Canadian Election Tread (part deux)

[notyoueither]

Are you afraid for the NDP's prospects if they had to address the Conservatives directly without mommy in the shape of the Liberals to hide behind?

[Tingkai]

The Conservatives?

[Asher]

Originally posted by notyoueither
Who's the other guy? Joe Clark?

Yeah, he looked A LOT like Joe Clark, which is why it made no sense to me...

[General Ludd]

For anyone else who missed the debate, you can see the whole thing here.


Does Paul Martin remind anyone else of Porky the Pig?

[Richelieu]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
I'm working on my killdozer as we speak.

What was its name again? Daisy Etta? Something like that...

Anyway: on Duceppe looking comfortable. He is better than he used to be and he has been the leader of his party for much longer than any of the others. Experience comes into play.
But the determining factor IMO is that he couldn't care less about the english debate. He's not going to get more votes from it however good his performance is and he can't lose that many either considering who watches it in Quebec.

[Kontiki]

Duceppe may have looked comfortable, but he pissed me off when he kept saying "the provinces and Quebec". Until and unless you actually separate, Quebec is a province dickwad, so sit down and shut up.

[General Ludd]

My impressions of their performance in the debate:

Harper; Smug, but also avoidant. He was just happy to see everyone tearing apart martin.

Martin; A bumbling idiot.

Layton; A charleton or snakeoil salesman. He tried too hard and usually ended up sounding really fake and contrived.

Duceppe; Direct and upfront.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Tingkai

Canada is routinely involved in peacekeeping missions without any help from the US. As for the last UN committment that involved Canada, but not the US, it is probably Rwanda.

.

The US military provided logistical help to relief operations in Rwanda, as part of "Operation Support Hope".

[St Leo]

Originally posted by notyoueither
Oh, and Liberals are down in Ontario, while the Conservatives will not be split this time.

BTW, in my riding of Richmond Hill, there is both a Consie and a Progressive Consie running.:P

I flirted briefly with the idea of voting for the Greens, but I think I'll go for the NDP. The Greens are running are much more active campaign, but I am not comfortable with their fiscal conservatism.

[Ben Kenobi]

A couple of memorable lines... I watched the whole thing.

Harper:

"Quebeckers have a hard choice between Corruption and Seperatism."

Martin - to Harper:

"You don't even accept the science behind climate change. Who could possible trust you on the environment"

Layton, in response:

"You accept the science, so why don't we see any love from you?"

[Ben Kenobi]

I agree with the assessment of Harper. Only once did Harper have to take off the gloves, and that was on the point with people who have different opinions from the Liberal party lacking representation on gay marriage.

Layton scored a big point for Harper when he hammered Martin for not allowing a free vote on gay marriage. What is Martin afraid of?

[Ben Kenobi]

No kidding. But "zero tolerance" means the Conservatives will not tolerate anything that depicts minors having sex.

No, it doesn't. I suggest you take another look at the policy.

We made exceptions for these cases with the artistic merit clause. After the court case in BC, the law was strengthened by changing "artistic merit" to "public good". In other words, as a defence, the accused would have to show that he/she was serving the public good.

Under the current law, anything goes. You can show pictures of naked children so long as they are 'tastefully' done.

That does nothing to protect children from exploitation, if they are allowed to have these pictures distributed.

This has nothing to do with firearms safety training. If you want to own a gun you have to get a Firearms Aquisition Certificate. To get that licence, you need to take a safety course. So why are the Conservatives promising to create a law that already exists.

Yeah, but there are significant differences in their policies, and your spin will not eliminate those differences. Harper wants to reassure folks that he will keep the Liberal's policy, which is significant.

Heck, Martin had an attack ad on the Conservatives using handguns which have been regulated since the 30's and the new firearms registry does not apply to handguns.

Can you say Kyoto?

Upheld? Don't make me laugh.

Canada pays its UN dues without the help of Americans.

Yeah, but the UN is toothless without military assistance to back up their declarations. Diefenbaker said this 40 years ago, when the UN first formed, and he is spot on. If Canada wants to play a significant role in the UN, they need to supply a military force.

Canada provides financial assistance to dozens of international organisations, without the help of Americans.

Yeah, a whopping half a percent of our budget. Big deal.

Canada is routinely involved in peacekeeping missions without any help from the US. As for the last UN committment that involved Canada, but not the US, it is probably Rwanda.

We can't even ship our peacekeepers to where they are needed without help from the Americans. So yes, they have to help us do our peacekeeping.

In other words, Canada decides its own foreign policy. For the Conservatives to claim that they are the only party with a "Made in Canada" foreign policy is ridiculous.

Canada is a puppet of the US. The only reason we did not go to Iraq is because we had no option to send troops, not because Chretien held us out. Heck, we collaborated as much as we could.

[Tingkai]

Sorry, dp

[cinch]

Joe Volpe is reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally pissing me off on COUNTDOWN with Mike Duffy.

As are most Liberal pundits, lately.

My innards are conflicted.

Current Intra-Cinch Polling Results:

Libs------- 45% (preventatitve measures)
Greens--- 35% (for the future)
NDP------- 15% (for certain reasons)
Cons------ 5% (for their spunk on certain issues)

[Tingkai]

About this zero tolerance for child porn thing, Harper is either lying or he's stupid.

I don't think he's stupid, so he must be lying.

Here's what the Conservative platform says:
"Rather than removing the defence of “artistic merit” for child pornographers, the Liberals simply repackaged the old law by including a new defence where child
pornography may be deemed to serve the “public good” – which may be held to include the old loophole of “artistic merit.”

"We will pass legislation that will adopt a zero tolerance policy for child porn, eliminating the so-called “public good” defence."

Harper knows that eliminating the public good defence and taking a zero tolerance approach would mean banning Romeo and Juliet, Lolita and other works of art. He knows damm well that the "public good" defence was designed to cover things like Romeo and Juliet. And there's no way that he would ever implement a "zero tolerance" approach.

What Harper is really doing is lying. He wants to make the Liberals look soft on child porn when they are not (definitely no puns intended).