I am shocked. Shocked and outraged actually that no one is discussing this! No, not outraged, annoyed? Perturbed? Apathetic?
Oh I dunno, but listen up! The Canadian government has hung on in a 152 – 152 tie vote which was broken in favour of the gov’t by the Speaker of the House.
For those of you not caught up in the drama and excitement that is Canadian politics, I’ll provide some background…
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Here’s where we stood as of yesterday at 5:15pm:
The Liberal gov’t (centre left – lefty leaning) of Paul Martin was mired in the alleged (okay, it’s true but ya still gotta say alleged until the verdict comes in) coruption of the Federal Sponsorship Scandal (or “Ad Scam” as that great Texas foreign policy expert told us we called it).
The NDP’s (secular humanists/ quasi-socialist party) leader Jack Layton made a deal with Martin and the Liberals to basically save the minority government. The deal surrounded the budget & Layton came out swinging… redirect $4.6 billion in corporate tax cuts to social programs and foreign aid & we’ll vote for your government… Martin took the pulse of the country (support for the redirection of the tax cuts and no desire to spend $30+ million dollars for another election) and made the deal.
That still left the Liberals 3 votes shy of a tie vote; the Bloc Quebecois (the equivalent of the NDP in PQ, except separatists) & the Conservatives (led by Harper they are Arlen Specter conservative/ there is also a big wing that is Bill Clinton/ Joe Lieberman conservative) were determined to bring down the government and call an election. There are 3 independents in the House. One a former Liberal, Carolyn Parrish (you might remember her from the George Bush voodoo doll incident or the “He’s a moron/ idiot” comments); a former Conservative (Cadman from Surrey, BC – liberal province for sure) and one actual Independent.
So in order for the government to succeed all three would have to vote for the “NDP” budget.
Enter Belinda Stronach stage right. Belinda is the former CEO of Magna Int. (her dad’s company – auto parts – huge supplier to GM/ Ford etc.), is from Ontario (another liberal province which actually decides who governs the country… by virtue of our population… and of course Toronto is the centre of the universe, ask any of us… sorry, inside joke), is socially liberal and a prominent and up coming member of the Conservative party. She’s also great chums with Bill Clinton.
On Tuesday, the day before the budget vote, she crossed the aisle and joined the Liberal party. She said she couldn’t abide the direction the Conservatives were taking under Harper & would not countenance a deal with the separatists to tear the country apart. All of a sudden the Liberals only needed two of the three independents and Parrish was a given.
But was she… she was undergoing treatment for ovarian cancer and was incredibly ill… could she make it from Toronto to Ottawa for the vote? Oh the drama, the drama! Long story short, she made it accompanied by doctors so her vote was in the bag.
Now it was just down to the last two and hours before the vote the Independent released a statement saying that ‘while he agreed with the spending priorities in the budget he could not agree to allow a corrupt party to continue in power’. So it was down to the former Conservative, Cadman.
How would he vote? No one knew. He wasn’t talking.
The vote came about and the NDP & Liberals voted ‘yea’. Parrish stood and said ‘yea’. And then applause burst out in the chamber. Cadman stood from his seat across the aisle & the government was saved.
And Canadians from coast to coast were relieved and could now go back to bitching about the lack of Stanley Cup playoffs.
ps – Layton rocks.. he did such a great thing and a recent opinion poll in ON (remember from above, that’s the province that decides elections) showed him as the most trusted leader in Canada @ 36%. Martin was second at 30% and Harper was at 26%. He acted like a statesman & worked out a deal that would benefit ordinary Canadians and the needy of the world vs. the corporations… what’s not to like?
