Stephane Dion has resigned as leader of the Liberal Party of Canada. I like Mr. Dion and I'm sorry that he had to resign but he did have to resign. He didn't have the support of the Liberal caucus and despite what a good many bloggers might believe, I don't think that he had the support of the majority of the membership of the Party.
What does Mr. Dion's failure have to say about the state of politics and the state of Canada? I believe that Mr. Dion has the intelligence and honesty to be a great leader of Canada. I also believe that an anti-french sentiment in English Canada is partially to blame for his failure on election day. Another source of his failure is that the Conservative Party was very successful in portraying a negative image of Stephane Dion this also fed into the anti-french attitude of many people. The media was also seduced by the negative image of Mr. Dion. My experience as I have written before is that the media is very lazy unwilling to do any work to get to the truth so if you provide them a story that is easy to report they will run with it. We live in a very instant society so rather than going past the 10 second clip on TV, the headline in the newspaper or online most people will accept what they are bombarded with and won't take the time to explore the issues.
The Liberals failed to counter the negative advertising until too late and Stephane Dion was doomed. I want to make it clear that I don't think that the Conservative Party did anything wrong, it is the CPC's job to win and it did its best to do just that. It is the voters of Canada who have to demand better from their political parties, go past the negative advertising, read the party platforms, listen to the politicians, read the entire article and not just the headline, read an opposing viewpoint and most importantly of all get out and vote.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Monday, October 6, 2008
The Canadian Election
I am deeply troubled by the current climate in Canadian politics. All the Political Parties are to blame, no Party has said to its supporters stop this nonsense and talk issues. I believe that vandalism has been committed by the supporters of all the parties, Greens, NDPers, Liberals and Conservatives.
When I say supporters I don't mean members of the political parties because for the most part I believe that it is not those people who are involved in the election vandalism because they recognize that the best way to get your view point across is to join the Party that reflects your views and work to get your representative elected. I think that the vandalism is being committed by those who don't know how or don't want to work within a Party structure and feel that they are somehow helping the Party that they support by committing vandalism on the supporters of other Parties.
What has caused this downturn in Canadian politics? I believe that it starts with a general lack of civility in today's society and is exacerbated by the adoption of dubious political methods from the United States and other parts of the world. The media hasn't helped in fact I recently came to the conclusion that the media has been seduced by the 30 second clip and sensational headline. There is no unbiased reporting going on each media outlet has a bias either political or commercial. They either want to sell the most newspapers, internet ads or tv commercials they won't report unbiasedly because that doesn't help their ratings, internet hits or sales. From their very beginning the blogs were all about bias and I don't have a problem with that because that is what blogging is all about. But bloggers have to be careful about the potential libel and slander that is appearing in some blogs and in particular in their comments sections.
Do I have a solution? I think that the Parties must all denounce any and all vandalism and I think that the Canadian media needs to start reporting the news and examining the issues and stop filtering the news and dumbing down the content. But most importantly the Canadian public must become engaged in the political process, read the Party platforms, ask the politicians questions, denounce negative advertising, follow the issues and most important of all vote. Is all that a solution I hope so, will it happen I doubt it.
When I say supporters I don't mean members of the political parties because for the most part I believe that it is not those people who are involved in the election vandalism because they recognize that the best way to get your view point across is to join the Party that reflects your views and work to get your representative elected. I think that the vandalism is being committed by those who don't know how or don't want to work within a Party structure and feel that they are somehow helping the Party that they support by committing vandalism on the supporters of other Parties.
What has caused this downturn in Canadian politics? I believe that it starts with a general lack of civility in today's society and is exacerbated by the adoption of dubious political methods from the United States and other parts of the world. The media hasn't helped in fact I recently came to the conclusion that the media has been seduced by the 30 second clip and sensational headline. There is no unbiased reporting going on each media outlet has a bias either political or commercial. They either want to sell the most newspapers, internet ads or tv commercials they won't report unbiasedly because that doesn't help their ratings, internet hits or sales. From their very beginning the blogs were all about bias and I don't have a problem with that because that is what blogging is all about. But bloggers have to be careful about the potential libel and slander that is appearing in some blogs and in particular in their comments sections.
Do I have a solution? I think that the Parties must all denounce any and all vandalism and I think that the Canadian media needs to start reporting the news and examining the issues and stop filtering the news and dumbing down the content. But most importantly the Canadian public must become engaged in the political process, read the Party platforms, ask the politicians questions, denounce negative advertising, follow the issues and most important of all vote. Is all that a solution I hope so, will it happen I doubt it.
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