so it's not actually hockey...

[vonteego3 0]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/americas/11/...ment/index.html But I figure there are more Canadians here than anywhere else I know of, so I'll pose the question from the point of view of the ignorant American that doesn't understand foreign politics... what the hell does this mean, exactly?

[sinc 0]

Vont: In Canada we have more than 3 major parties, therefore when we are voting in a government we arent always garaunteed a majority. In the past election we had a minority government elected amid alot of scandal from the previous regime of that party. Ever since the opposition parties have just been biding their time before they would topple the government with a vote of non-confidence. So tonight they did just that and voted to overthrow this current government with a vote of 171-133. So now we are looking at a new election in January sometime. Unfortunetly the election likely won't do much and we will be back to square one, while we do have more parties than down there we are plagued with a lack of acceptable choices besides the moderate liberal party the rest of the parties are eitter too far to the left or too far to the right. Hope that clears it up a bit, if ya have any more questions post here or feel free to pm me.

[Ottawa_Biatch 288]

Yeah, things are pretty messed up.

[vonteego3 0]

"toppled government" makes me think of heads rolling, bloodshed and the like. Obviously, that isn't the case here... what will come of this? Different people in charge, I assume... but how, if at all, does this directly affect the people/foreign relations/other important issues? Is it much more than California's recall election with big words?

[sinc 0]

Yes the equivelant in the states would be like the cali recall, sort of. It shouldn't have a huge affect on relations and the like. More than likely the same minority government is going to get in again. This is a really weird time in Canadian politics, only time will tell how things are going to shape up.

[vonteego3 0]

I was kinda hopin to see some Quebecois heads a-rollin... oh well. Just a tip... don't vote for a foreign, former actor.

[Fenxis 99]

Yes the equivelant in the states would be like the cali recall, sort of.  It shouldn't have a huge affect on relations and the like.  More than likely the same minority government is going to get in again.  This is a really weird time in Canadian politics, only time will tell how things are going to shape up.

Not really like a recall at all - the vote was all within the Parliament itself (for similar examples take a look at Italy and Isreal - two countries where the number of parties has fragmented even more and pretty much always have coalitions of parties govern their countries).To complicate things further, the party that is currently in power (Liberals) had pledge to call an election following the final report from the commitee investigating the corruption. Also, so far a link can only be made to one faction of the Liberals that used to be top dogs but have since left politics when Martin took over. The election will be about semantics; the opposition parties portraying the entire government as being corrupt, etc while the incumbents will try and show the party was split and there was a few bad apples.

[sinc 0]

Uhh just because it wasn't voted by the people the same principles hold true. Not to mention our reps are supposed to be the extension of their riding so essentially the same thing is happening but 300 people are voting on behalf of the country.

[Fenxis 99]

The two situations are similar in effect, true; I was explaining differences in the mechanics.