I vote because I like to complain

The bell rang this sparkling shining morning, and I tripped down the stairs to answer it. (Never mind what I was up to.) A pleasant young man stood there clutching a clipboard and I could see from his pile of brochures that he was our local Progressive Conservative candidate.

Some of you may be aware that Canada is suffering through yet another federal election. For the past decade, we've been having a damn federal election every couple of years. This is because we have a minority government, run by a lacquer-hair control-freak who has succeeded in reducing media coverage of his Progressive Conservative Party's shenanigans to carefully spooned-out sound-bites. Their latest trick has been tossing people out of PC events because they've vetted their backgrounds for tell-tale trouble-maker Facebook features such as liking environmental groups or having their picture taken with a Liberal Party member. I wish I were kidding.

I looked brightly at the guy on my porch: "Oooh, you're our PC fella!"
"Will you be supporting the Progressive Conservatives?" he asked hopefully.
"No, we're NDP and Greens in this house," I said cheerfully. "But we're pleased to see you as a part of the democratic process."
"It's nice to see a smiling face," he said and went on his way. This neighbourhood has been a Liberal riding for about a gazillion years. This means my vote will have no value whatsoever, but I will vote, dammit, because it's my duty and I figure I can't participate in the grand Canadian tradition of dissing the government, unless I cast my ballot.

Thankfully, we have the Rick Mercer Report to take the sting out of most elections. It's a very funny show, probably funny only to Canadians, but then, I have to Google most of Graham Norton's references, so there. Part of each show is a feature called the Rant. This week, Rick goes after young voters. About thirty eight percent of eighteen-to-twenty-five-year-olds turned out for the last election:
If you're not Canadian, and you're thrown by the accent, he's from Newfoundland.