Friends are Electric

Unlike last night, where live-Tweeting the English language debate just happened, I set out tonight with the plan of doing the same for the French language debate. I do not speak French well enough to follow the debate in French, so I watched the dubbed version broadcast on the CBC website. Commentary follows.

<8:06> Not the rules as I understand them #constitution #db8 #elxn41

<8:08> Duceppe: Coalitions are legitimate. (again, why does he have to be a separatist?) #db8 #elxn41

<8:09> Ignatieff is already on the talking points, already repeated himself four times. #db8 #elxn41

<8:15> The Liberals are the clear alternative. So I've been told eight times. #db8 #elxn41

<8:19> Love these hockey references #elxn41 #db8

<8:25> Tax hikes will cause the apocalypse. #elxn41 #db8

<8:28> Layton is on about ebil banks again #db8 #elxn41

<8:35> Harper: If we raise taxes, gravity will reverse, the oceans will boil and the sun will cease to glow. #elxn41 #db8

<8:37> Duceppe states facts on forestry job losses, comparing to auto industry. Only one saying anything interesting. #db8 #elxn41

<8:47> Fun fact, crime rate in more rural provinces are higher than in cities. http://is.gd/HmYgQb. #elxn41 #db8 #guncontrol

<8:48> Than in more urban provinces*

<8:49> Here comes the dodging on Bill 101 again. #db8 #elxn41

<8:54> Eyebrows #db8

<9:04> Is it just me or does Layton's translator sound like an Irish John Wayne? #db8

<9:10> Last I heard Nutrition North wasn't so great #db8 #elxn41

<9:11> http://is.gd/8cRDKO for example on Nutrition North #nunatsiaq #db8 #elxn41

<9:12> The old food-mail program ended last fall, Nutrition North just started this month. Thats a large time delay. #db8 #elxn41

<9:33> Ignatieff is defiantly no Trudeau. #db8 #elxn41

<9:33> Fun fact: Quebec is against Aboriginal sovereignty. Sovereignty for them but no one else. Just like what he said about Canada. #db8 #elxn41

<9:35> I call BS on the billions to forestry. #db8 #elxn41

<9:44> No, Layton, the Harper government is in power because of #voters. Like it or not. #db8 #elxn41

<9:45> Ignatieff criticizing someone for wanting to be everything to everyone is kinda rich. #db8 #elxn41

<9:49> If you want to invest $12B in jobs, etc., then invest $12B, buying planes and HOPING that some jobs are made is weak policy. #db8 #elxn41

<9:55> Canada in Haiti? Don't make me laugh. We are a colonial power in Haiti. http://is.gd/kR38fm #rabble #haiti #db8 #elxn41

I did not plan to do this prior, it just happened. I missed the first 10 minutes because I was making dinner which is why there are no comments on subjects covered during this time. Missing are comments others made. Without further adieu:

<7:21> Layton has got some really good lines in, Harper handling himself quite well. #db8 #cdnpoli

<7:26> Jack Layton is really good at changing the subject, I didn't even notice him do it. #db8 #elxn41

<7:28> Canadian mission in Haiti? Don't get me started. #db8 #elxn41

<7:40> Did #Harper really just imply he was not as responsible for mud-slinging as the rest of them? #db8 #elxn41

<7:43> Majority government puts country at greater risk than many minority governments. Liberal or Conservative are both bad in majority. #elxn41

<7:46> So sick of hearing about the economy. That is not the only issue here. #elxn41 #db8

<7:47> Wrong. The childish bickering is part of what is important. #elxn41 #db8

<7:51> Harper: blatant lies about the nature of Canadian government. Again. Unsurprising. #coalitions #db8 #elxn41

<7:53> Party that finishes does not necessarily form government. Coalitions are reasonable and quite legal. Stop the #lies. All of you. #db8

<7:57> Like what Layton is saying, but way off topic again. #db8 #elxn41 #electoralreform

<8:05> Layton, you are debating Duceppe, not Harper... #elxn41 #db8

<8:09> Annnd Duceppe blows Layton out of the water at the end of their one on one. #elxn41 #db8

<8:31> Layton, again, off topic. He is really good at this. #db8 #elxn41

<8:45> Gilles Duceppe, why do you have to be a separatist? Only reasonable person in this debate. #elxn41 #db8

<8:55> Taxes hurt growth. [citation needed]. #elxn41 #db8

I consider myself to be a pacifist by nature. I do not consider violence to be an acceptable way to respond to problems. I think that it should be our goal to be able to abolish the apparatus of state violence. However, we do not live in a world where this is an acceptable course of action. So, given that we must have a military for the foreseeable future, we should seek to use it in the most effective way possible.

It goes without saying that the primary use of a military force is self defence. Here I mean true self defence of a reactionary nature. The value of preventative war is a very interesting and important question but not within the scope I intend to present here. However, everything that follows would apply to the notion of preventive war as well as other forms of violence. Beyond pure self defence, the use of our military should be in serving important values, for example those guaranteed in the universal declaration of human rights. While this is not always the outcome, I would argue that it is the intention of peacekeeping missions. We are, however, not currently engaging in peace keeping. We are engaging in an occupation. Again, I am not going to get into the ethics of our participation in the occupation of Afghanistan, I’m just going to take it as a given that we are there for some reason.

So the use of military force aught to have stated purpose. If there is a purpose then there can be a `win’ condition. Put simply, the purpose of the armed forces is to win wars. Everything said until now is elaboration on this point. By logical extension, if the armed forces are not winning wars then they are not surviving their purpose to society. If they are winning wars in an ineffective way then they are also failing their purpose.

The First World War provides an excellent example of winning a war in an extremely ineffective way. It was a very blunt strategy, very brutish and simple. Send waves and waves of men until either we or the opponent could send no more. The first side to run out of troops would be defeated, although the cost to the winning side would be huge as well. Since we were on the side with a larger population, we were victorious. Every general, every strategist of the day aught to have been banished for such behaviour. They forgot that their purpose was to win wars as quickly and painlessly as possible. Instead their ineptitude lead to a four year bloodbath. They failed at their jobs utterly.

The Second World War was hardly better, however it does provide some examples of war being fought properly. The German invasion of France is an example of war being fought properly, it was quick and decisive. The rest of the war, however, was largely fought with the same blunt stupidity as the First World War. For example, despite outnumbering the Germans, out-gunning them and enjoying air superiority, the march from Normandy to Berlin took nearly a whole year, and even then we never made it because the USSR beat us to it.

To mention Vietnam here beyond name is unnecessary. The most advanced and heavily armed force in the world was defeated by a small third world country because the Americans lacked strategy. Their military failed in their most basic purpose, to win wars.

Iraq was the same story, although they have managed to pull off some concession victory after nearly a decade. Even if victory was eventually achieved, it was not effective and was still a failure. Afghanistan is no better.

The Americans did pull off something in Iraq. We won the world wars. These are all cases of extremely blunt strategy pulling through. This is, however, not an endorsement of this bluntness. Bluntness, which is really stupidity, is a luxury that the huge can rely on. The Allies of the world wars were on the larger side so they could survive a pyrrhic victory. The Americans in Iraq, or indeed Vietnam, could provide enough bodies to make the opponent give up under the crushing weight of their numbers. A case can be made that every empire has won its hegemony through these blunt tactics.

We in Canada are not a superpower. We are a middle power. We are fortunate enough to lack the luxury of hugeness. However, this poses a major problem when we get caught up in superpower wars of attrition. We lack the manpower, the equipment and the financial resources to utilize this strategy. To be completely politically incorrect about the situation (and please ignore the initial kneejerk reaction you will have at the next sentence) we should be mimicking the tactics of the Taleban rather than the Americans in Afghanistan. This is not to say we should have our troops commit suicide attacks, which is unethical and ineffective. Nor is it suggesting that we should plant IEDs, the removal of landmines from most of the armies of the world was a positive step not to be repealed. But the Taleban, and indeed most people fighting in resistance movements across the world, are the ones actually capable of winning wars, although sometimes superpowers can bleed them into submission.

With all this in mind, how do we react when the Conservative government decides to spend billions of dollars on stealth fighters? Who are we going to use such fighters against? The justification is to defend our Arctic sovereignty. If the interest is in protecting the Canadian Arctic then perhaps a few fighters are appropriate. I’d favour a solution involving expanding the Ranger program, essentially spending some of the money on snowmobiles, which are much cheaper than fighter aircraft, and hiring otherwise unemployed residents of the territories. This would provide a Canadian presence in the Arctic at the same time as building the idea of Canada and goodwill towards the country with the residents of the region.

So who are we to use these aircraft against? I have no evidence for it in any way, but I am reminded of something John Ralston Saul wrote on a similar topic. His argument was that we are not capable of winning the wars we actually fight because we are too busy planning to fight the Soviet Union in Europe. I think that the government is purchasing these aircraft to fight the Soviet threat.

Soviet threat? How can that be, there has been no USSR for two decades? But that is the point. Although they might not realize it, and I would hardly blame someone who grew up and came of age at the height of the cold war for having the cold war mindset as second nature even now, I think that our leaders, both civilian and military, are still preparing for the ground war of World War Three, perhaps out of some intellectual equivalent of muscle memory.

Fighter aircraft are tremendously blunt. They are excellent for targeting conventional armies with conventional supply lines and conventional defences. They fail utterly when the enemy, their equipment and their resources are just not there. They are not useful for the wars we find ourselves in. A telling example of their uselessness in these types of wars is how frequently wedding parties are mistaken for enemy fighters. I’m sure that from the air its a reasonable mistake to make, but few things are going to sour relations with the people we are attempting to help more quickly than killing people on their wedding day.

So what, then, should we do? Its a lot easier to criticize than it is to work to improve a situation. In that regard I fail at the follow through. I know that the type of armed forces we have had for a century is incapable of fighting and winning the wars we will find ourselves in. I know that this either means we get used to failure, we refuse to participate or we adapt. We will not get used to failure as quickly enough political parties will realize that becoming involved in a losing situation will result in their loss at the poles. I cannot accept refusal to participate in the defence of human rights, although this is itself a topic for another day. This leaves adaptation.

Adoption will result in much less certainty. It will result in a decrease in top-down command, in command from the home front. To fight effectively we must be ready and able to take advantage of slight changes in the situation quickly and effectively. This requires training in recognizing these situations and in what reaction is most appropriate. It requires risk taking, which is by definition risking lives. An air war is a low body count war (for the air superiority side) but it is a lost war, victory does not come without risk and loss of life. By the book training cannot cover these topics, only exercises and war games, as well as front line experience, can create the intuition required to be victorious in this type of conflict.

As I said at the opening, I do not wish to have a military. But to achieve such an idealistic goal, if it is possible to achieve, the world must be made ready. Violence is a poor substitute for diplomacy, but sometimes it seems that it is needed to make diplomacy work. Being realistic about the existence of the Canadian armed forces means that it must be an effective force, not a clumsy one. To serve Canadians, which is their purpose, they must be prepared to win the conflicts which they are placed in. Since every conflict since the Second World War has been a guerilla war to an extend, perhaps it is time that we accepted this reality, stopped calling our adversaries cowardly for refusing to engage us on our terms, and put a real effort into achieving victory.

Had I been asked at any point up until perhaps the last year, but more likely even more recently than that, I would have denied ever being in the state of mind, would have denied being capable of ever possessing the opinions, that I am about to present. Since my early teenage years I have bought into the myth of left and right, I’ve even written about it extensively here. There are a variety of reasons for this, many legitimate and some less so. I see, to be cliché about it, more clearly now. I understand, or at least I believe I understand, things better. Both the left and the right are, among other things, utopian ghosts. The features I disliked about the typical political right, more specifically the Canadian political right, belonged no more to capitalism than they did socialism. The positive features found in socialism can be found elsewhere as well. There is no absolute, which is of course obvious and perhaps even a truism, but its still a difficult concept to grasp and accept, at least for me.

Had I been asked at any point up until perhaps the last year, but more likely even more recently than that, I would have denied ever being in the state of mind, would have denied being capable of ever possessing the opinions, that I am about to present. Since my early teenage years I have bought into the myth of left and right, I’ve even written about it extensively here. There are a variety of reasons for this, many legitimate and some less so. I see, to be cliché about it, more clearly now. I understand, or at least I believe I understand, things better. Both the left and the right are, among other things, utopian ghosts. The features I disliked about the typical political right, more specifically the Canadian political right, belonged no more to capitalism than they did socialism. The positive features found in socialism can be found elsewhere as well. There is no absolute, which is of course obvious and perhaps even a truism, but its still a difficult concept to grasp and accept, at least for me.

For the first time ever in my life I can honestly say that I accept capitalism as a potentially positive force. I would say that, under the right circumstances, it is what is best for society. I would not say that I am a capitalist, but this is a technicality which is central to this new understanding and I shall get to it with time.

In my youth I read Marx, I read the manifesto, I studied the philosophy as best as I was intellectually capable. In the political climate of Canada, especially Ontario, which I came to political awareness in, this is an entirely reasonable and understandable thing. Mike Harris and his neoconservative Progressive Conservative party were in power provincially, doing damage to the social structure of the province which we still have yet to recover from. Jean Chrétien was weakening social programs to fight the deficit. All around me were these policies, ostensibly of the right, ostensibly capitalist in nature, which were directly opposed to what I considered to be socially just.

Time does not on its own bring wisdom. Had I remained isolated from philosophy, by which I mean had I been functionally illiterate, I would still likely be thinking in this way. Had I not read the works of John Ralston Saul, The Origin of Wealth by Eric D. Beinhocker, had I not read Nietzsche and William Blake, Naomi Klein and Oswald Spengler, I would not have developed my opinions on these matters. Even Mien Kampf, for all its terrible writing and weak arguments, was important. Without these and other books I would have remained naive, functionally illiterate and certain. I now understand things more fully, but at the same time know how little I know and how little I can truly know. I am filled with doubt, glorious doubt, and can question anything I would once had accepted as fact and dismissed.

Time does not on its own bring wisdom, but properly used time can help one acquire it. So, while I was never really a communist, I would no longer call myself one. I would have during a period in my teenage years. I would no longer call myself a socialist in the proper definition of the term. Social democrat perhaps, but in the end these are just labels which have no inherent meaning. The important change is that, unlike my teenage or even post-teenage self, I am no longer in a position to say with certainty that capitalism is an evil.

The reason I once called capitalism a negative actor is that I became confused about what it means to be a capitalist and what capitalism itself means. It is not, as I once thought, about the maximization of profit. It is not about the oppression of workers, or anyone else for that matter. It is not about markets and their godhands. These are all confusions that I am not alone in possession of. In fact, especially the first and last, are symptoms of the illness afflicting modern capitalism.

If it is not about profit, then what is it about? What could capitalism be about if it is not profit for the capitalist? It is as simple as it is obvious. Capitalism is about the creation of capital, which is in and of itself profit. Profit is a side effect, in many regards a desirable one, but not the goal. It is about the creation of wealth. Wealth is not money, although money is a useful measure of it.

What differentiates wealth and money then? The former has a value beyond the abstract. Money is useful when it is an abstraction of wealth. Money becomes a dangerous tool, one capable of turning minds to radical (not necessarily violent radical) politics, when it is divorced from wealth. The quest for paper profit, the business of most, if not all, modern banks, is a prime example of this. Wealth is a factory, a mine, concrete products. Money is an abstraction which does not really exist, although it is a very useful abstraction. A vital one to the functioning of our society. But not an end itself.

Markets are a useful tool for collecting enough money, abstracted wealth, to investing into the generation of new wealth. This is in fact the purpose of capitalism, the use of wealth generated through capitalist projects to invest back into these projects. Does a market, which is again an abstraction, have a will of its own? Does it demand freedom, liberation from the chains which society has placed on it? Or is it nothing more than a useful construct. I would say the later in a healthy capitalist system. Ours is not particularly healthy. The market has no will of its own, the will forced on it belongs to men. Rich men. Powerful men. These two attributes are neither positive nor negative in nature, no matter what the assembled speakers of the right or left may say. The argument by these men, and they are men, that markets need to be free to work is an argument from selfishness. These men have forgotten that with their power and their wealth it is their responsibility to give back to society. Instead they wish to break the shackles compelling them to do this. These CEO and upper management types have become more confused than I once was, they think they are capitalists. They are no more capitalists than I am a capitalist. Do either they or I own any means of production? Then we are not capitalists.

If a proper capitalist, that is the owner, is reinvesting the wealth their operations generate and paying their taxes, which is a highly efficient way by which the rich and powerful can begin to fulfil the social responsibilities which come from their position, then a healthy capitalist system exists. Other responsibilities would include fair wages, environmentally and socially sustainable operations and the like. If the system in place lacks these attributes then it is a dysfunctional system which is only to varying degrees capitalist in nature.

I failed to appreciate the value of a functional capitalist system firstly and most importantly because it does not exist presently in the world. Nor would a functional system which existed years ago, if it truly did exist ever, look like a suitable system today. I saw the devastation, the problems, caused by a sick system and assumed, wrongly, that this was a system functioning ideally. It was not, it was functioning as designed, but not in a manner even approaching ideal. I was wooed by a system which promised easy, fast solutions to difficult questions. These questions don’t require answers. They require work to build a suitable solution for the present and continuous tweaking to ensure their continued function. Whether the political right or political left represents what is required is irrelevant.

Whether spoken truly or not, the above says it all. The folly of the attempted escape from Paris of King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette may serve as an important lesson to those who find themselves beaten.

The bread riots were an important contributing factor to the outcome of the French Revolution, and in fact may be the single most important reason for its success. The widespread starvation created a kind of class consciousness in the peasants of France, which pushed for changes to the way government was run. Their starvation, in a sense, awoke them to their power. The most obvious goal they sought was an end to their hunger.

To their credit, the monarchy did make an attempt to overcome the famine. One cannot judge the people, however, for remaining angry at the failings of the monarchy. Famine was not the only cause of the revolution, after all. However rightly, the king was judged by the outcome of his actions (or queen, as the case may be). And they had failed. Naturally this increased ill will towards the royal family. Ill will was already at quite high levels by this point, and justifiably the royals began to fear for their lives.

At this point the supposed statement was made. “Let them eat cake.” Evidence does not support that it was ever said, especially by Marie Antoinette. The statement is used as evidence of the royal’s lack of understanding of the situation in which they found themselves. What it means is that the royals, in their plenty, could not comprehend the suffering of the masses. Since they had plenty of food, even very rich delicacies (the cake) they failed to see that others did not. It is also important to note that a better translation of “Qu’ils mangent de la brioche” would translate brioche as an egg bread, since it was not a cake as we understand it, but rather a very egg and butter rich bread.

Whether or not such a thing was ever said is irrelevant, since the next action of the king shows his complete lack of comprehension of the situation equally well.

The royals, while very likely blind to a great many things, were not blind to the danger of their situation. They fled Paris for a monarchist stronghold near the border of Holland. They dressed themselves as servants to a Russian baroness and fled in a very luxurious stage coach. When the party stopped to exchange horses, the king insisted on resting. He was recognized and they were captured later that morning, just a few kilometres from their goal. Why one would stop for a rest when fleeing for their life is a strange thing indeed.

An even more critical interpretation can be found on pages 499-501 of John Ralston Saul’s Voltaire’s Bastards.

What does this all mean? What is the lesson? Aside from the obvious, of course, which is to hide as quickly as possible if you are wanted dead.

The real lesson is that if you find yourself in a position of authority you must be receptive to the needs and problems of the people. The very worst type of bias is the idea that what benefits you most must necessarily benefit everyone most.

I have never made direct mention of them before, yet I constantly have been discussing the foolishness of their ideology. And of the many undesirable direct consequences of their ideology. And now a direct attack by those who seek to destroy what for hundreds of years, perhaps thousands, citizens of the world have fought for.

The right to self determination.

This is sparked by an exceptionally ignorant editorial in this week’s issue of Imprint, the University of Waterloo student newspaper. The editorial was titled No government is good.

What, exactly, is so wrong headed about this argument? The first and most important problem is the argument that a non-functioning government is the best form of government, as though the people we elected to govern our nation are not up to the task of it.

This idea has its source in a couple of deeply flawed ideas.

The first is the confusion between self interest and disinterest. The former being what modern economics demands we operate solely by. The later which democracy functions by. Certainly economics is an interesting field of the social sciences, as important as any other, but it alone does not have the rights and responsibilities to run government, or any type of government policy. Human beings are not solely self-interested beings, they are an irreconcilable combination of self-interest and group-interest.

Irreconcilable. Combination. Digest what that means for a moment.

Both factors are important for a functional human being. Leave self interest for where it is best, and leave government to disinterest. Society functions not based on the wild swings of the market but rather on the interactions of the human beings that make it up. Interactions which do involve the buyer-seller relations described by economics but also the family, friends, neighbour, etc. relations. When determining government policy, we must not enter with the thought “How can I get the best deal for myself,” but rather “What policies and practices are going to benefit society as a whole most.”

Ethics. Operating for the greater good rather than the personal good or the private good. When I am done school, self interest says that I should no longer care about education (unless I have children). Group interest tells me this is the highest level of foolishness. For social reasons as well as economic. Certianly the old adage that the youth are the future does hold true and influences this, as employees and future employers as an economic argument but, more importantly for the fabric of society, education is the process by whch we train the next generation of citizens to act in the ethical fashion.

The second source of this ignorant argument is the corporatist. The cult of the professional.

The ideology, which I am unsure if the writer even knows he subscribes to, is the principle that any task should be left to professionals and that the untrained cannot have an opinion, or an opinion which has an effect on the final outcome, about any topic which they themselves have no professional training or knowledge in. Corporatism has its place, having an MBA decide the direction of pure scientific research would be foolish, since the MBA has no skills to help them. Where corporatism is most dangerous is in government.

In government, corporatism has two important outcomes. The first is that government must be run by professionals. The environment ministry must be run by environmental scientists, since science is unbiased and impartial. But are the scientists themselves biased? And since they are scientists, they have no right to discuss policy with the natural resource departments, since environmental science is not the same as earth science. And neither are the same as human resources, or finance or transportation. Never mind the fact that all of these departments can be horribly interrelated to such a degree that any single specialist would never be able to see the big picture, the possible outcomes for other departments. No, if you are not a professional in the field then your opinion has no validity.

Of course, the parliament itself is dominated by nonprofessionals. The people elect it, and the people are not professionals in the art of government. This is either solved by having professionals select government or by having the people select from a list of certified professionals.

Either case, our right to self determination goes out the window. Which is the second important outcome. We lose our right to govern ourselves.

Which is what the article is all about. We have no right to determine how we want our society to be governed. We are to be reduced to a passive role where the only vote of any consequence is which brand of toothpaste we purchase and from which store. A mere mockery of democracy where societies interest is confused with the interest of large companies.

This morning, in my mailbox, was this delightful message from our local Member of Parliament, Peter Braid. Before I continue and, so to speak, remove the muzzle on myself, I should point out that in the grand scheme of things, Peter Braid has done a fine job here in Kitchener-Waterloo. He is, as far as I can tell, not the problem with the Conservative Party of Canada (CPC). However, it is difficult to really determine things for sure since Mr. Harper keeps all of his MPs quite quiet most of the time. The problem with the CPC is Mr. Harper’s autocratic leadership style. That, however, is a low hanging fruit for another time.

The main message reads:

In these tough economic times, standing up for families is more important than ever. The Conservative Government is delivering on its commitments to families.

We understand that everyone is stretching to make ends meet. Our Government introduced measures that give families a break, long before the global recession hit, and now Canada’s Economic Action Plan is making sure families get the support they need.

We have delivered a new child tax credit, the Universal Child Care Benefit and a break for families that enroll their kids in amateur sports.

The marriage penalty in the tax system has been removed.

Registered Education Savings Plans have been strengthened, so families can plan better for the future.

All of these measures have helped put Canada and Canadian families in a strong position to weather the storm, and set the stage for a promising future.

The Conservative Government is also helping young families get a head start on buying their first homes, by providing up to $750 in tax relief. We’re also providing first-time home buyers with more flexibility to buy or build a home. They can now withdraw up to $25,000 from RRSP savings to do so, an increase from the previous limit of $20,000.

These measures don’t just help first-time home buyers; they also stimulate our economy by boosting demand for housing, which is a key driver of economic activity in Canada.

The Home Renovation Tax Credit is an important foundation of Canada’s Economic Action Plan. We are lending a hand to families who want to improve their homes as their most significant investment, and at the same time, giving a boost to tradespeople and businesses that produce and sell building materials.

This year, as we fight the global recession, families will be able to claim a credit for eligible renovations worth up to $10,000 and receive up to $1350 in tax relief.

Right across the country, Canadian families are benefiting from this tax relief by improving kitchens and bathrooms, building new decks, laying new carpet or even putting on new roofs.

This activity is putting contractors, carpenters, and all kinds other trades people to work.

It’s generating local business at everything from hardware stores to lumber yards.

In turn, the entire Canadian economy reaps the benefits.

The Home Renovation Tax Credit, and the other new investments we’re making to stimulate the economy, are designed to create and protect jobs during this period.

All these measures reflect our belief that by making life a little easier for families, we can build a stronger Canada.

I found this to be a laughable piece, and will now take you through it, paragraph by paragraph.

In these tough economic times, standing up for families is more important than ever. The Conservative Government is delivering on its commitments to families.

While this is pure false populism and thus disgusting, there is technically nothing wrong with it. It does, however, set the tone for this entire piece.

We understand that everyone is stretching to make ends meet. Our Government introduced measures that give families a break, long before the global recession hit, and now Canada’s Economic Action Plan is making sure families get the support they need.

I’d call both of these points entirely false. The first is certianly, the second might be a matter of opinion.

Firstly, I recall Mr. Harper saying something to the effect that Canadians should be buying stock right now, since it is such a good deal. He said this during an election campaign after the crisis had really struck. An election campaign which he ran largely without a platform, and thus, without a plan. The fact is that the crisis really started to strike noticably a few weeks earlier than this, and to the best of my knowledge nothing was done about it for quite a few months owing to a prorougeing of Parliament.

It has been pointed out to me that technically, from an economist’s standpoint, a recession starts after two quarter years of negative growth. So the recession would not have started until later than when things went bad. I call nonsense on this point, if this is the argument the CPC is using then they have failed at communication. Use regular style english, not professional jargon, when communicating.

We have delivered a new child tax credit, the Universal Child Care Benefit and a break for families that enroll their kids in amateur sports.

Amature sports are definatly a middle-class past time. This is good for the middle-class, who were hit rather hard in the ongoing depression. The only negative comment one can say about this is that it will not benefit those hardest hit. This is a trend in CPC policy, and by extension in this pamphlet. Moving on to tax credits. A tax credit will only benifit those who would be paying taxes, if you are unemployed, you probably do not pay taxes. Again, hardly helping those who need it most.

The marriage penalty in the tax system has been removed.

Now, until I read this pamphlet I did not know what such a thing was. Apparently, to use their slant on the matter, it is descrimination against single-earner households who pay higher tax rates than an even split between the two with the same overall total wage. Certianly such descrimination, which is what it is, should not be encouraged. There may be issues regarding which persons work in a household which this solution glosses over, and I intend to find out more myself, but for now, I’ll give the CPC this one. Well done.

Registered Education Savings Plans have been strengthened, so families can plan better for the future.

Good policy, but those who need assistance most lack money to save and are statistically less likely to educate their children. Neither of these issues are addressed, granted, the later is a permanent problem and one can hardly blame the CPC alone for it.

All of these measures have helped put Canada and Canadian families in a strong position to weather the storm, and set the stage for a promising future.

This statement is true if you benefited from any of the above listed items. If you were a middle-class family with money to invest and spend on leisure and had a single wage earner, you are benefiting greatly from these policies. This does include a very large number of Canadians, and I will not take away from that. However, one must remember that this is not everyone and that there are many Canadians who truly need assistance.

The Conservative Government is also helping young families get a head start on buying their first homes, by providing up to $750 in tax relief. We’re also providing first-time home buyers with more flexibility to buy or build a home. They can now withdraw up to $25,000 from RRSP savings to do so, an increase from the previous limit of $20,000.

Allowing people to use up any savings they may have to get the economy started up on the exact path that just lead to ruin, bravo. Add more tax cuts which don’t help people who cannot afford a home or people who don’t pay taxes and you have more standard conservative policy.

These measures don’t just help first-time home buyers; they also stimulate our economy by boosting demand for housing, which is a key driver of economic activity in Canada.

Again: inflated housing prices help no one.

The Home Renovation Tax Credit is an important foundation of Canada’s Economic Action Plan. We are lending a hand to families who want to improve their homes as their most significant investment, and at the same time, giving a boost to tradespeople and businesses that produce and sell building materials.

I’ve always disagreed that a home is an investment. A home is the place you live and grow. Perhaps it is idealistic of me, but I find it impossible to put a price on such a thing. Much less allow it to cause intense inflation. However, this does promote spending and does employ some tradespeople, so while I find this ideologically unpleasant, it may actually work. Again, only if you already have money to spend and have any taxes left to pay after all these tax credits.

This year, as we fight the global recession, families will be able to claim a credit for eligible renovations worth up to $10,000 and receive up to $1350 in tax relief.

Right across the country, Canadian families are benefiting from this tax relief by improving kitchens and bathrooms, building new decks, laying new carpet or even putting on new roofs.

This activity is putting contractors, carpenters, and all kinds other trades people to work.

It’s generating local business at everything from hardware stores to lumber yards.

I won’t bother repeating myself on all this again. It may work, but it doesn’t assist everyone in the country equally.

In turn, the entire Canadian economy reaps the benefits.

Time will tell, but I expect that it will have some benefits. Just not equally across the board.

The Home Renovation Tax Credit, and the other new investments we’re making to stimulate the economy, are designed to create and protect jobs during this period.

All these measures reflect our belief that by making life a little easier for families, we can build a stronger Canada.

I won’t fault them on these last statements, this is just politician talk and any party would say the same.

In summation, the Conservative Party of Canada is behaving like a conservative party probably should. I will not say that they do not have Canada’s best interest in their mind, since everything they have done does address the problems at hand, albeit in a round-a-bout and convoluted way which I find ideologically disagreeable.

I think my days of reading mail propaganda are over for a while.

I recently made some statements about the nature of the public good, which I feel compelled to clarify exactly what I mean, in the hopes of convincing the reader of the nature of society.

First, the public good is a positive populist principle used here to mean what is best for the sum total of the citizens in whatever electoral area we are discussing, be it municipal, provincial or federal. Serving the public good is serving society as a whole, not serving individuals.

For example, socialised medical care is in service of the public good, since society as a whole benefits from healthy people. Safe and modern infrastructure benefits the public good because no one benefits if bridges fall down or if brownouts are demanded due to electricity capacity.

Acting in the interest of the public good is an exercise in rejecting what may be best for you personally in favour of what is best for the whole of society. It is always better for you if you pay less tax, but if government is unable to deliver the services required of it then lower tax is not in the public good.

Acting in the public good is just a matter of doing what is best for society from an absolute point of view, not from an ideological point of view.

Ideologies are an attempt to force society to conform to a pattern, rather than drawing patterns from society and using those. Ideologies of all kinds are inherently Utopian and impossible to achieve. Anyone acting in the public good ignores ideology and focuses on what is best for a specific situation.

For example, although both socialists and conservatives would disagree with me quite extensively, sometimes it is appropriate to privatise a crown corporation or a government service. Sometimes it is appropriate to have government take on a role which was provided by private enterprise. The only question you need to ask yourself in each case is who will serve the public better. If a private corporation is unwilling to serve the entirety of the public with an important or necessary service, then it falls to government to either make up the difference, relieve private enterprise of their role in the area or subsidise services. The same sort of behaviour is required of government in the case that private enterprise is better able to serve the public as a whole.

Anyone claiming that the above is an inappropriate way of looking at things has probably fallen victim to ideology and has a Utopian view, such as the belief that the free market will solve all problems. The market is quite able to solve a large number of issues when it is profitable to do so, but the market is an entirely inappropriate method to deliver services to dispersed populations where profit margins are too low or nonexistent at all.

It is governments role in a democratic society to be responsible to the people. The people are the source of power as it is their vote and their voice which forms government. Since a government is responsible to the people first and only, it falls to the government to promote the public good. This has not happened in recent times. Governments have been ignoring the source of power and legitimacy, the people, in favour of serving private interests of corporations or specific sectors of society.

Background: cbc.ca

Beyond that, especially the level of ignorance in comments. My serious question is whether or not anyone reads anymore, or if they just have a knee jerk reaction and run with it.

Elections Canada decided that it was against religious freedom to force people to remove veils in public for the purpose of voting. They would be required to reveal their face in private to an official prior to getting their ballot. This was to prevent, for example, men seeing a woman’s face if she did not wish it to happen. This was an enabling decision made to allow greater participation by every Canadian citizen.

And let me repeat: this was an interpretation of a longstanding law. Not a new law. Not rewriting laws. This was the interpretation of the existing law.

What was announced today was the highly controversial policy to change the existing election laws to prevent this from happening. I have theories about why such a policy might have been brought forward in the first place, but these are my own personal opinions about the matter and are irrelevant to present discussion.

So let us review the facts:

Elections Canada announces interprets existing law and decides that veiled voting is permissible in our democracy. The Conservative Party of Canada presents a plan to change the law, realize that there is no will in the House of Commons, which was democratically elected by the entire country, to bring forth such a plan. The Conservative Party of Canada kills the plan in a huge show of public relations.

An example people might understand:

What if it was illegal (impossible for it to be so, I would not support it) to vote with a cross showing. Why, I don’t know. Just say this was the case. Would we be up in arms? Yes. Everyone in the country aught to be, I don’t know if they all would be, but I know that I would oppose such action. Yes, are other issues with a veil. No, I am not saying the situation is identical. Or even related. There are issues with veils, I honestly think there is a gender issue related to it. But if a person wants to wear one, they should not be prevented from doing so.

Which brings us to the politics of it.

If the majority of the house does not want to pursue a piece of legislation, then (theoretically) the majority of Canadians do not want a piece of legislation. We can debate whether or not our MPs represent us until the proverbial cows come home, it changes nothing (I know mine does not represent me) .

The Conservative Party of Canada is in minority government, which means there are more opposition members than government members. They cannot do whatever they want, which is good for Canadians (the same can be said of any other party, minority governments are inherently much more democratic than majorities).

But I digress. The point is: read to become informed, avoid knee jerk reactions, think, think, THINK. An informed and thinking citizen is what this country needs, not clients.

We hear a lot of talk about referendums these days, especially about how they are the most pure form of democracy which a society can have. Direct democracy, it is argued, represents the true will of the people in creating consensus about how a society should move forward.

Now, anyone reading this after having read other posts I have written, will know that I am going to speak against direct democracy. And naturally, one must question my stability upon attacking such a target. Surely, everyone having an equal say in deciding the outcome of an important (or unimportant) question is the definition of a good democracy. And obviously I am going to disagree, and hopefully, in the process of explaining why, bring you onto my side concerning this topic.

So let me begin.

The first reason why I disagree with the use of direct deomcracy is that it reduces political discourse to marketing. And by this I mean the question posed to the public. How do you pose the question? Which shall be the `yea’ side and which the `nay’. This is an important consideration, as one has an obvious negative connotation. Certianly, most people would not be affected by such a simple matter, but one cannot deny the complexity of the decision making process, perhaps such considerations should not be ignored.

Beyond which side shall be yes and which shall be no, the exact wording of the question becomes incredibly important. If you can word the question correct you might be able to win people to your side. Or just keep them from the opponents side. If the question makes it sound treasonous to disagree, some might abstain rather than disagreeing. Likely not many, but some.

All this highlights another important issue: oversimplification. This works two ways. First, the phrasing of the question can make an answer seem obvious of gloss over the nuances of the actual situation. The other, more dangerous, simplification is in the results. 55% in favour of a proposition is a majority. The government can then go ahead and implement the proposition and disregard the detractors. But 45% of people disagreed. They have been silenced by the majority. Thus, a false sense of agreement and support is created.

The final issue I shall discus for the time being is the public good. This is a simple argument: direct democracy encourages selfishness, you are to vote how is best for you. In a general election, since more than a single proposition is being voted on, you are more likely to vote along what is best for society as a whole. Selfishness is the enemy of democracy, and referendums breed selfishness.

Those are some reasons why I dislike direct democracy and tremble when people call for greater use of it. Tomorrow I shall discuss selfishness and its negative effect on democratic society. Until then, think hard.

A neoliberal will argue that they support decentralisation because local governments are better able to deal with the ‘facts on the ground’ than a more centralised government.

This may be the case.

Certainly a local government is more in tune with the particular concerns of the people living in a province, region, township, city. And there is a lot of truth to this fact. A strategy to deal with poverty in Toronto is going to look different than a strategy in Timmins, Ontario or Churchill, Manitoba.

But there is another reason. I would argue the real reason. Related to division and conquest. Certainly, no party could ever successfully destroy something like medicare on the national level. The country is too large and diverse for any regional power to get enough strength and will to do so. If they did manage then they would suffer tremendously during any following elections.

But on a regional level, things are much more prone to wild shifts. In Ontario, for instance, Mike Harris was able to rule the province owing to the population distribution. On a more local level, the lessened diversity of opinion results in the chance of dangerous change occuring much more easily and rapidly.

This is, in my opinion, why neoliberalism is so in favour of decentralisation. It has nothing to do with imaginary gains in efficiency, since a functional democracy is highly inefficient by design and necessity. It has everything to do with the increased effectiveness in destroying the public good to increase their own power.

All this is not to say that centralisation is best in every case. Just that a ballance of powers is best. Reason is best when determining these things. It just must be remembered that we should all do what is in the public’s good, not our own personal good. We must act as citizens, not selfish individuals.

The courts got it wrong. The people were selfish. And now its all a mess.

Direct democracy is a wonderful thing. People deciding what they want for themselves, not selecting someone who they hope will represent them. A great thing indeed. The voice of the people should be respected above almost everything else.

Why almost? Because one of the most important principles of democracy is that the majority cannot remove the rights of the minority. And this is what has happened.

You can bitch and whine and say that “NO! This was not a right they had and we can’t have taken it away for that reason!” And technically you would be correct. But you have that right, and therefore everyone should have that right. We are all equal, right?

That’s the theory. But not today.

People: just because you think one thing does not make it right or wrong. If you want a right or privilege, then everyone must have it. Perhaps it is time to bring civics class back. You do not have to agree on moral grounds but to pretend that actions such as this are democratic is shameful and disrespectful to democracy.

Do you want to live in a democracy or a dictatorship? Ask yourself this and really thing. A democracy means that everyone must be equal, even if granting such equality might be morally objectionable to you. If you are not comfortable with this then stop lying to yourself and proclaim your beliefs for what they are: theocratic, authoritarian and foolish. If you can accept that maybe, just maybe, people can be happy through lifestyles other than the one you have, then fight for democracy and fight for human rights.

The choice is yours, speak your mind.

I won’t necessarily agree with what you say but I will fight for your right to say it.

Let us ensure we all understand a very simple thing before we get started on this: I, as a Canadian citizen, have the right to say nearly anything I please. I cannot call for someone to be harmed. I cannot discus some of the work I have done in the past. The first is a limit on my freedoms which a functional democratic nation requires, the second is an agreement I personally signed. There are a few select other cases where I cannot say what I chose to. However, in most cases, I can.

A second thing to understand is that, while you and I have the right to be offended at what someone else says, we do not have the right to be free from offence. In fact, offence is important if you can stand back and rationally examine what made you offended; if you realize that you were foolish for being offended and can move on, good for you; if you decide to remain offended then do not expect the situation to change. You are entirely free to remain offended or ignore me, but you never gain the right to silence me.

Now everyone just step back and think about what was just said. Really consider it. Even the most rational of us often forget this.

And now we can move forward.

What this means is that I can say whatever I wish so long as I break no laws. I am a Canadian citizen writing on a blog which is likely hosted in the United States of America. It is fortunate for me that both of these nations respect such freedoms.

I will always say what I think and I will never censor anyone on this site so long as they are being civil and reasonable. I would like it very much if everyone else did the same, all across the world.

Let us ensure we all understand a very simple thing before we get started on this: I, as a Canadian citizen, have the right to say nearly anything I please. I cannot call for someone to be harmed. I cannot discus some of the work I have done in the past. The first is a limit on my freedoms which a functional democratic nation requires, the second is an agreement I personally signed. There are a few select other cases where I cannot say what I chose to. However, in most cases, I can.

A second thing to understand is that, while you and I have the right to be offended at what someone else says, we do not have the right to be free from offence. In fact, offence is important if you can stand back and rationally examine what made you offended; if you realize that you were foolish for being offended and can move on, good for you; if you decide to remain offended then do not expect the situation to change. You are entirely free to remain offended or ignore me, but you never gain the right to silence me.

Now everyone just step back and think about what was just said. Really consider it. Even the most rational of us often forget this.

And now we can move forward.

What this means is that I can say whatever I wish so long as I break no laws. I am a Canadian citizen writing on a blog which is likely hosted in the United States of America. It is fortunate for me that both of these nations respect such freedoms.

I will always say what I think and I will never censor anyone on this site so long as they are being civil and reasonable. I would like it very much if everyone else did the same, all across the world.

So it happened. Obama is finally the president of the United States of America. And he is still speaking in terms of emotion. Emotion is fine, but at some point he has to change emotion for fact and plans, hopefully action as well. I had hoped that today might be that day, but it turns out that blind hope on its own is not sufficient.

The world needs leadership, Obama can be part of it, but the US is not the only country in the world. Let us hope that people can work together.

It isn’t that I am cynical, it is that I am realistic. Words are one thing, but action is always needed in the end. Let us hope he is up to the job.

Just when I thought I was free I get dragged back into it.

So I keep hearing the arguments that people `did not vote for a coalition.’ This is true. The fact is that they did not vote for the Conservative party either.

We vote for a person, not a party. Now, most of us do vote based on the party of our choice, however we must realise that our perceptions will not change the reality of our electoral system. You did not vote for a coalition. You also did not vote for the Liberals, the Conservatives, the Marxist-Leninist or the Bloc Quebecois. You vote for a single person who is theoretically supposed to represent your ideas.

Of course, not even I do this. But I am mature and reasonable enough to realise what my vote actually means. Please people, stop pretending that intention colours the meaning of the vote. No individual belief or thought changes that you vote for a person, not a party.

Now we must understand this. Anyone saying that they did not vote for a coalition is stating a fact, yes, but it does not carry the meaning they wish it to. They are only revealing their ignorance to our electoral system or, perhaps, merely stating the obvious. No one voted for a coalition, no one voted for the Conservative Party, no one voted for the Liberals, just as no one voted for any party.

Its just the way our government works.

I have read a large number of peoples’ opinions on this. That is all they are, opinions. There is what is legally allowed and what people consider to be moral. Lets work at separating the two.

From past writings, I am sure it is clear which side I appear fall on this debate. I want a functional government, be it Conservative or coalition. To be entirely honest, all of the parties working together would be the most idea, if unlikely, solution to our `crisis.’ I honestly do not care who gets to live on Sussex Dr., so long as they govern with respect and dignity. Whether any of the current party leaders are even capable of that is another matter which I will not consider at this time.

I have tried to point out the facts on how our democracy works all week. In keeping with this recent tradition, I am now going to defend Stephen Harper’s actions in suspending Parliament.

First of all, this is an entirely legal action. There is no arguing this. Just like there was no arguing that a coalition government was illegal. Calling either of these fabrications results only in the person making the claim displaying their ignorance or their agenda.

The morality of this action, as the morality of forming a coalition government, is entirely up for debate. Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. However, I would say this is not an immoral thing to do. Instead, I think that this was exactly what the situation called for.

Lets step back and examine exactly what suspending Parliament until the new year is going to do.

1. This will cool tempers
   All MPs will have a chance to talk things over in detail, work out agreements if necessary, and perhaps even work together on a larger scale. If Parliament were to continue now, harsh things could be said from emotion which were not meant
2. The Canadian public can become better educated.
   All of the political parties have been streaming constant attacks on the opposing party for days now. As far as I can tell, not one of these groups has actually been truthful about what is happening and what is legally able to happen. Harper has been saying that a coalition is illegal and undemocratic, which is false, and I am sure Dion and Layton will be calling Harper a coward over todays decision. Ideally this should stop and politicians can work to actually educate the public, rather than indoctrinating them.
3. MPs can ask their constituents what they think of any plans.
   My riding currently is represented by a Conservative who won by about 40 votes. NDP+Liberal supporters make up a plurality in this riding. He may be a member of the Conservative party, but I believe that he should do his best to determine what his electorate wants from him. This advice goes for every MP in every riding. The coalition is legal, but it is a change. MPs deserve the time to consult with the people who they represent, both those who voted for them and those who did not, to see how the people feel. Even though I did not vote for the Conservative candidate in my riding, I would be appalled if he ignored those in his riding just because we wear different political colours. I already said that all of the parties working together would be the best solution in my mind.

I, however, doubt this is what will happen. I fully expect that MPs will follow party lines on this, that all of the parties will spend the next two months filling the airwaves with the most horrendous lies and half-truths. And when Parliament reconvenes, I fully expect nothing to have been solved.

Perhaps I am too cynical. I know I will be in contact with my MP. I expect the same from all other Canadians. These are exciting political times, lets hope we do the right thing.

Its time to talk politics again. This whole ‘crisis’ is really trying my patience. Especially the ignorance of those who seem to speak the loudest. So, it is now time to set the record straight.

For some reason, the Prime Minister Stephen Harper, has been able to convince the masses that coalition governments are both immoral and illegal. This is an utter fabrication. Truthfully, Harper should have a coalition in Parliament at this very moment, since his party does not have a majority of the seats. Furthermore, if a coalition wishes to form and have power, it is fully able to. This is how our government is supposed to function. Stephen Harper can behave as though he has a majority as much a he wishes, but in reality he has a minority government, and a weak one at that.

There has been talk that Jack Layton and Gilles Duceppe were in collusion prior to the election, and perhaps even the Liberal Party was involved. I do not know if this is the case, however, judging by seat distribution, I can guess that this is not the case. One merely has to look to Italy since the mid 1990s to understand why this is the case.

In Italy, they have a multitude of parties but two ‘cartels,’ organisations of multiple parties which run elections in such a way that their power base is maximised. It works like this: In riding A, there are up to 6 parties which wish to be elected. This is far too many parties for any to gain a clear advantage. Parties 1-3 are some variant socialists, parties 4-6 are some conservative variant. They all differ on the Left-Right and GAL-TAN axis, but they share similar ideals. For instance, you could have a Communist, Socialist and Social Democratic party in one group, a Conservative, Christian Democrat and Neofascist/Neoconservative party in the other. Riding A has a traditional (TAN) bias and favours economic conservatism, but there are a large number of Catholics and the youth are somewhat radicalised. Parties 1-3 know that alone they will not ever win, so they form a coalition and run one candidate between them. Although the right-tan bias nets parties 4-6 60% of the vote, they divide it equally, leaving the coalition of parties 1-3 with the seat. This behaviour obviously necessitates the same kind of behaviour on the TAN-right, which forms its own cartel and, by these numbers, would win the seat. If any party leaves either of the cartels, the vote splitting would reduce both the leaving party and the cartel by a significant number of seats.

Because the NDP ran against Liberals and the Bloc Quebecois in the Federal Election this October, I can be fairly sure that they were not talking to each other beforehand. And even if they were, so what. If GAL values would be better promoted by a single party group instead of multiple parties then so be it. The difference in votes in many riding would mean a vastly different result if the Liberals and NDP were really working together to form a coalition in the ways which Plurality requires.

Conclusion thus far: by the methods which our Plurality functions, the NDP, Bloc and Liberals were not in collusion prior to the election, although they perhaps should have. Even if they were talking before hand, this is entirely legitimate. I can recall a day when there were two conservative parties in Canada, they went through similar motions before unifying to the much stronger and more functional party they have today.

Now, not to make myself seem arrogant or anything, but the Internet is full of people who just do not get it. Well, I finally found someone who really seems to. So, instead of paraphrasing to an extreme limit, I’m going to direct you in the right direction.

If you would like a summary of exactly how Canadian democracy works, go here.

I really wanted to keep from writing about politics here. However, sometimes, we have to do things we do not necessarily wish to. So here we go.

When people talk about the `Left’ and the `Right,’ they often are quite confused. On the left they place socialists, greens, communists, social democrats and even others. They claim the right is populated by liberals*, conservatives, fascists, Christian democrats and others. They are not wrong, but to pretend that greens, social democrats and communists are the same is foolhardy. And while many like to compare conservatives to fascists, there exists a world of difference between them. The whole left/right system is nothing but confusing and, when used this way, useless.

Enter a second axis. Surely we could use more, and this would further help us characterise political ideologies, however the added complexity is not necessary for an average citizen, only professional political scientists. Our second axis refers to social policy, leaving the old left/right for economics.

On one side, you have liberals, greens and social democrats. On the other you have communists, fascists, Christian democrats and conservatives. The first is called `GAL,’ which stands for Green, Alternative, Libertarian. The second `TAN,’ Traditional, Authoritarian, Nationalist.

This helps explain differences in ideology in a much more clear way than just using the old terminology of left/right. GAL/TAN has another use, as well. The Left/Right divide refers to traditional politics, where class differences were the key issue in elections. The Left and Right defined an economic standpoint: a continuum from a totally free market to an entirely planned economy. Of course, most parties were not at the extremes on this scale, but fell somewhere between.

New politics is much more based in social issues, rather than economics. Here the continuum is between government authority and personal freedoms. Rather than asking “How much taxation and income redistribution should the citizens face?”, new politics asks “How much control should the government have in peoples’ lives?” A good example of this divide is if homosexuals should have the right to get married. Traditionalists believe the answer is no, based on their beliefs, the past, and in many cases religious texts. The Libertarians believe hat this right should be granted, since they feel the government has no place legislating how people live their lives.

Again, at the extremes, we have very few parties. On one side, you would have an Orwellian dictatorship of perfect totalitarianism, on the other the government would cease to exist. Each of these is as undesirable as a completely free market or an entirely planned economy.

Finally, the reason why this was necissary. When we vote, we have to know what we are voting for. Thinking that a party’s economic stance is the only important thing is foolhardy, just as ignoring it entirely would be. Remember to take both new and old politics into consideration when we vote. There is often nothing wrong with their policies on one axis, however, often there are things hidden on the other.

*A final note: A liberal is someone who believes in total freedom, much like libertarians. In fact, the world outside of North America, where most democracies exist, use the world liberal where North Americans would use libertarian. By these definitions, liberals are Right-GAL. North American Liberals, on the other hand, are centrists, and tend to focus on compromise between the left and right, and usually tend to be on the GAL side of things.

Anyone in Canada over the last week will know what this is about. The Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, issued an economic update to the budget he released last year. The update’s purpose was to reflect the changing world economic situation and its effect on Canada. Some information can be found here.

I am not going to say anything on the reaction to this, enough has been said. However, I have not heard one particular argument as to why dropping the $1.95 per vote subsidy that each party gets to fund their operations. The argument relates to our plurality system.

Like the United States and Great Briton, Canada runs on a plurality, rather than proportional, system. This means that a candidate in a riding must only receive one more vote than the candidate with the second highest number of votes to be declared the winner in that riding and represent it in Parliament. Even if 10 parties run and split the vote roughly equally, with one party receiving a few votes more than the others, that party gets the whole seat. The other parties get nothing. Except, of course, this subsidy.

It is a commonly known fact that in plurality based systems, votes are wasted. What most people don’t realise is that they are wasted both ways. Most people understand that if one party gets 40% of the vote, the second place one receives 35%, and a third party has 25%, then a full 60% of the people in that riding did not have their voices heard, since total popular vote doesn’t mean anything. However, if there are three or more parties in a given riding, then every vote over the bare plurality of the second place parties vote count + 1 also counts to nothing, since the party already has been granted the seat.

Now, the person who’s vote was wasted on the winning side might not mind, since their vote might just as well have been one of the votes which allowed the candidate to win, but this still poses an interesting problem. If the government is supposed to be democratically elected, yet in Canada’s roughly three party system up to 66% of the population could have no say in the formation of government. (A truly frightening statistic is that, in such a three party system, a party can receive a majority if they get a bare plurality of about 34% in only 50% + 1 of the ridings, which works out to approximately 17% of the popular vote.)

So here is where the economic update comes in, specifically the fate of the $1.95. So long as this subsidy exists then the otherwise wasted votes have meaning. The Green Party may have gotten no seats, but they did receive a fairly large share of the popular vote, meaning they will receive a fair amount of money to keep their party alive to mount a campaign again another day. By garnering roughly 7% of the national vote, they have proven that their platform has a level of support unheard of by most other niche issue parties.

I have seen a few comments around stating that the Conservative Party has the most to lose by this measure, and it is true that they will lose the largest dollar amount of all the parties. However, they will be losing the lowest percentage amount compared to their total income intake in a given year. Some have argued that the other parties should focus more on raising funds in other ways, especially donations. My only thought on this is that a fiscally conservative party would likely have the wealthiest voter base. There is nothing wrong with this. Social Democratic parties like the NDP tend to focus more on those who would not be able to afford donations to political parties, while the Greens tend to be a party of the young, people who are using what money they have for schooling. While these parties should probably focus more on fundraising, especially in light of this event, the fact remains that the Conservatives are better based to receive large amounts of funding from private persons. We must remember that government must speak for everyone, not only those who can afford to keep their choice party afloat.

This issue, like so many others in Canadian democracy, should really not exist. A diverse group of political parties ensures that all beliefs have the chance of being represented. So long as a belief receives votes it is worthy of a continued existence, no matter if the people pushing it are willing or capable of funding it personally. That is the true tragedy of this, Canada has a comparatively diverse political landscape when compared to other plurality countries. This funding helps contribute to that, without it we would have fewer parties, fewer new ideas and a much more bland political culture.