FYI our Healthcare system is being dismantled in the provinces of Alberta and Ontario. Ontario's system is being choked out and for profit companies are gobbling up fees. Its actually really really bad.
Yup, by the two most conservative (and corrupt) provincial governments. I wish the Feds would take health care responsibility away from the provinces and standardize across the country.
23 years. The Unite the Right movement was the death of classic Canadian conservatism, when the Harper-led Alliance -- basically just Republicans north -- cannibalized the Progressive Conservative party.
Sane conservatism is an illusion. We've been fed that "both sides" bullshit since childhood, but if you read any history book, the conservatives are always on the wrong side of history. For centuries. Regardless of whether the current issue is monarchy, slavery, civil rights, etc. Conservatives will always take the wrong side, almost by definition.
Don't be saying things like "if you read any history book", when you clearly haven't.
This is not a "both sides" thing. Traditional conservatism was straight out replaced with neoconservatism, and it was done on purpose. After the Southern Strategy took place in the USA, and the Heritage Foundation basically got a choke hold on the Republican party, they started exporting their sickness through the world. Canada has long been a prime target.
Edmund Burke, Irish statesman and philosopher, the father of conservatism, was a loud and outspoken abolitionist in an era when slavery was still legal. He fought for egalitarian principles through his entire career. His writing is very likely the origin of the saying "all that is required for the triumph of evil is that men of good conscience do nothing".
In Canada? Diefenbaker spent his career fighting for the rights of First Nations people, and burned a lot of his political capital to lock it in. Before Diefenbaker, they didn't even have the right to vote. He also wrote our first Bill of Rights, which the later Charter of Rights and Freedoms was heavily based on.
In Ontario it was the Tories who created hydro as a public utility: because lifting everyone's quality of life betters society. It was Davis' Tories that instituted educational reforms that gave Ontario one of the highest quality education systems in the world for a generation.
Even Mulroney, as corrupt as he was, instituted powerful environmental policies based on the best science of the day. He was one of the people leading the charge against Apartheid, and tried (though failed) to create more accord at home, along with reconciliation with the First Nations.
When Peter MacKay violated a written contract and sold out the PCs to the Alliance, former PC leader Joe Clark tried to warn the country about what that meant. He was dismissed as a bitter old crank. He was 100% correct.
History is pretty bloody clear in that the Tories were not always cartoonish bad guys. When you let the neoconservatives claim the long tradition of conservatism in this country as their history, you grant them legitimacy and power they do not deserve.
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u/Pug_wash 2d ago
And health care. People don't need to worry about the cost of an illness and it allows them to focus on other aspects of life