I’ll accept your first two examples to some extent, but I would argue your point on the NDP in BC- that province is notorious for having insane governments regardless of the party in power. Also, Conservative governments have done more to screw up some provinces such as Ontario and Saskatchewan than the NDP has.
The NDP government in Ontario did a dreadful job, and by any economic measurement was vastly less competent than the PC government. Even granting that economic fortunes differ for other reasons, the Rae government was by any standard almost spectacularly inept. Getting rid of Grade 13 was a good idea, though.
How the Harris government “ran Ontario into the ground” as opposed to previous governments I cannot imagine. Ontario is in as good or better shape than it was in 1985.
Toughen up, Parliamentary System Boy. We have that long to go before the debates.
That’s a profoundly sad thing to hear from anyone blessed with the privilege of citizenship in a functioning democracy.
Except for you it’s quite a bit more than “pure spectator value”, is it?
ElvisL1ves said:
Oh, let’s not be dramatic. There’s nothing ‘sad’ about being cynical about the way politics tends to work in your own country. We have one of the most closed parliamentary systems around. Strong party discipline here squashes internal debate. So what happens here is that the government pushes some law, and instantly every member of the government joins lock-step and they all spout the party line. Then of course, the opposition all lines up against it. It’s impossible to find out what any individual members really think, and regional representation goes out the window.
The net effect is that a majority government is almost like a little dictatorship between elections.
So yes, I’m cynical about that. It doesn’t mean I’ve disengaged from the process, or that I don’t spend my time learning the issues and voting on them.
Save your personal innuendo for the pit. Everyone’s getting very tired of it.
Ontario debt at the time of the last election- 110 billion dollars.
Saskatchewan debt at the end of the Conservatives’ last term- 12.7 billion dollars.
This is what you call ‘good shape?’
Pardon me, Sam, but isn’t thanks to the NDP that Canada has a national single-payer health insurance system? Don’t tell me that’s something that even a conservative like you would think of abolishing!
I’ve looked at the NDP’s platform (http://www.ndp.ca/uploaded/20040527091443_Fed.NDP.Platform.eng.sm.pdf), and WOW! If only we had something like that down here! (We’ve got plenty of socialist and similar parties but they’re marginal. Even the Greens in America are marginal compared to the NDP in Canada.)
Also from the NDP site (http://ndp.ca/positivechoice/):
(See also Fair Vote Canada, http://www.fairvotecanada.org/.)
Well, you must know how I feel about proportional representation. Where do you stand on it, Sam? And how do most Canadians stand on it? Is it a real issue there? (Most Americans don’t even know what PR is – when I try to explain it, they often think I’m talking about either post-Census redistricting, racial gerrymandering, or a parliamentary system.)
How, exactly?
All those places also happen to have significantly less poverty than the United States, the gap between the rich and the poor is not as vast, public services and welfare-state benefits are significantly more extensive, and people who are employed are expected to spend significantly less time working and have better job security. If that’s how socialism screws things up, then America needs a thorough and vigorous screwing! Without vaseline! But we’re patient enough to wait in line behind Canada . . .
Just out of curiosity, why does Canada even have a military? I mean, we Yanks aren’t about to invade you (honest! trust us! 
), and what other country is there on Earth that could or would?
You ever wonder why that is, Sam? :rolleyes:
Now there’s something where we Americans could really learn something from you! I’ve never seen the wisdom in electing people to what are essentially administrative or professional posts. The vote is our way of imposing our political views on the government – it really only means something when we’re electing people who have leeway to make substantial policy decisions – political decisions.
Thanks **Brainglutton, ** that was an excellent response… I wanted to say essentially the same things but I was too lazy to type it all out. 
Brainglutton said:
Yes, I would. And in fact, Alberta is trying hard to move away from single-payer and start allowing some private clinics back into the system. Single-payer health care is not a good idea. And our health care system is suffering all kinds of problems because of it.
I worry about the tyranny of the majority. I don’t have a real problem with it as long as the constitution is strong enough to prevent majorities from stripping the rights of minorities, and that includes things like the right to property.
The same way socialists have screwed up other countries - spending too much money, over-regulating business, setting up a social safety net so strong that it acts as a disincentive to work, high taxes, etc.
In Edmonton we elected an NDP mayor once. She was a disaster. Business investment fled, she alienated natives by refusing to wear ceremonial garb because it contained the skin of a beaver, we had all kinds of touchy-feely social experiments, she wanted to put public housing in the nicest neighborhoods for ‘social justice’, which caused property values to fall, etc.
I remember a meeting she had with some businessmen who wanted to set up a factory in Edmonton - a factory which would have employed hundreds of people and brought hundreds of millions of dollars into the local economy. She harangued them about environmental needs. She demanded that they be willing to accept unionization of their workforce. Basically, she presented a hostile front. The business not only chose not to locate in Edmonton, but the owner of the company actually said that the reason was the hostile reception they got from the mayor.
This is typical of how the NDP operate.
Both of those countries have undergone new capitalist revivals since their meltdowns. If Britain’s doing great now, you might think of giving credit to Margaret Thatcher. I was talking about the Britain of the 1970’s. The NHS was a disaster, the country was crippled by a never ending series of labor actions and strikes, and the economy was a mess.
In New Zealand, the government actually went bankrupt, and had to cut spending dramatically across the board in order to recover some fiscal sanity.
Plenty of reasons. First, the defense of North America is supposed to be mutual. We have signed treaties to that effect which give us obligations. The fact that the U.S. will have to protect us if we don’t protect ourselves is no excuse for giving up our responsibilities. It’s shameful.
Also, a country that cannot defend its own interests becomes a pawn. If we rely on the Americans for territorial integrity, that gives them the ability to tell us what to do.
But most importantly, a strong military means we have much to add to international peacekeeping, and can offer value in other military engagements. This gives us a seat at the table and the ability to inject our values into world events. In short, a strong military makes you a player. Canada was a pretty big player not that long ago. We punched above our weight. Twenty years ago, there were more Canadian peacekeepers in the world than any other country. That gave us a lot of say in how these events played out.
If we had had a significant military presence to offer in Iraq, it might have given us the ability to change the course of that conflict somewhat, just as Britain has been able to do.
What makes the decline of our military doubly sad is that Canada had built a truly amazing military. Man for man, we were among the best in the world. Canada routinely won competitions like Top Gun and Maple Flag. We were (and still are to some degree) considered an elite force. Again, this allowed us to punch above our weight. We got tremendous value from our military, because they were so good that they could do more with equivalent spending than other militaries can. It was a significant Canadian advantage.
And the problem is that a military like that can not just be revitalized overnight. Canada’s military tradition (or any country’s for that matter) depends on a long chain of values, traditions, and tactice passed down from one generation of service to the next. Shrink it drastically, and then if you decide to re-inflate it you find that too many of your officers are green, and too many old pros are gone, and it’s hard to reach the rarified heights of capability you once held.
Our military was a precious commodity, and the Liberals squandered it. In one case, they bowed to political pressure and disbanded our entire airborne regiment because of the actions of a handful of people. Shameful.
I know exactly why that is, Mr. rolleyes. It’s because the Reform party was originally a regional western party heavily represented by conservative agrarian types. The new party is bigger and is pulling in a more cosmopolitan bunch, but the old Reformers are still there. This will correct itself over time.
Or if you were suggesting that the Conservative MLA wouldn’t last five minutes here simply because he’s conservative, you’re welcome to try debating Stephen Harper. Let me know how you do.
I would tend to agree - I’ve never understood the ncessity of electing dogcatchers and other purely administrative positions. But then, I don’t have the experience of what’s that like, so maybe it’s actually a good thing.
“Tyranny of the majority”? But PR exists to empower political minorities, who have some support among the people but, under a winner-take-all, first-past-the-post system, might not even get a seat at the table.
How strong are constitutional protections of property rights in Canada? In the U.S. Constitution we have the Fifth Amendment, which says private property cannot be taken for public use without just compensation. (This does not, of course, bar government from levying taxes.) Some people have taken interpretation of this clause to ridiculous extremes – e.g., using it to try to sue the federal or state or local government on the grounds that environmental regulations, or zoning regulations, or regional growth-management plans, or impact fees, prevent them from developing their real property in the most economically profitable way (strip mining, suburban PUD, whatever). Does that happen in Canada?
[QUOTE=Sam Stone]
Report it if you like, but it’s a direct observation. Do you really claim to take the role only of a *spectator * in US politics? Really? Would you like to discuss that, with reference to all the citeable posts you add every day here, or can we take your habit of claiming that any questioning of your views is a personal attack for what it’s worth? Your use of “everyone” apparently means simply “you”, so we needn’t bother.
You very obviously do care much more about US politics, taking the role of one of the most vocally loyal partisans of Republican Party politics and candidates that the board has, than you do about your own, about which you admit total cynicism and no end of scorn, when you mention it at all. The OP sincerely asked why. You owe us all a sincere answer. It can be in the Pit if you like.
You do realize that Ontario has been running deficits pretty much nonstop under all three major parties? It’s not as if the Conservatives were any worse. When three different parties all run deficits, you have to start to ask if it has anything to do with the parties, or if the populace just might not give a hoot about debt reduction.
I can’t speak for Saskatchewan except to point out that Saskatchewan is not part of Ontario the last time I checked, and so has nothing to do with my statement.
Did I? (looking at it since i was drunk when I wrote it) Nope.
He doesn’t owe me anything. He answered my questions.
All for the best if you two take it there.
Wait, did Lib change his name back?
I should have been more clear, my post was also directed to Sam Stone.
I should like to point out that the comments in this thread regarding provincial NDP governments haven’t been very fair. Just for example, in Saskatchewan in 1991 the NDP inherited an accumulated debt of nearly 50% of the provincial GDP after a decade of rule by Devine’s Tories. In 2003, the debt stands at 27% of GDP. (cite) It has been edging marginally up in the past couple years, but considering the extent to which the province’s economy has been hammered by drought, BSE, etc., I find it very hard to be critical on that score (yet - barring catastrophe, the deficits of the past couple years better disappear or I’ll be voting Liberal next time round). In short, the NDP under Romanow, and to a lesser extent under Calvert, have done exactly the opposite of run the province into the ground. The Tories ran it into the ground, and the NDP has largely dug us out of the hole.
I don’t think comments on the Rae government in Ontario are particularly applicable, either. I freely grant that they were a disaster, but the question is why? And the answer, I think, was not so much their general ideology as it was their complete lack of experience in governing. (And, it should be noted, for this reason I’d hate to see the NDP take power federally, at least at the moment. But I quite like their increased influence in the current federal government, as they can have influence over policy without their inexperience hampering effective implementation of policy.) As for BC, when was the last time BC had a government of any stripe that didn’t royally mess it up?
Let’s take a look at a source I’m sure the conservatives in this thread should regard highly, the Fraser Institute. According to their 2004 Budget Performance Index, Saskatchewan places 4th (after Alberta, Ontario, and the Feds), and Manitoba 5th. (cite) Seems the Fraser Institute doesn’t feel that the provincial NDP governments are a fiscal disaster. In fact, if you dig through the Fraser Institute’s past BPI rankings, you’ll see Saskatchewan has been consistently placing very high under the NDP, even though the Fraser Institute obviously disapproves of the size of our government.
As to the general point, I think it’s ludicrous to say that social democrats have been a disaster. It’s true that they don’t optimize economic growth, but that’s a conscious tradeoff in exchange for other social goods that the market doesn’t produce very well on its own. Sure, some instances of social democratic governments have been disastrous, but conservative governments haven’t quite managed an unblemished record either.
Ohhhhh, I get it. You’re new here. You may want to ask the admins to let you change your user name. See, we have a guy here who used to be called Libertarian but is currently called Liberal and he has this, well, history that you may not want to attach yourself to. Or you might want to, too, depending on your beliefs, but I suspect you don’t want to start out with people having preconceptions about you based on your user name.
That’s an interesting theory but I’m not sure I entirely buy it. While it’s true the Rae cabinet had no experienced ministers, it’s also true the Peterson cabinet had no experienced ministers (the Liberals hadn’t won an election in Ontario in forty years) and the Harris government had no experienced ministers (it was a totally different cast of characters in 1995 than the last Big Blue Machine team.) But neither government was nearly as inept.
Still, perhaps Rae simply did a terrible job of choosing his cabinet, as opposed to there being an ideological problem. It is worthwhile to note that many of the things the Harris government did were originally NDP ideas, including the educational reforms, that were simply picked up in process and carried through implementation by the Tories.
Also a factor to consider is that a socialist government might have a very different effect at the federal level than at the provincial level. An NDP government in Ottawa might scrap free trade, which could be a Godawful disaster. An NDP government in Toronto or Regina has a completely different set of responsibilities.
Moderator’s Note: Discussions of Canadian politics belong in this forum. Discussions of what personal reasons a particular poster has for caring about U.S. politics don’t. Let’s please keep this thread focused on the former.
What kind of history, exactly?
It would be frowned on to discuss that in this thread and this forum. You can search for posts by Liberal if you want to find out. However, whether the history is good or bad, people are going to constantly attributing opinions and arguments to you that you did not make. You’ll be forever saying “I’m not that Libertarian”. You seem like a reasonable fella and you wouldn’t have known this having joined recently. Just take it as a bit of friendly advice.
Fair enough, it’s just that when someone says that a poster has a “history” without explaining further, I can’t know exactly what that entails.