I'm not going to get into detailed predictions of specific ridings nor am I going to speculate on a seat count. There are many such theories out there, some credible, others not so much, but you can choose your favourite and watch how they pan out tomorrow.Instead of speculating, I'm simply going to suggest that there are some close races out there and if undecideds and progressives break in our favour, we do have a shot, so take heart.
I will state why we should win however. Detractors will dismiss my comments as partisan and to a certain extent they are, meaning that I believe in the Liberal platform. More than that though, when I consider where this country is today and what we are faced with, I see the Liberal platform as the most sound and realistic way of overcoming hurdles and moving forward.
The Green Shift has been derided and distorted beyond belief. The truth of the matter is, it is the only solution out there that reconciles the economy and the environment in a manner that the country can absorb and benefit by.
That's not just me speaking. That is the assessment of all leading economists in the country, all leading environmentalists and now, the Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman, who has not of course come out and endorsed Dion specifically, but he has been advocating for such a plan for years. He like others know that this plan is our only solution.
Mr. Krugman believes that the most efficient way to resolve today’s carbon emissions problem is to provide market incentives to burn less carbon. “The most straightforward policy would be an across-the-board carbon tax” and “any new tax on carbon could and should be offset by tax cuts elsewhere,” he wrote. (New York Times, November 29, 2000) Mr. Krugman joins 250 other leading Canadian economists in supporting the idea of shifting taxes away from income and investment and putting them on pollution.
Other Nobel Prize winners have been more directly supportive.
Three senior Canadian members of the 2007 Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are publicly urging those who really care about the environment to vote Liberal.
“We face a critical moment,” Dr. Andrew Weaver said in a news release.
Dr. Weaver told the Ottawa Citizen that a vote for the Green Party “is not a green vote.“A green vote is for a Liberal government and Stéphane Dion. There is no other candidate you can vote for,” he said. (Ottawa Citizen, October 12, 2008)
There is much more to the Liberal platform and it can all be found here. Every issue that concerns this country today has been addressed realistically and robustly. No other party has put forward such an ambitious or realistic plan.
Those are the factual reasons why the Liberals should win. Add to that the leader of the Liberal party, Stephane Dion, and you have a progressive agenda led by a man who had the courage to propose it knowing it would be a difficult sell. It's not a difficult sell because it is complicated as the media has claimed. It was a difficult sell because no one outside the Liberal party actually told the truth about the plan.
This plan and this man are what this country needs, right now. We've had over 2 years of dishonesty, manipulation and secrecy. Dion offers Canadians, honesty, transparency, sincerity and direction for the country that would return us to our rightful place on the world stage. That is a country that is respected for being progressive, fair and an honest broker.
The Conservatives have offered no plan and have received no endorsements. The NDP have offered a plan that could never be realised due to their flawed economic model and they have received no endorsements .
We can win and if Canadians outside the polling figures have not been too bombarded with the smoke screens that both the Conservatives and the NDP have thrown up, we should win.
1 comment:
Now this is the sort of political analysis I remember the media used to provide regarding a party's platform during an election (granted for each party as opposed to just one as is the case here, but still focused on the issues and credibility with independent advocates on those issues that each party was campaigning on). While yes this is one for a specific party it does nothing but speak truthful facts regarding the plan/platform of the Liberal Party and leader this time out and the massive amount of support from the environmental community for the Liberal plan and their disapproval of those offered by all other national parties. That we only see this from a partisan Liberal blogger and not in the so called political media speaks volumes to how far our political discourse has fallen and how poorly served we as a citizenry have been served this election cycle.
Before we start hearing about how the Libs didn't get it done before, note that it is the non-partisan environmentalists who are making these endorsements of the Dion Liberal plan and the same people who are saying the Dion Libs are the only ones offering a realistic detailed plan that would actually work. The NDP, which loves to ride on the fiction that it is the party of the environment (something that once was true but hasn't been under Layton) is criticized by those same environmental leaders for playing partisan politics and not providing real sound environmental policy. So if you really do care about the environment it is clearly the Liberals this time out you should support, and the fact that Dion's Liberals are the only party of the big three (and even the Greens) to be providing these details and having the details getting such wide and strong independent support from the environmentalist speaks to who truly is the "green" party this time out.
Good work KNB, and a well reasoned/written post on why the Liberals are the right choice this time out, not just on the environment either for that matter. This is my last comment online until after the election as I will be spending my election day providing transportation to those that need it to get to the polls plus helping to count votes once the polls close. Thankfully I can vote my conscience in this riding as it turns out and I don't have to support a party that is led by a man that has transformed his party from one of conviction to one of expediency while still trying to claim they are the same old trustworthy NDP. I really was hoping I wouldn't have to do that but was ready to do so as I try to practice what I preach (regardless of how few partisans are capable of recognizing this of me this is a part of my basic nature), but the ABC sites list this one as a vote for conscience riding instead of strategic and for that I am truly grateful.
Well, let us hope the large number of undecideds turn out and break hard for the Liberals generally (except in ridings where the NDP is the second choice to the CPC leader/incumbent, in those ridings I want to see the NDP win because despite what so many think of me I am not a Liberal first but a ABC first and always have been, I just see the Libs as the best choice of getting rid of Harper AND his ideology but then I live in the real world). Harper snuck into power last time out thanks to Liberal fatigue, old corruption scandals being rehashed on the party, and the RCMP reinforcing that notion with the announcement of the Goodale investigation (which of course turned up no evidence of Liberal wrongdoing, only that of a bureaucrat), and even then the public did not trust Harper to give him even as large a minority as Martin had.
At the very minimum I am hoping he can't meet his prior level of electoral support as my minimal definition of a good night for the election, and my best is the Libs somehow managing a majority, although at best I think the odds are they can manage is a strong minority with enough seats combined with the NDP to have a majority position. Mind you, that means trusting Layton to act in an honest manner with the Dion Libs, something I am not comfortable doing given his conduct and war on the Libs of the past three years now. Still though, even as bad as Layton could be he still is nowhere near as dangerous as Harper, a man whose politics and style of governance has shown him to be on a par with Quebecois separatists in terms of the danger to the health ands future of a united progressive Canada. Prior to his forming a government I used to say he was marginally less dangerous than the BQ/Separatists, after the past three years I am forced to conclude he is if anything more dangerous, which is truly horrific, and why this is so hard for partisans of all parties aside from the CPCers to see/understand is something I still find baffling and very frustrating, nearly as much so as Dana over at the Galloping Beaver.
Well, good night, and may the votes give us what we want to see!
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