Another Reason to Celebrate the NDP's Young Caucus

I can't wait to see the group photo of Jack Layton and all his new and youthful MPs from Quebec.

Not just because they are young and will bring a new energy to the crusty halls of Parliament. Not just because by voting for them, instead of the Bloc Quebecois, Quebecers have reached out to Canada.

But also because they are different.

Far from being “one of us,” Members of Parliament often are lawyers, businesspeople, journalists or experts of one kind or other. Even when they are not, they often adopt lifestyles so widely different from the rest of us that too often they lose their common touch. In short, perhaps to the dismay of Adams, legislatures in Canada, as in other liberal democracies, are in no way an “exact portrait . . . of the people at large.”

For the first time, the party of common folk has emerged as the official opposition. Why then should it come as a surprise that a large part of its new caucus is comprised not of political players but of youth, students, waitresses and single parents?

Ruth Ellen Brosseau might not be a political expert but as a single mother and a waitress, she has shared the hardships and aspirations of millions like her that no lawyer or “small business person” could claim.

The increased number of young people and women is going to make our Parliament a better reflection of who we really are. And I'm happy, because that's good for our damaged democracy. No matter what progressive party you support. No matter what our ghastly corporate media says.

The mainstream media have raised a hue and cry in targeting the humble origins of all these new NDP Members of Parliament. After all the earlier fuss about low voter turnout, especially among youth, pundits now seem unhappy that young people actually have been elected to Parliament.

If only the suits in the MSM better reflected who we really are eh? Instead of polishing the butts of the rich and the powerful.

Here's to our younger  Parliament. Fight the tyrant to the max like only you can. Speak up for those who have no voice. Defend the rights of the poor and the humble, and the oppressed. Tell them to stop torching the planet ...and YOUR future, and to put people before profits.

In short eh? Rock the rafters. Give them HELL.
  
Shake up this old and smug country.

Go young Canada go...

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