By Nathaniel Moher
Guys, we did it. We beat them! We beat the Conservatives! (USA! USA! er . . . I mean . . . CANADA! CANADA!) A little over a year after they were democratically elected (even if none of us voted for them), we’ve finally beat the Conservatives! It’s been a hard year for us citizens, filled with a lot of complaining and . . . well . . . wasn’t the complaining enough? But all that hard work has finally paid off because the NDP has beaten the Conservatives!
. . . in a poll . . . by three per cent. But, they’re winning!
That’s right, 38 per cent of Canadians now say they’d vote for the NDP, which may not seem like that much. I mean I’m no mathmatologist, but 38 per cent seems like less than 50 per cent. But that’s because most people don’t know how democracy works, because you only need 40 per cent of the vote to get a majority in Canada, and 38 is only two per cent away from 40!
And, if 40 per cent of the vote is 100 per cent of the vote, then that must mean that the 35 per cent ranking that the Conservatives have must only account for 85 per cent of the vote. And 85 is a far cry from the 100 per cent needed to win this election (and don’t even get me started on the Liberals 18 per cent of the vote, that only equals 45 per cent of the vote). So, the NDP has this baby in the bag, with 95 per cent of the vote!
Wooo-hoooo! NDP! NDP! NDP! Go . . . Thomas . . . Something-Something!!!! Let’s pop the corks on our Jim Beam bottles! It’s a celebration! (Actually, if your Jim Beam bottle has a cork in it, you should probably return it . . . it’s most likely been tampered with. Seriously . . .)
So, what does this mean to the Conservatives? Does it mean they need to back off that omnibus bill they just passed (all 400 pages of it)? Does it mean they need to stop adding amendments to the omnibus bill they just passed? Does it mean that we’ll finally get back to what Canadian politicians do best and have a forced election?
You betcha!
Well, actually, no. It means none of those things. In fact, it actually means very little, to nothing. The Conservatives still hold a majority; can still pass literally any bill they want to pass; and get to keep it that way until 2015. And all the NDP can do is toot the fact that they have an approval rating three per cent higher than the Conservatives at the moment (probably because Canadians can’t get mad if you can’t do anything).
And I say at the moment, because I mean at the moment (and because, really, 600 words is a lot of words to write . . . drunk on a Monday night), because if the Conservatives play their cards right, they could leave all this controversy behind them.
Look, the Conservatives have spent the last year pushing through all the bills that were literally the reason they were held in contempt of parliament (and then, were subsequently re-elected by all of you), but now they’re done! They passed them all! And now all they have to do to get us to like them again is . . . nothing.
That’s right. If the Conservatives spend the next three years just doing nothing, we’ll all forget about the mean stuff they did at the start of our relationship, and think they’ve actually changed – because people change right? Please, please don’t leave me Conservatives! I’M SORRY!!!!
But we Canadians are a pretty forgetful bunch . . . I mean, do any of you even remember why Harps was held in contempt anymore? Me neither.
Nathaniel Moher is a television writer living in Vancouver. This column first appeared in The Flying Shingle.
The prime minister in contempt of parliament in a 156-145 vote for failing to disclose the full financial details of his tougher crime legislation, corporate tax cuts and plans to purchase stealth fighter jets.
Also, I guess you’re okay with him running an election and not mentioning that he was going to raise OAS to 67. You’re an awfully forgiving person. I’m not.