lightcastle

So I went to the Débat des candidats dans Verdun today, arriving a bit late due to work.

misskitty79 saved me a space by the pillar, since it was pretty jam packed (I'd put it at 120 people or so). As some of you know, I've been less than enthused about my options in this election. Due to some prearranged agreement due to time constraints, only 5 representatives were given full time: PLQ, PQ, CAQ, QS, and ON. The Greens and the CUQ had to stay in the back, to be given 5 minutes of time at the end.

My impressions?
Liberal Henri-François Gautrin
--> Did not show up. This probably saved him some serious shit-talking from the crowd.

Parti Québécois Thierry St-Cyr
--> Blew my mind. Progressive, passionate, on top of the issues and knows how to work a crowd, stay on time, answer debate questions, and always work in his core message of "this is why we need a sovereign Quebec". If it wasn't for my deep distrust of Pauline Marois and the PQ, he might have won my vote right here.

Coalition Avenir Québec André Besner
--> Very solid. He's live here for most of his life, decided once he retired he would go into public service. I disagree with most of his fundamental principles, but he struck me as professional, engaged, and was impressively able to take some hits from a crowd that did not like him.

Québec solidaire Chantale Michaud
--> I like a lot about her platform, but she doesn't know how to handle this kind of format. Constantly going over time because she was reading her answers, rather than speaking them, she then got so flustered by being called out on it that when the red sign for no more time went up, she'd just stop mid sentence instead of finishing her thought. This marred what was otherwise some good policy ideas and what appeared to be a very solid knowledge of the local situation.

Green Jeffrey Mackie
--> Only got to speak at the end. Made the effort to do it in French, although it was clearly difficult for him. Just a vague stump speech introduction with no real policy meat.

Option nationale Marc-Antoine Daneau
--> He probably wished he hadn't had a seat for the debate, and had given it to Green. He apparently started with fair support from the crowd, but pissed it away by basically saying independence was the answer to everything. No context, no nuance. Probably just a computer geek who agreed to run. He did get better as the debate went on, which I complimented him on afterwards. That was NOT easy (it got to the point people just started laughing when he started to answer a question) but he stuck with it and clearly learned some just watching the professionals. No way I'd ever vote for a group whose entire platform basically consists of "Why aren't we already splitting off from Canada? We can figure out details later."

Coalition pour la constituante Elisabeth Doyon
--> Did not see this human.

Quebec Citizens' Union Philippe Refghi
--> He gave another quickie 5 minutes speech at the end. OK, but a bit unfocused, with most of it dedicated to the idea of "the old parties are bad, and voting for someone new isn't wasting your vote".

In the end, I am really glad I went. QS seems to have massive support, which surprised me. There is certainly a "dear god, get the liberals out" mood, but vote splitting PQ/QS could be a big deal.

With the coordinated shut down of many US Occupy sites, and the eviction notices in Toronto and the shut down of OccupyRegina, how long before there's a coordinated shut down here? Harper really does have US-envy and we already know from G-20 that he loves his security state schtick. I'm sure it seems deeply unfair to him that he can't organize a nation-wide crack down like happened down south. So will he indulge himself, or has the movement gotten enough traction in the political class to blunt his desires? And if he does coordinate a police crack down, will he completely forget to include Quebec? I could see that happening.

Page protests the Speech from the Throne.

If you are going to be fired for being partisan, do it in a great way.

Canada turned solidly to the left today, which handed the right a majority government. Such is the nature of the beast.

The next few years are going to be painful, since we will be following Europe and the USA down the path of "austerity" and giving as much money to rich people as possible while dismantling the social safety net.

The upside? The Bloc experiment may be over for good. Quebec decided they want to actually be part of the discussion at the Federal level. (I do expect the PQ to win the next provincial election because of this.) Also, the Liberals "squishy center" of "not as bad as the Conservatives" approach was rejected. I think many of the Con wins in Ontario were nothing more than Lib seats where people voted Grit out of almost reflexive habit of the Libs being the "serious" party and the NDP never winning. People want someone actually making the effort and doing the work.

Sadly, as in the US, the danger of rejecting the "not as bad as the other guys" party is handing power over to "the other guys who are that bad".

Will this new balance hold? Only time will tell. How much damage will Canada suffer in the meantime? Lots. I hope our general culture is strong enough to not turn back on abortion and same sex marriage and maybe healthcare. I think any support for the arts is probably gone.

Still, I can't help but feel some real hope in the fact people went out on the limb of changing the tune and trying to forge a better future instead of just standing still because at least then things wouldn't immediately get worse.

(Edit: Yes, that last paragraph is kind of word salad. Yes, it was on purpose. Yes, you're right in that it didn't work. Basically, that people took the risk instead of buying the "but the Right is so much worse" makes me happy and gives some hope for the future - even if the immediate result is more pain.)

So I am getting told by people who have been scrutineers that spoilt and blank ballots are tallied separately and *blank* ballots are officially considered protest "none of the above" ballots.

I have never heard of this. (Indeed, the whole edible ballot society thing depends on there is no way to cast a protest vote.)

I am trying to dig through elections canada to find some verification here. If there IS an official protest ballot option, I want to know about it. (Even if I have no intention to do so right now.)

and I won't see where it finally bends to.

Nonetheless, it has been odd to have been involved in two recent elections that involve a surge of enthusiasm that things might change. The stakes aren't as high in Canada, but I also think there is more chance for something actually positive to come of it.

This blog and its projections don't mean much to my friends in the USA, but it is a sign of what may be a historic change. That orange slice? That's the New Democratic Party. That's a social democrat party, you might even say socialist in bent. Actual socialism, not "socialism" as defined by the Republican party. The NDP have been around for a long time. They often finish third or fourth nationally. Sometimes even lower.

They are surging. They are making huge gains. The youth vote seems to be rallying behind them. They are rising dramatically in Quebec, where they are cutting into the formerly solid lead of the separatist Bloc Quebecois. (Yes, we in Canada have a formal Federal party dedicated to breaking the country up and seceding from the Union. Yes, Canada is weird. They even formed the official opposition at one point, because Canada.)

Some bank presidents have already started talking about how "market unfriendly" it would be if the NDP finished second. Because Socialism. This is the party that when they polled in shooting distance of first place in the late 80's the New York Times printed a story on whether or not the US should invade if Canada is taken over by a socialist government.

In a way, the whole thing is giving me Obama flashbacks. There's less messianic fervor and Jack Layton (the NDP leader) is actually left wing/progressive (although not a radical or anything), but the whole surge of "maybe we can actually see something happen and have our voices listened to" feels the same. I don't think it will be cynically squandered, but then even the best projections have NDP finishing second, maybe being able to form a coalition government, and what is more likely is just major gains. They won't have the opportunity to disappoint.

But still, the rattling of the cages is a big thing. While no one who was paying attention thought Obama was anything other than a centrist/technocrat, the rhetoric of involvement and the historic nature of electing a black man president rattled the cages a little. (We had a luxury in 2008, since if Clinton had won, the fact of electing a woman to the office would have also rattled the cages. ) The NDP breaking into the upper echelon would be similarly perturbing of the powers that be.

It is heartening in an otherwise dark time. I don't have a lot of faith in the future of the US, and what happens south of the border echoes strongly in Canada. The strong march to abandon decent society and to undo the gains of the New Deal seems unstoppable. But the people who turned out for Obama in 2008, the people turning out for the NDP now, are reminding me that a huge bulk of the population wants real change, and wants to push toward something better. This cracking of the whip hand on the unruly peasants has an element of fear. Crushing the rubes before they find the real enemy is a priority. So maybe there is hope, and maybe things will turn and not fall.

It would be nice to think so.

From a while back: Every single Dr Who journey ever. Crowdsourced ultra-geek dataset.

This person in comments seems to have actually taken a stab at making a data set out of it..

Meanwhile, it seems that Canada in general (and Toronto in particular) is a hive of open data activity.

I feel I should go to KG this year, even though it is further away, I still have no money to buy camping equipment, and I should probably be looking for a job those 4 days.

I am, after all, the bardic winner and have free registration. (And something of a duty to crown the next one.)

That being said, is anyone from Montreal going and might be willing to give me a ride? (Sadly, gone are the days of the easy last-minute decision now that they've moved to the new place.)

Some of you fellow Northerners may recall this classic mockumentary from the 1980s. The premise was taken by Michael Moore for his Canadian Bacon several years later, but the SCTV people got there first.

You always suspected we Canadians were secretly trying to take over, didn't you?