[Discussion] Canadian Politics Catch-All

A place to discuss Canadian politics and more general political topics through a Canadian lens.

krev82 wrote:

bah, the racist graffiti continues to appear in Ottawa :/
TW: contains racist slur and imagery: article

Though details are sparse at the moment, they have at least made an arrest [TW still applies] in the case, thankfully. Still, real scary and saddening that this happened in the first place.

kuddles wrote:
Tyops wrote:

I appreciate your concerns about electoral change but we absolutely need to move to a system where the results of the 2011 and 2008 (and yes 2015 too) are not possible. You cannot given an absolute majority to a government that represent 37%-39% of the voting public.

Yes, I hate our current system. It's what has led to parties getting a majority government where they can do whatever they want, completely unchecked and without compromise, based on less than 40% of the vote. It's what has also sometimes led to parties being ruling minority governments despite actually getting fewer votes than the official opposition. It's what leads to discussion about "strategic voting" every single election, rather than voting with your heart. It's what leads to people being told that because of a FPTP system, the vote for the party they believe in is a "wasted" vote in their constituency, and being encouraged to vote for their second-to-last choice instead of their first, again and again.

And for all the talk about how complicated a new system is, people clearly don't fully understand the one we have, either, especially with all the strategic voting talk. I can't tell me how many times I got into an argument with someone the most recent election who would say "I'm voting Liberal to keep Harper out" and no matter how many times I point out that the NDP and Conservatives are neck-and-neck in their riding, they never grasped it.

I agree this is a big problem; however, I'm not sure that the oft-suggested proportional representation is the best solution. I actually like the (still far from perfect) redistribution of voting power that our riding system creates, and we would necessarily lose that in a prop. rep. system. The problem of a party that less than 40% of people voted for getting a majority is not something to be waved away, but I don't think that replacing it with a system that will make majority governments extremely rare (a single party has only gotten >50% of the national popular vote once in the past 50 years, and even then it was less than 51%) will serve us well. I recognize that there is a lot of room for debate here though, as some people think that minority governments are preferable to majority governments.

I'm no expert, but I personally favour a system that still has some version of our ridings, but instead of a first-past-the-post system in each riding we have something more like instant run-off voting. People can vote with their hearts, and if their candidate doesn't win, there's still a good chance their second choice will. This would substantially reduce (eliminate?) strategic voting, and there would be much less chance of a party that 60% of people voted against getting a majority because that couldn't happen in any particular riding, but it still leaves the door open for effective majority governments that more closely represent the voting intentions of people. This also has the advantage of being a somewhat smaller shake-up of the system than the complete overhaul that prop. rep. would require.

Of course, whether or not this would actually result in a reasonable balance of majority and minority governments is an open question that would need more study and simulation (though I'm reasonably sure that prop. rep. would not). I'm also likely affected by my lingering anti-Harper bias, as a ranked voting system would likely greatly favour the major parties other than the Conservatives.

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An important analysis suggesting Kellie Lietch is playing us like pawns the same way Trump did...

http://www.canadalandshow.com/medias...

kuddles wrote:

An important analysis suggesting Kellie Lietch is playing us like pawns the same way Trump did...

http://www.canadalandshow.com/medias...

Yeah, I agree she's playing the media well. After the first or second CPC leadership debate all the big-headline stories were Leitch this and Leitch that.

A lot of the critical media pieces on her focus on the obvious hypocrisy of a surgeon/professor/MP railing against elites but I don't think that moves the needle much in support. The base of people who might support her like her because of what she's saying, who she is doesn't seem relevant.


No electoral reform until enough Canadians want it

I don't get it. The Conservatives not caring about anything but a referendum, and the NDP open to a referendum on proportional representation there's actually an open path now to get electoral reform and the Liberals are... backing down.

My first thought is they didn't want it in the first place, but why spend so much time and energy in your first year in government? If they didn't want to change things they could have easily forgotten the vague promise in the platform and move on to other priorities. Maybe they thought they could easily change things to ranked ballot because that looks like it would be advantageous for them in the short-term?

Until enough Canadians want it? erm do enough people even know that we currently use first past the post, what first past the post means, what the other options are, and their pros & cons relative to FPTP?

I'm gonna guess that's a big fat no, so this may take a while :/

And so the electoral reform committee puts forward their report (referendum & proportional representation is the short story) and the Liberals don't seem happy with the outcome:

The supplementary reports from the Liberal committee members and NDP/Green committee members apparently differ significantly from the majority report so it seems things we're more or less back where we started. There's still that referendum/PR path open for the Liberals but I still think they've only wanted ranked ballot, otherwise if I were them I'd take this and run with it.

The government has an electoral reform poll up at https://www.mydemocracy.ca

muttonchop wrote:

The government has an electoral reform poll up at https://www.mydemocracy.ca

It's an interesting quiz. Heard about it on CFRA (only good news place in Ottawa in the mornings that I have found, despite the views being pretty right-wing) and it is way more balanced than I thought it would be.

I fall into the Innovator position.

Spoiler:

Innovators
My democracy is diverse and inclusive

Innovators are generally among the most open to new ideas to improve the way Parliament works. Innovators tend to favour cooperation over competition when it comes to politics and to prefer governments that seek compromise with other parties. They typically support the idea of parties working together and sharing responsibility for decisions.

Innovators are commonly interested in new ways to increase diversity of Parliament. They tend to prefer that Members of Parliament, as a whole, better reflect Canada’s diverse population, which includes having more women and candidates from visible minority groups elected.

Of all the groups, Innovators are most likely to welcome having a greater diversity of ideas and political viewpoints expressed and represented in Parliament. They also tend to believe that voters should have more options or additional ways to express their choices on the ballot during an election.

Innovators are generally quite concerned about voter turnout in Canada. They are the most open to the possibility of online voting as a means to increase electoral participation. Innovators are also the most likely to support the idea of mandatory voting as they tend to see voting as a democratic duty.

Yeah I got innovator too

Some of the questions were not easy answers. The poll was well designed I think. (In my completely inexperienced opinion)

your views most align with

Cooperators

My democracy is accessible and collaborative

Cooperators are generally open to modernizing our democracy. They tend to favour more cooperation in politics and in the way that Parliament works. They typically prefer governments that build consensus and seek compromise with other parties.
Cooperators are, as a whole, the most interested of any archetype in taking action to increase the diversity of representation in Parliament. They are more likely to want Members of Parliament to better reflect Canada’s diverse population. They tend to be very supportive of measures aimed at increasing the number of women and candidates from visible minority groups elected to Parliament. Cooperators also tend to support a greater diversity of ideas and political viewpoints represented in Parliament.
Cooperators generally believe election ballots should be easy for voters to use and to understand, and that accessibility is more important for voters than having new ways to express their preferences on the ballot.
Cooperators tend to be concerned about voter turnout. While they are open to online voting as a means to increase electoral participation, they are only somewhat in favour of the idea of mandatory voting.

I too am an innovator.

I'd like to give a shoutout to the Brief Remarks podcast. It's not a newsy thing, focusing more on political institutions than issues of the day but they generally talk to a researchers or present/former political operatives every episode. The latest one on political fundraising and women in politics was particularly good.

I was pleasantly surprised by the spread of topics covered in the survey. Independence of MPs from party discipline and responsiveness to constituents is the biggest issue for me in the way our Parliament operates (the huge differences in population per riding is #2) so to see questions on that was nice. Good to see them focus on values rather than systems.

I don't think the survey's going to be all that useful (although I expect the Minister will express their disappointment in Canadians when they don't give the responses the government wants). I'd bet you're going to get a hugely self-selected sample like the National Household survey.

I also wasn't a fan of the false dichotomy questions, but since it was developed by the Vote Compass people that's to be expected. It was much, much better than the Manitoba election vote compass thing but that's really damning with faint praise.

I'm glad I found this thread. The past month of following the loudest news has also kept that PET quote perpetually in my mind. Also Wolverine.

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CPC Leadership "debate" tonight. Chong and Bernier really going after Leitsch who isn't helped by being useless with French. I'm hopeful Chris Alexander being a useless ass at the "rally" in Edmonton hurts Leitch. If she's not the only idiot supporting that nonsense she's not going to be the one getting all the headlines.

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Inanimate Carbon Rod is probably #5 on my prospective ballot.

I watched the debate tonight and there's just too many candidates on stage for a proper debate. Hopefully most of the deadweight will drop out before the next debate. Except for Obhrai; he's never going to win, but I can't imagine a debate without him.

Hated that survey. It skews so heavily toward preferential ballots they might as well come out and say that's what they're doing and move one.

Was hoping for a direct question that simply presented and described the different types of electoral systems and asked us which we would like Canada to have.

I got Innovator, but also see myself in the descriptions for Collaborator and Pragmatist. Soo...it's complicated?

I think the survey is a good idea, if only to get people to think about how they stand on these issues. I found it hard to answer the dichotomous "preference" questions, because I think that questions like "MPs should vote based on their constituents VS their party" largely depends on the circumstances involved. Tilted too far one way or the other would be really bad - there is a need for one sometimes and the other other times. So I didn't really feel like I had a "preference" on a lot of those questions.

krev82 wrote:

Was hoping for a direct question that simply presented and described the different types of electoral systems and asked us which we would like Canada to have.

I am not sure this would be a good idea. I am not sure that most people would read more than a paragraph on each type before they check out. The way it is currently done, you get more of an idea of what people want, and then you can match that (or try to) the various voting styles.

"MPs should vote based on their constituents VS their party" largely depends on the circumstances

I'm rather split on voting between constituency desires and MP's own beliefs, but I'm pretty sharply against the idea of voting a party line. That sort of team-based thinking, I believe, can be a very bad idea; witness the polarization of US politics as an example of how toxic it can get.

To my view, political parties are the least interesting parts of government, and their needs come dead last on the list.

Malor wrote:
"MPs should vote based on their constituents VS their party" largely depends on the circumstances

I'm rather split on voting between constituency desires and MP's own beliefs, but I'm pretty sharply against the idea of voting a party line. That sort of team-based thinking, I believe, can be a very bad idea; witness the polarization of US politics as an example of how toxic it can get.

To my view, political parties are the least interesting parts of government, and their needs come dead last on the list.

Yeah, that's always the worst part. Politicians will sometimes vote against both their constituents and their personal beliefs because the alternative is being ostracized from the party and careers possibly being ruined.

Malor wrote:
"MPs should vote based on their constituents VS their party" largely depends on the circumstances

I'm rather split on voting between constituency desires and MP's own beliefs, but I'm pretty sharply against the idea of voting a party line. That sort of team-based thinking, I believe, can be a very bad idea; witness the polarization of US politics as an example of how toxic it can get.

To my view, political parties are the least interesting parts of government, and their needs come dead last on the list.

To me, strong political parties are actually pretty important. The sort of horse-trading that goes on in systems with weaker parties is rife for corruption and inefficiency (I'll only vote for your issue if you put a military base in my district.) When there's a close majority, I'd really rather not let every member hold every piece of legislation hostage to their own personal peccadillos.

It also leads to more uncertainty and requires more effort from voters to be informed. As it stands, I primarily need to concern myself with the platforms of the parties. Now I need to, in addition, worry about the individual candidate's personal positions on everything and how that may or may not interact with their party's platform. If I'm voting for you as a representative of your party, (that is, for the slate of policies and priorities that will be enacted should you win) I would like to be reasonably certain that you actually represent that party.

Edit to add: I'd also argue that the easy ability to defect from the party with minimal consequence has actually contributed to American polarization. Rather than encouraging compromise, it led to the furthest right-wing of the Republican party having the power to drag the party further to their extreme by credibly threatening to withhold their support. (Combined with a complete lack of accountability for the resulting gridlock due to gerrymandering and the split between executive and legislative power in the US, but that's another issue altogether.)

Malor wrote:

I'm rather split on voting between constituency desires and MP's own beliefs, but I'm pretty sharply against the idea of voting a party line. That sort of team-based thinking, I believe, can be a very bad idea; witness the polarization of US politics as an example of how toxic it can get.

To my view, political parties are the least interesting parts of government, and their needs come dead last on the list.

The idea that any MP can know what "their constituents" want is ludicrous at best. It's short form for voting along with whatever interest group has their attention (usually business).

Whatever follows the phrase "my constituents tell me..." is the thing that that MP wanted to do anyway.

The idea that any MP can know what "their constituents" want is ludicrous at best.

Well, by that argument, why have a government at all? Since, clearly, politicians are incapable of asking people their opinions, and voters have no way of expressing those opinions in meaningful ways. we should just have a tyrant.

I don't understand how you could make that claim. It has no connection to reality that I can see.

I'm not sure the comparing our system to the US's completely broken political institutions makes sense to me, they're very different.

The UK and Australia seem like better places to compare since they have the same foundations, it's easy to see what works. and what doesn't. MPs having greater independence from the party leaders seems like a virtue in both the UK and Australia. Meanwhile disconnecting party leadership from the parliamentary caucus like UKLabour looks like a disaster. The Cameron government using direct democracy, not to legitimize a desired policy change, but to cheaply appease to a base of support with no plan for what happens if you completely miscalculate on the result seems bad.

Anyway, we should have a first ministers agreement on carbon soon (Plan to meet or exceed Canada's 2030 climate change target to be signed on Friday). I am concerned that Ontario and Québec won't have to abide by the minimum price because they've tied their cap-and-trade to California's market. A uniform national price is the least costly way to reduce to emissions and having a tonne of emissions in those provinces be half of what it is in the rest of the country would undermine the whole scheme. If those two can get away with having a cap-and-trade system with too many permits available for purchase it makes sense for the other provinces to follow suit.

Malor wrote:

I don't understand how you could make that claim. It has no connection to reality that I can see.

Easy.

Constituencies are diverse and hold a plurality of opinions. You can never represent them if you pick just one to push.

Constituencies are diverse and hold a plurality of opinions

So, representative democracy is not possible?