Kootenay Crust – By Ian Cobb

Op-Ed Commentary

We are one week away from British Columbia’s latest provincial election and there’s already been record turnout to advance polls. That’s a good thing.

It says people are engaged and focussed on what they want in terms of representation in Victoria. Or it says more and more people are buggering off south and are voting before they snowbird.

This is a unique election for the province thanks in a major way to Kevin Falcon collapsing like a tinfoil lawn chair and side-swiping his loyal BC United Party (BCU) troops with surrender to John Rustad’s B.C. Conservative Party. It’s been sold as a noble gesture to ensure the best possible outcome for the province as the ‘right of centre’ tries to wrest power away from Premier David Eby and the BC NDP.

What it also did was screw over loyal BCU soldiers such as Kootenay Rockies (formerly Kootenay East) MLA Tom Shypitka, who has been a breath of fresh air these past eight years as he worked to be as non-partisan as possible. Ditto to retiring Columbia River-Revelstoke MLA Doug Clovechok.

Party politics continues to degrade and devolve into the most feeble-minded, smelly circus imaginable. Candidates have now firmly embraced social media as their chief means of reaching voters and that alone tells me how nonsensical politicians and their handlers are becoming.

Consider how many people, especially older people who tend to be the most ardent voters, are NOT on social media of any kind. I know curmudgeonly old farts who would rather swallow razor blades than pee about on Facecrack or creepy megalomaniac Elon Musk’s dying X or the other time vacuums that are killing the free press.

Laziness and reliance on parties to push and boost messages that seem to contain deep flows of stretching-of-the-truth is now the norm. Shrill pettiness continues to rise, as influence from the Excited States of Murica washes over easily influenced wannabes. “Hey, if nonsense spewing imbeciles devoid of morals like Marjorie Taylor Greene can get elected, why can’t I?”

Party politics – or corporate vote-gamesmanship – needs to be curtailed, reined in and made to sit in the corner to consider what it has done to our society. Allowing terrible people to assume mantels of ‘candidacy’ is a reprehensible practise. (See also Donald Junkmouth Trump etc.)

And that is why I am voting for Tom Shypitka in this election. He’s an independent candidate, which in every election in the past would mean he’s a longshot to be elected. Not this time.

I would LOVE to see 20 or 30 independent candidates elected in B.C. because they would wield serious power. If that many independents win, it would mean the NDP has taken a few body blows and ‘politicking’ would kick into fifth gear as deals are made for votes.

That kind of power would mean an independent MLA could work a deal with the governing party to get some funds or supports to their riding; something that would never happen in the current political environment, especially in areas beyond Hope.

I would love to see the end of party politics and have every candidate step forward independently. What occurs in terms of ‘working together’ after that would certainly shake out left/right/centre but at least there would not be the greasy machinations of an all-controlling central party, where a few insiders control all the shots and gobble up all the gravy. A candidate would have to be severely committed to the task at hand and road ahead, whereas party backbenchers can gin and tonic their way to fat pensions, as long as they kowtow to the party bosses and funders.

An all independent government would also open the door for more potential purchasing of politicians by corporations and a system of checks and balances would have to be created to ensure punishments that would deter greed.

While we’re at that, it’s time to enact governance laws that put an end to the full embrace of bullshit over fact. People make mistakes all the time, confusing facts etc., so some form of fairness would be required. But politicians who bullshit 24/7 and refuse to cut it out once they’ve been proven wrong, should be forced to eat a bucket of poop during a nationally televised event or perhaps be hit with a crippling fine or be tossed in a local lockup for a couple of months.

That would make a lot droning idiots sit down and shut up; something our leaders used to do when such pinheads stepped from the shadows of ignorance to try and force warped agendas aimed at miniscule slices (thankfully) of society.

In closing, my stating I am voting for Tom Shypitka does not mean I think less of the other candidates. My take is they are earnest souls; not uncommon to find in the East Kootenay (thankfully). And I wish them all good luck.

Please get out and vote because that precious foundation stone of our free and so-called just society continues to teeter as extremism and silliness festers in party politics, pushed on by social media.

The voice of a single vote has never been louder.

e-KNOW file photo

– Ian Cobb is editor/owner of e-KNOW

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