Shutting down

Well, I've been very lax in writing my thoughts for quite a while now, and to be honest, I can't seem to find the effort to keep it up. I still love following politics, I'll keep reading everyone else's blogs, and I will stay an active member of my school's Young Liberals, but the last few months, I really haven't found the inspiration necessary to keep up with regular postings. So I guess I'll shut down my comments for now. Whenever we have our next federal election, I will hopefully still contribute to Greg's Riding Bloggers, but I don't think I have the desire to keep this one up. It's been fun while it lasted, and it has certainly given me a newfound respect for those bloggers who can actually maintain a blog. Thanks to everyone who has perused my commentary!

Royalty

Well, it seems the Alberta Liberals will set their foot in the sand and demand the full 20% increase in oil and gas royalties. It's the right thing do to, and for the Liberals, it should set them apart from the Conservatives, since I doubt Ed will be giving in fully to the report. As long as the Liberals are careful to explain that the oil and gas industry won't be packing up and leaving, this should be a solid position, standing up for all Albertans, not just the oil tycoons.

PET Day?

Mario Silva has proposed a Pierre Elliot Trudeau Day. I just can't wait to see the PET Day parade in downtown Calgary.

Avoiding an election

Well, it looks like Dion has decided to try to avoid an election, by just proposing amendments to the Throne Speech, and when they're shot down, abstain on the speech itself.

Basically, the amendments will be getting out of combat in Afghanistan in 2009 and some environmental stuff (to make the Conservatives oppose it), and corporate tax cuts (so the NDP will reject it). I can't say it's the option I'd be in favour of, but we'll see how it holds up. Although the way everyone else is talking, I still find it hard to believe that the Conservatives won't try to find a way to kill parliament before Christmas, and if they do, then this won't look so good on us heading into an election.

Chretien/Martin/Manley

Now, for a few quick points on the other Liberal stories in the news:

- I don't see a big problem with Manley being on the Afghanistan panel. If he rejected, then I'm sure Harper would have found a way to spin it to be like us Liberals are too self-centered to possibly come up with any solutions, and he would still have pressed forward with it anyways. Dion did fairly well again on this question in trying say something along the lines of, "Thank God we have a reasonable voice there, since the rest of the panel is full of Mulroney people." Great move by Harper by doing this, since he might be able to avoid the Afghanistan question in an election campaign, but we'll just have to work around this and show how he doesn't actually care.

- As for the Martin-Chretien dispute, what did people expect? Chretien's not going to back down from taking stabs at Martin. And while Warren may still be angry at the current people for defending Martin over Gomery, politically it's the only thing to do. As incredibly stupid and boneheaded as Martin actually was with the inquiry, once it's announced, we can't have people saying, "We shouldn't have launched it," especially Dion. It was a stupid move, but by denouncing it, we would be bringing up all the old corruption issues back to the forefront, which really doesn't help our poll numbers. Otherwise, all that Chretien's book seems to be getting out is that Martin was incompetent as PM, which I think most people already realize. And as much as talking about these disputes of the past sucks for us, I think it's better than media focusing on the "disputes" of the present group, which we can't so easily dismiss.

Showdown with the Throne Speech

Well, the big question on everyone's mind this week is what will happen with the throne speech. I caught part of Question Period yesterday, and the Conservative memo was definitely, "This is either a mandate for us or an election." I thought Dion was fairly decent in his response, trying to frame it as saying whether or not Harper will go crazy or not. The problem with this is if we actually tacitly support the speech, then it does give some credence to Harper.

So, my guess for the speech is that it will be very tough to support. I don't see Harper backing down wanting this election over with soon. However, I also see him putting in enough goodies to try to paint the opposition as anti-something. Thus, it will be absolutely essential that if we are going into an election to frame the question extremely early as to why we are voting.

That's one thing that Tory did well in the Ontario election: he framed the question early. Unfortunately for him, he picked the wrong question, but he did establish the religious schools funding before anyone else started talking about anything. And that's what Hampton was so fed up about: he didn't get his election plank out early enough for anyone to talk about anything in it. He got boxed out early.

If we do go to war, which I think is actually probably more politically sound for us to do, in my opinion, then we need to be ready right off the bat. If we pick the right question, it may not be so bad for us.

And the winner is... Al Gore

Well, he's doing it again. Al Gore wins yet another award, to go on his shelf with his Emmy (for his TV network) and his Oscar (for his documentary). Where to next? The presidency is the obvious one, but I say he just continues the award show tour. I say he goes to try to win a Grammy next. He doesn't have to sing, although maybe he could collaborate with "MC Rove" on a hit.

Congrats Dalton!

Well, I expected that the Liberals would take this one easily, but even I didn't think it would go this easily. Good job to everyone in trouncing the opposition.

Also, tonight I went out to scrutineer and help out for Leeanna Pendergast in Kitchener-Conestoga, and let me tell you, I think people on that campaign are still in shock about the results. They did amazing in getting her elected, and I'm sure she'll be a great MPP. Closer to home, Louise Ervin lost to Elizabeth Witmer, which was expected, but Ervin still got quite a good share of the vote, so congratulations to them on a tough campaign there. Next time, we'll get rid of Witmer.