Esquimalt Juan de Fuca
For whatever it’s worth, I thought it might be interesting to look at the campaign literature received from the different campaigns in recent days/weeks. (Sorry there aren’t pictures… I don’t have a scanner, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.) Click on the pictures of the candidates to link to their websites.
Liberal: Keith Martin
Apparently he’s “Effective”… this word is repeated several times across the front of his flyer. “Effective in Government” it says. “Effective in Opposition.” Oh, and Keith Martin knows how to be effective for you in Ottawa.” There follows a lot of “facts to help you decide.”
This is something that always cracks me up about “liberals” — they actually think that people pay attention to “facts” and other such curious, reality-based notions. Indeed, if we take the time delve into this rather elaborate piece of literature there is quite a massive amount of information. Keith’s background, experience, biography, record in parliament, short summaries of his positions on different issues (e.g., jobs, the economy, social issues, our rights, education, defence, etc.), “why he serves” and got into politics in the first place and so on and on and on…
It should be said that this is pretty standard fare from Dr. Martin, who sends out quite detailed reports summarizing his activities in parliament from time to time. This one is just a little more colourful (but not that much… to be honest, it’s kind of drab).
Conservative: Troy DeSouza
Now, here we see the difference with so-called “Conservatives” — they are far more direct. The first piece I received immediately after the writ was dropped — like within days — was a glossy, colourful little bit of cardboard that promised a highway overpass. I can’t quote it directly because I gave it away to some hapless ex-fisherman guy who was doorstopping for the NDP and was unfamiliar with it. Anyway, I know nothing about this McKenzie highway overpass thing. I would assume that it’s intended to relieve the traffic congestion — the dreaded “Colwood Crawl” — from downtown to the exurban “Western Communities” that make up a lot of the Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca riding (i.e., Colwood, Langford, Vic West, View Royal, Sooke, Metchosin). Well, I ride an electric bike around my neighborhood and take the bus when I grudgingly have to go into town on some dreary errand, so that means absolutely nothing to me.
His second pitch came the other day… This one is especially hilarious. It starts off with a bold headline: “You’ve told me: We need to protect rural communities.” Huh? Did I “tell” you that? What on earth are you talking about? Below that is a picture of cattle grazing in a field with some skyscrapers in the background. I’ve got no idea where this image was taken from, but it’s most definitely not local. Then it says “You need a strong voice in government.” Um, okay… But this message means nothing to me. There are “rural” communities and small farming areas, vintners and what not further to the west of where I’m situated, but there’s no content here. “Protect” them from what, exactly? Is there some imminent threat out there to their existence?
Flip the piece over and you get and either/or bit of propaganda. “PAY MORE” on the red Liberal side OR “GET MORE” on the blue Conservative side. Well, who wouldn’t want to “get more” right? Apparently, we’ll have “Commuter Rail” and “Economic Stability” if we vote for this mysterious fellow standing next to Stephen Harper (in the colour picture as opposed to the sepia toned picture of assorted Liberals on the RED side of the piece that’s presumably meant to appear “scary”).
NDP: Jennifer Burgis
Funny thing. After being inundated with regular mailings from Jack Layton for the last two years (all of which went unopened and tossed in the garbage) I’ve received nothing from Ms. Burgis. Apparently, I learn from the excellent CBC website that she’s an opportunistic carpetbagger from the Interior who ran unsuccessfully in Saanich–Gulf Islands in the last election.
Green Party: Brian Gordon
Brian’s nice little pamphlet features him pictured with Al Gore! It says that he’s a “former climate sceptic who was trained by Al Gore to deliver the Inconvenient Truth presentation.” Yes, many sighs and groans from this quarter at that particular bit of news.
His priorities are all in order of course and most of them I agree with, but they’re so general and vague. Yes, we do “need to rebuild our network of trains and streetcars” and “food security” is something that would desirous to be moving towards (except don’t forget that according to the Conservative candidate our “rural communities” need to be “protected” from… some imminent peril). Oh, and here’s another thing that Brian is for: “local jobs” — brilliant! Who would ever have imagined that? Then there’s a little spiel about the Greens’ idealistic vision of high-speed electric trains in France and Norway, organic farms and so on. Flipping over to the back page we get more of the Green message about the virtuous characteristics of European lifestyles, how the economy and ecology are linked and so on. Yes, yes, and yes… All good stuff, but yet… strangely ineffective and unconvincing in this format. Hey, flying electric cars would be nice too!
There’s an “Independent” in the race too. Some fellow named Philip Ney with no literature and not even a website. Unfortunately, we don’t get an amusing assortment of comedians, fringe loons and crackpots running this time out.
So that’s the perspective of a somewhat disinterested voter of what’s been received in the mailbox in my riding in this stupid, pointless election. Is it any wonder that so few people bother to go and vote?
Troy DeSouza is one of the 67 cons being investigated by Elections Canada for the In and Out scandel.Troy DeSouza is a public prosicuter.Amazing,eh?
There is much development in western suburbs of Victoria and this puts a lot more traffic on the trans-Canada into Victoria (where many in the suburbs work). (Langford’s pro-development mayor has endorsed Desouza, whose town includes Bear Mountain, a massive mountain-encircling suburban scar developed by a rich nutter named Len Barrie.) Read about it:
http://www.canada.com/victoriatimescolonist/news/story.html?id=9324c915-3383-496b-b92f-5c93634b1c20
The overpass is to reduce conjestion at an intersection part way down the trans-Canada. Not a bad a idea, I guess. But it is a really goofy thing to run on, since an MP in Ottawa would not be the one making the decision on the overpass anyway (it would be driven by the Capital Regional District, I think).
DeSouza likely has little chance against Martin. I met him though, going door to door last election, and he’s a nice fellow. Whatever talents he has would, of course, be utterly wasted in the dictatorship Harper prefers.
As I live in Blueville, it matters little except for the $1.75. So I’ll try to bum a ride to the polls and send it to the Greens. I wouldn’t want to start the car. You understand.
About protecting rural communities, we know you city folk just don’t understand. Not to worry though, there are liberal scientists working on those replicators and chinese hackers paying American software giants so they can swipe the secrets. So all is good, don’t worry.. be happy.
When I have more time I will explain the nuances to you. Right now I have to go stock up on whine for Tuesday night.
“City folk”… What a false distinction.
“City folk”… What a false distinction.
He meant “y’all”.
CRF — Well, yes, there is the Bear Mountain project, but also the fairly massive Colwood Corners development that’s imagined to be in the works in the next few years that will also add much traffic to the major highways and arterial roads leading out here. Clearly what’s needed is some kind of commuter rail line but how and where and how much it will cost and whether people are willing to pay for such a thing will of course be the subject of years and years of discussion and debate. Nothing ever seems to get done quickly or easily in Victoria. Good grief, they can’t even seem to get the bus system working properly out here in my neck of the woods. It’s gotten marginally better than it was many years ago by scaling down service to small commuter buses that feed into the main lines, but that’s been about it. The frequency of service is still poor and it’s a real pain with different connections having to be made, etc.
Ya’ll is good too. Wink Wink
Our local Canadian Action party candidate dumped a bunch of flyers off at the library. “debt reform blah blah” – thanks buddy! Now tell us how you’re party thinks 9/11 was a inside job!
Luckily we’ve gota Honduran immagrant running for the Communist Party – I may as well vote for him and drown my tears in cheap alcohol whilst singing the CCF song that night…
(Actually I’ll probably vote Telegdi – he seems cool. Plus he quotes Joe Clark on his website).
I think the choice is clear in this riding based on the work that Keith Martin has done over the years working on behalf of the community. It really has nothing to do with him being a Liberal. He’s earned people’s votes. Besides, he’s not just a “yes man” for the the party.
Martin will win tomorrow.
Unfortunately, likely so will Bob Rae so Martin won’t be filling the role that he should for the Liberals — that of Foreign Affairs Critic.
Which is actually kind of a shame. Martin deserves to win this election (which he will), and deserves to get that job (which he won’t).
Sometimes good politicians just don’t get everything they deserve.
PR — Chalk up another one in the argument for proportional representation whereby people from different parties could fill the role they’re best suited to in some kind of coalition government rather than just ideological hacks serving a purely political purpose.
I mean why was Bernier appointed Foreign Affairs minister? Not because of ability but because it was thought at the time that he was better suited to soft-pedal the Afghan mission to Quebec voters who were anticipated to be hostile to it.
We keep thinking that fiddling with the technicalities of Parliament and elections will improve things. It won’t. Until democratic politics becomes something more decent people are attracted to, nothing will make a difference.
Nothing.
“Chalk up another one in the argument for proportional representation whereby people from different parties could fill the role they’re best suited to in some kind of coalition government rather than just ideological hacks serving a purely political purpose.”
I don’t think so. Coalition governments have to be bound together by something. More often than not, it’s ideology.
If we’re hypothetically talking about a proportionally-elected Liberal/NDP coalition government here, perhaps one does have to consider that Bob Rae couldn’t reasonably have a place at that cabinet table. Neither could Ujjal Dosingh.
But I doubt the NDP would tolerate Martin, a pro-Afghanistan war politician, to serve as Foreign Affairs Minister in a Liberal/NDP coalition. It’s hard to look at that as anything but a potential deal breaker.
“I mean why was Bernier appointed Foreign Affairs minister? Not because of ability but because it was thought at the time that he was better suited to soft-pedal the Afghan mission to Quebec voters who were anticipated to be hostile to it.”
Probably so. But the Conservative party is tragically short on Foreign Policy expertise. When they decided to move MacKay to defense to clean up after Gordon O’Connor, Bernier may have even been the strongest candidate amongst a field of weak candidates.
David Emerson — as much as I personally detest his self-serving approach to politics — was actually pretty good. But I don’t think having Emerson managing both Trade and Foreign Affairs was exactly plan A in anyone’s books.
Wouldn’t those two things be kind of interrelated perhaps?
PR — Just to clarify, the above response was to Ti-Guy’s cynical comment.
Unfortunately, I don’t really have time to get into a discussion about proportional representation at the moment. It just seemed like an easy answer to the problem of the best people for the job not always being able to serve because of the way things are rigidly divided up according to ideology at the moment.
There are people with complex, contradictory stances on different issues who can nevertheless serve effectively in an administration that may likewise be conflicted regarding this or that.
I don’t know that it’s necessarily fair to characterize someone as “pro-Afghanistan war” as that seems rather simplistic. Yes, he may well have been and continue to be… but for what set of reasons and aims? So then you can get into a complex examination of why people support the war and come up with a whole bunch of different angles on it… from backing NATO to humanitarian aid… nation building… reducing terrorism… Some valid, some not… Different ways of tackling each aspect… and on and on and on…
Wouldn’t those two things be kind of interrelated perhaps?
I don’t think so. I think our problems have more to do with the corporate media than anything else, an agency very much invested in having untalented people in government and governments that don’t work all that well.
Ti-Guy — A proportional system full of diversity and fluid, shifting complexity would certainly make their jobs a good deal more difficult, if that’s what you’re getting at. It’s a lot easier to just hunker down into the more predictable norms of the traditional model of doing politics. Much less work for the likes of Taber, Duffy, Travers, Coyne, et. al. to navigate the more routine dynamic of our so-called discourse.
Hey man, at least you have Keith Martin. The one Liberal candidate that I would vote for ( if I indeed could vote ).
A proportional system full of diversity and fluid, shifting complexity would certainly make their jobs a good deal more difficult, if that’s what you’re getting at.
No, it’s more how likely we’ll ever get to a public that understands that democratic reform is required with a media, the interests of which are threatened by such reform.
I just don’t see it happening. I was considerably soured by last year’s failure of the referendum on PR in Ontario, something a lot of people attributed to the media.
So, in other words, you’re saying the public’s sensibilities were dulled (fogged, or whatever) by the media to the point where they just didn’t grasp the importance of the issue?
I think you have to attribute blame to people themselves who, for the most part, are just completely disengaged from the political system. 30-40% don’t even bother to vote at all (that number goes up to 80% when dealing with local elections). Of the percentage that DO vote, in terms of being really “informed” about the issues… well, that number is probably frighteningly low. So let’s say about 10% of people (a rough approximation based on wholly unscientific guesswork — a figure that might even be optimistically high) actually understand the issue.
In that frame of reference, I’m not sure that you can really blame “the media”…
Maybe more of the onus should go to people that have just lost/forgotten what it means to be an engaged citizen. As Ralph Nader has said, great changes could be made if more people spent a fraction of the time on how their country is governed than they did on hobbies and other pastimes like bridge clubs, etc.
The masses are a symptom, not a cause.
I don’t know how you cannot blame the media…directed as it is by well-educated, well-informed, highly remunerated people who sit around boardroom tables and decide that reality teevee, entire channels dedicated to cooking, sports and the paranormal and entire newspaper sections made up entirely of people’s relationship to shopping are what the public needs.
I know these people (they’re all like Stephen Taylor). They know what they’re doing…and they don’t care.
Perhaps you’re right. I really don’t have time to think it through at the moment. I guess I was just contrasting the present situation where people are for the large part relentlessly distracted, dulled and dimwitted by the corporate mass media to older times, say within the last three hundred years, and the relatively different types and quality of information available to the average citizen. It’s kind of a big subject to get into in an offhand way.
“Unfortunately, I don’t really have time to get into a discussion about proportional representation at the moment. It just seemed like an easy answer to the problem of the best people for the job not always being able to serve because of the way things are rigidly divided up according to ideology at the moment.”
Don’t worry about it. I know you’re a particularly busy person right now. There will be other opportunities, I’m certain.
On the topic of the Powers that Be and the media…. just wanted to add that it’s quite depressing to see the evolution of magazine selections at supermarkets. Previously, Macleans and Times were avaliable by the checkouts. Now it’s nothing but gossip mags.
As for the masses, there was an interesting article in the New Yorker recently about the hardest votes.
Sharon — Depends where you shop. At the Thriftys (or even smaller places) here you can get the New Yorker, the Atlantic, Macleans, Time, Vanity Fair, etc. But yeah, it’s mostly gossip trash and lifestyle crapola.
It’s almost alarming in a certain sense: who’s lives are really so bloody empty that they have to buy a magazine about the latest trials and tribulations of celebrities?
I’d advise watching TMZ. At least they’re willing to poke a lot of fun at the entire enterprise.
Definitely need to shop in better store.
Unfortunately, the two grocery stories in my neighbourhoods stock nothing but gossips.
(Luckily, there’s a International News in the same mall by one of the supermarkets with the better stuff out there.)