Some thoughts on the Canadian elections under way:

    o C's response to job losses in Ontario and Quebec
          o "Last place to invest"
          o We'll create jobs elsewhere (read: Alberta)
          o Encourage low-value export of raw materials because that makes money today

          o We've created more jobs than we've lost (read: service jobs (low-pay) and resource-export jobs)
          o "Let Ontario and Quebec hang, get as much as possible from them for Alberta" seems to be the party policy
    o C's response to environment
          o Percentage efficiency targets (read: pump more, pollute more, but reduce the amount/barrel slightly)
          o Encourage foreign countries with massive tax breaks despite huge environment degradation
          o Bush North, drag your heels as much as possible, pay lip service to the ideal, derail any significant discussion of changes
    o If you are not oil-rich, white and Albertan you probably should be voting for someone else
          o C's and the Reform party have a long history of recidivist gaffes.  When just about any time one of your members speaks in public you're likely to have something racist, offensive or downright stupid come out it ceases to matter that you officially apologized for each case... something is showing through...

It's depressing how 60% of the population can be overthrown by 35% of the population[1].  Worse yet is seeing people who have no business supporting C's (new immigrants, in the manufacturing sectors of Ontario, for crimminy's sake!) blindly parroting the party line.

[1] Canada has a first-past-the-post system, the party in each riding that has the most total votes wins the entire riding.  We have one ultra-right-wing Neo-cons party (the Conservatives), 1 left-of-center party (the Liberals), 2 left parties (the NDP and the Bloc), and the Greens out in center-of-left-of-center territory.  About 60% of Canadians are on the "left" side of the political spectrum, but the way-right-of-center party captures all 35% or so of the conservatives (even those who aren't nutty, as the Reform party "bought" the respectability of the old "Progressive Conservatives" (who were right-of-center rather than extreme right) in a takeover a few years ago), while the left-of-center splits each riding 3 ways (4 in Quebec).