I find it appalling how little Canadians truly understand their own political system. While media outlets such as CBC, CityTV and the Globe and Mail beam with pride because they are getting so many comments on the current debacle in Ottawa via e-mail, online comments and posts, the fact is most of said input is nonsense.
Even if it’s not partisan, it is generally ignorant of how our government works and almost always full of typos.
Even CBC Norman Spector doesn’t seem to get it, and thank God at least one or two people who took time to comment seem to know it.
We did not elect a minority government; we elected members of parliament and the result was Conservative minority government.
Under Canadian constitutional law, Mr. Harper can only govern under a minority government with the confidence of parliament, which he had, even after a very vague throne speech.
His inadequate economic update combined with a partisan poison pill aimed at opposition parties destroyed that confidence. Under Canadian constitutional law, other parties have the legal and ‘democratic’ right to demonstrate that they can govern with the confidence of parliament.
Kudos to Susan Ormiston explaining how things work on The National last night.
