A Coalition Could Work

A coalition between the Liberals and the New Democrats could work. I went to the rally at Parliament Hill today - what a spectacle! An amazing show of support for the coalition. Canadians from all walks of life turned out: unionists, the unemployed, lawyers, athletes, students, anyone and everyone.

When I saw Duceppe take the mic I was star struck. I'm not sure why but the BQ leader is probably the most charismatic of all the federal party leaders. His character demands attention. However, he is a Quebecer through and through and I wish he would have spoken more about the coalition and less about the detrimental affects the continuace of a Conservative government would have for Quebec and Quebecers.

Even the MC for the day, a very fine speaker, spoke too much about what I felt were irrelevant matters: gay/lesbian issues, the environment, pro-choice, etc. I don't want to see anyone alienated in this fragile, fledgling coalition movement. We shouldn't be discussing those subjects. We need to be discussing the importance of a coalition and how it can work.

Dion was very formidable and gave an impassioned speech, rife with criticism for the Conservative government and Mr. Harper, and full of hope for this coalition movement.

I think this coalition could really work. Too bad we don't get to give it a chance until January 26th now. I'm hoping that this arrangement will still be on the table.

I wonder how many Canadians are for and how many are against. If every Canadian were asked, and every Canadian was given the literature and the background of the situation so that they would make a fairly informed opinion. I would like to say 80% would be for, with only 20% against. But you never know.

Still, I believe that, at the end of the day, no matter what facts/statistics are shown to some of the nay-sayers, they would still refute a coalition. It's interesting, but there is something about human nature - whereby when we have an opinion on something, or a feeling about something, i.e. pro-Harper, pro-Conservative, this opinion will never be broken. We all view the world through a different set of lenses, and as such, it would take a DRASTIC change in a person's life to knock of those lenses. The majority of Tories are decided Tories - they will never go to another party. What's interesting is that the Tories will often berate other party members (those of left and centre parties) for their political beliefs without ever checking their own. I believe that, even if every scientist and person of influence in the world were to tell the Tories and their supporters that this coalition government would be a great success for Canada - there would still be many, many, who would disagree. Look at the climate change debate. Some people still don't want to believe that the world's climate is changing due to carbon emissions.
We all tend to believe what we want to.