l-r: Paul Martin, Liberal; Stephen Harper, Conservative; Jack Layton, NDP; Gilles Duceppe, BQ

A federal election is going on in Canada, although you’d hardly know it.
Even so, the election that’ll take place in less than a month — on June 28th — ranks as one of the most important Canadian elections in more than 30 years (because of the fact the possibility exists that the right-wing Conservative party might gain power, and do to Canada that which Bush has done to the United States, Gordon Campbell has visited upon British Columbia, and Mike Harris did to harm good government in Ontario).
Today, VanRamblings offers a few blog links to provide some perspective on the events that will take place over the course of the next month.

• Macleans writer Paul Wells is keeping a regularly updated online diary that, in recent days, has proved invaluable reading.
• Terminal City writer Ian King’s Vancouver Scrum is must reading.
• The Globe and Mail have teamed up with the McGill University Observatory on Media and Public Policy to provide statistics on how the leaders and parties are faring in terms of positive or negative coverage. The links and informative commentary provide worthwhile reading.
• CBC’s Peter Kavanagh provides a a daily analysis of cross-Canada newspaper election coverage.
• Jim Elve’s E-Group Elections Blog continues as a must visit blog for perspective on the election. Don’t forget to click on the links to the left.
• Ian Welsh and Kevin Brennan’s Tilting at Windmills blog has emerged as a favourite, although I don’t always agree with them.
• Don, at Revolutionary Moderation, is updating political commentary daily.
• The folks at Politics Canada suggest that they provide a ‘balanced perspective’, as if anything such things exists. Still, worth a look.
• The Montreal Gazette’s E-File has joined the campaign blogsphere, while The Globe and Mail’s blog Globe reporters unwired offers pithy commentary from Campbell Clark, Brian Laghi, Steven Chase and Daniel LeBlanc.
• Then there’s Canada 2004, an independent site, “owned and operated by David MacDonald, a political science student and J. P. McCarthy Scholarship winner attending St. Francis Xavier University.” As Tom at Trail Spotter says of David’s site, “Good, basic info on ridings, candidates, historical and house stats, and a rolling newsfeed.”
• And while we’re at it, Trail Spotter has a pretty damn good election blog.
• Longtime Liberal apparatchik Warren Kinsella’s Politics Watch, which he humbly calls ‘Canada’s Political Portal’, is well worth a look.
• Torontonian Andrew Spicer believes there’ll be a Liberal minority government.
• And, in all fairness, I suppose, on the right I should include Norman Spector’s Norman’s Spectator — not a terrifically good looking site (but the links work). Spector is a regular commentator on Victoria’s new VI.

If you’ve got more links to bloggers — or online journalists — who are providing daily coverage of the federal election, that you’d like to see added to the list above, either write to VanRamblings, or click on Comments below. VanRamblings will update the listings as more links become available.

Tommy Douglas, first leader of the NDP

At present in Canada, we are in the throes of a federal election.
Although the choices before us are not quite the same Tweeledum and Tweedledee that has been the case in the past, as the Liberal Party and the Progressive Conservatives vied for the reigns of power, truth be told there’s still not a great deal that separates the two parties, or even Canada’s traditional third party, the New Democratic Party, under new leader Jack Layton.
Oh sure, the Conservative Party is no longer Progressive, and even the last leader of the PC’s, Joe Clark, finds himself campaigning on behalf of Liberal candidates, and against the right-wing forces of the presently constituted — and still socially conservative — Conservative / Reform / Alliance party.
Today, we offer a voice from the past, that of Tommy Douglas, the founder of Medicare, and the first leader of the New Democratic Party of Canada. Mr. Douglas helps us to remember a time in the not-so-distant past when the idea of truly building a better world was an honourable and reasonable goal, when we worked collectively with members of our communities to transform a patriarchial consumerist society into an egalitarian society where want and injustice would become but distant concepts.
Tommy Douglas was the most influential politician never to be elected Prime Minister. He pursued his humanist ideals relentlessly until they became so mainstream that rival politicians claimed them as their own. Douglas battled hard to bring the New Democratic Party to legitimacy in its first ten years, following the formation of the party in 1961. He was often criticized for his singular idealism but through it all Douglas was undeterred, convinced that he was helping to create a better, more humane society.
VanRamblings offers Tommy Douglas’ voice, as a reminder of what might have been, and what will surely become our shining future.

On the heels of one of the worst-kept secrets in Canadian political history, Prime Minister Paul Martin dissolved Parliament today, and early this afternoon called for a federal election to be held on June 28th.
Allison Dunfield and Darren Yourk, throughout their story in The Globe and Mail, suggest that Martin is in real trouble with a ‘volatile’ electorate, not least because of the ongoing sponsorship scandal, an issue which has dogged the Martin forces for months. Nonetheless, Martin seems intent on putting forward a positive platform, based on core Canadian values, a strong health care system, and respect for the Canadian cultural mosaic.

“The Liberal Party stands for a balanced approach where economic prosperity matches social justice,” Mr. Martin said. “An all inclusive approach that respects our differences. To those who share our values as Canadians, to those who see Canada as we do, I ask for your support.”

Meanwhile, the Conservative Party — a federal coalition of Bush, Mike Harris, and Gordon Campbell acolytes — is attempting to paint itself as a moderate government in waiting. “For the first time in generations, Canadians have a choice that is moderate, modern and mainstream,” Harper says. Yep, that’s right. And the moon is made of cheese, too, and Stephen’s name is Sally.
The New Democrats have this ad at the ready, pretty much encapsulating their strategy over the next month, although one would have to think that the federal election campaign is bound to become signifcantly less sanguine and much more sanguinary over the course of the next month.