So I sent an email to Second Cup’s customer care. Their response was a little disappointing:

Thank you for your email and your interest in the Second Cup. I have included below our Fair Trade Coffee available through Second Cup. Currently this is the only coffee in our series that is certified. Please do refer to our website at www.secondcup.com to review our selection and how we are making a difference environmentally and socially.

So, even though Second Cup says “24 fairly traded coffees available every day”, they really mean they have one fairly traded coffee.

It’s back to Bridgehead, and their fully fair trade menu for me.

It looks like history is about to repeat itself.

Mr. Harper has announced that he wants to eliminate government subsidies for political parties. So far he’s only said that he wants to use that as a Conservative plank in the next election, but I’m betting that it will appear in bill form sometime before early March – just before a budget would have to be brought down.

Why? The first time the government tried to eliminate subsidies, the opposition parties freaked out and botched forming a coalition. This time around, instead of proroguing, Harper is going to force the vote and allow the government to fall on this handy dandy wedge issue. In the subsequent election, he can paint the other parties as pigs at a trough, and say “there are already generous credits and incentives in the tax system to encourage people to give to political parties today.” Oh wait. He just did.

I can pretend the move is antidemocratic: the subsidy means that everyone’s vote has value. In a donation-only system, only people who have spare cash can donate, so they’ll donate to parties that pander to their wants meet their needs. Poor folks (who can’t wait until tax time for their tax credits to be returned) won’t be represented as well.

But, in my heart of hearts, my main reason for supporting the subsidy is that it benefits the Green Party. The subsidy forms a substantial part of the our budget, so any reduction of the subsidy would cripple the federal party. I tend to think of that as a bad thing, but others would probably disagree.

89.6% of respondents believed that Clive Doucet and Alex Cullen wanted to cancel road projects because “[they] aren’t interested in keeping taxes down; this is just a thinly veiled attack on car owners by a couple of public transit lovers.”

That’s the first time I’ve heard “transit lover” used as an epithet. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

My voting career has spanned almost two decades now. I think this vote was the first winning vote I’ve ever cast.¹ It’s good to know that I’m in the majority largest single voting block for once.

I was only at the victory party briefly, but there seemed to be a degree of shell shock. Lots of the folks in the room had supported David’s previous campaigns, and we didn’t quite know what to do when our candidate actually won. I’m glad that we got to see it.

Congratulations to David, his campaign team, and his volunteers. You all did a great job.

1. I believe that I may have voted for a winner in a decorate-your-office-door-for-christmas contest in 2001, but I don’t think that’s on quite the same scale as electing a representative.