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Native affairs and Canadian apartheid are federal matters in Canada and always have been. I, too, am not naive.
constitutionally maybe but in practise they have long been "provincialized" with NDP BC leading the way actually.
No, Fidel you are incorrect and the statement is pure ignorance. "Native affairs" are Canadian affairs they are not separate, they have been one and the same since Confederation. Provincial affairs are also Canadian affairs, how are the two separate?. Last time I checked I was a full-citizen of this country but I happen to live in Sask. and my people are from Sask. Last time I checked the NDP was a party that ran on two levels of government: federal and provincial, and the two often inter-weave. By your statement you suggest that "Native Affairs" should only be responsible to the federal and leave the provincial alone and vice-versa. This is blind ignorance. Politics and social movements take on all facets of governance and government and you know this.
Here is a news flash to everyone because you probably did not hear it in any of your schooling including universities: First Nations peoples (full status and non), Metis peoples, and Inuit peoples are no longer 'wards of the state', i.e. the federal government. Aboriginal (meaning First Nation, Metis, and Inuit) peoples are autonomous and so are their communities. Autonomy is the key to erasing apartheid. 'Apartheid' officially ended in 1960 when First Nations people got the right to vote at all levels of government but the effects of apartheid are still prevalent in the day to day matters (schooling, governance, employment, health care, etc.). Therefore apartheid still exists at all levels of governance and society. Thus it is the job of all levels of society to work with Aboriginal groups in erasing the legacy of apartheid.
First Nation "Treaty rights" and treaty issues are federal, indeed but every other political issue in Aboriginal communities can take on three levels of governance and government, i.e.: 1) federal, 2) provincial, and 3) municipal. Treaty issues are not the only issues that Aboriginal peoples are fighting, treaty issues are just the most publicized and recognizable issues that every Canadian hears about. Again (why do I have to repeat this in 2009), what if you are non-status and/or metis, then the federal gov. could care less about you and your issues; they would just tell you to contact your local MLA.
Again, I ask the most important question - how will the federal government, housed in Ottawa, help me and my peoples get a job in Sask. in 2009 and in a capitalist economy that values fierce competition between individualized labour? The answer is that the feds may make some promises but they will leave employment in the hands of the provinces and in private interests (businesses and enterprise). Jobs, schooling, healthcare, are left in the hands of the provincial and municipal. Thus, these two levels of government have to be lobbied the hardest in order to achieve real social justice. If the Charter of Rights can be invoked then there is a case for the feds to be involved but this rarely happens when talking about non-treaty issues. All three levels of government are responsible in 2009, so please get out of 1959 and stay current.
The residential schools. That was federal Liberal and Tory governments not the CCF or NDP,
The theft of native lands had nothing to do with the NDP.
The segregation of whole nations of people on to narrow strips of land along highways and remote parts of Canada had nothing to do with the NDP.
Making human flag poles of Cree people in the North had nothing to do with a provincial NDP government. The federal Liberals were directly responsible for that and so many other wonderful things that happened to native Canadians.
The state sponsored execution of the first native person in Ontario in recent history was Mike Harris' regime nothing to do with the NDP.
The Indian Act had nothing to do with the NDP provincially or federally.
So let's give full credit to the two dirty, rotten old line parties for how they have handled native affairs in this frozen Puerto Rico since forever and a day.
And if native people vote for or associate themselves with either of the two rotten old line parties that have run this country together for twice as long as Soviets ruled the USSR, then they shall reap what they sow.
Hey, trust me I am more critical of the 2 big neo-cons because they withhold power and they always abuse power. But the NDP has a history of 'social justice' and the 2 others simply do not, in fact the 2 other parties perpetrate the abuses and then forget. The NDP has to be involved in all issues not merely the ones they can pick and choose. Social justice should never be racially motivated it should be based on the principles of equality and fairness, across the board. I am a Canadian and the NDP represents Canadian people, especially working class peoples but I am also a resident of Sask. I, along with thousands of others, work and are schooled in Sask. The NDP has been in power in this province and they are the official opposition and yet I still see few areas where they are trying harder to get social justice for the Aboriginal pop.
Where exactly is the conflict between Aboriginal workers rights and non-Aboriginal workers rights? They are one in the same but in different communities. The NDP is not allowed to pick and choose between workers rights but they often do and they do so along racial lines. Social justice is not just about getting more votes and the NDP is as guilty as the other 2 on this point, especially in 2009. Nevertheless I will reiterate what I have already said in this section a dozen times. The NDP can capitalize, socially and politically, on the immense social injustices that urban and rural Aboriginal peoples are currently facing. The NDP can lead a political renaissance and not merely join the race to the bottom.
Well, it's been federal Liberal and Tory governments whove been placing more and more of our economic decision making in the hands of private enterprise and foreign capital since the ideological shift toward US-style neoliberal economies since the 1980s and 90's. If you dont like the way our valuable natural resources and profits have been shovelled out of the country to America and to foreign banks since 1991 or so, then I think you should consider the NDP as an alternative to the "Let's transform Canada into a 51st US state" mentality that says we will benefit by tying our economic fortunes to those of the USA's. That country is run by a bunch of crooks and liars and crooked-liars, and that doesnt say very much for our two old line party leaders past and present whove made Canada more reliant on the US through bad trade deals and weakening foreign ownership rules in this country. Provincial governments dont have the ability to control and expand public sector economies at the provincial level like they did in Tommy Douglas' time - and this is due to federal level CUSFTA and NAFTA trade agreements signed and enacted in 1989 and 1994 by the two oldest political parties in government in Ottawa. Now what we have are federal governments practicing impotence in weak federal government while provinces compete with each other for private sector jobs and foreign investment. Things look good in good times but glaring deffincies with this model become evident when things dont work well, like now. Canada is a weak country with a weak economy in other people's hands because of the recent past and presently planned and enforced impotence of the top-down neoliberal agenda favouring big business, banks, and foreign capital. You didnt vote for them and neither did I.
Vote NDP that's what to do. But be prepared to be punished even moreso by the two old line federal parties for voting the wrong way.
Heh.
We need federal power for the first time in Canadian history in order to make a difference nationally. Until that time, provincial governments of all political stripes will experience reduced federal funding and be told to go with cap in hand to private enterprise and "the market" to finance social programs and essential infrastructure. There's no way I know of that we can simply ignore the elephant in the room that is top-down neoliberal ideology handed down from Ottawa since the 1980s and 90's. We need government-created money and credit to some extent and to buck the influence of foreign capital and Bay Street if we are to pursue any kind of economic or social welfare nationalism in this country. The NDP is the only mainstream party I know of indicating that it's even possible. But we need to break the 140 year-old monopoly on federal power first and foremost if real change is to be on the agenda.
I could understand why the NDP leadership would have been paranoid about the Waffle if, in the early 70's, the party had been in a long-standing "party of government" position, like Labour in the UK. But the party was in third place and had no prospects at that point of getting anywhere higher than that. If you're stuck at 15-18% and 20 to 30 seats, what's the POINT in being obsessed with "playing it safe"? Isn't that sort of like running down the clock in a football came when your six points BEHIND in the fourth quarter?
Really, in those years, with radical ferment sweeping the world, why SHOULDN'T the NDP have gone bold and radical? Why not embrace the times?
I'm not sure what youre asking, Ken. For one thing, the NDP has always been bold and radical compared to the two very similar Liberals and Tories. But keep in mind that there were compromises made by capitalists after laissez-faire fell apart the first time. And workers being martyred by two world wars didnt hurt the cause either. Our's is the party for mixed market economy while the other two are for let's allow the Yanks to siphon off our fossil fuels and raw materials for a song while we feign impotence in Ottawa types. There is still a big difference between mixed markets, which are proven to work fairly well for the working class, and that of leave it to the market ideology - and which in on record now as having failed spectacularly in two major western world experiments spanning 30 years both times. Soviet communism lasted longer before sanctions and cold war pushed it over the edge. Laissez-faire committed suicide twice now, and three times if we count Friedman's personal hobbyhorse in Chile,.
Of course the NDP was always more radical and "bolder" than the old parties. But it's also always had the pointless social-democratic fixation with "respectability". What I meant was, why didn't they party just say, in the late 60's-early 70's period "these are radical times, so let's be a party of the times". Why didn't they, in short, just go for it and become a "New Left" party in those years?
The New Left ideas had petered out here about the time labour killed the Waffle, and in Britain, the source of social democratic ideas since the late 30s, Maggie was doing a number on labour and the social safety net that was constructed in the first 20 years after the war.
The "radical times" belonged to a resurgent "Right".
But, again, Waffle was mostly a nationalist force depending on left Liberal thinking as much as NDP "radicalism" (the socialist ideas necessary to protect Canadian industry from U.S.incursion). The autoworkers caved.
And it also meant the loss of development of an environmental perspective - the first Earth Day was celebrated in spring 1970. The same reactionary forces branded us "tree huggers", and the tittering among the knuckle-dragging communities died out only a couple of years ago.
Uh, the Waffle was crushed(or at least left out after breakfast to go stale)in 1974. Thatcher didn't take power until 1979. The late 60's and early 70's were times of great radicalism all over the Western world(weirdly enough, right-wing social democrats and Communists fought against the New Left in an inadvertent show of unity-the Communists SAVING the capitalist status quo in France and Italy in '68 and '69 just as the prevented radical socialism from coming back to life in Czechoslovakia at the same time-that was a twisted parody of the Popular Front. It should have been called the Unpopular Back). That's what I meant by "radical times", not the late 70's retrenchment period (a period in which social democrats were absolutely useless at fighting the Right in large measure BECAUSE they had done such a great job of crushing the independent democratic radical New Left.)
And George, for those of us just getting up to speed on this, what do you mean "the autoworkers caved"? Was it the CAW votes that put the anti-Waffle fatwa over the top?
"Uh", Thatcher's coming to power was not an overnight phenom. The folks (some of my relatives over there) were getting restive in the early '70s...told me so when they visited here.
And the Waffle was voted down in '72 as I recall, laid to rest a couple of years later.
And yes, it was (then) UAW votes that ensured the death of Waffle. David Lewis had them in his pocket (or they had him).They also put paid to thoughts of advancing environmental issues, causing me a few years later to be a founding membe of the Green Party of Ontario (silly me, but it seemed necessary. Who knew the Libertarian strength out there).
Revolution and "jobs, jobs, jobs" don't mix worth a damn.
Ok I'm about ten steps behind here and drifting far from the topic, but I suppose I should reply that I somehow doubt that "Big Daddy" represents organized labour in the NDP anymore than any of their other traditional concerns, but maybe youve picked that up by now. I've seen a few other "NDP'ers" like him here before but let's leave it at that, my days of troll spotting are pretty much past I hope.
For your information, North, Big Daddy has self identified as a building contractor. This makes him management, not labour.
And I don't think we can assume that the average union member is as chokingly anti-left as Daddy is. I've always wondered what the deal is with him and leftists. Did Svend Robinson kick his dog or something?
Oh, since youre wondering too Ken, I suspect "Big Daddy" is just Big Daggy come to visit us again, minus the good humour, or maybe that Budd Campbell dude who's still going on about the evil leftists who have taken over the NDP last I looked at Public Eye. Long memories, short attention spans.
I hope the NDP do not re-introduce the Waffle. Anything to keep them from gaining more ground than they already have.
What a droll troll.
RightWingA-Hole is gone. For being a right-wing a-hole.
As is this thread. For being too long for our dial-up friends.