Election Time in Canada

Given that we are about to have another federal election in Canada, voters are no doubt scrambling to find a reliable source of information about what's going on. My dear friends, you have come to the right place.

Since many of my reader(s) aren't into politics and/or aren't Canadian, I assume no previous knowledge, and I'll carefully explain everything that's going on in terms you don't need to be an insider to understand. And as everybody knows, when you go to Vollman for information, you always get exactly what you deserve.

Q: What caused the election?

Excellent question! As we speak, the Liberals, who are the Official Opposition, are drafting a motion of non-confidence. By voting in favour, an MP (member of Parliament) is saying that they have lost confidence in the ability of the Conservatives, who are the current government, to run the country, which will trigger an eleciton.

The exact wording of the non-confidence motion is important. The Liberals want to highlight the government's corruption and arrogance, their secretive and highly partisan behaviour, their refusal to listen to anyone, and their general lack of ethical conduct.

Come to think of it, they could just use the exact same wording of the motion that was used to remove themselves back in 2006.

Q: Who are the parties and their leaders?

Ok there's the Conservative Party, and their leader is Stephen Harper. He's a greedy and compassionless moron who hates everyone for no reason. Oh wait I already said he was Conservative. His big challenge is running a campaign in light of both the recent retirement of most of his senior ministers, like Stockwell Day, Chuck Strahl and Jim Prentice, and the failure to retire of Jason Kenney and Rob Anders.

Next is the Liberal party, led by Michael Ignatieff. To connect with the common voter, he recently shared the challenges of growing up the son of a political refugee. It's really a sad story about a man forced to flee his country because of all those ungrateful peasants, coming to Canada with nothing but the clothes on his back, and huge bags of money. This is probably the only man who truly understands the needs of the average voter better than Hollywood celebrities.

One of my favourites is Jack Layton of the New Democratic Party. He's the son of Robert Layton, who was a former member of both the Liberal and Conservative parties. His primary motivations in politics is to help the disadvantaged, fight social inequality, and really piss off his old man. The big issue here is Layton's health, who is currently recovering from prostate cancer, hip surgery, and telling kids to get off his lawn.

The Bloc Quebecois is led by Gilles Duceppe. Their primary policy is the separation of Quebec from the rest of Canada, an idea that could get them a majority government if they would only run candidates outside their province.

Finally there's the Green Party, led by Elizabeth May. Obviously their primary policies involve the environment, on which May feels so strongly that she has compared her opponents to Nazis and the Holocaust. The Green Party got a jump start on the campaign, having recently released attack ads that attack, well, ironically, attack ads. Apparently Alanis Morrissette is their campaign director.

Q: Who's going to win?

Another excellent question. There are several possible results, in decreasing order of likelihood:

1. A Conservative Minority, like we have today. Since they would lack enough votes to pass anything unilaterally, they would need to negotiate the agreement of at least one of the opposition parties for every measure.
Result: No change, waste the cost of an election ($300 million).

2. A Liberal Minority. The arrogant, corrupt and heartless Conservatives are replaced by their ideological counterparts.
Result: No change, actually.

3. A Conservative Majority. It is unlikely that the opposition parties would trigger an election if they thought this was a strong possibility, but there is always the risk that a strong campaign could swing enough votes to give the Conservatives a strong mandate.
Result: Women lose the right to vote, the poor are left to die in the street, and gays are rounded up onto icebergs and sent adrift.

4. A Liberal-NDP Coalition Government. If the two main opposition parties have enough votes between them to form a majority, they may negotiate an arrangement where they share power and govern together.
Result: Conservative leader Stephen Harper resigns for his failure. And is disassembled and returned to the factory.

5. Something Meaningful to Canadians. For the sake of completeness I thought I'd include all outcomes, no matter how remote.
Result: Stephen Hawking writes another book.

Q: What's the key issue?

Ah yes, the key issue. Most elections ultimately boil down to a small collection of issues, and given the current economic turbulence, this time the campaign could focus primarily on the recent budget. After all, according to all opposition parties, the budget is the main reason they're defeating this current government.

Q: What's in the budget?

Nobody really knows because nobody actually read it. Mostly they just assumed it would be bad, because the Conservatives wrote it, and if you flip through it a bit you can see some of it was scribbled with crayon. It has about as much chance of being read by the Liberals as their own 1997 platform.

"Reading is for nerds." - NDP Leader Jack Layton, when asked why he didn't read the budget.

Well I actually read the budget, and it turns out that it's just a few pages that Jim Flaherty got from his accountant with a copy of Anne of Green Gables pasted in between to make it look thick. It's more something that can be waved around and used to make outrageous claims than to actually be read. Kind of like the Bible.

Q: What's wrong with the budget?

According to the NDP, there's not enough money being put in the hands of seniors, health care workers, working families, and ordinary Canadians. In fact, the NDP would be happy as long as money was kept out of the hands of those that, you know, actually earned it.

However, even those in favour of high government spending don't agree with all of the NDP's spending proposals. For example, the Saskatchewan Tsunami defense fund, which would cost taxpayers $100 million despite the province being over a thousand kilometres from a coast.

The NDP have several other problems with the budget, including:
- They believe that reducing corporate taxes are a huge waste of money, especially compared to subsidizing corporations.
- They want to lower taxes on fuels, and reduce our nation's fuel consumption. What's the problem, Harper?
- They want to cancel the purchase of the new jets.

Essentially the government bought some expensive jets without being honest about the costs and without releasing it to tender. The jets are currently very unpopular and bleeding money fast. Fortunately Gary Bettman wants to move them to Phoenix.

Q: What to the Liberals think of the budget?

It's hard to say, having voted in the past for nearly everything within. When asked about it, they mostly just cough quietly, say they have to go the bathroom, and never come back.

Bonus Q: Pssst ... Any big scandals yet?

The biggest scandal so far is that someone in Bev Oda's department apparently wrote the word "NOT!" in an official funding document. So far no one has been able to determine if it was Wayne or Garth.


That should be enough information to get you started, but by all means feel free to post your questions!



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