Voting day is coming up, and in the midst of all of this campaigning I want to remind everyone that in the history of the earth, and maybe even the universe, no politician ever has been able to deliver on every single promise they made during a campaign.
When making your decision, I encourage you to look at two things.
First, be critical of the campaign promises.
Are you voting because of a specific promise? If so how would you feel if that party backed out, but were still in power?
Which promises seem feasible?
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Some of the candidates have never set foot in parliament and have no first hand experience on how these changes would actually be made. Is there a reasonable plan behind the promise?
Where is the money coming from?
Even the ones with experience may have outlandish proposals for change.
It is important to be critical of them all.
Second, look beyond the promises at the party’s values.
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If they didn’t deliver on any of their promises are they the kind of people you would want in charge of the country?
What do you think their priorities and actions would be if they couldn’t follow through on their promises?
At the end of the day, remember that these people are fighting for a job and their campaign is their job interview: It is when they are at their best, it is when they are confident and hopeful, it is when they say they are creative because they draw pictures in the fog on the mirror every morning.
And not only are you choosing who you will hire to represent you, you are also hiring their boss, without (for most of us) ever meeting them in person.
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Hiring is hard enough, it’s no wonder that choosing someone to vote for is also difficult.
It might seem like decisions made at a federal level don’t even affect you anyway.
But we pay federal income tax, the federal government gives us passports, or grants us residency.
The federal government currently gives financial support to families with children. They give student loans. They run national parks.
They fund, in part, our health care (though the decisions are made by the provincial government). We pay the feds a sales tax.
All of that in the hands of someone who you get to vote for.
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