I Voted For Someone Who Won't Win

Yep. My first federal election ever, and I voted for someone who has absolutely no chance of carrying my riding. I guess that's what happens when you live in the most Liberal riding in Canada, in an election called by the incumbent Prime Minister to get a majority government instead of a minority one.

In the last election, the incumbent MP from my riding (Irwin Cotler,) won by a staggering 18,000 votes. His conservative opponent, Rafael Tzoubari, seems to be gaining some ground on him, but it will still be a blowout election. Even a dog could run as a Liberal in this riding and still win.

Anyways voting in my first election, however pointless it was, was still an experience. I didn't vote Liberal, but my one vote may make a 0.00001% difference in the total popular vote, or something like that.

Check back later tonight for some updates as the results come in.

The Countdown Continues...

The Communist Part of Canada has not bothered running in my electoral district of Montreal since the 2000 election, where they finished in 7th out of 8 parties, receiving 140 votes compared to the Liberals 33,118. It's a wonder why anyone even bothers to run against the Liberals here, but oh well. Here's the exact table just for your information, courtesy of Wikipedia:

Canadian federal election, 2000
Party		Candidate	Votes
	Liberal	Irwin Cotler	33,118
	Progressive Conservative	Stephane Gelgoot	2,489
	Bloc Québécois	Jean-Sebastien Houle	1,740
	Canadian Alliance	Alex Gabanski	1,444
	New Democrat	Maria Pia Chávez	1,034
	Green	Jean-Claude Balu	681
	Communist	Judith Chafoya	140
	Natural Law	Ena Kahn	122

As I've said in my post degrading the Marxist-Leninist Party, I do not agree with Communism in every way. I'm not completely tied to the Liberal Party just because of my riding, or my religion, but I am most definitely NOT even thinking about voting for the Communist Party and their Mont-Royal representative Antonio Artuso. In the 2006 federal election, the Commies, led by Miguel Figueroa, finished in 11th place, behind the Marijuana Party, the Canadian Action Party, and the Christian Heritage Party. Here are the 2006 federal stats, once again, courtesy of Wikipedia:

After the elimination of the Communist Party from the parties I'm seriously considering voting for in ten days, five candidates remain in my riding:

Tyrell Alexander (Green Party of Canada)
Irwin Cotler (Liberal Party of Canada)
Maryse Lavallée (Bloc Québécois)
Nicolas Thibodeau (New Democratic Party)
Rafael Tzoubari (Conservative Party of Canada)

And what a coincidence, they're the representatives from the five parties that are considered "major" and were allowed to debate in the Leader's Debate on Thursday. So now that I got the two parties that should not be taken seriously in the election at all, much less my riding, out of the way, I can concentrate on doing serious research.

Check back often.

The Great Debate...Debate?

Canada is stupid. That's not something you hear too often, what with our average test scores consistently higher than that of our neighbors to the south, the U.S. So why is Canada stupid? Because whoever is in charge of scheduling decided to air the first English debate between the five prime-ministerial candidates tomorrow night, at the exact same time that vice presidential candidates Tina Fey...er, Sarah Palin, and Joe Biden face off.

OR

So which debate should we watch? Well, if you're American, the answer is easy. You watch your own debate, you don't care about a country with one tenth your population. But Canadians have a different issue.

On one hand, this is the only real chance Canadian voters have to see their Candidates face off, with Green Party candidate Elizabeth May sneaking into the battle with Prime Minister Stephen Harper (Conservative), Stephane Dion (Liberal), Jack Layton (NDP), and Gilles Duceppe (Bloc.)

On the one hand, the two vice-presidential candidates seem to bring a much more interesting debate to the table, even if Canadians have no effect on the outcome.

From an Associated Press article:

Green party leader Elizabeth May is urging Canadians to pay attention to their own election.

"It's extremely unfortunate timing," May said of the schedule. "I'm hoping that people will decide to watch the Canadian debate live and check out YouTube later for whatever exciting moments there are between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin."

Sorry Ms. May, but the American debate is too intriguing to pass up. Myself, I'll be tivoing the Canadian debate while I watch the American one. With Joe Biden, who can't seem to stop saying dumb things in the press, ("Hillary Clinton is as qualified, if not more qualified, than me to be vice president,") and Sarah Palin continuing to perform extremely poorly in interviews, the dumb things said in this debate could be very Youtube or SNL-worthy quotes.

G-d bless Tivo.

The Countdown Begins

So I got the MY10 plan. Chose my ten friends and everything, (well 8 friends, and my mom and sister,) and am waiting for it to be activated Sunday. Unfortunately I don't get a new phone with it, like I thought I would. The guy at Rogers said to wait it out a couple more months until they can bribe me with an upgrade. Oh well... that's not what this countdown is for.

There is less than two weeks till the Canadian Elections, which means less than two weeks until I have to decide who to vote for. Unfortunately, I cannot sell my vote. So in the next 14 days, through this blog, I will eliminate candidates one by one untill I have someone to vote for.

For a recap, here are the seven candidates running in my riding, Mont-Royal:

Tyrell Alexander (Green Party of Canada)
Antonio Artuso (Communist Party of Canada)
Irwin Cotler (Liberal Party of Canada)
Diane Johnston (Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada)
Maryse Lavallée (Bloc Québécois)
Nicolas Thibodeau (New Democratic Party)
Rafael Tzoubari (Conservative Party of Canada)

Which brings the grand total of candidates to seven. With less than two weeks until the actual election, every two days I will be eliminating one candidate, starting with today. And again on the 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, and last but not least, the 13th, when I will reveal my vote.

One important thing to remember while voting is to vote not only for which party you want to win, but also the candidates. Though the MPs representing specific ridings don't have as much importance as similar candidates in American politics, it is still important to agree with the Ideologies of the party, Prime Ministerial candidate, and MP candidate.

So who am I eliminating today? The Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada.

Forced to register under that name by the Government of Canada (you cannot have a party name that could be confused with another,) they prefer their "official" title; Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist.)

The fact of the matter is, they are a communist party. Do I at all agree with any communist ideologies? Not even close. There are so many things about Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin's ideologies that I disagree with I don't even want to get into why. Maybe another time. And even if I did vote for them, what does my vote accomplish? In the 2006 federal election, the Marxist-Leninist party finished with 0.028% of the vote in Mont-Royal. That's 98 votes out of 34,251.

I honestly think that if I started my own political party, became accredited, and was acknowledged as a real party by Canada in my riding, I could find more than 98 people to vote for me. Obviously, communist ideologies don't translate too well with the Liberal-minded Mont-Royal voters.

Oh yeah that reminds me. The results from the 2006 election, just for reference:

Canadian federal election, 2006
Party		Candidate	Votes
	Liberal	Irwin Cotler	22,457
	Conservative	Neil Martin Drabkin	6,150
	New Democrat	Nicolas R. Thibodeau	2,479
	Bloc Québécois	Guillaume Dussault	2,035
	Green	Damien Pichereau	1,302
	Marxist-Leninist	Diane Johnston	98

(courtesy of Wikipedia)

Now even though the Liberals clearly dominate the riding, that doesn't mean Cotler automatically gets my vote. Like I've said many times over, I don't know all that much about the candidates just yet, and will be doing my research in the next fortnight. (Sweet, always wanted to sue that word before [thank you Demetri Martin.])

Back to the Marxists-Leninists. Diane Johnston is running again this year, and all the power to her, even if she has literally no chance of winning, much less getting even one percent of the vote.

Onto the national stage:

The Marxist-Leninists, led once again by Sandra Smith, finished 9th in the popular vote in 2006, behind such powerhouse parties as the Progressive Canadian Party and the Marijuana Party. With three times as many candidates (69) as the PCP (25) and MP (23), the Marxist-Leninist party still managed to end up with about 5000 less votes than the Progressive Canadians and a couple hundred shy of the Marijuana Party.

The only benefit I can think of for someone with similar views to actually vote for them instead of abstaining would be sheer volume. Surely 104 sounds better than 98 or so. "The more the merrier" should be their motto, because with each vote, a teeny (very teeny) bit of credibility is added to their party.

Anyways that's it for now, sorry for the lack of blog updates, I've been quite busy with the Jewish Holidays. Keep checking back for more of The Blender as well as the next time (Friday) I take a candidate off my list.

Recap: The Marxist-Leninist Party was removed from the list. The party is headed by Sandra Smith nationally, and in the riding of Mont-Royal by Diane Johnston.

I Fought The Law...

Not even close...but I did break it with one of my blog posts, apparently. Thanks to the guidance of one of my friends, Carmel, I realized that the post I wrote about selling my vote was indeed illegal. I kept the post there though, just because I think the comments are funny, and also because I think it's relevant for future discussions on the election.

My friend Yining also pointed something out to me; selling my vote, even if legal, would be almost useless. The riding I live in, Mont-Royal, hasn't voted Conservative since 1935. And that was a very different time for the riding, before Hampstead and Cote-St-Luc were filled with predominantly Liberal-voting Jews. Just so you know, that was not an anti-semitic comment. I'm Jewish myself, I just wanted to get the facts out there.

This photo is here for informative purposes, not an endorsement

When Irwin Cotler was first elected in 1999, he won 91.97% of the vote. The Conservatives haven't even come close to the Liberals, since 1984 when Pierre Trudeau was not running in that riding for the first time in 19 years.

"Réal Caouette, long-time leader of the Social Credit Party in Quebec, once said that a mailbox could win the Liberal nomination in Mount Royal and still win election just because it was red (the traditional colour of the Liberal Party)." (Wikipedia)

Also, my Understanding Quebec teacher once said that if a dog ran as a Liberal in my Provincial Riding of D'Arcy McGee, he would win.

And they were both right.

The point is, despite my riding's extremely Liberal views, voting is still important. It's our democratic right, and even though I originally opposed voting in this election because of my lack of knowledge on the subject, I'm changing my position.

I encourage you, wherever your riding, however one-sided it is, to still vote. I will.

BUY MY VOTE!

DISCLAIMER: This article is meant purely as a joke. Do not take it seriously, selling one's right to vote is an offense.Yes. You heard right, I am auctioning off my vote for the Prime Minister of Canada, with elections to be held October 14th.

Here are the seven candidates running in my electoral district, Mont-Royal:

Tyrell Alexander (Green Party of Canada)
Antonio Artuso (Communist Party of Canada)
Irwin Cotler (Liberal Party of Canada)
Diane Johnston (Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada)
Maryse Lavallée (Bloc Québécois)
Nicolas Thibodeau (New Democratic Party)
Rafael Tzoubari (Conservative Party of Canada)

I am not following the election as much as I should be, and do not have any ties to either party as this is my first election. Because of this, I am willing to auction off my vote to the highest bidder. Please send me an E-mail at gewurzj@gmail.com, with the party you want me to vote for in my riding, and how much you're willing to pay me.

Any money I receive from this auction will not go into my bank account or pocket, but to a very deserving charity, which I will decide upon at a later date. The person who buys my vote will have input on which charity will receive the money.

Please give generously, because not only are you helping out one of the parties, you'll also be helping out a very deserving charity.

Note: I reserve the right to refuse a bid if circumstances grant it.

PS. Please check the sidebar on the right for the leading bid, and who they want me to vote for.