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Canada's elections - October 14
Sheriff Roland:
I was reading this article this monrning and didn't finish it then, cause there were comments that offended me.
Was going to quote from it but found out in rereading it today that the 'offensive' passages were interpretations of comments from others elsewhere. Anyways - the bolding is mine.
http://www.canada.com/victoriatimescolonist/news/story.html?id=53fc2f65-0b46-4159-badb-a160afc677c0
Harper must manage rising anti-Quebec backlash
Iain Hunter, Times Colonist
Published: Wednesday, October 22, 2008
How many times have we heard the question: "What does Quebec want?"
Since last week's election, we might ask as well: "How is it going to get it?"
It wasn't long before election-watchers crunched the numbers the morning after and came to the conclusion that, hey, Quebec doesn't matter any more.
By plumping for the Bloc Québécois, the voters in that province seemed to be assuming that another minority government would be elected and that it would be weak enough to need Bloc support to survive, and have to pay for it.
Well, it turns out that the Conservatives can survive very well without Bloc support. The party can't make a difference even in alliance with either the Liberals or the New Democrats: It will take the combined will of all three opposition parties in the Commons to force another election -- should any of them be inclined to do so any time soon.
Stephen Harper is better with the arithmetic of this minority parliament than Joe Clark was with the one he had: He can afford to govern as if he has a majority, until he gets tired of it all again and pulls the plug.
I've seen the lament of newspaper columnists and academics that Quebec has turned its back on playing a role in the government of the nation in this election. That after all Canada has done for it -- righting a "fiscal imbalance" that was a fiction, giving anyone who wants to claim it the right to belong to a Quebec nation inside "a united Canada," whatever that means -- Quebec has given the rest of us the one-fingered salute.
Who could have thought that something as inconsequential as the Conservatives' cancelling a few so-called artists' travel grants or threatening to crack down on violent juvenile criminals could have made such a difference?
How could these issues have turned off Quebecers from voting for the party that was almost sure to be returned as the government in Ottawa with the cash to meet whatever demands that they might make, right whatever wrongs they perceived?
After all, aren't there artists in other parts of Canada? Are juvenile criminals confined to Quebec?
I've also seen disturbing letters to the editor and the remarks of blogheads reminiscent of nastier times in the past. They suggest that Quebec should be made to pay for backing a party content to live off the perks of a country it doesn't recognize.
The government must stop catering to Quebecers' "entrenched tribalism." No more should the "French tail" be allowed to wag the "English dog."
And, most disturbing of all, that it's now the turn of "the West," toward which the weight of Conservative support has shifted.
I've never approved of the extent to which successive prime ministers lately have pandered to the demands of regions and provinces at the expense of strong central government, though pretending that one size should fit all is absurd in a country as vast and diverse as ours.
I've never liked the way national cost-sharing formulas are negotiated and then wrecked by side deals that are more politically motivated than anything else. And I hate the way our provinces are described as "haves" or "have-nots," as if there aren't wealthy people in poor provinces and poor people in wealthy ones.
And I feel sorry for all of us that people get so upset when they see the English dog chasing its French tail. It's a splendid tail, and it should wag, not droop.
I was present in that old railway station in Ottawa when we put our nation on its new, independent track, but left Quebec as an unwilling caboose at the end, and its prime minister [sic] an emotional wreck. I still think that what I regarded as the mother country could have done more to make us try again before succumbing to Pierre Trudeau's advice to hold its nose and pass the bill that left Quebec alone.
I was present, too, when so many Quebecers' hopes sank in Meech Lake and were lost in Charlottetown.
It doesn't surprise me that people in Quebec have a different view of our union than, say, Albertans, or that what happens in Quebec City, as voter turnout in provincial elections shows, is more important to them than what happens in Ottawa.
Some loyalties have no price.
Sheriff Roland:
I'll be moving this thread to 'My Great White North' blog later this week.
a redirect will be left behind in this forum (but based on recent posting rates, that notice may not stay on the first page two days! :-\ )
Ellemeno:
--- Quote from: Sheriff Roland on October 22, 2008, 12:06:31 pm ---I'll be moving this thread to 'My Great White North' blog later this week.
a redirect will be left behind in this forum (but based on recent posting rates, that notice may not stay on the first page two days! :-\ )
--- End quote ---
Roland, just want you to know I've been reading this thread. I'm so unknowledgable though, that I've had nothing to add. But I look at it every time there is something new, so thanks for having it here as long as you have.
Lumière:
--- Quote from: Sheriff Roland on October 22, 2008, 12:06:31 pm ---I'll be moving this thread to 'My Great White North' blog later this week.
a redirect will be left behind in this forum (but based on recent posting rates, that notice may not stay on the first page two days! :-\ )
--- End quote ---
LOL.
Yeah, I've had to dig for it three or four pages deep in the past.
This latest article you posted Roland, are those all (particularly the bolded bits) Harper's comments?
Edit: Just saw your note here: :)
--- Quote ---Was going to quote from it but found out in rereading it today that the 'offensive' passages were interpretations of comments from others elsewhere. Anyways - the bolding is mine.
--- End quote ---
Sheriff Roland:
--- Quote from: Lucise on October 22, 2008, 12:27:20 pm ---This latest article you posted Roland, are those all (particularly the bolded bits) Harper's comments?
--- End quote ---
None of it is Harper's.
The first (offensive) bit is the article's author's synthesizing of some comments he's come across, while the last two bolded-up parts are from the author of the piece, Ian Hunter
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