We were disagreeing about the vote. That last bastion of democracy that political workers have done everything from hiring celebrities to Big Brother brainwashing to hammer into our heads that it is some sort of huge privelege and it represents our freedom and democracy. My argument was basically, "PPPpbbbbttthhhhhbbbbttttt!" And that was about as effectively as I worded it. I hope I can do better here. One of the things that came up in our argument was Harper, that THING in charge of ruining Canada right now. If I don't vote along with other Harper haters, he just might be allowed to continue. I didn't explain it well but I believe the vote should be used to get somebody IN not OUT. That's just one of the many ways I think the vote and democracy in Canada has been cheapened over the years. One of my other best friends ever sent me this:
Maybe it's another case of the wise, old Oscar Wilde saying and if I want to convince anyone that our system of government is messed up, I have to do it in a humourous way. Or they will kill me. So there you go. Can't get more accurate than that, can you?
Anyway, it's election time in Canada and I'm seeing a lot of irritating posts on facebook. Most irritating are the ones from Harper supporting friends who are doing the old switcheroo and claiming that people who hate Harper are the ones with cognitive dissonance. Saying that somehow we hate him but we can't prove why. They even give it a medical, scientific sounding acronym, HDF, which means Harper Derangement Frenzy. This ailment is acute in us Harper haters and it impairs our ability to reason clearly. So I'm told. But I wouldn't know because I can't reason clearly.
This must be why I put absolutely no stock in the glowing report Canada got recently from the highly reputable institute called, what else, the Reputation Institute that ranked Canada as the most reputable and admired country in the world. It is only my disability to reason clearly that keeps me from trusting that the most scientific methods imaginable were used to gather data for such an abstract title. Same goes for our number 5 ranking in "world happiness." I confess, my acute Harper hatred has caused me to doubt the hard science that must have gone into this study. Soft power? Social progress? What the hell are these things?
And when Harper supporters claim the #1 spot for "best country for business" proudly, it is only my blind hatred of Harper that brings to mind the statement of Confucius, "In a well governed country, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a poorly governed country, wealth is something to be ashamed of." I don't doubt Canada is the best country for business. I've written several examples before and I am sure there are many others. But it must be my irrational dislike for Harper that causes me to believe that only the rich and selfish, mostly foreign, are benefitting from Canada's world leading business practices. That's why, as explained a few times before, Norway has less oil than Canada, yet every Norwegian has a million-dollar pension because of it and I, a citizen of a vastly more oil rich country, probably won't ever get one.
The exact same thing can be said for our number 7 ranking in the world's most open governments scientific study. It's true. I believe it. Because the government has to be open to allow foreign corporations to steal our country's natural resources and fuck up its fragile ecosystems. I'm certain this has nothing to do with Harper's communication with other politicians, reporters, the public, well pretty much anybody who isn't waving briefcases full of money at him. But that's just the HDF talking.
Job growth, GDP growth, net debt reduction. These are things that are heralded by Harper supporters as evi-dense of his stellar prime ministership. Cited as rock-solid proof is that most fantastically creative annual work of fiction, the national budget. Then I read this article in the Huffington Post called the Top 10 Reasons To Vote For Anyone But Harper.
Look at number 2. It says Harper's economic record and job creation record are the worst of any PM since WWII. And then take a gander at number 5. It says that before Harper's reign of terror, (sorry. HDF spasm), there were 9 consecutive budget surplusses. In his 7 years at the helm there have been 7 consecutive deficits. 127 billion more HDF induced hallucinations I suppose.
Any list of Harper government achievements comes with a list of facts that renders the former list sadly ironic. Almost as ironic as the Harper supporters accusing Harper haters of ignoring reason. It brings to mind a most English of English sayings: "Are you taking a piss?" Or in a more PG13 version, "Are you winding me up?" Even when a Harper supporter talks about something that appears to be good, like the child care credits, we find that they are only available to a choice group of Canadians who need them the least and they are taxed so much that they end up costing more than they are benefitting. One of my friends proudly stated that at least Harper hasn't had scandals like the such and such government before him. Let's just ignore the fact that that statement is making me think of the last time I went to the circus and saw an elephant stand on its hind legs and a LAKE of piss came gushing out... ahem, is that what we are looking for in our leadership? No scandals? "It's okay if he de-protects water and changes laws to facilitate ease of illegal immigration and environmentally disastrous pipeline building despite Canada's environmental protection record going into the toilet, oil spills, including the largest on land ever, constantly being downplayed and kept from public attention, environmentalists being muted and defunded, as long as there are no scandals." It seems to my HDF-addled brain, that any perceived shortage of scandals, real or selectively observed, has more to do with the effective control of media than effective government.
That's the other irritating thing to me about election time: as a nation, and I'd go so far as to say the same goes for America, we have gotten to a point in our histories where we accept such weak, watered down shadows of the democracy we once prided ourselves in having. Those who think they know me well might believe I hate the vote. I agree with Mark Twain who says, "If voting made any difference, they wouldn't allow us to do it." But that doesn't mean I hate voting. People who don't vote aren't just too lazy or too busy or too stupid. This is such a common misconception! And it's a huge weakness in our system of government that bad people depend upon. There is a very real, very well developed, even well nurtured voter remorse in places like Canada created by many years of non-democracy being called deomocracy. Many who voted again and again and again and got a small amount of what they voted for, or even NONE of it, have given up. But don't be deceived. If we had anyone worthy of casting a ballot for, we'd be back. Give us a Bernie Sanders in Canada and I would not only vote, I'd encourage others to do so.
At the same time the Vote has become an untouchable, religious ceremony to Canadians and Americans. Sorry if I insert another Mark Twain quote here that fits quite nicely: "Religion was invented when the first con man met the first fool." Now please don't take this to mean I believe that all religion is con men conning fools. I just believe that in the case of the almighty vote, this IS the case. Can you tell me one SINGLE other thing that all politicians agree upon? Why do you think that is so? And who do you think is perpetuating the holiness of the vote? And to re-post that old line once again, "I wonder who would lead us if none of us would vote."
But I don't hate the vote. In fact I use it constantly in my life. In the classroom I let students vote on lessons sometimes. I will agree to a democratic choice of where to eat or drink on Saturday night even if I'm outvoted. I believe whole-heartedly in democracy. That's why I am possibly even more extreme than most in my belief in the vote. I believe that if a politician doesn't get at least 50% of the common vote, the election is not good. Otherwise, we really can't accurately say it's democratic. Though we always do. In fact even a 50% victory is going to fall far short of a true democracy, as our history of voting has proved time and time again, because even the BEST of politicians is only going to do about 50% of what he/she says.
Democracy is voting and letting the majority decide. There has never been, as far as I know, a government in either country in which the people got what 50% or more wanted. That means the majority is not deciding. That means it ain't democracy. The problem is NOT with the vote! I get so frustrated when I see these posts on people's facebook pages stating monumentally misinformed things like, "Bad politicians are elected by good people who don't vote." This may sound like a stretch but bear with me: That is like saying Charles Manson's grandparents are responsible for the crimes he committed. I don't know if anyone can, but let's pretend that we can see back to the time when Charles Manson's parents were dating. Maybe their parents, (his grandparents), told the two lovebirds time and time again not to have sex. They just had a feeling that nothing good could come of it. Maybe even saw a vision of the future. They voiced their opinions constantly, but Manson's parents only listened to them about once every four years when they ran out of money and needed a loan. At loan time the grandparents always said, "Okay, we'll give you just ONE more loan, just promise us one thing: don't have sny kids." Manson's parents always made genuine sounding promises at loan time. The future Mrs. Manson went on the pill. Mr. Manson bought condoms. But they spent their loan money on drugs, booze and sleazy hotel rooms where they could fuck like bunnyrabbits. Well on conception day Mommy hadn't used her pill and Daddy had run out of condoms. Manson was born. He killed seven people and is still rotting in jail for it. Who is at fault?
Manson's parents raised him and probably had some influence on his morality, just like the memebers of municipal, regional, state and provincial governments have some influence on the PM or President. Ideally, they should do what the voters, (grandparents), want. But they rarely do. Still, in these modern times when everything anybody does wrong can always be blamed on someone else, bad PM's and Presidents aren't blamed, nor are the members of their parties or even oppositions. It's the VOTERS' fault??? That's not even right, it's the NON voters' fault. That's like saying Manson's crimes were the fault of a FRIEND of his grandparents. It's ludicrous!
Let's go back to that article I gave a link to. I agree with it, sort of. Harper is bad. What he's done to Canada is equivalent to mass murder. The members of the Conservative party aren't at fault although they have some influence on him. Certainly the voters who voted for him are not at fault because a majority of what he's done was not in the election ads. The ones who DIDN'T vote for him have even LESS blame, but they DID support the system of government that got him elected. The ONLY people whose hands are clean in the midst of the most disastrous governments Canada has had maybe ever are the ones who didn't vote at all. But somehow the politicians want you to believe it's their fault. Why? Because if nobody voted, their jobs would be illegitimate. They'd be like CEO's of companies with no investors. Commissioners of sports leagues with no players. Voting is what keeps these guys in business. If you vote, you participate in our system of government, which, (you knew it had to be about money didn't you?), includes taxation.
Taxation, politics, economics, wheeling and dealing as the Prime representative of Canada. That comes with a lot of money, power and responsibility. This, unfortunately, attracts a lot of bad, greedy, capitalistic candidates because of the MASSIVE opportunities for mismanagement of the country and corruption. So am I only referring to Harper? Absolutely not. In my lifetime, as far as I can remember, there have been zero people who I could vote for that would have given me, and the majority of Canada, what we wanted. That is to say we have never had an opportunity at an actual democracy in our country. I would like to see a Canada that votes for ideas. This would be the most democratic solution. However, I know that not everybody would be willing to read all the details of all the issues. Many majorities would vote for the better options, but some wouldn't. So we'd get bad things because of ignorance.
I DO believe our system can work as we have it believe it or not. The problem is, we need honest and good politicians all the way up and we have to rid the system of its inherent corruption. The fault of our political system is NOT with the voters or the non-voters, it's with the scumbag politicians that a corrupt system of government attracts. Charles Manson killed those people and the legal system is reasonable enough to find him at fault and throw him in jail. But when it comes to politics, where does the reason go? Why are even the people who hate Harper trying to shift blame here? He's the poster boy for the problem with Canadian politics. Period. The fix couldn't be simpler. STOP LYING, CHEATING, AND STEALING. How to change the system is the complicated part. We need stringent rules, laws, checks and balances for the oversight of our politicians. We need candidates who offer what we want as a country instead of a little of what we want and a lot of what we don't want according to party policies.
Folks, voting for "anybody but Harper" will just get us Trudeau and I don't think he's what Canada wants. He's better, but he's still a turd sandwich. Or is he a douche? A turd sandwich vs. a douche. Modern democracy. Yay?
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