Let's not forget

President Clinton


;)

The biggest oxymorons to date:

Military Intelligence.
Democratic Leadership.

If you really want to understand the issue, you should read 'The Republican Option In Canada: Past and Present' by David E. Smith.

That looks into into the issue very deeply and unless you have a pretty serious interest in politics, you probably wont find it interesting at all.

Sigh... poor humanity What is so hard to understand about the simple result of one head of state being gone being another replacing it?

Edited by Mr Creosote at 20:55 on May, 02nd 2003

Neither do I.

Alright: every other member but sterge10

I don't :S

Strange that every other member can easily follow fretz' train of thought then.

Not at all. All what you said either doesn't make sense to me or would need several decenies to succeed...

Oh, I never said it is unlikely to be modelled after the US-system of time-limited dictatorship, I just said it doesn't automatically have to be...

Try to imagine America without a president, that is basically the system of government that Canada (and Britain) have at the moment, because our equavalent of the president, the Queen, has no power.

If you get rid of the queen, that space will be filled by a president, and the president will most likely gain a lot of power in the new constitution (Mr Creosote may disagree there because the German system is differant but the chances are, it would favour the american system).

If the president has gained power where the queen had none, then there will be a shift in power from the commons holding all the power to the power being split equally between the commons, the senate and the president. The balence of power will shift, and thats why the poloticians of the day will not force the issue of getting rid of her because it will be counter-productive to their own political goals.


Does that make more sense?

As far as I am concerned, the Federal already have full power, but gave most of those powers to the provinces. I always been told in school that we are a democratic nation, so I am in the obligation to say this:

I have absolutly no idea of what you are talking about?

Could be. If he talked like the pope, it was him

Schröder is the chancellor, i.e. the head of the government. That makes him the most important figure in politics here, but he's now the head of the state. There are several people 'above' him in the official 'ranking', for example the president and the president of the parliament. This isn't only playing with titles though: no politician in Germany has a similar amount of centralised power as the British Prime Minister or the US-president.

Edited by Mr Creosote at 21:10 on April, 30th 2003

That name rings a bell for some reason, but I cant put a face to him. I might have seen him on BBC giving an antiwar speech recently or something?

Is Gerhard Schröder top boy in German politics? It seems strange to me having the chancellor as the man in charge.

We have one here in Germany. At the moment, our president is some guy called Johannes Rau which you will certainly have never heard of. Guess why He's basically just a representative to whom it is specifically forbidden to mess with daily politics.

Is it feasable to have an elected head of state that carries no power?

Why do you consider that an automatism?

I doubt people of over a certain age will 'not even know about it' as you put there Eagle but I fully agree when you say you couldnt care less about her.

The reason Canada still has a British Monarch, (amazingly despite a quarter of the population speaking French with an (until recently) strong seperatist movement), is not because they have a love for all things British, nor because they(except Parti Quebecois followers) have a hatred for all things French, its because the feeling of discontent towards America is greater than their desire to ditch the Queen.

If Canada was to drop the monarchy a far more American style of republican government would be installed immediately. That would effectively lead to less power for the polititians because the 'electected head of state' would claim rights to an infinitely greater amount of power and influence than the Queen has(which is virtually zero).

This would lesson the power of the political parties immeasurably and turn Canada into a country where the elections are nothing more than a competition to see who can afford the most adverts on TV and have High Court Judges picking the people in charge.

So, will any of the political parties ever call a referendum on the issue like Australia recently did? (and voted to keep it incedently).... Not likely!, they would be shooting themselves in the foot.

Rather than just dismiss the issue you should really consider what the alternatives are. Personally I couldnt care less about the Royals either, they are nothing more than a source of amusement to me with their inbred antics splashed all over the newspapers every day, but would I want to get rid of them?? No chance! The alternative almost brings me out in a cold sweat!

In your dreams. Perhaps it's like that "officially" on paper, but if the queen would come knocking on my door you can bet I would not care the slightlest bit.

I don't know anybody here that beleive that "allegiance" is true. I bet most of us doesn't even know about it.

I thought you had the British Queen as your monarch, Eagle . And even a governor...