Canadian Election Politics and me

Well, that was depressing.

I have this old fashioned idea that a responsible voter gets to know her candidates before voting. So I went to the local all candidate's meeting tonight.

The NDP candidate is an inarticulate idiot. This distresses me because their Party's platform is the closest to my point of view.

The Green Party's candidate is .... well intentioned, but unformed.

The Liberal candidate is the incumbent. He's slick. Well practiced at the art of politics. And a typical Liberal - self-centered, self-righteous, arrogant.

The Conservative candidate sickens me. Mind you, I'm pre-disposed to be sickened by Conservatives, but this guy.... and the support he got in the room, suffice to say that this is the reason I found the debate so depressing.

For those of you who don't know - the previous Liberal government recently legalized same-sex marriage in Canada. I support this idea, hell, I celebrate it as a move long overdue in a humane society.

The Conservative Party has stated that they want to review this decision. I'm afraid that it will be reversed. That gay folks' right to marry will be taken away.

Some Conservatives are only in the party for the economics, and are socially liberal. A long time ago, back in the days when the Conservatives used to call themselves Progressive Conservatives, before the right wing first split off and drove the party into the ground, and then chased them off, these types used to be considerably more numerous and were called Red Tories. "Red" because the Liberal party colour is Red, left-leaning economically conservative. I understand that, I grew up that way.

Nowadays, most of them are all Conservative, all the way. This candidate is one of them.

But there was a bright moment - a women in a 16 year, 3 children, lesbian relationship got up and outed herself and challenged the Conservative candidate to explain himself. I was moved by the support she did get in the audience(not as much as the candidate, depressingly) and by her courage to speak up in that room. I thanked her personally afterwards.

Anyway....

I went home and ate some comfort food and hugged the puppy and took a skein of yarn off the spindle. Things look a little brighter, the world is a little warmer. It'll be okay. Maybe not in this election, but someday...

The weaving, by the way, is getting better. Anti-V suggested spray starch and it seems to be working.

Karen