Federal elections

We had federal elections in Canada yesterday. The results today showed that, as expected, we didn't accomplish anything. We are still ruled by minority Conservative government, just as before the election. Stephen Harper, our Prime Minister (in Canada that's equivalent to a president with the exception that he is not being elected by the people, but rather by his own party) called the elections claiming that his minority government can't accomplish anything because of the opposition. After spending over $300 million on election, nothing has changed. He's still the leader of the minority government and will have to work with the opposition.

Maggie and I both support a social democratic platform of the NDP party. However, in our riding the party's candidate is a kid who just came out of university and figured it's easier to get into politics than to find real work--in short, the NDP put up a candidate without experience who was parroting the party's policies but had no individual stands and ideas. We felt let down by NDP's choice, and since we couldn't bring ourselves to vote for neither of dominating parties, Conservatives nor Liberals, we voted for the Green Party candidate. Alas, the Green party won no seats in parliament, although they had about 7% of popular vote. It's nice to know we are not the only dreamers in Canada.

Our elections paint a dull but true picture about the country--we are not capable of raising excitement resembling even a fragment of the pre-electional hype they have in the States. Even as our bland leaders squared off in a TV debate, we had more Canadian viewers watching the vice-presidential hopefuls' debate in the States. True, a dumb but pretty Alaskan hockey mom against a seasoned but sometimes unbridled politician promised a better show than childish bickering of domestic politicians. In the end, both debates turned to be a complete bore. In desperation, I switched to a hockey game!