This election will be a crucial event for Canada

I think this election will have a profound effect on the future of Canada. We are a society plagued with ignorance and want, narcissism and obesity, and yet we have access to intelligent communication, education and progressive institutions. We have the potential to be just as great as Sweden or Norway, but we also have the potential to be as regressive and proto-fascist as our neighbours to the South.

I have read the history books and I know where Conservative style politics lead. I will be sad to see this progressive country fall to the fascists as Italy and Germany did. I'm not saying that Canada will be the same, but the apathy and disinterest of citizens is worrying.

Canada needs to use common sense in these times.

Political Rascals

Steven Harper is contemptuous. Yet, the media treats it like just another thing. He should be punted out of Sussex Drive immediately, fully clothed or not!
His attitude towards parliament and Canadians in general is a disgrace.

layton's quebec gain will be his problem

Those polls suggest that Layton mostly just gaining in Québec and that will be his problem. Thats because Layton is promising all sorts of nationalistic booty to Québec to make those gains - and if he ever had to deliver, there would be huge storm in rest of Canada.

jnewcomb

There would be a big storm among the Right but so what? A lot of Dippers support the Sherbrooke Declaration. Its a document that got news coverage and is available for anyone to read. Its not like its a big surprise.

The right-wing strategy of telling Quebec to go screw themselves almost broke up the country. Which made a lot of people on the Left upset.

Democracy=vote

I have said this in my other comments. No vote, no democracy. Apathetic, no democracy.

Things will not get better if we don't go and vote.

Countries like Sweden, Norway are way better than Canada because people seem to care more. Their social net is strong and admirable. We CAN have it here too, but not with whining and complaining.

I'm not surprised that the NDP is ahead. People aren't stupid.

The Harper government has no respect for the ordinary working class, for Canadian culture, for social assistance to those who need it to get back on their feet, for women and the list goes on and on.

What kind of nation do you have to be to accept a government like Harper's?

It would borderline with something like - I have no respect for myself and I allow any politician to kick me around like a soccer ball and I vote for it anyway. Huh?

If this would happen in a country where citizens have high self esteem and value their culture - this guy would be out in a flash!

Seriously people. Many of you would not allow this kind of treatment from your spouse, why then from a politician?

It's beyond me. Never mind what the media says and tries to sway people into certain directions. They only looking after themselves. So should we as voters!

That's some statement

"years of polling and focus groups suggest that if there was a direct line between voting and values, the NDP would win every election, hands down."
Anything to back that up ? Or else this is just propaganda, not a news article.

As for Sweden, their wonderful democracy voted in their far-right anti-immigration party recently (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/world/europe/20sweden.html).
I'll take our weird bloc party over the european neo-nazi parties any day. The grass isn't always greener on the other side of the fence.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favour of voting reform. But to say that the only reason why the NDP hasn't formed a government in Canada is because the masses are just not enlightened enough is just delusional.

Harper

"You don’t have to stupid to be a conservative but most conservatives are stupid.”

If Harper ever gets majority a darkness will descend upon Canada like the black plague. It will be remembered for generations with horror, if we are able to ever get rid if him.
Vote for this monster at your peril.
Anybody but Harper…. Vote for the person in your riding that has the best chance at beating the conservative candidate.
PASS THIS ALONG TO EVERYONE WHO LOVES CANADA

Excellent article

Thank you Murray. We, who do not want our grand-children to live under the threat of fascism must do everything we can to create adult education programs that will empower the people to choose engagement instead of the hyper-violent entertainments that keep them fearful of civic society.

Most Canucks Like The NDP Policies

But, because most Canuckians don't want to vote for a party that won't "win", their hands start to shake and the X ends up on the Lib or Con candidate.

Maybe the jump in poll numbers will help steady that political palsy.......

Layton loves Harper

At least he is working very hard to split the vote so Harper wins his majority with barely a third the vote.

We must vote strategically or the country is doomed.

Re: Layton loves Harper

Seth,
I've come to the conclusion after reading these forums for a while that NDPers do seem to prefer Conservative over Liberal.
My only explanation for it is that the NDP only thinks it can take votes from people that would otherwise vote Liberal, so any Liberal that gets elected in effect represents a failure on their part.

Though if this was the case then they should be really upset at the Greens taking votes, since there is a lot of overlap between NDP and Green platforms.

Splitting the vote

According to the polls its the Liberals that are splitting the vote.

On election day we'll see many Liberals stay home rather than vote NDP. Others will vote Liberal in spite of the NDP being the only party that can defeat Harper.

And of course, as we see in Ontario already, some Liberals will vote Conservative.

Frank

What happened in the last week in Atlantic Canada? A 15% jump away from Jack. Why?

elbillug

That was a great article. Thanks for the link.

I think European neo-nazi is a strong word. But one thing many people don't know in North America is that Europe is struggling with a huge amount of immigration that actually divides the countries even more and eating up the social welfare funds by the minute. And the reason is that the majority of immigrants - that are accepted with open arm so to speak - are not interested in 'assimilating' into their new culture. They claim refuge status and then go back to their countries to 'educate' their children. They don't learn the language and are not interested in the culture they chose as their second home. Arabs and the gypsies are a perfect example of what is going on in many European countries.
That is hardly comparable to the fact that Sweden had the most successful social Democratic government in the European union for many years. And they have a strong social net to prove it.

What do we have in Canada? Oh yeah, we have that idiotic moron called Harper. No thank you.

Centre right is still not equal to far right - like Harper's redneck gang.

Today's polls

Ekos says the NDP nationally are now almost 5% ahead of the Liberals and 6% behind the Conservatives.

The company that had the most accurate seat projection in 2008 (Ekos) is today predicting the NDP hits 100 seats. Goes on to say that with Liberal support it means an NDP minority government.

Environics released a poll today showing the NDP at 41% in Quebec and the Cons under 10%.

Atlantic Canada

Latest Atlantic Canada poll, Ekos I think this is unless I have them mixed up with Environics.

NDP 35
Libs 30
Cons 29
Grn 5

r'man

308 doesn't do polling himself. He combines polls. Most of them from before the debates and even before the campaign began. And his methodology has no track record.

If he's right, good for him, but his numbers aren't current polls.

r'man

You can read the article about today's Ekos poll here

http://ipolitics.ca/2011/04/25/ndp-leapfrogs-liberals-to-landin-second-spot-in-astonishing-campaign-twist/

Layton's Surge

Layton's NDP surge in the face of viscious, Voter Suppression campaigns suggests many people are fed up with the B.S. and the V.S.

Jack's message of moderate optimism and trustworthy leadership stands out amid the din of fear-mongering and negativity.

In Canada,since 1867,its been Tweedle-dum or Tweedle-dee. After 144 years we could be on the cusp of change. Or not.

One thing is for certain, Fear and Voter Suppression are powerful political tools a Prime Minister has chosen to use against his own people. This type of Leadership often signals one winner and many losers.

It is true that Democracy exists only to the extent that we participate in it.

The PM's campaign was planned and designed by Hill and Knowlton,N.Y.,Global leaders in P.R.. History shows suppressing Democratic participation can result in success. Todays' Conservative party has invested millions of dollars to ensure this happens.

I do hope the "surge" prevails: more ballots in the box is required for people to win.

In this election it is my goal to have one loser and many winners.

I'm voting for change.

An "Aha!" Moment... My Posterior I

An "aha!" moment, my ass. It's a much simpler and yet more fundamental moment that is happening, than anything the NDP has done of itself... which is be Liberals. (Which is why the Liberals can't understand what is going on... they've been studiously sounding like NDPers themselves, making sure it never really got on its Left. And the NDP didn't. Except they are not carrying the Liberal baggage.)

More than an "aha!" moment as Murray is partisanly claiming... though I understand why... the Canadian people, particularly the working class masses are arriving at a place of sheer desperation... wanting to signal their dissatisfaction with the status quo... and beginning to cast about for alternative ideas and solutions. In this, I think they are about to go through another period of disappointment with the NDP, but make no mistake... this is a profoundly important fucking moment. It is the line in the sand. It is the place and time where the tide begins to turn. (Unless the fascists pull a rabbit out of the hat. Always a danger.)

Only we are not in the immediate postwar period where Europe and much of the rest of the world lies destroyed... needing our goods to rebuild... and make our capitalism prosperous in the process. Creating a wealth pool from which compromises can be wrung to improve the lives of the working class. This is a period where capitalism has hit the proverbial brick wall, first because of its own greed excesses that are sowing confusion and distrust, undermining the economy and impoverishing the people. The critical to everything oil supply is in a slow collapse, the leading imperialist power is finally over extended... at that place where the cost of Empire is exceeding its benefits, Sand globalized growth is failing, and there is nowhere else to endlessly to grow. And the goddamn planet is itself heaped with abuse, poisons and systems collapses. Capitalism is at that place that says "Dead-end Ahead". There is nowhere for it to go... and the realization is finally dawning on the masses. This is not about to get better!

Fascist corporatism especially is a clear and demonstrable failure. And though the NDP is really just another wannabe capitalist party like the others, because it arose on the wrong side of the class tracks, it has been treated as a virtual pariah by the system, the ruling class and its media, and the other vanguard parties to capitalism. And the people bought it. But we are in a new moment, it is beginning to look like, where out of sheer desperation and casting about, in a sea where nothing is working anyway, where they are about to say, "Fuck you.", and vote NDP, just for something to do that isn't at least repeating old mistakes... they hope. And hope does tend to spring eternal.

continued next post...

An "Aha!!" Moment... My Posterior II.

Continuing from previous post...

NDPers will, of course, read this moment quite differently than this, just like Murray is. It is a "wanna believe" moment for them. For the rest of us, more concerned with real change in society, we will do better not to be swept away in this heady moment of theirs... and remain more grounded. Though like I said, hope ever springs eternal, I understand that too. And maybe... maybe... And I will await the NDP to prove me wrong. :-)

But that said, in any case, neither should we fail to understand the significance of the hour that is arriving here. Thank you, Bobby Peru. Thank you, Realisticman... and all you others of whom you know I speak :-)

Peace, Love and Revolution.

Let's hope enough people get

Let's hope enough people get tired of voting for the cats (whether Tory Black or Liberal White) and try for the mice this time. If Jerry Munro is right, the mice are really ginger cats -- but that's no reason for not voting for them!

History in the making

Harper wins a minority government with promises of openness and transparency.
Harper finds his government in contempt of parliament, a first and is facing an election because of party lies and cover ups.
Canadians reward Harper with his dishonesty by picking the Conservatives in some polls.
If Canadians vote in Harper they are begging to be lied and Harper government will not disappoint, now that is more the truth.
I did see posts saying I'm a Conservative voter voting for the NDP so the Liberals will not win. The insanity is catching on.

I don't believe there's any evidence

I don't believe there's any evidence for the assertion that the NDP prefers a Conservative government to a Liberal one. In fact, quite the contrary: there is empirical evidence that the NDP prefers a Liberal-led government to a Conservative (Harper led) one.

There would have been NO NEED for this election if Michael Ignatieff had not shafted the coalition agreement which Stephane Dion and Jack Layton came to after the 2008 vote.

I'm surprised anyone has forgotten that fact.

Ignatieff could have, after Harper became the dictator of the country when he prorogued the parliament rather than submitting to its will, stood by the coalition agreement AND voted down Pee Wee's budget.

It would have taken character and courage to do that and Ignatieff came up short. He didn't have the jam to face off against Pee Wee's hate campaign and thereby proved himself incapable of leading the REAL opposition to a Conservative revolution.

Because that's what Harper is - a Conservative revolutionary.

Any opportunity to get rid of Harper's government is worthwhile pursuing - NDP and Liberal voters in Saanich and the Islands should cast their ballots for Elizabeth May - ensuring thereby that Gary Lunn will have to find another line of work.

When the rubber hits the road, that kind of thing is necessary all across the country...but the suggestion that NDP voters have any kind of a secret hard on for Harper and his gang is just silly.

Appearance and Reality...

"I've come to the conclusion after reading these forums for a while that NDPers do seem to prefer Conservative over Liberal." ebilbug

My laugh for the day.

Though actually, all the parties to current parliamentary capitalism, as Bailey said in another thread, are ALL colleagues and break bread together.... and I would add, go through the motions of substantive differences. Which is not to say that they are not locked in an often tight competition, with all the frequent heated emotions of the moment... kind of like the teams to the NHL. Indeed, at about that level.

Appearance alone does not determine or reflect the full nature of a things reality. Can often be misleading... as in this case of bourgeois party politics.

Still ebillbug, good for a laugh. :-) (The NDP probably really doesn't get a hard on over anything. That would be too... indiscreet and unpolitic. Better to repress that thought.)

Maybe it's time

Me - I'm no Conservative & oppose much of Harper's agenda. Nevertheless, it may be necessary for the Canadian citizen to elect a Harper majority in order to learn what it is like to have one's hand in the fire.

My very unpolitical opinion

You know I think there is really something quite different going on....

Yes, people have had enough -

But I think it's Jack Layton ....and I don't think even he knows for sure what he is doing right.

But this is what I think it is.....

Everyone knows here that Jack has been battling cancer and I think that kind of fight, if one genuinely takes it on, leaves one knowing and feeling instinctively what is important in life. So Jack isn't acting like the others. He is glad to be alive - and his smile and openness and his positive bent is tremendously appealing.

And here is the best part: It can't be faked.

He has something, no pair of eyeglasses could ever compete with. He's happy to be alive. He's more honest and direct.

Life gets very simple when you are seriously ill.

Not that he wasn't a good man before...

Only now the things that Murray mentions below resound more deeply than ever with him:

These are the things of 'real life':

"And the things they want are, of course, essentially the list of things the NDP has always run on: Medicare, affordable post-secondary education, generous social assistance, human rights, genuine EI, eliminating poverty. You know the list -- if you are part of the 70 per cent majority, it is your list, too."

If a man... or a woman can genuinely know and feel and convey that life is indeed about 'life': that what is important in life is that which sustains and nurtures life. - Well, you become magic. And you are running your own race.

And since most politicians have become the walking dead - and more and more of us have had enough of their dead world... then, yes, Ah ha! we recognize this new life in Jack.... and we want it, too. A new way. New life.

Even Jack must wonder what the heck is going on.....

Now, I know what you are thinking of me but I don't care -

Jack's brimming with life and his deadbeat opponents are at a serious disadvantage.

Even the gutsy, lively, Mssr. Duceppe has been left in the dust.

Terry J. Nanaimo

My sentiments exactly! Except (as G. West mentions), I live in Saanich-Gulf Islands so will be voting for Elizabeth, both to get rid of Lunn, and because the Greens need representation.

why Lynn...

We think well of you - and as for me - especially when we disagree. Although I agree with you here, even though naturally I shall say it slightly differently, and not as poetically...

Politics has become dead and the discourse deadened, and any spark of life has the capacity to intrigue people. Naturally we hope it is just the beginning.

Murray continues to insist that our citizens are shoppers, but I think he reflects perhaps a small portion of his demographic at best. Most working people I know are working two, and sometimes three jobs, because they are all part-time. The unemployed are lined up at food banks and soup kitchens, and the most desparate are sleeping in doorways, on friends couches, and in any sheltered place. Really, those that have the time and wherewithal to shop as a pasttime have actually become a minority in our country - oh, and I do wish you could see the dire poverty of students (and some of them brilliant) and see the tragedy of food banks at our universities. A little prosperity in the form of one job, the ability to go to university without starving, the ability to find a job that staves off desperation - or failing that, a decent social safety net - why, I think we all might be amazed at what might happen politically. You cannot engage desparate, hungry, insecure people living from hand to mouth...not only is this what we have bequeathed to our children (metaphorically), we then insult them by berating their indifference to politics and mock them as 'shoppers'.

If we want them to be 'intentional citizens', we could do no better than to stop using deadened language and schoolboy bullying. Here's to life.

Hope

Possibly on the horizon?
I will likely vote Green - partly 'cus my sister is working so hard for them in Sannich/Gulf and partly because i hope our local NDP is a shoe-in. I just donated to the Greens.
If Ignatief looked like a winner it might change my thinking but he does not. Harper looks sorta like Reagan and if it walks and talks and smells it just might be a "Thatcher".
If Harper gets a majority we are just going to have to sit back and do what we did when the Yanks voted Bush back in for his last term:
Scrape your jaw off the floor and get up and carry on while your head shakes itself.
We will see

Not the first time the Liberals have slid

This is not the first time the Liberals have slid down the slipper path to oblivion. In Saskatchewan, the CCF displaced Sask's natural governing party in 1943 and again in 1971 and they never recovered.
In Manitoba, the Liberals slid steadily after being part of wartime an post war coalitions, (when they were more extreme than Roblin's Tories). With the rise of the NDP in 1973, it was the Liberals that slid into oblivion, something they have never really recovered from.
In Ontario, the NDP won (bad luck to be elected during a stronger recession than the 2008 recession) when Peterson's Liberals called a snap election because the polls looked favourable and the voters rejected their cynicism and were not yet willing to forget the Tories corruption and incompetence just a few years earlier.
In Nova Scotia, the NDP surged to victory when both the Liberals and Conservatives had destroyed their public's trust.
Being a party that has very few core values and the party of elites (they were always more dependent upon corporate and very wealthy donors than the Tories or the NDP [and still are]), without power they lose their power to control patronage and thus their core constituency.
What is happening today, appears to be consistent with history. The Liberals are less relevant than the NDP and the Greens.

Layton

The fact remains that Harper still has the potential of gaining a majority. Why? I believe it is because investigative journalism is all but dead in the mass media so most Canadians don't have a clue that they are about to lose the small semblance of democracy that we have. Secondly, Harper appears to be a strong leader. He doesn't waver, doesn't flinch, and doesn't lose his cool in public. He lies in a very convincing manner. He has all the traits of a sociopath. We have an international expert in sociopathology in BC - Robert Hare. Check out his books - "Snakes in Suits" and connect the dots.

Layton 2

The NDP has never addressed the fear that has been generated about the NDP. While people might like Jack because he's straight forward and down to earth, that doesn't necessarily translate into votes. Until the NDP does the research to understand the fear that Canadians have been brainwashed to have regarding the NDP, and addresses and counters those fears, they shall remain lagging behind the major, and proven corrupt parties. Vote Strategically!

DA Scott

I think you'll find the election Douglas won in Saskatchewan to become the government was in 1944...on June 15. Douglas and the CCF won 47 of the 52 seats and a majority of the popular vote.

Your other points are well taken...

@Finewine

You make a good point about the irrational fear and hatred of traditional parties in Canada with respect to the CCF and the NDP.

However, I think Layton's approach - which mirrors Douglas's own attitude toward irrationality is the best way to deal with fear and nonsense.

Keep smiling and remember what you believe and why you are in politics in the first place...

@OhCanada

"But one thing many people don't know in North America is that Europe is struggling with a huge amount of immigration that actually divides the countries even more and eating up the social welfare funds by the minute. And the reason is that the majority of immigrants - that are accepted with open arm so to speak - are not interested in 'assimilating' into their new culture. They claim refuge status and then go back to their countries to 'educate' their children. They don't learn the language and are not interested in the culture they chose as their second home."

I think you're confusing two issues - refugees and immigration. There are concerns in Europe with both, but you've conflated the barriers immigrants face with the benefits refugees get in assimilating.

This UNHCR report has some specifics including figures that may surprise you.

http://www.unhcr.org/4d8c5b109.html

That said, I know from Finland that the anti-immigration True Finns party is otherwise nominally liberal, so the concerns of European nations about immigration are not confined to right-wing voters as some might think.

The main barrier immigrants faced in Germany for many years was lack of citizenship. Since the 1960s, millions of Turks showed up to work at the jobs Germans wouldn't (at least until reunification) but were never rewarded with citizenship or more than a marginal level of social benefits. Nor were their kids - being born of Turkish parents in Germany qualified you for.... no citizenship at all in many cases. That was remedied in 1999 with the application of Basic Law, but many of the complaints Germans made about immigration until that time had little basis in fact.

They didn't like them becasue they were "different".

All aside

I think Murray misses the issue a little bit here. The population in this election is considerably different than the one in 2008. Back then, the great collapse hadn't quite hit - now some people have been out of work for more than a year. People are acutely more aware of the fragility of the social contract, and many are actively talking about what parts of it are worth keeping.

That's not a conversation you'd have heard five years ago.

In the past decade, there's been a grand experiment in selfishness - as we were told we were becoming richer and richer (because the values of our properties were increasing) we found ourselves lionized by consumerism.

This is the practice that led to the conservatives' micro-targeting. When people are largely satisfied, it's more difficult to get them motivated, and that's the kind of thing could perhaps work to engage them. The difficulty is in applying the results to extrapolate larger policy directions without excessive balkanization of the party.

Buit today's society is different - some of us aren't meeting our basic Maslovian needs, and more of us know someone who's in a situation like that. As a result, there's more consideration for those who've lost their jobs, especially among lower-middle-class immigrants from the Punjab and Vietnam, because they too are only a few years removed from the kind of violence, discrimination and poverty that made them emigrate to Canada in the first place. And those kinds of lessons aren't easily forgotten, when you finally turn off the big screen TV, crush the last beer can, and go to bed.

I think the intentional citizen has already been created, in varying forms, and needs no further support than continuing to tell the truth to power, in every form of public theatre one can find. I believe the people are indeed already listening.

Harper's Corporate Tax Shifts

He'll pay dearly for his choices last year when Gordon Campbell threw a tax cut at the people the people threw it back stating services not you Campbell.

Canadians expect a high level of public service not a huge increase in Corporate welfare vis a vie tax shifting.