Dammit! JJ has forced me into it by Presenting me with a Hilarious, yet Strawman Arguement:Aw yeah, that's right, No asking you to click the link, I'm a force it on y'all!
Ah, JJ. Always proud to present a Bulls*** Sundae with Funny Syrup.
Let's give JJ his turn, unabridged:
I drew this in bitter response to the cartoons that some of the other big-name Canadian editorial cartoonists have been churning out as of late.
There are people in this country who are so obsessively anti-American that they are incapable of seeing Harper's various democratic reforms as anything other than the sinister "Americanization" of Canada. We can toil endlessly under a stagnant, undemocratic, relic system of government from the 19th Century, but that's apparently a-ok to the Canadian left so long as nothing reminds us of the hated United States.
Alrighty then... So left wingers, and I guess that includes me, the left wing conservative, Hate these reforms because we see them as an americanisation of the electoral system. He's half right. I do oppose the reforms after looking at the American system. But JJ wants to just say that it's rife Anti-americanism. Well, he may have a point with those who are not familair with Canadian political history. So for those knee jerk anti-Americans following in the sickening tradition of George Cartier:
"It is necessary to be Anti-Yankee. That we have to oppose their damned system - that we can and will build up a nothern power... The Dominion is determined to do it"
-John Boyd George Ettienne Cartier p. 202
Here's your talking points, and let's start with the hard stuff:
1. An elected senate will be powerful enough to block bills on the strength of their own mandate.
Now, some may see this as a good thing. But I would argue that the Senate is far more effective as a House of Sober Second Thought
TM than it ever will be as a house of the regions or some crap like that.
"Gratitude is simply thanks given in expectation of future favours"
-Sir Humphrey Appleby (I may have paraphrased)
Right now what we have are a group of professional legislators who have only their own consciences to follow. What's going to happen if they double cross the PM who appointed them? No more appointments? I'm sure they'd be heartbroken. So the senate is free to oppose its own party and often does do just that, when it is within reason, but more often the Senate is a legislative filter. They stop really stupid bills or bills that deserve grerater evalutaion.
The classical example is the FTA enabling legislation. Thanks to a plea from John Turner to the Liberal majority in the Senate (This coudn't really be an order.) The legislation was delayed, forcing Brian Mulroney to call an election to seek a mandate for the legislation (The nation backed parties opposed to the FTA by a margin of about 9 to 7, but that's the way the redistricting crumbles.
Of course the Senate blocked a Liberal bill in 1994 to delay redistricting which would have severely altered the seats of newly elected Liberal MP's. The Senate rapidly blocked that, and the '97 election was fought on the redistricted boundaries. But would the Senate have had the respect of the public in opposing these act if they had felt the push from their respective parties to obstruct the business of those on the other side of the house? I sincerely doubt it. Right now we have a weak upper house that acts as a brake on reckless legislation that would quite simply have to differ with the House of Commons more often if it were elected, because it would have more legitimacy. And thus the lines of what is truly unacceptable legislation, would be blurred.
2.Fixed election dates eliminate the flexibility of the system to seek renewed and radically different mandates.
The '88 election as case in point again.Brian Mulroney ran opposing Free Trade in 1983 and '84. He would have violated the faith of his electors if he had decided to simply ram through such radical legislation. But were he on a fixed time table, he may have, "Had no option."
A more radical example would be the Maitres Chez Nous campaign in Quebec. Lesage had come to power in 1960 with no plans to do anything radical to the electric utilities, then privately and widely owned. Would he have been justified in springing such a plan for debt financed Nationalisation of Hydro on the people of Quebec in 1962? He had little ability to delay the program for a futher two years, he would have most certainly have forced the resignation of his national resoucres minister, the Hon. Rene Levesque and most likely watched his government fall apart. The most honest action he could have taken was to call an election and ask for a mandate for Hydro nationalisation. Lesage did, and the system is hailed by Quebecers as a triumph of public enterprise.
Without the ability to ask for a renewed mandate, (One that if sought without reason, ala Peterson in 1990, is often rejected) governments are rendered unable to take action on a pressing public concern.
3. Fixed election dates lead to a longer undeclared writ period.
Those of you who remember your most recent civic election could do well to remember their example. In Edmonton, the mayoral campaign in 2004, while officially lasting 28 days, was a more than half year affair, diverting the attention of both the previous mayor, Bill Smith, and the current mayor, then councillor Stephen Mandel. Our legislators should legislate, not perpetually campaign.
4. Responsible Government is also a relic of the 19th century, should we jettison that as well?
Given the Prime Minister's treatment of the House of Commons' opinion in advance of the Afganistan debate, that such an idea is simple hyperbole is not as concrete as I should like such an assertion to be.
Ball's in your court JJ.
