The 2019 Canadian election was officially launched yesterday, on 9/11 (Trudeau assures our neighbors to the south no disrespect intended), so now, like America, we embard on a long and gruelling 40-day campaign leading up to the election on October 21.
The first debate is set for tonight, coinciding with NFL Thursday Night Football, as well as the third Democratic Party debate. But don’t worry if you miss it, you’re in good company. Trudeau is skipping it as well.
Here are some cliffs of what you’ve missed during Trudeau’s time in office
It’s all summed up nicely here by our friends at the BBC.
Up until recently Canada had three main parties, the solid neo-liberal centrist Liberals, the Conervatives
(note 1)
Formerly the Progressive Conservatives, from which the righter-wing Reform Party broke off and split the right wing vote, ensuring the Liberals could never lose an elections again, until the reunited, Righter than ever, as the Conservative Reform Alliance Party, a name that lasted until someone figured out how acronyms work. Eventually the just settled on calling themselves the Conservatives.
and the New Democratic Party, who are the Leftie socialist-but-not-too-socialist Party who never stand a chance at winning a Federal election but sometimes come in second when the Liberals or Conservatives have been in power a while and really fucked things up.
Then there’s the Bloc Québécois, who are pretty left wing, but mainly just want to separate from Canada and make sure no immigrants settle in Quebec since Quebec’s French identify is already too diluted for their liking.
Recently the Greens have won a lot of ground on the left with their strong environmental policies. They are definitely against racism of any sort, and have been boosted by their willingness to accept NDPers who want nothing to do with that party anymore since their leader
The Greens will not tolerate any racism. Also, Greens are fine if their nominees are anxious to vote to separate from Canada, and their leader has said that as long as they had a good environmental party, she’d be willing to form a government with the Conservatives, which is exactly what you want in the front-running left-wing party.
And once again, a group has split from the Conservatives party, since it’s not right wing, and especially not anti-immigrant enough for them. They have limited support so far (not enough to get into the debates), but I predict strong growth for them in the years to come. Here is one of their billboards, which was paid for by a third party and that they definitely do not endorse:
Trudeau has been one PR nightmare after another, the biggest being
It probably would have handed the election to the Conservatives, except Ontario’s current Progressive Conservative premier (they’re still progressive in Ontario) is none other than Rob Ford’s brother Doug. Remember Rob Ford, former mayor of Toronto and international laughingstock?
His brother is not quite as big a buffoon, but a Trump-level fascist (though bigt2k4 will be along shortly to say he’s better than the alternatives), and has hurt the Conservative brand in Ontario and nationally to a lesser extent, and will cost the federal Conservatives some votes.
Cliffs: lolCanada
Go Canada 
