Okay, for the unlikely few of you who don't know me in real life and a refresher for those of you who do, i used to be addicted to politics. We're talking full fledged addiction, and i use that word with full awareness and respect to its power. Harper's first election win ended in a three day wine fueled blackout.
But i kicked my addiction. I was clean for a few years, not head in the sand completely out of it, but not substantially personally emotionally involved.
Recently, however, i read Hunter S Thompson's book, Better then sex: confessions of a political junkie (i highly recommend it) and that coupled with the very intrigueing election to the south has drawn me back into the game. It's has been a fun few weeks but last night i reached a point which reminded me why i got out of this abusive relationship in the first place, but before i go into that...the reason i prefaced this little opinion piece is to assure everyone that i usually do not and will not in the future talk about politics, i hate them.
But last night should peak evryones intrest...following Harper's second (and in my opinion surpriseing) election win, he promptly made an ass of himself and the Liberal/NDP proposed a coalition government to replace him. In response to this Harper asked the governor general to Prorogue parliment, and she complied.
What the fuck is this bullshit? Pardon the language but i think its time we started getting angry about this. I've always felt that the GG was an outdated relic, but i didn't mind her sticking around as a figurehead...as long as that's all she was. This weeks display of power calls into question what exactly the GG's role in Canadian politics is?
Why do we have a representitive of the Queen of England occupying the highest office in Canada? An non-elected office. A theoretically neutral posistion.
I understand the King-Byng precedent about the GG doing as the PM asks, but doesn't it seem a bit strange that she weilds this kind of power over our political proces. She's subsurviant to th PM, but weilds power over all Parliment...doesn't that seem like a contradiction? The ability of a minority leader to artifically keep his braindead cabniet alive through the winter mounths, honestly what is the point? We are not a colony anymore. It boggles the mind, I really don't understand why we put up with these kinds of shinanigans. She was not acting neutrally, she was not acting in the intrest of the canadian people, not even in the intrest of the monarchy. I really think it's time we pulled the plug on the GG's office and started governing ourselves. Well i guess our leadership is coming from Washington more and more these days, but that's a heart attck for another day...maybe.
I'm really trying to quit again.
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2 comments:
hear hear.
Chris, Hi - I came here from Stevie's blog. Now I know very little about Canadian politics (to my shame), but this smacks sorely of a black episode in Australian political history, when in 1975 the Governor-General sacked the Whitlam labour government, putting in a caretaker liberal govt until a new election. Totally unconstitutional and downright undemocratic. Many of us "maintain the rage" even today, I can tell you.
Yes, the GG is an outdated convention, and theoretically the position is open to abuse. Clearly for both our countries, not just theoretically!
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