Old Boys Club

Update: Looks like public reaction actually forced a positive change for once as apparently the Greens will now be included in the debate. I may have to reduce my cynicism meter from 9.8 to 9.7 (out of 9) - although I still think we need to establish some sort of objective criteria for who is included/excluded from televised debates during elections.

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Dear Unelected and Unaccountable Media Consortium,

During the 2006 Canadian federal election, you stated that the Green Party was excluded from televised debates because they did not have an MP in the House of Commons. As we head to a 2008 Federal election, the Green Party now has an MP in the House of Commons and you are now saying that they can not be included in the debate because, "it is better to broadcast the debates with the four major party leaders, rather than not at all."

I am trying to decide which is worse, a) that you continue to lie about the true reason the Green Party is excluded from the debates (do you really expect us to believe that if there was a televised national debate, the other political parties would rather allow the Green Party to have the floor to itself for 3 hours of prime-time television than participate?), or b) that whatever your true reason is, you felt that it was better to claim that you had to exclude the Green Party because you were blackmailed by the other federal parties.

My conclusion is that, absent your establishing clear criteria for deciding which parties will be included in the debates, this matter should be decided for you by Elections Canada.

In the meantime, your credibility as anything other than a defender of the status quo and established interests continues to dwindle.

Yours truly,
Declan.

Things You'll See During An Election: Part 1

#1: Trivialities

There is a sense in Canada that both the media and the citizens have an obligation to care about politics in general, and elections in particular. The reasoning is that the policies enacted by the government have important impacts on people's lives and since we shape these policies through (among many other, often more important ways) the votes that we cast during an election, we should attempt to make an informed decision.

However, it requires some effort to try and determine both what set of policies are best and which vote will likely result in the closest approximation to said policies being enacted. Additionally, many people find discussion of policies and their impacts quite boring.

Faced with this situation, the media and the citizens generally respond much like a group of schoolchildren tasked with homework who would prefer instead to gossip about their classmates and teachers.

To take just one example, City TV (Vancouver) was running a poll this morning on which politician you would most like to have as a friend on facebook. Less obviously, but just as trivially, you will see endless coverage of tactics and strategy and much forecasting of results, almost none of which has any bearing on which policies will bring the best results or how citizens should use their vote to encourage good policies to be enacted.

Of course, the one difference between students gossiping and the media focusing on politics related trivia is that the students are under no illusions that gossiping is getting their homework done, whereas much of the media actually seems to believe that polls about facebook friends and the like actually discharges their duty to cover politics and inform citizens in a responsible manner.