That ad campaign that the Ontario government is running must’ve got to me 🙂

Today’s the day that Ontario goes to the polls, so you might as well have your say – it’s your right. A referendum on electoral reform is on the bill this time around, and it can be a bit confusing. YourBigDecision.ca does a descent job of explaining the referendum, but for those looking for the Coles Notes on the referendum, then I’ll distill it for you.

In the current system, you vote for the MPP for your riding and as such, that’s also a vote for the candidate’s political party. If the person that you voted for wins, then they get a seat in the provincial legislature. The party with the most members holding seats in the legislature forms a government, be it a majority or minority one, depending on the number of seats won. Usually the winning party is one of the “big three”; Liberal, Progressive Conservative or the New Democratic Party.

The new system that we’re voting on today will basically entail two votes in subsequent provincial elections; one for their local representative and one for a particular party. The local representative vote is just like how it’s done now. The second vote for the party is a vote for a candidate from a list that political party has assembled, but is not known to the public beforehand. So while it is possible to vote for one of the “big three” parties, it’s also feasible to see lesser-known single-issue parties (Ex: Green, Communist, Family Coalition, Marijuana, etc). This proposed system would almost always result in minority governments, which in itself is fine, but the reigning governments may have to answer to some parties that may or may not be bat shit crazy.

To the polls, Ontari-ari-ari-o!

On a side note, I looked in vain for the much-better version of the song as sung by Jim Carrey on Conan O’Brien‘s show when it was in Toronto a few years back.

A couple of weekends ago, Dena and I were watching Thank You For Smoking (good movie, BTW) and in one scene, Aaron Eckert’s character is helping his son write an essay on the topic of “why is the US government the greatest government in the world?”. Of course, Dena (Team USA) and myself (Team Canada) both turned to each other with a WTF look on our faces. It got me thinking, what does it take for a country to call itself the best at any given thing? Sure, the US media and education system preaches about how it’s the “world’s superpower” and that the “US president is the leader of the free world”. Japan is the most technologically advanced nation. Canada is the most tolerant country. And so on. I thought it was interesting to see which countries are actually number one at…

Literacy (source)
Citizens’ ability to read and comprehend the written word might be a good indicator of the quality of a country’s education system. Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK are all tied for the top spot with literacy rates of 99.9%.

Human Development Index (source)
The UN publishes this annual list that attempts to quantify the quality of life as per the countries of the world. Life expectancy, education, purchasing power and standard of living are a few facets that are taken into account. Norway is currently number one. I’m proud to note that Canada has been number one for many years during the late 1990’s and this decade; we currently sit at the fifth position.

Wired-ness (source)
The geek in me likes this list 🙂 IBM published this list in 2005 of countries that are the most prepared and capable of offering Internet connectivity as well as the having a modern nation-wide network infrastructure. I’m not sure if there’s a particular ranking order. The top five countries are Singapore, Denmark, Canada, Sweden and the US.

Internet Usage (source)
There are more Internet users per capita in Iceland than anywhere else in the world. I wonder if they’ve discovered a geothermic method for transferring TCP/IP packets yet. 😉

Gross Domestic Product Per Capita (source)
GDP is a measure of the value of all goods and services produced within a country divided by the average population. Luxembourg currently has the most purchasing power.

Surplus/Deficit Account Balance (source)
Does your country sell more goods and services than it buys? I hope so, since a surplus is a nice thing 🙂 Japan currently has the largest surplus and the US is saddled with a massive deficit.

Military Spending (source)
Who spends the most money on their military? The US does by a crazy-big margin.

Active Military Troops (source)
The PRC has more people serving in the military than any other country.

Beer Consumption (source)
Here’s a tasty one 🙂 It turns out that the Czech Republic really loves their beer.

Murder Rate (source)
I’m sure it’s a beautiful country, but I don’t think I’ll be visiting Columbia any time soon.

Obesity (source)
The US is the heftiest country.

Population (source)
There are over a billion people living in the PRC and India is not too far behind.

Population Density (source)
You’ll constantly bump into people in Monaco. On the other hand, you can really stretch out in Greenland.

Keep reaching for the stars 🙂

I won’t be part of the trend of commenting on or throwing in my two cents about the five-year anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attack in the States. Not gonna do it. “Nah gah dah”. Sit back and watch the television networks, newspapers, and websites battle with each other over who can better promote the hell out of this in order to grab your attention. A thousand points of light, or some shit like that.

I avoided saying anything about this because it distracts from the actual tragedy that Hurricane Katrina has caused for those in Lousiana and Mississippi, but…

It seems to me that everybody is finding something wrong with everyone else and choose not worry about the immediate tasks at hand which should be cleanup, helping those in need and rebuilding the affected areas. People need to get their noses out of the air and quit waving their index fingers at everyone else. A national tragedy happens and people treat it as an opportunity to campaign and push their political views and slander those with opposing views. Save that crap for your next election. Sheesh.

Happy Flag Day!