Maybe all politics is local, after all. It seems the key question for candidates in this current federal election is: When did you have your covid-19 vaccines? And be prepared for some surprises.
I know that the conservatives have not checked and even the liberals might have one or two anti-vaxxers who have kept quiet.
That key question out of the way, you can ask other more mundane questions to see if one of your local candidates is worth supporting on election day.
If you want to embarrass your local liberal candidate, for example, ask him or her how liberals can be concerned about climate change when they are paying another $12 billion to twin the Trans Mountain pipeline to Vancouver? Do they know that bitumen from the Alberta tar sands can only be refined into synthetic crude by a highly polluting process?
Even funnier is the question to conservative candidates as to why they want to give parents tax credits for daycare while doing nothing about making sure that sufficient daycare spaces are available? The point is that without the provinces creating the daycare places, a tax credit is useless.
The question to your new democratic candidate is very simple. Ask him or her who they think is going to implement their plans? If they think they are going to win an NDP government, you can write them off as delusional and you can take your vote elsewhere.
It is worse with the greens. A vote for your local green person and it is you who might be delusional. And wouldn’t it be great when that party gets its act together? Mind you, the other parties have been getting into the green’s act—with more words, if not substance. And who would believe anything realistic on the environment from O’Toole’s conservatives?
It is high time Canadians stopped following the hollow promises of the party leaders and seriously considered voting for the most caring and intelligent candidate in their riding. That might seem like an unusual idea but it is inevitable that two if not all three major parties will need new leaders in the next couple years. The members of parliament can have a strong influence on whom their party will choose. If you have intelligent and caring MPs, they might help get us better party leaders. And wouldn’t that be excellent?
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Copyright 2021 © Peter Lowry
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