Thread by @rateldajer

Just had a very nice chat with one of my local candidates for #Elxn44 in #KitchenerCentre.
It was @morricemike of the @CanadianGreens.

He does bookable short calls with voters to talk about issues. Great idea and shows a lot of confidence.

#cdnpoli

After watching some debates between local candidates I've decided to vote Green. So I wanted to explain a bit why if others are having trouble deciding.

You see, #KitchenerCentre is a complicated riding to say the least. It has historically flipped between Libs and Cons but...

...more recently has been a Liberal stronghold. Now that Liberal candidate Raj Saini has stepped down from campaigning, it throws open the doors for a flip. But it's tricky because Saini is *still* on the ballot.
How many people will realize? What will they do?

On top of that, last election, @morricemike surprised everyone outside the riding by coming in second.
He was pretty close too.
Greens rarely do that unless they win or are the leader.

In town, it wasn't surprising because everyone had seen all the signs for Mike, seen him him at the market, around town, or at his office right on King St.

And the fact that Guelph has gone green provincially gives you this feeling that people can think a bit different here.

Plus, now there is also a viable new NDP candidate, and our riding is already strongly NDP provincially with the fantastic @LauraMaeLindo

So what's gonna happen?

I don't know. But I do like how Mike thinks so here's how I think about it in terms of strategic voting.

And as I've long said, all voting is strategic:

popthestack.wordpress.com/2011/03/29/eve…

Path 1: The Liberals aren't going to win the riding.

But if they do, Saini will either sit as an independent, or Libs will do a byelection eventually. What does that mean? No influence for a long time.

Path 2: The Conservatives win the riding.

Bad bad bad, they'd be *incorrigible* at the market!

More importantly, they will continue to speed us toward climate catastrophe, feed a culture of distrust in science, and do nothing to deal with the actual problems in our society.

Path 3: The NDP win. Fine, great.
But I don't see Kitchener being an influential part of the NDP party. So, no influence for Kitchener.

Path 4: @morricemike wins as the second or third Green party MP and the first in, what forever?, from Ontario. People in Ottawa and elsewhere will find out what we all know here. Mike's a lucid, creative, thoughtful person who's pragmatic about getting things done in government.

Mike pointed out while we were chatting that Green Party members always get mentioned disproportionately often in the news and it's true. We all know who Elizabeth May is. Sure, mostly that her (ok, I'm a May fan alright? popthestack.wordpress.com/tag/elizabeth-…)

But it's also true that the Green Party is..., well, kind of *weird*. Journalists love weird, underdog stories.

And finally, since they KNOW they won't form government, they don't have to pretend they will.
So they can actually, you know, say what they really thing is wrong.

I like that.

So faced with the choices of being ignored as some minor NDP riding or shining bright as a #Green spot of hope, the choice is actually easy.

I choose hope.

Every time.