12.27.2011 01:00 AM

In today’s Sun: buckle up, bumps ahead

If 2011 was Canada’s year for election, then 2012 looks to be the year for friction.

Federal-provincial friction, that is.

This past year, as you will recall, witnessed a remarkable number of provincial electoral contests, from east to west.
In Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and the Yukon, incumbent governments were re-elected handily.

In a year where most of them had been written off by the pundits, that’s pretty remarkable.

Recessionary times, scandals and an appetite for “change” should have have meant disaster for the Manitoba New Democrats and the Ontario Liberals, where both parties had been heading toward political oblivion. But they, and the others, were all handily re-elected.

28 Comments

  1. Bill says:

    The federal government is about to get everyone ready for what is ahead, hard times. Hopefully the public sector unions are watching aswell because the provincial governments needs to have some “friction” with them aswell. Some times you need to cut an arm off to save the body, that will be what 2012 will be about. Increase taxes and decrease spending might get us out of this mess, if we start now and do it year over year for about 8 -10 years.

    • Michael Radan says:

      Or what you need to do is create a crisis to further your agenda and implement policies that would otherwise be unpalatable to the electorate. 😉

      • Bill says:

        No need to “create a crisis”. RED and BLUE governments have been doing just that since the 70’s. This is not about agenda, this is about trying
        to be ready for some serious economic troubles, that as of right now has very good chance of occuring.

    • Bill – Politicians WAY too chicken to do this. Or even suggest it. Just look at Europe.

  2. jon evan says:

    “Canadian voters, meanwhile, aren’t likely to consider the ensuing friction funny at all.”

    There is nothing “funny” as the Greek voters have awoken to discover when the nanny state is broke!

    Here is where we need leaders who will lead by example to teach their voters that there is no free lunch. PMO Harper was awesome on CTV’s yearend interview! Practical, pragmatically flexible, and demonstrating wisdom for the difficult year ahead. I’m a proud Canadian today but not a proud British Columbian I must add because here we have an ineffective premier who will lose the next provincial election!

    • Ed says:

      Ha! I love when right-wingers first discover Warren’s not-a-blog and send up posts like it’s where elections will be decided, trying to at once scorn Liberals and convince them to join the conservative mindset. They always fall off after awhile (save for Gord), but it is kind of sweet that they care so much.

      • jon evan says:

        Don’t agree with your opinion of Warren as “not-a-blog”!
        I think it’s a fine blog!
        Ed, just agree that the Conservatives are doing a good job when they are. Hey, Warren does that!

    • Bill says:

      Jon, I agree with you completely. We need strong provinical leaders to tell the people “we have a serious debt program” and we must reduce services + reduce the size of the public service + freeze public service salarys for 5 years. Many people have no idea how many of the provinces have some crazy debt (Total = 430 billion). Provincial + Federal debt is almost 1 trillion dollars. That’s some scary shit. The partys over, time to bunker down and pay the pay the piper! Harper govermnet is doing the right thing here, now it’s up to the provincial governments to let the unions know it has nothing more to give.

    • smelter rat says:

      You might want to explore the Greek crisis a little more closely. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WS0rpNHzT0

  3. moose gemmell says:

    It is the rural folk in the US and Canada who are responsible for Republican presidents
    in the US and Conservative victories in Canada.So we have the voters in the boonies
    who brought about the unprovoked slaughter of innocent Iraqis (sometimes referred
    to euphemistically as a “war”) in the US,and the rural,and generally unsophicated
    voters who are bringing us bigger and better prisons in Canada despite the decrease
    in crime.Maybe they will bring back nineteenth century attitudes re punisment
    as opposed to rehabilitation.We have the impact of the oil immigrants from the US
    in Alberta to thank in part for their their refusal to acceptM2CE the more reasonable
    attitudes toward modernity.

  4. smelter rat says:

    Harper was awesome? Psychiatrist’s call it “lack of affect”.

  5. pomojen says:

    I NEED to not look at the Sun comments section in 2012. Homophobic slur within three comments. Idiots.

  6. Bill says:

    Some great points Dan, I like the concept of pro rated health care. I agree with you on this issue. My point with Trudeua was he was to focused on multiculturalism, bilingualism and the charter. He didn’t really have a economic policy, he really made racking up debt acceptable. I can definitely agree to disagree on this topic, for me Trudeau did some good things, but was more negative then positive. I don’t thing Harper has “frittered” it away, 2007 -2008 was pretty bad and I think 2012 – 2013 will be difficult aswell. I feel we are receiving leadship from the top. I probably sound like a broken record but the provinces need to get the unions under control.Teachers, police man, doctors, firefighters, government administration, etc, they all make to much money, 10 -20 % to much. I have witnessed the pendulum swing, it has yet to come back down, salaries need to be controlled. I wish we could pay everyone these crazy salaries (base pay + bonus + penision) but we have run out of time, the debt man is about to break down the front door.

    • The Doctor says:

      It’s the public sector pension thing that’s going to force this issue on us. That, competing for dollars with health care funding. Something’s gotta give.

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