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| quote: | Originally posted by Abercrombie
I applaud your rant, Spam. I've basically given up too.. No decent candidates in my riding, and I'm left to pick one out of the worst. If Frank Klees (Conservative, ooooo shocking to you supporters, isn't it!) was running up here, he'd likely get my vote. |
I applaud the fact that you still do your best to keep informed and vote based on what you believe to be the best decision for yourself and, perhaps, your country. But I really don't see how Belinda Stronach could do anything to garner your support.
If you ignore the fact that she's a Liberal and I really don't like them right now, what you STILL have is a backstabbing rookie who makes political decisions solely for her own personal gain (wow... maybe it wasn't such a bad thing she switched, she fits in SO WELL).
I don't know about your other choices, as I live in a riding where my choices are Whajid Khan and Rupinder Brar. I don't know anything about these guys, except that when Khan calls my house, I can't understand him, and what party they belong to. But, I've decided this time around to vote for the party I believe will be best for Canada at this time. And in my mind, it's the Conservatives. Based mainly on two things.
Although I like the ideas and ideoligies behind Liberal policy, I'm becoming increasingly skeptical of whether or not their grand social programs can ACTUALLY work, and I'm getting more and more tired of Liberal agendas intruding on my, and other's personal lives (what dogs we can own, where we can smoke *not a smoker btw... of cigarettes*, what type of firearm we're allowed to own *don't want a gun, but respect other's rights to it*) as well as the waste of money many of their policies become as a result of administrative costs (paperwork rather than actual results, Such as the Gun Registry). I like that the Tories are willing to cut social programs, because I believe it forces those in charge of expendatures in those programs to become more creative and learn to spend more efficiently. The current Liberal strategy of "Lets spend 32982398563 Billion dollars over 32982398563 years to fix Problem X" results in giant black holes of fiscal waste. The major result from more money being thrown at these problems is faster paperwork, and hefty raises to the corresponding employees of whatever union is in control of whatever institution they are trying to fix, be it health-care, education or whatever. Although seemingly uncaring, Tory cuts can actually be a blessing because, as I've said, it FORCES these institutions to budget properly.
The problem is, instead, they just whine and cry to the newspapers about how 'underfunded' they are, and the media eats it up because it sells. The Government is then held under increasing public pressure to spend more on said problem instead of working on SOLUTIONS (and then, the NDP, which is basically Liberal to the power of 3, gain support).
That being said, Harper continually says (in response to people complaining about him cutting this or that social program, that aboriginal deal, for instance, or the kyoto accord) that he believes there are better SOLUTIONS and that he wants to work with said institutions to fix the problem. This is how I believe problems should be solved, not just by throwing billions of dollars at them, but by truly attempting to work out the kinks CAUSING the problems to begin with.
Last election, Paul Martin spat out all sorts of this type of rhetoric, and I gave him the benefit of the doubt. He did a good job as finance minister under Jean Chretien, and leading up to the election he had the sponsorship scandal to deal with and never really had a chance to govern. He's had his chance now, and in my mind, he's failed miserably. His constant non-action on a seemingly never-ending list of issues he said he'd fix has completely outraged me.
Combine that with my more recent learning of many conservative theories (as in, WHY they want to do things the way they do) and it's made a conservative out of me if, or until THEY screw it up.
In all honesty I believe that a regular change of Government is what's best for a country, and democracy. I think that after 8-10 years, ANY government will become complacent, corrupt, and will begin to lose sight of their citizen's true interests. 8 years from now you may see me speaking out against the Conservatives and how they've mis-managed the country, but for now, I think it's time they had their chance at Governing once again.
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. Now it's all about his (their?) PhD and the millions of dollars sitting in his (or her) bank account. It's ridiculous. It's why we end up with dolts like Paul Martin in the PM office to begin with! Don't get me wrong, education is a GREAT thing, but only to a point, and certainly not to the extent that our current society upholds it.
