Canada Election 2011

[aduidarnenye]

Who thinks there won't be an election in the next few months?

If there is, I might actually be political this time around instead of voting Liberal like I have for the last 17 years. I might actually do a bunch of research and volunteer at a politicians election office, because I have a lot of time to myself and I don't have much to do. Has anyone ever volunteered for an election campaign before?

http://www.news1130.com/news/local/a...a-may-election

How do you like a May election?

There are a few ways it could happen, but the end result is the same

One way or the other, we are facing the prospect of a federal election in May. It would be the fourth time in seven years that Canadians have gone to the polls, and there are a number of scenarios that could see the plug pulled on the current minority Conservative government by week's end.

The NDP, the Bloc and the Liberals have all made it clear how they'll vote on the federal budget. That vote is Friday, and it could topple the Harper government and trigger an election. But could Harper call an election himself?

Option One: the federal Liberals are deciding today whether to move a motion of non-confidence against the Harper government, which is facing contempt of Parliament accusations and a string of scandals.

Option Two: all three opposition parties have stated they will vote against the federal budget tabled yesterday. If it does not pass a vote Friday, the Tories topple and an election will be called.

Option Three: Prime Minister Harper defends his budget this morning and there are rumours he will make the election call himself, rather than wait for the opposition to take him down. He is scheduled to speak on Parliament Hill at 8:30 a.m. PST.

[Takedown3]

im canadian but due to the flood of american tv into my head i dont know many off the issues. i know its sad but unfortunately true.

i'm a lib but a parent a live in rural eastern ontario. the only thing i'm aware of is the openmedia fighting hard to make the internet cap shit go away http://openmedia.ca/

[Anton]

Not voting Bloc(lol).

Not voting NDP.

Don't care about Green.

So...

Look, I don't agree with alot of Harper's extraneous bullshit. Like the census retardation, and the tough on crime backwardization, overhauling the Senate... and then quick appointing senators to pass legislation, the G20 debacle, etc - the Tories are moving out of touch, it's true. But at the same time, Harper hasn't really done a bad job with the economy, either. Considering all the troubles going on in the world, leading the G8 in terms of bank security, debt-to-gdp, and to a large extent, the recovery itself... you gotta admit, that's pretty good. And the gst is down 1% FUUUUUCK YEA.

I don't know anything about Ignatieff. Other than he has like 4 Phds. But he seems like such a greaseball after succeeding dion... and then "whatever it takes"ing his way to power in a 3 way coalition. First Dion, now Iggy... why are the Libs throwing such weak leaders at us? It's not like they're short of big names either. When Iggy ran for the leadership, he ran against Bob Rae, young Trudeau, Ken Dryden... Belinda Stronach (actually thats a terrible candidate).

Look, the point is Ignatieff is an unknown. The conservative attack ads are in "full force" again, but there's an element of truth: Shortly after attaining the leadership, Ignatieff tried to force-feed canada an election in 2009 with the NDP and the Bloc in coalition, and it backfired spectacularly when Layton pulled out. It was shady from start to finish, which is alot like Harper. So why change?

Idk, that's kinda where I'm currently sitting.

[Thorin]

I turn 20 in about a month, but I've been a card-carrying Liberal since the day I turned 14. My older brother is currently the president of SYLO (Saskatchewan Young Liberal Organization), is one of two employees in SK officially employed by the Federal Liberals, as well has been a campaign manager a number of times for past candidates (he'll be managing a campaign in this potentially up coming election as well). With him heavily involved I sort of fell into it naturally and have volunteered countless hours on a number of past campaigns whether it be Municipal, Provincial or Federal. The Liberal candidate in my riding for this election is also one of my closest friends, so I'll be working tirelessly again.

I wasn't expecting there to be an election until 2012, but after this budget I'm thinking there will be an election called this Saturday with Canadians going to the polls on May 2nd.

[Elesirdur]

I've volunteered during elections before and they can be a lot of fun, but they can also be pretty crap too. If you're interested in volunteering, go to your EDA (electoral district association) office for the party of your choice and sign up now. The bulk of volunteer work during campaigns is door knocking (can be fun), licking envelopes/stuffing mailboxes (not fun), and doing call centre type work where you get a list of people in your riding and ask them for opinions, vote for party X, etc (depends on how much you like calling people).

However, if you show to the people at the EDA you're not completely retarded and have a real interest in helping the campaign out, you might get to do some interesting work with the campaign like helping out at events, going door knocking with the candidate, doing some local policy research, etc. There aught to be free booze, or at least soda and pizza, at most events for volunteers. It's pretty interesting to get to peer inside the sausage factory of Canadian politics, even just a little bit.

In my experience with the LPC, and more specifically with the Young Liberals of Canada, most volunteers are either eager youth or seniors - though there are certainly plenty of regular adults out there helping out wherever and whenever they can. I fully applaud anyone who volunteers their time and efforts during a campaign, for whatever the party. It makes me proud to see so many people being seriously engaged in Canadian politics by giving up their free time to help out a campaign.

As for the election itself, my thoughts are that the Tories are much more likely to want to be defeated on a budget vote than on the Liberal non-confidence motion holding the government in Contempt of Parliament. By what I've read of the budget, the Tories have prepared it to be more of a talking points and election platform than any serious public fiscal policy. Lots of nickle and dime elements to the budget that they're going to be using soon during a campaign.

BC's in an interesting position with this likely federal election though. Christy Clark, our new premier who does not have a seat in the legislature, will (I'm guessing) hold off on calling a general provincial election until after the federal campaign is over and done with. A lot of municipalities in BC also have local elections this year too. 2011 looks like it's going to be a banner year for politics in BC.

[Thorin]

I've volunteered during elections before and they can be a lot of fun, but they can also be pretty crap too. If you're interested in volunteering, go to your EDA (electoral district association) office for the party of your choice and sign up now. The bulk of volunteer work during campaigns is door knocking (can be fun), licking envelopes/stuffing mailboxes (not fun), and doing call centre type work where you get a list of people in your riding and ask them for opinions, vote for party X, etc (depends on how much you like calling people).

However, if you show to the people at the EDA you're not completely retarded and have a real interest in helping the campaign out, you might get to do some interesting work with the campaign like helping out at events, going door knocking with the candidate, doing some local policy research, etc. There aught to be free booze, or at least soda and pizza, at most events for volunteers. It's pretty interesting to get to peer inside the sausage factory of Canadian politics, even just a little bit.

In my experience with the LPC, and more specifically with the Young Liberals of Canada, most volunteers are either eager youth or seniors - though there are certainly plenty of regular adults out there helping out wherever and whenever they can. I fully applaud anyone who volunteers their time and efforts during a campaign, for whatever the party. It makes me proud to see so many people being seriously engaged in Canadian politics by giving up their free time to help out a campaign.

As for the election itself, my thoughts are that the Tories are much more likely to want to be defeated on a budget vote than on the Liberal non-confidence motion holding the government in Contempt of Parliament. By what I've read of the budget, the Tories have prepared it to be more of a talking points and election platform than any serious public fiscal policy. Lots of nickle and dime elements to the budget that they're going to be using soon during a campaign.

BC's in an interesting position with this likely federal election though. Christy Clark, our new premier who does not have a seat in the legislature, will (I'm guessing) hold off on calling a general provincial election until after the federal campaign is over and done with. A lot of municipalities in BC also have local elections this year too. 2011 looks like it's going to be a banner year for politics in BC.

When it comes to volunteering for a campaign, I couldn't have put it any better than you just did. Sometimes it can be incredibly mind-numbing but the shit needs to be done. There's not much to be added in terms of work a person would be doing other than general data entry (the new software Liberals use is pretty awesome) and calling/shuttling confirmed voters on election day. And when it comes to free food/drinks/whatever, it really depends on the candidate. Some don't do too much to reward their volunteers, while others will buy countless drinks out of their own pocket to show how appreciate they are.

I'll address Anton's points eventually, but as of right right now I simply don't feel like it and I'd rather avoid being involved in a debate.

@Elesirdur: B.C Young Liberals fucking rock, I was in Peachland B.C in summer 2010 for Western Caucus and met a lot of cool people and new friends

[Demosthenes11]

You loonies vote for your queen?

[Thorin]

Miss you Robin <3 (Behique from Ex if you remember)

[Anton]

Oh, yea whoops. I actually wanna apologize cause... I saw the thread title and kinda skimmed the OP...

I kinda missed the point.

I have thought of campaigning for a party but I've heard bad things about the grunt-level work. So I didn't.

You loonies vote for your queen?

Governor General, appointed by the queen on advice of the Canadian PM at the time. Constitutionally the Queen's representative (really just signs things into law) and... also the guarantor and receiver of ambassadors. Neat wiki.

Edit: Also tasked with promoting canadian pride and presenting orders. Sort of like a "Mr./Mrs. Canada"

[Elesirdur]

@Elesirdur: B.C Young Liberals fucking rock, I was in Peachland B.C in summer 2010 for Western Caucus and met a lot of cool people and new friends

There's some really nice people in the YLC organization. I haven't been active in a few years (aged out of the YLC 2 years ago) but I know a bunch through mutual friends and my time at BC Universities Model Parliament. I always liked national conventions since you got to meet YL's from all across the nation. Aside from the usual contingent of political dorks, there's always a lot of very fun, solid people to party and work with.

[Cadsuane]

The liberals want to vote down the budget to capitalize on tory ethical foibles, and the bloc wants to do the same because the current budget doesn't involve Quebec robbing the rest of Canada blind. The NDP wants vote it down because they want more social spending and fewer corporate tax cuts as per usual.

What confuses me is that the tories have tabled a pretty un-conservative budget with lots of new spending initiatives that still somehow keeps the federal government on track to post surpluses by 2015 or so. All in all, public opinion is probably pretty favourable towards it, and it's pretty easy to picture the liberals tabling a similar one, which suggests that the Liberal party's problem with the government isn't specifically the budget and they'll vote down whatever is proposed. Paying Quebec a few billion dollars to avoid an election for another year is more or less out of the question since it would kill the current government in the polls faster than a no-confidence vote anyway. That leaves Jack Layton and the NDP, the ideological diametric opposite of the conservative party, to parlay with. Outside chance Layton will support the budget if his requirements are modest.

Anyway, if an election happens I'm voting liberal, not that it particularly matters in my yuppie slash senior citizen suburban riding, but I'm calling another Tory minority government which isn't the worst thing that could happen.

[Shiroikage]

I'm probably voting Liberal this time even if the flatlander inside me wants to compulsively vote NDP.
Haven't been living in QC long enough to even consider voting Bloc.

[Ksandra]

wth is this "if they have an election" stuff? Canadians vote the same way they decide to go on a trip to Denny's or something?

[aduidarnenye]

wth is this "if they have an election" stuff? Canadians vote the same way they decide to go on a trip to Denny's or something?

In Canada, if people don't like the government, we get rid of them with a vote of no confidence. Then there is an election. There's been 3-4 in the last decade I believe. I lost track.

[Anton]

Canada uses the Westminster parliament system - the ruling party, and hence the Prime Minister, can be removed by either a Vote of No-Confidence or losing a vote on a confidence-issue, triggering an election. If you lose you have 3 options:

-Form a coalition party to gather enough support to defeat the confidence motion. Involves lots of asskissing and bullcrap.
-Ask someone else to lead the party and survive the confidence motion
-Dissolve parliament, run election.

Since the upcoming federal budget is a confidence issue, losing the vote means the gov't has no budget, so it falls. Joe Clark was Prime Minister for all of nine months, because he ultimately couldn't pass his budget.

It's a similar mechanism to the one that outed Malcolm Grant in the 2009 New York State Senate crisis.

[Ksandra]

That's either retarded or brilliant.

I can imagine if we were like that in the U.S., we'd have a new president every week.

[Olo401]

That's either retarded or brilliant.

I can imagine if we were like that in the U.S., we'd have a new president every week.

We'd also have more than two political parties, which would hopefully force the government to stop catering to fucking billionaires.

[aurik]

This election is a big waste of money. It will cost us the taxpayer like 300 million, and the very likely result is a parliament that has the same general proportions as the current parliament, which many people are generally happy with. The end result is that a very similar budget will eventually be passed after the election that doesn't do much to change the makeup of the government.

The libs were always going to vote against the Tories no matter what was in the budget, and PQ won't vote for any budget which doesn't unjustly enrich Quebec. So, essentially, the NDP is costing us $10 per capita because they're not happy with the fairly sizable concessions the Tories put in the bill to win NDP support. I hope that The People will take this into account at the polls and punish the NDP for being petulant. But I'm not holding my breath.

[aduidarnenye]

We'd also have more than two political parties, which would hopefully force the government to stop catering to fucking billionaires.

I've never understood that two party thing in the US. I've been trying to wrap my head around whether or not the Tea Party is a separate party or if they're Republicans or whatever for ages now.

[Anton]

I've never understood that two party thing in the US. I've been trying to wrap my head around whether or not the Tea Party is a separate party or if they're Republicans or whatever for ages now

"Republican" could mean super-right-wing evangelist, could mean anti-establishment Tea Partiers, could mean moderate right-wingers, could mean Arnold Schwarzenegger (who really should be a Democrat). There's so many flavours of "Republican", why should you have to order the "Everything Sundae" all the time?

That's either retarded or brilliant.

I can imagine if we were like that in the U.S., we'd have a new president every week.

It does work a lot better with more than two parties.

For example, Stephen Harper is competent, but he's also a schemer. Though he's managed the money pretty well so far, Canada hasn't seen fit to grant him a majority. Because, in the last election, the conservatives won 38%(ballpark) of the House seats, if Harper goes "off the rails", the House can boot him out if they're determined enough. In theory anyway.

It also means you're not "wasting" a vote by going for the NDP or Bloc (you really are though). The NDP is far too leftist to govern but, as happens often in a minority government, it comes down to the NDP to take sides between the Conservatives and Liberals on confidence issues. So you get to be important and not important at all, all at the same time. Welcome to canadian politics.

Were Harper to win a majority (51% or more) it'd mean he could survive confidence motions so long as his entire party votes in line. Thus, there is no "fixed" term limit for Prime Minister - you could be PM all your life if you A) kept Winning sheen-style and B) stayed as leader of your party. Chretien was PM for, what, a decade?

There is a fixed four year maximum(was five) between general elections, but that cap has never been reached. Ever.