As parliament nears its end for the current session, some reflection on the most recent sitting is in order. What better way to start than with the release of today’s EKOS Research poll where we find, yet again, stagnation in voting opinions across the country. The breakdown is as follows with the numbers in brackets indicating the percentage of support from the last federal election: Conservatives- 36.5% (37.65%), Liberals- 26.5% (26.6%), New Democratic Party- 16.7% (18.18%), The Bloc Quebecois (in Quebec only) – 39.8% (38.1%), The Green Party- 11.3% (6.78%) and undecided were in the 14.6% range. These figures show what many political analysts have known for some time, and that is that the electorate is not as volatile as it has been in the past. The biggest change is the rise in support for the Green Party, which jumped almost 6% from the time of the last election. It should be noted that the Green Party always tends to garner more support in a non-election year than it does during an election. The NDP’s numbers are down a bit too, but are actually trending upwards in recent months as a result of their stance on the Harmonized Sales Tax.  All the other numbers are relatively unchanged.  So what does this mean in real terms?
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The NDP sent out a press release criticizing the Conservative Party and immigration minister Jason Kenney for reducing the number of immigrants who will be accepted into the country in the upcoming year. The document claims that the 2010 numbers are being reduced to over half of the numbers from 2009, leaving out approximately 17,000 refugees who would otherwise have been able to come to Canada. Read the document here.

We may have escaped a general election this fall, but four ridings are going to the polls November 9 for by-elections. The two Quebec ridings will likely remain BQ, but the other two ridings, one each in British Columbia and Nova Scotia, are in play, largely between the Conservatives and the NDP. The outcomes won’t shift the balance of power in Ottawa, but they could test Harper’s ability to win a majority. And for child, youth, and family advocates, they isolate and juxtapose these two parties’ family policies in a way that’s usually not possible.

In the BC riding of New Westminster-Coquitlam, there are four candidates, but it’s really a two-horse race between NDP Finn Donnelly and Conservative Diana Dilworth. This riding has swung between NDP and Conservative for years, both candidates have been municipal politicians for years, and both work for environmental non-profits. Donnelly, born and raised in the area, is a local hero for twice swimming the length of the Fraser River to bring attention to sustainability issues. Dilworth’s bio notes that, as a single parent of two adult children, she understands the stresses of raising a family. But she also understands business, having worked in the public, private, and non-profit sectors, and having run her own business.
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As of this writing it, looks like the minority Conservative government may last through the week, if their budget-related ‘ways-and-means motion’ is supported by either the NDP or the (GASP!) Separatists. This after an election looked downright inevitable after Michael Ignatieff suggested his Liberals would no longer support the Conservatives and would instead send the country back to the polls at the first chance they got.

The mood amongst Canadians generally seems to be anti-election, with polls suggesting that 71% of Canadians don’t want or see a need for an election, sentiments which I would share. This would be the fourth election in less than six years, and less than one year after the last one of October 14th. Not much has changed since then, and public opinion has only slightly swayed back and forth (although the Liberals have a new leader, and the country has since descended into, and then begun to recover from, a recession, so perhaps that’s really poor analysis on my part).
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When Arnold Schwarzenegger successfully entered politics, it was proof that the American dream was still very much alive. The Austrian-born actor started his career as the star of Conan the Barbarian. He didn’t speak a word of English. From loincloth to politics, he is now the Governor of California twenty-one years later. Greased up to show off a glistening six-pack, he wore nothing more than a loincloth for covering. But that was okay.

A bare-breasted picture of Lenore Zann is apparently not. This actress and now NDP candidate in Nova Scotia is being attacked for her work on the tv show The L Word.
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In a stunning move this week, Jack Layton, slammed the government over a leaked memo that revealed the government’s interest in cutting the number of environmental impact reviews it conducts. The leader of the New Democrat Party, “Uncle” Jack Layton, said it spoke of the government sacrificing the environment for the economy. Perhaps even more stunning was Layton’s suggestion that the opposite of a green economic recovery was a “brown” one.

Until now, political leaders in Canada have traditionally abstained from weighing in on opposite-colour contraversies. The last time it had happened was in 1967 when Lester B Pearson suggested the opposite of burgundy was magenta; a move which grew widespread protest from members of the PWFCIM (People Who’s Favourite Colour Is Magenta) who claimed Pearson’s assertion was reckless and inaccurate. That was a different time however, and Layton’s modern-day assertion is drawing its share of supporters, as well as speculation that “brown” may actually enter the books as the colour of anything un-eco friendly. This comes much to the dismay of the PWFCIB (People Who’s Favourite Colour Is Brown), who lament that the colour brown has been through enough denigration already, having previously been stigmatized as the colour of ‘poop’.
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AM640 is reporting that Andrea Horwath has been named the new leader of Ontario’s New Democratic Party.

Horwath succeeds leadership from Howard Hampton after he announced would not seek re-election as party leader, a position he has held since 1996.

Horwath has been MPP for Hamilton East since 2004 and beat out fellow colleagues Peter Tabuns, Michael Prue, Gilles Bisson for the position.

Democracy is about choice. It’s about the right to look at differing visions of the country and make a choice about which you think is best. Some people say the more political parties there are, the more varied the choice and, thus, the stronger the democracy. Is this true? When different political parties take similar stances, is that still a choice?

It has become painfully obvious that the Conservative Party and the Liberal Party no longer represent distinctive options to the Canadian electorate. Stephen Harper has proven time and again that he is willing to compromise his beliefs in search of his majority government (to see how far Harper has come, look up some old Reform Party platforms; the Conservatives are pushing for none of it). The Conservative Party is now far more centrist than it was intended to be, the most glaring proof being the acceptance of deficit economics. Meanwhile, Michael Ignatieff and the Liberals are suffering an identity crisis. Harper’s strategic move to the centre has taken a large piece of the electorate away from the Liberals. Stephane Dion’s response was to propose a radical environmental policy that was intended to win over all progressive voters. The left-of-centre vote never unified behind Dion (remaining split between the Liberals, NDP and the Greens) and drove more traditional Liberal supporters into the arms of the Conservatives. With that strategy deemed a failure, Ignatieff has been forced to subtly acknowledge that his version of the Liberal Party wouldn’t do things very differently than the Conservatives (see Ignatieff’s support of the budget). The Liberals are being squeezed out of the political picture, and since they can no longer offer anything distinctive in terms of policy, they are left hoping Canadians will think Ignatieff is the more capable leader.
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Stephen Harper announced today that he will be firing all of his cabinet except himself. “I was wondering what I could do to cut government spending and at the same time hold on to more power”, he said with a constant twitching of his left eye. “As of today, I will be taking over all of the ministerial jobs in Foreign Affairs, Justice, Finance, Revenue, Indian Affairs, Inter-Governmental, Fisheries, Environment and any other departments I can think of. I will be giving myself a healthy raise for taking on this extra workload but rest assured that the rest of the savings will be passed on to Canadians. My first order of business is with the department of Technology. I have ordered them to develop a new device that will transfer all the information of the various departments straight to my brain,” he confided. Harper’s move means that his Conservatives have completely been relegated to backbencher status.
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It all started when Barack Obama included “Buy American” language in his economic stimulus plan coming out of congress. That built tension worldwide after an $825-billion stimulus plan was passed last week by the House of Representatives requiring the sole use of U.S. made iron and steel in public projects. The protectionist messages being relayed by the US are especially a concern for Canadians, given that the US is our largest trading partner.

In a panicked response, the governments of both the European Union and Canada sent letters to Congress urging that the provision must be dropped.

But Canadians nervous about a trade war with the US heard reassuring words from Obama after he realized the extent to which nations worldwide were panicking. “I think it would be a mistake … at a time when worldwide trade is declining for us to start sending a message that somehow we’re just looking after ourselves and not concerned with world trade,” Obama stated. He also assured the world he did not want to send a protectionist message.
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