If Canada only had a reset button...

So the last federal election was a humongous waste of time and money. Only about 60% of eligible Canadians showed up to wield their democratic right, the lowest in history if I'm not mistaken. It swamped the Canadian media for over a month and very little policy was discussed, but we did get to find out how each federal leader appreciates to arts. Yawn.

And after it was all said and done, what do we get? A slightly larger Harper minority; the expected land-second disappearance of the Greens; rambunctious Jack making up a bit of ground but still far from his unrealistic bid to actually run the country; and the downfall of the Liberal superpower at the hands of the outgoing (and not a minute too early) leader, Mr. Dion. 

So now what? The Liberals (still in debt) are in the midst of another unaffordable and overly dramatic leadership race, Elizabeth May has disappeared (perhaps abducted by eco-aliens), Jack is being Jack, Quebec is acting like the good ol' nation within a united Canada that it is and Steve, well, he's still leading this country into oblivion, sweater vest and all. 

Government finally got back into session and within a week or so there's talk of another election. The Conservative government released its economic update, stating that it has been forced to cut a number of programs including funding to the other political parties, all in the name of keeping the budget balanced. The big piece missing from all this: a nice big stimulus package for the economy.

Don't Flaherty and Harper keep up with the times? Big, fat stimulus packages are all the rage these days. And as much as we may like balanced budgets, this is one of those times where its OK for the conservative folks to roll down their socks and spend a little money. Otherwise there won't be much of a budget to balance next fiscal year after tax revenues have dwindled to nothing when the average Canadian Joe the Igloo Plumber doesn't have any money to be taxed of. 

So what's the other option? Obviously we can't let this go through, so now the opposition parties are considering a coalition. Oh, great. I'm sure this will be a very co-operative group. The drama that will unfold from that may be worse than holding another election. Who will be the new Prime Minister? We might all cry if its Dion. Duceppe isn't all that much of a national guy. Jack would be lousy because he'd have no one to complain about. And May doesn't have a seat, so scratch her off the list. Ignatieff or Rae might forego the leadership race and just step in, which could be alright, but I'd be a little bit worried about Rae after his time serving with a coalition government and then heading a majority for several very awkward years at the helm of Ontario.

So basically it's a huge mess. Election=bad. Even less people will show up and the last thing we need is an election at a time when politicians should be at work saving the country from economic collapse. Coalition=probably bad. Expect lots of infighting and hairpulling. 

I offer a simple solution. Perhaps we can grab a four year free-trial from the United States to join up and make up their giant 51st state. At least we'd have a decent guy at the helm who seems to know what he's doing, and we could sit back and enjoy the benefits of these massive stimulus packages. And by the time the taxpayers have to start paying back the $2 trillion or so of government debt, we kindly return to our status as an independent nation.