Column 7

Top 5 signs your candidate is having a bad debate
# 5 During opening statement he gives a shout out to O.J.
# 4 Her French translator gives up and leaves for a smoke
# 3 He tries to once again to ignite a “puffy shirt” trend
# 2 His mom goes into hiding.
# 1 Moderator constantly asking “Is that your final answer?”

Headline: Canadian party leaders’ debate goes head to head with US vice presidential debate
Voters were torn between getting information on the Canadian economy and watching the leaders’ debate.
History will be made as for the first time viewers will debate whether to watch a Canadian show rather than a US one.

Headline: Leaders sit at a round table for debates
This kitchen table setting had a Thanksgiving theme with the opposition carving up Harper and offering pie in the sky options.
Green officials declared victory saying this format conserved energy.

Headline: May accuses Harper of buying military equipment from China
In fairness it is probably the only product China sells that has the correct amount of lead in it.

Headline: Media says Harper was too civil during the French debate.
The last thing the media want to see is a grown politician acting like an adult.
Harper later admitted he had trouble with the debate because churlish isn’t his first language.

Headline: Leaders asked to say nice things about each other during French debate
I’m still not sure if “You’re not nearly as stupid as you look” qualifies as an answer.
Elizabeth May told Stephen Harper she thought he was a good father but should use the strap on his cabinet more often.

Headline: Layton accuses Harper of hiding his platform in his sweater
This is different from NDP policies that directly pull the wool over voters’ eyes.
Not to be left out Dion says he has more surprises left up his sleeve.

Headline: Duceppe accuses Alberta and Saskatchewan of ruining the environment
Every time Quebec is forced to take the billions in transfer payments from them Duceppe says he feels so dirty.
In fairness the pollution index doesn’t include the smoke being blown by Quebec artists.

Headline: Opposition parties promise to add taxes to the oil industry
The parties disagreed as to which part of the Golden Goose should be served up first the white meat or dark meat.

Headline: May calls Harper a fraud in both official languages
Unfortunately he could not respond because the phrase over-the-top histrionics doesn’t translate well into French.
It’s clear which one of the leaders will be directly affected by cuts to drama classes.

Headline: Opposition parties continually cite unnamed experts to justify their policies
This shows it isn’t just statistics that are for losers.
I was always led to believe an expert is a spurt that used to be.

Headline: Leaders focus on jobs of the future
The way the economy is going there won’t even be jobs at Future Shop
All the leaders talked about green jobs and they appeared to be getting a head start by recycling old clichés.

Headline: Layton says Harper will give big corporations $50 billion in tax relief
If elected Layton says he will stop the giveaway to companies and concentrate on the real drivers of the economy, welfare.

Headline: Dion introduces 30 day plan once he is elected
This is a limited time offer but if voters act now they will also receive, absolutely free, a complete set of steak knives.
If Dion is elected experts say it will take at least 30 days for his own party to recover from the shock.

Headline: Harper accused of plagiarizing a speech from an Australian politician.
Liberals were outraged saying if he was going to steal anything why not the Green Shift?
Reading from the same page the opposition parties agreed the real issue is Harper being a George Bush clone.

Vancouver voters have been hit with provincial bye elections in-between the Federal Election in October and Civic Election in November. Analysts worry about "ballot fatigue", but that's the beauty of coffee and donuts in school auditoriums in Canadian elections: the voters are more wired than a Starbucks shareholders meeting. - Torben Rolfson

Cross border fun...

It's a shame that the Canadian PM debate and the US vice Presidential debates are at the same time. If Canadians could watch Sarah Palin debate Joe Biden first, Stephane Dion might look articulate in English by comparison.

So the Liberal party just figured out NOW that Stephen Harper copied a 2003 speech almost word for word from Australia's Prime Minister? Who's running this campaign anyway, former U.S. employees of FEMA?

No one would ever accuse US President George W. Bush of plagiarizing a speech. Plagiarism would mean that he would have to have read something.

I think you all need another Trudeau. Now HE was fun!!!! I was a kid at the time but he helped get me interested in politics. And Margaret was I think more qualified to be in charge than Governor Palin. - Janice Hough

The final nail in the coffin of America isn’t the financial crisis, ill advised wars or even the loss of our standing in the world. The final blow to US pride was seeing that our debates were more boring than the Canadians. – Mark Dewar