October 25th, 2004

Filed under:
Politics
7 Comments »

100 Facts and 1 Opinion

I’m generally steering clear of the US elections. I have a number of Canadian friends who are more or less obsessed with American political news, but I can’t get excited about it. The candidates and their parties are so profoundly polarized, there’s precious little intelligent debate. Canada will be better off if Kerry wins, but we’ve managed with Bush in power.

I do, however, like the format of this article in The Nation. It offers an argument against the Bush administration in the form 100 facts with citations. Every argument made on the Internet ought to follow this format (well, 100 facts is a bit demanding–I’d take, say, 20). I’d be curious to read a similarly-built response in praise of the Bush administration.

Comments: 7 Responses so far

Lindsay
October 25th, 2004
12:41 pm

Thanks for the link Darren, it’s kind of amazing when you see it all in point form like this.

Reply

Anonymous
October 25th, 2004
3:06 pm

Are there 100 facts in praise of the Bush administration? ;-)

Reply

John
October 25th, 2004
3:38 pm

I keep asking for just one!

Reply

Chris
October 25th, 2004
3:43 pm

How about “We gots our foot massager with our $300 paycheck from the gov’ment.”

/David Cross standup

Reply

Devin
October 26th, 2004
4:00 pm

Perhaps it’s because of your self proclaimed disinterest in US politics, but it’s far from given that Canada would be better off if Kerry wins (assuming you mean ‘better off’ in the commonly held economic sense, in which case it’s almost certainly not true).

d.

Reply

Darren
October 26th, 2004
4:43 pm

I’m not sure that the commonly-held sense of “better off” is economic. In fact, that’s a realm–Canadian/American economic relations–that I can’t capably argue about. I do know that the last four years have hardly been a field day in that department, but that’s as far as I can get.

I was thinking more along the lines that Canada and the US always get along better with a Democrat in the Whitehouse. This no doubt because the Democrats’ party line is closer to the average Canadian’s than the Replicans’. Furthermore, I’ve been overwhelmingly unimpressed with Bush’s foreign policy. As we’re neighbours, I’d prefer someone else be running the most powerful country in the world.

Reply

Devin
October 26th, 2004
5:00 pm

I see your point, but so much of our relationship follows from the economics of the situation. Kerry wants to renegotiate NAFTA. Kerry wants to curtail offshoring of jobs. It’s also possible (though not certain) that protectionism under democratic leadership could be even more significant than it is now. If our trade relations with the US sour, our diplomatic relations are next in line.

Don’t get me wrong though, I absolutely don’t want to see Bush win. Though Canada may be slightly worse off, I think the world in general will be much, much better off.

d.

Reply

Add a comment