TIME TO VOTE! THAT MEANS YOU! YES, YOU, READING THIS RIGHT NOW!

VOTING TIME!!!!!!!!!



Here is a useful election FAQ if you're unsure about how long voting will take, how to vote if you wear a face covering, or what kind of ID you can bring.

Still undecided? Here's one more platform-comparing tool.

And now go vote! And to awesome people like my Awesome Housemate who are working the polls this election: you guys are awesome. You are like millions of hand across the country holding the democracy tent over our heads.

Okay, awkward simile time is over. Time to vote!

Coast-to-Coast with Editorials

So this is pretty neat. It’s a collection of abridged editorials from across the country. I, of course, cannot refrain from adding my commentary.

From the Vancouver Sun:

…the Conservatives should be returned to Parliament with a majority. A minority government will be unstable at a time when we need stability. Without a majority, Canadians will have no idea who their leader will be. The fact is that the opposition could defeat the government on the budget within a matter of weeks of the next sitting of Parliament. Then, either Ignatieff (or possibly his successor, whoever that might be) or Layton could ask the Governor-General to invite one or the other or both of them to form a government.

. . . Canada can't afford an election that delivers a result with so much uncertainty.

. . . Despite the Tories' flaws, however, a Conservative majority is the only path that at this time leads us to a Canada that will remain the prosperous, peaceful and predictable country in which we are fortunate enough to live.

False. We are not a republic. Not knowing who the leader of our government will be doesn’t really change much. The prime minister is the leader of the party that forms the government. Let’s not inflate the position with too much importance.

Honestly, majorities are scarier because they’re the closest this country can legally get to a dictatorship. Minorities have to compromise, not be reckless—be predictable. Majority governments have historically been the most unpredictable, and passed the most bills that weren’t in their platforms.

And you know what? No matter what happens in the House of Commons, the core of the civil service remains stable, with just a few changes at the upper bureaucratic levels. Civil servants will be peeved if the upper administration keeps changing on them like that, but the people who actually do the stuff to run our country are going to be here doing the stuff that runs the country regardless of the situation in the House.

From the Winnipeg Free Press:

That the country even talks about coalitions composed of weak parties focused on buying votes, instead of focusing on the fragile economic recovery, is all the evidence Canadians should need to conclude that seven years of minority government, of the posturing and name-calling and brinksmanship that results when no one ultimately is in charge, must end. Canada must get more serious about its present predicaments and future prosperity. That leaves only the Conservatives.

To be sure, Conservatives over the past five years, and Prime Minister Stephen Harper in particular, have contributed much to the rancour that today sours our polity. But just as surely, over the past five years no political party or leader has shown more disciplined commitment to the engine that makes all else possible — the economy. For all the talk of a hidden, right-wing agenda, none has emerged over five years and there is no evidence it will over the next four.

Oh, please. Our economic recovery is hardly fragile, little thanks to the Conservatives. It was Paul Martin’s banking regulations that left us in such a good place to being with. And as I mentioned earlier, no one ever is “ultimately in charge.” The prime minister’s powers are supposed to be fairly limited, to a leadership role over his own party, and the ability to appoint people and recommend things to the governor general. In fact, the Speaker of the House is far more “ultimately in charge” of the House of Commons.

Of course a “hidden, right-wing agenda” hasn’t emerged over the last five years—that kind of thing is really difficult to have with a minority government. The fact that we haven’t seen a hidden right-wing agenda doesn’t mean there isn’t one (not that I’m saying there is).

From the Halifax Chronicle Herald:

Voting intentions have moved to the poles as we have got closer to the polls, turning this into an effective contest of the NDP left and the Tory right.

You can peg this partly on Prime Minister Stephen Harper being a polarizing leader. And also on his strategy of eking out a majority by winning over targeted demographic groups in a few marginal ridings instead of aiming to make the Tories a bigger-tent party.

That left a lot voters essentially disengaged. But they have decided they want to be heard in this election. And they've been jumping to Jack Layton to do that . . .

It's an astonishing result when most people, at heart, are probably still somewhere in the middle, not looking either for a big expansion of government, or a drastic shrinkage of the social safety net, but simple competence in managing the economy and public finances and in ensuring crucial public services like health care are there when needed.

True that. Truuue that.

Voters Today: Not All Bad

Low voter turnouts may mean that more of the people who show are informed voters, but this isn’t necessarily the case—especially since only about 20% of the electorate “votes well” (that is, for the common good). And despite everybody freaking out, voter turnout today is not that much less than it has been historically since Confederation:

According to Elections Canada, voter turnout from 1867 to the present has hovered at approximately 70 per cent, but more recent elections have shown erosion from there. About 64 per cent of voters cast a ballot in 2006 and 58.8 per cent voted in 2008.

Voter turnout has actually been in decline since the 1980s, according to Elections Canada, but political scientists have only recently been able to verify this.

Voter turnout figures were based on calculating the number of votes cast against lists of eligible voters. The problem was that lists were sometimes incomplete, error-filled or non-existent. Voter turnout rates were calculated using incomplete data for decades after Confederation in 1867.

In 1997, the national registry of electors was developed, a permanent list that kept track of every eligible voter in Canada. For years until then, political scientists weren't sure whether the perceived downturn in voter turnout was more a myth than reality.

You know, I don’t understand why people persist in thinking that we’ve degenerated from the 1860s. I mean, in the 1860s we still didn’t have secret ballots (those weren’t around until 1874 for federal elections and even later for provincial ones), so you had to stand on the hustings and proclaim your vote, and you got heckled, and the candidates were sitting there watching you proclaim your vote, and people would try to bribe you and because it wasn’t a secret ballot they would know if you didn’t vote the way they wanted and come and beat you up after.

So… yeah. Voting: in better shape than the 1860s even if the voter turnout is about 10% lower.

Getting Ready for the Big Day

I made an election playlist on YouTube of all the most epic, empowering, pro-political engagement songs. If I've forgotten one that is key to your empowerment, comment here or drop me a line at voteagainstapathy[at]gmail.com.

Also preparing election results drinks! I'm watching the results come in with my Awesome Housemate after she comes back from her Awesome Job as a poll clerk. At a polling station. See, these are just the kinds of people I hang out with so you can understand how I'm confused about this apparently low youth voter turnout...

Andrew Coyne explains why he's voting Liberal.

If we return the Conservatives with a majority, if we let all that has gone on these past five years pass, then not only the Tories, but every party will draw the appropriate conclusions. But if we send them a different message, then maybe the work of bringing government to democratic heel, begun in the tumult of the last Parliament, can continue. And that is why I will be voting Liberal on May 2.

Are you still undecided? Apparently, undecided voters are more likely to vote for someone who looks like them. So, you know, if you're a white guy, you've probably got lots of choice.

Chantal Hébert says that the real winner in this election is democracy. Well, I'm paraphrasing a bit, but mine sounds more epic. Actually, she says that the winner is citizen engagement.

The populist mood that could result in a dramatically realigned Parliament on Monday changed the face of municipal politics in Calgary and Toronto last fall, bringing a left-leaning mayor to Alberta’s energy capital and a right-wing one to the home of Canada’s caviar Left.

The wave that could carry Jack Layton and the NDP to a historical finish next week has tapped into the same powerful desire for change but it is different from the one that propelled Rob Ford to the Toronto mayoral office in one significant regard.

In Quebec, where the so-called orange wave originated, the surge of support for the NDP is borne out of more hope than anger.

In spite of the best efforts of Conservative Leader Stephen Harper to claim the role for himself, it is Gilles Duceppe who has emerged as the angry man of the campaign.

The more the Bloc Québécois leader has raised his voice over this campaign, the less his call for a seventh strike vote against the rest of Canada has resonated.

To a lesser degree the same could be said of the Conservative and Liberal campaigns.

If anything, the developments of the past five weeks have shown that there is a lot more appetite for a discourse based on hope than one based on fear.

Hear, hear!

This week the Young Liberals released Angry Bairds, which is exactly what it sounds like.

Saturday Morning Catch-Up

Some news stories from the past few days I haven't gotten around to yet.

1) What would a Harper majority look like? To me, scary, but I think that this author is intentionally trying to be terrifying:

While parties in modern Canada rarely ask for a majority expressly to do big things, it endows them with unfettered authority. A majority as prime minister allows you to summon and dismiss Parliament, set election dates and name the governor general, senators and judges, among other appointments.

By and large, you are — borrowing a line from Globe and Mail columnist Jeffrey Simpson — a "friendly dictator."

So what would Stephen Harper do? While he may pay lip-service to social conservatives, he is unlikely to reopen the debate on abortion, same-sex marriage and capital punishment. He knows that's playing with fire.

What he is more likely to do, though, is what he is doing already: appoint more conservative judges, deny funding to liberal-minded non-governmental organizations like Planned Parenthood, abolish the gun registry and get tough on crime.

Where he is likely to move aggressively is reshaping the state? Here, expect him to use the deficit as reason to shrink the size of government. That may mean slashing the public service, starving (or selling) the CBC, and privatizing government services.

Expect him to lower taxes and explore ways to empower the individual. Expect him to reform the Senate. Expect him to offer the provinces new authority, including Ottawa's residual powers. While he is unlikely to initiate constitutional reform (he doesn't like convening first ministers), expect the national government to be less national.

At the same time, watch for the Conservatives to give more substance to citizenship, which they think is too easy to acquire. There will be new emphasis on national history and national symbols, particularly the monarchy. The Conservative will continue to trumpet the North, espousing a new kind of nationalism.

Abroad, Canada will continue to regard the United Nations suspiciously. There will be no return to peacekeeping, as the Liberals suggest, or a human-security agenda. Military spending will rise while international assistance is reassessed. A foundering CIDA will be reorganized, even abolished.

The government will pursue a new deal with the United States on border and security issues. It will build on new free trade with Europe. Canada will remain Israel's best friend.

Those who expect the same tone and tenor of the last five years — a centrist stewardship, reflecting a comfortable moderation, veering right only on the margins — should not be surprised to see the empowered Conservatives abandon that kind of caution.

*shudder* Also, I just want to say that I don't think you need to make citizenship harder to get when the majority of adults born in Canada already can't pass citizenship tests. I remember my friends memorizing long lists of lieutenant-governors past, and I can't even name any of the current ones.

2) Reality Check on post-election scenarios and the constitution. This lays out potentials for what might/could happen with various election results. With a Conservative minority:

All we know for certain is that in this third scenario, a minority Conservative government would have to table a throne speech to lay out its priorities and a budget (the one in March was never passed), presumably within the next month or so.

If a minority Conservative government were to lose either of those votes, or any confidence vote within, say, four to six months, Harper would have to resign. But he would have the option of asking Gov. Gen. David Johnston for another election.

Normally, the governor general is supposed to act on the "advice" of the prime minister. But in special circumstances like these, "the reserve powers of the Crown come into play," Franks points out.

"These reserve powers permit the governor general to reject Mr. Harper's advice if he requests a dissolution when he holds a minority of seats in the House of Commons and is defeated early in the session of the new Parliament."

At that point, the governor general would inquire whether another party leader could gain the confidence of the House and govern instead, with the support of one or more other parties.

Franks suggests Johnston might well make the leaders commit to such an arrangement for 18 months to two years; indeed, commit to it in writing and make the agreement public.

Franks is basing these time limits - at least four to six months before Johnston would grant another election, and 18 to 24 months for an alternative government to work - on what Adrienne Clarkson wrote about her preparations in case Paul Martin's minority Liberal government fell back in 2004.

That was the year, incidentally, when Harper, Bloc Leader Gilles Duceppe and NDP Leader Jack Layton prepared a letter to remind Clarkson that she didn't necessarily need to grant an election if Martin lost a confidence vote in the House.

Overall, Franks says, "the governor general's first and most important duty is to ensure that there is a prime minister."

3) There have been some youth debates this week, which are interesting to look at not only because it's young people being completely politically involved, but also because they actually cover youth issues (and articulate what they think youth issues actually are). For example:

Elizabeth Dubois, chair of the campus political action committee for the Young Liberals of Canada, reminded young Canadians of the Liberals' Learning Passport, which would provide $1,000 of financial assistance to post-secondary students each year for up to four years.

She said the platform promise was designed to ensure youth had access to "tools to build our future."

Alykhan Velshi, who is working a second election in the Conservative party war room, insisted that the Liberal plan isn't the best option for youth.

"It's very deep in their platform . but they're also taking something away. They're going to raise taxes on students," he warned, referring to the Liberals' plan to eliminate current textbook tax credits currently offered to students.

The pair was joined by Isaac Cockburn, who has worked at NDP headquarters in Ottawa and as an assistant to the NDP's Nathan Cullen, and Jonathan Halasz, co-president of the Carleton University Green party. Each party representative is under the age of 30.

The Bloc Québécois declined to join the English-language debate.

Cockburn immediately echoed his party leader Jack Layton's message that "Ottawa is broken."

"This type of back and forth is what he's talking about," he said, promising he wouldn't join "rigorous partisan stuff" as his peers poked at their opponents' policies.

Cockburn said Layton was the sole leader who would address rising tuition fees, while other parties have said the concern is not a federal responsibility.

4) It's hard to respect our MPs when their behaviour would be getting them a time-out if they were children.

How can the grown men and women who wish to govern our nation expect to be taken seriously as trustworthy, thoughtful people when their behaviour suggests they are hysterical toddlers? Whenever I tune into Question Period I last about 20 seconds before I have to change the channel because the bickering sounds like an out-of-control Middle School classroom.

So how about it, folks? If you want to govern the country, how about showing some self-control and good sense? Quit shouting in the background while other people are trying to speak. Quit calling each other names. Quit using scare tactics to try to convince the populace that negotiating in a coalition scenario is worse than having one man’s ideas shoved down our throats.

5) If young women voted, things would be different. We already know that the composition of Parliament is more likely to reflect the votes of older men rather than younger women. This survey also points out to some striking differences of opinion between young women and young men.

“Time after time I have seen in national polls that young women tend toward views that favour environmental sustainability and social justice, while young men’s attitudes tend toward maintaining the status quo,” says the President of McAllister Opinion Research.

Here's some stats:

Agree/Strongly agree that “Canadian girls receive adequate support to achieve their potential in life.”

63% of young women
100% of young men

Agree/Strongly agree that “Violence against women is a serious problem in Canada today.”

92% of young women
42% of young men

When asked if the following facts should be a concern or not for Canadians, here is what young women and men had to say:

“Teenage girls are 3 times as likely as boys to suffer from depression”

96% of young women are concerned
61% of young men

“Men outnumber women 4 to 1 among Canada’s elected representatives”

80% of young women are concerned
38% of young men

“2/3 of minimum wage workers in Canada are women”

90% of young women are concerned
55% of young men

I think the first statistic is possibly the most striking. All the young men surveyed felt Canadian girls receive adequate support to achieve their potential, but less than two thirds of the young women surveyed agreed.

Who said this election wasn't going to change anything?

Things are shaping up for this to be a historic election. First of all, voting at the advance polls jumped 35% from last election. This is part of a general trend seeing more people vote at advance polls, accompanied by the fact that they fell on a long weekend and also, I think, greater awareness of the advance polls. So it doesn't necessarily mean that there will be a big jump in overall voter turnout. The advance polls in the riding where my school is ran through 60% more voters than last election. In this student-heavy riding, this might be due to vote mobs, the fact that there are no exams on Good Friday, or the fact that most students are going to be out of the city and off to summer jobs before May 2nd.

Besides a potential voter turnout revolution, things are looking good for a potential Green victory in Elizabeth May's riding of Saanich-Gulf Islands, BC. (Saanich-Gulf Islands, was, by the way, a trending topic in the Twittersphere today.) Both the Liberal and NDP candidates have environmental activist cred, so it seems the riding is environmentally friendly in general.

And, one of the biggest upsets--polls show the NDP leading the Liberals in support. They're predicting a Conservative minority of around 130 seats with an NDP official op with about 100. People in Ontario are freaking out remembering Bob Rae's disastrous NDP provincial government, but I had dinner tonight with someone from Nova Scotia and someone from Manitoba. Both of these provinces are currently under NDP government, and both are getting along just fine. "The Liberals are just falling away," one suggested. "There's just less interest in a centrist party. My problem on a federal level is that I'm fiscally conservative, but left socially, and there's no party for that." Too true.

Anyway, they're calling it the Orange Crush:

And, even more orange crush-ing, here are the results when people were asked to name both their first and second choices:

That's the majority of people polled putting the NDP in their top two, yo! Totally throwing that in the face of everyone who says this election isn't going to change anything. Now there are definite problems with polling data, so let's not count our MPs before they hatch. But anyway, orange crush. I am drinking some right now (for non-NDP-related reasons). Also:



UPDATE: I picked that song because it has orange crush in the lyrics, but I forgot how depressing it was. Pro the NDP's promise to get troops home from Afghanistan? Anyway...

"Dirty Tricks" and "Imagined Scandals": Power, Partisan Politics, and the 2011 General Election

If I was writing a history paper on this election campaign, that is what I would call it.

First, the dirty tricks. They are the actions of a small few, and not representative of the general population:

The sum effect is that people are left with a bad taste in their mouths (a new Angus Reid survey shows 80 per cent of Canadians are politically "scattered between mistrust, cynicism and alienation"), despite the best efforts of most candidates to run clean campaigns.

"I see it as a few bad apples in a pretty darn good system," said Capstick. "If you go to local debate, after local debate, you'll see candidates shaking hands — and meaning it. Some of them even hug."

Of course, hugging doesn't tend to make headlines.

But even looking at the bad behaviour that is making headlines, experts say things could — and have been — much worse, with most pointing to previous violence by the Front de liberation du Quebec between 1963 and 1970.

J. Scott Matthews, an assistant professor of political studies at Queen's University, said the problem is that the actions of a few are being mistaken for the sentiments of the many.

And now for the scandals, which are apparently imaginary.

A Liberal ad (now revised) claimed that Stephen Harper is after “absolute power.”

Really?

And, when one person was kept out of Harper rally, the media went on a feeding frenzy. I’m not saying it was right to keep that one person out of the rally, but I’m pretty sure that our democracy was not threatened.

The same is true of the various scandals surrounding the Conservatives: Afghan detainees, Kairos funding, Rights & Democracy, Bev Oda, in-and-out funding, ethnic fundraising, Helena Guergis, Rahim Jaffer, Bruce Carson, proroguing parliament, and right up to contempt of parliament.

Time and time again, we’ve been warned that the scandal-ridden Conservatives are a threat to our democracy.

Have we lost all perspective in Canada?

No. Perhaps you have. Because the scandals surrounding "Aghan detainees, Kairos funding, Rights & Democracy, Bev Oda, in-and-out funding, ethnic fundraising, Helena Guergis, Rahim Jaffer, Bruce Carson, proroguing parliament, and right up to contempt of parliament" all sound pretty threatening to democracy to me.

Anyway. The later part of the article is less eyebrow-raising. He makes the point that no one is really focused on the issues anymore, and we're all getting distracted by this flouffy scandal stuff, which is fair--I mean, Bruce Carson and Helena Guergis won't even be footnotes in history textbooks in twenty-five years, but the actual policies governments create have lasting effects.

Vote Mob Extravaganza Continues: UBCO & Kelowna, Brandon, Brock, Regina

UBC Okanagan & Kelowna vote mob got all their candidates out, which is awesome to see. Also: how are three of the four candidates women?? I have never seen this before but it makes me happy!



I LOVE the song choice for Brandon U's vote mob! (Although, apparently, Stephen Harper plays it on his tour bus. Finally, something Harper and I can agree on: classic rock.)



Brock's vote mob is particularly patriotic, although I was terrified someone was going to step on the flag!



I like Regina's mascot. Is that... a gopher??? (Update: Ok so it's apparently a cougar who interrupts pirate duels and marriage proposals in order to get people to vote. WIN for most awesome mascot ever!!!)



With all the vote mobs today, it's really got me thinking that one of the really nice parts of this is being able to see universities across the country. Like Brandon University for example--I've heard of it, maybe, but I don't know anyone who goes there and I never gave it too much thought, and now I get to see all the awesome and creative and politically engaged students. And all the vote mobs running across campus, through libraries and food courts and student unions, that's really really neat to see. It's too bad it's such an icky time of year--I know my campus shows up best in fall when the leaves change. Maybe we can do this all again next time!

People Think Really Deep Thoughts

The biggest news so far this long weekend is that the NDP have made gigantic gains in the polls, leading all the other parties to gang up on it. If anyone says that this election hasn't changed anything in federal politics, there's your most concrete example right there.

I am not a fan of attack ads, so I'm not going to focus on this (although you can easily find them on YouTube if you are interested). Instead, here are a bunch of opinion pieces about widely different topics.

1) Andrew Coyne thinks that Harper is laying the ground for a constitutional crisis. Clearly Harper knows that coalitions are viable options--he thought of forming one himself in 2004. But talking of a potential coalition government or second-party-minority government as "undemocratic" might be a preparation for a second King-Byng--if the government loses the confidence of the House, Harper might demand that the governor general call an election instead of asking another party to form the government.

2) Rita Trichur is pissed at ethnic tokenism and blatant pandering to "ethnic voters" this election. Worst of all, special focus on South Asian and East Asian communities is alienating other minority ethnic groups.

3) Joe O'Connor speculates who would be king or queen of Canada if we ever decided to rid ourselves of our current monarchy.

That's it for tonight. Tomorrow: an influx of vote mob videos!

Mob Mentality

Yesterday, I read this and it made me really angry. It's an opinion piece by Michael Taube, a former Harper speechwriter, about why vote mobs are a terrible, horrible, very bad idea. I already knew I was going to be unimpressed by the second paragraph: "A few weeks ago, there was no such thing as a “vote mob.” But an idea hiding in a deep, dark corridor of comedian Rick Mercer’s brain has, quite by accident, unleashed this holy terror onto unsuspecting Canadians." Holy terror? Srsly? Don't you think that's a bit overdramatic? Taube also says, "Thanks a bunch, Rick. Just what Canada always wanted: another excuse for young people to do foolish things in public, complete with a mob mentality. I’ll make sure you get an extra lump of coal in your stocking at Christmas for your good deed!"

Excuse me, sir. I did not realize that making a public demonstration of our intentions to perform our civic duty and vote counted as "doing foolish things in public." Please allow me to grovel at your feet in forgiveness.

Taube argues, first of all, that vote mobs aren't going to encourage anyone to vote who wasn't going to do so already. This is a common criticism of vote mobs, and my opinion on this subject is down later after I've finished ranting. Anyway, back to Taube:

Also, vote mobs aren’t going to force major changes in the political parties to recognize youth issues. Do you really think any of the major leaders honestly cares that some 18-25 year-olds who wouldn’t ordinarily vote have suddenly been convinced by a comedian’s rant on TV? I hate to break it to them, but there are already young people in all political parties who have been volunteering in campaign offices for weeks. They do everything from answering phones to helping shape policy. These are the type of young voters that the parties want to attract, not those of the circus clown variety.

At the same time, is it a wise idea to encourage young people to vote who aren’t well informed on politics and current events to begin with? For instance, there is a political radicalism among youth — especially the type of youth who would stay home on election day — that could lead to many fringe parties receiving votes. This is good for democracy, but not necessarily for political stability. While no one is expecting all young people to have PhD-level understanding of the Canadian political system, a decent amount of knowledge would be nice.

You think that just because we dance around in bright colours to demonstrate our enthusiasm, we are "circus clown" voters instead of "serious" voters? I don't think this even dignifies a response. Also: have you ever tried to control a crowd of 300 screaming young adults, or an elephant? Requires skills I imagine you don't possess. Have some respect for the circus, please.

And then--"...encourage young people to vote who aren't well informed on politics and current events to begin with." Well colour me infuriated. Do you think that all "non-young" adults who vote are informed about the issues? Today when I was standing in line at the advance poll, I heard a middle-aged man say that the results would probably be the same as last time, because nothing had happened to change people's opinions. WHAT. I wanted to turn around and tell him everything I've posted on this blog in the past month, and more. An even bigger problem is people (particularly elderly people) who vote out of tradition. Two close friends of mine say their grandmothers do this--the one votes Conservative every election because her father always voted Conservative, the other considers herself to come from a strong Grit family and so votes Liberal in every election out of family tradition. (Both of these women live in rural areas where memories are long and traditions strong.) Being informed about the issues has never been a requirement for voting for any segment of the population--and I think that young people are more likely to NOT vote if they feel uninformed.

Don't even get me started on "there is a political radicalism among youth — especially the type of youth who would stay home on election day." I feel like he's probably imagining a person who votes for the Marijuana Party but accidentally gets high on election day and forgets to go to the polls. Or something. Because all of the young people I know who are politically radical are making a point of returning a ballot this election--even if it's a blank one.

And you know what? I would like to see a decent amount of knowledge about the political system from our leaders, thank you. A lot of the most politically active students are studying politics or related fields, and know WAY MORE SHIT about parliamentary democracies than the general population.

I'm sure that Mr. Taube also imagines that young people don't read newspapers, or perhaps he wouldn't have submitted something so negative against young people to be published.

Anyway. Happier news. The CBC interviewed some vote mob participants in Toronto. It's pretty interesting.

The other day I participated in a vote mob myself, and I wanted to share some of my thoughts on the experience. While it was happening--the running, the screaming, the cheering, the chanting, the waving of signs, the dancing, the singing--I felt invigorated, enthused, inspired. The only problem was that, unlike your average rally, this was explicitly being filmed for YouTube, and so the camera operators needed to get a lot of shots of us to edit together later. We would run around the intersection, dance for about a minute, cheer, dance a bit more, and then run around the intersection again... rinse & repeat... that really got in the way of the momentum and just became exhausting.

After I got home, I thought about it. I thought about the students who streamed out of exam halls as we started our mob, and who we were supposed to be trying to engage. I thought about their faces... confused, amused, or indifferent. Groups of people in colourful outfits running around, cheering, and waving signs are actually a fairly common sight on my campus. (Another reason why I took offense to Taube's "circus clown" comment...) And I thought about the twenty minutes we spent standing around before the vote mob started, waiting for exams to let out so we could make noise. A couple of girls walking by on the sidewalk knew one of the participants who was standing near me, and they came up to ask her what was going on. She explained about the vote mob movement, about low youth voter turnout, about the importance of voting. The two girls looked interested. "That's really cool," one said. "I thought you guys were like rallying for the Young Liberals with all that red." "No! No! The red is for Canada!" "Ooooooohhhhhh..."

While those two girls walked away from us more informed and interested than they had been, I didn't see any of the students coming out of the exam halls join in our dancing/running/chanting/sign-waving. I realized that our brightly-coloured mob looked closed to them--no, not even that. The mob of people had become one amorphous blob of humanity, dancing-running-chanting-singing-running-dancing-chanting, alienating rather than welcoming.

That led me to two important thoughts. First, the potential for vote mobs to attract new voters lies more in the social media aspect--having an awesome YouTube video that makes its way around Facebook and Twitter--than in the actual vote mob itself. Second, vote mobs are important NOT just to encourage students to vote--the biggest criticism of vote mobbing. Of course they're almost entirely made up of people who were always going to vote anyway. That's not a problem. Vote mobs are the highly visible physical manifestation of some young people's political engagement. Because almost 40% of young people voted in the last election, and while that is a very small voter turnout, we focus so much on the almost two-thirds of youth who didn't vote that I think a lot of people often forget about the over one-third of youth who did. Showing up for a vote mob is kind of like putting on a "This is what a feminist looks like" t-shirt. Maybe we're less than half of youth, but we're here, we pay attention to the issues, we're voting, and you can't ignore us if we wear bright colours and scream really loudly (although you can call us circus clowns).

At the end of the day, a sign I saw at the vote mob expresses in itself why the vote mob phenomenon, why the visibility of youth voters, is so important: "We're not just the future. We're the present, too."

Sometimes the news makes me angry

What is this you say? You want to hear more from Stephen Harper and high-ranking Conservative cabinet ministers proving they have no understanding of or respect for parliamentary democracy? Okay. Here is more. And also here.

In case you can't tell, I'm still pissed this is even happening and even more pissed that Harper's fear-mongering, anti-parliamentary attacks are working.

A few last things before the advance polls open

1) All you need to vote is proof of identity and proof of address. That's a government-issued photo ID and, if your driver's license has your parents' address on it but you want to vote at school, a piece of official mail with your address. You can find out more at Elections Canada. If you're not sure where to vote, Vote.ca is a really easy-to-use resource.

2) If you're still undecided, Apathy is Boring has handy-dandy summaries of the platforms of each the 18 parties running candidates this election. (For example, the Rhinoceros party: "Democracy Reform: Voting areas will be decorated and soft music will be played"; the Christian Heritage Party: "Women's Rights: The CHP is the only pro-life party in Canada today"; the Marxist-Leninist Party: "Defence and National Security: Withdraw Canada from NORAD and NATO".) Seriously, check it out.

3) Find yourself a vote date! "Vote, Actually" from Lead Now:



4) Results of the latest poll. Absolutely shocking.

5) Another analysis of the latest poll results. Still shocking. It's shaping up to be a potentially historic race!

6) It's illegal to publish election results on the Internet (including Facebook and Twitter) when polls are still open in some areas of the country, in case it influences voting in those regions. Tweeters are fighting back. If you live in BC you probably won't have to worry about this.

7) Elizabeth May with Paul McCartney and... a baby? Anyway. I bet Stephen Harper feels silly for singing all those Beatles/John Lennon songs now, knowing they're friends of Pierre Trudeau and Elizabeth May. Via Vintage Voter.

8) The vote mob movement made it onto the BBC! You know you're newsworthy when. Perhaps we shall set off an international student movement. ...yeah, right.

Well, as far as I know that's it. For those of you who are planning to vote in the advance polls, as I am, happy voting to you!

Late-night double-feature picture show

You know that Liberal candidate with the really awesome ad I liked? Now he has another video, which is also awesome. Seriously, the Liberals are winning at YouTube.



And this epic song should convince students everywhere to vote!

This is How a Parliamentary Democracy Works

The CBC have an article called "Ignatieff, Harper in war of words over minority scenarios". They've got that right.

So, here's the 411, to use Layton-esque slang. Yesterday, Michael Ignatieff said that if the Conservatives win a minority, but are unable to secure the confidence of the House, and the governor general asks the Liberals if they can form the government, he will try to do so.

He acknowledged that he could try to form a government — without going back to Canadian voters — if a Conservative minority is elected but subsequently defeated in the House of Commons. Moreover, Ignatieff made no apologies for that possibility — saying that this is exactly what would normally happen in a parliamentary democracy.

Ignatieff's comments set up a clear contrast with views held by Conservative leader Stephen Harper over the legitimacy of a government led by a second-place party and promise to be pivotal issues in the remaining days of the campaign.

He's absolutely right. This is exactly what would normally happen in a parliamentary democracy. It's called the Westminster system. In the Westminster system, electors choose the MPs that make up the House of Commons, and whichever party has the support of the House gets to form government whether it has the most seats or not. Usually the party that has the most seats gets to try first, but if things change, that party loses confidence but another party gains it, then that second party can form the government. Here's the hypothetical situation in question, according to Ignatieff:

"If Mr. Harper wins most seats, forms a government but does not secure the confidence of the House — and I'm assuming Parliament comes back — then it goes to the Governor General. That's what happens. That's how the rules work.

"And then, if the Governor General wants to call on other parties — myself for example — to try to form a government, then we try to form a government. That's exactly how the rules work. And what I'm trying to say to Canadians is, I understand the rules, I respect the rules, I'll follow them to the letter and I'm not going to form a coalition."

Seriously. Trust Ignatieff on this. He's right. That's what happens, that's how the rules work. I mean before he was a politician he used to study and teach this stuff for a living at some of the greatest universities in the world!

Stephen Harper sees things another way. He's already mentioned he thinks it's "undemocratic" that the second-place party rule. He also believes that Ignatieff is secretly talking about a coalition:

The Conservative leader said Wednesday he would be “honoured with any mandate” his party receives from voters on May 2.

But refused to discuss what changes to the party’s platform he would be willing to accept to keep the Conservatives in power if they win another minority.

Instead, Harper ratcheted up his rhetoric about the prospect of a coalition, calling it a ‘black hole” that would stall the recovery, provoke more constitutional squabbling, and trigger a “national-unity crisis.” He was likely referring to comments by Jack Layton in the English-language debate, in which the NDP leader said he was open to re-opening the debate on how to get Quebec to sign the constitution.

Harper also declared that an opposition coalition would lead to another referendum on whether Quebec should separate from Canada, even though it would be up to the provincial government to put forward such a vote.

“We don’t know what that government will stand for,” Harper said of a possible coalition.

“But we do know the general outlines. There’s no focus on the economy. There are tax hikes, and of course these parties have very dangerous and conflicting views on national unity and constitutional matters. So as I say, I think the option for Canadians to avoid all of this, is to vote for a strong, stable, national majority conservative government on May the second.”

Okay. First of all, it is FAR FROM a clear choice between a Strong Harper Majority and an Evil Reckless Coalition. Firstly, majorities tend to be more reckless than coalitions, who must remain moderate in order to appease all parties involved. Secondly, Ignatieff has said time and time again that he WILL NOT form a coalition, and in the hypothetical situation he has outlined he's not forming a coalition either. Thirdly, if there is a Conservative minority, what makes a minority stable is having the support of the House. If Harper refuses to co-operate with other parties, any minority he had would be lost very quickly. And I'm not even going to get into the allegations that a Liberal government will mean another sovereignty referendum in Quebec.

But back to the CBC article, where the leaders are bickering and trying to clarify their statements.

"I have never said I will vote against his budget," Ignatieff told reporters in Saint John.

Harper would have to negotiate support with the other parties and govern accordingly, he added.

"What I've said is, I want to form a government. I want to get … the most seats. I then want to offer a budget to the Parliament of Canada and seek its support. If he gets more seats than me or my party, then he will present a budget, and hey, you know what I do with a budget: I read it."

Harper says he wants to form a majority government. Ignatieff says he would be happy to form any government at all. Clearly this makes Ignatieff a volatile vigilante bandito. Even worse, the leader of a gang of volatile, vigilante, separatist, socialist banditos! But Ignatieff responds to Harper's comments about the coalition:

"No. I repeat, no," Ignatieff said to applause from Liberal supporters.

"I don't have a problem about coalition, and I don't have a problem about respecting the constitution of my country. With the greatest respect, I would tell you that Mr. Harper has a problem with both."

Later, Ignatieff said of Harper: "What does he think he is? The king here? It's 'my way or the highway' the whole time .… He has an obligation to present a budget that has the confidence of the House of Commons .… The ruthless, relentless disrespect for Parliament is why we're having an election here."

And Gilles Duceppe weighs in on the issue with clear insight, reminding me that during the leaders' debates some people commented that he has the best understanding of how our government works:

Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe was critical Wednesday of what he called Harper's "no compromise" approach to dealing with the possibility of another minority government, calling it irresponsible.

Speaking with reporters in the Eastern Townships, Duceppe said Harper "needs to respect those whom Canadians choose to send to Ottawa to represent them."

Because, see, THIS is how the Westminster system works, THIS is how a parliamentary democracy works, THIS IS HOW OUR GOVERNMENT WORKS. We, Canadians, choose our MPs, based on the interests they're trying to protect. Then the MPs go to Parliament and duke it out there over who gets to form the government, based on who has interests in common. Your MP will presumably vote to protect the same interests WHETHER OR NOT their party is government. In the case of a minority government, it doesn't have that much more power than the other parties in terms of creating legislation, except it makes the budget. Whether a minority government is formed by the largest or the second-largest party doesn't really make a difference, because either way they have to work and compromise with other parties in order to pass their budgets and their bills. So, as Duceppe pointed out, Harper's refusal to work with the MPs the majority of Canada chose, in the case that he has a minority government, is incredibly irresponsible and WILL result in him losing confidence of the House.

This seriously feels like the King-Byng affair all over again. In that case, Mackenzie King's Liberals, who finished second to Arthur Meighen's Conservatives, formed the government with the support of the Progressives. The next year, when King's government was under threat due to a scandal caused by one of his ministers, King asked Lord Byng, the governor general, to dissolve parliament and call an election, but Byng refused. Since Meighen actually had more seats than King, Lord Byng wanted to give him a chance to form government before calling an election. Meighen was prime minister for only a couple of months before his government lost the confidence of the House. Then there was an election and King won a majority.

Moral of the story? Sometimes the second-place party makes a better government.

Also, I kind of want to be governor general. But that's another story.

Vote mobs and videos and lawn signs, oh my!

So there are lots of things, being said on the Interwebs, about young voters these days. First off, this is the new video from LeadNow.ca



I have to admit, when I saw the title "Let's vote together" I thought/hoped it would be a parody of that song from The Parent Trap, the original one.

Well, anyway. Next, the Globe and Mail talks about the vote mob phenomenon.

When Canadian television celebrity Rick Mercer challenged young Canadians to get themselves to the polling station on election day, he had no clue what he had started.

“In the back of my mind I was thinking perhaps some of them would write a nasty letter to the local paper,” Mr. Mercer said Sunday on CTV’s Question Period. “But no, they’ve started these vote mobs."

While the vote mobs have definitely been a mobilizing force on campuses, the Globe brings up the little-known fact that university students vote at about the same rate as the general population, while young people not at school are the ones who tend to stay home from the polls. So will youth mobilization reach out to all youth?

Still, there is something in the air this time around. It’s not just the vote mobs. It’s the huge number of election-oriented messaging that is available on the internet and on social media like Facebook and Twitter that reach students but also the young Canadians who are not actively enrolled in post-secondary education.

Gracen Johnson, one of the organizers of the vote-mob movement in Guelph, said she “definitely” believes the message is getting out to people her age who are not in school. “We all have a lot of non-university friends,” she said Sunday. “You can avoid university, you can avoid classes, but you can’t really avoid Youtube."

And since everyone knows that the real way to motivate youth is booze, Gracen Johnson and her friends are all planning to vote in the advance polls on Friday and then go out for election-themed drinks. This is something I've never heard of before. I mean, I know people who watch the election results come in at the bar, but I've never heard of going out to celebrate voting. It's like a giant drunken democracy-fest sorta reminiscent of nineteenth-century elections before they brought in the secret ballot. But I digress.

Both the Liberals and the NDP think they've been doing an awesome job at courting the youth vote. I will grant the Liberals YouTube victory, for all their excellent, pithy, short, clever videos that are easily Facebookable ("Hey Stephen Harper, stop creeping me on Facebook" being my favourite). And it makes sense that the NDP would have the strongest promises about net neutrality and cell phone billing, like this candidate claims, although if that's been in the news I've somehow managed to miss it. On the other hand, I think that the issue most likely to draw out youth voters (other, perhaps, than students) is the fact that the unemployment rate for the under-25s is almost twice that of the general population. Both the Liberals and the NDP have discussed youth employment initiatives, although I'm not sure it's an official platform plank.

This is one of the most interesting questions raised by this article, besides the student/nonstudent distinction:

If young people are going to turn out to vote in larger numbers, their new interest in democracy is impossible to measure in public-opinion polls.

Christopher Waddell, the director of the journalism school at Carleton University, who questions how Elections Canada knows who is voting and who is not given that age is not included on a ballot, said polls largely exclude the youth.

“The majority of young people these days no longer have landlines on their phones, almost all of them have cellphones. Most public-opinion surveys are not calling cellphones,” said Prof. Waddell.

And internet polling panels are largely assembled from mailings that have been compiled for other purposes like points plans or credit-card companies. “It’s very unlikely that those mailing lists would include a wide variety of young people,” he said.

I don't know. It's true that a lot of young people don't have land lines (I do, call me old school) but I would say most have credit cards, especially those in the 20 and up range. And I know lots of people (myself included) who have WAY TOO MANY points cards. Air Miles, Aeroplan, HBC points, PC points, Shoppers Optimum, MovieWatchers, Chapter's iRewards, Subway points… Most people probably have points cards from some shoe places or American Eagle Outfitters or something at the bottom of their wallets, like from that time when there was a special so if you got the points card you got 15% off your purchase that day. Anyway. The point is that young people might not be entirely unrepresented in opinion polls, although that being said by Prof. Waddell's criteria I probably should be on some pollster's list and no one's called me yet.

In other youth vote news, Ilona Dougherty of Apathy is Boring talked to Decision Canada about why youth don't vote. A lot of it is stuff I've heard before--young people feel uninformed about the issues, and think that casting an uninformed vote is irresponsible--but this is new, and something I hadn't thought of before:

Every candidate says that they want young Canadians' support. But for the most part, political campaigns are more interested in persuading the people who already voters than in encouraging young people to cast their first ballot.

Don't believe me? Ask anyone you know under the age of 30 about the last time a candidate got in touch with them. At Apathy is Boring we have an office full of 20-somethings, many of whom live in competitive ridings. None of them have received a knock on the door during this election. Or the 2008 election. Or the 2006 election. Or the 2004 election. In the last four elections, none of the parties have bothered to ask for their votes.

Up until last week I would have cried, "Too true!" However, the Liberal candidate in my riding did, in fact, come knocking on doors last week in a mainly student-populated neighbourhood. Then again, he is a fairly young candidate, and intentionally courting the considerable student vote because it's a really close race around here.

Meanwhile, Global has three ways to fight apathy. There's the informative method, taken by Apathy is Boring (which you should totally check out, by the way. They're supposed to post major party platforms minus the partisan rhetoric sometime before the advance polls). Then there's the motivational. I Vote Because… asks Canadians to explain why they vote, and then posts their responses on a map, in order to spark a conversation about why voting is important. Finally, there is The Great Canadian Blank Ballot Project, which is intended "to raise awareness of the dire need for democratic reform in Canada."

So far, the project has received both support and condemnation. “People frequently think we are advocating spoiling a ballot, which is illegal and simply not true,” says Dean.

The group makes the distinction on their website www.rejecttheelection.ca between a rejected ballot and a spoiled ballot.

“A blank ballot is perfectly valid and is counted as a rejected ballot and reported by Elections Canada,” says Dean. “whereas a spoiled ballot - one that has been defaced or destroyed - is not counted by Elections Canada.

Voters can request “None of the Above” campaign signs through the project website.

See? What did I tell you. Didn't I tell you, that if you're frustrated with democracy the blank ballot is the way to go? Answer: yes, I did tell you that. Anyway, if you're interested, this is what the lawn sign looks like:


Anyway. I've mentioned before that the vote mob movement seems to be more or less English-Canadian in nature. But I recently came across Qui vote gagne, a French site devoted to combating youth voter apathy and creating informed voters! It's awesome, and also has links to two Facebook apps, one of which allows you to create your own government by naming your friends as ministers.

Also, if you understand French at all, watch their video. It's hilarious!

The Youth Vote & the Mainstream Media

So… we've been in the media quite a bit lately, and by "we", I mean young Canadians who intend on turning up to the polls (or at least are thinking about it). First there was the coverage of the vote mobs, and then the "Facebook ejection", and now people are actually listening seriously to what we have to say! I know!

I have to admit, every time I see something about young voters in the mainstream media I get really excited. Like you know when you're watching an American tv show and they mention Canada and you get really, inexplicably excited? And you know you probably shouldn't be so excited, because Canada is the world's second-largest country, and a member of the G8, and otherwise important, and also right to the north of the US and one of its biggest trading partners, so you know they're aware of us, even if they're 25 thousand times more likely to mention a European country. Or Mexico.

I feel like this is probably a sign of alienation. When I get this excited to see my social group acknowledged by mainstream media.

Maclean's explains that while the youth voter turnout is, in fact, declining, it isn't declining as quickly as the overall voter turnout or the turnout of voters in their 40s and 50s. This is reassuring, as I kind of hate being blamed for everything that's wrong in this country's democratic process. They also point out that the election of 38-year-old Naheed Nenshi as mayor of Calgary suggests Good Things for the political engagement of youth.

Then there's Decision Canada on Web 2.0 campaigns and ordinary Canadians getting involved on Youtube. Okay, maybe this isn't strictly a youth issue, but it is something I'm involved in (i.e. this blog, my Twitter, and my YouTube channel. (Also: this link has a few of the key viral videos of the campaign--the Harper/Emperor Palpatine speech, the promotional video for shitharperdid.com, Stephen Harper as a creepy Facebook creeper, and the Our Country Conservative/Tea Party ad.) This article ponders why and to what end most of the social media attacks have been on Harper:

Greg Elmer, a Canadian Internet politics researcher, said the disproportionate number of anti-Conservative successes is likely a reflection of Harper's continued health in the polls, and the creative community's historical lack of support for his policies.

But even if YouTube has become a virtual whipping post for the Conservative leader, Elmer noted that it may not have the effect desired by those leading his flagellation.

"To be attacked online can sometimes be a good thing, in the sense that you're getting more attention," said Elmer, a professor of new media at Ryerson University.

"And there's a lot of foul language in some of the (anti-Harper) videos, which some voters might find that offensive. It might, in fact, reinforce their support for a party with more traditional conservative values."

Interesting. Although I don't think that the demographic these videos are aimed at will mind the language. Also, "the creative community's lack of support for his policies" or "his policies' lack of support for the creative community"? Chicken-and-egg.

And then there's this reflection on advance poll vote mobs, which operate on the idea that if you mobilize people with the vote mob and then send them to the polls right away, they'll probably be more likely to actually give up the twenty minutes of their day. According to one of the organizers at the University of Ottawa:

Hill said he thinks youth are not apathetic, but rather alienated. He said politicians overlook issues that youths care about, such as the environment, student debt, and post-secondary education.

"The idea is that if we want to see real change on Parliament Hill and if we want youth to see politics that is reflective of their values, then we need to engage them politically," Hill said.

And the first step of engaging youth in politics is getting them to vote, he added.

"It's the beginning of the process of engagement. And ideally, once you get people voting, especially if the person they voted for wins, they'll want to see if they follow through with their promises."

YES. Thank you. I love it when people affirm my opinions in public forums.

Finally, Steve Paikin had a special edition of The Agenda on Thursday about youth vote and political engagement, with six commentators all under the age of 30. It was wonderful to see. It's a bit long, over 45 minutes, so if you don't have the time/patience, I was a nice person and took point-form notes about the most interesting things they said.

• This election comes on the heels of the prorogation of parliament and the G20, both cases where youth were active and engaged (if only on Facebook) but their voices were not heard.
• There is no legal way to display political disaffection (ie spoiling your ballot is illegal), so young people might be abstaining from voting instead.
• The media is unfriendly to political leaders who say anything too radical or different--this may drive down voter turnout and youth interest, since young people tend to be the most highly ideological. Also leads to homogenization of political parties.
• Young people who feel informed feel a duty to vote, while people who are less informed feel like voting would be irresponsible since they don't know enough to make an informed vote, and so abstain. Also, more differentiation between parties and candidates increases the sense of duty with regards to voting.
• A lot of youth don't like Harper (in reference to shitharperdid.com) but the election is being fought over budget issues and things that might be better settled by a referendum.
• Youth are less likely than older adults to believe that politicians will keep their election promises, so they're less likely to be swayed by election promises.
• Campaigns to try to increase youth voter turnout are usually not run by youth, and usually run by people who couldn't imagine not voting, so they're not usually very persuasive.
• Parties end up patronizing young people by treating them as a homogenous group or assuming they don't care about any issues that don't directly affect them (education, youth employment, etc.).
• Is a 1.5% change in the corporate tax rate a big enough difference to actually get people motivated to vote?

Anyway, I really liked that show, and I think that it could have gone on for longer. Everyone there clearly had so much more to say. It's kind of sad to think that young people get one 48-minute segment on TVO to express their opinions, and other than that we have to highjack the attention of mainstream media with vote mobs in order to be heard.

Personally, I think that a lot of young people these days care passionately about things, but those things aren't necessarily electoral politics. I know so many amazing young people who are involved in philanthropy and volunteer work, or going to build schools and houses with Habitat for Humanity and so many other organizations. And yes, I do know a group of people who are passionately dedicated to electoral and parliamentary politics. You may have noticed I'm one of them. I'm originally from the National Capital Region, where federal politics were easy to enter into since pretty much everybody's parents worked for the federal government when I was in high school, and Parliament dominated the front page of the newspaper (except for when the Sens were on a winning streak). I find myself regularly surrounded by other people, like myself, who follow political news obsessively and attend all-candidates meetings and treat Election Day like it's a giant party. Young people who dream about forming their own political parties when they're in high school--better political parties than the ones we have, ones that go back to the old values of MPs who represent their constituents, first and foremost, rather than their party. Young people who run for mayor even though they know they'll never win. So yeah. I think, that given that young people already care passionately about things, and some already care passionately about our government, mobilization of the youth vote isn't an impossible task.

I like that they said that young people don't vote because they're not informed about the issues, because that reaffirms what I'm trying to do here. And you want to know why your vote matters? Okay, I shall tell you why your vote matters:

Five things to read over your Saturday morning coffee

1. This take on the uGuelph ballot debacle. Worthwhile even just for this graphic:

2. This article on the importance of being politically engaged. I'm not sure I agree with it. A friend told me I should write here about how we should vote because people DIED for our right to vote, but I don't think that's actually a super-convincing argument. Partially because, as a Canadian history major, I know way too much about both world wars and neither were really fought on the basis of protecting suffrage rights. People were more worried the country would be blown up. But that's another story. Anyway, Goetz's argument isn't that we should vote because people DIED, but rather that we should vote because CANADA. I find this marginally more convincing. Thoughts?

3. This young man's reaction to the French-language leaders' debate. Don't read the comments. They will just make you angry. In fact, never read the comments on major news sites unless you don't mind being made angry because there are always people saying angering things! In this case, wondering why teenagers are allowed to vote when they're "barely out of diapers", and kids these days don't know anything anyway, and don't vote because they can't text from the polling booth, and all other kinds of things that will make you say, HELLO HAVE YOU EVER MET A YOUNG PERSON OR DO YOU JUST SEE THEM ON TV A LOT? So, yeah. Don't read the comments.

4. This piece on the vote-swapping phenomenon. I heard about this last election, I think, but I didn't pay too much attention then. I'm kinda leery about it… seems a bit manipulative and underhanded. But then I guess so is gerrymandering…

5. "Stuff" my candidate says, which will make you shake your head.

Casting ballots!

Everyone knows that election day is May 2nd, but if you will be away/otherwise unable to vote on that day, you can cast your ballot on April 22, 23, or 25 at the advance polls. More info here. Don't forget to bring your government-issued ID and an official piece of mail with your address on it if the address on you ID isn't within the riding (i.e. if you're voting in the riding where you go to school).

It actually works out really well for students that the advance polling is over Easter long weekend, because then those of us who want to vote at home have a better shot. That's what I'm doing. Watch out for me at the advance polls on April 22/23, yo! Both my home riding and the riding where I live at school are close races between Liberal and Conservative candidates, and a lot of my friends are choosing to vote at school rather than at home in order to tip the scales, but I think my strategic vote has more strategic value in my home riding. WHOLE NEW LEVEL of strategic voting!

Speaking of ballots. Conservatives are asking that the ballots from a special polling station at Guelph University be disqualified. If there was partisan election material (ads or even signs or pamphlets from any of the parties or candidates), the polling station might be illegal. Or is it just the Conservatives freaking out because Guelph, who jump-started the vote mob movement, scared them?

UPDATE: Elections Canada declared the ballots valid.

Election Misconceptions

In the course of my obsessively-talking-politics-with-everyone-I-meet day, I've realized a couple things about people who don't talk obsessively about politics with everyone they meet (aka normal people). One of those things is that a lot of people are just so jaded that no amount of lying, cheating, stealing, manipulation or downright dishonesty on the part of politicians even fazes them anymore. "Well, they're politicians," people will say to me. "What do you expect?" And that's sad, because the last few election campaigns have been getting progressively dirtier until I, personally, find the current level of discourse completely unacceptable, and I think we can and should expect better from our politicians.

I mean, let's look for a second at Stephen Harper's campaign. A good number of his ads are based on the strategy of taking old footage of Michael Ignatieff from 2008 or 2009, finding little soundbites and clipping them out of their context, and then just inserting them willy-nilly to make him sound really bad.

Take this ad, for example, which is all over tv right now:



Here are the three pieces of evidence cited against Ignatieff:
"We'll have to raise taxes" Kitchener-Waterloo Record, April 14, 2009
"I'm not going to take a GST hike off the table" CITY News, December 18, 2008
Supported up to $75 tax on iPods, Vote on Dévision No. 22 April 14, 2010

I mean, look at those. Really look at them for a minute. The newest one was from almost a year ago. One of them is from December 2008, and he's just being noncommittal and refusing to make promises. As for the first one? Who thought to dig through the archives of the Kitchener-Waterloo Record? Seriously. And by the way, I got curious, so I went to check out the Kitchener-Waterloo Record's online archives, and according to the search only one article on April 14, 2009 included the words "Ignatieff" or "Liberal," and that is an opinion piece by Eldon Yundt called "We deserve honesty." Unfortunately you have to pay to see the actual article, and I didn't feel like doing that. But the summary is:

The gist of his advice to Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff: promise nothing, have no policies, simply gripe and criticize the Conservatives.
Canadians have been inveigled into negative voting, and the percentage of those voting continues to decline as more Canadians refuse to support politicians with no vision, no platform, no courage of their conviction.
Along with many other Canadians, I am weary of the games politicians play. We expect a better, more honest standard and that is what [Geoffrey Stevens] should be advising -- not just to Ignatieff, but to all the leaders.

(Geoffrey Stevens had written an opinion piece for The Record the day before, predicting that the Conservatives were losing power and the Liberals would determine the next election.)

I don't think an op-ed piece about how politicians should be more trustworthy, published in a local paper, is necessarily going to be the most reliable source for Ignatieff's words. In fact I think Eldon Yundt would disapprove.

But don't just roll your eyes and say, "What do you expect? Harper's a politician." Because this isn't just regular everyday spin. This is downright manipulation of the facts. And I expect better, because no one else is stooping to that level of dishonesty.

The other thing that I've noticed, is that a lot of people don't seem to have quite a grasp on why an election was called in the first place. Stephen Harper isn't helping, because he's going around acting like his government was taken down over the budget, which it wasn't.

Stephen Harper and the Conservative government were found in contempt of Parliament for refusing to divulge information to the House of Commons (i.e. the cost estimates of the F-35 fighter jets and proposed crime prevention measures). Because of this contempt finding by the standing committee on procedures and house affairs, there was a non-confidence motion, and a majority of MPs voted that they had lost confidence in the government. This caused the government to fall.

It's important to note that the actual motion was a non-confidence motion, rather than a contempt motion. The Harper government was found in contempt of parliament by the committee, not by the House. If they had been found in contempt by the House, it would have been more like an impeachment.

So. Contempt of parliament. What does it mean? Basically, a disrespect for democracy. From the Wikipedia page:

In many jurisdictions governed by a parliament, Contempt of Parliament is the offence of obstructing the parliament in the carrying out of its functions, or of hindering any Member of Parliament in the performance of his or her duties.
Actions which can constitute a contempt of Parliament vary, but typically include such things as:
• deliberately misleading a House of Parliament or a parliamentary committee;
• refusing to testify before, or to produce documents to, a House or committee; and
• attempting to influence a Member of Parliament, for example, by bribery or threats.

So in this case, the government was hindering MPs in the performance of their duties and obstructing the functioning of parliament by refusing to give out details of proposed bills. This is a big deal. The Harper government is the first government in the history of Canada--in the history of the Commonwealth--to be found in contempt of parliament.

As the CBC points out:

A Canadian government has never before been found in contempt but Harper doesn't give much weight to a finding that might go down in the history books.
He tends to shrug it off, as he did during the debate: "First of all, everybody should realize the so-called contempt motion Mr. Ignatieff speaks of is not a ruling of a court or a ruling of the Speaker, it was simply a case of the other three parties outvoting us. We don't agree with that."

So that's where things stand now, and to a certain extent, that's what this election is about--for me, anyway. Stephen Harper has shown a disrespect for our democracy and contempt for our parliament by not only withholding this information, but also by proroguing parliament in order to avoid losing power and by blatantly lying during the election campaign. Is this just what politicians do, power-hungry amoral beasts that they are? Or is this something you find unacceptable in the leader of a democracy?

Democracy needs YOU!

Democracy Needs You from Millefiore Clarkes on Vimeo.