Québec Politics...

[c9]

Paul wells says it best...

So today André Boisclair broke a month's silence on his "youthful" cocaine use (he used to enjoy the odd snort back when Lucien Bouchard was premier of Quebec) because he needed to rebut jokes that governor-general Michaëlle Jean made about him at the Press Gallery Dinner two weeks ago! ("Mr. Boisclair always follows the party line...")

Note to Parti Québécois: Pleeeeeeeeeeease vote for André Boisclair for leader.

Comments

[c9.livejournal.com]

Downside to getting rid of the GG position: we have to deal with Paul Martin making all the decisions, and never get to see a smiling neutral face again!

[c9.livejournal.com]

I actually see a lot of value in the GG position, as Adrienne Clarkson redefined it anyway. Having a figurehead head of state is *very* common around the world, and gives us a non-partisan person to deal with for the national unity topics, support of military, national mourning... think about how George Bush can't talk at a soldier's funeral because it becomes a political act, for example.

100% agreed though that her job is a job, not the position of court jester. Luckily both Adrienne Clarkson and Michaelle Jean are familiar with how it works, and to my eye have performed admirably. It will be interesting to see where Jean takes the job next.

Downside to getting rid of the GG position: the Prime Minister gets to make *all* the decisions, and can start ignoring constitutional laws in times of minority government. I don't like the look of that road.

[c9.livejournal.com]

You're right, the GG's real value is outside of her decision-making authority, to be sure. I realized this in answering Jamie's comment shortly afterward. My new response would be "Downside to getting rid of the GG: we never get to see a smiling neutral face again!" More important than it seems at first glance.

But anyway:

1. The Prime Minister's Office (PMO) has way too much power, and can do many things with no recourse in the House of Commons whatsoever. Not that the GG can stop this, but it's another cog in the overall machine that prevents simply outright ignoring the customs of office.

2. Even should the HoC decide to pass a motion of non-confidence in a minority situation, how is the government supposed to deal with that when the PM doesn't want to go? Taking the King-Byng situation: the minority government falls just a few days after the election. Should we just keep having elections every month or three? No PM would say "well OK, you go ahead and try Stephen." :-) Yes, new laws could be written to take the place of the GG's role, but then we'd be stuck with whatever Paul Martin decided was best, or we'd be rewriting that law every time a new party got into office.

3. Remember that "the rest of the electorate" has no power outside of election time. We can't just "bring down the government," we have to hope that the opposition gets their shit together and does it, or in a majority situation we have to just wait out five years of elected monarchy. While I would never call the US a working democracy, I do like the staggered elections deal, that might be an interesting thing to try somehow.

[c9.livejournal.com]

In the US, there are federal elections every two years. From wikipedia:

Elective offices of the U.S. government are filled by Election Day
 balloting, for terms starting in January of the following year,
 specifically:

    * in every even-numbered year,
          o for all seats in the United States House of Representatives;
          o for approximately 1/3 of United States Senate seats;
    * additionally, in years divisible by four,
          o for the President and Vice-President.

Although we only have one elected body, part of me likes the idea of having half the MPs up for re-election every 2-3 years. The cynic in me says that governments would just stay in election mode all the time, and then we'd all go crazy.