Canada General Discussion (2019-)

[CumbrianLefty]

I think the point is surely that until recently, the Canadian Tories were fairly crap at "populism".

If that is now changing - even under a pretty rigid ideologue like PP - that is surely notable.

[CumbrianLefty]

Apparently Canada's population hit 41 million yesterday just 9 months after reaching 40 million.

I agree with those who say that this and not the carbon tax are why the Liberals will lose in 2025. It's not even just that Canada can not absorb this number of people in this period of time, but that for a long time the Liberals showed no interest or even understanding of the need to coordinate the population increase with the municipalities and the provinces. This is just basic incompetence.

I can't stand Poilievre or the Conservatives, but I can certainly appreciate the desire to fire a government that demonstrates basic incompetence.

Competence - or rather the lack of it - is sometimes underrated as a factor in big electoral swings; see the UK currently for another pertinent example.

[CumbrianLefty]

Well yes - I have certainly been critical of Singh as NDP leader, but they are probably playing the hand they have actually been dealt about as well as you could reasonably expect at the moment.

[CumbrianLefty]

Another example of a provincial government in Canada backtracking on a policy they previously defended religiously.

B.C. Premier says changes could come to decriminalization project amid backlash

How badly do you have to screw up a country to then backtrack massively on literally all your policies just to stay in power?

BREAKING: Policy that sounds ridiculous turns out to be ridiculous. More news at 6.

Btw, "decriminalization" is such a weird thing to focus on. Here in Ontario, you tell me simple possession is still a criminal act. I'm not talking about the Criminal Code of Canada, I'm talking about whether that so-called crime actually gets enforced. All of the harm reduction policies that BC has been pursuing has been tried in virtually every major city in Canada, and I'm tired of people telling me that decriminalization is a thing we NEED to do in drug policy when in actuality, the government already massively subsidizes the use of hard drugs, which they don't do for ACTUAL crimes. I'm not saying we need to start locking up homeless addicts, that's not the right approach either, so I guess in principle I have no problem with decriminalization. I actually think some of the harm reduction policies are good, like providing clean needles so we don't have to deal with an AIDS epidemic on top of an opioid epidemic. But presenting "decriminalization" to the people and actually implementing policies that result in people being allowed to shoot up in children's playgrounds is a genuinely evil approach to drug use that is fundamentally dishonest to the people of Canada. Yes, I know that particular case was a decision of the almighty courts and not Eby or Trudeau, but they certainly opened the door to the courts even considering drug use in children's playgrounds as a genuine Charter rights issue by trying to destigmatize something that clearly should be stigmatized. Not to mention the other things that have happened, like flooding the streets with even MORE opioids (but you know, the "safe" stuff), which has made its way into the black market and will inevitably create MORE addicts, not less. And here again, Trudeau has given up the Liberal Party's traditional commitment to pragmatism and dove head-first into whatever nonsense the activist class is jerking themselves off over. Eby has allowed his province to become a human experiment in this nonsense, and ordinary people suffer as a result.

It's insane how the definition of 'decriminalization' went from simply not arresting people for simple possession to the government handing out free drugs within a couple of years.

Though in actual facts neither of those things is *actually* decriminalisation.

The first is merely more relaxed illegality, the second legalisation (and maybe then some)

[CumbrianLefty]

That claim is indeed "arguable".

Very arguable indeed, in fact

[CumbrianLefty]

Which brand of conspiracy theory in particular?

[CumbrianLefty]

I am becoming very concerned about the state of the country in general. We are struggling to control immigration (not to mention all the scams and dishonesty associated with it), foreign powers can meddle in our politics as if it were a board game, we can't meet our NATO commitments that our allies have either already met or are on their way to meet, we have appallingly high cost of living, especially with regards to housing, we have a struggling economy and rapidly declining levels of productivity, there are issues with the healthcare system and other aspects of the social safety net, the current government is extremely unpopular yet the PM won't even resign or call an election, there is an incredible amount of corruption (eg, the ArriveCan app).

The most concerning thing isn't that we have so many issues, but no one really wants to comprehensively discuss these things and fix them. You listen to Poilievre - vague rants about the carbon tax and entrepreneurs 'fleeing' Canada, the Liberals defending their policies with weird analogies about a being in a car for 10 days with no washroom breaks and the NDP doesn't seem to care about anything except keeping Trudeau in power and Jagmeet Singh getting his pension lol.

Is there no one in this country trying to fix these things? Is this the best we can do? If so, it pains me to say it, but our future is bleak.

Though not sharing your country or politics, I can certainly relate to at least some of this. I think that you might take some comfort, as do I., from an election resulting in a change of government meaning that other things *will* change too. For both the Canadian Tories and UK Labour, the incentives that come from being in power are different from those when you are trying to get there.