Jaicee said:
*shrugs* You're just factually wrong about this. I mean you say there's no point of comparison between the Coalition Avenir Quebec and the Conservative Party of Canada, and yet Quebec's premier, Francois Legault, who belongs to the Coalition, has very publicly endorsed the Conservative Party in this federal election: I don't think points of comparison get more direct than endorsements. The question of Quebec sovereignty appears to be the main ideological difference between the two parties, in fact. To be sure, from the standpoint of advancing Quebec's independence from Canada, an endorsement of O'Toole's Conservatives makes sense for Quebec on a certain level, I think, in the sense that the Conservatives often favor more autonomy for the provinces and Quebec compared to the other Canadian parties. However, they're also often stingier in terms of the amount of aid they provide to the provinces and Quebec relative to what they request, I would point out, so there's also a price to going along with the Canadian Tories. You know what doesn't come with such a price? Supporting Quebec sovereignty in a principled way by voting for the Bloc Quebecois. Fortunately (at least in my opinion it's fortunate) that appears to be exactly what many Quebecers are doing right now despite their popular premier's endorsement of the Canadian Conservatives, as that same report above highlights. It goes to show the limits of even Legault's degree of overwhelming popularity (some 80% of Quebecers approve of his job performance according to recent polling) and that many of his supporters actually occupy a political space to his left. As to your comparison of Canada's Conservative Party to our Republican Party here in the U.S., let me just say as an American myself that that comparison is patently absurd. The current leader of the Canadian Conservatives, Erin O'Toole, has publicly declared himself pro-choice, a supporter of Bill C-16 (the sweeping gender identity bill that has resulted in the de-funding of Vancouver Rape Relief and Women's Shelter over their shelter's women-only policy, among other things...which, let's face it, is what Canadians actually mean these days by "LGBT rights" and the kind of legislation I'd rather not see imported here, personally), taxing carbon emissions, and a whole raft of other social policies that frankly I cannot even imagine someone analogous here, like a Republican presidential nominee or a the Chair of the Republican Party ever endorsing, ever. Frankly, even the Canadian Tories' of budgetary hawkishness is quite mild compared to what many Republicans in this country support. Some of these policies for their part are new; a slight, conciliatory leftward shift made under new leadership selected after their second electoral defeat in a row two years ago that effectively renders them basically just a lite version of the Liberal Party on almost every issue. There are Republicans like that in this country (such as Vermont Governor Phil Scott, Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker, or Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, for example), but they're today only politically viable in the liberal-leaning American Northeast and ideologically represent less than 15% of Republican partisans overall. They're different from their Democratic counterparts mainly just in that they veto minimum wage increases and such (and may well get overriden at that). They even take Covid seriously and favor Western-style democracy over the emergent police states of Russia and Eastern Europe, just to be revolutionary. The Coalition Avenir Quebec seems very much like this as well in most respects in my observation. No, the closest analogy to our Republican Party in Canada, and in this election, can be found squarely in the anti-immigrant, anti-abortion, pro-Covid People's Party of Canada, the very creation of which was obviously inspired by the election of Donald Trump to the American presidency in 2016 in the first place. Not exactly being a fan of our "GOP" here, I'm particularly unimpressed with the PPC there. |
Well the only reason for Legault endorsement of the Conservatives is as a rebuke for the Liberals, the Conservatives are the only party who have completely shut down any federal intervention against bill 21 vs Liberal who left the door open (if need be).
Also the liberals were greatly favored to form a majority government early in the race. The CAQ does not like the idea of a majority government on federal level.
Like you pointed out the endorsement does not have any significant impact on Bloc voting intention nor was it expected to. But it could sway many vote from the Liberals to the Conservatives in Quebec though, which could hinder the ability of the Liberals to form a Majority.
Also the CAQ does not have any direct federal party equivalence, which allow them to be flexible with their endorsement except for the Liberals because of the obvious association to the provincial Liberal Party.
Then again there's is a Quebec Conservatives party, it just don't get any love from the electorates.
While Legault 'Endorsed' the conservatives party, make no mistake, he will vote Bloc as Legault was once a member of Quebec Partie Québecois and was about the most separatist you could possibly have.
Asking the then prime minister (Lucien Bouchard) for a referendum about every other week or so.
As for the difference between CAQ and Conservatives.
There is much more than the obvious Sovereign Status of Quebec.
Gun registry program and gun law in general
Oil and natural gas exploitation and regulation
Environment policy and climate change
The only real point of similarities between the two are on the economics side, but as I said before the Quebec Liberals are actualy more akin to the Conservatives on this front than the CAQ.
The CAQ did win their 2018 election by playing the middle ground between the Liberals Right and the 2 Left and sovereignist party (PQ and Quebec Solidaire) after all.
As for the position of O'Toole on Abortion and climate change those are very recent position for the Conservatives and while I welcome those change, I have no confidence that he will follow through on those election time position.
And can you blame me to doubt this position, they even refused to acknowledge climate change existence as recently as this year https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/conservative-delegates-reject-climate-change-is-real-1.5957739
But, of course when compare to the US Republican I though in a much more moderate/refrained way and was based on Conservatives classic position, not the fairly recent change.
Also I had in mind more classic "Bush republican" waiting to be unleashed by a Trump like populist figure.
And, yes, Conservative would hardly register as a party on the Right in the US, still it is the party most to the Right in Canada. (Except for the PPC but it is not even considered as a party by the national Assembly)
Maxime Bernier and the PPC would undoubtedly better fit the comparison to the US Republican of today.
But that said Maxime Bernier was actually a member of the Conservatives party and was only a hair shy of becoming their leader as recent as 2017.
And he only lost to Andrew Sheer (Later replaced by O'Toole) 49.05% vs 50.95% in a race reserved to party members.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Conservative_Party_of_Canada_leadership_election
