Canada’s history is wrought with Liberal left wing to center of left dynasties that brought in government sponsored health care, lucrative welfare and unemployment benefit programs that our burgeoning overseas immigrant and refugee population are taking advantage of at the expense of Canadians. The current strongly right wing Harper government is trying to stem the tide but cannot get a majority of seats in the House of Commons allowing the Reform-Conservative coalition to rule. The Reform party that spawned Harper and a bevy of hard right wing politicians from our western provinces could only garner a few seats mostly in the oil producing regions until overpowering a weakened Conservative base in central Canada. The Liberals meanwhile after thirteen years in power led by Quebecer Jean Chretien began an internal battle for party power between Chrétien and his finance Minster Paul Martin. The Gomery scandal surfaced involving many Quebec Liberals that led to Chrétien retiring and Paul Martin’s selection as leader. The scandal had legs enough to cost the Liberals their traditional power base in Ontario and Quebec defeating the Martin led Liberals in the 2006 Election. The Reform-Conservatives won most seats in our 303 seat four party parliament but not a majority. That meant compromising with the Liberal opposition, The New Democrats (Labor) or Quebec Bloq Quebecois (separatist) party to enact legislation.
Harper became frustrated with having his legislation blocked and parliament became so partisan along party lines that the business of government came to a virtual standstill. His party engineered a defeat of a money bill that usually leads to an election before the mandatory 5-year election term expires. The voters once more decided during the 2008 election a minority government was best for the country and denied Harper’s coalition a majority. Two elections and polls over the past five years continue to deny any party a majority. It seems Canadians just don’t trust politicians of any cult. That was even more evident in the past few weeks when the independent Auditor General announced her intention to audit the expense accounts of all elected politicians and our unelected senate. (another can of political worms) and both Houses of Parliament refused to let their personal tax funded expenses be independently audited. They claimed the internal audit performed by civil servants under the influence of political leaders was sufficient. The electorate through polling felt the current checks were similar to letting a fox rule the henhouse. The polls registered an 87% rejection of allowing internal audits to continue. The strange or sad part about the issue is that all parties except the Quebec Separatists balked at the independent audit. The politicians under unprecedented constituent pressure reached a compromise with the Auditor general and she will now audit every expense member’s account. We can bet that some unacceptable spending that some if not many politicians were feeling was beyond scrutiny will surface.
Canada or rather the Harper government is hosting the G8 conference at Huntsville a resort region north of Toronto followed by a G20 conference in Toronto. The theme of the conference covering three days in June is how to deal with the out of control spending and huge deficits plaguing the world economy. Our government is spending $1 billion just for security. That will add another billion to our own deficit. Does any of this make sense? Erupting volcanoes grounding air traffic costing billions, the Gulf spill will cost????? The future of oil exploration is probably on the line and from reports, alternative energy sources are far into the future.
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