We cats understand that we might have to explain a few things about Canadian politics. Not that we're experts, mind you, but we try.
First, gentle American readers, in Canada the whole red-versus-blue thing is reversed. The Liberal Party's official color is red while the Conservatives (Tories) are blue. The Bloc Quebecois also likes blue, although they spell it bleu. The National Democratic Party (NDP) has lately leaned toward orange.
However, since the Liberals and the Tories are the two biggest parties, polling tends to focus on them alone. Which means that the match-up reflected above is pretty interesting. Looks like the Liberals, whose death warrant Canadian pundits were all signing last week, now are only six points behind. Hm!
In a Parliamentary system, the elections are blessedly short. This one will last about five to six weeks. But it's long enough to ensure that the ever-unappealing Tory Prime Minister Stephen Harper has cancelled plans to attend the Royal Wedding. (Aw, gee, Wills and Kate — try to buck up, if you can.)
We cats have often pointed out the similarities between the Harper Tories and the U.S. Republican Party. Well, gosh — turns out that Harper is having to explain today why a crooked guy who's being investigated by the RCMP is managing his campaign in Alberta. Boing!
And speaking of Tory hypocrisy, here's another interesting nugget. If a party wins the most seats in Parliament but not a numerical majority, the other parties can try to band together and form a coalition government. Stephen Harper just totally bitched about this scenario the other day, but back in 1997, he was all for it.
Finally, just in case we all need to know this, the guy who's currently head of the Liberal Party bears the unlikely name of Michael Ignatieff. That's pronounced Ig-KNOT-tee-eff. It took us cats awhile to learn this. And yes, every time we see a picture of him, we think he's going to be handsome — and then we realize, no, he's not.
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