The Greens : Breakthrough or Death Blow?

The much-lamented non-breakthrough of the Green Party to win any seats in Parliament was a bit of a disappointment, but in reality, I would have been shocked if they had.

Judging by the tone of at least Elizabeth May and Adrianne Carr in their post-loss interviews, they seemed to feel the same way.

My view on the Greens is that this was, in fact, their breakthrough election.

Stay with me now.

This was the first time that the Greens weren't seen as a fringe, throw-away your vote party. They were seen as a viable alternative, and they actually made some pretty good gains in the popular vote, and in BC.

In terms of the popular vote, they grew by about 3%, which guarantees them another few million in public funds to run their party for the next few years, and become a more viable force in the next election cycle.

Canadians aren't huge fans of dramatic or drastic changes, and while electing a Green MP wouldn't have entered that territory, it was enough of a change to make people pause, if for no more than this cycle, and also was based on the ridings those prominent Greens were running in.

I wish Elizabeth May didn't run in Central Nova against Peter McKay. I wish Adrianne Carr didn't run against Hedy Fry and Lorne Mayencourt in Vancouver Centre. These are the two highest profile Greens, being respectively their leader and deputy leader, so it was relatively imperative that one of them enter Parliament if the Greens were actually going to be anything more than a bump in the road in Canadian politics.

May chose Nova because she grew up there, which is completely admirable, and the way decisions of which riding to take a crack should start from. But not when it's the Defense Minister who currently sits there, and not when it's a strong blue riding. She came a strong second, partially because there was no Liberal in the riding, but mostly because May is an incredibly gifted orator and politician, and would actually do more for Central Nova than people could ever hope for from McKay.

Alas, it was not to be. And furthermore, May is going to run in the same riding the next time around. Damn.

Here sits the best, most dynamic and intelligent Green Leader we have seen on the national scene, and she is going to again throw herself into what is essentially an unwinnable riding against Peter McKay. If she ran out in BC this cycle, or next, she would likely be sitting in the benches. Instead, she will likely lose, and the Greens will eventually be forced to turn to a leader that actually has a chance of sitting in Parliament, because at the end of the day, that is the only way to do anything you want to do politically in this country. I honestly love Elizabeth May, her candor, her skills and her beliefs, but I'll be shocked out of my shoes if she's ever the MP for Central Nova.

In terms of Carr, this was another missed chance to make an impact, as she was part of the Greens national face, appearing in commercials and having the title of Deputy Leader. She ran in the strongest riding in Vancouver, and finished a distant fourth. No matter what the polls showed, Carr tanked.

Hedy Fry has now won 6 elections, Lorne Mayencourt has high name recognition from being an MLA in the riding, and Michael Byers of the NDP was expected to have a strong showing. Against all this, Carr threw herself into the mix. As with May, a more strategic riding choice could have sent a Green MP to Ottawa.

I see plenty of sunshine around the edges of the shutout though. The Greens finished above the Liberals in almost every BC riding breakdown I saw over the course of last night, pulling significant numbers of votes. There is room to grow, but only at the expense of the Liberals, because at the end of the day, Green ideology is essentially very Liberal in nature, obviously with a heavier emphasis on the environment.

They can take some of the steam out of the NDP as well, but seem to pull in more disaffected Liberals than anyone else.

Splitting votes between the three will only lead to more and stronger Conservative governments, so maybe something like the Dion-May deal to not run candidates in each others ridings could be tried on a larger scale. That is a different subject for a different day though, as is proportional representation, which seems ever more prevalent on the minds of people after seeing the Bloc pull 50 seats out of 10% popular vote, and the Greens pull zero, when their popular vote totals were about 7%.

I understand it is not the best juxtaposition to put these 2 parties together, but when we talk straight numbers, the system we have seems even worse than most people believe it to be.

The Greens are not dead, not by a long shot, and if May stays as leader, and they keep getting themselves into debates, and into the conversation, they will eventually find themselves in Parliament as well.

Meeting Elizabeth May, Peter McKay , and Discussing Charter Rights

Well, it wasn't me, but it was my significant other, Lindsay.

She lives on the East Coast, in Antigonish, Nova Scotia, home of St Francis Xavier University, which she attends, and also the site of the local candidates debate for the riding of Central Nova last night.

In this riding, the very impressive Green Party Leader Elizabeth May is trying to wedge herself and the Greens into Parliament by knocking off Nova Scotia native son and Defense Minister Peter McKay.

At first glance, this does seem, frankly, insane. Going up against a Cabinet Minister, from a town within the riding, who is running for the party that has had an iron grip on the seat for decades, etc. But, all that outsider, fringe party, insurmountable stuff is getting turned on its head. May has a shot, and she showed why last night.

She was smart, on the ball, rational and reasonable, just like she was in the Federal debates last week. The crowd, chocked full of university students, was fully on her side, as the Liberals aren't running a candidate in the riding, and the NDP candidate is completely and utterly out of their league with two such strong and notable candidates.

She runs her campaign out of Antigonish, and clearly has a good chunk of the town on her side, just based on the amount of signs populating lawns. The riding is not just Antigonish however, as it covers a wide area, but May has more of a chance of knocking out McKay than any Liberal or NDP member has done so far.

After the debate, Lindsay got a chance to speak with both McKay and May, and got a chance to bring up the question to McKay that had gotten cut from the actual debate due to time constraints.

A little background before unleashing the whole story. The Nova Scotia Conservative provincial government has new regulations in place that force those that have taken prescription drugs for a disorder such as depression or post-traumatic stress disorder to declare those conditions and the drugs taken on their driver's licenses.

The government says it is due to safety concerns over people driving under the influence of medication, but that is a little hard to swallow with no evidence that these kinds of people have been a danger, or the drugs taken will impair driving ability.

So, basically what is in place now will force people to either admit to the public record their private medical conditions, or simply ignore treatment to avoid having to do so. Neither of those jives with my values as a Canadian.

I smell a Charter violation there, and so did Lindsay. So she decided to pose the question of the viability of such a law from a Charter standpoint to the one and only Peter McKay.

Now, while provincial and federal parties aren't specifically aligned together (In BC they couldn't be more of a separate entity), apparently on the East Coast it is much more of a central party than translates policy from the top down.

So, talking to a Cabinet member of the ruling Conservatives federally can very much have an impact on the Conservative party provincially.

She posed the question, they went back and forth and debated for 10-15 minutes, and then, the shining light appeared.

Peter McKay admitted the law was a violation of our Charter Rights, and pledged to do what he could to affect some positive change on the matter.

McKay went against his own party, and conversed with a constituent on a personal level. I admire that, and I have a lot more respect for the man now than I think I ever have. Up to this point, he seemed nothing more than the guy that was jilted by Belinda Stronach and sold his soul to Stephen Harper to unite the right.

They exchanged email addresses, and he also gave her some links and contact information for the provincial and federal health ministers, so that she could run down some of the details on her time.

Obviously, that doesn't mean the law is repealed, or that it will be tomorrow, but there is a commitment on record from a very powerful minister to the effect that it should be. That my friends, is a pretty big deal.

I want to congratulate Lindsay for standing toe-to-toe with a very seasoned politician, and winning him over in the end. That's not an easy task, especially when that politician resides in the spin and negativity of the right wing.

Just so you know I'm not fakin', here's the pics of Lindsay and Elizabeth May, and with Peter McKay