There's nothing like Canadian elections. Well, except for being dipped in hot oil while an army of crazed beavers gnaw on your toes.
It's that time of the year again everyone! Well, that time of the few consecutive years. No, I am not speaking of a leap year, though if you want to get technical it's really the more interesting of the two. No, what I speak of is a time-honoured tradition started a hundred years ago by our forefathers, and then promptly butchered every election since then, right up until we have reached this point, the Armageddon of all elections, where tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people will make a choice that will influence the very country... and only one quarter of them will have any idea of what the hell is going on!
This is precisely why mandatory voting would be a bad idea! If no one even knows who they're voting for any why, it sort of screws up the whole process, doesn't it? If every Canadian who could vote had to, and most of them didn't bother to know anything about the opposition, all Hell could break loose! Or, worse, the Bloc Quebecois could get voted in! I'm sorry, calm down, I won't even joke about that.
Of course, the irritating part is that, even though every student in Philemon seems to have very strong opinions of who should get voted in, they can't! How ridiculous is that, not allowing perfectly intelligent teenagers to decide how the country in them should be led, yet opening the doors for every single 30-ish men who wouldn't know a Constitution from the contents of a toilet bowl! (Which, lately, seems to be amounting to roughly the same thing.)
Of course, I know for a fact that you all want to hear my virtually omnipotent opinion on exactly who should get in... well, okay, you don't, but humour me. Please? I really, really want to rant on this... thank you.
The Liberals: On the negative side, all of these accusations that the party has become corrupt might very well be true, and there might not be any indication that this little scare to their foundation of power will make them straighten themselves out. Furthermore, the fact that they waited so long to come out with their own foe-bashing commercials, or any commercials at all, shows that they are not exactly the fastest on the uptake. On the other hand, they might just be more mature, but then they wouldn't be in politics.
On the positive side, their decision to defend basic charter rights for minority groups, and their suggestion to remove the clause allowing the removal of civil rights is probably the best thing I've ever heard, though there is a chance that they are only planning on doing so to get brownie points, but I really don't care about their motives. My support is with them.
The Conservatives: On the negative side... well... they're jerks. In case some of you did not know, the New Conservatives is a combination of the old Conservatives and the Reform party. Stephen Harper originally belonged to the Reform party, who could best be described as Stereotypical Americans. They made more than one racist comment, and obviously had a rather redneck view on everything in general. Eventually, they and the old Conservatives melded into the New Conservatives, but there were many more Reformists than Conservatives, so the Reformists essentially assimilated the Conservatives. Furthermore, rather than vow to defend constitutional rights for minorities, they consider revoking the right for legal gay marriages. Avoid this party at all costs.
On the positive side... erm... never mind.
The NDP are pro-union, pro-environment groups that are the bane of business everywhere. Whilst they have put forward nothing that would make me vote for them either way, except for maybe their wish to protect the environment, they are still a rather minor player in this debate.
The Bloc Quebecois. On the negative side, well, look at their name. Who's interests do you think they plan on exclusively supporting?
On the positive side, it will be a cold day in Hell before they are voted.
So, yeah, that's my opinion. I know that the last thing you need is more political propaganda, considering the insults that both of the major players in this little fiasco have been bombarding e ach others' reputations on the airwaves, filled with insults on a regular basis but never telling you why you should vote for that party in particular and not just go for another one. Rather than saying "Liberals good" they just keep saying "Conservatives bad" which is pretty much just increasing the chances that one of the other parties will be voted for. This is simply a case of the lesser of two evils, my friends, and on Monday we're going to get stuck with one of them.
I bet the founders of the Confederation of Canada are spinning in their unmarked graves right about now...
Yours Truly Politically, Mentally and Generally Incorrect.
