I, for one, am glad that the long gun registry was scrapped. It was such a stupid idea that costs money without showing any results.

as well Harper has made so many cuts with the CBSA as well he's trie to take away their pensions twice, currently trying to take away sick leave which is a fucken joke. I an't wait for this election to be over and I so hope it's a Liberal majority and not a minority like the projects currently have.

shocked at how many voted Cons on here :eek:


also shocked at how many people i know who think it's a popular vote, shocked even further by those who don't care when i edumacate them -_-

Why? The Conservative Party has some good points to them. I don't like Harper and how he's running his party, but it's not like they're completely without merit.

Quoted because last post on last page

Abbotsford is so solidly conservative and a lot of them are the socially conservative types. I need to move.

oh man

you guys hurt my feelings with your fails

http://i.imgur.com/MHsBs5n.gif

Harper was just there campaigning. Looks like he is afraid he with lose the seat.

wp... nice avatar to post ratio.... butt hurt liberals like me :okay:

The thing about the policy is that many of the 1% don't actually make salaries in that range - they have personal corporations to shelter their income, or have shares as part of their salary. It hurts people like doctors and lawyers who collect salaries.

Kelly McParland: The case for re-electing Stephen Harper
 

Kelly McParland: The case for re-electing Stephen Harper | National Post
A week or so before the start of the federal election campaign, an item was carried in The Daily Mail, a British newspaper that has built an immense circulation on a diet of celebrities, scoundrels and adorable animals.

Occasionally it throws in a bit of news for fun. This item said: “Canada named world’s most well-respected country.” It cited a study by an international research organization that polled 48,000 people on a range of measures including technology, social and economic policies and international perception. Canada came first, for the fourth time in five years.

It didn’t get much attention here, perhaps because it didn’t fit the narrative of a country in crisis, with a desperate need for a change in leadership and direction. Just this week a second report of similar ilk was released – this time by the banking group, Credit Suisse – indicating Canada “has a disproportionate number of millionaires,” and that much of Canada’s middle class is so well off it qualifies among the world’s richest 10%. Anyone who owns a home anywhere in the country almost certainly falls in that group.

We seem to be doing pretty well by these measures, but you wouldn’t know it from the Vesuvian eruption of opprobrium that has rained down on the government of Stephen Harper through the course of the election, and the months before. So appalling has Harper been portrayed – so lacking in any redeeming feature – that a visitor would have to wonder how the guy ever got elected in the first place, never mind three times in succession. Are Canadians nuts?

Perhaps. Or, perhaps as one of the world’s most prosperous and peaceful countries we have the luxury of nitpicking our leaders to death every few years when we tire of the same old faces and feel the need for new ones on which to focus. The Harper years have offered plenty of opportunity to ruminate and get grumpy, enjoying a period of relative prosperity while much of the world – the U.S. and Europe in particular – has struggled on a plane ranging from recession to meltdown. No government has the ability to “control” an economy, no matter what they might like you to think, and Canada has benefited from strong commodity prices until recently, but Ottawa has adroitly avoided the sort of self-destructive policies that hobbled much larger and diverse economies, using the opportunity to pursue an impressive web of trade agreements that open Canadian products to billions of consumers beyond our limited domestic market of 36 million people. Canada depends on trade – without it we’d be a large but easily-ignored afterthought – and no government has put greater effort into opening markets than the two Conservative governments of Brian Mulroney and Stephen Harper.

In doing so, opponents complain, the government has shown inadequate concern for the environment, promoting pipelines and defending Alberta’s oilsands in the face of environmental concerns and celebrity disapproval. It’s a valid complaint, but the critics have yet to identify an alternative means of protecting so many jobs for so many Canadians, and forget that Canada does not, in fact, end at Ontario. Ten years of a Calgary-based leader have erased much of the resentment that divided east and west for a generation. Western Canada may feel more integral to Canadian interests than at any time since Sir John A. Macdonald sent a railway to the Pacific to bring it into the fold. Alberta alone – filled with eastern migrants eager for the jobs it could provide – feels secure enough to end a 43-year political hegemony and elect an NDP government, unimaginable when the east was seen as a hotbed of schemers eager to steal its resources.

At the same time, the hostility that typified relations between Quebec and the rest of Canada has faded to a degree few could have imagined just 20 years after the most recent referendum came within a hair of fracturing the country. The angry separatists who dominated discourse for so long have been replaced by a more confident, less strident and enterprising group, eager to embrace the advantages Canada offers rather than complain of ancient slights. While there are many reasons for the change – simple aging being a big one — Harper’s disciplined effort to avoid confrontation, to refuse to engage in the endless antagonisms in which the separatists specialized, removed much of the oxygen from the sovereigntist cause. The Bloc Quebecois won 54 seats the last time the federal Liberals came to office; on Monday they will be fortunate to retain the two to which they still lay claim.

Harper’s approach to Quebec typifies his aversion to Ottawa-based social dirigisme. There’s a very real difference in belief systems at play here. Liberals are big on grand national projects that reflect their view Canada needs the guiding hand of government to do great things, even if the proffered programs often fail to materialize — the oft-promised national daycare system that was never introduced, the Kyoto accord on emissions that was approved then ignored, the national energy policy that appropriated western resources for eastern priorities, the national gun registry that spawned an expensive new bureaucracy without reducing gun crime. Harper prefers to provide the means, and then allow individuals to use it as they see best, cutting back steadily on the size of government and the regulatory burden every Canadian faces. The Wheat Board lost its monopoly, freeing farmers to seek markets without producing the prophesized disaster. The gun registry was shuttered with no upsurge in gun crime.

Taxes have been reduced even as healthcare funding has continued to rise at several times the rate of inflation, and as provinces continue to complain they can’t possibly get by on the ever-rising billions they receive. A balanced budget and lower taxes has allowed for creation of more ways to save, particularly the innovative tax-free savings accounts championed by former finance minister Jim Flaherty, which have proven so popular that both opposition parties now pledge to cap them. In place they propose a larger Canada Pension Plan that will siphon off income and invest it as hired professionals see fit.

None of this pleases those accustomed to regular infusions of public cash, and who see ongoing subsidies as a justifiable claim on the taxpayer. Harper has generous support for those most in need, accepting it as a fundamental duty of a prosperous nation, but is less prone to propping up arts bodies, special interest activists, public broadcasters and others he figures should be capable of doing much more of their own heavy lifting. His relentless focus on commerce strikes urban critics as faintly crass, in much the way Britain’s landed gentry once looked down on those involved in the vulgarities of “trade”.

Those born outside the country aren’t so blasé: throughout the Harper years immigrants have been welcomed at record levels, with increased emphasis on skills and education over family ties. Former immigration minister Jason Kenney undertook a radical remaking of the system, reducing a backlog that produced wait times of up to eight years and was subject to widespread abuse by families eager to bring in elderly relatives in need of healthcare or social housing. Though predictably denounced by opponents, it unabashedly put Canada’s needs at the forefront, fast-tracking applications from ambitious, highly-skilled people who could fill employment needs while capping the number of grandparents no longer able to look after themselves in the old country.

It’s probably no surprise that Liberal leader Justin Trudeau has pledged to weaken the reforms so more families can bring in older relatives able to take advantage of Canada’s generous benefits. It’s always been a handicap for Harper that he assumed people would see the value of pragmatism over imagery, and appreciate the advantages that come from placing national interests ahead of sunny sentiments. Cold efficiency rarely warms hearts. Canada has done well under Stephen Harper, in many ways. Now, it appears, it wants to be hugged a bit.

National Post
• Email: kmcparland@nationalpost.com

4Head

You get all that from the NDP website, or some random on Facebook?

As a bit of political junkie, this has been an interesting campaign to follow. I honestly thought that this race was going to be between Mulcair and Harper.

The polls are indicating one thing, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a Conservative minority. The last 3 elections have proven that there's a silent, but reliable Conservative base of voters out there. Will they come out, or stay home?

is any of it false?

I'd like to think that, but the Abbotsford riding doesn't appear on any of the strategic voting sites as a battleground and Ed Fast (Con) received more than double the votes of any other candidate in the last election. :okay:

Kelly McParland: The case for re-electing Stephen Harper
 

Kelly McParland: The case for re-electing Stephen Harper | National Post
A week or so before the start of the federal election campaign, an item was carried in The Daily Mail, a British newspaper that has built an immense circulation on a diet of celebrities, scoundrels and adorable animals.

Occasionally it throws in a bit of news for fun. This item said: “Canada named world’s most well-respected country.” It cited a study by an international research organization that polled 48,000 people on a range of measures including technology, social and economic policies and international perception. Canada came first, for the fourth time in five years.

It didn’t get much attention here, perhaps because it didn’t fit the narrative of a country in crisis, with a desperate need for a change in leadership and direction. Just this week a second report of similar ilk was released – this time by the banking group, Credit Suisse – indicating Canada “has a disproportionate number of millionaires,” and that much of Canada’s middle class is so well off it qualifies among the world’s richest 10%. Anyone who owns a home anywhere in the country almost certainly falls in that group.

We seem to be doing pretty well by these measures, but you wouldn’t know it from the Vesuvian eruption of opprobrium that has rained down on the government of Stephen Harper through the course of the election, and the months before. So appalling has Harper been portrayed – so lacking in any redeeming feature – that a visitor would have to wonder how the guy ever got elected in the first place, never mind three times in succession. Are Canadians nuts?

Perhaps. Or, perhaps as one of the world’s most prosperous and peaceful countries we have the luxury of nitpicking our leaders to death every few years when we tire of the same old faces and feel the need for new ones on which to focus. The Harper years have offered plenty of opportunity to ruminate and get grumpy, enjoying a period of relative prosperity while much of the world – the U.S. and Europe in particular – has struggled on a plane ranging from recession to meltdown. No government has the ability to “control” an economy, no matter what they might like you to think, and Canada has benefited from strong commodity prices until recently, but Ottawa has adroitly avoided the sort of self-destructive policies that hobbled much larger and diverse economies, using the opportunity to pursue an impressive web of trade agreements that open Canadian products to billions of consumers beyond our limited domestic market of 36 million people. Canada depends on trade – without it we’d be a large but easily-ignored afterthought – and no government has put greater effort into opening markets than the two Conservative governments of Brian Mulroney and Stephen Harper.

In doing so, opponents complain, the government has shown inadequate concern for the environment, promoting pipelines and defending Alberta’s oilsands in the face of environmental concerns and celebrity disapproval. It’s a valid complaint, but the critics have yet to identify an alternative means of protecting so many jobs for so many Canadians, and forget that Canada does not, in fact, end at Ontario. Ten years of a Calgary-based leader have erased much of the resentment that divided east and west for a generation. Western Canada may feel more integral to Canadian interests than at any time since Sir John A. Macdonald sent a railway to the Pacific to bring it into the fold. Alberta alone – filled with eastern migrants eager for the jobs it could provide – feels secure enough to end a 43-year political hegemony and elect an NDP government, unimaginable when the east was seen as a hotbed of schemers eager to steal its resources.

At the same time, the hostility that typified relations between Quebec and the rest of Canada has faded to a degree few could have imagined just 20 years after the most recent referendum came within a hair of fracturing the country. The angry separatists who dominated discourse for so long have been replaced by a more confident, less strident and enterprising group, eager to embrace the advantages Canada offers rather than complain of ancient slights. While there are many reasons for the change – simple aging being a big one — Harper’s disciplined effort to avoid confrontation, to refuse to engage in the endless antagonisms in which the separatists specialized, removed much of the oxygen from the sovereigntist cause. The Bloc Quebecois won 54 seats the last time the federal Liberals came to office; on Monday they will be fortunate to retain the two to which they still lay claim.

Harper’s approach to Quebec typifies his aversion to Ottawa-based social dirigisme. There’s a very real difference in belief systems at play here. Liberals are big on grand national projects that reflect their view Canada needs the guiding hand of government to do great things, even if the proffered programs often fail to materialize — the oft-promised national daycare system that was never introduced, the Kyoto accord on emissions that was approved then ignored, the national energy policy that appropriated western resources for eastern priorities, the national gun registry that spawned an expensive new bureaucracy without reducing gun crime. Harper prefers to provide the means, and then allow individuals to use it as they see best, cutting back steadily on the size of government and the regulatory burden every Canadian faces. The Wheat Board lost its monopoly, freeing farmers to seek markets without producing the prophesized disaster. The gun registry was shuttered with no upsurge in gun crime.

Taxes have been reduced even as healthcare funding has continued to rise at several times the rate of inflation, and as provinces continue to complain they can’t possibly get by on the ever-rising billions they receive. A balanced budget and lower taxes has allowed for creation of more ways to save, particularly the innovative tax-free savings accounts championed by former finance minister Jim Flaherty, which have proven so popular that both opposition parties now pledge to cap them. In place they propose a larger Canada Pension Plan that will siphon off income and invest it as hired professionals see fit.

None of this pleases those accustomed to regular infusions of public cash, and who see ongoing subsidies as a justifiable claim on the taxpayer. Harper has generous support for those most in need, accepting it as a fundamental duty of a prosperous nation, but is less prone to propping up arts bodies, special interest activists, public broadcasters and others he figures should be capable of doing much more of their own heavy lifting. His relentless focus on commerce strikes urban critics as faintly crass, in much the way Britain’s landed gentry once looked down on those involved in the vulgarities of “trade”.

Those born outside the country aren’t so blasé: throughout the Harper years immigrants have been welcomed at record levels, with increased emphasis on skills and education over family ties. Former immigration minister Jason Kenney undertook a radical remaking of the system, reducing a backlog that produced wait times of up to eight years and was subject to widespread abuse by families eager to bring in elderly relatives in need of healthcare or social housing. Though predictably denounced by opponents, it unabashedly put Canada’s needs at the forefront, fast-tracking applications from ambitious, highly-skilled people who could fill employment needs while capping the number of grandparents no longer able to look after themselves in the old country.

It’s probably no surprise that Liberal leader Justin Trudeau has pledged to weaken the reforms so more families can bring in older relatives able to take advantage of Canada’s generous benefits. It’s always been a handicap for Harper that he assumed people would see the value of pragmatism over imagery, and appreciate the advantages that come from placing national interests ahead of sunny sentiments. Cold efficiency rarely warms hearts. Canada has done well under Stephen Harper, in many ways. Now, it appears, it wants to be hugged a bit.

At least 8 people choosing not to vote? In this day and age when everything is getting worse?

:seriously:

Takes an average of 15 min and you have a say in the future of your country. You got kids? Nieces / Nephews? A friend with kids? Don't you think 10 years is enough with the same leader? OR don't you want to see him continue for another 10 years if you like him?

If you can't be convinced to take the meager time out of your day (you can leave work early as is required by law) to help put a collective voice out, then you may as well shit a brick and then hit yourself with it.

I don't think doctors and lawyers are really hurting.

A lot of people either don't care if they feel like the government won't have much impact on them either way, or they think all the options are shit. It's easier to be motivated to go vote if you feel strongly for or against a particular candidate.

damnit my voting card didnt come in the mail... wtf!!! or someone threw it away :okay: i hope lineups wont be too long at richmond centre tmr for the people that has to register....

I knew this would come up eventually.

The LGR was a bloated pig that did little to protect the public, firearm related homicides have been on the decline since the 1970's, which predates the LGR entirely. The one to two billion dollars that had been spent leading up to the elimination of the LGR could have been allocated elsewhere to greater effect. Estimates put the actual compliance to the LGR at around 50-65%, which means that 35-50% of the actual non-restricted firearms in the country were hidden away by their owners without a trace.

"The statistics show that police recover registered long guns in just 1% of homicides. During the eight years from 2003 to 2010, there were 4,811 homicides; 1,485 of those involved firearms; only 45 featured long guns registered to the accused. In none of these few cases have the police been able to say that the long-gun registry provided the identity of the murderer."

Source: Why the long-gun registry doesn?t work ? and never did | National Post


The simple answer is that criminals weren't aquiring guns legally, which is an arguement that has come up time and time again resulting in the same conclusion (that it's true). Another important point to note is that statistically, criminals favour handguns, which have been restricted and force registered since 1935. Yet, the majority of firearm homicides in Canada are still committed with handguns.

Another favourite within the criminal element are automatic firearms, which are prohibited entirely for private ownership in Canada, though we still see them being used (although sparingly) on the streets.

Random sources:
http://blogs.vancouversun.com/2015/0...eted-shooting/
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2..._shooting.html

The FBI kindly supplies relevant statistics to the public online for anyone to view, in which it clearly shows that handguns kill more people in the Unites States alone than rifles, shotguns, fists, knives, explosives, and/or other miscellanious devices combined. Deaths related to fist fights alone shadowed murders with rifles and shotguns, the same firearms that the LGR intended to keep track of.

The pattern does not change when you come back over the border, though it is proportionally smaller due to our population. You don't see Canadian street gangs hauling around M1 Garands to knock over convenience stores, and yet that is exactly the type of firearm the LGR was built for. The RCMP has always been against private ownership of firearms, so it's no surprise that they would tell the public how much of a god send the LGR was, despite the LGR only listing the make, model, and serial number of firearms that belonged to legal firearm owners (see above for uselessness).

To put a cherry on this cake, let me give you a simple rundown of how idiotic the RCMP is regarding how they classify firearms.

Non-restricted (go out into the bush shooting): http://www.tacticalimports.ca/gm6-lynx-p-3.html

Restricted (only shoot in designated gun ranges): http://gun-shop.ca/product/beretta-cx4-storm-9mm/

/end rant.

I am so is my family. There are some screw ups with the Con but overall they did an OK job. No party is going to do well during a recession. I would think if Libs or NPD is charge for the last couple of years we will be in a worse spot.

I don't like how the Libs is going to spend billions of dollars into social programs and put the country in more debt that I or my kids are going to have to pay off. I also don't like how NDP is going to raise min wage to $15/hr (at least in some parts of the country) I make roughly $20/hour now do you think my wage is going to up when min wage is increase? Hell no so what happens is everything becomes more $$$ coz most business just pass the added cost down to consumers that equals to less spending money for me.

I also don't like Con on certain matters but I rather things stay they way they are for now. At least with the Con I got a pretty decent job and my tax haven't gone up too much while they run things.

Doubt that.

Lots of doctors and lawyers are incorporated as well.