[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[crazy canuck]

Either ceremony plays a role, or it's empty gestures. What ceremonial role do you want the GG to play? One cannot simply say it's "only" symbolic, for symbols have power. And in the current setup, the GG remains one of the very few institutional check to the PM power, but it's a check rooted in a tacit understanding of the past, and the spirit of institutions. I would be happy if the institutions were to change, but as they exist now, one has to value, and defend, the power that stems from tradition, and history because they provide counter discourses to the will of the PM, especially now.

I agree that ceremony plays a role.  The GG is a reminder of the historical context of this country.  That we were able to gain our independence from GB peacefully and not through revolution.  That is an important symbol.  But you want the ceremonial power of the GG to be substantive.  I think that would reverse the gains our form of Parliamentary democracy has made since the King Bing affair. In our modern Parliamentary democracy the institutional check on the PM is Parliament and the Senate.  Not a representative of a Monarch who has not attempted to meddle in political affairs of Canada.

[crazy canuck]

To give Trudeau credit where credit is due: our new foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, had been banned from Russia due to things she's written about the country as a journalist. 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/10/canada-chrystia-freeland-foreign-minister-russia-critic

Good on you BB 

I was impressed with her selection for a number of reasons.  A very able person for this particular time.

[Grey Fox]

She'll be our next Woman PM.

[crazy canuck]

She'll be our next Woman PM.

Perhaps 

[Drakken]

This debate on Monarchy is getting so tedious, when everyone knows it is locked into the Constitution since 1981 and the key to the lock has been thrown in the Atlantic Ocean since 1992. Then again, it might be a good thing Oex and Viper lose time and energy debating on something that cannot and will never be attempted to be changed. As irrelevant as the GG's executive role as the being the (temporary) representative of the Queen-in-Parliament is here, why waste time replacing it by something akind Germany's and Israel's own Presidents in their own Republics - which is even more partisan and divisive there?

Given that it takes unanimous consent of all provinces, then what Oex and Viper ask is that we open constitutional negociations, but this time with a liberum veto even worse than the Gang of Eight: One province drives a hard bargain, and we are all in a constitutional crisis. What price are you willing to pay to PEI, Saskatchewan, or Nova Scotia to get them to ratify your Republic? All that because you dislike pomp and ceremony?

I mean, I am as Monarchist as one can get. As designed, Parliament requires the Crown to function. Yet, the Crown's role is defined thanks to centuries of acts of parliaments, civil wars, kings been decapitated or exiled, and a whole set of constitutional conventions created to adapt it to their realities of parliamentary politics. A Canadian President would be without precedent in law or usage, empty in jurisprudence, and thus open to all sorts of uncertainties and adventures. Do we really want a President who feels they might have leeway to get ideas that they may have a right to mess around in Parliamentary business?

[Oexmelin]

You are so right. Only the fine pleasures and distractions of a discussion on Languish over the merits of a specific instituions is preventing me from unleashing untold horrors unto the world.

[Drakken]

merge the PM office with the GG.

[viper37]

I agree that ceremony plays a role.  The GG is a reminder of the historical context of this country.  That we were able to gain our independence from GB peacefully and not through revolution.  That is an important symbol.  But you want the ceremonial power of the GG to be substantive.  I think that would reverse the gains our form of Parliamentary democracy has made since the King Bing affair. In our modern Parliamentary democracy the institutional check on the PM is Parliament and the Senate.  Not a representative of a Monarch who has not attempted to meddle in political affairs of Canada.

We had governors for each colony before independance.  It's a reminder that we were and still are a British colony governed by a foreigner.

[viper37]

You are so right. Only the fine pleasures and distractions of a discussion on Languish over the merits of a specific instituions is preventing me from unleashing untold horrors unto the world.

When angered, you morph into some sort of green Rambo Gauthier?

[Jacob]

Didn't know you were a Trump supporter Drak.

[Drakken]

Didn't know you were a Trump supporter Drak.

Merely pointing the potential consequences of having a Canadian despot like Viper recommends.

[Jacob]

Didn't know you were a Trump supporter Drak.

Merely pointing the potential consequences of having a Canadian despot like Viper recommends.

Ah... I totally didn't get that from the post, so thanks for clarifying

[Drakken]

Ah... I totally didn't get that from the post, so thanks for clarifying

Godwin Law's notwithstanding, what Viper recommended was exactly what Hitler did in 1934: Merging the posts of Chancellor and President together. That made the GROFAZ both Chancellor, Head of State, and Commander-in-Chief of the Wehrmacht.

The GG's sole effective role in the Canadian parliamentary system is one of final, sovereign authority: PMs know their places, they are not the absolute master of the country and neither are they the legal Commander-in-Chief of the Canadian Armed Forces. That the PM office executes those power de facto in the Queen's name, does not mean it is the fountainhead of that authority. There is a valve present that, when things come to shove, may fire a PM - or a Parliament - which begins to behave grossly unconstitutionally.

[Drakken]

We had governors for each colony before independance.  It's a reminder that we were and still are a British colony governed by a foreigner.

[viper37]

yes, Drakken, I haven't forgotten your monarchist hardon    I guess you had a poster of Elizabeth II instead of Samantha Fox when you were younger