This election is very strange. No one wants to win and no one is going to vote for anyone.

The Liberals.   They guys are doing the worst job of campaigning so far. Watching last night's hockey game, I was subject to repetitive presentations of the play "Paul Martin Waiting for Godot on Someone's Porch". Apparently the backroom thinks it is clever to show a leader hiding out at a cabin alone talking to people who are not there. I am tired of the blue dress shirt, Paul. I am tired of a Liberal telling me about child care that never arrives. Why does Martin not tell us how the Conservatives added over 300 billion to the debt, remind us how we felt about the Tories and point out it is the same bunch reformed he is running against?   Why does not Martin tell us that he saved the nation's finances and ruin - which most accept he did!   For a leading politician he is not much good at making his case.   Will he join John Turner in the world of smart Liberal guys who stutter and stumble and never quit get elected into that Prime Minister's Office.   Should have called election the first day he was appointed Liberal leader.

The Conservatives. They are running a good ad about the waste. It points out 3.75 billion in waste over ten years. The Conservatives wasted 300 billion over nine last time they were last in power nationally.  I have also lived under the wasters Buchanan, Harris, Binns and Eves, the last one of which gave me an electricity blackout and cost me the health tax in Ontario which we will have to pay under a cock-eyed honest McGuinty. They are promising more spending with shifted priorities, lower taxes and more Tory voo-doo economics. Personally, I would probably have more cash in pocket with them but is that all you vote for? To win a majority they need most of the 32 seats in Atlantic Canada and they are promising to cut all the funds that Atlantic Canada likes. They are promising a muddled theory, a poor fiscal vision and could soon appear desperate enough for power that they would say anything. They would govern very differently from how they are presenting themselves.   Harper scares me not because of evil plans but because his party has not held one policy convention and will attract a vast range of voters most of whom he will not speak for on a policy level.

The NDP. They are looking sensible and leftist cranks but are being out gunned for the alternative vote by the Greens. The Greens have 13% in British Columbia apparently which may win them one or two seats but will lose the NDP maybe eight or ten as it is tapping off their support. The NDP counter with little else other than a leader who says uncomfortable truths out from under one of the more trustworthy moustaches in political history - which is not saying a lot.

The Bloc Quebecois. This is the only party that knows its constituency and speak to and for it. The offence taken at the details of the sponsorship scandal, playing the population of the country's second biggest province for fools at the cost of a very slushy 100 million. They speak for Quebec like the New Tories speak (among themselves) for Alberta.

The Greens. I am a little more comfortable with them now as I have learned a bit more about their brand of fiscal conservatism and like the radical approach - especially if they nave no hope in hell of actually winning. A voice you want at the table to carry a small but irritatingly sharp stick to poke everyone else with.

Not voting. This is the choice most may actually make for the first time. I always vote. I voted NDP in the 1981, 1984 and 1988 provincial election in Nova Scotia, the 1984 and 1988 Federal elections, in 1992 on the Charlottetown Accord I voted no, the 1993 Federal election I voted for Hec Clouthier as an independent Liberal in the Ottawa Valley just cause he was goofy, by 1997 as a full Liberal he was too goofy and, though I was still going to vote for him, he was lobbying in the voting room on the day and no one was kicking him out so I voted NDP; in the 2000 Federal I voted Green as I did in the 2000 PEI provincial and the 2003 Ontario provincial.   

I like elections, like to watch election night coverage, like to follow the policy arguments, the neediness of leaders which is only exposed when the wheels start coming off the wagon.   This year, except for the Bloc and the Greens, things could all go very badly by voting day on the 28th of June.   The real fun may be just beginning.

Cross-posted and improved over at the BlogsCanada e-Blog.