Adrian Brijbassi

Free drink if you can name this guitar player from a Canadian band. (Hint: They're making an appearance in Toronto on Saturday night.)

Lots of responses on the upcoming election and the option of not voting— plus the debate continues on the best Canadian songs that reference our country’s geography. Thanks, as always, for reading — and for pitching in with your letters!

Here are some of your responses to recent articles:

Canadian women suffered for the right to vote, Margaret Baily reminds us:

I feel it is my duty as a Canadian citizen to vote in all elections and have missed only one in my whole life, 1984, because I was out of the country and was not sure how to exercise my right. Women died early in the 20th century for the privilege of voting. In many places around the world today people still die, trying to obtain the right to vote. So, disgusted as I am with politics federally, I will vote on May 2.

Harper won the leaders’ debate, says Keith Munro of Belleville:

Who won? Steve Harper easily. He kept his focus while the others got lost. Iggy admitted that he wants to form the next government by saying “try to form a government”. He also got pegged by Layton for not showing up for over half the votes in Parliament. That’s representing your constituents proudly. As for Duceppe, who cares what he has to say? He should not be there anyway. This was supposed to be a debate between Canadian political party leaders.

What ticks me off most is the fact that we are spending $300 million or more on an election that should have gone to our economy. We were forced into this by three spoiled little boys that can’t play together for the good of the team (Canada). They should be ashamed of themselves. Not one of them has come up with any practical solutions to any of our social or economic problems.  If you can’t or won’t try to find solutions then you are the problem.

It’s lazy not to vote, articulates Robert Vincent:

You can dress it up anyway you want, but the reason people don’t vote is that they are too damned lazy.
They’re too lazy to keep informed.
They’re too lazy to invest in finding out what’s behind the headlines.
They’re too lazy to read deeper into an issue than the front page of the newspaper.
They’re too lazy to study their form of government in school.
They’re too lazy to get off their asses and attend leader or candidate presentations.
They’re too lazy to watch debates on the issues.
They’re too lazy to set leadership criteria against which to measure their preferred own leader’s worth.
They’re too lazy to assess positions on issues.
They’re too lazy to debate the issues among friends.
They’ve been too lazy all their lives to live up to their responsibilities as citizens in the greatest democracy on earth … for the time being.

The only thing one can say to support their position is that at least they won’t be casting an uninformed vote like some of the sheep will who have no idea how significant and important any election is, but especially how very significant this one is going to be.

“Canada is content to become a second-tier socialist country boasting ever more loudly about its economy and social services to mask its second-rate status. You won’t recognize Canada when I get through with it,” Stephen Harper, 2006 Election Campaign.

Debby’s with me and says she won’t vote this time:

Love your comment: “Someday, we might uncover our next great leader. When you think it’s happened, nudge me. I’ll stay happily disinterested in our national parties until then.” I think that sums it up for 42 percent of Canadians in the 2008 election who didn’t vote, and could perhaps prove to be more on May 2. I know it certainly sums it up for me, and I was the one who was upset when they called another unnecessary expensive election and was urging people via Facebook and Twitter to get involved and get out and vote.
How sad.

Bryan Challis comes up with a Great Canadian Playlist of his own:

My wife told me about the list that appeared in the Star: I’ve been saying for a few years now that I wanted to compile a list of such songs. The impetus being you hear all kinds of songs out of the US about US cities that are iconic (“New York, New York” of course being the pre-eminent one). I began thinking of what songs are as iconic for us that really give a sense of a Canadian location and couldn’t immediately come up with one. Then I began keeping my ears open for them and realised there’s a plethora of songs that at the very least mention a city a town a street a region and I did start the list.

The funny thing is just a month ago my friend ask me an odd favour. His family was planning a cross US trip in a Winnebago and he wanted to keep his 13-year-old daughter educated during the trip – since they would have her out of school for six weeks. He asked us for a list of songs that she could find the lyrics for and then analyse them. Right away I thought of my list. Odd timing, eh? They are going for Easter so I am anxious to hear how that goes.

I found that most of my list was already on yours and the one in the Star.  But I do have ones not on your list: so here for your perusal are my additions, gratis:

Chris Ross gets a kick out of our Blue Jays feature:

Is this seriously a J.P. Arencibia to Cooperstown Watch??? That is sooo funny, no joke. I’m a huge Jays fans just thought I’d say that lol.

[ANSWER: It is, Chris. And we hope to have fun with it – and give away some great Jays tix too.]

Our previous “letters” article is here.

Keep responding with your thoughts and suggestions for coverage.

And remember: Name that guitar player — get a free drink on me.

Posted on April 14, 2011 at 5:01 am in News and Politics, Toronto News   |  RSS feed |   Reply   |   Trackback URL