Boy am I glad to be here!!!
I have found my place among the GPC! My true and final conversion came after a lengthy evening read of Vision Green - a tremendous exposure of the underlying values and vision of this fantastic party.
At one point - shamefully in the not-so-distant future - I thought of the Green Party as a far, far-left group of tree-huggers whose only care was preservation of the environment at the expense of anything else.
But I am now enlightened, as they say, to your true nature as a party. To OUR true nature as a party! We transcend the two-party, Left vs. Right system that has bogged Canadian politics in a decades-long arm-wrestling match where each side is too scared to elect the other because of what it would mean for their own values.
The GPC bears many sound arguments on both the left and right side of the spectrum. We believe in alternatives that have a profoundly positive long-term economic effect, as opposed to the band-aid approaches the "usual" parties keep throwing at us.
I believe strongly in the entrepreneur, in small business as the backbone of our country. I believe in the creation of jobs in all sectors of our country. I believe we should be proud of the abundance of resources that the rest of the world could only wish they had! I believe in social progress, equality, that the government DOES NOT have the right to invade the privacy of people's homes. I believe that the long-term benefits of a massive shift to alternative energies will allow us to decrease dependency on oil and gas, and thus be able to export more of these products and flow billions of dollars into Canada! I believe that our infrastructure is desperately in need of change and that neither Liberal, NDP, or Conservatives have even close to the right idea.
I DO NOT believe in privately signing agreements like the SPP which literally make the import of Chinese goods, and the rapid export of many many more Canadian jobs, a streamlined process. I do NOT believe that the Prime Minister, without approval of the House of Commons or of the Senate, has the right to place the sovereignty of our country in dire jeopardy! I DO NOT believe the current framework for NAFTA offers anything close to equal trade and that Canada has the resources to start playing hardball against corporate bullying. I DO NOT believe in allowing American troops to patrol INSIDE of our borders and make arrests. I DO NOT believe in fear-based governance with the intent of robbing liberties, such as we have especially seen in the last two years.
Lucky for me, I found a place where my beliefs actually fall in sync. I am a newly-converted GPC who has left the Conservatives. Winning the debates entry was a monumental success for Mrs. May, and every Canadian who has seen what the US debates have become and fought for ours to be truly democratic has both my praise and my undying gratitude. We need to free ourselves from the 2-Party shackles! We need to get Vision Green into the hands of the public! We need to approach the youth of our country with sincerity and truth - they will be the true rain-makers for change in the coming years.
I am absolutely DYING to give my time and effort towards this party. I already have some very good ideas for exposure of our ideals so we can rid ourselves of the stereotypical tree-hugger image and show the rest of Canada that our Vision Green policy is by far the strongest approach to our long-term needs than any of the scripted, rehearsed statements the other parties have made.
Let's show the rest of Canada the truths they have been looking for for so long!
Derek.
As Canadians we must fight the corporatization of our country and stand up against such proponents of it as the Security and Prosperity Partnership. When we have our national census being taken and stored by Military-Industrial Complex beneficiary Lockhe
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Me too
And like you, I'm itching to get busy volunteering for the party. Have made my willingness and skills known to the local riding. Unfortunately, I'm hampered by transportation issues. If there are any Green candidates that need a basic website, or maintenance of a website already set up, do contact me. I have some competence, especially with HTML and CSS, both of which I taught online for awhile - not with scripting, although I can use and tweak basic scripts (but not create them).
Unlike you, Derek, I didn't come from the Tory side of the political spectrum. Prior to 2004, when Layton ran in that federal election campaign, I tended to vote NDP although there were things about the party I didn't like even back then.
Since that time, it has been Green, both provincially and federally.
Was a Green member for a bit, but had to withdraw that membership due to my having become involved with a nonprofit (WISE). Since WISE went defunct earlier this year (thanks to changes made to Status of Women Canada by the Harper government), I can come out again in my support for the Greens.
WISE Book - Policies of Exclusion, Poverty & Health: Stories from the front
Podcast Channel: http://bcseawalker.podbean.com/
Personal Blog: Challenging the Commonplace - and other irreverent activities
http://challengingthecommonplace.blogspot.com/
Welcome Derek!
Very glad to have you in our party. I'm a Nova Scotian Green who was once of another political stripe.
After Jack Layton's non-democratic pronouncements on the debate and the dearth of action around proportional representation, I am embarassed to admit I was once (in my desolate youth) a New Democrat.
One of the primary reasons for the ascent of the Canadian Greens is our "big tent" philosophy and approach. This gives the party a depth and vitality which other parties can only dream of.
Once again, very delighted that you've seen the Green light!
Chris
Chris Alders
Head Organizer, Green Party of Nova Scotia
902-678-0326
(cell) 902-680-2723
chris.alders@greenparty.ns.ca
Welcome Derek
I am really excited too to be part of a party drawing from both sides of the traditional left/right spectrum, and the centre for that matter. I've long thought humans to be spectacularly deprived of progress in political thought when for centuries but two main political ideas, capitalism and socialism, seem to have been sufficiently dominant so as to couch any and every political idea within their antagonisms. To think that nuclear war would be the price of the disagreement. I came from the NDP to the Greens. I got tired of the NDP for many reasons, one of them being left/right politics. Coming from a culture of entrepreneurs I get the need for a positive business environment. I was dumbfounded at an NDP conference in 06 when I was approached by a Marxist who felt that private enterprise should be abolished!
This is a place where the best nuggets of the great traditions of social democracy, liberalism and conservatism in Canada can thrive without the baggage of left and right, and be integrated with bold new thoughts. Green does not just stand for the environment, it stands for fresh thought. From here could emerge a new perspective in Quebec and English Canada that looks outward toward the world, instead of one inward to ancient separatist and nationalist parochialisms, and the preoccupations that ignore the deeper reconciliation that must be made in participation with First Nations so that we may one day complete our country, both a nation-state born in 1867, and a land much older than that. Bienvenue membres du Bloc, if that party has lost its purpose for you.. and please help me learn the French language, a great and beautiful one.
The green direction is about better, higher quality, more vibrant, and inspired - not a pendulum swinging from righteousness to lefteousness. It is to be brighter, smarter, more determined and compassionate, informed by the past, looking at the future, focused on solving real problems, not pre-conceived ones, freed from the stagnant debate of the past. It's not about small government vs big government, it's about responsive and good government for the 21st century. It's not about choosing social priorities and rejecting the business world or vice versa, it's about the right incentives and policies that allow business to serve social and public goods as a natural by-product of enterpreneurship and freed markets, and about a social floor and foundation.
I want to put forward a new idea then that is inspired by a traditional idea that has never been owned by left or right, yet has allowed democracy to exist in plural societies for centuries - the separation of church and state, an idea that allowed for political freedom to grow out of state capture by religion. Today, that must still be upheld and is still relevant, but today state is too involved in markets, and markets too often capture democracy through state. That is the contemporary problem.
So I suggest the idea of the separation of business and state, allowing political freedom to set standards of human rights, environmental protection, social welfare and democracy as well as insulation from crony capitalism and free markets freed further by institutional structures of free people today, markets freed from the moral and economic uncertainty created by the abuse of greed in the absence of such structures. Perhaps this is the idea that can bring together a social vision with a vibrant free economy of choice and better choices. Let me shop in peace, no more sweatshops, no more destruction of the planet, no more passing by homeless people with my consumer goods packed into a gas guzzler, no more depression of real wages, no more turning away from the weak and the weary (Pink Floyd credited there).
Ok, enough of the rhetorical flourish! Wow, I think I've been watching too much Obama!
Anyway, welcome and hope I didn't embarass myself with enthusiasm.
be good,
arif
Arif Jinha
Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu,
Buddhist, sufi or zen
...only that breath breathing human being
(credit of my signature goes to rumi's poem).
Let us talk about what we can accomplish!
I agree Arif. I am so sick of the political tone which is so negative and destructive. Where is the talk of what we can accomplish? Where is the talk of our worth as a nation? I believe as Greens, and amongst all parties, we need to bring this tone to the stage.
Joel Robitaille
Halifax, Nova Scotia
Thanks all!
Thank you to all who have posted so far, for the wonderful welcome. I am calling the London North Center riding (my riding) tomorrow to see if there is anything I can do for them this week.
Let's get some seats so the general public can see what we are REALLY all about and help them shake off the apathy!