Well, the hoopla is well over.

We have a minority parliament, not a coalition as the talking heads keep repeating endlessly as if by them saying it over and over it will come to be.

We have had minority governments before and mostly – that is with the exception of the Stephen Harper years – quite a lot of good was accomplished.  There is no need to be frightened by such an animal, in fact, some small semblance of democracy might just raise its head to smile upon us.  We can but hope.

Meanwhile, those talking heads are guessing what will happen and few seem to acknowledge that the world is not coming to an end. Surely there is real-time news they can report upon until moves are made when parliament eventually meets.

There are some things that stand out for me and I guess the main one is the reaction of one Andrew Scheer.  After claiming that the loser in a minority government must resign as party leader it is clear in his own mind that it only applied to Justin Trudeau, not to him.  He has said he will stay on as leader unless his caucus wants him out, and as there really is nobody to replace him he will stand pat. Wow, what a surprise!

Alberta is, of course, moaning that they will not have a seat at the table, but that was their choice and with Saskatchewan, they will form a solid block of red neck, bigoted, yellow vest supporters who will agree to nothing on principle. It seems that what they wanted was austerity and cutbacks and Alberta got that through Jason Kenny’s budget, conveniently delivered after the election was history.  Typical!  How do you like conservative values now Alberta?  Clearly, any form of democracy is an anathema to you.

But back to CBC and their consummate desire to offer their speculations on what happens next.  No ideas or even suggestions on possible democracy as only a majority government seems to fit with their idea of good governance. The very concept that there will be different opinions on how to do the best thing for Canadians through real debate in committees – even though they have become a time-conscious waste of time since 2006.  Democracy means that what the people need is important and legislation should reflect that rather than pandering to big oil, big pharma and big anything else that wants to make a healthy profit at our expense.   There are people who have no homes, no money and who rely on others for their food.  There are people whose homes are mouldy, who have no drinkable water and whose education and hospital facilities are not even on a par with 3^rd world countries; and what land they have is constantly being taken from them for a road, pipeline or mining operation and they do not get a fair share of the proceeds. Their burial grounds, as sacred to them as are the cemeteries in Christian churches, are destroyed by construction crews defended by the rent-a-cop RCMP with no regard to ancient and treaty rights.  What a hypocritical country we are when we preach reconciliation and practice theft and genocide.

Referring to Andrew Scheer again, his new caucus has decided to relieve him of his self-imposed suggestion about the looser resigning as party leader and have agreed to follow his vacuous smile for a while longer.

Yet Elizabeth May, a more parliamentary politician than Scheer will ever be, has stepped down as Green Leader because she promised her daughter she would do so.  Who would you rather trust?

 Jeremy