Another election

Another election. Jesus Murphy. Now, on the one hand, a side of me welcomes an opportunity to rid ourselves of Stephen Harper. On the other hand, I'm aware we live in a country with an antiqued electoral system that will allow politicians bulldoze voters, and keep parties like Green out, even with nearly a million votes to their credit.

http://vimeo.com/21072501

Watch the video about to get a better idea what we're dealing with here. I vote for no other reason than because I'm militant about exercising my rights. But I'd by lying if I said I wasn't trying to fight off a growing apathy to the whole system. The only thing that prevents me from not caring is apathy is what Stephen Harper is banking on. God, how I hate that man.

He recently went on a tirade about the Liberals plotting a coalition with the Bloc, even though he himself tried to do the exact thing when it suited his party's needs. Newsflash: It's legal and above board to form coalitions if the House believes the acting government is not acting in the best interest of Canada, or is ignoring the will of parliament. Some (many) people in this country are ignorant of parliamentary law and see coalitions as sneaky. What's sneaky is the Conservative leader doing it on the sly and then blasting other parties for doing it against him.

He's prorogued Parliament twice: once to avoid a vote of non confidence and again to avoid answering to the Afghan detainee torture issue. Proroguing is a commonplace procedure-- when all business is concluded. When there are still bills on the table and issues at hand, proroguing is a miscarriage of democracy.

He wasted over a billion dollars on the G20 & G8, namely because he held it in Toronto, against the pleas of the mayor, resulting in the largest mass arrest of civilians in the country's history. He could have paid a fraction of the cost and hosted it in Nunavut or Newfoundland or Saskatchewan, places with small populations and less security risks. They could have built infrastructure and secured it for less than the cost of security in Canada's largest and most easily accessed metropolis.

He's a religious zealot. He's anti-choice for women, and make no mistake that if he thinks he can, he'll tread on women's rights. He's already axed women's programs and services.

Prior to becoming PM, he campaigned for privatization of health care. He's not invested in our healthcare system at all. Boomers are aging and need nursing facilities and spaces. We need more beds in our emergency rooms. We need more doctors and nurses on staff. All those things require more money. He goes and cuts the GST, which does little for most regular people, but those pennies we save each day accumulates into massive monetary loss for the government to spend on services we require. So going to Tim Horton's will be a few cents cheaper but going to the hospital will be gruelling. What an excellent trade off.

He rebranded the Canadian government, that is The Government of Canada, as the Harper Government. Hubris, thy name is Harper. I cannot even properly explain just how offensive I find that. Do you think Americans would tolerate The United States Government being rebranded as The Obama Government? or The Bush Government? There'd be rallies in the street.

He spends tax payers money on Conservative party propaganda! $26 million! Those "Your country is in good hands with Stephen Harper" commercials? Paid for by you and me. He's advertising his own party with our tax dollars. He's not putting that money into healthcare. He's not putting it into education. He's not funding anything of value to us, the people. He's funding a love letter to himself for all of us to watch.

He's managed all of this and more in a handful of years with a minority government. Frankly, I'm terrified. What has my Canada come to? Everything we are, everything we value: women's right to chose, homosexual rights, parental leave, Canada pension plan, healthcare, quality public education...

Does anyone honestly think he supports or believes in any of those things? He doesn't even believe in banking regulations, the ones that saved us from a massive recession. He was for opening the market up like the Americans, and look what happened to them! And now he's riding off the good choices of previous leaders and taking the credit, though he would have lead us down the same road as our neighbours.

Any Canuck out there, with a brain and a heart, look at this guy. Seriously. Look at him. Look at his record. He's failed us, he's failed us so hard and so miserably. He can't be given more power. Open your eyes.