One Fan's Opinion

For a bit of a change, I'm gonna talk about my beloved Canucks today. I'll warn you ahead of time, I'm not gonna offer anything about their play or personnel. For that, check out Alanah and the rest of The Crazy Canucks for some excellent (and usually pretty friggin' hilarious) commentary. Actually the idea for this post was triggered by one of J.J.'s comments on their podcasts and from some talk from the guys on Team 1040.


As many of you may already know, the NHL, in partnership with Reebok, launched new uniforms at the beginning of the All-Star break. This has started up talk amongst various commentators about some teams changing their uniforms, including logos. One of the big things I've been hearing lately is about the Canuck's going back to their old logo, ie. the "stick in a rink" design. And I've gotta say I'm for it, but with a few conditions. First off, just like Rebecca from the podcast, I don't want anything to happen to Fin, just 'cause he's a pretty cool mascot and what the hell would we replace him with? Pac Man (what else would look like the stick in rink logo?) And I wouldn't want them to get rid of the Orca C design entirely. I don't know, when they first came out with it, I wasn't so sure but its kinda grown on me and I'd be sorry to see it go. If they did something similar to the current uni's, with one logo on the shoulder and a different one on the chest. except obviously switching the logo positions I think I'd be pretty happy with that. Hell, who am I kidding, if the hockey god's were to guarantee perfect health for Luongo for the next 6 years I could live with the old flying V's sweaters.

Finally, speaking of Luongo, did anybody else hear the new "Luongo" song on the Team yesterday? I've been trying to find a copy but have been so far unsuccessful in my hunt and any tips would be appreciated.

Tags: Vancouver Canucks, NHL, RBK, Reebok, Roberto Luongo

PM or King?

Well, as promised here is the first of (hopefully) many posts I'll be writing on the different issues/concerns I have with the federal government and the way it is run. An important note, both political parties,unless explicitly mentioned, are guilty of most of these things (IMHO,anyways). Another note, the problem I'm discussing here relates to majority governments, minorty governments have been so rare I don't have the time or enough information to discuss that situation with much confidence. Now to begin.


Perhaps the biggest problem I have with the Federal government lies with the power that our PM has. Or to be more specific, how much power the PM (& PMO) has managed to concentrate in one place. Perhaps the only other position that can claim a similar level of power is the Minister of Finance, and even then the PM wins out.

It starts with the control the PM exercises over his/her party. Being able to prevent candidates from running for your party or on the other hand "parachuting" candidates into different ridings is just the start. The different patronage powers allows one to reward those that helped you out or to offer as a prize for being loyal. With regards to the party MP's, the PM can promise Cabinet and Parliamentary Secretary positions to reward loyal MP's. And the you have the Cabinet, where most(if not all) the important policy is decided upon, and who is the head of the cabinet? Who decides what Cabinet consensus is?

And to control all of this it only takes 3 people, the PM and two deputies: the Minister of Finance and the party whip. The whip takes care of the back-benchers and makes sure they follow the party's (read the PM's) line. The Minister of Finance keeps the Cabinet in line just by being in control of the purse strings, he (or she) can either allow each minister's projects to go forward or to impede them by denying funding. Finally you have the PM (and the PMO) as the ringmaster, who with his two "lieutenants" becomes the "captain" of this little ship we like to call Canada, pretty much free to do as he wants (at least until the next election).

Guess this reason this bugs me so much is goes against the idea of responsible government in Canada, best defined in this quote from one of my old poli sci textbooks:

A regime in which legislative and executive power are fused together in a cabinet which is accountable to an assembly of the peoples elected representatives

In other words, our cabinet should ultimately have to answer to the House. But ultimately, who makes the final decision in Cabinet? The PM. And who can control the way the House votes (at least his party)? The PM.

We have a system that follows the letter but not the spirit of responsible government. And increasingly, we have one man (or woman) in a position to control all of the levers of power.

Tags: PM, MP, government, Prime Minister

A New Year, and a new beginning (maybe)

Ahh man, its been a long time (sorry Carolynne ;) ). I have to admit, I've been so busy this last month that it has been impossible to keep up with all of the stories popping up in the news and blogosphere. It may not appear so, but I do a fair amount of research and (more importantly) fact checking on each one of my posts. Because of this, I haven't really felt like I could write and give you guys a decent post. That and I have to admit I've been distracted a little from the political world by other interests.

As such, I'm wondering about the direction I'm going to go with this blog in the new year. I started off this blog back in Nov. '05 and as you can see it was a bit of a mishmash of topics. During the last year, I drifted towards a format that was almost exclusive political. And now, I'm not sure where to go, should I stay with the politics (and possibly post only 3-4 times a month) or do I move to a more personal theme (ie. widen the scope to more of my interests but lower the quality (IMO) of the posts). Or, as Monty Python puts it, is "now time for something completely different"?

So far, I haven't made a decision but I will be sure to let you all know once I do. In the meantime, I don't really have anything else to say right now but I'm planning on doing a post (or possibly a series of posts) on the different issues I have with the way government is run and structured, so keep an eye out for that.

One last note, it appears that the spammers have discovered my blog, so I've turned on word verifaction.