Politics

Federal Greenhouse: Let’s Make Good Use of Hot Air

/ Lauren / 2 Comments

For the past few weeks, I’ve been trying to take a little break from being angry at Canadian politicians for being uninspiring to the citizenry at best and downright insulting to us at worst. This doesn’t mean I haven’t been stewing in my juices the whole time. It’s been hard to ignore the signs that a blog post on the subject was looming.

First, I read this. “This” refers to an article on the CBC website, outlining plans to build a $42 million dollar glass dome as a temporary home for the House of Commons while it undergoes much needed repairs. Huh.

Then, I read THIS. “THIS” refers to an excellent special feature in the February 28, 2011 issue of Maclean’s by Aaron Wherry. The article details Wherry’s visit to the House of Commons on February 3 to see, well, what was going on in Parliament. Not much. There are 305 Members of Parliament (including the Speaker). On February 3 at 1:05 p.m.,  only 19 MPs were present for debate in the House. At 2:30 p.m., during question period (when the photographers and video cameras are usually present), the numbers swelled to 231 MPs present. By 6:45 p.m., as the House finished opposition questions, only 5 of 305 MPs remained. Huh.

It’s kind of funny, isn’t it? Some people slave away at their jobs for years to scrape together enough income to support their families and maybe, SOMEDAY, upgrade to an office with a window, and we’re going to build a fantastical glass dome for a bunch of people who can’t be bothered to show up and do the thing taxpayers pay them to do? Huh.

And then I read, in a variety of places, that there’s going to be another Federal election. In fact, I just heard my first attack ad on the radio today. (Thank you, Conservative Party of Canada! I was not aware Ignatieff was only in it for himself but you sure taught me a thing or two!). So not only will I get to pay for a bunch of no-shows to hang out in a glass palace (when they can be bothered to be there), but now I get to listen to personal attacks and false promises for the next month and a half? Huh.

It was all getting a bit much and I was thinking about going to bed for a few months until the attack ads were over and the “Will they? Won’t they?” coalition questions had disappeared.

But then, I had a better idea.

Glass-domed Parliament + No-show MPs + Federal election (i.e. a chance to get rid of everybody in one fell swoop) = FEDERAL GREENHOUSE.

What I am proposing, ladies and gentlemen, is that come election time we bid adieu to the MPs who have failed to change our country for the better and replace them with hothouse vegetables, which would be grown in the House of Commons and donated to needy families. As soon as that glass dome gets built the House would be the perfect environment for an indoor garden.

Harper: "Deceit. Abuse. Contempt." Starchy.

Just think of it: the seats belonging to the Liberal Party of Canada would be replaced with rows of juicy red tomatoes. The NDP, carrots (’cause they’re orange, do you see where I’m going with this?). The Bloc, some kind of legume (just to keep things en français), and the Conservatives? Well, I couldn’t think of any blue vegetable so I settled on potatoes. Sometimes, Stephen Harper looks a bit like a potato. Come to think of it, so does Jason Kenney. AND John Baird. Potatoes it is.

Should the Green Party ever win any seats, those will be planted with zucchini. (Because let’s face it, as much as we all enjoy zucchini from time to time, if we don’t have it, it doesn’t really seem to make a difference, does it?)

Ignatieff: "He didn't come back for you." But he sure is delicious.

I believe a Federal Greenhouse is a much more cost-effective way to run a Parliament than paying salaries to 305 eating, breathing, expense-claim-submitting human beings. It would also serve to restore some civility to question period. I highly doubt that any back benching legumes will be on their smartphones instead of paying attention to the issues being discussed. And if a potato managed to make personal attacks in QP aimed at a tomato or carrot across the floor, I’d actually be impressed instead of disgusted. Sure, big issues like health care and the Canada Pension Plan and Canada’s role in overseas conflicts probably wouldn’t be dealt with very effectively by a room full of vegetables, but I would like to posit that they aren’t really being dealt with very effectively now by a room that’s only occasionally full of MPs. At least the vegetables would go to hungry families. And giving nutritious food to children is something I’m sure all Canadians of any party stripe can get behind.

(For all you pedants out there, yes, I am aware that tomatoes aren’t actually vegetables. But they’re very good for you.)

Still not convinced this is a fantastic idea that should be implemented as soon as humanly possible? Fine. I have another solution for you. An election is coming. Go get informed. Find out who the candidates in your riding are. Ask them questions about the issues that matter to you most. Ask your MPs what they are doing for your constituency, both within and outside of the House of Commons. On election day, go vote.

The Elections Canada website provides a very helpful webpage where you can search for your Federal riding by entering your postal code. Once your riding comes up, the page shows you when the next Federal election takes place (May 2, 2011) and also has lists of helpful links along the side, answering FAQ’s such as “Where do I vote?” and “Who are the candidates in my electoral district?”. I just gave you the link to the aforementioned helpful website so you’ve really got no excuse not to check it out.

Young voters, I’ve already berated you in an earlier blog post. Now’s your time to shine. Get out there and give your MPs a kick in the ass. Or, if you dig greenhouses, find your gardening gloves. One way or another, it’s time to get your hands dirty for your country.

Conservatives & Liberals: Just stop it, both of you.

/ Lauren / 2 Comments

Like kittens? You'll love Harper's politics.

Today’s rant about being sick and tired of hearing about Canadian politics may come as a surprise to people who read my December 2 post, berating my generation for their lack of political participation and poor voter turn-out. I do still sincerely believe that citizens my age have a duty to be informed and involved. But democracy is a two-way street. Politicians who want our support need to give us something to vote for. Stephen Harper, the leader of the Canadian government, and Michael Ignatieff, the leader of the official opposition, are just not doing it for me right now.

I am tired of reading about whether or not Canadians will be subjected to a federal election this year (wasn’t that the question last year, and the year before that, and the year before that?). I am tired of the government being so arrogant (or perhaps so hopeful) as to make the claim, as they often seem to do, that “Canadians don’t want an election.”  I am tired of the opposition being so unimaginative and so impotent that the only weapon they seem to want to deploy is the threat of an election, only to withdraw that threat as soon as anyone starts to think they might really be serious.

I am tired of Stephen Harper’s sweaters and musical stylings. I am tired of Michael Ignatieff’s plaid shirts and cross-country burger flipping. Why are they doing this? Why aren’t they running the country? What the heck is going on?

That's actually pretty good. Quebec City, July 2010 Photo: Jacques Boissinot/Canadian Press

My January 17, 2011 Maclean’s came today, and with it a tidy little opinion piece by columnist Paul Wells entitled “How Stephen Harper Will Survive 2011.” Even before I read the article there was little doubt in my mind that Stephen Harper will survive 2011 just fine, though whether he’ll do anything with the power he’s still managing to cling to, anything that serves Canada more than it serves his party, is another matter. According to Wells, Harper is in a position of “relative strength” and “has a good shot at avoiding an election and, if he cannot avoid it, a good shot at winning it.” Let’s get this straight: Harper doesn’t want to win an election, he wants to avoid one, but if avoiding doesn’t work, it’s okay, he’ll win it. Harper also seems to be a fan of saying that the opposition is a fan of an election. Which seems silly, because if there was an election, Harper would win it, right?

I’m confused.

Speaking of confusion, I am not exactly receiving a boat-load of clarity from the opposition either. Iggy’s bus tour and the fact that he’s a really smart guy (albeit a bit of a cold fish in front of the camera) notwithstanding, I don’t know much about what Michael Ignatieff wants to do for my country. He likes to complain about the Conservatives, that’s for sure, but any bozo can complain. I’m complaining right now. Ignatieff’s job is to be more effective than that, and the Liberals’ only claim to fame at the moment is that they do not agree with the government. Except when they do, of course.

Just for fun, here’s a little snippet of Twitter conversation I caught on January 7, 2011 between Paul Wells and Andrew Coyne (also of Maclean’s Magazine):

InklessPW Paul Wells

“Planes and prisons” vs “families” and other good stuff: the Liberal ballot question as framed by Brison today and Goodale 2 weeks ago

acoyne acoyne

Interesting, since Libs also for planes & prisons RT @InklessPW “Planes & prisons” vs “families” & other good stuff: Liberal ballot question

acoyne acoyne
ie They’re still going to buy the planes, and they voted for the crime bills that necessitate more prisons RT @InklessPW

.

Again I’m confused. Both parties want some new planes? Both parties are on board with laws that would necessitate more prisons?  I’ll take Coyne’s word on this one, even if it is just a Twitter conversation, even if Twitter isn’t always a good “source”, since he’s a much more knowledgeable person than I.  I know 140-character limits tend to over-simplify issues a bit but it’s the very idea that bothers me. Planes and prisons for both Conservatives and Liberals? Talk about arriving at the party in the same dress and now having to figure out who “wears it better.”

This one's for my scrapbook.

If both the government and its closest rival agree on planes and prisons, and stimulus spending, and all the other big and small issues that the two parties have made gutless compromises on since 2008 (some necessary, some not), all that’s left for each side to do is accessorize that same old dress and try to convince us that the other gal looks trashy.

Which means that instead of being asked to consider which party better represents my values and beliefs regarding war, justice, education, and the economy (not to mention health care and the environment), I am being asked, by BOTH sides, to care about who is more cuddly, who likes “ordinary Canadians” more and terrorists less. To care about whether Iggy is “just visiting” or whether he’s here to stay, to care about whether Harper has something sinister up his sleeve or whether he’s doing what he truly believes is best for Canada. In short, I’m being asked to care about “politics”.

I don’t mean, “caring about politics” in terms of being informed, and of voting for the MP you think will best address your concerns. The “politics” I’m being asked to care about is mostly spin, hype, polls (whose conclusions my beliefs are never on the winning side of), a coalition of “Socialists” and “Separatists” that never really happened (and likely never will), and an election that isn’t happening yet, but that we don’t know for sure isn’t going to happen. This is the kind of crap that always seems to float to the top of the murky federal politics pool. I suppose I could stick my head in there and try to see if I can find any useful information but it’s not an appealing prospect.

Clap if you believe he can win an election. Photo: Sean Kilpatrick/ Canadian Press

This constant stream of exaggeration, hyperbole, and trivial detail seems to come from both sides. And it belittles me as a citizen. It makes me feel as though my part of the political process is about being led to the ballot box by half-truths and handshakes. It makes me feel as though nobody in Parliament thinks we’re smart enough to think about the actual issues that affect our lives and to vote that way. The fact that I haven’t seen either side touch health care with a ten-foot pole recently even though, at some point, we’re really going to have to, is not inspiring. It seems that while both sides certainly believe they have the right to govern, they don’t really have the guts to, and, to add insult to injury, they don’t think we’ll notice.

For goodness sakes, enough already. Conservatives, Liberals, just stop it. That new, nasty, media-sexy, but actually totally irrelevant barb you’re ready to let fly at the other party? That photo of you cuddling a cute kitten/baby/constituent you’re waiting to release? Just don’t. I don’t care. Go to your rooms. Think about what you’ve done. Think about what you’re going to do. I don’t want to hear a single word from either of you until you have something constructive to say.

A Call to Political Participation for the ME-llenial Generation

/ Lauren / 2 Comments

In the November 22 issue of Maclean’s this fall, columnist Andrew Potter had this to say about the generation I belong to:

The members of the “millenial” generation have been accused of being a self-centred and politically apathetic cohort of cool-hunting technology addicts whose central claim to notoriety is that they have the attention span of a puppy dog on Red Bull. In last week’s mid-term elections, they did their level best to prove their critics right.

The context of this diatribe is an article entitled, “Where Was the Youth Vote?”, examining the effect poor youth voter turnout had on the recent mid-term elections in the US. Though I think my generation has a little more to offer than a puppy on Red Bull (I for one don’t pee on the rug), I can’t say I blame Andrew Potter for blaming us.

According to Potter’s article, Obama was voted into office in 2008 on a wave of support from new voters. A vital component of this wave was the youth vote: over 50% of eligible voters between 18 and 29 showed up at the ballot box (the second largest young voter participation rate in US history).  Fast-forward to the 2010 mid-term elections, and only about 20% of young voters bothered. Apparently two years can do a lot: “Yes We Can” has turned into “Do We Have To?”.

Yes. We do. I know voting for a more-or-less not famous Democrat or Republican during the mid-terms isn’t quite as exciting as being given a chance to vote for the first black US President ever, but that doesn’t mean it’s not important. Unfortunately, being a Canadian, I am not able to vote in US elections.

A little closer to home the picture doesn’t seem quite so bleak. The Stats Canada website didn’t have a neat little figure like “such and such percentage of eligible voters between 18 and 29 voted” (at least not that I could find), but I was able to glean that 59% of Canadians in their 20s have voted in at least one election. This is pretty much on par with the 58.8% of eligible Canadians who voted in the 2008 federal election. This doesn’t mean we should rest on our laurels. There are still 40% of Canadians in their 20s not doing the bare minimum when it comes to participating in democracy in Canada, and I see no particular virtue in being only as bad as everyone else.

All is not lost, however. The Stats Canada webpage helpfully goes on to cite a report called “Willing to Participate: Political Engagement of Young Adults” that found that while voter participation among young people was low, young adults are just as likely as any other age group to participate in non-voting political activity. This non-voting activity includes signing a petition, boycotting a product, or choosing to buy a specific product for ethical reasons. Social networking has made these non-voting activities all the easier (no more walking door to door collecting signatures: 200 000 Canadians can express their disapproval of Harper proroguing Parliament on Facebook!).

I understand that it’s easy to become disenfranchised with the government and have a preference for non-voting activity over voting in elections. As one of my friends (a Poli Sci grad) recently pointed out, government’s hands are often tied when it comes to the issues that are important to us. For diplomatic reasons (or because they want to get re-elected), governments are sometimes unwilling or unable to go to certain places or to tackle certain hot button issues and leave that gap to be filled by NGOs, non-profits, and advocacy groups. Being the young people we are, it’s reasonable to expect that we’d rather put our energy and faith into supporting non-voting activities that actually seem to have an impact than cast a ballot and try to choose one bunch of stuffy old jerks over another bunch of stuffy old jerks. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t vote.

The only way to make politicians care about the concerns of young voters is to make them think they actually have something to lose if they don’t. A lack of voter participation in elections allows the governing party to pander to the demographic that voted for them– and no one else. An example of this would be the tempest in a teapot the Conservative government created this summer over “privacy concerns” and the mandatory long-form census. What do they care that minority and low-income groups might be poorly represented by a voluntary census? Statistically, these groups are less likely to vote, and so the government has nothing to gain in the polls by troubling themselves over the concerns of those groups, and everything to gain by catering to the caprices of the far right groups who “don’t think it’s the government’s business to know how many bedrooms they have”, because these are the groups that can be counted on to show their support on election day.

www.marriedtothesea.com
www.marriedtothesea.com

The government doesn’t really seem to have a lot do with my daily life. I suppose as a BC theatre artist, the provincial government has a lot to do with the fact that I had to take a job in a different sector to support myself, but really, we all just seem to hum along no matter who’s in power and maybe we assume we can just hum along forever and it will never matter who we have in government. Well, someday it will matter. If you ever have children, it will matter what the education system is like. When your parents (and someday you) retire, it will matter what pensions are like. And unfortunately, someday, without warning, it will matter very much what the health care system is like.

I am incredibly impatient. I hear a lot about my generation having a short attention span and being addicted to instant gratification and maybe that’s true. I hate the excruciatingly slow pace of getting something, ANYTHING, done in government. The systems I mentioned above are in need of massive change if we want to preserve the quality of life we enjoy now. But change comes in baby steps. So why not take the baby steps now, become part of a strong voting base NOW, so that by the time you really need change to occur you’ll have provided the foundation to bring it about?

Marketers have realized that the millenial generation is the most important consumer demographic, because we can be counted on to buy things. Wouldn’t it be great if governments treated us as the most important citizen demographic because we could be counted on to vote?

Voting is practically one of the easiest things I’ve ever done in my life. Not registered to vote? Register with Elections Canada online at www.elections.ca and click on “Voters” in the upper left of the home page. Are you one of those lucky readers who can vote in the US? Visit www.usa.gov/Citizen/Topics/Voting/Register.shtml and get your ass registered.

Technically, Canada isn’t scheduled for another election until 2012, so in the meantime, effect change in that non-voting political way we’re so good at. The internet is full of information about how to get involved with just about any cause under the sun. Seeing as how we’re all “cool-hunting technology addicts”, I’m sure we’ll have no trouble finding it.