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PM Justin Trudeau's Canada

@Northern Light, I agree....the tax system needs to be overhauled and simplified. Like, now, not "eventually, maybe...we're studying it".
However, I don't think we can expect much from the same people who brought us the small business tax change debacle of last year.

Yes. No. Yes! Wait, what? No. Maybe a bit. Sure. Where were we?

Edit: I submit my tax return on ye olde paper form and every year I try to read the book of instructions, exemptions, loopholes, refunds, and.......zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Luckily, my taxes are as simple as can be (read: I pay full amounts and get sweet F.A. back) so I don't have a maths day filling the form and am good for business. If I put my mind to it, however, had a couple of kids, a spouse, and some real money then whoah, we're talking a week-end of triple checking sums and licking my chops at the thought of getting back half of what I paid (or more....yeah, likely more).
 
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Videodrome said:
Any Canadian who sides with Trump over their own country in a trade war deserves to be deported.
Click to expand...
Are you saying that with the Trump insults coming from Trudeau and his cabinet that they are responsible for this trade war - and they should be deported?
Maryam Monsef maybe - but I don't think the rest of them should be deported.
You could probably make that argument better with the blossoming trade war with India - that it was invoked by Trudeau accusing the Indian government of sabotaging the visit.
 
BurlOak said:
Are you saying that with the Trump insults coming from Trudeau and his cabinet that they are responsible for this trade war - and they should be deported?
Maryam Monsef maybe - but I don't think the rest of them should be deported.
You could probably make that argument better with the blossoming trade war with India - that it was invoked by Trudeau accusing the Indian government of sabotaging the visit.
Click to expand...

I mean that taking the side of the US because of this MAGA crap, and to spite Trudeau, isn't a very good position to take. You should want good results for Canada when it comes to trade. A good economy and job creation isn't only for the party in power. All parties here support NAFTA and other trade agreements.

Also, do some research. The chick pea thing was misreported and it won't affect Canada at all. The media totally messed up their reporting on the Sikh issue too.
 
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MTown said:
@Northern Light

Edit: I submit my tax return on ye olde paper form and every year I try to read the book of instructions, exemptions, loopholes, refunds, and.......zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Luckily, my taxes are as simple as can be (read: I pay full amounts and get sweet F.A. back) so I don't have a maths day filling the form and am good for business. If I put my mind to it, however, had a couple of kids, a spouse, and some real money then whoah, we're talking a week-end of triple checking sums and licking my chops at the thought of getting back half of what I paid (or more....yeah, likely more).
Click to expand...

My dad was an accountant and, to be kind, a pack rat, meaning he kept records and things for-ev-er. After he passed and I was cleaning out his Scarborough house I found tax returns back to the late '40s. I kept a few just for fun, including the one for the year of my birth (1951). The entire return, including the tax tables, was 4 pages. Oh how far we have come.
 
BUMP:

Let's talk about electoral reform, specifically a change to some kind of PR system. Have you seen what happened in Germany and now Italy? In Germany, it took several months to form a coalition and Italy is set for deadlock, with no party or coalition winning a majority of the seats.
 
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Videodrome said:
BUMP:

Let's talk about electoral reform, specifically a change to some kind of PR system. Have you seen what happened in Germany and now Italy. In Germany, it took several months to form a coalition and Italy is set for deadlock, with no party or coalition winning a majority of the seats.
Click to expand...

This is true, but despite this they are both still wealthy western G7 nations, Germany especially with a a higher per capita GDP than ourselves. The deadlocks and need for coalitions don't seem to be overly harmful.
 
Oh, yeah, that backwater Germany. What a dreadful place. Massive current account surplus. High wage-high export. High quality of life. Wealthy industrialised nation which had to come back from near-destruction twice in the last 100 years.

What. A. Hole.

Italy, on the other hand, is just about starting to leave its dark recent past, economically speaking and may be in for some trouble with the current composition of its assembly due to idiotic policies and promises of one particular potential governing coalition (The Salvini-Berlusconi Monstrosity).

Neither country's state of affairs has much to do with their electoral system though.

Czechia is also yet to form a government after their election of October past. All these places are fully functional and free.

Where do certain parties hold majority power? Poland. Venezuela. South Africa. China. Russia.

You do know what's been happening in Poland lately, right?
Venezuela?
Heard of "state capture"?
Fancy China's resoluteness?
Think Putin's a good old strong leader?


...and, of course, Canada. Where the majority were unhappy during the Harper years and are still unhappy now in spite of both being "majority" governments.
Our government majorities ARE NEVER the function of a majority of votes and are therefore a fraud. It's as simple as that. No government should get to impose their policies on an entire nation with something like 35-40% of votes cast. That's an illiberal joke.

FPTP is an anachronistic and illiberal electoral system and its simplicity is little defence for disregarding people's votes. My votes literally do not count. They tally them, sure, but I don't have a voice. The only reason I still vote (since 2003) is because I'm stubborn as all hell. There is no reason for me to have ever voted in a provincial or federal election. Zero. I wasted my time. Every. Single. Time. Luckily, some polls were in my building's lobby so I didn't have to feel like a complete fucking moron for having gone kilometres out of my way after work just to mark a piece of paper that may as well have had an option for "You don't matter anyway, mark an X here".

Oh, but, I fail to mention, the representative nature of our elected representatives. You know, the ones who are supposed to represent their constituents yet vote with their party anyway which is one of the overblown fears that is talked about in regards to PR. The same representatives who are nominated by closed party structures before they are voted on by the public, usually along party lines anyway.
Whoah, doesn't sound so different after all.

I get it. People hate change. Especially older people who are set in their ways. Especially people for who change means a loss of privilege and power. I understand all that.
I just wish people would understand simple maths (ie, 35% of 68% is not a fucking majority of anything) and simple fairness (ie, in a democracy all votes are supposed to be considered) and stop stalling on the necessary changes.

The liar Trudeau promised the nation (on very many separate occasions) that the last election was the last one to be held under 19th century frontier dominion rules. A good number of people were hopeful and put their faith in him and his colleagues. He lied because he wasn't willing to follow through on a promise that would result in him and his cronies (Liberal Party of Canada) losing a significant amount of their future power and privilege.

That's fine. I don't mind feeling like an idiot for actually putting some faith in this government after their election. I deserve to feel like an idiot for believing a politician who is of an entrenched political gentry and a member of a party who are arrogant enough to think of themselves as Canada's natural governing party and act in such ways as to make that idea as much of a reality as possible.
 
I should also like to point out that countries in which a government hasn't yet been formed still function. They have provisional governments, are allowed to pass budgets with parliamentary approval, and don't just cease to exist as functioning states.
The laws of the land still apply.
The judiciary doesn't cease to exist.
Parliament still meets.
It isn't an economic drag.
Business sentiment cares a lot more about profitability, the fair and equal application of law (or the existence of fair laws) and social stability.

I know coalition talks get a lot of news but they really aren't that big a deal in terms of the functionality of a state.
 
Videodrome said:
BUMP:

Let's talk about electoral reform, specifically a change to some kind of PR system. Have you seen what happened in Germany and now Italy? In Germany, it took several months to form a coalition and Italy is set for deadlock, with no party or coalition winning a majority of the seats.
Click to expand...

Of course that situation is fairly unusual for Germany - and still ended up with a repeat of the CDU/CSU-SPD grand coalition after careful and transparent negotiations. Fairly sure all that German train and transit infrastructure has still been running with the usual efficiency - that's a country where 10 minute delays lead to profuse apologies. All that FPTP in Canada has given us is wild swings in politics (See Peterson -> Rae -> Harris or Miller -> Ford) and persistent underinvestment in infrastructure, research & development, and social capital.

As for Italy, they don't even have true PR, and I don't see how picking on a country with an infamously erratic party system has much relevance to debates around electoral reform.
 
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