2008 Races

[Andy 60]

Do you two run on the same election schedule or something?

I just looked up about ours, as I'm not sure when it is...

The exact timing of a general election is decided by the Prime Minister and often there will be an election before the full five years has elapsed. In some circumstances, for example when a government cannot get support in the House of Commons for its major policies, convention will force a Prime Minister to dissolve Parliament and call an election. When an election is announced, Parliament is dissolved by a proclamation from the Queen and the election campaign ? lasting around three weeks ? begins.

So that makes ours any time between now and 2010.

Edited October 10, 2008 by Andy

[Chickenman 9]

Panel: Palin abused power in trooper case

I take back all of my remarks about her being unfit for the Presidency. She's ready.

[TheUnknown 39]

Three weeks to go before the U.S. election. It's really looking like a Democratic wave is forming.

[Chickenman 9]

Is anyone else absolutely terrified/sick to their stomach about the recent Palin campaign rallies? The way she keeps working them into a frenzy is downright scary.

C'mon, Chicken. Let's not sink to her level with the childish insults, eh?

In other news, A critical in-depth report by the Rolling Stone on John McCain's personal history. Long, but definitely worth the read.

Great article with some great bite to it. I'm going to have to read a second opinion on some of the points it makes, but now I'm even more scared of a McCain Administration.

Three weeks to go before the U.S. election. It's really looking like a Democratic wave is forming.

I'm not counting my chickens. Not in the era of electronic voting machines, and, let's face it, dirty tactics by the Republicans on Campaign Day.

Edited October 14, 2008 by Chickenman

[Drake 53]

It's Election Day here in Canada! I go to cast my vote in about...oh...two hours. Polls are open until 9:30 EST tonight so I will be keeping tabs on the numbers as they go up from there.

[TheUnknown 39]

Which party are you voting for?

EDIT: Also, I like that the polls are open that late. Here in Georgia, they're only open from 7 to 7. In Indiana, they're only open until 6 I believe.

Edited October 14, 2008 by TheUnknown

[Drake 53]

I'm voting Green.

Also, the polls are open 12 hours everywhere in Canada and the times they're open depend on the timezone. So here it's 9:30-9:30. West Coast, it's 7-7.

[TheUnknown 39]

Can you briefly explain how the Canadian electoral system works? I know there are districts as opposed to proportional representation. Are there runoffs or preference voting? If, say, a Liberal gets 49% and the rest of the candidates get the other 51%, does the Liberal win or does (s)he face the next highest finisher in a runoff? What is the role of the Senate? I get the feeling it's largely ceremonial.

[Drake 53]

I'm not an expert when it comes to politics so I'll see if I can explain what I can and I'll also try to dig up some sources.

We have proportional representation as well except that the population is divided into ridings. Each of the major parties have a candidate for each riding (the smaller ones don't, usually). When you vote, you vote for your riding. The winner will go and take a seat in the House of Commons. It's actually very much like your Congress with the House of Reps and the Senate.

Our next government and Prime Minister all rely on how many seats/representatives each party wins. There are 308 ridings in all so a party would need to win at least 51% to become a majority government in which they have enough votes to pass along whatever bills they want without much intereferance. However, as is the case with the previous Conservative government, there can be a minority, meaning the party in power won less than 50% but still got more seats than the other parties. In that type of government, the opposition parties are able to team up and out-vote the party in power on issues.

As for the Senate...well, I'm not too sure what they do but I know it's more than ceremonial, lol. I think the whole system is, again, very much like your Senate. Both are bicameral systems.

Here are some wikipedia pages:

Government of Canada (overview)

House of Commons (and some info on the electoral process)

Senate

[Drake 53]

Another Conservative minority government is being predicted.

*watching election coverage*

I think that the Libs would have done better, maybe even won, if their leader wasn't such a goof.

Edited October 15, 2008 by Drake

[Drake 53]

It is officially a Conservative minority once again.

Conservative: 142 seats

Liberal: 79 seats

Bloq Quebecois: 48 seats

New Democrat: 37 seats

Independant: 2 seats

Green: 0 seats

Sad to see the Greens get no seats, especially since this was a strong campaign for them.

Prime Minister Harper, when he called the election, was going off an internal party poll that it was a good time because popularity for the Conservatives was high and he could easily get a majority government. Then the economic crisis hit and popularity went down. The results of this election are pretty well the same as the last. Harper got a few more seats and others shifted around but what matters is that nothing was really accomplished and it was essentially a waste of time.

Edited October 15, 2008 by Drake

[TheUnknown 39]

I've read that that Conservatives only got like 38% of the vote, but won a near majority. If I were a Canadian, I would be ranting right now.

[Andy 60]

It depends how many parties there are lol.

Green: 0 seats

lol :p

Edited October 15, 2008 by Andy

[TheUnknown 39]

Why are they called "ridings," by the way?

[Andy 60]

A "riding" is another word for district.

Edited October 15, 2008 by Andy

[Drake 53]

I've read that that Conservatives only got like 38% of the vote, but won a near majority. If I were a Canadian, I would be ranting right now.

Yes and my guess is that they won a lot of very close ridings. In fact, I was randomly checking a riding map last night and there was one riding in BC where the Con won by just under 400 votes over the Lib. The Liberal Party got 26.24% of the vote. The Bloq, while getting 48 seats, only got 9.97% of the vote, while the NDP with 37 seats got 18.2%. Then the Greens, with no seats, got 6.8% of the votes. I think it all depends on how close the margin is for each riding.

Anyway, I'm not going to rant because, frankly, the Conservatives here are not the equivalent to your Republicans. In fact, they've done good things for the country.

[TheUnknown 39]

I would imagine there are plenty of ridings where one of the left parties would have won had the other left parties not been on the ballot. The Liberals, Greens, and NDPers probably cost each other a lot of seats.

[TheUnknown 39]

A "riding" is another word for district.

I knew that. My question is how did that word becoming synonymous with district.

[Andy 60]

A "riding" is another word for district.

I knew that. My question is how did that word becoming synonymous with district.

For that you'll need a time machine to go back to medieval England. :p

[TheUnknown 39]

I'm a gay Atheist. My ancestors would burn me at the stake.

[Drake 53]

If it was medieval England, my guess would have something to do with horses.

Anyway, yeah, the opposition parties are very much on the same side of the spectrum which is actually not a bad thing as they can ally to topple Conservative bills and whatnot.

Democracy at work.

[Andy 60]

Then I guess you'll never know. lol

In the UK we call polling districts "wards"

[TheUnknown 39]

Anyway, yeah, the opposition parties are very much on the same side of the spectrum which is actually not a bad thing as they can ally to topple Conservative bills and whatnot.

But they're also assuring a Conservative government by taking votes and seats from each other.

[Drake 53]

This is true. In fact, the same thing was happening to the Conservatives not too many years ago. There were two parties on the right, the Progressive Conservatives and the Reform Party. They merged to form the current Conservative Party.

[Mara 29]

I could get my Etymological dictionary, but it's at home.

This is from m-w on "riding":

Etymology:

Middle English -redying or trithing, alteration of Old English *thriding, from Old Norse thrithjungr third part, from thrithi third; akin to Old English thridda third ? more at third

Date:

15th century

Which doesn't help, but is interesting! :p