Mercifully, this sorry spectacle of a general election in Quebec is over. I can't remember a campaign so empty of any real debate as it came down to a choice between an extremely lame Charter of Values that would have banned the overly overt display of religious affiliation in the public service and the dubious notion that the new government will somehow better THE economy.More importantly, this collective decision was made in the context of a pause in the deliberations of the Charbonneau Commission, which will now turn its focus on how the alleged criminal behaviour surrounding the awarding of public works contracts and the illegal financing of Quebec's two major political parties, the Liberal Party of Quebec and the Parti Quebecois.
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Only 18 months ago, the electorate ousted the ruling Liberals, just weeks before the Commission began its work. Last night, the same electorate re-elected the disgraced Liberals to a new four year term.
What's up with that?
At first glance, it may appear that Quebecers have rather short memories, but it goes deeper than that.
Essentially, Quebecers would rather offload the responsibility of running their own affairs to a small group of politicians that they can always get rid of later rather than being engaged in the messy business of democratic self rule.
That's why when Radio Canada declares a Liberal majority government with only 41% of the popular vote that, other than the two deputies from the leftist Quebec Solidaire who unabashedly contested the legitimacy of a majority government elected with less than 50% of the popular vote, everyone else goes along for the ride.
Whew, glad that's over. Now we can get on with the important business of piling up more personal and public debt as we pursue a quality of life that we can no longer afford.
No matter. We'll just pass on the mountain of debt to subsequent generations.
So, deep down Quebecers are not all that different from the rest of the vast majority of Canadians. We'll gladly defer to authority as long as we can periodically change who exercises that authority over us.
Democratic self rule?
Nah, leave that to the Scandinavians. I wonder what is the Swedish word for democracy.
I don't think they even want to make the effort to go to the polls for a referendum, which, frankly, needs to happen. They don't want to go to the polls.
ReplyDeleteI am disheartened by the election result. I was hoping, best case scenario, as a realist and a Quebec Solidaire supporter and member, was another minority. Neither Marois, nor Couillard should be left without a tight leash.
In case you''re interested, here is my take.
http://sistersagesmusings.ca/2014/04/07/is-anyone-capable-of-critical-thinking-does-anyone-even-care/
I wrote it in anger so I may have repeated myself a few times, but you get the idea.
Nothing was solved. Charter gone? Who cares? The debate on both sides of the argument were dishonest at best. Even with the charter gone, not only Quebec, but the rest of Canada is pretty xenophobic. Let's not kid ourselves.
We'll be paying more as Couillard further privatizes everything that was built since the Quiet Revolution. He intends to do nothing about corruption. There is a problem when a criminal like Arthur Porter endorses a leader from a jail cell which frankly, Couillard should be sharing with him.
I see the celebrations on Facebook and Twitter. My post that I linked to was in response to all of that. Frankly, there is nothing to celebrate.