Canadian vs. US politics

I’ve been keeping my head down of late trying to get more work done. One of the things that keeps me from disappearing entirely into my office and cutting myself off from the world is the US election. Well, we’re not anywhere close to the election, but the race to determine who will be the final candidates for president has been fascinating. Okay, maybe bewildering is the right word to describe it from a Canadian’s perspective. Who knows, by the time November roles around Canada’s government may have already fallen and a new one elected. That’s one of the things I like about the system there. Even though 15% of Canadians in a recent poll suggested that they would trade their vote in the next Canadian election to be able to vote in the US (who came up with THAT question?!), I’m quite happy to vote in the election that still matters to me most.

Rick Mercer’s rant last week on The Mercer Report got it right, though:

And speaking of Hillary, when it comes to casting, we can’t touch them. Here we are, we think of ourselves as this progressive, diverse nation and yet there’s big bad backwards America and who’s running for the big job? A woman, a black man, a Libertarian, a Mormon with big hair, and some dude who was in a bamboo cage in Vietnam for five-and-a-half years. Meanwhile in Canada, we’re gearing up for yet another race between a pudgy white guy and a skinny white guy and some other white guy. Which may go a long way to explain the other big difference between Canada and USA politics these days: in America in this race, young people are engaged. In Canada – they’re choosing none of the above.

You can watch it here (choose Rick’s rant from Episode 14, season 5).