I hate governments.

[missemily]

And yet in 2014 when Ontario faced many of the same issues plus the gas plant scandal The Liberals were elected to a majority government.

That scandal was due to the Ontario Liberal Party. You know the one that runs Ontario. Or in other words one out of ten provinces. I doubt the other 9 really cared that much about.

Which almost cost the Ontario Liberal Party the election, however the Tories said some stupid shit about the schools, days before the vote and then lost big.

Any failure in such areas as economic growth are due to the fact that the Canadian dollar traded almost at par with the US dollar due to high oil prices. And that with the US having being hit hard twice by recession has hurt Ontario exports.

Man I wish I was expert on economies so I could properly debunk this stupid myth that Canadian dollar on par with American dollar is bad for Canada.

The year when we got hurt the worse by oil prices (which happen to be my last year so far in working in anyway with oil) was 2016. Oil prices were dropping in 2015. However our dollar went up in the tail end of 2016 to match 2015 when facing against other currencies.

Worse years of unemployment was 2010, however the highest dollar got was in 2011-2012.

Basically our dollar doesn't have anything to do with job rate in Canada. Low dollar doesn't mean jobs will magically come back after they left. A high doesn't mean jobs will go away.

[QUOTE}And while slipping against the oil provinces Ontario's GDP growth tops many European countries. Growth for 2013 was 1.3%.

http://www.conferenceboard.ca/hcp/provincial/economy/gdp-growth.aspx[/QUOTE]

Okay am Canadian and your Canadian. We both know that Ontario is "have province", they are ones that bail out the "have not provinces". In other news Leafs still haven't won Stanley Cup and Sky is still blue.

Elections are not slated for another two years. The OLP could change things around. Or things beyond their control could improve their position in the polls.

http://www.threehundredeight.com/p/ontario.html

And these days polls are suspect. No one polled T-Rump or Justin to win!

Your right on Trump, horribly wrong on JT.

Every single poll had the race as extremely tight. In fact they were calling for minority government on whoever actually won. NDP, Liberal, or Harper and his dumbshits (I will leave explantation why Harper was terrible PM for another thread). Up into the results were announced the race was to close to predicted and poll results changed every week.

Translation for Americans. Canadian elections our much much shorter then yours. So when we have nail baiting election for weeks, no one knew what would happen.

What no thought was that it would be majority government. No one. Heck I was shocked that for once my hometown would be sending Liberal to Ottawa even if we couldn't pronounce his name

So it is completely wrong of you to say no one thought Justin Trudeu and Liberal Party of Canada would win. Several people thought, problem was the election was to close to call with polling. Mainly because people still had there Orange Crush high and started to realized that Harper had no idea what he was doing.

Again I will leave why Harper was idiot to another thread. But basically it comes down to being completely depended on oil.

 

[LincolnDuncan]

After the change of US President I started thinking about governments and people around the world.

I have met people from many countries, some of them in their own countries. I have found almost all (except the obvious assholes) to be pleasant company. But I have found one thing in common for most of us. We hate our government.

It doesn't matter whether they can vote freely, or apparently freely with a government selected choice of candidates, or without a vote at all. They don't like their current or recent government.

I can say I like French people but I don't like their government or President. Many of them will agree with me and reciprocate. They don't like the UK's government nor Prime Minister (whichever government or Prime Minister).

The degree of hatred varies whether the government is run by the political party they support or not but all elected governments are compromises. Their range of policies includes things we like and things we don't like.

To return to US governments. Since WW2 I believe that all US Presidents and administrations have pursued a policy of "America First" whether they have stated that publicly or not. The so-called 'special relationship' between the US and UK is bullshit and has been since 1917. The US government wants the UK to be an ally but not a powerful ally. The US governments' policies in WW1 and 2 included a desire to dismantle the British Empire and replace the British with an American-dominated world. The US will do the minimum to retain the appearance of the special relationship but in practice will demand more than they will give back.

Do I blame the US? No. The British governments acted exactly the same in the 19th and early 20th Centuries.

While individual people can get on with each other, their governments' policies can divide them. I have friends in France and Germany who are also friends with each other but when they discuss each other's governments they start ferocious arguments - until they agree their own government is full of as many assholes as the other countries.

Why are governments so alienated from their electorates, and even from many of those who voted for them?

I don't know. Any answers?

Politics is a career choice for mobsters afraid of blood.

Some people invest in the market, others invest in politics.

 

[Hard_Rom]

I'm probably a government supporter. Heck no probably about it.

King John was a far better king than his crusading lion-hearted brother. It was John who rebuilt the economy after Richard bankrupted it twice to pay for his crusades and ransom. John was king during the time of nation and democracy myth building time of the Magna Carta.

Ad the movie 'V' he made the 5th of November plotters out as heroes fighting tyranny not traitors trying to return England to the foreign rule of the Pope.

The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few and POGG. Sounds good to me.

And I was reading Che and Mao back in high school! Cut your hair and sellout to the system!

Long live the Revolution!

 

[ishtat]

The final straw was the Suez campaign. Israel, France and the UK opposed Egypt's nationalisation of the Suez Canal. They were winning the war on the ground until the US government said "Stop or we'll no longer support your countries". Israel has never forgiven the US for that. The UK government should have known better before starting the campaign. We had already lost so much in men, material and money backing the US in Korea.

America has never been a reliable ally - until its own interests were directly affected - and that is how it should be. America failed to support UK and France over Suez because Dulles wanted Europe dealt out of the game . Dulles succeeded and then more or less copied most UK France policies.

Harold Wilson, a Prime Minister of remarkable 'greyness' had one redeeming feature. When LBJ came calling for help in Vietnam, Wilson told him to take a hike, - Wilson's best decision ever.

National Interest trumps alliances every time. Alliances are bollocks until interests align.