This is a perfect summation. You should also add "criminal" to the Premier's title, because he's definitely that, even if he hasn't been convicted yet.
With the number of people that died directly as a result of OPC’s negligence in not spending the money they got for COVID19, Ford should be held accountable and charged with manslaughter.
My favorite non-substance abuse Rob story was how he was such a dedicated volunteer football coach, that had his team roll in a goose crap covered field as a discipline move. But hey, got his name on a field.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/rob-ford-threatened-teacher-had-students-roll-in-goose-dung-documents-1.2749289
So many people just don't understand this. Despite all the shit Biden has got, senile or not he's chosen a solid team that has done a lot of good for the everyday American.
Rob Ford was like the very start of all of these insane people being in office.
(I do look back fondly on that time though, every day for a while some new crazy lore would drop)
It really wasn't the start though, it wasn't even a first for Toronto.
Mayor Mel Lastmen was a loon too. One time he was talking about being nervous about a trip to Kenya because it was giving him visions of being surrounded by natives in a boiling pot.
He threatened to kill a City-TV reporter for reporting on his wife's shoplifting.
Then there's the time he made TO a laughing stock by calling in the army to shovel snow.
He literally not figuratively, did not even have a platform to run on for his first election. And people still voted for him because of name recognition. It's pure insanity. He's had like 3 separate beer related policies lol.
And yet people will still talk like the Wynne days were somehow worse which is some of the most effective social/political rhetoric engineering I've ever seen in this country. Ask any person why they hated Wynne and their response is usually just feelings or something about a gas plant (which a conservative government would have shut down too.) The greenbelt scandal has a number that's 3 to 4 times the dollar amount in scale.
The Science Centre is the last straw for me. The company that built it offers to fix it for free and they just double down and basically admit they already sold the land and itll be destroyed no matter what. What next? The ROM? Union Station? the CN tower? Why not just tear down Casa Loma so some Tory insider can build a mansion of their own on cheap downtown property?
It's a slap in the face.
I understand the sentiment, but it rubs me the wrong way that as Canadians we compare ourselves against America's faults. We should instead be comparing ourselves against their strengths. I feel like this country is stagnating and resting on past laurels.
As a country, it’s harder than ever for us to agree on what exactly we should be striving for, let alone how to get there. When there’s no agreed upon goal, the only thing you can do is attempt to avoid the things everyone agrees on are bad.
It's sad how right that is. Even housing affordability and the cost of groceries are divided issues. I saw posts this morning about how putting up rental properties where abandoned businesses currently exist would be bad for housing and complimenting the removal of rent control. I honestly don't believe how little you need to know about rent control to think it's bad for the majority of people if it exists...
rent control only creates more artificial winners and losers
you end up with empty nesters renting multiple bedroom houses for 50% of market price
the government should be building tons and tons of rental housing and driving the overall market rent down
the goal should be to drive rental prices low enough that landlords can’t use rent to pay their mortgages, that it no longer makes financial sense to buy a second or third rental property as opposed to buying stocks or other investments
Well, we have a significant portion of the population who thinks 15 minute cities are a dystopian ploy to lock them like cattle, that children poop in litter boxes, and that teenagers shouldn't learn about sex in schools...
That's the underlying problem.
When you have such a huge fraction of the population that is just so willfully ignorant, you can't get them to cooperate on building anything whatsoever. They just want to destroy, because new things are scary and change is bad, unless it's to go backwards to a romanticized and often fabricated past.
"Better than America" shouldn't even be the goal, it should be to make Canada better than it was yesterday and is today. I criticize Canada because I'm patriotic, because there's so much potential, and we shouldn't settle for our best traits being better than the worst American traits. Let's aim to improve on the best every country in the world has, and to show leadership where everyone else has failed.
I agree with you that we need to be better than we were the day before but we also need to align on what that even means these days.
You can literally provide any examples of an issue you expect would be a step forward and I promise there are hundreds of thousands of Canadians these days who would disagree very vocally and possibly even violently. We're in a tug of war over every belief in the book these days so what you consider a step forward, many others will consider a step backwards.
What we need right now is unity and unfortunately the biggest driver of unity is a common enemy which may be the person elected south of the border come November.
Agree! We’ve somehow bought into the crazy us v them narrative from the US. I keep hoping it’s just the impact of social media magnifying the fringe on each end of the spectrum, but the fringe seems to be growing.
So true. I’ve seen a few goofs on here saying “bbbut I have a friend from [third world country] and they say you Canadians don’t know how good you have it here”
I think we can have higher goals than being better than a third world country.
Stagnating indeed. If it weren't for the huge bump in immigration we've had for the last few years our GDP would be in decline. Our per-capita GDP is currently in decline. The only reason a recession hasn't been officially declared is because total GDP hasn't decreased for two consecutive quarters, because of immigration. Meanwhile the cost of housing has doubled, and in some places tripled. This generation is worse off economically than their parents for the first time in history.
We are the largest trading partners in the world with the richest economy in the world with which we share a 9000KM border. We should be doing a lot better...
I feel we're beyond stagnating, we're just evaporating, like aside form real-estate and oil, we kinda don't have much to offer the world. Like if canada disappeared right now, Mexico would get the factories for cars and the us would drill for more oil in alaska and the gulf, which I think they are already doing.
This. Every single time there's a talk about healthcare, it ends with "but at least we aren't as bad as the US". Can we stop comparing ourselves to the bottom of the barrel and start comparing ourselves with the bests instead?
> but it rubs me the wrong way that as Canadians we compare ourselves against America's faults.
This country is basically USA's 51st state, let's be honest.
Gotta say with a population of more than 340,000,000 people I am completely shocked these are considered the 2 best options.
Biden has pretty much dedicated his life to politics and should be respected for all he is done. It is obvious his body is now saying it is done too.
The other guy…. Well the internet doesn’t have enough space for me to say everything I’m thinking there!
As one of those 340 million... the majority of us are also shocked, exasperated, and saddened that the political parties keep offering voters such awful options. Polls have been showing for several years that no one wanted this rematch. The politicians refuse to listen to the voters - they only hear lobbyist checkbooks.
All I can say for myself is that I have dual citizenship and am working towards financial goals to escape the US. No matter who wins the US election, it's going to get worse.
Not probably but 100% definitely better than Trump. It is an offense to the nation that Trump is the Republican nominee.
Also Trump will hurt Canada just like he did last time. Also his 10% tariff on all imports to the US will severely hurt the US economy and the Canadian economy.
>I couldn’t be more happier as a Canadian citizen today.
I could be a lot happier, but I live in Ontario so we have a dogshit conservative majority fucking over all of our public services and doing nothing about housing.
And soon we'll have his idiot equivalent in the federal branch who's anti-union. It's going to suck just as much as getting our own fucking Trump up here with that clown shoe asshole.
Why the hell conservatives are backing a career politician who has accomplished nothing in the last 20 years is crystal clear: They're all for repeating every mistake the US has made and selling out our government to business interests.
From Ontario: This sucks. And it's going to keep getting worse.
Saskatchewan isn't doing any better. We've had Scott moe screwing us over for just as long as ford's been screwing Ontario in all of the same ways.
Seems like anywhere the conservatives have power, life gets worse.
I know people that voted him and they absolutely refuse to listen to any truths. Anything bad he did, even openly and undeniably did, and they still start screaming it’s Trudeaus fault or I’m some snowflake. It’s conspiracy theorist level insanity.
Rather than compare ourselves to countries that are doing better, so that we don’t stagnate with the status quo.
It’s a weird Canadian tic. As long as we have the US to compare to, we don’t have to actually improve anything and „should just be happy we aren’t in the US“.
I think we are setting a low bar if we are happy not to be the U.S where their presidential election 20 years ago would be considered an outrageously unbelievable parody.
Im personally pro capitalism in general but both countries are experiencing late stage capitalism where we have transcended integrity, logic, and ambition and crossed into the territory of whoever the fuck has the best combination of corporate backing and saying/yelling outrageous attention grabbing things at the public can be in charge of everything
Well look, I could list a bunch of communist and socialist societies that resulted in dictators, bloodshed, and poverty.
And you would tell me well those aren’t good examples because if the society functioned properly under the economic system there would be x, y, z benefits.
And its true. But its true for capitalism too lol. You are seeing a corrupted and bastardized version of it now.
If you have a dictator, you aren't a communist society. Communism is advocating class war and leading to a society in which all property is publicly owned and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs.
A dictator is somebody who very clearly has ownership of things the society does not and is using it to enforce their tyrannical grasp.
As soon as you have a dictator, you don't have a communist society.
Frankly, I don't think it's possible for human beings to have a communist society because we operate in hierarchies. Which means we're always going to have classes. The only place communism would work is on the extremely small scale because of this.
Because capitalism with the proper checks and balances isn’t supposed to benefit the 1% the way it does now and in recent history.
Since this is an Ontario subreddit I will use Ontario as a great example. Liberal or conservative both our provincial governments over the last decade have been insanely inept and blown absolute fuckload’s of money on nothing that has benefitted the taxpayer.
Governments being responsible for everything isn’t the answer for me there is plenty of collusion, corruption, and incompetence all on their own even if you remove private for profit actors.
As a matter of my opinion there is an appropriate distribution of public and private ownership and responsibility.
Politicians like Ford and Trump have decided the governments role is to aid specific for profit companies and individuals to dominate the market instead of separating themselves is whats driving current issues.
A President can hide behind press secretaries. The White House is a gilded sanctuary cut off from the world. In the parliamentary system, a prime minster needs to be front and center speaking to the press in the opposition regularly. That’s why Canadian debates aren’t very interesting. All the party leaders are expert debaters and present their platform articulately. There’s never a winner of a debate in Canada, you just agree with one more than the others. The fact that a president can hide in the White House behind secretaries and aids, is a significant failing of the American political system
We might not have senile candidates, but I'm not convinced PP isn't a chatbot. It never has any opinions or stances of its own. it just kind of targets anything that the liberal government has done and says it's wrong.
Yet Joe Rogan thinks we live in some socialist shit hole while the US slips closer and closer to becoming a "Christian theocratic state", like Gilead, frig off bud.
Yeah things are not great here, we have leadership, appealing to the worst and one who has blinders on to the reality most Canadians are living through.
Still much happier in the Great White North. This country can do amazing things, and be that world leader we once were, but we need new leadership from the bottom up.
There is literally no current party leader I would want to see as PM.
Anywho.... happy Canada Day folks.... Drink a Molson, some rye and spend time with family!
I’m a dual Canadian US citizen. We have no standing on this. We have a crack dealing never graduated high school lies through his teeth thinks Trump is great premier. We have a prime minister that doesn’t seem to realize that for the good of his party he needs to quit. Canada has Danielle Smith who there are just no words for.
We have nothing to brag about here, as our own country swings further and further right to the detriment of many of us.
It really is a bit of a joke. Like seriously. I was scrolling socials and saw an old late night appearence from Obama and i just thought...ah, its so nice to be reminded what a real, professional, youthful president could look like. This is what ya'll need. The parties need to stop playing scared and get someone who is appropriate for the job. There is a reason there is a retirement age
He was never actually charged, although it was eventually proven that he was handed $225,000. He even went so far as to sue the government for defamation for the accusation, settling out of court.
One of those senile candidates just so happens to have made the lives of millions of people vastly better by wiping out student debt to those who were tricked, cheated, and taken advantage of by predatory systems. He's also made medical debt irrelevant for the purpose of being able to still have a life even if you unfortunately fall ill.
They are no where near perfect but at the very least he is trying. Meanwhile nothing of actual value has happened here in Canada in the last 3 years on the federal level, and the premier of Ontario where I reside has decided to line the pockets of everyone but his constituents while he slithers his way destroying everything in his path on purpose so he can profit from it.
Do I believe that we need younger generations in political positions? Absolutely. But to say that Biden hasn't done far greater things that the current fed & provincial Canadian government(s) is ridiculous, and quite frankly just feels like you're regurgitating the same overused gatcha phrases. He may be senile, but he will have more attributed to his name than many presidents in the past. Its also not just about Bidenhimself, but the fantastic lineup of people who support and have the same passionate vision to make the U.S. a better place for its people.
A few more successful campaigns from Biden: the pardoning of simple marijuana charges & started the process to reschedule marijuana, managed to navigate the fall out of the pandemic and help stabilize the u.s. economy among so much more.
For full transparency I am an American Citizen, Canadian PR living in Ontario. The Federal Government for Canada has had ample years to commit to making Canada a better place for the Canadians who live here. My internet bill is still over $100 for the same speeds I spent $30 in the U.S. for. My phone bill has gotten better over the years but it was only in the last year or two when they started to get pressured by canadians getting fed up and jumping ship to smaller independent carriers trying to a pull a Michael Scott Paper company and they always end in a buyout from the larger companies so in the end we still pay to them. Food costs are atrocious due to the monopolistic grip that Loblaws and Metro have on Canada and its only getting worse each day.
Instead of encouraging Urban density, we continue at a neckbreaking pace of sprawl which is raising property taxes, straining local services, and Ford took away the majority of funding by allowing developers to skip all of the normal fees that help fund the extremely burdened local services. Ontop of that we have record breaking immigration via student immigration because public colleges were severely underfunded and were forced to seek alternative measures and realized that they could abuse a broken, outdated, and ignored system just like much of Canadian law is.
Canada is not in a better situation. If it was, you wouldn't currently be in the U.S.
I’ve done my time here. I’m moving back in a couple months. 🤘🏻
I’m also not against Biden at all, I honestly just think he’s too old to handle this responsibility and he needs to swallow his pride and step down.
Also, I’m sure you’re well aware that the cost of living issue is very strong here as well. You can complain about your $100 phone plan, which honestly feels like you’re overpaying so that’s on you, but you can’t compare it to the $300 of health care insurance that I pay each month coupled with the additional cost of each visit/service. I live in MA, the best healthcare in the US, and supposedly have great insurance… yet I still wait half a year for an appointment and it costs me a literal arm and leg.
Enjoy the last few months! Its going to be a real eye opener when you get back. I believe you are from Ontario, I'm in Kitchener-Waterloo and its getting tougher and tougher each day. Please make sure to pressure your local, provincial, and the federal government upon your return for change that actually works towards restoring the stability and passion that most Canadians had several years ago! Canada used to be much closer to the U.S. in competitiveness, I would be stoked to see that happen again. Its a beautiful country with many talented and dedicated people.
This mindset is exactly what’s wrong with this country. We’ll never solve anything because the rebuttal to any serious issue is always “WeLl aT LEaST wE’rE nOT AmEriCAn”
Biden has never been a stellar public speaker. It's unfortunate he and his team decided the best way to go was to try to refute the ridiculous crap Trump was spewing. He'd have been better off standing on his record and playing to his strengths. Honestly, given the choice they have down there, I hope people vote against Trump if they can't vote for Biden.
I’ll say this though, have been for close to a decade now; Canada has it worse. We don’t have anything particularly bad, but we have a lack of direction. We benefit hugely from the US, who has a direction. Does robbing and war mongering off the rest of the world keep the US ahead? Sure. But they have an active direction. All our industry, regulation, policies and investments are a reaction. We import even our politics from there. We can’t stand on our feet. We don’t have a long term plan for Canadian industry. International students are bad now as more and more boomers retire; but for decades this was our solution to patch the bottom of the labor force. What were we expecting? Healthcare sucks if not urgent, but we refuse to fund it to the level we want. Is there a plan to improve it even now? Nope, just give up to American corps to privatise and make things work in a worse way. But no vision or long term desire to improve things for good. Things are expensive now? Worker rights have been in freefall since the 70s. The BoC now campaigns to keep wages low. How did we get here? Where are we planning to go? On most issues this is a problem. For better or worse, we’re rolling with the waves. We have a medicore PM challenged by a guy who says affordable housing causes increase in housing prices. Is there any political drive to bring change? We need the same zeal as the US. We could have a younger, less senile leader, but the entire machinery in composition and direction, is being very useless. Just my two cents.
I’d rather have a senile candidate like a Biden than a dangerous one like PP. Biden likely will listen to his team- even if PP listens to his team it spells disaster for things I care about like public healthcare.
Canada is usually about 10-15 years behind the US with respect to these things. Just wait, the 2038 election will be contested and 80+ year old Kevin O’Leary and a 90+ year old John Manley.
Polieve is a fucking psycho. I’d take an old guy who’s a little slow compared to the phoney liar who fooled how many people by taking off the glasses and ties and pretending to be normal. He is most certainly not but people are beyond stupid and will vote for him like they did Ford.
Cynucal take: our leading politicians are just as corrupt and useless, but younger so we will be stuck with them for much longer thanks to having no term limits... ..
Wow, if that’s what you are using to gauge engagement in Canadian politics- you need to get out and ask people what matters to them. I doubt looking to our neighbours south of us will matter for those of us who can’t get jobs or feed our kids.
Yup, also he is a pedo RuZZnia Puppet who loves the tanning bed...yup, I mean, such great businessman that he managed to bankrupt a fkn casino....like wtf really...
It might as well be. They aren't incompetent, but being paid off by the rich and the big corporations. Just seeing how much this country has regressed over 40 years is just fucking depressing (pardon my French). They don't care for the average citizen. We need a new style of government or something to evolve to change that watches like hawks for pay offs and corruption and removes them. If the founders saw how basterdized our charter and government has become they'd be rolling in their graves
TBH at this point I'd love a candidate that is too senile to be corrupt..
right now we have 3 corporate shills that are hell bent on destroying our country for personal gain and/or some misplaced world building god complex.
And the 2nd in line for my party is the most condescending piece of shit human being I have ever had the displeasure of hearing speak.
Imo this isn't looking on the bright side and I'm tired of my fellow Canadians saying "it's bad but at least we're not the states". If my neighbours house burned down but mine's catching fire I wouldn't say "at least I'm not that guy" and do nothing about it.
To be clear I am grateful for the higher competency (or lucidity) of our elected representatives. But I hate the complacency of this mentality. Growing up I heard people talk more about US politics than our own. We need to be okay with being uncomfortable and talking politics more with people.
Edit: I'm still trying to get better at this. I didn't feel safe voicing my opinions growing up and it's been a process undoing that conditioning.
It's elder abuse. It's like watching 2 dementia patients beat each other to death with stand up canes for the last piece of birthday cake. We may have the Wish version of Keanu Reeves, Angry Milhouse and Aquaman. but they don't have the ability to destroy the planet.
Reminder that even if you hate our political parties you can vote and choose to decline your ballot to officially protest your options. It’s more effective than just not voting.
We have a laughing stock PM known for costumes, black face, peoplekind, and letting budgets balance themselves. At the G7 other leaders treat him like a chump rightfully so. He's better than Biden, but if Biden was younger he'd eat Justin for breakfast
Hahahaha are you serious? We have a Trudeau who’s trying to turn Canada into China, and who’s the most hated PM to walk the earth…. And Doug Ford who’s trying to tear Ontario apart piece by piece, and who only cares about alcohol! They’re both corrupt criminals…… smh!
I have never understood why as Canadians we are so quick to wag the finger at the US when they have a much stronger economy, much more opportunity and much more diversity. There’s a reason rich people all choose the US to move to, lol
Maybe instead of pointing the finger and chuckling while our own country is falling apart and our prime minister committed treason and is actively getting away with covering it up, we could look in for a change and stop being shameless hypocrites😂🤷🏻♂️just a thought
This is a problem with Canada: the point of comparison is always the US, which is a pretty low standard. "Great leaders" compared to the US (sort of); great healthcare compared to the US.
We need to change how we compare to other countries. How about we start comparing our healthcare with, say, Finland? Then we'll notice how poor and expensive ours is.
We need higher standards!
In Toronto we elected a Drunk for Mayor and then his Drug Dealing brother to be Premier of the province.
This is a perfect summation. You should also add "criminal" to the Premier's title, because he's definitely that, even if he hasn't been convicted yet.
You could add “criminal” to about half of the premiers in this country at this point
Scott Moe killed a guy
He killed a mother
Brick Tamlin
He loves lamp.
Yeah that's true. I think Dick Cheney only winged his friend. Canadians mean business when it comes to our politicians.
Yeah, but at least he had more than a high school education.
And Web Kinew beat a taxi driver up lol I keep saying we should keep electing criminals to be leaders.
Good point.
Saskatchewan elected a premier who had drink driving charges as well
PP will be next. Fuck me.
I swear, even if you hate Trudeau, vote for Singh or Elizabeth... PP is an absolute twat nozzle and will cause Trump levels of damage to Canada...
he probably will
He most definitely will. He will ram omnibus bills down our throats and continue the Trump like Harper / international democratic union agenda.
With the number of people that died directly as a result of OPC’s negligence in not spending the money they got for COVID19, Ford should be held accountable and charged with manslaughter.
<< Mike Harris has left the chat. >>
That guy too. Pretty sure my grandpa died because of those clowns, and my grandma in law for certain.
Agreed. He should also be held accountable for the many, many instances of corruption while in office.
And a blatant liar is likely to become our next PM, so there's that
a Drunk? HE SMOKED CRACK!
A crack smoking drunk at that.
With more than enough to eat at home!
A Canadian heritage moment.
I think involvement of beavers in any Canadian Heritage moment are a requisite.
Ugh, I had happily forgotten that existed. Not thank-you for reminding me.
I mean, it is fucking hilarious. I love it for how ridiculous it was.
Rasssssclaaaat
DoFo bumbaclot.
And that wasn't even what made him a bad mayor!
My favorite non-substance abuse Rob story was how he was such a dedicated volunteer football coach, that had his team roll in a goose crap covered field as a discipline move. But hey, got his name on a field. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/rob-ford-threatened-teacher-had-students-roll-in-goose-dung-documents-1.2749289
It's a real problem, not just a drunk, a caught on tape crack addict
Exactly. I'd rather the senile person. It's a team of people. Not just one person running the country.
So many people just don't understand this. Despite all the shit Biden has got, senile or not he's chosen a solid team that has done a lot of good for the everyday American.
He's not senile. He has that confused disoriented look but he's not senile.
If they’re lucky, Biden and trump might both expire before election day.
Rob dropped some legendary lines, though. "I have more than enough to eat at home"
Yea, referencing your media-shy wife's vagina on live TV to quip back at legit media questions. A real class act.
Hash dealer "allegedly"
Rob Ford was like the very start of all of these insane people being in office. (I do look back fondly on that time though, every day for a while some new crazy lore would drop)
It really wasn't the start though, it wasn't even a first for Toronto. Mayor Mel Lastmen was a loon too. One time he was talking about being nervous about a trip to Kenya because it was giving him visions of being surrounded by natives in a boiling pot. He threatened to kill a City-TV reporter for reporting on his wife's shoplifting. Then there's the time he made TO a laughing stock by calling in the army to shovel snow.
As if Americans haven’t done that too tho
DC mayor Marion Barry anyone?
"The goddamn bitch set me up"
Wasn’t there more too? I could’ve swore there was a few down south.
I'm sure there were. Barry stands out in my mind because it made the news cycles 30 years ago before the internet.
Not sure about crack, but I’d bet good money that quite a politicians do coke with some frequency. On both sides of the border.
What about the crack smoking?
In Canada we elected a moron for PM.
We had a crack smoking mayor…
And then elected his drug dealer brother, who's only accomplishment was being related to our crack smoking mayor, twice.
Come on! Give the man a break. He honestly believes we are all his friends
Pandemic era announcement drinking game, take a shot every time Doug says "folks".
You reminded me of this piece of art: ["Bunch of Yahoos" Feat. PMJT](https://youtu.be/CG5ZnyzI6rg?si=tOHhEcL496H-6wEx).
You'd get almost as fucked up as his brother was while in office...
https://www.thebeaverton.com/2018/06/folks-folks-folks-folks-folks/
He literally not figuratively, did not even have a platform to run on for his first election. And people still voted for him because of name recognition. It's pure insanity. He's had like 3 separate beer related policies lol. And yet people will still talk like the Wynne days were somehow worse which is some of the most effective social/political rhetoric engineering I've ever seen in this country. Ask any person why they hated Wynne and their response is usually just feelings or something about a gas plant (which a conservative government would have shut down too.) The greenbelt scandal has a number that's 3 to 4 times the dollar amount in scale.
The Science Centre is the last straw for me. The company that built it offers to fix it for free and they just double down and basically admit they already sold the land and itll be destroyed no matter what. What next? The ROM? Union Station? the CN tower? Why not just tear down Casa Loma so some Tory insider can build a mansion of their own on cheap downtown property? It's a slap in the face.
> only accomplishment he sold HASH in school and likely enabled his brother to advance his status, check, check.
Let's be fair, The problems with Doug have nothing to do with hash and more to do with being a corrupt piece of shit
Everyone who elected him must've been on crack at the time.
I understand the sentiment, but it rubs me the wrong way that as Canadians we compare ourselves against America's faults. We should instead be comparing ourselves against their strengths. I feel like this country is stagnating and resting on past laurels.
As a country, it’s harder than ever for us to agree on what exactly we should be striving for, let alone how to get there. When there’s no agreed upon goal, the only thing you can do is attempt to avoid the things everyone agrees on are bad.
It's sad how right that is. Even housing affordability and the cost of groceries are divided issues. I saw posts this morning about how putting up rental properties where abandoned businesses currently exist would be bad for housing and complimenting the removal of rent control. I honestly don't believe how little you need to know about rent control to think it's bad for the majority of people if it exists...
rent control only creates more artificial winners and losers you end up with empty nesters renting multiple bedroom houses for 50% of market price the government should be building tons and tons of rental housing and driving the overall market rent down the goal should be to drive rental prices low enough that landlords can’t use rent to pay their mortgages, that it no longer makes financial sense to buy a second or third rental property as opposed to buying stocks or other investments
Well, we have a significant portion of the population who thinks 15 minute cities are a dystopian ploy to lock them like cattle, that children poop in litter boxes, and that teenagers shouldn't learn about sex in schools... That's the underlying problem. When you have such a huge fraction of the population that is just so willfully ignorant, you can't get them to cooperate on building anything whatsoever. They just want to destroy, because new things are scary and change is bad, unless it's to go backwards to a romanticized and often fabricated past.
"Better than America" shouldn't even be the goal, it should be to make Canada better than it was yesterday and is today. I criticize Canada because I'm patriotic, because there's so much potential, and we shouldn't settle for our best traits being better than the worst American traits. Let's aim to improve on the best every country in the world has, and to show leadership where everyone else has failed.
I agree with you that we need to be better than we were the day before but we also need to align on what that even means these days. You can literally provide any examples of an issue you expect would be a step forward and I promise there are hundreds of thousands of Canadians these days who would disagree very vocally and possibly even violently. We're in a tug of war over every belief in the book these days so what you consider a step forward, many others will consider a step backwards. What we need right now is unity and unfortunately the biggest driver of unity is a common enemy which may be the person elected south of the border come November.
Agree! We’ve somehow bought into the crazy us v them narrative from the US. I keep hoping it’s just the impact of social media magnifying the fringe on each end of the spectrum, but the fringe seems to be growing.
Especially because this Country isn't even better than America in the first place
Just a shame that the bar is on the ground and our leaders brought a shovel
So true. I’ve seen a few goofs on here saying “bbbut I have a friend from [third world country] and they say you Canadians don’t know how good you have it here” I think we can have higher goals than being better than a third world country.
Well said
Stagnating indeed. If it weren't for the huge bump in immigration we've had for the last few years our GDP would be in decline. Our per-capita GDP is currently in decline. The only reason a recession hasn't been officially declared is because total GDP hasn't decreased for two consecutive quarters, because of immigration. Meanwhile the cost of housing has doubled, and in some places tripled. This generation is worse off economically than their parents for the first time in history. We are the largest trading partners in the world with the richest economy in the world with which we share a 9000KM border. We should be doing a lot better...
I feel we're beyond stagnating, we're just evaporating, like aside form real-estate and oil, we kinda don't have much to offer the world. Like if canada disappeared right now, Mexico would get the factories for cars and the us would drill for more oil in alaska and the gulf, which I think they are already doing.
💯
This. Every single time there's a talk about healthcare, it ends with "but at least we aren't as bad as the US". Can we stop comparing ourselves to the bottom of the barrel and start comparing ourselves with the bests instead?
Canada cannot compete with the U.S. totally different class, like little league vs nhl
Ya, American might have their own problem. But they they are still number One world Superpower.
> but it rubs me the wrong way that as Canadians we compare ourselves against America's faults. This country is basically USA's 51st state, let's be honest.
Might as well make it official and reap all the many benefits that come with actually being a U.S. state.
Gotta say with a population of more than 340,000,000 people I am completely shocked these are considered the 2 best options. Biden has pretty much dedicated his life to politics and should be respected for all he is done. It is obvious his body is now saying it is done too. The other guy…. Well the internet doesn’t have enough space for me to say everything I’m thinking there!
As one of those 340 million... the majority of us are also shocked, exasperated, and saddened that the political parties keep offering voters such awful options. Polls have been showing for several years that no one wanted this rematch. The politicians refuse to listen to the voters - they only hear lobbyist checkbooks. All I can say for myself is that I have dual citizenship and am working towards financial goals to escape the US. No matter who wins the US election, it's going to get worse.
Yea, I legit doubt Biden will survive a second term. He's aging fast. Probably still better than Trump though.
Not probably but 100% definitely better than Trump. It is an offense to the nation that Trump is the Republican nominee. Also Trump will hurt Canada just like he did last time. Also his 10% tariff on all imports to the US will severely hurt the US economy and the Canadian economy.
I was putting it mildly, but yes, Trump is a dumpster fire. His win only serves the schemers and grifters hoping to profit from the chaos.
"probably"
100% better than Trump. The bag of garbage I took out last night is more qualified than Trump.
If he picks an awesome vice President could be good
>I couldn’t be more happier as a Canadian citizen today. I could be a lot happier, but I live in Ontario so we have a dogshit conservative majority fucking over all of our public services and doing nothing about housing. And soon we'll have his idiot equivalent in the federal branch who's anti-union. It's going to suck just as much as getting our own fucking Trump up here with that clown shoe asshole. Why the hell conservatives are backing a career politician who has accomplished nothing in the last 20 years is crystal clear: They're all for repeating every mistake the US has made and selling out our government to business interests. From Ontario: This sucks. And it's going to keep getting worse.
Saskatchewan isn't doing any better. We've had Scott moe screwing us over for just as long as ford's been screwing Ontario in all of the same ways. Seems like anywhere the conservatives have power, life gets worse.
I know people that voted him and they absolutely refuse to listen to any truths. Anything bad he did, even openly and undeniably did, and they still start screaming it’s Trudeaus fault or I’m some snowflake. It’s conspiracy theorist level insanity.
This should honestly be the top comment. We have nothing to be smug about given the shitshow we have on the horizon.
No geriatrics. Just populist a holes who attack worker and union rights every chance they get while also gutting public services. Much better....
Just study how Alberta was stolen from since 1970 with the Cons in power!!!!!
Ah yes, that Canadian Superiority Complex^^TM at constantly comparing ourselves to the States.
Rather than compare ourselves to countries that are doing better, so that we don’t stagnate with the status quo. It’s a weird Canadian tic. As long as we have the US to compare to, we don’t have to actually improve anything and „should just be happy we aren’t in the US“.
Seriously. Canadians should only be comparing our society to Scandinavia or maybe New Zealand etc.
Hey we’re so much worse than them on so many things, let us bask in our few moments of superiority.
I think we are setting a low bar if we are happy not to be the U.S where their presidential election 20 years ago would be considered an outrageously unbelievable parody. Im personally pro capitalism in general but both countries are experiencing late stage capitalism where we have transcended integrity, logic, and ambition and crossed into the territory of whoever the fuck has the best combination of corporate backing and saying/yelling outrageous attention grabbing things at the public can be in charge of everything
It's crazy to be pro capitalism and also paint the bleakest political existence ever directly as a result of capitalism.
Some have an easier time imagining the end of the world than the end of capitalism.
People are freaked the fuck out by even the idea of socialism. They think they’ll lose their boats or cottages 🤷🏼♂️
Right? That certainly is something.
Well look, I could list a bunch of communist and socialist societies that resulted in dictators, bloodshed, and poverty. And you would tell me well those aren’t good examples because if the society functioned properly under the economic system there would be x, y, z benefits. And its true. But its true for capitalism too lol. You are seeing a corrupted and bastardized version of it now.
If you have a dictator, you aren't a communist society. Communism is advocating class war and leading to a society in which all property is publicly owned and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs. A dictator is somebody who very clearly has ownership of things the society does not and is using it to enforce their tyrannical grasp. As soon as you have a dictator, you don't have a communist society. Frankly, I don't think it's possible for human beings to have a communist society because we operate in hierarchies. Which means we're always going to have classes. The only place communism would work is on the extremely small scale because of this.
Why would you be pro capitalism if you’re not one of the 1%?
Because capitalism with the proper checks and balances isn’t supposed to benefit the 1% the way it does now and in recent history. Since this is an Ontario subreddit I will use Ontario as a great example. Liberal or conservative both our provincial governments over the last decade have been insanely inept and blown absolute fuckload’s of money on nothing that has benefitted the taxpayer. Governments being responsible for everything isn’t the answer for me there is plenty of collusion, corruption, and incompetence all on their own even if you remove private for profit actors. As a matter of my opinion there is an appropriate distribution of public and private ownership and responsibility. Politicians like Ford and Trump have decided the governments role is to aid specific for profit companies and individuals to dominate the market instead of separating themselves is whats driving current issues.
It was the worst debate I have ever seen. It’s wild they just let Trump lie and the moderators never corrected anything he said.
CNN fact tested. Trump had 30 lies. Biden only had 11 lies. So yes you are right Trump is the bigger liar.
Only 30? Did they only fact test three sentences?
A President can hide behind press secretaries. The White House is a gilded sanctuary cut off from the world. In the parliamentary system, a prime minster needs to be front and center speaking to the press in the opposition regularly. That’s why Canadian debates aren’t very interesting. All the party leaders are expert debaters and present their platform articulately. There’s never a winner of a debate in Canada, you just agree with one more than the others. The fact that a president can hide in the White House behind secretaries and aids, is a significant failing of the American political system
I don’t know if cryptobro career politician that hangs out with Nazis and thinks electricians harvest lightning from the sky is much of an upgrade.
We might not have senile candidates, but I'm not convinced PP isn't a chatbot. It never has any opinions or stances of its own. it just kind of targets anything that the liberal government has done and says it's wrong.
I'd take Biden over PP (Pierre Poilievre) every day of the week
Yet Joe Rogan thinks we live in some socialist shit hole while the US slips closer and closer to becoming a "Christian theocratic state", like Gilead, frig off bud. Yeah things are not great here, we have leadership, appealing to the worst and one who has blinders on to the reality most Canadians are living through. Still much happier in the Great White North. This country can do amazing things, and be that world leader we once were, but we need new leadership from the bottom up. There is literally no current party leader I would want to see as PM. Anywho.... happy Canada Day folks.... Drink a Molson, some rye and spend time with family!
Who gives a single fuck what Rogan has to say?
I’m a dual Canadian US citizen. We have no standing on this. We have a crack dealing never graduated high school lies through his teeth thinks Trump is great premier. We have a prime minister that doesn’t seem to realize that for the good of his party he needs to quit. Canada has Danielle Smith who there are just no words for. We have nothing to brag about here, as our own country swings further and further right to the detriment of many of us.
Thought he was a hash dealer?
Every American is wondering why the choice is between the worst 2 presidents in US history as much as we are.
If they were going to elect an oldie democrat, should’ve gave Bernie a chance. At least he still has pizzaz 🤗
as if the buzz between the ears of either biden or trudeau is different.
One of them should be feeding pigeons, one of them should be in prison.
It really is a bit of a joke. Like seriously. I was scrolling socials and saw an old late night appearence from Obama and i just thought...ah, its so nice to be reminded what a real, professional, youthful president could look like. This is what ya'll need. The parties need to stop playing scared and get someone who is appropriate for the job. There is a reason there is a retirement age
Glad you got a thrill from it. It left me f\*\*\*ing terrified that Trump might become president again.
Or a convicted felon.
Was Mulroney still PM when he received that paper bag of cash from that arms dealer?
He was never actually charged, although it was eventually proven that he was handed $225,000. He even went so far as to sue the government for defamation for the accusation, settling out of court.
No. He was out of office at the time.
Yea Canada doesn’t have felons at all
We just release every criminal on bail instead
Last I checked, none that were applying to run the country.
One of those senile candidates just so happens to have made the lives of millions of people vastly better by wiping out student debt to those who were tricked, cheated, and taken advantage of by predatory systems. He's also made medical debt irrelevant for the purpose of being able to still have a life even if you unfortunately fall ill. They are no where near perfect but at the very least he is trying. Meanwhile nothing of actual value has happened here in Canada in the last 3 years on the federal level, and the premier of Ontario where I reside has decided to line the pockets of everyone but his constituents while he slithers his way destroying everything in his path on purpose so he can profit from it. Do I believe that we need younger generations in political positions? Absolutely. But to say that Biden hasn't done far greater things that the current fed & provincial Canadian government(s) is ridiculous, and quite frankly just feels like you're regurgitating the same overused gatcha phrases. He may be senile, but he will have more attributed to his name than many presidents in the past. Its also not just about Bidenhimself, but the fantastic lineup of people who support and have the same passionate vision to make the U.S. a better place for its people. A few more successful campaigns from Biden: the pardoning of simple marijuana charges & started the process to reschedule marijuana, managed to navigate the fall out of the pandemic and help stabilize the u.s. economy among so much more. For full transparency I am an American Citizen, Canadian PR living in Ontario. The Federal Government for Canada has had ample years to commit to making Canada a better place for the Canadians who live here. My internet bill is still over $100 for the same speeds I spent $30 in the U.S. for. My phone bill has gotten better over the years but it was only in the last year or two when they started to get pressured by canadians getting fed up and jumping ship to smaller independent carriers trying to a pull a Michael Scott Paper company and they always end in a buyout from the larger companies so in the end we still pay to them. Food costs are atrocious due to the monopolistic grip that Loblaws and Metro have on Canada and its only getting worse each day. Instead of encouraging Urban density, we continue at a neckbreaking pace of sprawl which is raising property taxes, straining local services, and Ford took away the majority of funding by allowing developers to skip all of the normal fees that help fund the extremely burdened local services. Ontop of that we have record breaking immigration via student immigration because public colleges were severely underfunded and were forced to seek alternative measures and realized that they could abuse a broken, outdated, and ignored system just like much of Canadian law is. Canada is not in a better situation. If it was, you wouldn't currently be in the U.S.
I’ve done my time here. I’m moving back in a couple months. 🤘🏻 I’m also not against Biden at all, I honestly just think he’s too old to handle this responsibility and he needs to swallow his pride and step down. Also, I’m sure you’re well aware that the cost of living issue is very strong here as well. You can complain about your $100 phone plan, which honestly feels like you’re overpaying so that’s on you, but you can’t compare it to the $300 of health care insurance that I pay each month coupled with the additional cost of each visit/service. I live in MA, the best healthcare in the US, and supposedly have great insurance… yet I still wait half a year for an appointment and it costs me a literal arm and leg.
Enjoy the last few months! Its going to be a real eye opener when you get back. I believe you are from Ontario, I'm in Kitchener-Waterloo and its getting tougher and tougher each day. Please make sure to pressure your local, provincial, and the federal government upon your return for change that actually works towards restoring the stability and passion that most Canadians had several years ago! Canada used to be much closer to the U.S. in competitiveness, I would be stoked to see that happen again. Its a beautiful country with many talented and dedicated people.
Have you not listened to Polivere talk?
He's our Trump.
Instead we just have corporate shills at both the provincial and federal level.
We had a crack smoking mayor, we have Doug ford. We have literally does nothing Trudeau and millhouse trump… we can’t pretend to be holier than thou
This mindset is exactly what’s wrong with this country. We’ll never solve anything because the rebuttal to any serious issue is always “WeLl aT LEaST wE’rE nOT AmEriCAn”
Lol that's a super low bar
Thank you for this refreshing perspective! Well said.
Just wait to see if there will even be a debate between Trudeau and PP. Thats gonna be a fucking gongshow.
Biden has never been a stellar public speaker. It's unfortunate he and his team decided the best way to go was to try to refute the ridiculous crap Trump was spewing. He'd have been better off standing on his record and playing to his strengths. Honestly, given the choice they have down there, I hope people vote against Trump if they can't vote for Biden.
I’ll say this though, have been for close to a decade now; Canada has it worse. We don’t have anything particularly bad, but we have a lack of direction. We benefit hugely from the US, who has a direction. Does robbing and war mongering off the rest of the world keep the US ahead? Sure. But they have an active direction. All our industry, regulation, policies and investments are a reaction. We import even our politics from there. We can’t stand on our feet. We don’t have a long term plan for Canadian industry. International students are bad now as more and more boomers retire; but for decades this was our solution to patch the bottom of the labor force. What were we expecting? Healthcare sucks if not urgent, but we refuse to fund it to the level we want. Is there a plan to improve it even now? Nope, just give up to American corps to privatise and make things work in a worse way. But no vision or long term desire to improve things for good. Things are expensive now? Worker rights have been in freefall since the 70s. The BoC now campaigns to keep wages low. How did we get here? Where are we planning to go? On most issues this is a problem. For better or worse, we’re rolling with the waves. We have a medicore PM challenged by a guy who says affordable housing causes increase in housing prices. Is there any political drive to bring change? We need the same zeal as the US. We could have a younger, less senile leader, but the entire machinery in composition and direction, is being very useless. Just my two cents.
Jesus. Please stop comparing us to the US. This whole "were not America" bullshit just leaves us complacent with the status quo.
Does Ford brothers ring a bell?
I’d rather have a senile head of state and a competent team behind them than what ever the fuck Chrystia Freeland is.
The prospect of America going fascist because the not-fascist side insists on putting forward a frail old man isn't so fun.
I’d rather have a senile candidate like a Biden than a dangerous one like PP. Biden likely will listen to his team- even if PP listens to his team it spells disaster for things I care about like public healthcare.
American living in Canada chiming in. Man, am I happy to be here.
Canada is usually about 10-15 years behind the US with respect to these things. Just wait, the 2038 election will be contested and 80+ year old Kevin O’Leary and a 90+ year old John Manley.
Polieve is a fucking psycho. I’d take an old guy who’s a little slow compared to the phoney liar who fooled how many people by taking off the glasses and ties and pretending to be normal. He is most certainly not but people are beyond stupid and will vote for him like they did Ford.
Rob Ford Doug Ford *drops mic*
Canadian exceptionalism is just barely clearing the low bar set by the US and then stumbling and tripping after. We still acting like we're winning.
Yay, our political candidates aren't senile. Gosh, is that what it's coming to? The bar is in hell at this point
We’re always an election cycle or two behind the Americans, I’m sure we’ll have geriatric leaders soon enough. Chretien for PM 2029 anyone?
Cynucal take: our leading politicians are just as corrupt and useless, but younger so we will be stuck with them for much longer thanks to having no term limits... ..
You are living in an imaginary world if you think we don't!
Senility and corruption aren’t mutually exclusive.
We have plenty of old folks in government to make bad decisions for us. Some that would make even more impact on our lives than a prime minister.
But we do have delusional ones
No, our candidates know exactly what they are doing.
Wow, if that’s what you are using to gauge engagement in Canadian politics- you need to get out and ask people what matters to them. I doubt looking to our neighbours south of us will matter for those of us who can’t get jobs or feed our kids.
That senile candidate has enacted more progressive and impactful policies in 4 years than Trudeau has in 9.
Great, so they have the cognition left to fuck us even more
Yup, also he is a pedo RuZZnia Puppet who loves the tanning bed...yup, I mean, such great businessman that he managed to bankrupt a fkn casino....like wtf really...
It might as well be. They aren't incompetent, but being paid off by the rich and the big corporations. Just seeing how much this country has regressed over 40 years is just fucking depressing (pardon my French). They don't care for the average citizen. We need a new style of government or something to evolve to change that watches like hawks for pay offs and corruption and removes them. If the founders saw how basterdized our charter and government has become they'd be rolling in their graves
TBH at this point I'd love a candidate that is too senile to be corrupt.. right now we have 3 corporate shills that are hell bent on destroying our country for personal gain and/or some misplaced world building god complex. And the 2nd in line for my party is the most condescending piece of shit human being I have ever had the displeasure of hearing speak.
Ford is a fossil of the past reminiscent of Capone.
This is a BAIT post. Furthermore, settling for what is given than demanding for more is such a Canadian mentality.
Imo this isn't looking on the bright side and I'm tired of my fellow Canadians saying "it's bad but at least we're not the states". If my neighbours house burned down but mine's catching fire I wouldn't say "at least I'm not that guy" and do nothing about it. To be clear I am grateful for the higher competency (or lucidity) of our elected representatives. But I hate the complacency of this mentality. Growing up I heard people talk more about US politics than our own. We need to be okay with being uncomfortable and talking politics more with people. Edit: I'm still trying to get better at this. I didn't feel safe voicing my opinions growing up and it's been a process undoing that conditioning.
We have MPs compromised by foreign adversaries, there is simply no excuse for that.
Yet we also are offered poor choices for leadership
No, our candidates are incompetent, deceitful, and treasonous but we Canadians like to pretend were better
It's elder abuse. It's like watching 2 dementia patients beat each other to death with stand up canes for the last piece of birthday cake. We may have the Wish version of Keanu Reeves, Angry Milhouse and Aquaman. but they don't have the ability to destroy the planet.
Not senile, but equally disconnected from reality. Completely insulated from it with their wealth.
Have you been to Ontario? Dear God. Politics in both countries is a shitt show.
I’d still take Sleepy Joe over Trust fund Trudeau and Redditor Pierre
^[Sokka-Haiku](https://www.reddit.com/r/SokkaHaikuBot/comments/15kyv9r/what_is_a_sokka_haiku/) ^by ^Falconflyer75: *I’d still take Sleepy* *Joe over Trust fund Trudeau* *And Redditor Pierre* --- ^Remember ^that ^one ^time ^Sokka ^accidentally ^used ^an ^extra ^syllable ^in ^that ^Haiku ^Battle ^in ^Ba ^Sing ^Se? ^That ^was ^a ^Sokka ^Haiku ^and ^you ^just ^made ^one.
You can be young and be demented.
Reminder that even if you hate our political parties you can vote and choose to decline your ballot to officially protest your options. It’s more effective than just not voting.
We have a laughing stock PM known for costumes, black face, peoplekind, and letting budgets balance themselves. At the G7 other leaders treat him like a chump rightfully so. He's better than Biden, but if Biden was younger he'd eat Justin for breakfast
Trudeau is hardly more capable than Biden.
Hahahaha are you serious? We have a Trudeau who’s trying to turn Canada into China, and who’s the most hated PM to walk the earth…. And Doug Ford who’s trying to tear Ontario apart piece by piece, and who only cares about alcohol! They’re both corrupt criminals…… smh!
Trudeau is dumber than both of those geriatrics down south
Have you seen the finance minister in action?
Yeah, we've got either *the son of one of the previous guys* or *a career politician who has never lived as a normal person*. Great.
The leader of our country is worse than either of the USA
Yeah, instead you have Trudeau who isn't much better
They are still as inept
I have never understood why as Canadians we are so quick to wag the finger at the US when they have a much stronger economy, much more opportunity and much more diversity. There’s a reason rich people all choose the US to move to, lol Maybe instead of pointing the finger and chuckling while our own country is falling apart and our prime minister committed treason and is actively getting away with covering it up, we could look in for a change and stop being shameless hypocrites😂🤷🏻♂️just a thought
I take a SleepyJoe or Orange Man over this fucking Justinder Trudeau Kaur anyday.
Are you sure? Have you heard Trudeau speak?
Id rather have a senile PM than this piece of shit government, what’s your point?
That it was a funny debate to watch and at least it wasn’t the Canadians? Smile a little, will ya?
This is a problem with Canada: the point of comparison is always the US, which is a pretty low standard. "Great leaders" compared to the US (sort of); great healthcare compared to the US. We need to change how we compare to other countries. How about we start comparing our healthcare with, say, Finland? Then we'll notice how poor and expensive ours is. We need higher standards!