Politics

Out there, there are supporters of our current Liberal Party leader, Stephane Dion.

I’m not one of them.

And so, the news that Mr. Dion is expected to resign in the upcoming week makes me quite happy. I am a Liberal Party girl at heart. Never been a big fan of Stephen Harper, or conservatives in general. The previous election’s results disappointed me, considering how few seats the Liberals managed to hold on to. At the same time, I was still pleased that the Liberals hadn’t gained more seats than the Conservatives, as expected. Why?

Let’s see: 1) Stephane Dion can’t speak English all too well. 2) Most Canadians speak English.

I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with a PM from Quebec. I love the idea. I love French, too. I just love English a tad bit more. The truth is, simply put, the lack of Dion’s decent English-skills made it hard for him to communicate his ideas (policies, platform, and inspirational ideas and other thoughts) with a lot of voters.

French is indeed one of Canada’s official languages, but we must realize that the proportion of English-French speakers in Canada is not proportionate, and this proportion is diminished even more when you take Quebec out of the equation (the Bloc takes up too much of Quebec anyway). It is also important to remember that on the global stage, great English and bad French is going to be a hell of a lot more useful than sort-of-bad English and great French.

I think that many voters were actually usual Liberal voters, but voted for Conservatives instead. Now why would long-time Liberal supporters do something like this? Even if they did think Dion’s policies were pretty good? Because Dion and his French accent was just such a huge turn-off, that they voted for their Conservative candidate. Dion loses. End of story.

And that is why I am glad Dion is resigning.

Who will win the position of the Liberal Party’s next leader, Ignatieff or Rae or someone else, will be another story. Yes, the whole unanimous we-support-Dion pact was a lie. Well, politics in general are full of lies, and this one I can accept. And the coalition? That’s another story too.

I’m just glad Dion will be resigning soon, or so they say. I’m hoping, at least, because anything without an actual date is never certain. But I think, the sooner, the better. Nice meeting you, Mr. Dion.

I am happy.

I am ready for change in America.

And I am hoping that people will stop making unfunny jokes about Obama getting assassinated.

Here’s a funny picture, of people from “Obama, Japan.” Apparently, Obama means “Little Beach” in Japanese. What a coincidence, a Japanese town and the American president-to-be having the same name.

Fans from Obama, Japan

The election hype that has built up over the past two years will begin to die down now, and the political-news-obsessed (like myself) will need to find way to fill in for procrastination.

Congratulations, Barack Obama.

Note: This post was written at 7:21pm ET

The wait is over, and election day is here.

I personally support Obama, but in general I love watching political elections and analyses on TV. While some are saying that the race will be called early, I think it’ll go until midnight at least. If it weren’t for a special event I have tomorrow morning, I would watch the television all night if it were necessary.

Interestingly, the anchorwoman on CBC News just informed us tv-watchers of a “recent study” that says 97% of Canadians would vote for Barack Obama, if they could vote. I guess that means I know a disproportionate amount of McCain supporters. How odd.

I’ve also recently learned that polling stations in some states close as early as 6pm. Isn’t that a tad early? Quite a bit of people work 9 to 5 jobs, and judging by news reports, there are long, long lines for voting today. Here in Canada, or at least where I live, polling stations for the last federal election closed at 9:30pm. Lots of time to vote. Now that’s a democracy.

Today, or early tomorrow, we will find out of America has its first African-American President. Or will McPalin prevail and disprove the polls? I’m so excited, only a few more hours!

(P.S. If there’s a repeat of the 2000-election Fox News scandal, I will not be a happy person tomorrow)

I should have been studying last night, but I really do love being a part of election hype (and thus, I will be spending more study-time watching the Obama-McCain debate tonight) so I decided to go to the results party of my riding’s (Liberal) Member of Parliament, Maurizio Bevilacqua .

While he did win, Harper gained twenty or so seats in Parliament, for a slightly stronger Conservative minority government. Despite all of Stephane Dion’s ads that said “Only the Liberals can stop Harper,” in reality, it was the Bloc that stopped Harper from gaining majority. Because of the Bloc’s dominance in Quebec, Harper didn’t get the nine more seats he needed.

A lot of people think Dion should resign now, for the sake of the future of the Liberal Party. The fact that his English sucks was a huge turnoff to voters. Having heard him speak two weeks ago at a rally, I can verify that - you have to really focus on him when he’s talking. I’m sure a lot of people would have voted for the Liberals had they had a leader who could speak English fluently, considering English is the predominant language in Canada and also one of the most important globally. A lot of people probably can’t picture their leader not speaking the same language as them, and most of the rest of the country. As great of a language French may be, English is just the more official official language.

But anyway, I am still glad that I went to the results party. I met some new people, met some old people, shook hands with Maurizio, talked to the Rogers cameraman who got kind of annoyed at me…

Oh and more thing. Free food.

That’s not to say I’m not into politics at all, I am. I’ve spent a weekend or two volunteering for Maurizio’s campaign. It’s just free food is such a nice addition. A couple old ladies that sat at my table were just packing up those sandwiches like crazy. They took loads of napkins and just kept on wrapping the sandwiches, put them into plastic bags they brought, and finally stuffed it into their handbags, coat pockets and pant pockets. Who doesn’t like a little free wine, free beer, free pizza, and free sandwiches?

Here are some pics from Bevilacqua’s results party, last night at some banquet hall in Woodbridge: