OT - Dryden's Next Step

Dunno if this has already been posted here or not. A quick glance didn't indicate so.

Looks like Dryden is attempting another step up in his political career ...

[sympaticomsn.ctv.ca]

Good luck to him. Often, after a scandal, the perimeter supporters like to clean house and bring in guys not intimately associated with the former core, so he may have a shot.

I love how the first paragraphs mention his hockey achievements.

I wonder if this will turn into a Cornell v. Harvard race
[Q]Perceived frontrunner Michael Ignatieff, a Harvard professor who has lived outside of Canada for close to 30 years, has already been campaigning hard.[/Q]

Can someone explain to me the office he's running for? Is it the equivalent of Howard Dean's chairmanship in the DNC, where it's not actually a government position?

Beeeej

Beeeej
Can someone explain to me the office he's running for? Is it the equivalent of Howard Dean's chairmanship in the DNC, where it's not actually a government position?

I'm no expert, but I think in a parliamentary system, the party leader usually becomes Prime Minister if the party gains a majority.

Beeeej
Can someone explain to me the office he's running for? Is it the equivalent of Howard Dean's chairmanship in the DNC, where it's not actually a government position?

Think of him as the House minority leader. If his party then gains enough seats in the next election, he becomes the House majority leader, and gets to make all the rules (where "making the rules" means becoming "head of government."

Parliamentary systems run much more on platform and issues, rather than the cult of personality that the Presidential race is decided on. That's because whoever is head of government, they have the Queen as head of state. (Well, in Canada, it's technically the Governor General, but nobody has any idea who that is.) The Presidency combines both roles, reducing it to an insipid race to the bottom.

Reason #68 why Canada > US.

Trotsky
Think of him as the House minority leader. If his party then gains enough seats in the next election, he becomes the House majority leader, and gets to make all the rules (where "making the rules" means becoming "head of government."

Parliamentary systems run much more on platform and issues, rather than the cult of personality that the Presidential race is decided on. That's because whoever is head of government, they have the Queen as head of state. (Well, in Canada, it's technically the Governor General, but nobody has any idea who that is.) The Presidency combines both roles, reducing it to an insipid race to the bottom.

Reason #68 why Canada > US.

I respectfully disagree. In the Canadian system the head of government automatically has a legislative majority. I submit that separating the head of government from the legislature, as in the US system, provides a better opportunity for checks and balances in the system. This even occurs (albeit to a lesser extent) when the same party holds the executive and the legislative majority.

Further a two party system encourages relatively moderate parties because each party has to appeal to a broad range of voters. While this may seem wishy-washy, it's probably a good thing. A parlimentary system often empowers fringe parties, who have the ability to make or break a government and as a result must be catered to (more so though in a proportional representation system as opposed to one based on direct representation). That's all well and good if you like the policies of the fringe in question, but overall tends to be a bad thing, IMO.

The Governor-General is nominally appointed by the Queen, so it really goes back to the Queen anyway.

Good luck to Ken Dryden in the leadership race. May he be leader of a minority Liberal party for many years to come!

KeithK
A parlimentary system often empowers fringe parties, who have the ability to make or break a government and as a result must be catered to (more so though in a proportional representation system as opposed to one based on direct representation).

Proportional vs direct representation is a completely separate issue.

The active objection is checks and balances -- in effect, arguing for the separation of executive and legislative power in the praise of gridlock, to put the brakes on if the electorate goes temporarily insane. One can achieve the same thing within a legislative body by having protection of minority rights, i.e. through filibuster, supermajorities on important issues, review and amendment, etc.

But the real problem is that the political parties now are almost perfectly synced with ideology. Formerly, there were wings which created a significant inter-party overlap across the ideological spectrum -- so alliances sometimes crosscut parties. The ethnic cleansing that both parties have subjected themselves to has made them mere squabbling litigators -- government by plaintiff vs defendant. The system wasn't designed to function in the absence of compromise between (or sentience among) party leaders.

Leaders of both parties forgot that the ideological wingbaggery which they foist upon the public during campaigns is just posturing for contributions and votes. They actually started believing in it -- or in any case we started electing the stupid and the crazy -- and began structuring their governance according to it.

That was, in the words of South Park, dum-dum-dum-dum-dumb.

Trotsky
That's because whoever is head of government, they have the Queen as head of state. (Well, in Canada, it's technically the Governor General, but nobody has any idea who that is.)

Well, maybe in the past nobody had any idea who the Governor General was. The current one's a rather notable (in the Canadian pop culture sense) former journalist.

How is John Spencer doing? Is he running for anything?

ugarte
How is John Spencer doing? Is he running for anything?

Not in the off-season. Maybe in October though.

He and Generalissimo Francisco Franco are both still dead.

Updates to come.

Beeeej

KeithK
Further a two party system encourages relatively moderate parties because each party has to appeal to a broad range of voters. While this may seem wishy-washy, it's probably a good thing. A parlimentary system often empowers fringe parties, who have the ability to make or break a government and as a result must be catered to (more so though in a proportional representation system as opposed to one based on direct representation). That's all well and good if you like the policies of the fringe in question, but overall tends to be a bad thing, IMO.

Much better to have those "fringes" completely disenfranchised by having to choose the lesser of two evils, not to mention the non-competitive nature of most congressional elections thanks to effective gerrymandering.

My ideal system: a legislature chosen by proportional representation within each state, and an executive selected by Condorcet voting. Condorcet methods, for the unitiated, have the voters rank the candidates as in instant runoff voting, but the winner is the candidate preferred over each of the others head-to-head. This tends to favor those near the median of the political spectrum.

jtwcornell91
Much better to have those "fringes" completely disenfranchised by having to choose the lesser of two evils, not to mention the non-competitive nature of most congressional elections thanks to effective gerrymandering.

Yes, it is better over all to "disenfranchise" the fringes. You may like the policies of one fringe and I the other, but it's probably better to have leaders drawn from the wishy-washy, pandering middle.

Gerrymandering is a totally different issue. The current system is pretty horrible in most states. Drawing voting districts should be done using mathematical rules that emphasize compactness and following pre-existing political boundaries (county and city lines). Take the human factor out entirely.

KeithK
Yes, it is better over all to "disenfranchise" the fringes. You may like the policies of one fringe and I the other, but it's probably better to have leaders drawn from the wishy-washy, pandering middle.

IMO, the lack of effective fringe parties is a large part of what has given us our mercantile economy. When the major parties are busy tackling the actual issues raised by the fringe parties, I imagine they'll have less time to pass legislation favorable to donors.

The problem our system has that has resulted in a move from a free market to a mercantile economy is twofold: the federal government has the power to do just about anything they want, and there is no real opposition because both parties---the one in power and the one out of power---concentrate the voters' attention on unimportant issues to draw attention away from the way they're screwing us.

Not to mention that real coalitions---that is, coalitions of parties with specific, real platforms---require actual results or the coalition breaks up. Right now, who represents the small government constituency? No one, because it's a two party system, and so the Republicans (somehow!) manage to retain that vote simply by paying lip service to it because there's no other viable choice.

Cheers,
Kyle