election
So last night Liberal Glen Pearson won with 35% of the vote, with the Green Party candidate coming in 2nd place. This is the best the Greens have done in any election so far!
Haskett came a distant third, and, true to form, insinuated that the media was to blame for giving her a negative image (never mind the fact that most of the time she refused to talk to reporters). That kind of arrogance is very typical of Harper's governemnt, and it's a startegy that appears to be backfiring.
I was surprised at how badly the NDP did in this election. It's likely that the Green candidate took away thier support, and actually, if their votes added together they would have won.
A few other thoughts:
* We really do need to adopt a run-off ballot system here in Canada. With 4 (or 5) major parties, it is going to become more common for reps to be elected with a plurality of the vote. This has been going on for some time anyways; the average Majority government here is elected on about 40% of the vote, which means that more people oppose them than support them, and yet they can act as though they have the support of a majority of Canadians.
* I heistantly voted Green this time, but more because of the exceptional personality and campaign of Elizabeth May. If the Greens could consistently draw candidates like her, they would win seats.
* On that note, it is interesting how, in a by election, people vote more on the individual than the party, which is really how it should be. I wonder if, instead of electing all of our reps at once, we could have some staggered term system where a portion of them are elected, something like how the Senate in the US is done. It would certainly keep governments of their toes and more responsive if they knew their levels of support would be altered every few years on a regular basis.
* Overall our parliamentary system is old and unresponsive. But i'm not optimistic of changes happening anytime soon.
Haskett came a distant third, and, true to form, insinuated that the media was to blame for giving her a negative image (never mind the fact that most of the time she refused to talk to reporters). That kind of arrogance is very typical of Harper's governemnt, and it's a startegy that appears to be backfiring.
I was surprised at how badly the NDP did in this election. It's likely that the Green candidate took away thier support, and actually, if their votes added together they would have won.
A few other thoughts:
* We really do need to adopt a run-off ballot system here in Canada. With 4 (or 5) major parties, it is going to become more common for reps to be elected with a plurality of the vote. This has been going on for some time anyways; the average Majority government here is elected on about 40% of the vote, which means that more people oppose them than support them, and yet they can act as though they have the support of a majority of Canadians.
* I heistantly voted Green this time, but more because of the exceptional personality and campaign of Elizabeth May. If the Greens could consistently draw candidates like her, they would win seats.
* On that note, it is interesting how, in a by election, people vote more on the individual than the party, which is really how it should be. I wonder if, instead of electing all of our reps at once, we could have some staggered term system where a portion of them are elected, something like how the Senate in the US is done. It would certainly keep governments of their toes and more responsive if they knew their levels of support would be altered every few years on a regular basis.
* Overall our parliamentary system is old and unresponsive. But i'm not optimistic of changes happening anytime soon.