Tories Spoiling for a Fall Election!

This is wrong on so many levels. You are essentially advocating strategic voting. We must be the only party in Canada that has such a problem with going out there and earning as many votes for themselves as they possibly can, damn the torpedoes. Elections Canada defines a political party as an organization that puts forward candidates for the purpose of winning elections, not for the purpose of ‘educating the public’ or ‘stopping some other party’.

We are not here to ensure that Conservatives don’t get elected. We are here to get Greens elected. We aren’t here to define ourselves as ‘opposite of Conservatives’. We are Green, we have a unique political offering and the best way to advance our agenda is to show that we can keep increasing our vote in every single riding and maybe elect a few MP’s in the process.

The GPC flirted with supporting strategic voting in the 2008 election. It was a bitter failure, nearly cost us our leader and left many campaign workers and volunteers wondering why they were working for their local candidate when other GPC people were messaging ‘hey, maybe it’s ok to vote Liberal or NDP if it keeps out a Conservative’ (ie, the ABC strategy or Anything But Conservative).

If you really want to keep Conservatives out, let’s convince their moderates to vote Green instead. Our values of living within our financial and environmental means actually resonate with some Conservative supporters. Go figure, about as many of our members and supporters were former Conservative supporters as were former Liberal or NDP supporters.

And, the more votes we earn the more financial support we receive (ie,  $2.00 per vote per year subsidy). As long as this government subsidy continues we’d be leaving money on the table by not running candidates in all 308 ridings. More importantly, we wouldn't be giving all Canadians an opportunity to vote Green if we ran fewer than 308 candidates.

We absolutely need to put a stop to this nonsense.  As Ard indicated, the call for strategic voting is wrong for so many reasons.  He gave us a few.  Gail gave us a couple of other reasons.  Here are a few more:

First, it's wrong to assume that if we withdraw a Green candidate from a race, those votes will go to the Liberals or the NDP.  That's just an assumption.  Some voters will turn to the Conservatives; other Green supporters will stay at home.  Take a look at the recent Ekos poll, where Green voters were to identify their second choice parties.  Yes, Green voters didn't choose the Conservatives very often (only 10.3% of the time, but keep in mind that's still a higher percentage than we Greens managed to tally in the last federal election, so we're not talking about something trivial here).  More interestingly, Green voters indicated that over 31% of the time that their second choice would be....NOBODY.  Which brings me to my second point:

Voting for the Liberals or the NDP, or the Bloc for that matter, isn't going to mean that we end up electing a government which gives a damn about the environment, or many of the other issues which are important to Greens.  I'm sorry, but a Liberal government headed by Ignatieff would be almost as bad for Canada as a Harper government.  Indeed, a majority Liberal government might even be worse.  Remember that Ignatieff is on record saying that the tar sands need to proceed.  His party supported scuttling the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. 

No, the only green vote is a vote for the Green Party.  That's why we must offer this option to every Canadian.  It's wrong to believe that withdrawing our candidates will lead to electing the NDP or the Liberals (and it's wrong to believe that would be a good thing).  It's equally wrong to believe that keeping a Green in the race is actually helping the Conservatives win, for the same reasons in reverse.  This is a more insidious argument which Greens are often faced with.  We're told that we shouldn't be running people in an election because it helps the Conservatives.  Again, nonsense.

Rather than working towards keeping our candidates from running in elections, all Greens should be committed to doing what they can to see that all Green candidates have the best possible opportunity for election when the ballots are ultimately cast.  That's a better, and worthier goal, not just for our Party, but for Canada.

Please, let's stop going on about the need for Strategic voting.  It's very distracting, and does the Party no good at all.

We are not the Anti-Conservative Party of Canada.  If you aren't in this to win or at least make an attempt at winning then perhaps you are a better fit at Greenpeace.

I joined the Green Party of Canada to make a change in our nation by becoming part of the system - not blindly raging against it.

Strategic voting is not in our or the nation's interests.

I think any candidate even casually endorsing strategic voting even if it isn't in their riding and even if it isn't during the writ period should be replaced.

1. "Ignarper".  I don't really think that if we had a Conservative government or a Liberal government that we would have any substantial difference or approach to solving the problems that our country has today.  The Liberals would still be racking up a huge amount of debt to bail out the economy, they would allow the oil sands to proceed as planned, and they still would have wasted $1B on the G20/G8 photo-op.  It doesn't matter if you vote for the Conservatives or the Liberals, you are still going to get Ignarper.

2. Right to Lose. Any party that doesn't support our policies deserves to lose votes, and if that costs them seats - all the better.  We have a different point of view on how to make Canada a sustainable country and a real partner in the world community again that is vastly different from the approach the other parties will take.  Until such time that these parties adopt our policies on mass, until such time that energy, environmental, and economic sustainability are the status quo policy of all parties there is a reason for the Green Party to exist.

3. Momentum. We are the only party that is growing election after election.  Don't doubt for a minute that we are not on the cusp of a breakthrough.  Who would have thought that the "Reform Party" would have became the leading party in the country, but that's what happened. They got one seat, and in the next election they took off.   In anything, whether it be sports, business, or politics the one thing you don't do when you have the momentum is to take your foot off the gas.  People are fed up - they don't want to vote for Conservatives or Liberals - we can be that choice for them. 

4. Passively Aggressive.  The Liberals may not be actively hostil towards the environment, but you can do just as much damage by ignoring it.  How much work actually occurred to curb Canada's carbon emissions when the Liberals were in power? How much effort was undertaken to make Canada energy sustainable?

5. Disenfranchised.  If you can get the voter who doesn't vote out to vote, they will vote for you.  This is the experience of the Obama campaign.  The put a significant amount of effort at reaching those who felt they had no voice and made them feel engaged again.  This can be very powerful if done right.  So yes, if we can get that 40% out that doesn't vote, they will have a propensity to vote for us.

6. Alliances are made after elections and not before.  Until we have seats in the house of commons we have no bargaining power.  This is the experience in the British Parliament during the last election.  The Liberal Democrats would have had no real say about policy or direction before the election, but because they became "king maker", they had a signficant amount of pull.  We will have this opportunity - if we get 5 to 10 seats and can make the difference between 2 parties leading, or help form a coalition then we will have leverage to ensure that our policy and our voters voice is heard. Like insisting on proportional representation.

7.  Rigged Voting.  Any attempt at forcing a voters hand by limiting their choice in an election will be seen as a distortion of the electoral principals that we hold so dear, and trust me, Harper will use it against any party that takes part. He will galvanize voters in a way that we have never seen and it will backfire.  Let the NDP and Liberals do  this and destroy themselves. 

8. Our Supporters.  We have supporters who have made significant investements in our party because they believe that there is a reason for us to exist and want our policies to become more popular. They expect and deserve a return on that investment.  I'm not just talking about dollars, but also about time in terms of volunteering.  Asking our candidate to step down gives the a return of zero.

9. Long Term.  We are going to be significantly more popular in the next few elections, not 12% where we are today, but 30%-40%.  This is just my opinion, but here's my reasoning. 

a. The Climate - as it becomes clear that the climate is getting wierder more voters will align to our point of view. 

b. Energy - we have most likely hit peak oil, and as energy costs start to rise because of a declining resource base of energy more voters will align to our point of view on energy sustainability.

c. Democracy - the more that Harper and the Conservatives abuse the democracy that we have today the more that voters will become upset and align to our point of view.

d. Demographics - the voters that are our biggest supporters today, but don't generally vote will become regular voters.  Those that do vote on mass will increasingly align to our point of view.

In summary - we have the right platform, and the right policies to put Canada back on the right path, the trends are in our favour.  The other parties can continue to alienate voters and we will pick them up along the way.  But we must continue to run and to push forward or we will be seen as just any other party - only in it for the short term power grab, and not in it for the long term sustainability of our country.

Kevin Smith

Candidate - Pickering-Scarborough East.

Stephen Harper's greatest attribute is that his opposition is divided into four parties. That’s the reality; which blind faith in the Green platform and hard work will simply not overcome - given our present electoral system.

Politics has been described as the ‘art of compromise’. There comes a time when in order to rescue a country it must be considered. It depends how you view Stephen Harper: (1) as just a regressive conservative that can’t do much harm, or (2) as a man on a mission to retract our parliamentary democracy and transform Canada into a mirror image of a George Bush’s Republican America. 

I believe his speeches and record demonstrate the latter, and agree:  there needs to be some kind of coalition to stop splitting the non-'extreme-right-wing' vote that is the vast majority of Canadians. (70+%). Strategic voting has dangerous pitfalls. But perhaps the Greens could act as a broker/negotiator to initiate a coalition movement.

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with a coalition movement and/or government. In fact in Europe its the essence of their democracies, in that it represents the ‘majority’. Democracy isn’t about getting it all your own way, or nothing. 

Some of the issues raised here are touched on in this Federal Campaign Committee Report on the 2008 Election: http://greenparty.ca/node/8715 .

For those interested, accessible to members only when logged in.

Strategically Québec is the weak point. No party is strong there except the Bloc and that’s by default. Ignatieff has been painted as a ‘Toronto elitist academic’ and its stuck. Harper has fallen out (too many ‘faux pas’ to list here). While Québec shares concern for social programs with the NDP, the NDP are viewed as strong federalists and against provincial rights. Québec actually is fairly pro-green, at least they promote and believe themselves to be. Reality may be a different matter.

A dream coalition: GPC, NDP, and possibly, portions of the Québec-wing of the Liberal party (they dislike Ignatieff for same reasons above.)

A leader who speaks fluent French and can actually communicate effectively with the population. Not the excruciatingly painful, stilted, repetitive speeches of all the current (non-Bloc) leaders.

Like it or not, historically until maybe now, no party has governed effectively without Québec.

To try to answer your question Ron, there are a number of permutations and types of agreements. I wish I knew which would be ideal. I believe that the GPC is in the best neutral position (not seen as left or right) to lobby and broker some form of cooperation between the other parties.

(My dream party would be the GPC, NDP and a portion of the Quebec wing of the Liberal party, with a fluently bilingual leader. But that would take a miracle.) Open to all and any suggestions...

My objective is to keep the concept of a merger/coalition/working agreement, alive and try to break the detrimental stalemate Canada is caught in.