So what if they had an election and nobody showed up?
My prediction.
It will be a record low voter turnout. Unlike past low voter turnouts, this one will result in a strong CPC minority government. (Generally low voter turnouts, result in a LPC win, and a CPC loss.)
There are going to be many LPC supporters not showing up, and there will be/has been a general “whatever” approach to this election among most people.
The LPC, the Greens and the NDP are just not inspiring enough and the people are not falling for the scary CPC stuff anymore. There is just no compelling issue that is grabbing people this time. Hence a CPC victory.
In Guelph? For various reasons I have to give it to Gloria. I just don’t see the numbers falling any other way. (BTW, I am not involved in the CPC or the election at all) So I’m really trying to be non partisan with my thoughts. The numbers just are not there for Frank, Tom or Mike.
bail outs
It always amazes me, that in good times business Leaders want nothing to do with governments, while in bad times business almost begs for help, and governments have no choice but to help out. Note this story, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7620127.stm , becoming all too common as of late, and more than likely to become more common place still.
Business can make bad decisions, bad investments, cut tens of thousands of jobs, incur massive financial losses, have CEO’s make absurd salaries, yet governments have to bail them out for the good of the economy.
I understand the situation, the economics, but my God, why do we reward failure so often in our society?
I support business and their right to make money, provided its legal, they pay taxes, and contribute jobs to a society, but I think we’ve gotten to the point in the past thirty years of looking at dividends and stock prices, (for our pension plans, and our other investments), that are the end all and be all of our society. It doesn’t matter just as long as my shares produce.
That is and will bite us in the ass. I’m certainly no economist, but I still think the worst is yet to come. The US has been running an economy on huge debts for over a decade, it has to stop. Who ever is elected President in the fall has some serious economic problems to address, problems that will effect the rest of the world for quite a few years.
Business can make bad decisions, bad investments, cut tens of thousands of jobs, incur massive financial losses, have CEO’s make absurd salaries, yet governments have to bail them out for the good of the economy.
I understand the situation, the economics, but my God, why do we reward failure so often in our society?
I support business and their right to make money, provided its legal, they pay taxes, and contribute jobs to a society, but I think we’ve gotten to the point in the past thirty years of looking at dividends and stock prices, (for our pension plans, and our other investments), that are the end all and be all of our society. It doesn’t matter just as long as my shares produce.
That is and will bite us in the ass. I’m certainly no economist, but I still think the worst is yet to come. The US has been running an economy on huge debts for over a decade, it has to stop. Who ever is elected President in the fall has some serious economic problems to address, problems that will effect the rest of the world for quite a few years.
Again, the united left.
Gee this sounds somewhat like my column from the other day.
http://www.thestar.com/FederalElection/article/498604
Layton's flawed strategy
Sep 14, 2008 04:30 AM
Angelo Persichilli
"I'm applying for the job of prime minister," Jack Layton said last Sunday.
It sounds like a joke, but it's not. Layton knows that his supporters have had enough of being members of the fourth party and the NDP being just a parking space for the conscience of the nation. They now want their party in government.
But there's a problem: Layton could only become prime minister as the leader of a coalition supported by all the centre-left electorate. This means that if he wants the job, he has to deal with the Liberals first.
It's highly unlikely that federally we will ever have two left-leaning parties in government and in opposition at the same time. Even when the Conservatives were destroyed in 1993, the NDP didn't succeed in becoming the official opposition.
Layton is doing the right thing in applying for Stephen Harper's job, but I hope he knows that convincing Canadians that the Conservatives are bad is only half the challenge. The most difficult part is convincing the centre-left electorate that his party, not the Liberals, is the alternative.
Unfortunately for him, while Harper is building a centre-right coalition, the centre-left vote is split between the Liberals, NDP and now also the Green party.
The collapse of Brian Mulroney's leadership in the early '90s split the conservative vote into three parts: Quebec nationalists went to the Bloc; the right went to the Reform party, mainly in the West, while moderates stuck with the Progressive Conservatives.
In the last election, Harper brought Canadian Alliance voters and most Progressive Conservatives back into the same tent. In this election, he is trying to recapture the conservative votes in Quebec. At the same time, the centre-left electorate remains fractured.
So who is going to unify the left in Canada? Who is going to lead it into a two-party system?
Considering that the monothematic Green party can mainly be just a temporary shelter for dissatisfied Liberal and NDP voters, the answer is restricted to these two parties and, in a two-party system, one of them will go. Currently, the NDP looks to be that party.
The strategic vote is the first and strongest signal of this trend. Political hatred for the Conservatives is much stronger among some socialist voters than their loyalty to the NDP. If the Tories are strong, NDP support is weakened by strategic votes cast for Liberals in the hope of stopping the right.
This also means that the more the NDP leader attacks the Conservatives and demonizes its leaders, the more his supporters are scared and vote for the Liberals. In fact, the first victim of the political demonization of the Mike Harris Conservatives in Ontario in the late '90s was NDP Leader Howard Hampton, and the NDP lost party status at Queen's Park – twice.
The federal NDP will always be in this unhealthy situation until its leaders solve this dilemma and understand that in a two-party political system, they have to deal with the Liberals first. The best time to do that is when the Liberals are weak, as they are now. It almost happened in the '80s with Ed Broadbent.
In this election, the NDP fight to increase popular support by a few percentage points will only help the Conservatives to remain the governing party. You may or may not agree with Buzz Hargrove's ideological creed, but he has clearly understood that the presence of two parties fishing in the same centre-left pond will weaken both.
Pretty soon Layton will be forced to fish or cut bait.
http://www.thestar.com/FederalElection/article/498604
Layton's flawed strategy
Sep 14, 2008 04:30 AM
Angelo Persichilli
"I'm applying for the job of prime minister," Jack Layton said last Sunday.
It sounds like a joke, but it's not. Layton knows that his supporters have had enough of being members of the fourth party and the NDP being just a parking space for the conscience of the nation. They now want their party in government.
But there's a problem: Layton could only become prime minister as the leader of a coalition supported by all the centre-left electorate. This means that if he wants the job, he has to deal with the Liberals first.
It's highly unlikely that federally we will ever have two left-leaning parties in government and in opposition at the same time. Even when the Conservatives were destroyed in 1993, the NDP didn't succeed in becoming the official opposition.
Layton is doing the right thing in applying for Stephen Harper's job, but I hope he knows that convincing Canadians that the Conservatives are bad is only half the challenge. The most difficult part is convincing the centre-left electorate that his party, not the Liberals, is the alternative.
Unfortunately for him, while Harper is building a centre-right coalition, the centre-left vote is split between the Liberals, NDP and now also the Green party.
The collapse of Brian Mulroney's leadership in the early '90s split the conservative vote into three parts: Quebec nationalists went to the Bloc; the right went to the Reform party, mainly in the West, while moderates stuck with the Progressive Conservatives.
In the last election, Harper brought Canadian Alliance voters and most Progressive Conservatives back into the same tent. In this election, he is trying to recapture the conservative votes in Quebec. At the same time, the centre-left electorate remains fractured.
So who is going to unify the left in Canada? Who is going to lead it into a two-party system?
Considering that the monothematic Green party can mainly be just a temporary shelter for dissatisfied Liberal and NDP voters, the answer is restricted to these two parties and, in a two-party system, one of them will go. Currently, the NDP looks to be that party.
The strategic vote is the first and strongest signal of this trend. Political hatred for the Conservatives is much stronger among some socialist voters than their loyalty to the NDP. If the Tories are strong, NDP support is weakened by strategic votes cast for Liberals in the hope of stopping the right.
This also means that the more the NDP leader attacks the Conservatives and demonizes its leaders, the more his supporters are scared and vote for the Liberals. In fact, the first victim of the political demonization of the Mike Harris Conservatives in Ontario in the late '90s was NDP Leader Howard Hampton, and the NDP lost party status at Queen's Park – twice.
The federal NDP will always be in this unhealthy situation until its leaders solve this dilemma and understand that in a two-party political system, they have to deal with the Liberals first. The best time to do that is when the Liberals are weak, as they are now. It almost happened in the '80s with Ed Broadbent.
In this election, the NDP fight to increase popular support by a few percentage points will only help the Conservatives to remain the governing party. You may or may not agree with Buzz Hargrove's ideological creed, but he has clearly understood that the presence of two parties fishing in the same centre-left pond will weaken both.
Pretty soon Layton will be forced to fish or cut bait.
Cool
I love this stuff.
http://www.nunatsiaq.com/news/nunavut/80912_1516.html
September 12, 2008
Kimmirut site suggests early European contact
Hare fur yarn, wooden tally sticks may mean visitors arrived 1,000 years ago
JANE GEORGE
Vikings - or perhaps other Europeans - may have set up housekeeping and traded with Inuit 1,000 years ago near today's community of Kimmirut.
That's the picture of the past emerging from ancient artifacts found near Kimmirut, where someone collected Arctic hare fur and spun the fur into yarn and someone else carved notches into a wooden stick to record trading transactions.
Dorset Inuit probably didn't make the yarn and tally sticks because yarn and wood weren't part of Inuit culture at that time, said Patricia Sutherland, an archeologist with the Canadian Museum of Civilization.
Other artifacts from the area, such as a small wooden carving of a mask, missing its nose, also suggest face-to-face contacts with Europeans.
That's because, although the mask is carved in a Dorset Inuit manner, it shows a long and possibly bearded face with straight and heavy eyebrows, wearing what may be Viking headgear.
Analysis on ancient yarn spun from Arctic hare fur, which was found near Pond Inlet, shows the yarn may pre-date the arrival of the Vikings. Similar yarn and cordage has been found near Kimmirut as well as in Greenland.(PHOTO COURTESY OF PATRICIA SUTHERLAND)
To Sutherland, these artifacts all seem to point to prolonged contact in south Baffin between Inuit and Vikings, or some other mariners, from 1000 AD to 1450 AD or even earlier.
The dating of microscopically identified rat droppings found near Kimmirut may hold the key to learning more about the timing and origin of contact with Europeans, Sutherland said.
If there were rats in south Baffin, it shows European ships were also in the area because "rats aren't found in the Arctic."
Further analysis of the rat droppings is expected to provide even more information about exactly where these ships called, Sutherland said.
Many scholars already believe Baffin Island was Helluland, the name the Vikings' sagas gave to the land of rocks and glaciers they found west of Greenland.
But uncertainty about the age and origin of artifacts attributed to Vikings continues to raise questions about the nature of the contact between Inuit and mariners and whether Greenlandic Vikings were the first travelers that Dorset Inuit met.
Dating of some yarn and other artifacts, presumed to be left by Vikings on Baffin Island, have produced an age that predates the Vikings by several hundred years.
So, as Sutherland said, if you believe that spinning was not an indigenous technique that was used in Arctic North America, then you have to consider the possibility that as "remote as it may seem," these finds may represent evidence of contact with Europeans prior to the Vikings' arrival in Greenland.
Artifacts, stored in collections at the Canadian Museum of Civilization, first drew Sutherland to two old sites near Kimmirut in 2000.
When Sutherland learned that yarn, found near Kimmirut during earlier archeological digs, came from Arctic hare, she started to wonder about the nature of the contact between Inuit and Vikings - also known as Norse.
Because if they were weaving local fur, then maybe they were living there.
"Were the Norse spending more time in Arctic Canada than we previously thought?" And could someone have visited Baffin Island before the Vikings?
For the past five summers, Sutherland has conducted new excavations for the CMC's Helluland project on Cape Tanfield, assisted by local youth.
Cape Tanfield has many Dorset Inuit sites, which were occupied over many generations, as well as some "unusual" architecture.
But Sutherland said she not "prepared to say at this time that it's European."
Unlike L'Anse-aux-meadows in Newfoundland where remnants of Viking houses have been found, Kimmirut sites contain a mix of cultures over time, which makes understanding them more challenging, Sutherland says.
If the community wants to promote and preserve its rich heritage, Cape Tanfield could be nominated as a national historic site, Sutherland suggests.
http://www.nunatsiaq.com/news/nunavut/80912_1516.html
September 12, 2008
Kimmirut site suggests early European contact
Hare fur yarn, wooden tally sticks may mean visitors arrived 1,000 years ago
JANE GEORGE
Vikings - or perhaps other Europeans - may have set up housekeeping and traded with Inuit 1,000 years ago near today's community of Kimmirut.
That's the picture of the past emerging from ancient artifacts found near Kimmirut, where someone collected Arctic hare fur and spun the fur into yarn and someone else carved notches into a wooden stick to record trading transactions.
Dorset Inuit probably didn't make the yarn and tally sticks because yarn and wood weren't part of Inuit culture at that time, said Patricia Sutherland, an archeologist with the Canadian Museum of Civilization.
Other artifacts from the area, such as a small wooden carving of a mask, missing its nose, also suggest face-to-face contacts with Europeans.
That's because, although the mask is carved in a Dorset Inuit manner, it shows a long and possibly bearded face with straight and heavy eyebrows, wearing what may be Viking headgear.
Analysis on ancient yarn spun from Arctic hare fur, which was found near Pond Inlet, shows the yarn may pre-date the arrival of the Vikings. Similar yarn and cordage has been found near Kimmirut as well as in Greenland.(PHOTO COURTESY OF PATRICIA SUTHERLAND)
To Sutherland, these artifacts all seem to point to prolonged contact in south Baffin between Inuit and Vikings, or some other mariners, from 1000 AD to 1450 AD or even earlier.
The dating of microscopically identified rat droppings found near Kimmirut may hold the key to learning more about the timing and origin of contact with Europeans, Sutherland said.
If there were rats in south Baffin, it shows European ships were also in the area because "rats aren't found in the Arctic."
Further analysis of the rat droppings is expected to provide even more information about exactly where these ships called, Sutherland said.
Many scholars already believe Baffin Island was Helluland, the name the Vikings' sagas gave to the land of rocks and glaciers they found west of Greenland.
But uncertainty about the age and origin of artifacts attributed to Vikings continues to raise questions about the nature of the contact between Inuit and mariners and whether Greenlandic Vikings were the first travelers that Dorset Inuit met.
Dating of some yarn and other artifacts, presumed to be left by Vikings on Baffin Island, have produced an age that predates the Vikings by several hundred years.
So, as Sutherland said, if you believe that spinning was not an indigenous technique that was used in Arctic North America, then you have to consider the possibility that as "remote as it may seem," these finds may represent evidence of contact with Europeans prior to the Vikings' arrival in Greenland.
Artifacts, stored in collections at the Canadian Museum of Civilization, first drew Sutherland to two old sites near Kimmirut in 2000.
When Sutherland learned that yarn, found near Kimmirut during earlier archeological digs, came from Arctic hare, she started to wonder about the nature of the contact between Inuit and Vikings - also known as Norse.
Because if they were weaving local fur, then maybe they were living there.
"Were the Norse spending more time in Arctic Canada than we previously thought?" And could someone have visited Baffin Island before the Vikings?
For the past five summers, Sutherland has conducted new excavations for the CMC's Helluland project on Cape Tanfield, assisted by local youth.
Cape Tanfield has many Dorset Inuit sites, which were occupied over many generations, as well as some "unusual" architecture.
But Sutherland said she not "prepared to say at this time that it's European."
Unlike L'Anse-aux-meadows in Newfoundland where remnants of Viking houses have been found, Kimmirut sites contain a mix of cultures over time, which makes understanding them more challenging, Sutherland says.
If the community wants to promote and preserve its rich heritage, Cape Tanfield could be nominated as a national historic site, Sutherland suggests.
Unite the left?
With a possible agreement between Dion & May, perhaps all the talk of a“unite the left” movement is not so far fetched after all. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire, as the old saying goes.
Really, when you think about it, it’s got some merit.
The LPC is about to get annihilated in the general election we are now in. They are financially deep in debt and only plunging further down the trail, their campaign in the first week is plain boring, no policy bombshells, no huge grassroots movement underway for change, poor campaign leadership, while the CPC and Harper control the centre of the Board, and outside of a few stupid mistakes seem to be running a very well oiled machine.
The Greens and the NDP will for the foreseeable future always hold 3rd or 4th party status. Canadians just aren’t that far left. The NDP want to take your hard earned money and give it to everyone else, the Greens, regardless of what they say, are still a one issue party. Really? They’re the two friend you had in high school who were always so negative, the doom and gloom parties.
The LPC does not want to be the PC party of 1993. A merger between the three left leaning parties looks very likely to me if the LPC wants to live to fight another day.
Really, when you think about it, it’s got some merit.
The LPC is about to get annihilated in the general election we are now in. They are financially deep in debt and only plunging further down the trail, their campaign in the first week is plain boring, no policy bombshells, no huge grassroots movement underway for change, poor campaign leadership, while the CPC and Harper control the centre of the Board, and outside of a few stupid mistakes seem to be running a very well oiled machine.
The Greens and the NDP will for the foreseeable future always hold 3rd or 4th party status. Canadians just aren’t that far left. The NDP want to take your hard earned money and give it to everyone else, the Greens, regardless of what they say, are still a one issue party. Really? They’re the two friend you had in high school who were always so negative, the doom and gloom parties.
The LPC does not want to be the PC party of 1993. A merger between the three left leaning parties looks very likely to me if the LPC wants to live to fight another day.
economic downturn
A column from the Sun today, http://www.torontosun.com/money/columnists/linda_leatherdale/2008/09/11/6732271-sun.html
I’ve heard several doom and gloom predictions over the past year very similar to what Linda’s saying, from local businessmen and from economic professionals.
When I was in Northern Ireland and Scotland a few months back, the housing market was dropping like a stone, the economy in general was on its way down. In fact the whole EU is in a down turn cycle.
Canada has 0.5% of the world population, with 2.3% of the worlds GDP, no matter how important we feel we are, we are irrelevant to the vast majority of the world economically. China has cities with a greater population then our entire country.
The credit crunch south of the border is coming to bite us in the rear end very soon. We’re just along for the ride folks.
I don’t care who the PM is, we’re going to get hit hard. Increasing taxes and increasing the price of goods, is not the thing you do in an economic downturn.
I’ve heard several doom and gloom predictions over the past year very similar to what Linda’s saying, from local businessmen and from economic professionals.
When I was in Northern Ireland and Scotland a few months back, the housing market was dropping like a stone, the economy in general was on its way down. In fact the whole EU is in a down turn cycle.
Canada has 0.5% of the world population, with 2.3% of the worlds GDP, no matter how important we feel we are, we are irrelevant to the vast majority of the world economically. China has cities with a greater population then our entire country.
The credit crunch south of the border is coming to bite us in the rear end very soon. We’re just along for the ride folks.
I don’t care who the PM is, we’re going to get hit hard. Increasing taxes and increasing the price of goods, is not the thing you do in an economic downturn.
Dion can't win
Alright, I haven’t written anything political in a while. Mostly because I haven’t cared too, but we are in an election so…
Dion and his LPC simply can not win this election. Why?
Because the current LPC strategy is the same strategy they ran unsuccessfully with in 2004 and in 2006. Yes they won a minority in 2004, but they were damn close to losing it until the last two weeks when the Conservatives imploded, giving the Liberals the election.
Constantly compare Harper to Bush. People aren’t buying this load of crap anymore, Canadians have seen Harper in action, and while he is far from perfect he isn’t even close to GB. I can think of a tomato plant in my garden that is closer to Bush then Harper. Bush is an idiot IMHO.
Scare people with the religious right talk, and how these folks dominate the CPC. Really? Well in my experience in the party I can count on one hand that’s short a few fingers, the seriously religious people I’ve met in the party. Most members are normal people, some Atheists, Agnostics, Muslims, Pastafarians, and Hebrew. Funny how we crucify people for being Christian in the party, but ignore comments regarding all other faiths, because then we would seem intolerant. Again Canadians don’t care about the issue. Get over it.
The old hidden agenda card. Yawn. That’s right the CPC is just waiting for that elusive majority government to spring on Canadians their evil plan…..of lowering taxes and being hard on crime.
Stéphane if you want to win this, or at least not bleed your party into oblivion come up with a strategy that produces policies everyone can buy into. They need universal appeal across the spectrum. Raising my taxes and increasing the cost of goods is not going to get my support. I looked, and any income tax savings for me will be as minimal as you can possibly get. How many more manufacturing jobs are going to go over seas because of an added tax burden?
I’m happy with a CPC minority, if the Invisible Pink Unicorn blesses the CPC, and they get a majority, then so be it. It certainly can’t be any worse then the 12 years of a Liberal majority we had to put up with.
Dion and his LPC simply can not win this election. Why?
Because the current LPC strategy is the same strategy they ran unsuccessfully with in 2004 and in 2006. Yes they won a minority in 2004, but they were damn close to losing it until the last two weeks when the Conservatives imploded, giving the Liberals the election.
Constantly compare Harper to Bush. People aren’t buying this load of crap anymore, Canadians have seen Harper in action, and while he is far from perfect he isn’t even close to GB. I can think of a tomato plant in my garden that is closer to Bush then Harper. Bush is an idiot IMHO.
Scare people with the religious right talk, and how these folks dominate the CPC. Really? Well in my experience in the party I can count on one hand that’s short a few fingers, the seriously religious people I’ve met in the party. Most members are normal people, some Atheists, Agnostics, Muslims, Pastafarians, and Hebrew. Funny how we crucify people for being Christian in the party, but ignore comments regarding all other faiths, because then we would seem intolerant. Again Canadians don’t care about the issue. Get over it.
The old hidden agenda card. Yawn. That’s right the CPC is just waiting for that elusive majority government to spring on Canadians their evil plan…..of lowering taxes and being hard on crime.
Stéphane if you want to win this, or at least not bleed your party into oblivion come up with a strategy that produces policies everyone can buy into. They need universal appeal across the spectrum. Raising my taxes and increasing the cost of goods is not going to get my support. I looked, and any income tax savings for me will be as minimal as you can possibly get. How many more manufacturing jobs are going to go over seas because of an added tax burden?
I’m happy with a CPC minority, if the Invisible Pink Unicorn blesses the CPC, and they get a majority, then so be it. It certainly can’t be any worse then the 12 years of a Liberal majority we had to put up with.
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