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CHIMO

(9,223 posts)
Tue May 12, 2015, 07:21 PM May 2015

Voters should have lots of debates – including at least one big TV faceoff: Editorial [View all]


Canadians may roll their eyes and hold their noses through political debates during federal elections – yearning for knockout punches the debates generally don’t deliver. But voters clearly pay attention.

In 2011 the leaders’ debates drew more than 10 million viewers.

The cut-and-thrust, however infuriating, helps us get to know our politicians, get a sense of the issues that move them, get a hint of how effective they’d be leading the country, and hear how they function in les deux langues officielles. For many voters, it’s the only chance to hear the contenders in a face-to-face debate. And many voters start making up their minds only after the debates.

So why then are Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservatives so anxious to wrest control away from the consortium of major broadcasters that traditionally hosts these events, and let other media outfits stage mini-versions?
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/2015/05/12/voters-should-have-lots-of-debates-including-at-least-one-big-tv-faceoff-editorial.html

Having watched Power n Politics tonight, I am very disappointed. It seems that the NDP is siding with the Conservatives.
Having just gone through several years of jockeying votes to keep the Wild Rose out of power it appears that we now have an NDP in Ottawa that is siding up to the Conservatives.
So another election may be required to align things up.
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