I said, in one of my posts apparently free from typos, that Canadians
would have voted for Kerry.
Rick Froman admonished me:
. I would <snip> suggest you
> consider how it would sound if you heard that most Americans would vote
> for a particular individual for Canadian Prime Minister but,
> unfortunately, my American ethnocentrism just kicked in and I can't
> remember the name of your Prime Minister and I am just too apathetic to
> Google it. I don't even know if you have direct elections of your Prime
> Minister. You do have Prime Ministers up there, right?
>
And Jody Gabert helpfully contributed:
> If I remember correctly, Paul Martin is the current PM of
> Canada and he's a member of the Liberal party. Do I get
> full marks for that?
I'd say about 90%, Jody. Actually, our previous prime minister was
Jean Poutine, and the current one, just elected, is Paul Merde, who
is indeed the leader of the Liberal party.
I'm also happy to enlighten Rick Froman, a typically political
science-challenged friend from our southern neighbour. Yes, we do
have a Prime Minister and no, we do not directly elect him or her.
Instead, we vote for our representative member of Parliament and the
party which elects the most members ("seats") gets to choose the
prime minister.
In reference to Rick's admonishment, those in the Undecided States
are probably not aware that just before our election we had a visit
from someone named Michael Moore. He advised us not to vote for the
Conservative Party, whose platform is pro-gun, pro war in Iraq, anti-
abortion and anti-gay (sound like a political party you know?). Some
hotheads in that party resented Moore's good advice, and advocated
use of an obscure law we have in Canada, never-used and probably
unconstitutional, to prosecute him for interference in our election
(see
www.talkaboutabook.com/group/alt.censorship/messages/218649.html)
No one did, and we seem to have taken his advice, which is why we
ended up with the Liberals and Paul Merde. I might also mention that
we have an unusual example of real democracy in our current
Parliament, in that the Bloc Quebecois holds a substantial number of
seats. The primary goal of this party is to achieve Quebec separation
and, in the process, destroy Canada. In other countries, notably the
US and France, it is an extremely serious criminal offense to
advocate such things, and I believe you can be executed for doing it.
Up here, we just call it democracy.
And while I'm on the topic of political differences between Canada
and the Undecided States, I should point out that voters in the US
are allowed only to elect electors, who do the real deciding on who
gets to be president. So Americans actually do not have a democratic
system. Given that you don't, and that you also possess weapons of
mass destruction, we're thinking of invading you to bring freedom and
democracy.
Stephen
___________________________________________________
Stephen L. Black, Ph.D. tel: (819) 822-9600 ext 2470
Department of Psychology fax: (819) 822-9661
Bishop's University e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Lennoxville, QC J1M 1Z7
Canada
Dept web page at http://www.ubishops.ca/ccc/div/soc/psy
TIPS discussion list for psychology teachers at
http://faculty.frostburg.edu/psyc/southerly/tips/index.htm
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