Think twice

Among the many differences between the Canadian and U.S. political systems, one of the most glaring will be in full view tonight when U.S. President Barack Obama takes the stage with Republican hopeful Mitt Romney in the first presidential debate leading up to the Nov. 6 election.
That’s right, the debate will feature just two candidates—a far cry from the five that have been regular fixtures in recent leaders’ debates on this side of the border.
With Canada already following the U.S. lead on fixed election dates, coupled with continued calls for an elected Senate here, no doubt many Canadians are equally envious of U.S. voters who generally are presented with a clear-cut choice between just Democrats or Republicans each election.
There has been a push of late to reduce the number of parties here in Canada. Take the “unite-the-right” movement that merged the Progressive Conservatives with the Reform/Alliance parties—which produced election victories in 2006 and 2008 and, ultimately, majority status in May, 2011.
Now there’s talk of the need to “unite the left” in order to take back power from the revamped Tories under Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
Ironically, though, as Canada appears to be slowly creeping toward a two-party system, the U.S. is seeing the emergence of the Tea Party—a growing right-wing movement that threatens to split the Republican Party and perhaps spawn a division of politics between right, left, and moderates staking claim to the middle ground.
Critics have disparaged Canada’s multi-party system as a “pizza Parliament” in a reference to Italy, where the mish-mash of parties typically produced various coalition governments and a constant stream of elections. Canadians got a taste of that instability over the course of several minority governments—and four elections—until the Conservatives finally captured a majority in May, 2011.
Another flaw—when more than two parties are vying for power—is the fact that a party can win a majority government with far less than a majority of votes, which is exacerbated even further when four or five parties are in the mix.
But as we’re seeing south of the border, its two-party system is showing definite cracks, with voters perhaps ready to break free from the constraints of being limited to one or the other.
Let’s think twice before eschewing our multi-party system due to a troubling misguided fascination with U.S.-style politics.