The American race for the presidency is on. Everyone is talking about it. Television commentators can’t stop debating about it. Saturday Night Live makes the news headlines just by parodying it. Even the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation can’t help but devote a significant amount of its programming time to US election analysis. With all this excitement, it’s easy to overlook that Canada also has an election looming on the horizon.

On October 14th 2008, Canadians will return to the polls to once again vote and try to create some kind of stability in their government. Still floundering since the end of the thirteen-year Liberal Party majority government in 2003, the Canadian parliament has seen its last two minority governments dissolved. The power vacuum left by the battered Liberal party has made it difficult for any political party to create a government strong enough to last more than a couple of years.

Maybe it’s because Canadians have had 3 elections in the same time span in which the American’s have had one, but the enthusiasm for the upcoming Canadian elections is nowhere near the level of passion and excitement experienced by our American cousins over their November Presidential election. Perhaps it’s Canada’s election process that takes some of the fun out of the political race to the top. Either way, Canadians haven’t seen much excitement or passion in their politics since the 1990s.

The Canadian system of electing our government and leader of our country is a bit different than the American system; Canada has a parliamentary system of government. Essentially, Canadians elect a political party to represent their interests in government while the Americans elect a person. Canadians have five main political parties vying for a place in Canada’s Parliament; the Liberals, the Conservatives, the New Democratic Party (NDP), the Bloc Quebecois (although they have no one running for election outside of Quebec), and the Green Party.

On Election Day, Canadians go to their local polling station and vote for the person whom they feel will best serve their district (or ‘riding’). Once the votes are tallied and the winner determined, the winner in the riding becomes a Member of Parliament and they have a seat in Canada’s Parliament in Ottawa. The political party whose members win the most seats in Parliament is then the Party whose leader becomes Prime Minster and that Party is the one who will form the next government in Canada.

Perhaps it’s because our electoral system is a bit more convoluted and complex than the American’s (the Electoral College notwithstanding) that Canadians are missing out on Election fever. Our system is not as straight-forward as the direct vote for the American President. Or perhaps it’s that we are currently without any truly charismatic and visionary leaders. There hasn’t been anyone to really get Canadians fired up about our government in a long time. Until the Canadian charismatic leader emerges we will, in good Canadian fashion, continue to look south for our political excitement.