What a Week for the Conservatives

I am sure that the Federal Conservatives are not looking forward any talk of an election this week. This week news has come out about the Conservative party apparently offering bribes and leaking information that affects a foreign election. This is a classic case of what not to do, and what to do instead.

Well if you want and election, and someone is not going to vote for an election that you want, by all means offer to pay them 1 million dollars. Well that is what some people have suggested the conservative party tried to do. So then you wonder why the have not said we did not offer the MP any money. The PM's office will not say that they did not offer the MP money even when prompted. It would be great if they did, or even say we offered him (fill in here) much to do (fill in here) with it. I am sure they would not just give him money just to vote, I am sure they would find another good reason for it.

Then with comments that all the NAFTA talk was just lies was a great idea. For their defense they went against both Hilary and Barack, yes they went after both sides. But those sides are just the Democrats. So yes he did take a side, the Republicans, something that nobody should do if they want to win a majority in Canada. I know that sounds bad but it is true, Canadians generally do not support republican party politics. I do not think there is a good way to get out of this position for the PMO, but I am sure there are ways not to do it. I hope that it does not become and international issue that makes Canada look bad.

These happened after the great Peterborough Train, and a Conservative senator complaining about how useless the senate is. It would help if the senator has actually showed up to say half of the votes, and say at least one committee meeting.

Super Tuesday 2.0

So I was hoping that the First Super Tuesday would be able to tell us who was going to represent the Democrats in the Presidential election. Well one month later we sill have no idea who is going to lead them. Yes I guess we do have an idea, Hilary or Barack, but there is not clear winner. Well we know who two people who are running are: Nader and McCain.

Hilary does not have a complete chance at winning the nomination because she will not be able to win all of the delegates needed to pull ahead of Barack's pledged delegates. This will mean that she will have to win over more super delegates, which she could. She could also gain momentum, being able to win so many of the large, powerful and 'important' states. She is also married to the Comeback Kid from the 1992 primary season, that is a positive point. She is also only 140 in pledged delegates behind Barack, only 100 total. That is less than 3% of the total votes that could be casted at the convention.

Barack has a much better chance at winning the nomination but he could slip and start to show weaknesses which could spell the end of his campaign. If what he said to the Canadian authorities did actually happen than he is no better than any other politician. It could end the honeymoon that he has had with the media, nobody really has taken shots at him. If that starts to happen and he is not able respond well or hold his own, he could loose his lead. There has been some talk about how he has not been a seasoned politician, I hope that does not affect him negatively.

Why are there two 'great' people running for this year to be president for the democrats while 4 years ago there was not really anyone who was good. I know that it was because they were going against a 'great' president. (some people think they are great, but I will let you decide). This has been a less interesting one that the ones of the 1960s and 1970s.

Walking in the Urban Environment

Well the news in New Zealand was interesting a few days ago. There was first a story about how Kids should walk to school, then a story about how Auckland is cutting funding to foot paths. These issues are tied, the affects of one will directly affect the other one, and cutting funding will cause both of them to fail.

It was interesting to read that not only in North America do we have issues of people driving their kids to school. In the last 15 years the number of people driving to school has increased by 66%. It has become such a problem in some areas that there are rush hour like issues of people traveling to the schools. According to the news article 40% of rush-hour traffic is educated related, but who know what educated related means. To get more kids to walk to work they are having famous sport stars and politicians walking with kids to school. That would be so much fun, who would not want to walk with your favorite politician to school.
Most of these ideas are interesting but the issue of the built form of the neighbourhoods would be a better way to address this issue. If a child can not safely walk to their school, why would they walk rather than drive.

At the same time as there are efforts to encourage people to walk more, Auckland is cutting back their footpath redevelopment plan. Auckland has most of the population and wealth of New Zealand, if you are wondering. The city government is also not looking at reducing funding to road improvements in the area. The government should fund both automobile and non-automobile projects at the same rates and force cuts on both of them. I do not know the jurisdictional issues around roads for Auckland so that may be the reason why they are not cutting back on roads.