Pollister
Nick Nanos opines in the G&M that perhaps Canada is a
'joyless democracy' and points to the fundamental disconnect between
the economic numbers hurled at Canadians and the anxiety we feel
about the future. He continues by wondering if there is a fundamental
disconnect between democratic sentiment and parliamentary outcome in
regard to the results of our last election which returned a minority
parliament.
He goes on to suggest that this is
perhaps because the outcome of the popular vote is not reflected by
the various party standings in the HoC, this is hardly a new opinion
for the efforts to change our electoral system early last term fell
by the wayside when the various political partys could not agree on a
new system. I would suggest that this was in part, if not mainly,
because the various political partys and many of their supporters are
scared of MINORITY Parliaments where to get ANYTHING done they would
have to find consensus, seek compromise, be open to opposing ideas,
something not seen much of generally in the political arena. Perhaps
our 'representatives' are more cooperative behind closed doors but on
the floor of the House and in public gatherings and social media they
are far too busy slamming the other guy to say much productive. It is
this that makes for that joyless opinion that so many of us are
coming to have of our democracy.
We are a LONG way from having any kind
of truly representative parliament here for not only is it, as we
have seen, difficult to select an acceptable system from the many
proposals and their various specific details but I suspect that even
if such a system was brought in tomorrow how would our
confrontational MPs react in what would almost certainly be a series
of minority coalition parliaments. It CAN work as seen in New Zealand
where they are on just their fourth coalition since 1996 and where
their native population are part and parcel of that government. I see
the desire for such a system building here in Canada but are we ready
to embrace and support such a radical change just yet?
Finally a word about the dangers of
social media.
As a senior citizen who has personally
resisted the thrall of 'social media' I am hardly qualified to
comment about its effect upon our democracy but will ask this: is the
speed with which information both accurate and inaccurate can be
spread part of the problem? How many of us take the time to determine
the accuracy of what is being fed to us from the various modern media
before having a knee jerk reaction and quickly head for our keyboard
(or thumbboard) to add to the confusion. Think before you poke folks,
once its out there its out there for keeps in this day and age!
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