Almost one year ago a reporter wrote in The Gazette that the Liberals “used to be one of the best political brands in the country, a name so synonymous with success it has been dubbed Canada’s Natural Governing Party.” However, since Jean Chrétien resigned from office the Liberals have not been doing very well. They have slowly lost their status as the Natural Governing Party of Canada and, according to the polls, have become a distant second to the Conservative Party. Surprisingly, this presents one of the reasons given for voting Liberal: keeping the Canadian system from becoming dominated by a single party.
Leader of the Liberal Party
September 28, 1955
53 years old
Stéphane Dion was born in Quebec City and is currently the representative for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville in Quebec.
Dion has an interest in many academic pursuits, was a professor and has led many environmental causes for many years. He received his PhD in sociology from the Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Paris.
The Good – Stéphane Dion is a good looking cowboy: he won the best-dressed political cowboy award at the Calgary Stampede – surpassing even Stephen Harper in Harper’s own town.
The Bad – He got pooped on by a puffin. He constantly finds himself as the butt of someone else’s joke. If he became Prime Minister, he might transfer this affinity for being mocked to all of us.
The Ugly – While trying to be the poster child for saving the environment through the “green shift,” his old gas-guzzling campaign plane is putting out so much pollution he’s probably going to have to impose a carbon tax on his own dog, Kyoto.
The foundation of Liberals current campaign is known as the Green Shift. The purpose of this plan is to stimulate the economy while having a positive effect on the environment, accomplished by moving taxation away from the consumer and onto the polluting corporations. The tax will cost carbon-producing industries $50 for every ton of carbon dioxide they produce. The Liberals claim that this will be a revenue-neutral tax, made so by cutting personal and corporate taxes by billions of dollars per year.
How will this boost the Canadian economy? According to the plan, the switch to green technology will create jobs. Manufacturing will be needed to create the technologically advanced products that will lower businesses’ carbon footprint. Highly skilled Canadian workers will make these products.
Whatever the opposition may want you to believe, this is not the only plan that the Liberals have for Canada. They intend to increase the funding for the arts. In fact, on Sept. 20, Stéphane Dion promised that if he were elected to government, he would give $530 million dollars to bolster arts and culture in Canada.
The majority of the Liberals’ plan was kept under wraps through the first part of the campaign, but has now been revealed and is online. The tag-line of the plan is “Richer, Fairer, Greener.”
Their intent is no longer to win. They have encouraged plans like ABC (Anything But Conservatives) and other such desperate pleas to be heard by the Canadian people. It would seem that the Canadian people have not forgotten the sponsorship scandal.
For many people their distrust has expanded to all parties that might gain a majority in Parliament. The push towards the Liberals in this election does not seem to be because people particularly like their policies but because they are afraid of a Conservative majority. Perhaps things will change when the Liberals actually present Canada with a comprehensive plan on how they intend to change things.
