. Maybe some quid pro quo endorsements and policy plank compromises will be possible between the NDP and the Liberals.