Okay, some has to explain this to me...

As I said earlier, the U.S. federal government is a limited sovereign. It is not the fundamental unit of administrative authority in the United States. For the vast majority of American citizens, their State is the fundamental unit of governance. Over my own lifetime it is true that this principal has become obscured by the ever growing power of Washington but the States are not "provinces". They are not political subdivisions. They are sovereign entities who have entered a permanent compact with each other to transfer some limited portion of their sovereign authority to the federal government to secure the common welfare. States per se therefore must have significant direct representation in that federal government. That's how the Founders saw it near as I can tell.

The 14th Amendment isn't just reciting platitudes when it says that all persons born or naturalized in the United States are citizens of the United States and the State wherein they reside.

Now, whether this founding principal is honored more in the breach I do not know. The U.S. today is a very different place than it was in 1789 or 1865. But if you choose to work in law, politics, or public administration, the dual sovereign nature of the U.S. will become immediately and practically clear to you.

 

True. In fact, Conservative government would also be a problematic outcome, given the votes NDP got. Liberal minority with NDP support is about right, pragmatically.

But yeah, proportional party lists; Westminster first-past-the-post blows. PM Synnyways Goodhair arcually had elections reform as one of his promises running against Harper, but basically just never got to it. Shame, for I personally would be more likely to cast my ballot for Rt. Hon. Mr. Goodhair if it didn't involve voting for one Yvan Baker of our riding, whom I've met and can't stand.

 

Canada should switch to direct national proportional representation? Is that what you are saying, Stanislav? Well, maybe so but I'm not sure what would have to happen to make that change. I once tried to understand the Canadian constitution. I came away flummoxed. It is not, contrary to some popular opinions, just the former British North America Act. Oh, no. There is a laundry list of Acts and documents that comprise the federal constitution and, according to the gaggle of red and white Justices of the Supreme Court, that list is not exhaustive! Furthermore, some sources of Canadian constitutional law are unwritten.

Now, this isn't as weird as it sounds. The UK famously has an unwritten constitution and a goodly part of legal scholarship lies in figuring out what law is and what law is not entitled to the level of deference one associates with a "constitution". But there's a difference, a dangerous difference, in my mind. Until recently, the UK had no Supreme Court outside of the Law Lords in the House of Lords. Parliament was its own Court of Last Resort. Practically speaking, that means that there wasn't (and maybe still isn't) any notion of "Judicial Review". Not so in Canada. But if you have a Supreme Court interpreting a "constitution" whose terms are exceedingly difficult to specify since they come from many sources and MAY be unwritten, AND you have the doctrine of Judicial Review, what check is there against the power of that Court?

So who can be sure of the process for a complete overhaul of the system of federal elections? Nor is this all. Canadian provinces aren't exactly political subdivisions. They mostly pre-existed the Federation, they have each their own Lieutenant Governor (who is NOT answerable to the Governor General but instead is a direct representative of the Crown), they have their own peculiar rights and responsibilities derived from whatever instruments created them and they have rights as against each other that arose during the process of confederation. I suspect, but I absolutely CANNOT prove, that any substantial change to the Canadian system of federal elections would require the unanimous consent of the Provinces.

Good luck with that.

 

It would be nice not to have states with nothing but administrative responsibilities.

 

Not sure what you mean.

 

You might be right. I sure wouldn't know.

 

That is a lay-up... because he is a very stable genius.

 

Him being a self described very stable genius actually does explain quite a bit, doesn't it.

 

Exactly!