When I took this picture, the wind was from the northwest and the Liberals were leaning right. That's a joke. Get it? Campaigning has been in the west the past few days. Lots of rightwing thinking on the prairies, and lots of promises from all the parties aimed at winning their support.
OK. It wasn't that funny. But it is something to think about. They know what they are doing. They are buying votes. Why are they not ashamed, all of them, every party? And why do we tolerate it? Well, we tend to tolerate dirty tricks if it's our party playing them, because tricks are justified if they work. Why are we not ashamed? There should be one promise, to serve all the people leaving nobody behind.
Now look here.
When I took the picture from another point of view, the Liberals are leaning left. Nothing else has changed. I conclude that the way we do politics is much too simple. The terms right and left don't tell us who to vote for. Even the party names are misleading. You don't know what you are getting until you examine the policies. No, you don't know what you are getting until they are actually in office making decisions. No, you don't know what you are getting until you see the consequences. No, those consequences persist, so the great-grandchildren might have a better idea whether we got it wrong. I was going to say right rather than wrong, but that would be confusing.
The problem with democracy in its current iteration is the party system, a contest which rewards those who best appeal to the lowest levels of human motivation: simplicity, indifference, fear, anger, avarice, selfishness, thoughtlessness, tribal unity. They figure out what we want and make promises, sometimes different promises as they move about the country. Of course, when they form government, they discover that every issue involves weighing multiple competing imperatives, costs, benefits, values, loyalties. You can't please everybody all the time, but what you get is criticism from everybody all the time because there is always something to complain about and complaints are more fun than praise. What sort of idiot would enter politics just to be the target of everyone's dissatisfaction?
What we need in government is people who want to make things better for everyone, with a variety of perspectives, who can think as well as emote about an issue, who aren't taking orders from the party whip, whose status is not tied to an ideology or the reward of their group winning an argument. We need to flatten the hierarchy, less power at the top, so that all elected members have a say and decisions are made on the basis of what is revealed by the discussion rather than who wins. If the decisions are good, everybody wins.
I'm dreaming, of course. We won't do away with the party system in my lifetime. That won't stop me from imagining government based more on reason and conscience and less on ambition and slogans.
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Cluster Thinking is Damaging Our Politics: Jonny Thomson, Big Think, March 2025
Campaign Highlights: CBC News, April 2025
Climate Change Policy: Aaron Wherry, CBC News, April 9, 2025
B.C. Drug Consumption Sites: Ashkay Kulkarni and Katie DeRosa: CBC News, April 9, 2025
Housing GST Policy: Andrew Chang, About That
A good refresher Thank you. John
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