Canadian Election This Fall?

How do you feel about a fall election?

Canada and the US have struck a deal on softwood lumber. It would see $4 billion of the duties collected over the past several years to be returned. It would also prohibit Canadian producers from seeking legal remedy against US lumber duties. The government will be voting on this in the fall and it will be a confidence vote.

"It should be a matter of confidence. It is a terrible, terrible deal and it sets an atrocious precedent for all of our trade negotiations with the U.S."

Rae said Harper is assuming the Liberals will support the deal, or at least absent themselves from a vote that could bring down the government, rather than risk an election before a new leader is chosen on Dec. 3. But he said the Liberals must not fall into Harper's trap.

"The Liberal party can not under any circumstances allow our own internal issues to get in the way of focusing on the importance of this question in the House of Commons," said Rae, who once served as legal counsel to the Free Trade Lumber Council.

Rae urges Liberals to risk election over softwood

The sneaky thing is the Liberal leadership convention isn't until December. Will the Liberals take their chances with another election so soon or should they wait to rebuild and elect a new leader? And when has the Liberal party ever put the good of the country above their petty internal fights?

Personally, I think the softwood deal is crap. But I think it would be a mistake for the Liberals to go back to the polls so soon. The Conservatives have only begun to screw things up and back out of promises. I worry that if we have another election before the end of the year people may vote in a Conservative majority, just so they don't have to deal with another election any time soon.

Not that I want either group in power. The Liberals haven't finished learning their lesson and the Conservatives just flat out disturb me. I'm more than happy with the minority. Sure nothig gets done, but at least nobody can screw the country up beyond repair.

Originally posted by Duzey
I'm more than happy with the minority. Sure nothig gets done, but at least nobody can screw the country up beyond repair.

That sums up how I feel also.
There is something wrong when the top two parties of our nation both suck. I think many people realize that their votes don’t matter. Whoever gets elected is still going to be a self serving politician.
We need a political revolution IMO.

Something needs to change, I'm just not sure what.

It's pretty sad when I don't much care if they are crooks anymore, just as long as they don't run the country into the ground. Idealists in charge can be scary; they don't change their mind in the face of public opinion.

Originally posted by Umbrax
We need a political revolution IMO.

It would be like re-arranging the terds from one pile to another. Wouldn't serve us any good, financially and time wise, as we'd be back to square one in the end.

Idealists in charge can be scary; they don't change their mind in the face of public opinion

So, you'd rather see a leader have his agenda amended by lobbyists on a whim as they see it fit? Give me a guy with morals and a backbone.

Call me that dirtiest of words, a moderate. I like a politician who knows which side his bread is buttered on and is flexible enough to sway with the current. My problem with idealists in power is that not everyone shares their ideals.

To me, one of the signs of an ok government is a willingness to admit they have made an error in judgement and not have their ego tied up in public policy.

Originally posted by Duzey
Call me that dirtiest of words, a moderate. I like a politician who knows which side his bread is buttered on and is flexible enough to sway with the current. My problem with idealists in power is that not everyone shares their ideals.

To me, one of the signs of an ok government is a willingness to admit they have made an error in judgement and not have their ego tied up in public policy.

Fair enough.


But just to clarrify, are we implying that Harper is an 'idealist', or is that just me assuming?

I think Harper is many things, but an idealist is not one of them. He's a very smart man and he knows how to tell people what they want to hear.

In other words:

I don't think Harper is an idealist, I think he just plays one in government.

I think Harper is a pragmatist more than anything else - forget about his five priorities; his top priority is to get re-elected with a majority government, and ensuring that Canada takes a right turn. His policies to date, as well as his snubbing of Ontario's Dalton McGuinty and very public endorsing of John Tory as "the next Premier of Ontario", all point in that direction.

The problem is, the cynicism of this man and this government are showing through. They'll do anything to make their government fall and blame it on the Liberals and NDP. Have you guys seen that nice news bit about the letter sent to Conservative donors?

The Conservative Party is asking supporters for a special cash contribution in light of political attacks on the government's controversial Middle East stand.

In a letter circulated to members, the party's executive director, Michael Donison, asks for donations of either $75 or $150 to promote the government's position and to prepare for a possible snap election. (...)

Mr. Donison's letter says the opposition is concerned by the “growing strength” of the Harper government.

“We must be ready for an election now because the opposition is blindly determined to drag the country to the polls, on any pretext they can contrive. ...

www.theglobeandmail.com...

The Conservatives are no better than the Libs were. The cynicism is revolting.

Ultimately, it will most possibly come down to the government trying to hold confidence vote after confidence vote in the Commons. In such a case, the Liberals would probably develop a flu epidemic in their ranks to avoid having to vote...

The snap election is a reasonable bet. Perhaps. the only chance the current regime will have to snatch a majority. I think they'll bet they can put it all (the whole wad) on the "Blue" and hope that the Libs won't have the coin to "call" or make a bet on the "Red" without a leader.

Even if the Libs do get a leader - they ain't nothin' to write home about... can you say ineffectual? There is one guy (he's not running) and quit Volpe's campaign as it's manger over the M-E thing... Jim Karygiannis? (sorry if I blooped the spelling) now that fellow, for a poli seems (I may be entirely wrong) on that and may other issues, reasonable-ish to me. But he ain't runnin'.

My bet is the end of September or the 1st week of October will be when they "drop the writ on the GG" - this'll be messy and an election of complete contrivance to suit the current regime's agenda or lack thereof depending on the perspective held.

Victor K.
Remember our 9.

I think Otts has it right when he says this government's only priority is re-election. It seems like the only policy they have is do whatever it takes to get a majority. The fundraising letter they sent out made me sick.

I noticed that the Conservatives have backed down a bit on the softwood deal. Now Emerson is saying that if the provinces are against the deal, they won't vote on it. How convenient. What's the point of holding an election if you can't blame the Liberals for it?

I think that the new polls published this morning should be enough of a cold shower for the Tories' ambitions to hold a snap election. According to Decima, they're running neck to neck (32 to 31 percent) with a party that doesn't even have a leader yet... that can't be good.

I will concede that right now - summertime - is the best possible time for the Tories to be seen unravelling, since people are on vacation and Parliament is out. However, there are a number of issues that I think won't die down when fall comes, including:

1) The government's position on the attack on Lebanon
2) Whatever happened to Harper's fifth priority, reducing wait times in hospitals?
3) The softwood lumber deal (you can call a confidence vote in Commons on that and blame the Opposition if it fails, but if the lumber workers are against you it ain't gonna work)
4) Harper being seen more and more as a Bush mini-me.

Plus, they'll have to convince tired voters that it's the opposition's fault if the government fell... when every editorialist in the country has been repeating for months that Harper's been out to get his majority government ever since Jan. 23.

Duzey - one thing that points in a real big way to the fact that Harper *really* wants his majority and wants it fast is that even in Washington D.C., in front of the White House press corps, he began his speech in French and kept on speaking French for a good while...

He knows that if he can harvest 25 more seats in Quebec, he's pretty close to his majority. Unfortunately, Quebec is the place where his stand on Israel is harming him the most...

Originally posted by Otts
2) Whatever happened to Harper's fifth priority, reducing wait times in hospitals?

That has been replaced by strengthening our country at home and around the world.

In keeping with the new open and transparent government style that we were promised in the runup to the election, the announcement was made in Report Magazine. Don't worry if you've never heard of it, most people haven't. It's a conservative magazine published out of Edmonton with a small circulation.

Paul Wells wrote about it for MacLeans:

I have here the July issue of Report Magazine, a conservative journal published nine times a year out of Edmonton. The magazine's president, Curtis Stewart, told me its paid circulation is about 10,000 and it has several regular contributors. One of them is the Prime Minister of Canada.

In his latest column, Stephen Harper offers an update from Ottawa. "It's been quite a ride," the PM reports. Since the election, the new Conservative government has made progress "on all of our five priorities -- from cleaning up the federal government, to cutting taxes, cracking down on crime, supporting families, and strengthening our country at home and around the world."

Stephen Harper's new game: Hide-the-Priority

I think Harper's big mouth may have really hurt his chances of gaining any ground in Quebec. It's time for these buffoons to learn to work together, because I don't see anything other than a minority government for a while.

The fifth priority?

Uh, that's Tony "close the hospitals" Clement's deal - the second most dangerous man in Canada. I still worked in healthcare till those "Harris-clowns" closed 11 hospitals in one day... I and hundreds of other RN's and other pros decided then and there to pull the eject handle and play the deke.

Made Ray days seem like a fart in a mitt. Having had a stroke during those years I feel like I was a test-pilot checking the firmness and consistency of the healthcare hay-bales and catch net. Not a "good" experience from client or practitioner perspective...

We still aren't even close to recovering system capacity and that was like a decade ago... the fifth priority? There is only one - a majority mandate so the axe can really start swingining in the forest of the North. No sustainable silvaculture of healthcare from the current regime should be expected. The five universal tenents of our healthcare system are empty slogans of a time long since gone. Tommy D. must be lookin' down from Heaven and thinkin' - how could they mess that up so very badly?

Sorry for the rant but the dagger on this one strikes close to the heart.

Victor K

[edit on 4-8-2006 by V Kaminski]

If the polls showed a hugh lead for the CPC then they may have tried to force an election but that has not happened yet.

From where I sit most of the promises made have been or are being fulfilled by this government vs the prior regime that either did not make any promises or wrote books of them and then threw them away. Of course they were never held accountable for this until many years later if at all.

Despite the numbers in the summer when most people don't give a hoot about politics... if anybody with a life is even at home that is... the LPC is not in that great shape.

I expect miniority government to exist for some time maybe even into early 2008 if possible before annother election.

The slate of possible new leaders for the LPC is jokable and bolsters my confidence that even with a new leader they are going nowhere fast.