Election 2015
- Thread starter Edward Campbell
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jollyjacktar
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Agreed. But I'm damned if I could see the "if it bleeds it leads" crowd putting some proper perspective in the story. There's no glory in that avenue of investigation. Nexen will be pilloried for this, especially if they try to down play it by mentioning 66 vs 5M. (Hell, I'll admit guilt here myself with my OP on the subject.)
Brad Sallows
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>I don't need to rephrase it - you know exactly what I am talking about and are being deliberately obtuse.
No, I'm just not taking the bait. I might if the analogy were meaningful.
No, I'm just not taking the bait. I might if the analogy were meaningful.
Brad Sallows
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Macleans - Where the Provinces Stand on Senate Reform. Courtesy of Aaron Wherry. So there are 8 of 10 (another article from an earlier time that I read had one more in favour of abolition) with 50% of pop, but Senate reform isn't a standout priority for many.
Brad Sallows
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>In a more general sense, though, it is pretty hard to suggest the PM has nothing to do with the Senate when they sit in Cabinet, and 48 of the 83 active Senators were appointed by him (58%).
The PM also appoints Supreme Court justices. Although the process for SC nominations is more rigorous and open, the salient fact is that senators and justices belong to themselves and are answerable to their own respective institutions, not the PM who appointed them.
The PM also appoints Supreme Court justices. Although the process for SC nominations is more rigorous and open, the salient fact is that senators and justices belong to themselves and are answerable to their own respective institutions, not the PM who appointed them.
Brad Sallows
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>If one doesn't have more than enough proof that the CPC in the last 10 years is as "institutionally corrupt" as the Liberals were in 2006, then one never will.
I doubt that is true - nothing remains hidden forever - but I don't really care about things unproven. Anti-Harper partisans will believe whatever they choose, as they are at liberty to do.
>Did you ever stop and wonder why the ceiling for the CPC is only around 40%?
No more than I wonder why the LPC and NDP ceilings are also low.
I doubt that is true - nothing remains hidden forever - but I don't really care about things unproven. Anti-Harper partisans will believe whatever they choose, as they are at liberty to do.
>Did you ever stop and wonder why the ceiling for the CPC is only around 40%?
No more than I wonder why the LPC and NDP ceilings are also low.
Brad Sallows
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>5 million litres
1 million litres is a cube 10 metres on each side.
I'd like to see people get a grip: petrochemicals have to be moved in bulk somehow.
1 million litres is a cube 10 metres on each side.
I'd like to see people get a grip: petrochemicals have to be moved in bulk somehow.
Brad Sallows
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>Why do the Liberals renounce coalitions while the NDP favours them?
Liberals are opposed because it weakens their brand and position.
NDP are in favour because it give them a shot at doing something besides talking.
Liberals are opposed because it weakens their brand and position.
NDP are in favour because it give them a shot at doing something besides talking.
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Harrigan said:
http://www.electionalmanac.com/ea/canada-popular-vote-results/
Liberals have barely made it above 40% in their election wins, going all the way back to 1953. Not sure where you're going with that red herring.
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PuckChaser said:
Quite correct. I've been making this point for years: absolute majorities (even a simple majority of those who actually come out to vote) are very, very rare in Canada ~ or in any multi-party democracy.
Another point: the fact that the CPC got, for example, less than 40% of the popular vote in 2011 does not, in any way, mean that 60% of Canadians voted against the Conservatives. That's arrant nonsense. It is so tendentious that it goes beyond being just misleading and becomes a lie. 60% of Canadians did, indeed, vote for candidates not representing the Conservative Party of Canada; they made positive, not negative choices. The NDP wants to harness that progressive vote, either by displacing the Liberals or by having the Liberals agree to join them in coalition. If they do it will still not be an anti-conservative vote, it will be a vote for a NDP led coalition. The argument that "my vote didn't count because Harper got in with 39%" is dishonest and pathetically stupid.
Thucydides said:
Here is my original comment on the subject:
"I may not agree with it, but I suspect the Liberals would happily compare their economic performance between 93-06 to the Harper Government's between 06-15 any day of the week, and twice on Sunday."
Despite arguments by you and your like-minded posters, they ARE using that tactic, as would be expected. And claiming that only the CPC has "experience" in these matters because the opposition hasn't been in government recently is silly. In 2006, the Liberals used that same tactic to suggest that we couldn't possibly choose another party to govern because they are inexperienced. We kicked them out with good reason. In 2015, the CPC will likely use the same tactic, except that on the opposition benches there are some folks who HAVE done the deed and have experience, such as Mr.Goodale.
The veracity of the argument about who has a better record is certainly open for debate, but to pretend that there is no debate is simply putting one's head in the sand. Whether the CPC likes it or not, people will see 9 straight years of Liberal surpluses, and they will see a majority of Harper's term was in deficit, and the Liberals will play that up. Is it unfair? Yes, absolutely. So the CPC needs to rationally argue why their term was in fact superior to the Liberals - in other words, run on their record. They certainly have the money to flood media with their message, so I don't see any excuse for them not to do so.
And reference the Liberal leader, he doesn't get a pass for making dumb statements, but to pretend that "the budget will balance itself" is official Liberal Party policy is ridiculous.
Sure, but apparently only my comment was conjecture. I see how this works.
The operative word is "should". I didn't say that the parties DO run it that way. I agree that is unrealistic. But if we lower our expectations to the lowest common denominator, then we will get what we ask for. I will hold the PM to a higher standard than (clearly) his supporters on this site do, and this disappoints me. Just remember to be as equally forgiving of Trudeau or Mulcair if they are PM in future and put their own party's political gains over all.
There will never be a definition of "the good of the country" that everyone agrees on. That's why one talks, discusses, compromises, collaborates, to come up with the "best" solution to issues. Why is that so difficult to conceive?
This I agree on. But I don't feel any government can arrive at the "least worst choice" if they only hear from their sycophants or their favoured lobbyists. That's why I believe constructive evidence-based dialogue is far better than one-party decree.
Harrigan
Brad Sallows said:
I agree with you on this Mr.Sallows.
I also suspect that the NDP will not be as publically supportive of a coalition prior to the election (especially if they continue to increase in the polls), as all parties want people to vote for them. Tactically, it makes sense. If Trudeau were to say now that he is open to a coalition, it would be conceding that he thinks he will finish 3rd, which no party wants to suggest to the electorate lest they switch their vote to a party that may win. Same for Mulcair at this stage.
Harrigan
PuckChaser said:
I apologize for not being clear. I didn't mean 'historically', I meant at the moment the CPC ceiling is only 40%, (actually 42%.)
http://www.nanosresearch.com/library/polls/Nanos%20Political%20Index%202015-07-10E.pdf
According to this recent poll that asked whether one would consider voting for a party, the results are:
NDP - 53%
Lib - 44%
CPC - 42%
Of course, this can change over an election campaign, but when less than half of the voters would even consider voting for a party, that is not good news for the Liberals OR the CPC.
No red herring intended.
Harrigan
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Harrigan, why don't you let it all hang out and consolidate in one or two rebuttal posts vice a million individual posts? That way my finger will not get stressed scrolling through your replies.
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http://epaper.nationalpost.com/epaper/viewer.aspx?noredirect=true
National Post - 18 Jul 2015 - Rex Murphy
A very refreshing premier
Murphy: ‘ Brad Wall is utterly untinged with the mysticism of some of his fellow premiers.’ Why is Brad Wall the only one of the bunch who seems as concerned with 2015 as he is 2050?
The distant future is a politician’s most useful friend — it is where every good and noble thing they promise actually happens. It is where the clutter of present events and the roiling fortunes of this busy harsh and confounding world do not impinge on their wildest wishes.
For example, under Ontario’s green ambitions, we are given to understand the goal is to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by a full 80 per cent by 2050. This is Premier Kathleen Wynn’s pledge, a commitment that will take merely 35 years to be tested — a generous breathing space by any standards for a political commitment, and which happily just might be the identical term it takes to learn all there is to know about the infamous billion-dollar cancellation of a couple of Ontario gas plants a couple of elections ago.
We have long since learned, and from a thousand examples, that the promises of most politicians barely survive the time it takes to make them. Antiques like me remember the bitter mocking Pierre Trudeau once gave Robert Stanfield on the latter’s promise to introduce wage and price controls — “Zap! You’re frozen!,” said the wily Trudeau — only to pirouette mere days after an election to introduce … wage and price controls.
Pledges three, four or 10 decades out are perfect vapourings. To call them useless is to elevate their dignity. To build present-day policy under the umbrella of such projections is to blend fantasy and irresponsibility.
Essentially that’s what we have been watching at the premier’s conference this week in St. John’s. Those premiers who are extremely confident on the events of 2050 — Quebec’s and Ontario’s being the leaders, Rachel Notley of Alberta looking very much like an ally — and who are awash in self-esteem about how their ardent “commitments” to reduce global warming (the ignis fatuus of our day) want the present to act as hostage for their dreams.
One premier, however, who seems seriously stuck in the present, and who is unaccountably concerned with such trivial matters as Canadian jobs and the contribution the energy industry has made to all parts of Canada, who has the outlandish idea that the use of the word “oil” in public is not a pure blasphemy, takes a different view. Saskatchewan’s Brad Wall is utterly untinged with the mysticism of some of his fellow premiers, and astonishingly — it is very “incorrect” to say obvious things — mounts a public defence of the central industry of this entire country.
How outrageous he has been can be gleaned from just a few of his remarks. “There is a growing sense of frustration in the West that our economies have been creating significant opportunities for all Canadians” is one of those statements. It carries the clear implication that since this is so — the Western oil industry has helped all Canadians — it is a little more than curious there is so little encouragement or support for that industry. Indeed, it’s rather the opposite. Any opportunity to hobble it, or to put it in harness to an environmental agenda, is leaped at by some. In this contest 2050 always wins over 2015.
Premier Wall had the nerve to allude to the new and trendy concept of “social licence.” He didn’t add, but he very well could have, that there was no talk of “social licence” when it came to getting jobs in the oil industry, or contracts with companies outside the west, or working with university science and engineering programs, or contributing to the national economy during the most turbulent economic period in a generation. The venue of the conference, Newfoundland, is the grand illustration of all these points. Offshore oil, and western oil, salvaged Newfoundland during its greatest economic and cultural crisis since Confederation.
On the great pipeline debate Wall was ruthless enough to put the matter in very plain terms, which in the context of global warming is a faux pas of unimaginable dimensions. “In terms of a licence to build a pipeline, or in this case, simply convert a pipeline to move western energy across the country, how about $10 billion in equalization?” This was terribly bad manners. To talk about equalization in 2015, and draw a connection with oil coming out of the sea and land today, when the discussion could have been about the world applauding the forward vision of Ontario and how it will have cooled the world circa 2050, was so very déclassé.
Ms. Notley of Alberta, whom one would have thought would be onside with this line of thought, to the contrary, seemed to take some offence. She accused Mr. Wall of “showboating.” Au contraire. The showboating, if any is to be noted, really is in the camp of those who prattle on about their “specific” commitments in a year when all of them will be so long out of office that it will be necessary to look up their names in the mid-century’s version of Wikipedia. “Showboating” might better describe holding Canada’s major job-creating industry hostage to the ideology of an aggressive and debate-intolerant global warming industry. Or, it might really fit another premier, who hosts the Qatar-rich Al Gore — who received $500 million not long ago from that oil-gurgling fiefdom — to offer advice on Ontario’s stumbling, confused and costly green policies. (I’d mention the recent protest visit to Ontario from another Nostradama, Jane Fonda, but there is no need to be sadistic.)
Finally, Mr. Wall might have thrown one more cat in the midst of the self-satisfied pigeons. Why are the producers of energy given all the weight of environmental opposition, and not the users? The users, of course, are everyone — business, industry generally, manufacturing in particular, automobile companies and all who drive, schools, towns, households and even those who manufacture solar panels and the great whirring windmills of our future. Everyone uses energy. The country’s economy is inextricably bound up with energy. Yet those provinces who supply it, and offer jobs and security to the rest of us, are the only ones continually in the dock.
There is something seriously illogical here, and it is pleasing to see one premier with the daring to state how very illogical it all is. If he’s around in 2050, we should make him prime minister.
National Post - 18 Jul 2015 - Rex Murphy
A very refreshing premier
Murphy: ‘ Brad Wall is utterly untinged with the mysticism of some of his fellow premiers.’ Why is Brad Wall the only one of the bunch who seems as concerned with 2015 as he is 2050?
The distant future is a politician’s most useful friend — it is where every good and noble thing they promise actually happens. It is where the clutter of present events and the roiling fortunes of this busy harsh and confounding world do not impinge on their wildest wishes.
For example, under Ontario’s green ambitions, we are given to understand the goal is to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by a full 80 per cent by 2050. This is Premier Kathleen Wynn’s pledge, a commitment that will take merely 35 years to be tested — a generous breathing space by any standards for a political commitment, and which happily just might be the identical term it takes to learn all there is to know about the infamous billion-dollar cancellation of a couple of Ontario gas plants a couple of elections ago.
We have long since learned, and from a thousand examples, that the promises of most politicians barely survive the time it takes to make them. Antiques like me remember the bitter mocking Pierre Trudeau once gave Robert Stanfield on the latter’s promise to introduce wage and price controls — “Zap! You’re frozen!,” said the wily Trudeau — only to pirouette mere days after an election to introduce … wage and price controls.
Pledges three, four or 10 decades out are perfect vapourings. To call them useless is to elevate their dignity. To build present-day policy under the umbrella of such projections is to blend fantasy and irresponsibility.
Essentially that’s what we have been watching at the premier’s conference this week in St. John’s. Those premiers who are extremely confident on the events of 2050 — Quebec’s and Ontario’s being the leaders, Rachel Notley of Alberta looking very much like an ally — and who are awash in self-esteem about how their ardent “commitments” to reduce global warming (the ignis fatuus of our day) want the present to act as hostage for their dreams.
One premier, however, who seems seriously stuck in the present, and who is unaccountably concerned with such trivial matters as Canadian jobs and the contribution the energy industry has made to all parts of Canada, who has the outlandish idea that the use of the word “oil” in public is not a pure blasphemy, takes a different view. Saskatchewan’s Brad Wall is utterly untinged with the mysticism of some of his fellow premiers, and astonishingly — it is very “incorrect” to say obvious things — mounts a public defence of the central industry of this entire country.
How outrageous he has been can be gleaned from just a few of his remarks. “There is a growing sense of frustration in the West that our economies have been creating significant opportunities for all Canadians” is one of those statements. It carries the clear implication that since this is so — the Western oil industry has helped all Canadians — it is a little more than curious there is so little encouragement or support for that industry. Indeed, it’s rather the opposite. Any opportunity to hobble it, or to put it in harness to an environmental agenda, is leaped at by some. In this contest 2050 always wins over 2015.
Premier Wall had the nerve to allude to the new and trendy concept of “social licence.” He didn’t add, but he very well could have, that there was no talk of “social licence” when it came to getting jobs in the oil industry, or contracts with companies outside the west, or working with university science and engineering programs, or contributing to the national economy during the most turbulent economic period in a generation. The venue of the conference, Newfoundland, is the grand illustration of all these points. Offshore oil, and western oil, salvaged Newfoundland during its greatest economic and cultural crisis since Confederation.
On the great pipeline debate Wall was ruthless enough to put the matter in very plain terms, which in the context of global warming is a faux pas of unimaginable dimensions. “In terms of a licence to build a pipeline, or in this case, simply convert a pipeline to move western energy across the country, how about $10 billion in equalization?” This was terribly bad manners. To talk about equalization in 2015, and draw a connection with oil coming out of the sea and land today, when the discussion could have been about the world applauding the forward vision of Ontario and how it will have cooled the world circa 2050, was so very déclassé.
Ms. Notley of Alberta, whom one would have thought would be onside with this line of thought, to the contrary, seemed to take some offence. She accused Mr. Wall of “showboating.” Au contraire. The showboating, if any is to be noted, really is in the camp of those who prattle on about their “specific” commitments in a year when all of them will be so long out of office that it will be necessary to look up their names in the mid-century’s version of Wikipedia. “Showboating” might better describe holding Canada’s major job-creating industry hostage to the ideology of an aggressive and debate-intolerant global warming industry. Or, it might really fit another premier, who hosts the Qatar-rich Al Gore — who received $500 million not long ago from that oil-gurgling fiefdom — to offer advice on Ontario’s stumbling, confused and costly green policies. (I’d mention the recent protest visit to Ontario from another Nostradama, Jane Fonda, but there is no need to be sadistic.)
Finally, Mr. Wall might have thrown one more cat in the midst of the self-satisfied pigeons. Why are the producers of energy given all the weight of environmental opposition, and not the users? The users, of course, are everyone — business, industry generally, manufacturing in particular, automobile companies and all who drive, schools, towns, households and even those who manufacture solar panels and the great whirring windmills of our future. Everyone uses energy. The country’s economy is inextricably bound up with energy. Yet those provinces who supply it, and offer jobs and security to the rest of us, are the only ones continually in the dock.
There is something seriously illogical here, and it is pleasing to see one premier with the daring to state how very illogical it all is. If he’s around in 2050, we should make him prime minister.
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