With the federal election date wedged between May Day, the traditional international workers’ day, and the full moon on May 3, it seems the stars were aligned for a strange outcome.
Those who saw their Bloc Quebecois Party decimated were likely pleading “M’aidez” — “Help me” — which became the international distress call of “Mayday” for those in the sorely-depleted Liberal Party, too.
That orange wave that began as a ripple after the French language debate swept tsunami-like across our country, and deposited an unlikely new resident in Stornoway.
In every election there’s a call for change that sometimes materializes, but the outcome of May 2 was the sea-change not too many Canadians anticipated, despite all the polling. Things could easily have been even more weird; on Sunday night all news channels world-wide dropped their schedules to cover events in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Imagine if the death of Osama bin Laden occurred a day later during the election results.
With wraps soon to be removed from that hidden agenda we’ve been forewarned of for years, there will be interesting times ahead; such a pity more citizens didn’t exercise their franchise at the poll booths.
Last election the very small turnout resulted in just 22 per cent of the eligible electorate voting for the Conservative Party, which became the minority government. This time, despite all the other upheavals, those numbers barely changed with the Prime Minister of a majority becoming Mr. 24 per cent. Not exactly an overwhelming mandate in our democracy, and two old adages comes to mind: “Be careful what you wish for” and “It’s no use crying over spilt milk.”
Bernie Smith
Parksville
