In another embarrassing study conducted by the Dominion Institute, Canadians simply don’t know much about Canada or Canadian politics. A national survey has found that approximately 2 in 5 Canadians don’t know who our first prime minister was. For you 40%, it was Sir John A. Macdonald.

I’m not really surprised. Right after the recent fiasco that took place in our government, another study was released that showed a majority of Canadians don’t know we don’t directly elect our Prime Minister, who our head of state is, or how to describe our system of government.  Let me be even more specific for you: 51% of Canadians were unaware that we don’t directly elect our Prime Minister. 51%! No wonder this past federal election recorded the lowest voter turnout in election history, no one cares about Canadian politics! If you’ve ever bothered to exercise your democratic right to vote, you’d notice that nowhere on the voting ballot is the name of any of the Prime Minister’s running for the position.
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2008 got off to a very slow start in terms of political news, but certainly picked up steam in the last few months.
So, without further ado, here are Top 5 Political Scandals of 2008:
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Imagine what Canada could have done with the election budget… saved thousands of jobs, stimulated the economy, given everyone in Canada $10…

There are many things that could have been done but instead Harper wasted $300+ million and accomplished nothing. Now the government is prorogued and there will likely be an election again within the next year or two regardless of what happens when the prorogation period is over.

What will happen in the next election?
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Every candidate attempts to obtain 4 levels of commitment from voters through the running of their campaign:

i) A vote for the candidate
ii) A commitment to “soft” campaigning for the candidate (speaking with friends, family)
iii) A commitment to “hard” campaigning (volunteering for the campaign: fundraising, going door to door, putting up signs)
iv) Financial support (donations)

Based on the recent Federal election, it would appear that candidates in Canada are having a hard time getting the first commitment out of Canadians.Tamir Birk reminds us that at 59.1%, the 2008 Federal election had the lowest voter turnout in Canadian history.
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The tragedy that occurred on Election Day still bugs me to this day – Canada recorded the lowest voter turnout rate in history with only 59.1% of eligible Canadians casting their ballots. According to Elections Canada, a total of 13,832,972 votes were cast nationally of the 23,401,064 registered electors. This is undoubtedly a huge blow to Canadian democracy that can’t be overlooked.

Another similarly tragic record was also set on Election Day. A political party received the highest number of votes in a federal election without claiming one seat in parliament. That, of course, was the Green Party, which received just under 1 million votes and 6.8% of the overall popular vote.

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