We have a bloated, out of date governmental system. Modelled after the british system, which descened from centuries of petty lord bickering. That mostly, we don't understand. And when we do hear about it's gross inadequacies and overspending, we do nothing about it. Canadians for the most part are apathetic. You could call this our national attitude. Tell us anything thats happening in our own country and we'll generally reply with 'meh' and go back to watching the Simpsons. We had an instance where a Member of Parliment's credentials were found to be completely and utterly false. His citizenship papers, his university degrees, everything this man had down on his resume was a lie. His party abandoned him. Which is to say his politcal party broke affiliation with him. And his riding (The people that voted for him) abandoned him as their representative. So basically you had this man (who wasn't even Canadian) with no party, no one to represent, taking up a seat in parliment. You'd think that would mean he'd be out of a job. Nope. As long as he showed up, as long he was there for the pre-requiste number of ballot castings, he got paid. Lovely eh? And that pre-requiste number of ballot castings is so outrageously low that we have MP's that don't actually live in the country anymore. They live in Carribean or somewhere and just show up 5 or 6 times a year to cast a ballot on something. The Reform party in Canada started out as a grass-roots kinda conservative retaliation to all this. They refused to take the governmentally funded shuttle from the parking lot to Parliment as a form of protest over government spending. The shuttle driver, who's entire job is to drive fat politicians to the door of parliment earned something in the neighbourhood of 80k. Everyone like the Reform party, to start with. Then their 'down-home' conservatism started showing. With pro-life, anti-gay and racist sentiments being uttered by every member, we were suddenly feeling like we'd been backing the KKK. Luckily for us, as is the case with many extremist groups the Reform fell victim to in fighting, and now are just a joke. Which puts us back to where we started. With an overbloated, out of date, archaic and convulted governmental system that we don't fully understand, and now we don't even have any politicians on OUR side telling us whats going on up there!! The Reform party made headlines when they revealed the salaries of the Parlimentary building staff. There are full time shoe shiners working in Parliment, to keep the politicians shoes spic and span earning upwards of 100k. And we wonder where are tax dollars go. Side note: Canadians pay .... ooh BM correct me if I'm wrong.... the second highest personal income tax percentage in the world. (I think the first is Britain). Granted, this pays for our 'National' Health care. (in quotes because it's actually provincally administrated and in Alberta it's not paid for with your taxes. You have to pay for it seperately) Or so the average citizen would like to believe. And since thats easier than over throwing the governement...
meh
;)
I will actually keep you updated (innundated) with Canadian info now! heh I would suggest a news paper if you really want to know, but all ours are corporate whores... though the Globe and Mail is still pretty good. Globeandmail.ca (I think). Our two big national papers are The Toronto Star and The Toronto/Calgary Sun. I was once told I was NOT allowed to use them as a source of info for a research project for HS because they were un-reliable. :) (Kinda like FoxNews).
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momijizukamori
I ran out of room, damn 4000 character limits!
Date: 2001-09-22 09:58 am (UTC)We have a bloated, out of date governmental system. Modelled after the british system, which descened from centuries of petty lord bickering.
That mostly, we don't understand.
And when we do hear about it's gross inadequacies and overspending, we do nothing about it.
Canadians for the most part are apathetic.
You could call this our national attitude.
Tell us anything thats happening in our own country and we'll generally reply with
'meh'
and go back to watching the Simpsons.
We had an instance where a Member of Parliment's credentials were found to be completely and utterly false. His citizenship papers, his university degrees, everything this man had down on his resume was a lie.
His party abandoned him. Which is to say his politcal party broke affiliation with him. And his riding (The people that voted for him) abandoned him as their representative. So basically you had this man (who wasn't even Canadian) with no party, no one to represent, taking up a seat in parliment. You'd think that would mean he'd be out of a job.
Nope.
As long as he showed up, as long he was there for the pre-requiste number of ballot castings, he got paid.
Lovely eh?
And that pre-requiste number of ballot castings is so outrageously low that we have MP's that don't actually live in the country anymore.
They live in Carribean or somewhere and just show up 5 or 6 times a year to cast a ballot on something.
The Reform party in Canada started out as a grass-roots kinda conservative retaliation to all this.
They refused to take the governmentally funded shuttle from the parking lot to Parliment as a form of protest over government spending.
The shuttle driver, who's entire job is to drive fat politicians to the door of parliment earned something in the neighbourhood of 80k.
Everyone like the Reform party, to start with.
Then their 'down-home' conservatism started showing. With pro-life, anti-gay and racist sentiments being uttered by every member, we were suddenly feeling like we'd been backing the KKK.
Luckily for us, as is the case with many extremist groups the Reform fell victim to in fighting, and now are just a joke.
Which puts us back to where we started.
With an overbloated, out of date, archaic and convulted governmental system that we don't fully understand, and now we don't even have any politicians on OUR side telling us whats going on up there!!
The Reform party made headlines when they revealed the salaries of the Parlimentary building staff.
There are full time shoe shiners working in Parliment, to keep the politicians shoes spic and span earning upwards of 100k.
And we wonder where are tax dollars go.
Side note: Canadians pay .... ooh BM correct me if I'm wrong.... the second highest personal income tax percentage in the world. (I think the first is Britain).
Granted, this pays for our 'National' Health care. (in quotes because it's actually provincally administrated and in Alberta it's not paid for with your taxes. You have to pay for it seperately) Or so the average citizen would like to believe. And since thats easier than over throwing the governement...
meh
;)
I will actually keep you updated (innundated) with Canadian info now! heh I would suggest a news paper if you really want to know, but all ours are corporate whores... though the Globe and Mail is still pretty good. Globeandmail.ca (I think). Our two big national papers are The Toronto Star and The Toronto/Calgary Sun. I was once told I was NOT allowed to use them as a source of info for a research project for HS because they were un-reliable. :) (Kinda like FoxNews).