A few years back I was on the boardwalk in Brighton Beach, England. I approached a series of concession stands and as I walked down the line, observing the selections, I noticed something:
The walls separating each concession stand had an open doorway in it.
Then I noticed something else: Not every concession stand was manned by a counter person.
As I walked down the line, passed pizza counter, the hotdog counter, ice cream counter, fish and chips counter, I noticed something else:
The entire line of concession stands was being worked by a single, breathless teenage girl who ran from counter to counter to counter, taking orders, making food, pouring drinks, making change, and then fleeing through the open doorway to whatever other counter.
The concession stand is symbolic for the shallow variety and illusion of choice in our democracy. No matter which counter you go to, the same face is there to greet you, the same hands are there to make your food or pour your drinks. Everything is equally over-priced and of all the same dismal quality.
The girl behind the counter is representative of our political class, which I think should be more accurately labeled, the Scoundrel Class. They will pander, run through whatever doorway, make whatever promises are necessary in order to get from you what they want: votes.
That's the easy part of this analysis.
Here's the hard part:
Conservatives want one thing -- to control the populace. That's why conservatives tend to be religious, militaristic and put forth the lie of being "fiscally responsible."
Conservatives are religious because that's yet another club to which to belong in order to look down on others. All things being equal amid a group of people, a fantastic row can be started by invoking religion. It's the last and greatest divider of people.
Conservatives are militaristic because they don't believe in negotiation, debate, conversation, sharing ideas, seeing both sides,
listening, or otherwise engaging their minds in anything other than a self-serving endeavor.
Conservatives are militaristic because they want to
take what they want. They don't want to buy it, or barter for it. They want what they want, and they want to take it.
Conservatives preach "freedom" but really only want to control people. Hence the call for building more prisons in Canada as the crime rates are dropping. A definite case can be made that harsher sentences should be handed out to our murderers and rapists and white collar criminals. But the fact remains, the rate of crime in Canada is decreasing.
Conservatives want more prisons because they want to put more people into them. Hence, "mandatory minimums" for people caught with the dreaded offender of civilization: marijuana.
Conservatives preach "freedom", but want to control who people marry, what they put into their bodies. Moreover, conservatives want to control what is taught in school so that it's complimentary to conservative
The Liberal Party of Canada is an object less in self-sabotage. Prime Minister Stephen Harper has served himself up like a badminton birdie to the Liberal Party more times than can be counted:
- Proroguing Parliament three times as PM;
- Criticizing the appointment of senators while part of the official opposition, and then appointing more senators than any other prime minister in history after becoming PM
- Non-chalance over the Bev Oda affair
- Being slapped down in the UN when Canada sought to be on the Security Council
- Now, Stephen Harper announces he won't answer more than five questions a day from the Canadian press
- Hell, someone put together a list of 100 Reasons NOT To Vote For Stephen Harper's Conservative Party
A "vote mob", availing of Wednesday's special ballot at the University of Guelph was unceremoniously interrupted when Michael Sona -- communications director for Guelph Conservative candidate Marty Burke -- attempted to confiscate the ballot box.
While dying the death of a thousand self-inflicted cuts in Detroit, Charlie Sheen can be happy about one thing: 
It takes an amalgamation of the worst human tendencies to create a corporation.
Billboards showing a message that read "Judgment Day is Coming May 21, 2011" began showing up in my city a couple of months ago.
