It created a pretty magical “snow globe” effect at the Heritage Classic last night, continued to fall through the night and it’s always a bit of a judgement call but it feels like it’s time to do my annual post of this song as it feels like the snow is here to stay again for another long Saskatchewan winter (though again, if you have to bring in winter, having the first snow that stays come during an outdoor hockey game is a pretty cool and memorable way to do it!)
Pretty cool experience to go to the Flames Heritage Classic game in Regina with my Calgary cousins and our dads.
A variety of ways to look at the results.
How would proportional representation have shaped the results (always with the caveat that even PR supporters like myself have to acknowledge parties knowing the election was happening under PR would change strategies and the results so it’s hard to map FPTP results onto PR models perfectly.)
And I didn’t see this until after the election but Macleans magazine had a hilarious (and relaxing!) way to cover the election – they simply live streamed video of people colouring in a map of Canadian constituencies as the results came in
I’m super excited for the Heritage Classic outdoor NHL game (first regular season NHL game in a non-NHL city ever!) on Saturday night at Mosaic Stadium.
I’ve always been a Flames fan since I have a lot of family in Calgary but they were my second favourite team, at least until we moved to Calgary in 2001 when they took over from the Islanders as my favourite NHL team.
Living in an NHL city moved my fandom to another level and I’ve been a huge fan ever since.
One highlight of our time in Calgary was the Flames’ unexpected 2004 run to the Stanley Cup finals.
I was even able to get tickets to their first home game (third in the series) in the Flames opening round games against the Vancouver Canucks. But that was the only game I got to as I either couldn’t afford and/or couldn’t find tickets to any games (I remember sitting in a pub near my workplace for what turned out to be the final game when the Flames lost the Cup in game six and, in those pre-smartphone days, running to my office to see if any seats were for sale. And yes, I was looking for two but if I’d found one, I probably would’ve left Shea at the pub to go!) 😉
It took him fifty years to get there but it was worth it!
Usually after an election, there are articles and blog posts about “winners and losers”.
But after last night, I feel like we have the rare situation where every party could arguably be said to be both a big winner and a big loser in some very definitive ways.
Liberals
Won: The election obviously
Lost: But dropped to a minority parliament situation
Conservatives
Won: The popular vote The most votes of any party including the Liberals and gained a number of seats
Lost: But couldn’t defeat a vulnerable PM, still had 66% of the country voting for other parties and couldn’t make a breakthrough in Quebec or Ontario in any serious way
NDP
Lost: A number of seats that they held at dissolution
Won: But may end up with more power now by holding the balance of power in a minority parliament
Green
Won: One more seat than they had at dissolution including a huge breakthrough in Fredericton, their first seat outside of BC.
Lost: But didn’t have any other breakthroughs or win more seats (especially in BC/on Vancouver Island)
Bloc
Won: Back from the dead going from 10 seats to 32
Lost: But they’re the Bloc. They have no real purpose in a national government and unfairly benefit with a hugely inflated seat count by having their votes concentrated in a single province. They are a big contributor to western alienation and separatist sentiment in the west and arguably one of the worst things for national unity not named “Trudeau” in this election.
People’s Party
Won: Bernier created a new party, basically from scratch, and may now have a base for future growth.
Lost: But Bernier didn’t even win his own seat (thanks Rhino Party?) when many expected the PPC to vote split the right. But they didn’t even break 2% support across the country so how much room is there for a far-right, libertarian-tinged party in Canada?
Canadians
Won: Minority governments have the potential to be the most productive and force parties to work together in ways they wouldn’t normally for the benefit of all Canadians.
Lost: But it feels like western alienation is going to get a lot worse before it gets better. Trudeau’s name alone is a swear word in much of the Prairies and his perceived (real?) arrogance won’t help unless he can quickly develop some true (faked?) humility – not his strong suit from what I’ve seen.
“D for Democracy” – Spirit of the West
I’m not sure if it was something I learned in a political science class or read in a book or when exactly I figured it out.
But I don’t think it’s especially profound to realise that, at its core, the biggest difference between people on the left and people on the right is that people on the left tend to be more focused on making life better for everyone else in society, no matter who, and people on the right tend to be more focused on making things better for themselves (and people most like them) first and foremost.
It’s completely understandable why humans have evolved to look out for ourselves first (if the sabre tooth tiger is choosing between you and someone else, tripping that other person probably seems like a good idea!) but I think it’s also important to realise that many of the things we think are sabre-tooth tigers in our modern age – taxes that pay for public services we all benefit from, people from other countries (including those who wear a turban!), people who want to move from a non-renewable-based economy to one based on renewable energy – aren’t really that dangerous to any of us and, in fact, help make our society a better, more empathetic, more inclusive, more equal place which ultimately benefits us all.
Tomorrow, I hope Canadians keep that in mind when they go to vote:
I mean I’m not personally a fan of the guy but we happened to have Justin Trudeau’s autobiography in our collection so I put it on an election-themed display I did (along with a range of books about various topics and issues that are important to supporters of all parties this election season. I also included books by other political figures – though we didn’t have Jagmeet Singh or Elizabeth May’s books and Andrew Scheer nor Maxime Bernier haven’t written books so I used stand-ins – Stephen Harper, Naomi Klein, etc.)
Anyhow, the hatred of Justin Trudeau is visceral in the Prairies but someone adding a book to our display to draw a comparison to Kim Jong-Il is probably *a bit* over the top (though I admit I cracked up when I saw this – though more in the sense of it being a beautiful act of subversion!) 😉
Pace and I have spent the evening watching YouTube videos of the video games I loved as a kid – here are YouTube videos of three of my all-time favourites:
