Only David Warren could spend 7 days on a Caribbean cruise and arrive home pessimistic.
Which surprises me, frankly. He looked plenty merry in the thong.
Only David Warren could spend 7 days on a Caribbean cruise and arrive home pessimistic.
Which surprises me, frankly. He looked plenty merry in the thong.
“This leaves inexperience as their �unique selling point�. I am truly unexcited.”
Nails it.
Speaking of losing the will to live. From http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Render&c=Article&cid=1134774155553&call_pageid=968332188774
The poll suggests Prime Minister Paul Martin, meanwhile, is deemed best in the other categories: vision for the country, decisiveness, understanding the economy, knowing the issues and having the right approach to Canada-U.S. relations, among others.
The man has never decided anything in the last 2 years.
He looked plenty merry in the thong.
Ya wanna warn people before you post damaging imagery like that, Kate? Time to take the old brain to the dry-cleaners.
�Let me put it this way. Canada is not so much a country as a holding tank filled with the disgruntled progeny of defeated peoples. French-Canadians consumed by self-pity; the descendants of Scots who fled the Duke of Cumberland; Irish, the famine; and Jews, the Black Hundreds. Then there are the peasants from Ukraine, Poland, Italy and Greece, convenient to grow wheat and dig out the ore and swing the hammers and run the restaurants, but otherwise to be kept in their place. Most of us are huddled tight to the border, looking into the candy store window, scared of the Americans on one side and the bush on the other.�
http://newcriterion.com/archive/20/sept01/mordecai.htm
I am surprised to see David Warren be this wrong. His prediction is not worthy of a man of his intellect. The Idler demographic, posssibly numbering in the dozens, seems anomalously anti-Harper, but I think the CPC shall overcome this obstacle.
it’s interesting in that none of the MSM were officially on your cruise but you had trolls.
Wow. This is the first prediction that shows a Liberal majority. Maybe he had too much sun. I could live with a Conservative minority for awhile. But never a Liberal majority.
Plato you never mentioned the all important British we are a proud sort from strong stock.
Check out Paul Wells’ site, now.
Thanks, Mitch. It’s up.
“Plato you never mentioned the all important British we are a proud sort from strong stock.”
Then send over some British armored divisions to interrupt the planting of the Prime Ministerial lips on the gluteus maximii of China and North Korea.
I hear the screaming of tortured political prisoners is as distasteful to some in Ottawa as is — how did Adam Daifallah put it? — “drinking a f*cking Merlot”
It’s always delightful when people with influence throw the game before half-time by announcing the loss. Thanks for reminding me, Kate, why I never read what that guy has to say. I’d have slashed my wrists months ago.
My thoughts to Mr. Warren
If after watching the english debate tonight, Ontarians still harbor some kind of resentment/resistance to Harper, then I think we can pretty much write them off as having any salient political perceptions.
The Stephen Harper in tonights debate is exactly what Ontario and the National media have been clamoring for from the conservative side of the spectrum for the last 20 years.
Mr. Warren I cannot think of a political leader in the last 40 years that has put forth a clearer understanding of major policy issues, or articulated them in as clear or concise a fashion as I witnessed Harper do tonight.
Should Ontario reject Harper again, I think it is time to question Ontario, not Harper or the Conservatives.
I hope he has given you cause to rethink your opinion.
Ward, it is not an Ontario thing. Never was. That is a myth that is unsupported by data. Support for the CPC is pretty strong outside the 416. If Harper goes down don’t blame Ontario; blame other cohorts of society who vote Liberal in extremely, extremely large numbers. I will not have my province used as a scapegoat when I know damn well who is really responsible for this mess.
Has Warren been on a boat in the Carribean since 2000? A Liberal Majority? Perhaps the boat ran aground on a smoke-filled Jamaican beach with no Quebecers or non-GTA Ontarians.
I hope Warren is right. In fact, I hope Ontarians vote for Liberals in record numbers. I hope every seat in Ontario goes to the Liberal party.
That way, Albertans can put separation from this diseased Dominion onto the fast track, and get our province out of the country with our wallets reasonably intact.
A vote for the Liberals is a vote to break up the country. Vote Liberal!
I don’t like what Warren has to say, but regardless, unfortunately, I’ll bet that the conservatives still won’t even form a minority. Despite the debate, Harper’s performance, and any other points going for the CPC, or against the liberals, most people I run into have already been fully programmed. The Trudeaupian organs are fully functional. There is still a lot more to destroy in this country before a change will take place. Until then prepare for more of the same from the last 30 years.
The Hockey metaphor.
First period ends at the Xmas break. Harper’s job is to re-calibrate himself into Mr. Calm.
Second period ends after the next debates – second period job is to roll out the rest of the platform and nail the Liberals as corrupt liars who are unfit to govern and have no realistic policy.
Third period is the time for Mr. Harper to show passion. An audience must be prepared and have time to mentally change over before they will accept new messages.
Cognitive dissonance lives.
If they stay the course, continue to roll out really good policy, it could easily be a CPC majority – there is enormous hunger for change of government in the land.
Call me a sap, but I thought Harper’s analogy at the end, about how a Canadian hockey team is vastly improved with players from Quebec, was great stuff; subtle and not overblown like Martin accusing Duceppe of killing his first born or whatever he was whinging about. Give the old f-cker some Viagra. His battery is almost dead.
Amazing how the Liberal bootlicking talking heads eat up the fake smile and bullshit that Martin oozes.
I am disappointed by David Warren’s blog today as well as Charles Adler’s bashing Harper again in the London Free Press, also today.
What in hell does Harper have to do to have his program to end Liberal style corruption governance be understood by MSM ?
If fake emotions mean more to the scribes of this country than honest to goodness real substantive changes, then we really are in trouble and on the way to a banana republic level of existence.
I had to laugh last night at the news when the reader said Harper was very calm and didn’t get overly excited (etc.)in the debate so he came across more like a business man and not a Prime Ministerial person. “GAG RALPH PUKE” The media has gone adrift in a sea of Liberal excrement.
Time to vote these COLD HEARTED BASTARDS out.
Crikey, we’re pooched. This is not a democracy.
democracy ???
how could it be in a place where more than a third of the voters work for the government?
vote for the status quo or dont eat.
Gotta love the MSM, Harper gets angry about the sponsorship scandal and that makes his crazy and scarey. He tries looking prime ministerial and calm, and that makes him not passionate enough.
The CPC could run Ghandi, Tommy Douglas or even Paul Martin himself and the Liberal media would crucify them. It doesn’t matter who the leader is.
It’s going to take lots of money to run ads to counteract the media bias, so give till it hurts and twist your friends arms to cough up as well.
If Liberals win, we all send as much beer and popcorn to the Libs as we all can afford. Dump it on Parliament Hill and watch the media wallow in it.
I will not have my province used as a scapegoat when I know damn well who is really responsible for this mess.
Who, then? I hate it when people play coy.
I’m really surprised that Harper didn’t use his minute during the question regarding senate reform to attack Martin. He could have done this by saying, “I’d like to ask Mr. Martin: It does NOT require a Constitutional ammendment to appoint senators from provinces that have systems in place to elect senators. It simply requires a desire for change on your part, Mr. Martin, from the old ways of doing politics … that which breeds cynicism and contempt from the public. So why, Mr. Martin, did you appoint senators and not take those that have been elected in the province of Alberta? You had an option, Mr. Martin!”
Anonalogue wrote: “If Harper goes down don’t blame Ontario; blame other cohorts of society who vote Liberal in extremely, extremely large numbers.”
Let’s see.
Ontario has about 39% of the population and is home to about 56% of the Liberal MPs from the last parliament. The only other major area of support for the Liberals is the maritimes, which has the excuse of seeking a continuation of the federal gravy train on which they have come to depend. Ontario, of course, has way more seats.
Recent polls suggest that the Libs remain meaningfully ahead in Ontario, despite everything. It’s like battered spouse syndrome. Those of us who think 12 years of abuse and mismanagement is too long wish they’d wake up and dump the Libs, but they never do.
So, yes, I tend to blame Ontario for keeping the Liberals in power. What are these “other cohorts” that are a bigger cohort than the 40% of the country living in Ontario?
Actually, I have an idea who you mean, but I want to hear your theory.
The 1997 election shows just how flawed our electoral system is.
In that election, the Liberals won 155 seats – just 4 seats over what was needed at the time to win a majority government (There were 301 ridings that election).
In that election, the Liberals won 102 of 103 seats in Ontario (98.1%).
This means that of the remaining 198 seats, the Liberals only took 54, or just 27.2% of the seat total.
Clearly, there is something wrong with a system that allows for a party to form a majority government that has only 27.2% of the seat total from 9 of 10 provinces containing 70% of the population.
But perhaps is more disturbing is that we had an illegitimate Liberal government between 1997 and 2000, passing legislation as a majority when they, in actual fact, had no mandate to do so.
In that election, the Liberals won 26 seats in Quebec.
Had Quebeckers known then what they know now about dirty money being used to usurp the democratic process the certainly the Liberals would not have won all those seats. And remember, all it would have took was a loss of 5 seats out of those 26 and the Liberals would have had a minority government in 1997.
To me, the fact that we had a phony majority running the country from 1997 – 2000 is more of a scandal than the monies that were stolen.
Does anyone know the answer to what I’m about to ask?
I stated previously that in 1997 the Liberals formed the government with just 27.2% of the seat total from 9/10 provinces.
Using extrapolation, is it possible for a U.S. presidential candidate to win the presidency with just 5 states giving him a majority of the votes, meaning the other 45 states, containing roughly 2/3 of the population, voted against him?
I realize I’m comparing apples to oranges here in terms of seat distrubution in the Canadian system and over all popular vote in the U.S. system, but there’s still something to be said here.
Scot,
Not possible. There are 538 electoral votes; ergo, it takes 270 to win. The five largest states total only 162.
Well, exactly, and that’s the whole point.
Only in a system like ours can you perfrom as poorly as the Liberals did in the ’97 election
Again, just 27.2% of the seats from outside Ontario went to the Liberals.
Think about it: 9 of 10 provinces in our confederation (containing roughly 2/3 of the population … isn’t that considered a “super majority” in U.S. vernacular?) handing the Liberals just 27.2% of their seats and yet that party was still able to form a MAJORITY gov’t.
Something is wrong with a system that allows for that to happen.
Yep, you’ve got it exactly right. Canada has a major structural flaw – one that guarantees that 9/10ths of the provinces will always remain mired in resentment. The nine outliers are given a “voice”, but it’s a voice without proportionate power, so it’s never listened to.
Ontario, vis-a-vis the other provinces, stands as the Crown stood to the American colonies prior to American Revolution.
Still no word from Anonalogue on who, other than Ontario, we should blame for the Liberals remaining in power?
Scot – one of the reasons we have the Electoral College, to “balance” the popular vote. And each state legislature decides how its EC votes will be apportioned – most choose to give all to the pop vote winner in that state, but a few (ME & NB I think) give them proportionally. Rarely, this produces a result just slightly different than the pop vote (4 elections incl 2000 which was the first in 112 yrs) [but everyone knows the rules going in, which was why Al Gore’s “recount” effort irritated me much more than that I was a Bush supporter]. Not perfect and it’s argued about, but I think it’s an important & desirable part of our system. Of course it also reminds us that the Founders desired us not to have political parties, too . . . of course, they were also founders *of* political parties, after Washington. So there’s reality.
Canada’s main need for reform at the moment seems to be devolving some of the functions arrogated to the PMO back to the House of Commons proper. I don’t know that any of that is a constitutional issue – ? You need a powerful – but not TOO powerful – PM. And then perhaps upper house reform, perhaps that would be more difficult? A minority govt w/ the CPC and either/or/both the NDP/the Bloc focused on reform in the House and Ottawa and refitting the Dept of Defence would be a very worthwhile minority govt. IMvery, veryHO. Not very exciting to campaign on – though the Republicans in the U.S. did in 1994 with the “Contract with America” now that I think of it.
a democracy implies equality in voting . well an average PEI voter has 4 times the stroke of a western voter where the ridings are 100000 plus. PEIs ridings are about 25000 to 30000 tops. but they keep returning libs to office with guarentees of jobs and subsidies.
PEI is one of the greatest scams ever perpeturated under a very corrupt system , -highest post secondary education, highest house ownership (outright) highest ownership of new cars.(need a bridge for that) but they consistently fly under the radar by keeping quiet , cashing the cheques , and benefiting in spades from the system they quietly but diligently support.
they get higher subsidies per capita than Quebec, but dont draw the wrath.
You don’t know Warren. He’s only really happy when miserable about something political.