Growing up, one of the questions my parents posed was “So, if everyone was jumping off a bridge, you would jump too?” whenever I tried ‘everyone is doing it’ to justify my action.
‘Just because everyone’ was not an acceptable excuse for not thinking it through myself.
If we are considering a change as far reaching and impactful as a proportional representation electoral system, we had better think it through carefully to avoid surprises and unwanted consequences.
The NDP/Green collaboration is trying to sell the claim that changing the electoral process is about improving the electoral system…
….although they have not provided any facts or evidence to support their assertion. Instead, to accomplish this assumed ‘improvement’ they are rushing into changing how we elect politicians and governments with a process mind boggling in its slipshod recklessness.
“Let the buyer beware” is an excellent approach for citizens to take when it comes to an issue of the significance of electoral reform, particularly a change to proportional representation, a system of electing a government with which Canadians have no experience.
Despite the apparently cavalier attitude of the NDP/Green collaboration, election reform is a BIG DEAL.
From ignoring, or failing to recognize, that the profound ongoing effects of the proposed change to British Columbia’s method of electing governments and politicians makes the decision on the NDP/Green proposal the most significant decision ever made by voters in BC;
Contemplative Canadians reacted to Canadian Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould’s statement that she was “extremely disappointed” because the Senate opposed legislation granting police the power to conduct random breathalyser tests, with support for the Senate’s “upholding of Canadian values” against the “appalling assault” by Federal Justice Minister Wilson-Raybould.
Wilson-Raybould’s actions were judged as making it clear the testing really needed was electroencephalograms [EEGs] for politicians to confirm – or deny – the presence of brain activity.
The May 30, 2018 Abbotsford News editorial “New Weapons Needed” about the continuing death toll taken by fentanyl brought to mind the words “makes clear the writer is part of the conforming majority, complacently adjusted to accepting what society believes – knows for sure – about drug use and related issues.
The problem…….is that what is accepted as known for sure is wrong.
The bold words are taken verbatim from a commentary on the October 31, 2017 Abbotsford News editorial on drug overdose deaths.
