A plea for unity and common sense

A few days ago I received a email from a man from a 26 year old University of Alberta graduate named Jared Milne. He asked me and a handful of other bloggers if we were interested in putting up a letter he had written to all Canadians up on our blogs.

For various reasons I am not posting it here in its entirety but I have made it available for download at with a link provided below.

the letter/la lettre


In his letter Jared where he calls on all Canadians, politicians and voters to put aside their differences in the face of the global economic crisis and for the sake of national unity. He outlines various reasons why the proposed coalition of the NDP-Liberals-BLOC was formed in the first place. Why certain people were for the coalition and why others opposed it.

But I think most importantly he outlines the ramifications that the actions of all of our politicians is currently having on the entire Canadian population.

Here are a few excerpts:
"Any coalition with a political party whose stated goal is the separation of one of Canada’s provinces will provoke a negative reaction in the rest of the country by itself…and who is to say what demands the Bloc will make in exchange for its support? Don’t forget, too, that Dion claimed during the election he would never form a coalition, and that Layton attacked him for not knowing how to handle the economy."

"Arguably even worse for Canadian unity is the backlash this has already provoked in Western Canada."

More importantly he outlines the need for cooperation from all of our political parties. Stating that the two consecutive minorities are clear mandates for cooperation between parties.

"What the opposition parties should be doing is working with the Conservative government, the way the people wanted them to! Both sides should remember that, in order to avoid the collapse of the Harper government and avoid an election that Canadians absolutely do not want, they must cooperate and compromise, which what they were elected to do in the first place."

"With no party receiving a clear mandate of support from the voters, and with nearly 40% of the population staying home on election day, to me it seems clear what Canadians want, for their politicians to not play partisan games and cooperate with one another in dealing with our economic, environmental, and social issues."

All that to say that I think this young man has hit the nail on the head with his letters and I encourage other who read this post to download the letter or offer the link on their website.

Pour ceux de nous qui préfèrent lire en français la lettre de Jared est complètement bilingue. Chapeau!

For those of you who'd like to read more of this young man's work click here and if you have any comments for Jared I'll make sure to pass them on!

Thanks for reading,

Muchacho Enfermo