Canada – go vote.

Tomorrow Canada is having (yet another) federal election.  We’ve had a minority government now for what?  3 billion years?  So we will go to the polls once again to elect, well, a minority government I imagine.

I tend to steer clear of politics on my blog these days for a few reasons.  I’m not as up on current events as I once was because of the rottens, so I feel somewhat ignorant  and I don’t have the time to properly compose an intelligent post.  Also, there are people in my Real Life that I care deeply about who are on the extreme opposite end of the spectrum to me when it comes to politics and I prefer to stay out of pissing matches with people I love.  As a result I keep my mouth shut and they keep theirs shut and we hold hands and skip gayfully through the wildflowers.

Although I trust my readers know that I sit firmly on the left.  Firmly.  Hello lefty friends! 

This much I do know – our electoral system is STUPID.  Last year 1 million people voted for the Green party and they did not win a seat, yet 1.3 million people voted for The Bloc and they had 49 seats (I think, I can’t find the actual stat to confirm this, perhaps Lisa can do it for me, but it is very close to those numbers). 

Previously I have voted strategically in BC in an effort not to split the left vote, something I NEVER did in Calgary because Calgary is heavily Conservative so what would be the point?  Might as well just vote for the candidate I liked the most.  The strategic vote, to me, has always felt a bit dirty.  It just isn’t a party I would typically support and it meant that the party of my choice didn’t get MY vote. 

This year I have opted to vote swap, and wow!  People have VERY strong opinions on vote swapping.   The knee jerk reaction seems to be something like “well that’s stupid” before folks even have any inkling what vote swapping is.  So, if you’re curious, check it out at Pair Vote.  The chance to vote swap in this election has ended for Pair Vote, but you can still get in on the action through facebook and the like.

As luck would have it, I got a partner!  So my vote WILL make a difference in my partner’s riding – a potentially enormous difference - and I will HAPPILY vote for his party in my riding guaranteeing that at least his party gets some funding.  His party also has a strong presence in my riding, so while the candidate is unlikely to win, he does have a strong presence and that is something. I’ve also had the pleasure of meeting the candidate my vote-swap partner would like me to vote for, so I feel good about it and not the slightest bit dirty.

Tomorrow, I’m voting for change.