Canadian Elections V

Election day is tomorrow and I stepped down from my job as a Deputy Returning Officer (DRO) this past weekend. Luckily Elections Canada has a contingency plan when it comes to people flaking out, so they found a replacement rather quickly.

As I've been explaining in my previous posts (I, II, III, IV), I've been working out my position vis-a-vis voting in the next election. This lengthy deliberation has now brought me back to a familiar place and a newer, protest-based place.

The first place is the one that would see me vote for a social democratic option, probably the winning candidate in my Ottawa Centre riding. While I have done so in the past, some fundamental part of me has been trying to articulate my critique of the Canadian voting system and the Canadian liberal-capitalist state through various means, including by not voting at all or registering a protest vote, which brings me to option two.

This second position sees me voting on election day but registering my protest by writing it out on the back of the official ballot. I have been reflecting on what precisely I would write and after talking with my friend who has seen this year's ballots, I'd say there's ample space to write something in.

However, all of this deliberation and participation in debates and discussions about electoral politics has me thinking about casting my ballot for the NDP candidate. Not so much because I've become totally convinced about the importance or perhaps usefulness of voting, though that is without a doubt a key consideration, but more so because I'm a closet political junkie who keeps track of polls and riding-by-riding analysis and all the other stuff that makes the election a hyper-text. Oh, and the other thing worth mentioning is that a good friend of mine who lives out-of-town but can't vote suggested rather kindly, no guilt intended, that I cast a vote for her. All very reasonable...

So then, I won't officially decide what to do until I walk up the hill to the polls tomorrow afternoon, but I'll make sure to fill you in. And stay tuned for my post-election round-up and commentary. There are few things I enjoy doing more than watching election coverage. Anybody up for watching the U.S. election coverage with me in a few weeks?