COALITION GOVERNMENT?

In my opinion, Harper precipitated the current state of federal politics by the proposing of cutting back funding to the various parties, and then things escalated from there.

OK, Goys and Birls, now that the GG has prorogued Parliament, what do you think will happen? Do you think the Tories will use the next six weeks to start a new election campaign? Do you think the coalition will break down? Do you think that there will be a vote of no confidence in January?

Whatchathinkkids?

i'm not a fan of the bloc, but the conservatives will further demonize them and accuse the coalition of opening the door to the destruction of canada

and they would be right

Heil Harper ! ! !

(OK, ok, i'll tone it down . . .)

Did you hear his remarks after he met the GG? It was as though he were schizoid . . . he kept speaking about the three parties whose interest is national, the implication being that the Bloc doesn't care about Canada, and then trying to suggest that he respects the Bloc and the people of Québec. Duceppe called him twelve kinds of liar after his speech. One of Harper's stragedies in the last election was to pick up seats in Québec . . . one has to assume he's give up on that.

Yep. If Stephan Dion was not such an idiot....we would probably have a Liberal government now.

I don't think Dion is an idiot, but i do think he is own worst political enemy. He can get down and fight in the trenches with the best of them--he gives Harper Holy Hell in the House all the time. But he is hopeless as a campaigner--he comes off as lame and out of touch. He's probably too intelligent to be an effective campaigner. I don't think the Liberals could have won the last election even if someone other than Dion had been the leader--but i would agree that they could have done much better, and that Dion is probably the one responsible for their failure to have done any better than they did.

OK.. I will give you that he is not an idiot. Translate idiot into lame and out of touch and we are in agreement.

You are also correct in that they probably would not have won, but they would have done much better and the Conservatives would have had a small majority at best.

If there was a coaltion, I cannot even fathom the fact that he could become Prime Minister.

I think the biggest problem the proposed coalition has, in terms of public perception, is Dion as PM. If the coalition is to survive, and improve upon the time available in the next six weeks, they should use it to come up with someone else to be PM. I have no doubt that as soon as the House is back in session, the opposition is going to move no confidence, and that Harper will then call for a new election (which will p*ss people off), and try to throw the blame on the opposition. What will be interesting is to see if the GG will allow a coalition to form a new government if no confidence is move and passed, or whether she would allow Harper to fight a new election.

Any way you look at it, not a lot of productive work is being done by this House.

By the way, all the law requires is that the governing party or coalition appoint a member of the House who has the confidence of the House--it doesn't have to be either Dion or Layton--it can be any member of one of those parties who currently sits for a riding.

Exactly. The extra time, however, gives those who propose a coalition to prepare for an election.

If an election is called, I can see that the people of Canada could look at it in two ways. Either they will blame the other parties for the need to call an election or they could blame Harper for taking this road.

The fact that the Liberals lost so many seats in the recent election could continue.

My bet is that an election will be called and the Liberals will lose more seats (unless Dion is dumped and a really strong leader is put into place real quick) and the NDP will gain more seats. We will probably still see a minority Conservative government and we will all be the worse for it.

if harper and a few selected cabinet members, baird for one, were to commit some sort of ritual suicide on the steps of parliament, i'd be willing to let the whole thing go

That would probably be the outcome of a new election. I think a lot of people ignored that early in Harper's first government, there was a by-election in Québec, all the pundits were arguing about whether the Tories would take it away from the Liberals, or the Bloc would take it away from the Liberals--and the New Democrats came in and snapped it up. The NDP has been the real gainer in the last two elections, and in truly dramatic fashion last time. But i also think that Harper will have sufficiently alienated les habitants that there could be a reaction in favor of the Bloc in a new election.

Of course, if Harper comes back, loses a vote of no confidence, and goes back to the GG, she has every right to ask the opposition to form a government.

Yeah, but most voters aren't as reasonable and forgiving as you are . . .

The whole thing was a cluster ****. I'm pissed at all of them. A cooling off period was needed, but I didn't think it would be allowed. Yeah, I said it. Cluster ****.

I just checked to be sure, and the evidence is pretty good that the NDP has really prospered under Layton's management.

In 2004, the NDP picked up 6 seats, from 13 to 19, and nearly doubled the number of voters who chose the New Democrats, from just under 1,100,000 to well over 2,100,000. In '06, they jumped from 19 seats to 29, but their share of the vote only jumped by less than a half million votes. In this last election, they picked up eight more seats, from 29 to 37, and this time they polled fewer votes than they had in '06, although they picked up somewhat more than a half of a percentage point of the voter turn-out. All the evidence is that Layton has managed the affairs of the NDP better than any other leader, except for Ed Broadbent.

I think that's an angry puppy . . .

yup yup yup

an "enjoyable" editorial from the globe and mail :

How to spend your stay of execution

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20081204.WBwbradwanski20081204121135/WBStory/WBwbradwanski

my understanding is that the GG had little choice but to "follow the prime minester's advice " .
i believe she supposed to follow "precedent" .
though one elder and retired parliamantarian who has advised many young democracies on how to conduct parliament , suggested she should not listen too much to her advisers and instead talk to her hairdresser and other "normal" people .
he said that always applying old and established principles will result in the atrophy of the political system . "new ideas are required" , was his final comment - pretty sensible imo .

i place the blame for the whole fiasko with canada's outmoded "first-past-the-post" system .
most of today's modern countries - especially im europe - have more representative systems . no wonder many canadians don't vote since they believe that the current election system gives their vote scant chance - unless they vote pc or liberal or they live in quebec .
since the current system favours the pc's and the lib's there isn't much of a chance that we'll see the system changed .
hbg

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38,000 people voted for monsewer Harper and we're stuck with this mess

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We elected a parliament, not a prime minister.

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