The Conservatives were reduced to 99 seats from 159 in the last Parliament, according to preliminary results.
.. The election became something of a referendum on Mr. Harper’s approach to government, which, in the view of his critics, has often focused on issues important to core Conservative supporters, mostly in the West, rather than to much of the population.
.. And Mr. Harper won the three previous elections without ever exceeding 40 percent of the popular vote.
Canada’s History of Violence
Steven Pinker, in his book “The Better Angels of Our Nature,” hypothesized that the differences are deeply rooted in culture and history. In the 19th century, he wrote, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police — the Mounties — got to the Canadian Western frontier “before the settlers and spared them from having to cultivate a violent code of honor.”
During the settlement of the American “Wild West,” in contrast, there was no centralized authority. Plunder and feuding were the rule, and settlers often resorted to violence to protect their lives and property. Violent codes of honor, revenge and self-justice were second nature for early settlers and were transmitted from parents and society to children.
.. In addition, those who live in areas that historically lay outside the reach of the Mounties are most likely to vote for members of the Conservative Party — the only party in Canada that opposes restricted gun ownership.
.. I analyzed N.H.L. data from 1980 to 2007 for 737 professional players born in the Canadian prairies. The players share a common environment in the ice rink, but those who were born in areas historically outside the reach of the Mounties were penalized more often — an average of about 1.4 minutes per game — than those who were not — an average of about 1 minute per game.
After a Political Reversal in Alberta, ‘Anything Seems Possible
The Progressive Conservatives, Mr. Marshall said, lost power in part because they missed an evolution in the thinking of outsiders who followed him to Alberta looking for opportunities.
“What we’re watching here is a whole new generation of people,” Mr. Marshall said. “They’re socially minded, they’re environmentally minded. I’m not sure that the P.C.s were picking up on all those cues, the change in the demographic.”
Koch brothers amoung largest Canadian oil sands leasees
The Keystone pipeline, though largely symbolic in the global scheme of things, does nothing for the American economy except set up the United States as a pass-through colony for foreign industrialists. Well, not all foreign: The Koch brothers are one of the largest outside leaseholders of acres in Canadian oil sands, according to a Washington Post report. I’m sure that has nothing to do with the fierce urgency of rushing Keystone XL through Congress now.
.. The motto is tax what you burn, not what you earn.